Pennywiseby Live LightChaptersInvestigationsFlashbacks Pt. 2VisitorJournalThe Next StrikeSnowponySolutionConfrontationBrokenLairBattleThe CircusFlashbacksEpilogueInvestigationsAs stated before, an investigation regarding Pennywise The Dancin' Clown transpired. A detective by the name of Noir Shade was called upon to question witnesses and anypony from the carnival. Happy Days told his side of the story, and so the detective added it to his notes. From the notes he received, and the examination of the corpse, he has determined that Pennywise is not a clown. That may be some sort of form it uses for familiarity. Either it's a changeling, or is just able to change its form, like a changeling. Elsewhere, a Manticore was wandering the woods. It was a weary manticore, not having much to do with any other forest dwellers. It found a tree stump, and sat there to have a rest. Sniffing the air for prey, it smelled something... this was a new scent, however... Out of apparently nowhere, a balloon appeared in front of it's face. It growled, and popped it with a nail. It popped, inexplicably covering its' face and the area surrounding the balloon with blood... It roared at the air, challenging what unfamiliar creature appeared to annoy it. A Timber-Wolf appeared in front of it, its mouth curled in a threatening grin, like a hyena. It was smaller that the Manticore, it should prove no problem. The Manticore stared in horror as the Timber-Wolfs' size grew, until the form resembled a creature definitely never seen before... the Manticore could not describe it if it could speak... the Manticore looked into the creature's glowing eyes, and died of shock. Feeding time. The Mane 6 were walking along Ponyville to the office of Noir Shade. It wasn't really his office, it was a small room they had availible in the Townhall he was offered. It was about a month after the incident, and after that time, a lot of younger residents found that some sort of hallucinatory clown fitting Pennywise's description was appearing before them, and would taunt them, sometimes with a monster attacking them at the end. This has happened with all the Mane 6, and they were going to Noir Shade's office for that reason. *Knock Knock* Noir looked up from his work, at the door. "Come in," He said, pleasantly. 6 ponies, lavender, pink, alabaster, orange, cyan and butter-yellow colours, entered the room. He recognized them as the Elements of Harmony. "Oh, good evening. What can I do for you?" He asked. "We'd like to report some... strange happenings to us throughout the month." The lavender mare, Twilight Sparkle, said. "I've been hearing a lot about these, and only a few of them told me of it. Nevertheless, any information you have might be helpful." "Okay..." Twilight began her story. -----Point of View: Twilight Sparkle----- Okay, umm, I'd gotten back from shopping one day, and I arrived at my treehouse. Spike told me that somepony came looking for a book. I went to check if the books were put in their proper place, because, well, I prefer them to be organized that way. And I found a book I hadn't noticed before. There wasn't a cover on it. I decided to open the book, and I found there were a lot of pictures, some of them illustrations drawn on the book, and others were messily taped on the page. Some of them were of various balloons, a few of those balloons had faces written on them, and sometimes even messages, but I couldn't make out what they were saying. All of the pictures were in black-and-white. I decided to look a bit further in the book, and I found pictures of that Pennywise clown you mentioned, at a lot of circuses, apparently performing. I'd taken a moment to ponder the possibilities that he was a performer before, and so I had taken my eyes off the book. When I looked back, most of the pictures had changed entirely. They were still Pennywise, except, what they were doing in the picture, had changed entirely... now, it seemed as if they were pointing at the other pictures of themselves... the one in the far right looked as if he was motioning for me to turn the page... I took a closer look at that picture, and for a moment, I thought he winked at me. Rubbing my eyes, I thought my uneasiness was playing tricks on me. I turned the page, and it was one big illustration. A balloon, in an overhead view of the crowd... then the picture started moving... the crowd was walking in the book, as if it was real life. The balloon started hovering closer to where the camera would have been... I stepped back, not liking this apparent magic... there would have been a scientific explanation if magic wasn't involved... then the balloon... it floated out of the book... and randomly popped... there was... blood all over me, and the book was empty... save for the fact it seemed to not just have blood all over it, but it seemed to be bleeding... I could swear I could hear laughter from elsewhere... I just looked at myself in horror. "Twilight, everything okay?" Spike called from downstairs. I didn't want to tell him that a... thing like that had basically taunted me... he's still young, I didn't want to scare him. "I'm fine, Spike!" I called back. I immediately levitated a cloth to my face, and wiped the blood off of it. I thought about the situation for a moment... I felt I should keep the book in the basement for a while. "I decided I should bring the book in today, though." Twilight said, reaching into her saddlebag, and levitated a brown book towards Noir. He checked the page Twilight left off of. There was so much of the blood dried out that it seemed like a pattern on the book. He put a hoof to his mouth for a moment, feeling like he was going to be sick, then cleared his throat. "Thank you for bringing it in... I guess..." He said, closing the book. "Anypony want to go next?" "I do." The pink mare, Pinkie Pie said. Noir hadn't noticed, but right now, she looked less colourful, and her mane and tail were straight. She cleared her throat and began her story, with a bitter edge in her voice. -----Point of View: Pinkie Pie----- (Author's notes: If you're squeamish or generally don't like anything relating to blood and guts... I suggest turning back now... there's a dark tag for a reason, you know. Although, I agree with one of the comments, we need a 'horror' tag.) Well, if you paid attention to Ponyville, you'll find that I'm the party pony of Ponyville. I like to throw parties, bake, and have fun... I'm not so happy right now as you've noticed... It technically visited me twice... it's okay if I call it It, right? Yeah. Okay. I was bouncing along to the shop I always go to when I need to get extra ingredients. The Cakes were busy with their foals, so I needed to get the ingredients, and I was happy to be doing that. I bounced along to that shop I was talking about, and requested the ingredients I needed. They had it in stock, fortunately, so I paid the requested bits, and they hoofed the ingredients to me in a paper bag. I thanked them, put the paper bag in my saddlebag. I turned around and... I saw Pennywise standing at the door, grinning and waving at me. "When's your next party?" It asked... "Don't forget to bring some balloons!" I stared at him, with my mouth agape. My legs were trembling. "Is something wrong?" The pony at the counter asked. I looked at him... couldn't he see It standing at the door? Was I going crazy? I looked back at Pennywise, and he had a bunch of balloons with him this time. "Here's some balloons for you in case you don't have enough for the party," He said, with a tone that sounded eerily friendly but unfamiliar, "They all... floooooaaaat..." He said, grinning once more, and his eyes... they changed colour into something monstrous... and his teeth... they were all really sharp looking, so sharp I wasn't surprised that he was capable of eating ponies the way he does... He then lets go of the string he was holding, and the balloons started floating towards me and the pony at the counter. She just looked at me with friendly concern, and she didn't let that expression leave her face...even has the balloon popped and blood was splattered all over her face. I just tried to tell myself that it was all probably some nightmare I was having over worry, and I told her in the best attempt of my cheery personality, "Nope, nothing's wrong!" I said, looking back to where It was... but he was gone. And a balloon popped up in front of me, and got blood all over my face too. I stopped myself from screaming, trying to remember, 'Giggle At The Ghostly.' It was really hard, because I wasn't sure if he was a Ghostly, or if he was really there... I did the best giggle I could, and felt most of my fears wash away. I then just walked back to Sugarcube Corner. Not bouncing, not running. Just walking. I got to the kitchen, and put the paper bag on the table. I decided to check what was in it, taking the contents out of the bag, one by one. Yep, I got what I needed alright. I put the ingredients on the table, and I thought I'd make some cupcakes to cheer myself up. I looked in some drawers and got the baking equipment I needed. I put them elsewhere on the table, and I looked back at the ingredients, I had no choice but to put two hooves to my mouth, and put on the best laughs I could... There were... organs. Literally, there were pony organs where I placed the ingredients. And they looked like they were still working... I saw a heart beating, lungs inflating and deflating, there was even an bloodied eyeball, staring back at me. I looked up from them, and... Pennywise was standing at the door again, with that grin on Its' face. "Hi there, Pinkie Pie. Seems you and I have similar taste." It said, laughing. I just wasn't sure if I could laugh anymore... I just shook my head in disbelief, and I felt my mane and tail deflate into straightness. I heard hoofsteps come from upstairs, heading downstairs. Mrs. Cake walked through the door, and I felt I was gonna be called a cannibal... again... "Oh, hello, Pinkie, did you get the ingredients?" She asked. I just stared at her as she walked past Pennywise, in disbelief. "Oh, there they are. Thank you for getting them, dearie. Life gets harder when you're a mother, I guess!" She continued, picking up the heart that she believed to be bread. She squeezed it a little bit, checking to make sure it was soft enough... that just squirted blood in her face... she didn't notice that either. I put a hoof to my mouth, I felt I was gonna be sick... I looked at Pennywise, who was cackling, and saying lame jokes, about someone named 'Albert' in a can, and how we should let him out... "Well, all the ingredients are fine, Pinkie. Thanks again! By the way, I like your new mane-style, looks really good." I just nodded in disbelief, as Mrs. Cake walked back upstairs. I looked back to Pennywise... It squeezed Its' red muzzle like it was a real clown nose. "Beep, beep, Pinkie! Come back any time! I'll show ya how to floooooooaaaat..." It began, dragging 'float' on for a few seconds, "They all, floooooooaaaaat down here!" I closed my eyes, shaking my head. When I opened my eyes, It was gone, but the ingredients were still organs... I ran to the bathroom and vomited... ____________________________________________________ End of Chapter... Flashbacks Pt. 2"But I'm alright... as long as my dear sister Sweetie Belle is..." Rarity finished her story. "Where is she now?" Noir asked. "At home, sleeping. Pennywise hasn't visited again all this time, so she said she would be safe." "Alright. Who wants to go next?" He asked anypony. "Ah do." The mare in the Stetson said. -----Point of View: Applejack----- One day, Ah was outside th' farm, applebuckin' the trees. After finishin' one, Ah started t'go to another one, then Ah tripped on somethin'. Ah figured it was a rock, so after gettin' up, Ah took a look't it. Looked more like a rotten apple. Ah didn't wan' it so close to our farm, so Ah picked it up, an' threw it real far. Noddin' with pride, Ah continued t'walk to the next tree. Ah tripped again. Ah took a look't it, it was another rotten apple. Ah looked to the ground, mainly to the direction the tree was at. Ah didn't see any after this one, so Ah threw the apple away, jest like the other one. Ah turned to face the tree, and walked to it... an' Ah tripped a third time. Ah was just mad an' confused now. Ah saw there wasn't any rotten apples after that one, so why was there another one? Ah looked aroun' t'see if anypony was playin' tricks on me. And then Ah saw that Pennywise clown y'all talked about. He was sittin' on a tree stump that weren't there before, examinin' a rotten apple, jus' like the other three, then throwin' it away, as if he wasn't aware of mah presence... Ah could tell he was, 'cause he turned his head t'look at me. His smile turned to a grin, an' he waved his hoof at me. "Hi. Nice accent," He said, "By the way... lovely apples, I must say." Ah scowled at him. Ah heard some sorta crack from mah bag carryin' th' apples, as if somethin' was openin' inside it. Ah looked in, an' some of them were revealed t'have things inside 'em. There was a bloody eye, cockroaches, tongues, some sorta weird pink paw with nails, an' a beak, openin' and closin' as if it were tryin' to breathe. Ah ran back into th' farmhouse. Ah felt ah was still a bit tired, an' ah was havin' some sorta daymare or somethin'. Ah heard to voices come from upstairs. "Howdy, sir. What can we do ya for?" Came Applebloom's voice. "We don' have extra make-up if that's what yer needin'." Make-up? Ah was dreadin' the fact it was probable he went and visited mah sister in th' time I was occupied with mah ruined apples. "Heh, heh, you're a funny kid," Speak'a the devil... Literally... "I came here for some food." Ah wasn' gonna let him eat mah sister, ah started gallopin' upstairs. As Ah opened th' door, Ah was just'n time t'see Applebloom backin' away from that clown. Ah rushed at him, and went t' applebuck him in th' flank. He stepped forward, and looked back at me, with that monstrous look on 'is face. Its' eyes started glowin' as his grin got wider. Ah couldn't look away. Mah chest started gettin' more n' more painful, as if mah heart was gonna explode. Ah was then knocked over by somepony. Ah clutched mah chest, and looked back t'where Pennywise was, but he was gone. "Sis..." Ah heard Applebloom's voice whisper, "You okay?" "B-been better..." Ah replied. "Ditto..." She responded. Ah looked back at her... and the devilish monster'd taken a bite at mah sister's foreleg... "The doctors say that she'll survive... the bite didn't take a chunk of it at least..." Applejack said, finishing her story. "As long as she's okay, I guess..." Noir Shade said, rubbing his head in his hooves, feeling very stressed after all the stories so far. "I guess that leaves us with Fluttershy..." "O-oh... U-u-um... ...Okay..." She began her story, now trying her best not to stutter. -----Point of View: Fluttershy----- It was me and Rarity's Spa Day, the time we use to speak to each other while making use of the treatments at the Ponyville Spa. We were in the hot springs, and she was just finished telling me the story she'd told to you, as my encounter had happened after hers. "O-oh my... that's so horrible..." I murmured in shock. "It is..." She replied. "I'm so worried about Sweetie Belle, despite her insistence that she will be fine... maybe I'm starting to realize more of how precious life can be..." "W-well... it seems to be over now, at least..." I said, trying to keep things calm, before moving to the bad news... which... I probably should have said first... oh, dear... I'll just... continue... "I-it's not just you, though... I was told by Twilight that had happened to her. S-she also told me that Lyra, Bon-Bon, Pipsqueak, Featherweight, Roseluck and Snowflake have encountered him..." I didn't mention that Pinkie had told me what happened to her, because I Pinkie Promised not to tell anypony, since Pinkie wanted to tell them when she was ready. "Oh, dear... will it ever end?" "I hope so..." "...I can't take it anymore, I need to check on Sweetie Belle!" Rarity said desperately. "You don't mind my leaving, do you?" "Oh, n-not at all... do what you need to do..." I replied, nodding. "Thank you... I promise I shall stay all the way the next time! Goodbye, Fluttershy." She said, before rushing out of the water, and getting most of the place a bit wet... I relaxed in the springs for a moment, before getting out. I went to go and have a shower. After turning it on, I stood under it, washing my coat and my mane. I could hear the shower running, but it had stopped pouring the water on me. I looked up, and noticed it extended... I walked under it again, not taking advantage of it still running, I was still wondering why it wasn't where it was before... "It's okay, Flutters..." I heard a distorted voice, coming from the drain. I gasped, immediately heading to the wall. "Hi. I just wanted to say... Hellloo." I thought I heard him mutter something about others not usually running this fast, then chuckling to himself. "Hot enough up there for ya, is it? Maybe I should try the springs!" As he was saying this, he was lifting the drain, a white gloved hoof opening it, and throwing it to the side, so there was a little circular hole in the middle of the room. "This is a little inconvenient... just hold on, while I make a few... adjustments," the voice continued, with two hooves gripping the hole, and pushing it, making it longer, and wider. The source of the hooves pulled himself up, and... I think it's fairly obvious who appeared... "Here I am, Flutters!" Pennywise exclaimed. I squeaked in fear. He grinned, and rested his head on his hoof. "There's no good in trying to run, Scaredy-mare. I'll be there, even in your nightmares!" He said, with a terrifying amount of sinister cheerfulness. "So I'll see you in your dreams! Oh, and come back any time. If I may make a suggestion... bring some friends with you. Seven's a party!" He said, grinning, before his eyes had changed to orange, and his teeth became sharp spikes, as he growled and laughed at me. I rubbed my eyes, to see if I was just imagining things... for a second, I thought I was... he was gone. I sighed, relieved. But I was very curious in this state. So I gingerly tip-toed to the hole-turned-chasm, and looked down it... it was pitch black down th- "AGH!" I screamed, stepping back, as fire suddenly blasted out of the chasm. I heard a very familiar roar emerge from it. It was... a... "A d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-DRAGON!" I screamed, galloping out of the spa quickly, not bothering to see anypony's reactions to my wet coat and mane. I managed to get home, where I stopped at the door and closed it behind me, looking back at Angel Bunny, my favourite pet, who looked relieved to see me, and saddened of something that had happened. "Angel Bunny? What's wrong?" Angel made a motion that meant I was to follow him. He went out of the door, and I followed. We found some of the other woodland animals cradling injured children, and some burying them... I fainted. Fluttershy looked down at the ground after the story was finished, and did her best to stop herself from crying. *Knock Knock* "...Er... who's at the door?" Noir asked. A head poked through the door, belonging to a blue stallion with pure blue eyes and a short brown mane. "Err. Hi. I came to report someth-" He said, before noticing the Elements of Harmony, momentarily pausing, probably from not expecting them to be there, before looking back at Noir. "Err... sorry. I'll come back later." "Wait just a moment," Noir said. "Are you here because you believe you saw Pennywise?" "Y-yeah. My name is Live Light..." _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ AUTHOR'S NOTES To those who have seen my other fic, The Recluse, this is a different fic from that one, and the events from this version will be entirely different than that of The Recluse. Though, it may be referenced. _________________________________________________________________ End of chapter... Visitor"Very well," Noir Shade said to Live Light, "You can come in. I think I can bear one more story. As long as it's not too gruesome, anyway." "Alright..." Light said, entering the room, then looking to the Mane 6, then looked sort of nervous. "Err... Where do I sit?" "There's a seat over there," He pointed to an unoccupied seat, a bit away from the Mane 6. Light nodded, trotted over to it, and sat on it. He looked to Pinkie Pie for a bit, and gave a bit of a wave. Pinkie, still looking depressed with her mane and tail straight, gave a wave with a sad smile regardless. "*Psst...* You know each other?" Rainbow whispered to Pinkie. "I'll tell you all about it later," she replied. "Okay, Live Light, tell me about yourself," Noir began, taking a notepad out of his jacket, "Where do you live?" "Well... I live in a bit of a bleak house, with my adopted son, 7 years old." He replied. "Married?" "No." "And how long have you been in the house?" "...Few years, give or take." "Anything you used to do?" "Well... I used to help Pinkie Pie with some of her parties. That's... pretty much it." "He's a writer, too." Pinkie Pie added. "...Yeah, and that." Light nodded. "Alright then..." Noir said, after noting all that down. "So... want to share what happened?" -----Point of View: Live Light----- Alright. So, I was writing down notes about a novel idea I'd finally come up with. 'The Impossible Corpse.' Basically, it's about a sort of corpse... belonging to a murderer... and it doesn't decompose. Still working on it. Anyway, I was writing down notes for that. My adopted son, Tyler, entered the room. "Dad, I'm gonna go to sleep now," he informed me, "Goodnight." "'Night, Tyler." I replied, smiling and nodding to him. He went to his room, to go sleep. After finishing with the notes, I decided I'd call it a night. I was currently upstairs in the house, and my bed happened to be in the same room as my workplace. I walked over to it, and threw the covers over the bed. I decided to check how dark it was outside, so I walked over to the window, and opened the curtains. It was really dark, it seemed, because I couldn't see anything out there. Just blackness. I thought about it for a while, and thought that while it was possible, that's never happened to me before. I got a flashlight, and shined it on the window. It turned to a lighter shade, and from that, it seemed as if the colour was moving... I tapped at the window with my hoof. It wasn't that it was really dark, it was that it was covered by things... things that I don't like at all. And those things were hornets. I don't remember there being hornets in Ponyville. Although, that's probably because I hardly ever go outside. After I had tapped the window, the hornets buzzed off of the window momentarily, where I could see the rest of Ponyville, and it was indeed dark, but not as dark as the hornets made me think. To be exact, it's not just hornets that frighten me. It's really any small thing that has the capabilities of stinging. That's why I try to stay away from bees, wasps, hornets, crabs, I even think that the spiders that don't bite are gonna bite me. It's always the small things. It was a really disgusting sight, seeing all those hornets at once. And now, after I had disturbed them, they were throwing themselves at the window, apparently trying to break it. I quickly covered the windows with the curtains, hoping they'd forget about it and move away. Well, they stopped attacking the window at least. I decided to take a moment to look outside again. It was a natural darkness for Ponyville. The hornets seemed to have cleared off rather quickly... I heard Tyler yell in fear, and his hoofsteps were getting closer to my room. I waited until he entered the door, then I quickly threw myself at the door and tried to keep it closed, as if the hornets were trying to get through again. "Tyler... what's wrong? Hornets?" I asked, assuming they were really there. "N-no... well, kind of... there's a giant insect creature trying to get me." I just blinked. I wasn't sure if it was worth believing him, the only strange thing with this situation is that hornets don't usually entirely cover windows. I heard a heavy knock at the door. I yelped. I looked through the door's peep-hole. ...There was... a giant hornet... and it was standing on hind legs... and it looked ready to kill. "...Tyler..." I whispered, my voice shaking, "Go hide in the closet... everything's gonna be okay..." He nodded, and quietly went to hide in the closet. After a few minutes, I looked through the peephole again... It was gone... I didn't hear any hoof- ...Footsteps in this case. I stopped leaning at the door, and stood in front of it. I inhaled, then slowly turned the knob to open it. When I opened it, there was a clown standing there. The one mentioned in the circus. He wasn't grinning at me, not even smiling. He just looked at me with a blank expression, almost one of disappointment. I stared at Pennywise for a moment. I thought for a moment he was just waiting to see if I'd react before he tried to cannibalize me or something. And then he just started talking about things. "You know... I never meant to go here." He told me. I narrowed an eye in confusion. Did he mean he didn't mean to go to my house or to go to Ponyville? "To be honest, I would have preferred much if I'd kept my original template," He continued. "Switching from hind to equine is a little uncomfortable." And now I was just pretty sure he was delusional. "You don't have to think me delusional," He said, as if reading my mind, "It's merely predator's instinct." He grinned as he said this. "Your fear of stings... gave me a lot of time to think of how to use it... nice one." "...You..." I began, "released the hornets?" "Oh, sure. And I released the giant hornet man," he said with obvious sarcasm in that creepy voice. "Look behind you." He said suddenly. I'm not sure why I did... but I looked behind me. I saw nothing out of the ordinary. I looked back, and there was a big balloon in front of me. It popped. And... I had a really bloody coat after that. Pennywise cackled maniacally at this. "Made you look!" I just got mad and punched him in the face... and... well... I actually hit him, and he fell back, not moving. I backed away. And I closed the door. I looked through the peephole. He disappeared. That's never a good sign. I heard my notepad's pages flickering. I took a look at it. I then looked at a picture of the place-holder character I put in some pages. I like to call this character Mr. Hop. It's a little cute bunny. If I can never think of a good novel idea, I always make a story about Mr. Hop, and his innocent way of life, and all the people he meets. Although, they're usually too short for my liking, or too happy for my taste. Well, he seemed to have animated himself, hopping around happily. Then a clown drawing, resembling Pennywise... as one of those fictional creatures, called humans, enters the picture, and his drawing becomes deformed until he turned into some sort of Timber-Wolf, and viciously eats the innocent fictional rabbit. Animated blood comes out... and it turns into real blood, leaking out of the notepad. I watched in horror as my sign of innocence got mauled and devoured. After the remains are all eaten, the Timber-Wolf turns back into human-Pennywise, rubbing what I presume is his stomach, then looking at me, grinning maliciously. He starts to walk towards me, as if the drawing were really a camera, but stops when you could only see his head and his apparent shoulders. He starts to apparently write something, then sticks it in front of him, effectively replacing the picture I drew of Mr. Hop with the following letters... 'I.O.U' I look out the window, and see him walking away, in pony form. He looks directly at me, and waves, before walking off, nopony apparently noticing him. "And... that... is my story." Light finished. Twilight looked skeptical, yet worried. Rainbow Dash looked confused. Rarity looked unnerved. Applejack looked uncomfortable. Pinkie Pie looked extremely worried. Fluttershy had her hoof to her mouth, looking worried and sympathetic. "So... he's a shape-shifter then," Noir decided. "...Wait, what?" Light asked. "He probably as the ability to change form," Noir replied, "He didn't send the hornets, or the mutated hornet. He was probably the hornets the whole time. He was practically demonstrating this to you in your notepad." "But... why?" Light enquired, confused. "Remember how he'd written I.O.U? My guess is that he decided that he wasn't finished with you. Obviously, he's finished with no one, but he has something very special in store for you. And before you ask, I'm not sure." Light looked extremely uncomfortable at this notion. "...Well... what now?" "I think you and your son should be moved to another pony's house," Noir replied, "At least until we can figure out his... IT's motives." "Oh... okay." Light reluctantly agreed. "Err... so... Pinkie, should I go with you?" "No... I'd like to be alone for now... If you understand anyway..." She replied. "Yeah... who should I stay with though?" "Well... maybe Fluttershy could take you." She suggested. "...Okay." "U-um... are y-you alright with that?" Fluttershy asked. "...I guess. Are you?" Light asked her. "Oh, I-i don't mind." "...Okay then." End of Chapter... JournalPENNYWISE CHAPTER 6 Fluttershy, followed by Light and his son, Tyler, walk over to her cottage. She wasn't too sure who Light was at this point, but he's obviously been through a lot. She's rather kind. Maybe too kind. "W-we're here..." Fluttershy said, as they arrived at the cottage. Light and Tyler looked around them, with amazed looks on their faces, admiring the plants, the grass, and all the animals around it. "It's simply beautiful..." Light said. "O-oh... really?" Fluttershy asked, blushing a little. "Yeah, it's awesome!" Tyler replied. "What he said." Light added. "T-thank you both..." They all went inside the cottage. They were quite impressed with everything from the inside as well. All the nice furniture, decorations, and the place smelled good too. "You have a really nice house, Miss Fluttershy!" Tyler said. Light seemed to be spending a lot of time walking around the place, examining every bit of the place. When he was finished, "Yep, very nice indeed!" "Thanks again..." Fluttershy said. Noir Shade's Journal Day 33, Entry 1 New information about Pennywise the Clown has been very helpful. From what I've gathered, he is not equine in nature at all, and is, in fact, a being that perhaps no definitive shape or form. As I thought, it uses the appearance and personality of a clown as a sort of method of familiarity. From Live Light's encounter, the clown was originally not a pony shape. Perhaps the fact it chose to identify itself as the fictional species of 'humans' means that it comes from a world where humans are real, or it merely likes this form due to the unfamiliarity. However, I'm going to go with the former, as it doesn't explain why he can't become a human clown at this point. A slight bit of testament to the creature not being equine in origin is a new victim we've found, in the Everfree Forest. While looking for a possible den for It to hide in, detectives found the remains of a Manticore, torn up in a way nopony has seen, yet similar to how Cobalt Royale ended up. Anypony claimed by this creature were not just victims. They were prey. Soon after the Elements of Harmony (and Light) left, a balloon appeared beside me and popped (with nothing splattered onto me). Aside from hearing mocking laughter from somewhere, nothing else seemed to have happened to me. Seems to me It's trying to test me. The Mane 6 were at Sugarcube Corner, discussing recent events. Everypony around them noticed how different they seemed since It came to Ponyville. Strands of hair were sticking up in Twilight Sparkle's mane, Applejack had been bucking trees with only the most perfect of apples, Rarity's boutique was doing much less, Rainbow seemed to stay grounded a bit more than usual, Pinkie Pie's mane and tail were still as straight as the time she thought her friends abandoned her, and Fluttershy seemed somewhat fidgety. "I simply can't find the time to work on dresses at the boutique," Rarity began, "I'm too worried about Sweetie Belle to continue work..." "I'm not usually this paranoid..." Rainbow said, "Same here." Applejack said. "I'm not sure what to say..." Twilight began, "This creature just defies all matter of logical explanation... it's like he was created to annoy us." "Or frighten us." Pinkie said. "Worked so far." "Well, you coulda tried giggling at the ghostly, right?" Rainbow asked. "Remember what I said about it being hard to tell if It was a ghostly or not? Try to remember, next time you ask a question with an obvious answer." Pinkie replied, with an irritated tone to her voice. Rainbow flinched. "...I'm sorry, Dashie..." She offered, "I just feel really useless, nowadays..." "It's alright, Pinkie," Rainbow replied, accepting her apology. "So, Fluttershy, how are your guests?" Rarity asked Fluttershy. "Oh... they're fine," She replied, "Tyler's very nice, and Light's fine too... when we see him." "What do you mean?" Twilight asked. "Well... I gave him permission to work in solitude, inside one of my sheds." She explained. "Did we ever get rid of all the... 'decorations'... your impostor left one day?" Pinkie glumly asked. "I helped with that," Twilight explained. "Never know when a changeling is gonna take somepony's place, I guess..." "Anyway..." Fluttershy continued, "He studies in there a lot, mostly on his novel. But he does come around when I serve dinner." "Well... as long as his son trusts 'im, he should be fine." Applejack said. Fluttershy nodded in agreement. Noir Shade's Journal Day 36, Entry 1 We got another complaint today, from a stallion called Haystack. He said something about It taking the form of his father, and taunting him. It followed him, telling him things like, "You remind me of someone I know..." and proceeded to call him things like 'Fat Boy,' wondering if he had 6 other friends in a group named 'The Losers' Club', and commenting how nice it would be to have a little reunion. Eventually, Haystack apparently eluded him, but was unsure where It knows him from... perhaps an equal from his world? End of Chapter... The Next StrikePENNYWISE CHAPTER 7 ____________________________________________________________ Happy Days. Exactly what the eponymous, lonely clown wished for. He'd considered doing written works, like novels, instead of the physical comedy clowns needed. He felt he wasn't that good of a writer. His descriptions of things isn't as good as he'd like. He'd find it easier if he was talking about nonsensical things, and people are probably too old to find that appealing or entertaining. Plus, he felt his name would be vaguely creepy... Funny Bones... He was still in his make-up. He wasn't sure why. Walking through some fields, he came across the sight of Ponyville. For the past 36 days, he had been living in a hotel, partly in fear of the killer clown, and partly of depression. However, he felt as though he needed to do something about this, after a long time for thought, and so returned to Ponyville to see if he could find Pennywise. He entered Ponyville, and, after shopping for a while, decided to move back into his old house. He took a look at it. It was a relatively small house, but it was home. It was bright green, with yellow linings, and wide windows. He began to walk into the door. Suddenly, blue hermit pegasus. He was tackled to the ground by a pegasus, a blue one. He was then turned around so his back was on the ground. The blue pegasus looked him over, then looked a bit shocked for a moment. "Oh, sorry sir..." He apologized, "I thought you were... somepony else..." Happy was reminded he still had his clown make-up on. "Let me guess... Pennywise?" He asked. "Yeah... he's visited a lot of townsponies, and practically intimidating them." "How so?" "Well... ..." The pegasus looked a bit bothered, "...You wouldn't believe me if I told you..." "If the whole town thinks what you're thinking, hopefully it's a bit different than that Zecora thing that happened." Happy said, shrugging, before getting up. "What's he doing?" "Okay, well... he turns into what scares ponies, and frightens them." "..." "..." "..." "..." "I like that way of thinking, usually, but that's just disturbing," Happy finally said. "What d'you mean?" Light asked. "Well, I always wanted to be an author, and write some weird, funny stories. I opted for being a clown instead. Writing just wasn't for me, I guess." "I see... so... do you believe us or not?" "Well..." Happy looked momentarily thoughtful, "It sounds a bit weird, but I don't -not- believe you. I mean, he did eat someone as if he was some animal predator." "Right... anyway, I'll introduce myself..." The blue pegasus began, "I'm Live Light. What's your name?" "Funny Bones. But call me Happy Days. It's my clown name." Noir Shade's Journal Day 37 In the few days that have transpired, hardly any appearance from It has happened so far. Happy Days, the clown that I questioned on the events surrounding Cobalt Royale's death has returned to Ponyville. After a rough greeting from Live Light, he now lives in his house, alone. I gave him a greeting sometime yesterday. I confirmed with him the information surrounding Its' supernatural nature. He just nodded, and tried not to think much of it. Probably from this already being shared with him by Light. Still waiting for a sign... All I've received are balloons. Pipsqueak. Moved from Trottingham to Ponyville. Wore a pirate suit to his first ever Nightmare Night. He is perhaps one of the main reasons for saving Nightmare Night from almost being permanently cancelled. Now fearing for his life. His parents tell him that it will all be fine. The Clown won't come for him. He doesn't know him. It was night time, of the 37th day. He breathed shallowly, looking around the dark room, with only his lamp and a flash-light as a source of light. He listened to the sounds outside that surround the house. He heard owls hooting, crickets chirping, and wings fluttering. *Crunch* *Crunch* He heard two sounds... they were in the rhythm of a pony using two of their hooves to walk, but it sounded nothing like hooves touching the ground. He inhaled sharply, but quietly. He heard those steps again, but four of them, this time. Something heavy hit the ground. A few seconds later, it sounded as if a record were inserted into a player. Circus music... The Clown was outside his house... He heard the crunching, a little more fast paced, combined with sounds of the air being cut through... his imagination told him he was performing acrobatic tricks to an invisible audience... possibly to attract youths such as himself. Pipsqueak shut his eyes, and imagined the happiest music he knew. The Circus music outside stopped. He could vaguely hear some dark chuckling. He kept the music in his head, hoping it could let him think less of the situation. He could hear the doorknob for his house's entrance turn, and the door eventually opened. The floorboards slowly creaked, dragging out for a long time with every step the presence took. His eyes looked around, but he kept imagining the music. Soon, the stairs began creaking too, each creak getting closer as It ascended. His breathing quickened slightly. The presence was near. The creak had reached upstairs. I'm on the Top of the World lookin' down on creation & the only explanation I can find... It got closer to his bedroom door. Is the love that I've found ever since you've been around Your love's put me at the top of th- *Knock Knock* "..." Pipsqueak didn't answer. "Pip?" Came the voice of Sweetie Belle. "... Sweetie Belle?" Pipsqueak replied in his Trottingham accent, quietly, but loud enough for Sweetie to hear. "Can I come in? Please?" She asked. "...Uh... okay." He slowly and quietly got out of bed, tip-hoofing to the door, and looked through the peephole. Nopony there... He was suddenly tackled, and being held to the ground with a white gloved hoof to his throat. It was The Clown. He felt his breath leaving him. "I'm impressed, Pipsqueak..." It spoke, "Your fear is... exquisite." Pipsqueak punched the ground a couple of times, trying to make a noise. He wasn't sure if his parents had heard or not. The Clown's head got closer, and It opened his mouth to feast. The door opened abruptly, and Pipsqueak's parents ran in and tackled The Clown. It overpowered them both, and held them both to the wall by their throats. "Well, this is a little strange..." He comments, "Not a lot of adults have ever believed in me before... this could be quite the party..." Pipsqueak looked to his parents. His father pointed his hoof in the opposite direction of Pipsqueak. He shook his head. His father narrowed his eye, silently telling him he was serious about this. Pipsqueak shed a tear, and ran out of the house. Noir Shade's Journal Day 38 It struck again, after the long wait... It attacked Pipsqueak, the small colt who is best known for preventing the cancellation of Nightmare Night. He said 'The Clown' had pretended to be Sweetie Belle in order to get his attention, and then attempted to strangle him. His mother and father came to save him, but his father told him to run. This is the last he's seen of them so far. No bodies were found. This leads me to believe they are still alive somewhere, as Pennywise hasn't left any remains at the scene. There are, unfortunately, no leads to their whereabouts. Happy Days is currently looking after Pipsqueak. Pipsqueak also mentioned something about It saying something about how adults usually don't believe in him. Some thought about this will be needed. In other news, I received a red balloon. It had text written on it, asking me if I was enjoying this investigation... ________________________________________________________________________ End of Chapter... SnowponyPENNYWISE CHAPTER 8 ________________________________________________________ Noir Shade's Journal Day 39 Strange occurrence today... I found officers barging into Sweet Apple Acres, and dragging Caramel Apple out. The only thing I forgave about this was the fact he was wearing clown make-up. It was obviously not him, as we've established Pennywise assumes multiple forms. I tried to reason with the officers taking him, but they seemed to disregard me, except for one who pushed me away. I was able to commandeer their prison chariot and take them to headquarters. When I looked inside the confinement section of the chariot, everypony except for Caramel had not a clear idea where they were or what they were doing. Now that I think of it, I didn't recognize any of them as employed officers. I questioned Caramel about what he was doing in clown make-up. He claimed that there was some sort of balloon in his face before it happened. He couldn't explain the part of how he put the actual baggy suit on, however. It seems Pennywise may be capable of influencing others somehow... in any case, I let him go. Today, I got three balloons at the same time, the entire message reading, 'I'm sure you've noticed, I look good in another one's skin, Haven't tried yours' Pinkie glumly walked across Ponyville. She heard about what happened to Pipsqueak. As she wanted to try to make the others smile again, she decided to pay him a visit. She took a look at his old house. It was sealed off for further investigation. She looked to his current residence, the house belonging to local clown Happy Days. She sighed, and walked to it, knocking on the door. After a while, Happy Days answered the door. At least, she thought it was him. He'd washed his clown make-up off. "Oh. Hello, Pinkie Pie," He greeted, "Bit surprised to have a visitor..." "Yeah... err... I know it sounds weird, but... is it okay if I see Pipsqueak?" She asked. "Well... not sure, he's a bit uneasy at the moment... and how do I know you're n-" "If you're not sure about me, you can be in the same room. I understand." Happy thought for a moment. Nowadays, nopony was trustworthy. But if she's fine with him being in the same room... "...Okay. He's upstairs." He said, widening the door, "Come in." "Thanks..." Pinkie thanked, walking in. The interior looked rather clean, the sort of clean you find in a house that was recently cleaned... he did only come back some days ago. There were hardly any pictures, and despite the cleanliness, most of the interior seemed empty and dull. "Err... your mane looks good..." He offered. "Really...? I don't like it... thanks, though..." She replied, "Uh... you look nice without your make-up... less unfamiliar." She nodded, before going upstairs. Happy followed after. Pinkie opened the door to Pipsqueak's room. He was tucked in a bed, wide awake, looking at a televisional device that was paused at the opening titles. The title read 'The Snowpony.' Pinkie smiled a little. One of her favourite films, despite being 26 minutes long. She remembered what she came here for soon enough, and looked to Pipsqueak, who was now looking at her, curious as to why she was here. "...Hi, Pip," Pinkie said, "How you doin'?" "...Well, I've been better, but... I feel safe during the day, at least," He replied with his Trottingham accent. "Understandable," Pinkie said, now noticing Pip was kind of curious as to why she's now using big words that aren't made up, and continued, "Given what's going on... I'm not feeling my usual self. I'm sure you can tell by the way my mane is..." Pip nodded, even though he thought it was rather nice himself. "So, Miss Pie," Pip began, "What can I do for you?" "Well... I know it wasn't a pleasant experience, but... could you tell me what happened when It visited?" She asked. "...You mean The Clown?" "Yeah... The Clown..." He sighed, and looked thoughtful. Pinkie thought he wasn't going to go through with it for a moment. "...Well..." He began, "He came around at my house, after placing a record player on the ground, and then inserting a record with circus music in it... the music was cheery... but eerily haunting... I thought of the music that made me happy... and almost as if he could hear it too, he went in my house... I think he noticed my fear..." "He started walking over to my house rather slowly... and assumed the form and voice of Sweetie Belle in order to trick me to open the door... he got in anyway, though... and my parents came in to stop him... that's when my father made me run, and I never saw them after that..." Pinkie thought for a little bit... "Did It say anything to you or your parents that was a little... interesting?" She asked. "Well... something he said that was a little confusing was when he said that usually, not a lot of adults have usually believed in him..." He replied. Pinkie looked thoughtful for a moment. That was very confusing. She thought back to her encounter with It... She remembered how, for some reason, Mrs. Cake, who was practically her aunt, had ignored the fact there was blood all over the place, and even held up a beating heart, thinking it was bread... and the first thing It ate was a child... And considering the town has seen a lot of creatures other than themselves, also finding the Nightmare Moon story to be real, most of them probably believe in the impossible... but some don't... "...I think I have it figured out, a little..." Pinkie said. "What is it?" Happy Days asked. "Well..." Pinkie began, before looking back at Pipsqueak, "I think we should discuss it outside Pip's hearing..." Happy gave her a questioning look, but she went out of the door, and he followed. "Well?" He asked, "What have you figured out?" Pinkie nodded, before speaking, "It seems that It takes the form of what scares the others so that they're afraid when they're eaten... but it's one of the things that has to be seen to be believed... and the ones who don't believe it can't see it anyway... this is usually what happens with adults. It could eat adults, but usually, hardly any of them would believe it. This isn't a problem with children. This, combined with the knowledge that everypony tastes better to it when afraid, and children are usually more afraid of things than older ponies, tells us that It prefers to eat the youngest foals it can find. It's only a preference, though." Happy looked uncomfortable with the thought, but nodded to show he understood. "Would explain his attack patterns so far..." He said, "I wonder why he was torturing everypony else, though..." "Probably so we'd be afraid. And I think everypony's brave enough to admit it's working..." Pinkie replied. Happy nodded. "Should we tell the authorities about this?" He asked. "Yeah. Would be best," Pinkie said, "...Can we wait for a moment though?" "Why?" "Well, Pip's watching something I haven't seen in a while... I'd like to see it too. It always used to make me happy if things went wrong." "Well..." Happy thought for a moment, "Okay then." Pinkie grinned as much as she could (Only a little), and walked into the room, with Happy following. Pinkie walked over to Pip. "Hey, Pip... are you watching The Snowpony?" She asked. "Well... I might... not sure if I want to, though..." He replied. "It's one of my favourite films... you wouldn't mind un-pausing that, would you?" Pip took a look at the screen, still at the titles, then back to Pinkie. "Alright then." He reached for his film player's remote, which was connected to it with a wire, and pressed the play button. The film started up, and Pinkie sat on the floor, looking directly at the televisional device's screen. A family sat at a lake, watching the birds fly freely, the fishes swim swiftly, and the sky's colours reflecting off the water. The sun glowed brightly. The family consisted of a mother, father, daughter and son. This was a thing they'd do on the weekends. Enjoy the outdoors. They loved the outdoors. "Alright, time to take a picture!" Dad said. "Alright!" The Son said. He, his sister and his mother ran to the edge of the lake. The Dad placed a stand on the ground, placed the camera on it, and set it to take a picture in 5 seconds. He then ran next to the group. The photo clicked. Pinkie watched as the Snowpony took off to fly with the little colt. She loved that scene, it reminded her of how nice it would be to fly, or at least have some sort of golem of snowy awesomeness that could fly without wings, just with pure magic. Her coat began to have a brighter saturation of pink, and her straight mane began to have strands of hair sticking out. As well as that, her grin had gotten a lot bigger. She was humming to the song. After the flight sequence, she grinned happily when Pony Claus appeared, and giggled as the group of snowponies danced, memories flooding back to her. She went back to a happy smile as the colt and the snowpony hugged each other after they'd flown home. And she shed a tear as morning came, and the snowpony had melted, the colt gradually realizing that it wasn't a dream, when he looked at the scarf Pony Claus had given him. Her mane and tail was now all frizzy and messy, as usual. She sighed. "I love this little cartoon," She said. She looked to Pip, "Thanks for letting me watch it again." "No problem, Miss Pinkie. Glad to see you're your usual self again!" He replied. "Yeah, probably won't last, but we'll see!" Pinkie said. "Well, see ya, Pip!" She said, bouncing out of the room. Happy followed. "So, you gonna be okay?" He asked. "For a while. Still pretty bummed about you-know-what, but as long as nothing gets thrown at my face too soon, I'll be fine long enough to make others happy! Not sure if I should throw a party, though. It could ruin anything!" She replied. "I guess. Should I tell Noir about the thing you thought up and you can do what you do best?" "Good idea! See you around, Happy!" She said, before out the door. Happy sighed. Pinkie Pie then came back, walking through the door. "By the way," she began, "I don't know your real name, just your clown name. Wanna share?" "It's Funny Bones." He replied. "Hm... that could be a clown name too. Anyway, why do you wanna be called Happy Days instead of your real name?" "Ehh... Funny Bones reminds me too much of my heritage. Won't talk about it." "Okie-dokie-lokie! But really, you should use your real name more often. Everypony will like you for who you really are! Well, I better go now. Bye!" She said, before zipping out of sight. Happy looked confused for a moment, wondering where she went, then shrugged. Pipsqueak sighed, moving his hoof to turn the film player off via the remote. Then, the film started rewinding... he hadn't mis-pressed anything... or pressed anything at all. It rewinded to the Trotting In The Air scene. As they were flying in the snow, a large bird suddenly appeared on screen, and grabbed the two of them, taking them elsewhere... this never happened before. He heard familiar cackling after that... the televisional device turned off after that. Pip looked to his left. There was a blue balloon, that just floated... floated. After their picture, they went over to the camera, taking it to a seat, and inspecting the picture they had taken. The picture was of them, The Father and Daughter smiling, the Mother and Son grinning, and the Clown cheerily waving to the camera, with an equally cheery expression on his face. ...Clown? "...I don't remember a clown being near us..." The Father said... "Neither do I..." The two looked around. Their children were nowhere to be found. "...Kids?" The Father asked. "Where are you?" The Mother stood up and trotted off to go look for them, calling their names. The Father looked at the photo with a horrified expression on his face. The picture's background was the same, except it was at night, the Mother and Father had indifferent expressions on their faces... their children were nowhere to be found. There were lines on the grass that looked like somepony had dragged something... or somepony somewhere, and bits of the grass were also reddened. And the clown was still there... but he was now grinning viciously, and holding balloons too. _______________________________________________________________________ End of Chapter... [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&list=ULj5GIHITJnFE&v=zNM_WS-rcOc&feature=endscreen] SolutionPENNYWISE Chapter 9 Noir Shade's Journal Day 41 It has come to our attention that Pinkie Pie has realised the method of Pennywise's Modus Operandi. We already know that It uses one's greatest fear to take It's prey. But it seems It is weak against those who do not believe in It. Therefore, most adults do not see or hear It, and generally ignore It without knowing. It is easier to eat children, as they would believe in many things potentially impossible, and are easily frightened. Today, there was a balloon floating into my office, with a string carrying a rolled up paper. I had taken a look at it. It depicted Pennywise, depicted as a human, which may be his form where he comes from, under a sewer and offering a paper boat and a balloon to a younger human in a yellow raincoat. I started wondering what the significance of it was... I noticed there was now blood-red writing on the paper, telling me to look behind it. There was a picture of a sort of circus. Except there were a bunch of humans all over the place, some who looked like locals, a few people with balloons, a person on stilts, and some acrobatic clown somersaulting closer to the camera. As soon as I realized who this was supposed to be, I heard a monstrous growl as he pointed directly at me, ran closer, and climbed up a lamppost so he could look at me face-to-face. It was bad enough I was looking at what looked like an actual human directly, it was scary from the fact it was Pennywise, and he was addressing me directly. "Hi, Noir! How's it hangin'?" He asked me. I didn't answer. "Come in here with us, there's all sorts of surprises here! And balloons, too!" I shook my head quickly, as if in some sort of willing conversation. "But of course, there's the problem with me being your enemy..." He began, "That makes you my prey... but I have a bunch of stuff planned for ya!" I scowled, trying to forget any fear I have. "After all, Clowns are for entertainment, but who says they can't have a bit of fun before dinner? Speaking of dinner, take a look in your refrigerator! If it's not running, that is!" I calmly put the paper on the desk. I went to the refrigerator, as if I was a child following orders from a parent/guardian... I don't know why, I just felt intrigued. I opened the refrigerator, and the room is then flooded with balloons, of all shapes, sizes and colours. I threw what got in my face away from me, and I found a disturbing sight... the dismembered head of an officer. I put a hoof to my mouth, feeling like I could vomit. To make matters worse, the head opened his eyes, and looked directly at me. "Hello, Detective, nice to see you. How's the investigation going?" He asked. I just stared in shock, not quite believing what I'm seeing. "Obviously not very well if I'm here like this. At least I've gotten my severance pay," He joked. I wasn't sure whether I was frightened or slightly amused by the fact he was practically attempting a stand-up routine. "Hmm," Pennywise's voice filled the air, "This looks a little familiar... I guess I'm getting repetitive." He then giggled maniacally. "And it's true what they say," the officer continued, "In the deadlights, everything floats. They all float down here, and you will too!" I immediately closed the door on this. "Thanks for participating in our unnatural act!" Pennywise exclaimed as if he were some sort of magician at the circus, "Come back any time, and bring your friends! They'll surely be surprised for my next act!" He laughed maniacally once more, before I ran to the paper and tore it to shreds. If I get more experiences like this, I'll be driven mad... Applebloom and Scootaloo were walking to Rarity's Boutique to visit Sweetie Belle, considering all the things that had happened. Scootaloo wouldn't really admit this, especially not to Rainbow Dash, her idol, but the situation has made her a bit nervous of clowns. Not quite all the way to afraid, just nervous. Applebloom now just wanted to hurt any clown that she happened to see... though, she was told to be nice to Funny Bones. They arrived at the Boutique, and Applebloom knocked on the door. In a matter of seconds, Rarity answered. "Oh, hello, girls. I assume you'd like to see Sweetie Belle?" She asked. "Yeah, Miss Rarity," Applebloom replied, "Can we see 'er?" "I don't see why not. Your visits certainly keep her spirits up." She stepped aside so they could come in. The Crusaders nodded, and walked in, heading to Sweetie Belle's room, where they assumed she would be. Sure enough, they found her in her room, reading a book. Though they couldn't see what exactly it was she was reading, they assumed it was a book she had borrowed from Twilight's library, which she usually read. It was basically a book about how to improve one's singing, as the other two Crusaders once suggested that she should try singing, but she wasn't feeling sure her voice was good enough for a Cutie Mark, so she got this book. She tried a few methods, but they either involved breaking glass or making her not sound like herself. Rather than accept her voice was probably perfect, however, she decided to keep on reading. She looked up from the book, and her face brightened up. "Hi, girls! How are you?" She asked. "We're fine, Sweetie Belle," Scootaloo said, "In fact, we're more than fine!" "Uh huh... why?" Sweetie asked, wondering why they were 'more than fine' when there was a Killer Klown from Outside Equestria... and then she noticed she had spelt Clown with a K... Must be the alliteration in this book, she thought. "Well, we were watching our TV's, an-" Scootaloo began, "TV? Really?" Applebloom asked. "...Saying Televisional Device is too slow..." Scootaloo said. Applebloom shrugged. "Anyway," Scootaloo got back on track with what she was saying, "We were watching our TV's, and then there was the commercial with a sort of expert in the supernatural who calls himself Bob Grey." "What kind of name is 'Bob'?" Sweetie Belle asked with an unsure look on her face. "What kind of name is Tyler?" Scootaloo countered, referencing Live Light's adopted son. "...Mean example, but fine." Sweetie Belle said, "Anyway, you're pretty sure he's the solution to our problems?" "Yeah, pretty sure, he looked friendly and awesome. Not as awesome as Rainbow Dash, but still!" Scootaloo replied. Applebloom deadpanned, "Seriously though," She said, "He did look convincin'." "Well... if you two are fine with it, then I guess it's okay to go... where's he at?" Sweetie asked. "Th' commershull said he'd be in th' room next t' that detective fella, Dusk Shadow, or somethin'." "Noir Shade." Scootaloo corrected. "Yeah. That." "Okay then..." Sweetie Belle said, "Let's go now!" End of Chapter... ConfrontationPENNYWISE Chapter 10 _______________________________________________________________________ Fluttershy walked into her cottage, after feeding all the animals. She takes a look around, and sees Angel Bunny holding some sort of note. Fluttershy wondered who put a note in here while she was gone. She walked over to Angel, who handed the note to her, and she read it. Dear Fluttershy, I've gone to see a Mr. Bob Grey, who, according to a commercial, is able to deal with supernatural matters. Not sure how many others are going, but I feel I need to say something. I've told Tyler about it, and he has decided to stay in the cottage. If you haven't seen it, you should go find a friend who has a televisional device (We really need a new name for that) and see it yourself if you feel like contacting him... just a thought. Yours sincerely, Live Light Fluttershy wasn't too sure who Bob Grey is supposed to be... What kind of name is 'Bob'? She decided that she would head to Sugarcube Corner, as she knew Pinkie had one of those televisional devices, and she was also wondering how Pinkie was doing at the moment, so it'd be like killing two birds with one stone. ...Oh, my... that's a horrible example... Fluttershy walked over to Sugarcube Corner, looking around warily. She opened the door, and looked inside. There were a lot less customers in this place. The ones who did come here looked tired and depressed. Mrs Cake was watching them all with a concerned look on her face. "Oh, hello Fluttershy," Mrs Cake greeted, "Can we get you anything?" "No thanks... Can I see Pinkie?" Fluttershy asked. "Of course, she's upstairs in her room," Mrs. Cake answered, "Still on about that 'It' creature she talks about. She has such an imagination." Fluttershy's eye twitched. "...It's... all over the news..." Fluttershy said in monotonous disbelief, "And you're saying it's her imagin-" She remembered the information about Pennywise's power coming from ponies believing in It. "...Never mind... thanks anyway..." She went upstairs to see Pinkie. She opened the door to Pinkie's room, and found Pinkie looking out the windows intently. Her mane and tail were frizzy again. She smiled, and walked over to her. "Hi, Pinkie," she greeted. No answer. She curiously looked at Pinkie, and on closer inspection, it wasn't Pinkie, but some sort of still replica of her. She suddenly heard hoofsteps behind her. She slowly turned around, and 'eep'ed when she saw a masked figure behind her, backing up into the wall. After looking a bit more, she saw it was Pinkie. "Oh, sorry Fluttershy!" She said, taking her mask off. Her mane was as frizzy as her replica, so she was definitely in an 'okay' mood in these circumstances. "That's okay, Pinkie... um... what's with the... other Pinkies?" Fluttershy asked. "That's to fool It and make It think I'm an easy target. It may not seem like much, but given everypony else's extreme measures, a method like this will be fake enough to seem real! I mean, have you seen everypony else's? Lyra's protecting herself with human shaped mannequins! 'Cause that's apparently what It really looks like? Well, usually looks like anyway..." Pinkie stopped to take a breath, which was rather unusual for her. "Anyway, what can I do you for?" She asked. "Um... could I watch your televisional device please?" She asked. Light's right, that needs a shorter name... "Light said something about a Mr. Bob Grey, who's apparently an expert at the supernatural..." "Huh? Haven't heard anything about that," Pinkie said, scratching her mane. "Then again, I haven't watched much TV in a while. Maybe it's about time!" She hopped over to her televisional... screen, and pressed the standby button, taking it out of standby and activating the TV. The two mares sat down and looked at it as it warmed up. After it warmed up, white subtitles that said something about Grey and a number quickly faded into black. "Oh... we missed it..." Fluttershy said, disappointedly. "Hello, Ponyville," a pleasant and reasonable voice came from the TV. It sounded as if the source of the voice should have been in a children's show. The source of the voice was a brown coated stallion with a short, blonde mane, dressed in a business suit. "My name is Mr. Bob Grey," he said. "Didn't that advert just come off, Pinkie Pie said, confusedly. "I should be telling you that I'm an expert at handling situations like the monster that is haunting this town..." He began, "But I have something specific to say to you mares, Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy." Fluttershy eep'ed, leaping back a few feet, Pinkie Pie uncomfortably shifted away. "I'd like you to spread this to your four other friends," Grey continued, "You ponies act like you could make a great sitcom. And yet this land seems to come under peril so much, it's like this weird place relies on you to do everything. Maybe you should just stop, and let others have a go. Of course, there's no point in trying. Everybody grows up." "...Is that.." Pinkie said... Grey reached under his desk, and pulled out a cloth, and rubbed it over his face. It turned into the visage of true fear itself, Pennywise. "Hi, kids," It said, "Guess who." Pinkie's mane deflated again. "As I was saying..." It continued, "Everybody grows up. But I'm astounded by how many adults here notice me... I think my most memorable case was the one where a mentally unsound adult thought I was sent by 'Langoliers' or something... sounds like a construction profession. But whatever I am, I am eternal. I am the eater of worlds. And of children. Their fear is like... salt on the meat. I preferred where I was before. But the fact your adults believe in me just means I won't have an empty stomach for a while. So if you don't want your friends eaten, leave town and cry about it elsewhere." "Now... if you'll excuse me, I'm waiting for my next appointment." Pennywise put the cloth over his face again, and looked like Grey again. "Goodbye," he said, pleasantly waving. The screen cut to a different advert almost immediately. "..." "..." "..." "...We need to find out where he works," Fluttershy said, "Light said he was going there, and who knows how many others are going too?" She rushed out the door, with Pinkie following her. The Cutie Mark Crusaders knocked on the door leading to Bob Grey's office. After a while, Grey opened the door. "Oh, hello, there," He said, pleasantly smiling. "I assume you came here about recent events?" "We sure did!" They said in unison. Grey smiled again, "That's good, that's very good. Come in," he said. They all walked in, and he closed the door behind them. He walked over to his chair, and sat on it. The room was nearly empty, save for the office table and chair Grey was sitting on, and a cupboard near the door. There was a yellow balloon next to Grey. "Mr. Grey," Scootaloo began, "Why d'you have a balloon next to you?" She asked. "That's so I can study the way things float," He said, "But I have enough experience to know of the joys of floating." His smile seemed to get rather... wider. "So... y'like balloons?" Applebloom asked, kinda creeped out. Sweetie Belle looked at it like something was very wrong with what she was seeing. Grey noticed this, and had an indifferent look on his face. "Want the balloon?" He asked. Sweetie Belle looked to him with a worried look on her face, but didn't answer. Grey scowled. "Don't you want it?" He said. "Don't you want it?" He repeated, his tone getting aggressive, until it didn't sound like him anymore. The Crusaders backed away to a wall, and looked at him. There stood before them, Grey, with orange fuzzy buttons growing out of his increasingly colourful suit, a pale white beginning to cover his face, which twisted shape in a gruesome manner. His mane hair started to retract into his head, and it grew out the sides, but in red. "Don't you WANT IT!?" Pennywise snarled at them, before grinning maliciously. Suddenly, the door opened with a slam. Pennywise looked at it, rather confused. Noir Shade bursted through it. "Oh, hello, officer. How's your day going? Come to see the next demonstration?" Pennywise asked. "Be quiet," Noir retorted, "Get out of Ponyville. Now." "You see, kids..." Pennywise said, "This is why clowns don't do much clowning nowadays... too many ponies with irrational fears for clowns..." Noir lunged at him, and Pennywise grabbed him with a monstrous, scaled arm, gripping him at the neck. Then came the sound of gasping, coming from the door. Everypony (and thing) looked at the door to find Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie standing there with mortified looks on their faces. Well, mortified is an understatement. Pennywise threw Noir to the wall, causing him a great deal of pain. It then walked to the chair, and sat on it as if nothing happened. Fluttershy scowled at him, "What do you think you're doing!?" She yelled, unexpectedly, and not taking the time to notice that. It just forced a smirk, which just made it look like It was somewhat nervous. "What happened to Light!?" Fluttershy demanded. "Who, the one worse off than Wheezy?" Pennywise asked rather monotonously. He paused for a moment. "Last I saw him, I was in his dreams." "What do you hope to accomplish with all this!?" She yelled. Pinkie rubbed her ear because of the shouting, and the CMC just held their ears. "I dunno," It answered, "Food? Like your carnivore animals? Sorry I landed here, I guess," It finished with a hint of sarcasm. Fluttershy was now staring directly at his eyes. He looked rather unsettled, until his eyes started glowing white. Everypony but Fluttershy looked away. She kept her stare, trying to beat his deadlights. Everything was silent. ... ... ... ... A snarling sound was heard, and the sound of a window crashing was heard. Everypony opened their eyes. Pennywise was gone. They looked to Fluttershy, who looked extremely shocked, before fainting. End of Chapter... BrokenPENNYWISE CHAPTER 11 _________________________________________________________________ Noir Shade's Journal Day 43 The few days have been eventful since Pennywise said he had something planned for me. He adopted an alias of a Mr Bob Grey. Was Bob the sort of name they had where he was from? Did he even come from a world of humans? Perhaps he appeared there, and used the inhabitants as his prey. This is all he really is. A predatory animal, with a degree of intelligence... if Pennywise isn't the true form, I don't want to know what is. As Grey, he had planned to lure a number of civilians as food. He had almost gotten three fillies, but after learning of the strange appearance of a door directly next to mine, I investigated, and found him threatening the fillies. Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie came in, and for some strange reason, Pennywise looked a little bit like this was an unwelcome addition to his meal... almost a little nervous. Fluttershy proceeded to stare into his eyes, which apparently, nopony can endure without feeling crushing fear... it seemed to be affecting Pennywise, but he gave some sort of stare of his own... his eyes had started glowing... I don't know what that's supposed to mean... after a while, he escaped. Fluttershy looked shocked, and fell into a coma. Light arrived about 15 seconds later. To say the least, he was pretty shocked himself, and immediately got Fluttershy to the hospital. The fillies looked extremely frightened. They tried to shrug it off, telling us they were fine, but I could tell they didn't feel safe anymore. As for me, all I can do is write what messages It sends me... It left no trace of where It was headed. Today, It has yet to send me anything. Day 45 It sent something, two days after I last wrote in this journal. It sent me a few illustrations of Itself, sent with stringed balloons. The first illustration depicted him balancing on a ball, juggling, with others watching. Everything was human. The second was one of the moving pictures... he was in a sort of library, in the same room as someone who had looked directly at him. He had spawned multiple balloons from the ceiling, which, when they popped, released blood on the person they were next to... no one noticed but that man. He frantically ran to someone, apparently yelling. It was like watching a silent movie... I could hear circus music, but nothing else. Pennywise spoke to the man. Trying to read his lips, he seemed to be telling him he was too old to stop him, and he should leave 'Derry.' He then proceeded to make an admittedly hilarious looking routine to distract him. The last illustration was Pennywise, once again in human form, looking at me. It seemed to be a still image. I looked on the back, and there was writing all over it, like a schizophrenic had written in a hurry. The most I could decipher was... 'I looked into It's Deadlights, and I wanted to be there.' I turned it over again, and the illustration wasn't still... it was moving again. Pennywise looked at me, his eyes beginning to glow. I felt great terror. I accidentally dropped the paper, and snapped out of it. I immediately picked up the paper and scrunched it up into a ball, throwing it in a trash can. It slowly began flattening itself, before I put a lighter in there, burning it until it was no more. I decided to head home, and get some sleep. Day 47 No word on how Fluttershy is doing. Clown sent me another message, like the one from yesterday I decided to ignore and not mention in the journal. There were pictures of balloons. All shapes, all colours. Strangely relaxing. Day 52 Mental stability seems fairly drained, wouldn't you say? If you're -my- journal, I command you to answer me. Well, answer me. Fine. Anyway, You're probably not interested, but... whatshername isn't out of her coma. Maybe she should stop trying to wake up. I'd like to sleep for a long time. Wouldn't you? Day 52, Night time. Balloons keep me safe. I need balloons. Day 53 The Clown gave me balloons to help me sleep. He's a very nice clown. Hardly anyone has visited me since Day 50. I don't know what happened, I don't think I was there. Day 53 I like it here. I'm warm. Day 53 Balons... ned bllans... Day 1 ! ? & ^ % :) :D Day 0 I finally made it. I'm in the deadlights. It's true what they say down there. They all float down there... and you will too. They all float. Light closed the journal of Noir Shade, the last entry making it clear he's not among the living anymore. He watched Fluttershy, and sighed. He was sitting with Funny Bones and the rest of the Mane 6, in a white room with Fluttershy, who was in a coma on a hospital bed. They were hoping for her to wake sometime soon. Fluttershy stirred, exhaling. She inhaled, as if to smell the nature of her cottage. She didn't smell much... just like someone sprayed things around to make a room clean. She slowly opened her eyes, and looked around curiously. She noticed she was in a hospital. She took another look around, and saw her friends, along with Light and that clown he befriended. "Fluttershy! I'm glad you're okay!" Twilight said, getting off of the chair and walking over to Fluttershy. The others followed suit, which made Fluttershy cringe a little, as she isn't comfortable with a lot of ponies looking at her at the same time this close. They all stepped back a bit, which calmed her slightly. "H-hi, everypony," She said, "What happened?" "According to Pinkie, you Stared at Pennywise, who gave some sort of Stare of his own at you..." Rarity answered. "I've gotten to the end of the journal," Light said. "Well, what happened to Noir then?" Twilight asked. "It seems after the 45th day of his journal, he started going mad until his entries were barely legible, like baby talk. His last entry was Day 0... and he wrote the following... "I finally made it. I'm in the deadlights. It's true what they say down there. They all float down there... and you will too. They all float." He finished. "What's he trying to say?" Fluttershy asked. "In his earlier entries, Pennywise had sent him an illustration of himself under a sewer coaxing a little child into it... by floating, he probably means dead bodies floating in sewer water," Light explained grimly, "And later, he wrote that he received a picture of the Clown apparently using It's Deadlights. The glowy eye things. If he's -in- them, the Deadlights must be it's essence." "That... makes sense..." Twilight said, "How did you figure that out?" Light had a blank expression on his face for about five seconds. He answered with a simple shrug after that. Funny Bones looked at him for a moment, with a mix of concern and suspicion. "...We have to stop It," Fluttershy said to the group, "Now." "...Fluttershy, are you sure about this?" Twilight asked, speaking for the group's concerned expression, "I mean, I've written to Princess Celestia about this, but it seems something's stopping her from intervening, because she's not replied or appeared to do something about this." That explains her absence, I guess... Funny Bones thought, But... how? "If she can't stop it, Twilight, we have to," Fluttershy insisted. "If he's obsessed with bodies floating in sewers, his lair must be a sewer. We have to go down there, and end this." "Ah dunno..." Applejack said, "S'awful risky..." "If it isn't us, who will it be?" Fluttershy asked. "We need It gone... it's the only way us ponies will receive some good rest." "...I'm in." Pinkie said. "Ditto." Funny agreed. ... ... ... "Me too." Rainbow Dash said. "As am I." Rarity said with a nod. ... ... "I guess I'm in too..." Twilight said. "Count me in." Applejack said. "...Same..." Light said... rather monotonously. "We'll go when Fluttershy is released from the hospital," Twilight said. The others agreed, nodding. End of Chapter... LairPENNYWISE CHAPTER 12 ______________________________________________________________ Fluttershy put on her saddlebags, before looking at herself in the mirror. Her mane was slightly messier than usual, but she didn't bother fixing it. After being let out of the hospital, she and Light had headed home to prepare, as had everypony else. She swallowed. She and her friends were going to the sewers to face It. She had thought to bring meat, as a sort of distracting meal for It, a sort of Mace spray provided by Angel, and a few rocks. She breathed in deep, looked away from the mirror, and headed for the door. "Wait a moment," Light said. Fluttershy looked back. "I'm gonna need to talk to Tyler about this. You go. I'll catch up." "...Okay... be careful." Fluttershy replied, before heading for the door. She opened it, and looked outside. A storm was beginning, and it was raining. She felt a tapping on her back left hoof. She looked back, and saw Angel Bunny standing there, giving her a concerned look that said, 'Are you sure?' Fluttershy sighed, and looked at him. "Angel... I have to do this. It has done enough harm to us. If we let It continue, It'll continue killing everypony... and all the other animals here..." Fluttershy explained. "I'm doing this for us, Angel. For all of us." Angel looked at her for a while. He shed a tear, then hugged her hoof. Fluttershy couldn't help but shed a tear as well. It wasn't too common for him display this sort of affection. And it happens on what could be the last time they would see each other. "I...I-i gotta go, Angel..." Fluttershy reluctantly said. Angel slowly let her go, keeping a brave face. "I promise to come back. Love you, Angel." Fluttershy arrived to the Sewer covering known as a 'manhole.' There, she found Twilight, Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Pinkie and Funny Bones waiting, with their own saddlebags wrapped around them. "Where's Light?" Bones asked Fluttershy. "He said he was going to speak to Tyler about where he was going, and that he'd catch up with us..." Fluttershy answered. "He's not going to catch up with us if we go now," Twilight said, "We'll have to find some way to tell him." The group spotted a familiar grey coated pegasus mailmare flying across. Twilight had an idea. "Hey, Ditzy, could we ask you to do something for us please?" Twilight called. The group descended into the sewer with the ladder. The sewers looked just as expected. Dark, damp, and had all sorts of things around the corridors. The smell was simply terrible. Twilight's horn glowed as she used her magic to create a pulse. Everypony could smell freshness, and sighed in relief, as they wouldn't have to suffer with the smell. Bones noticed something on the ground. "What's that?" He pointed a hoof. Everypony looked, and saw one of the fuzzy orange buttons Pennywise would wear on his suit. After a moment of wondering why it was there, Twilight duplicated it multiple times, and decided to use it as a method of keeping track of where they were in the sewers. They continued onward. It's Thoughts Ever since my appearance in this world... I've had a pretty good amount of meals. So many adults have the potential to believe, and yet, there are still some who do. I'm not surprised, as I shouldn't be. After all, there are other monsters out there. But the reason why I stand out among the rest... I am the one thing everything will fear. Beings like Tak cannot rival my power, the Langoliers remind me of evil meatballs covered with fur, and the Tommyknockers didn't deserve their nursery rhyme. Gan apparently does not exist in this world... good. But as powerful as I am... I have my limits... as proven by the Loser's Club... These midget horses, however... they're nothing special, surely. The seven ponies slowly and carefully trotted through the damp corridors of the sewers. On occasion, they would see a decomposed body part, an item of clothing, accessories, and even discarded and bloodied currency. Rarity tried her best not to faint here. She did feel being here was rather undignified for a lady, but that doesn't matter much with a beast such as Pennywise inhabiting Ponyville. Twilight hoped to get rid of this monster. She wasn't sure whether she would go as far as killing, but if she did, it would certainly not be as bad as what It did to others. Applejack didn't want a thing like that threatening her little sister. She honestly wished to end It in the most punishing manner possible. Rainbow Dash feels the need to get revenge on It for doing all that it's done, and giving her a paranoia of clowns. Pinkie Pie simply wishes to smile again. She doesn't feel right about killing, but it's the only way, in her opinion. Funny Bones wishes to put the memory of Cobalt Royale to rest. He wants to stop this thing. Fluttershy definitely wanted to stop It, but she was feeling rather concerned on how Light was doing... There was a growling sound, and everypony stopped in their tracks. They heard the vengeful voice of Pennywise speak to them. "Leave, now! While you still can!" "Show yerself, ya coward!" Applejack yelled. The sound of chuckling filled their ears. "You still think you can see me?" He chuckled some more, until his ghastly visage appeared like some floating aura. "You'll never see me. You'll see only what your little minds allow your eyes to see. So turn back, for if you stay... you shall be caught... in my Deadlights. Like all the others." He smirked evilly at the ponies. "Like all the others." He began chuckling, until it turned into guffawing and mocking, maniacal laughter, as his image slowly shifted into thin air. "We gotta find 'im..." Applejack said. "And fast," Rainbow added. ... ... ... Applejack looked around. Rainbow was there, but nopony else. The group has been seperated. "...Where is everypony?" Twilight and Rarity looked around for their friends. "How could we have gotten separated so easily?" Rarity asked. "Remember what we're here for, Rarity," Twilight said, "We don't know the limits to what It can do. Expect the unexpected." With that, she trotted forward through the corridor. "...Easier said that done, darling..." Rarity said to herself, with a deadpan expression, before following Twilight. Pinkie Pie looked around the place nervously, while Funny Bones took a moment to verify the situation. "Where is everypony..." Pinkie murmured warily... "If we're seperated like this, it'll be easier for It to get us..." "We'll be fine." Bones said. "No, we won't, Funny, no! We won't!" Pinkie yelled hysterically, "We're sitting ducks now! How am I supposed to believe we're going to be fine!?" She was surprised when she was suddenly pulled in an embrace. "Because I'm not letting us get hurt if It finds us..." he said, "Until then, try to be confident for me, alright?" Gradually, Pinkie began to feel all warm inside, and hugged him back, smiling. "I'll try..." "U-um... hello?" Fluttershy called out. There was nopony with her. She swallowed hard. She had to be as brave as she could. She carefully trotted onwards. She noticed her corridors were getting increasingly bloody, gore-y, and desolate. There were webs appearing all over walls, corners, the ceiling, even the floor. Some of them even held body parts in them, probably as food being saved for later. She comes across a box in the middle of a corridor. She has a look at it. On the inscription, it says Jack 'Attack' In The Box Don't open until Christmas ! Fluttershy looked rather confused. She wasn't sure what 'Christmas' is, and the fact Pennywise apparently owns a Jack-In-The-Box (What kind of name is Jack...?) means it's probably trouble. She shook her head, and continued on. She checked behind her, in case the Jack-In-The-Box attacked for some reason. It was still sitting there. Fluttershy sighed, and trotted on. She saw messages written in blood, such as, 'IT,' 'THEY FLOAT,' 'WHO' and 'HELP.' This served to unnerve her further. Eventually, the messages had turned to drawings, looking like they were drawn by schizophrenics, sometimes even drawing menacing and disturbing faces. She started walking a lot faster. After some amount of time, she had reached an extensive room. The room had a large amount of blood, guts, and webbing. The webbing even had other ponies wrapped in them, stuck to the wall. Some were dead, some were unconscious, and a few were catatonic. She saw Pipsqueak's parents. They were alive. She saw the remains of a manticore, which shocked her extremely, as she couldn't imagine what form It would take to take down a creature of this magnitude. And then she saw... Live Light... not wearing his cloak... catatonic, and looking like he hasn't eaten in days. She stared at him, shocked. He stared at the ground blankly. "Hey there..." His voice filled the room... but the source wasn't Light. The source was at a dark corner. She slowly turned her head to it, and saw two pure blue eyes staring at her, narrowed in a scowl. The source walked closer towards her. Light's familiar appearance came out of the shadows, wearing his cloak, but somewhat torn and ragged. Fluttershy, confused, looked from the catatonic Light, to the Light standing there. Gradually, realization dawned upon her, and she looked at Light in horror. He was suddenly missing his wings, in a clown suit, having a red, wild balding, and wearing clown make-up. His face twisted into a more familiar shape. It grinned maliciously. "Told you I'd catch up..." Pennywise said with murderous glee. End of Chapter... BattlePENNYWISE CHAPTER 13 _______________________________________________________________________ Pennywise stood in the shadows, smirking at Fluttershy. It takes a moment to look around the room, as if admiring what it has done with the place. It looks back at Fluttershy. "Welcome, Fluttershy... do tell, what do you think of my humble abode?" It asked. It didn't get an answer. "Thought as much," It continued, "Simply marvelous, isn't it... I feel I could do a little more with this room, though. Maybe the addition of lavender, orange, pink, cyan, white, and yellow... I think that sounds nice, don't you?" Fluttershy stepped back a bit, obviously preferring her yellow coat on herself. She felt a cold, solid object gripping her hoof, and realized it was a corpse's hoof, protruding from the ground. Its grip was strong, and she couldn't free herself from it. Pennywise just smiled at the attempt. "I told you to leave, but you just had to please your curious little minds, didn't you?" It asked with a sinister edge in his voice. "I-it's n-n-not right t-to do this..." Fluttershy responded. Pennywise shrugged. "Your animals do the same, but you don't punish them. Not nice to show favouritism, you know..." "M-my animals a-are nothing... like you..." She stuttered. "You're right..." Pennywise replied. "They're not intelligent." He smirked. "Y-yes... they are!" "Nuh-no. Thuh-they're not." Pennywise countered mockingly. "I can underst-stand them... you c-can't..." Fluttershy said. "Is that what the little tattoos you have on your flanks-" Pennywise stifled a giggle at the thought of tattoos on a rear, "Is that what they represent?" "Yes... it is..." Fluttershy replied. Pennywise smirked. "Things really are different than they are on Earth... only some kids aren't mad or abusive, or bullies who are mad and abusive." "Th-that's... horrible..." "It is, isn't it? And for a while, that's how I thought all humans acted." So he does come from a human planet... Fluttershy thought. "After all," Pennywise continued, "I did arrive in a meteor on a planet called Earth, inhabited by a bunch of these humans. I arrived in a little place called Derry..." He smiled as nostalgic feelings hit him. "Oh, there was so much I did around there... I awoke there, and made the sewers my home... kinda like this one. I think my most memorable and favourite kill was when I first awoke during the... 1950s, I believe. I found a little boy playing with a paper boat his big brother Bill made him. The boy's name was Georgie Denbrough. I promised him a lot of fun, some cotton candy, and all sort of surprises. Balloons, too." Fluttershy watched It as it spoke of all the things he had done. "And then... I took him... ripped his arm off... and I showed him how to float... like the balloons..." He made no attempt to suppress his grin. "Then, I began my feeding spree, and to start that, I gave Bill a bit of a scare... and I found some others to frighten... you know by now I need fear to devour what I need? Well, fear is exactly what I got from them... it was so fun to scare them with the things they were frightened of the most..." "But alas... it was not to be... they all became friends, into some 'Lucky Seven', then ganged up on me, eventually, and the girly-boy used his inhaler as a weapon, saying there was battery acid in there. I escaped... and waited..." Fluttershy's reaction to Its' story was a mix between contempt and fear. It talked about these things like they were some fond childhood memory. "In 30 years... I came back... and I killed someone under a bridge. Next, I learned those seven kids that had bested me were coming back... or at least, six of them were..." He chuckled to himself, "Seems that Stan the Man wasn't enough of one." "But since they were adults, now... I couldn't hurt them... now, they just half-believed. I got their old bully, Henry Bowers to attack them... he only managed to hospitalize one. Eventually, they'd found me, in the true form they could comprehend, and I'd killed only the girly-boy, because he thought his little inhaler trick would work on me again..." "They killed me, though... but they forget... I am eternal... I may not exist in their dimensional plane... but I can cross over... and now... here I am!" It finished, grinning. "And to this day... while I still liked when I killed little Georgie... it was most regretful indeed." Fluttershy looked at It, and it didn't look as if he regretted it at all. It seems that the only thing It would regret about it is that it would have inspired this 'Lucky Seven' to kill him. Then she wondered... perhaps if she could talk to him for a bit, he could calm down, and, if that's not the case, allow the others enough time to find her, and save her quickly. "...Wh-what were the Lucky Seven like?" She asked. "They were perhaps the most innocent kids in Derry... they all had their problems, though," Pennywise said. "For example," it started, "Bill, the brother of Georgie, had a big stuttering problem. Kinda like you, except he was a bunch braver. You're kinda like a cross between Bill and Eddie Kaspbrak, the shy girly-boy with the inhaler. He thought he had asthma, but really he's delusional. His mom was real manipulative. 'You don't need any friends except for your mother,' she said. A little too Norma Bates, but oh well. Then there was Ben Hanscom, who they called Haystack, who was really fat. I thought I saw him in here. Probably not the same one. And Beverly Marsh. Easier to get into than an art college." "There was also Richie Tozier, real lighthearted, and a real comedian, into a lot of movies. A bit like your friend Pinkie, except he's not possible murderess. Or murderer. Whatever. We also have Mike Hanlon. You midget horses with candy coloured coats might not believe this, but back on earth, sometimes people were made fun of because of their colour. Mike was one of those people. All I did was just try to kill his father's military group as a giant bird. When everyone else had left Derry, after I had escaped them, he was the only one who stayed. Boring." "And finally, we have Stan. Always skeptical about everything. Even me. I quickly managed to change his mind about that, though. Maybe psychic, but we didn't care about that. Even though he was the last one to believe me, he was the first one to know what the very best thing to do was, instead of coming back to kill me, and that was by killing himself. He even left a suicide note, signed in blood. ...It." Fluttershy looked at It as it stared blankly at nothing. "I mean, I know that what you all refer to me as," Pennywise said, "But can't everyone have a better imagination?" "You'd like that very much, wouldn't you?" Came a raspy voice Fluttershy was glad to hear. Everyone turned to looked at Rainbow Dash and Applejack arriving and entering the room. "Oh, hello there," Pennywise said, cheerfully. "Did you notice my decorations?" The two newcomers looked around the room, and saw all the bodies stuck the walls, held by webs. They looked at Light, and now they were frightened and confused. "What's Light doing there?" Rainbow Dash asked. "The same thing he was doing when you met him," Pennywise replied, "Being at the wrong place at the wrong time." "What's going on?" Came another familiar voice, Twilight's voice. She and Rarity appeared in the room, and looked at the 'decorations' as well. "Uh... I think we found our friends..." Twilight said quietly. "But where's Pinkie and... what'shisname?" Rarity asked. "Doesn't seem like they're here yet..." Applejack responded, "Prob'ly a good thing right now..." "You know, this seems like the perfect blend of prey..." Pennywise stated. "Enough to satisfy my hunger, and not enough to overpower me. Then came the sound of galloping hooves. Pennywise's expression deadpanned. Everypony else looked to the source. In the fog, two silhouettes could be seen. They knew who they were just from looking at the shapes. True enough, Pinkie Pie and Funny Bones emerged from the fog, skidding to a halt upon arriving. The two of them took a while to look at the entire room. They took another moment to look at Light. And another to process what just happened. Pennywise also looked around, due to boredom. "...You... keep ponies here..." Pinkie said... "And... you wait until they're awake to be afraid?" "Hmm. Sounds about right." It responded. Pinkie stared at It for a moment, then rushed at him to attack. Pennywise's arm changed into a sort of large, scaled arm, grabbed her, and threw her back. She collided with the wall painfully, but got up, walking next to her friends. Twilight used her magic to free Fluttershy's hoof from the limb that was gripping her. Fluttershy stepped back. Twilight opened her saddlebag, and levitated five necklaces and one tiara. The necklaces were given to her friends, and the tiara was placed upon her own head. Pennywise looked at them for a moment. He then burst out laughing hysterically. "...What's so funny?" Twilight asked. "Y-you have a... girly tiara..." Pennywise responded between laughs, "And it's like you're... pl-playing dress up on the go!" As he cackled, Twilight looked to her five friends. They all nodded, and their eyes began to glow. Pennywise took a moment to look at them. His eyes widened in surprise. He stepped back into the shadows and disappeared. The Elements of Harmony looked to where he was before, confused. The room started to rain blood. There were sounds of others crying in agony, fear, and despair, and there were large spiders crawling around the walls, onto the ceiling, and then descending from their web, to get closer to them. Rarity cringed from the uncouth display. Fluttershy found it hard to think straight. But there was one thought that resided in her mind as this happened. ...Lucky Seven... "Everypony..." She said, "Get into a circle and hold our hooves together." "What good will that do?" Bones asked. "Just... listen to me... please?" She asked. Everypony did as she said, and they all got into a circle, and held their front hooves together. The bloodied rain continued to patter onto their coats, and the agonising screams of possible previous victims continued. As the blood fell, it landed on some of the bodies used as decoration. Pipsqueak's father looked as though he was crying blood because of it. Everypony closed their eyes and tried to block everything out. ... ... ... Silence... Everypony opened their eyes. They looked around, although still keeping close and holding hooves. It had stopped raining, the screams had stopped, and the spiders were nowhere to be found. "Where did your accessories go?" Bones asked. Twilight looked at her friends, and saw that they weren't wearing the necklaces that represented their elements. Her tiara was also missing. After a bit of looking around, they saw the tiara and necklaces on the floor. "I'll get them." Bones said, letting go of the hooves. "No, wait!" Fluttershy said. As soon as Bones touched on of the elements, Pennywise had risen out of the ground in a second, and grabbed him with two scaled claws, and walked over to a wall, pushing Bones into it and keeping him pinned there. "You all taste so much better when you're afraid..." Pennywise growled, grinning maliciously. "And you... are... NEXT!" He opened its mouth, revealing its fanged teeth to take a bite at Bones, ignoring his petrified expression, when It felt something hit his back leg. It looked at the ground next to the leg, and saw one of its fuzzy orange buttons. It looked behind him, and Fluttershy stood there, holding a can of mace. "This is battery acid, demon." She said darkly, and sprayed it across Its face, imagining it as sulphuric acid, just as It let go of Bones to strike her. It screamed in agony, confirming Fluttershy's theory, as it gripped its face. However, it was quite horrifying to see Its face become undone, melting away slowly. Twilight levitated a silver shard out of her saddlebag, being glad it hadn't created any holes, and threw it at Its head. The shard had opened his head up, and his Deadlights poked through it. It snarled and aimed the deadlights at the group. They recoiled and averted their eyes. As soon as it had stopped shining on them, they heard another snarl. They looked, and saw It somersault in the direction of a small drain. Its back hooves had strangely managed to fit through it, and as It gradually, yet quickly, fell through the drain, Its face melted further, making most of the skin-turned fluids land next to the drain, and slither through it. The group looked down the drain. ...Darkness... A scaled arm (The claw looked more like a mouth) grabbed at Bones again, covering his entire head and trying to pull him down. Twilight levitated the silver shard, and stabbed at the arm repeatedly until it let go of Bones' head (Not without scratching him with Its teeth) and fell back down the drain slowly. "We have to find a way down there..." Pinkie said. "But It's dead!" Rarity argued. "We have to make sure!" They heard Pennywise give a scream of agony, which sounded more like a growl, and then a dragging groan that got quieter as it went on. They heard nothing more from it. Fluttershy fainted. They all looked to her, and rushed to her. Twilight put her hoof to her neck to see if she had a pulse. It was a little slow, but it was there. They also noticed her breathing shallowly. They all sighed in relief. "I'm glad that's over..." Pinkie said, her mane slowly getting a bit frizzy. "We should get everypony who's alive out. I'm sure Pip will be happy to see his parents again." "Agreed." Bones agreed. Twilight nodded. She looked to Light, and started making cuts on the webbing keeping him stuck to the wall. It was very durable webbing, but it eventually gave in to the cuts, and released Light. As he fell, she used levitation to stop his fall, and slowly placed him next to Fluttershy. She then proceeded to do the same for everypony else. By the time this was finished, some of the unconscious ponies were placed on the backs of the Mane 6 (The ones who were conscious) and Funny Bones, but Twilight had to use levitation to handle the rest. Along the way, Fluttershy had woken up, and volunteered to carry some of the levitated bodies, making Twilight's job easier. They had made it to the surface, which they were lucky to have done so fast, as the orange buttons were starting to melt, probably due to It's demise. Everypony unconscious was placed in the hospital and being monitored. Fluttershy stood in the hospital room of Live Light, watching him. Pinkie Pie walked in, her mane and tail all frizzy, but not yet in the mood for partying. "Hey, Fluttershy. How ya doin'?" She asked. "O-oh... just fine..." Fluttershy said. Pinkie looked to Light. "I hope he's alright. He used to help with my parties you know!" She said. "Y-yeah... It said that..." Fluttershy whispered sadly... "So, um... how's Funny Bones?" "He's doing good, he'll be looking after Pipsqueak for a little while longer until his parents wake up." "Oh... that's good..." Fluttershy said. She sighed as Light lay in the bed, unresponsive. She noticed Pinkie wasn't saying much, and so looked to her. She was looking from Light, to Fluttershy and back again. "Oh, I see what's going on..." Pinkie said. "Wh-wh-what do you mean?" Fluttershy asked, knowing full well what she meant, and blushing hard. "Don't worry, I Pinkie Promise your secret's safe with me!" She said, before quickly looking around. "As long as you keep a secret I have too, anyway..." "O-okay... what is it?" "Well, uh... ...I think I 'like' Funny Bones..." Fluttershy took a moment to think about this. "Hm... okay." "...Wait, okay? That's it?" Pinkie asked, a bit confused. "If I think of it as 'okay,' it might be easier to keep a secret," Fluttershy explained, "I'm not really the best one to talk about secrets to..." "Well, yeah, but I trust you, don't worry. And you can trust me!" Fluttershy nodded. "I guess I can... after all, it's fairly obvious you're not a carnivorous shape-shifter..." Pinkie smiled only slightly, "Yeah I guess... let's not speak of that again... I still get the feeling It'll be around one day..." "Why?" Fluttershy asked. "It's just a feeling... remember the promise we made when we got out." "If It comes back, we'll be sure to do something about it." Fluttershy said, nodding. Pinkie nodded, gave Fluttershy a friendly hug, then went away. Fluttershy looked to Live Light. She smiled. End of Chapter... The CircusThe Circus. A travelling company of performers, gathered for the entertainment of the ponies inhabiting the towns they visit. Some are great, some are okay, some are bad, some simply caused the worst of days for a circus to go to town. The Top Hat circus was visiting Ponyville, as organized by former circus magician Top Hat, now the manager of his own circus. He had everything, large tents, acrobats, trapeze acts, balloons, musicians, tightropes, and clowns. Lots and lots of clowns. None of the residents were really afraid of clowns at the time, but they knew there were coulrophobes for sure. From their understanding, it was because clowns were always smiling or laughing, sometimes even sad and crying. And they hid their faces in their make-up, and so trust was an issue. In Ponyville, however, there weren't that many circuses that visited. And the ones that did, were successful, and there was no reports of deaths or accidents related to clowns. Nopony had a reason to be afraid of them, and so accepted them. This circus was pretty big. A lot of ponies went outside to see what was there to enjoy. There were some who didn't attend however. Twilight Sparkle, for example, was too busy studying to attend. Rarity Belle was occupied with her dress-making. Applejack was more interested in her apple-bucking. And Fluttershy never was fond of crowds. Ditzy Doo was busy, but the flying acts were making it increasingly difficult to deliver the mail. Pinkie Pie attended, everypony knows she can never pass down a good old-fashioned party. And Rainbow Dash wasn't busy, and saw no harming in going too. A lot of foals wouldn't pass up the opportunity to experience entertainment at this amount. The Top Hat circus was one of the most successful, celebrated and trusted travelling companies. It's gone now. There was a young 5 year-old colt, who came here, accompanied by his Mommy and Daddy. His name was Cobalt Royale. His parents were rather rich, but modest too, and publicity shy, so they decided to live in Ponyville. Cobalt also has a big sister, who isn't into circuses. Nonetheless, Cobalt loved her very much, as much as his Mommy and Daddy. Cobalt got to go on the Ferris Wheel, be entertained by a clown on a unicycle, watch a trapeze act, and see a puppet show. This was going to be the best day of his life. They were on their way to see the new magician. Cobalt had his head in the clouds. He was trotting forward, looking at the attractions surrounding him. Halfway through, he looked to his parents.... or at least where they should be. The only thing surrounding him now were other, unfamiliar ponies. He called out for his Mommy and Daddy... but his cries were never heard over the chatter, the mirth, and the circus music. He was panicking now, on the verge of tears. "Hi there." Cobalt looked behind him, startled. It was a clown, wearing a baggy costume adorned with multiple colours and textures with three orange fuzzy balls appearing at the front area, in a vertical fashion. His mane was a frizzy red balding around his white painted face, with red lips curled downwards a bit, black eyebrows of paint, and his muzzle was completely red. His tail was like his mane, red and all over the place. Wrapped around his hoof was a string that carried multiple balloons. It seems a member of staff noticed him crying out for help. "Uh... hello, mister..." Cobalt replied. "You're lookin' pretty lost. What's wrong?" The clown asked. "I can't find my Mommy and Daddy." "Ooh, I see how that's a problem. Where were you all headed?" "To see the magician..." "That's not too far away from here! Come with me, I'll show ya!" The clown offered. "My daddy told me not to go with strangers..." "Oh, very wise of your father, kid, very wise indeed! My name is Pennywise the Dancin' Clown! What's yours?" "Cobalt...." "Nice to meet ya, Cobalt. Now we know each other! Gee, right?" He said, comically. "I guess so..." "Now, let's go find your parents, shall we? Here... have a balloon... it floats!" Pennywise said, as he extended his balloon-bearing hoof." "Okay, then..." Cobalt agreed. Pennywise began walking. He looked back to Cobalt, who hadn't begun following him yet. "Come on, Cobalt, don't be shy!" He called. Cobalt thought of the things that made him happy, and went with the clown that he assumed had come to help him. There was a clown elsewhere, who was great with balloon figures. But only a few ponies ever visited him. Despite his make-up being designed to look happy, he just wasn't. Things had happened in his life, and he was feeling rather bitter for it. He either frightened or bored the foals who ever visited him in the towns visited by the circus. They only knew him by his clown name, Happy Days. Happy looked around the place, glumly. There were a lot of ponies having fun. He wished he had the enthusiasm for it. He sighed, not concentrating on his troubles. Then, he saw a clown with a bunch of balloons escorting a little kid somewhere. He then realized something about that clown... I don't remember seeing a clown like that... He knows a lot about the other clowns, and he didn't recognize that one... whenever he gets a bad feeling, he knows he should do something about it. He galloped over to Top Hat. "Mr. Top Hat!" He said. "Ah, hello, Happy Days. Anything eventful on your end yet?" Top Hat asked. "There's a clown escorting a kid to a tent... and he's not one of our clowns." Top Hat widened his eyes. "Anything special about this clown?" He asked apprehensively. "He had a red wig, he was bald, and he was carrying balloons with him." Happy replied. "Please lead the way, we should hurry." Happy ran to where he last saw the unfamiliar clown, with Top Hat following. They looked around frantically. "Look!" Top Hat cried, pointing to the sky. Happy looked. There was a yellow balloon with a smiley face on it floating above a large tent. They immediately ran inside the tent, and were horrified by what they found. If you look in the newspapers today, you'll see the incident of the unfamiliar cannibal clown, Pennywise The Dancin' Clown. How he had convinced a boy to go with him, and end up having being chewed and eaten like a Manticore victim, correction... even worse. Happy Days will be remembered as the Sad Clown who tried to help an innocent foal. The disaster caused the circus to close out of the shame and fear. But what ponies will wonder was: Who was this Pennywise? Some figured he was a mental patient obsessed with clowns, and wanted to use this obsession to fit into the background of the circus and satiate his hunger with an unpleasant food choice. Others believe he was a clown who wanted to take his revenge on other ponies. Most of it is all wrong. Pennywise The Dancin' Clown is not a clown, but fear Itself. It was true that It entered a circus so It could do what It needed nearly undetected. In another universe, it was thought to have died. It crossed over to Ponyville to preserve itself. Its appearance there will open up many investigations of Its purpose and existence, and how it can devour a foal as if It were not anything remotely close to the pony form. It welcomes them to try. Because all the ponies know, and probably will ever know... was that this was definitely the worst of days for a circus to come to town. FlashbacksPinkie sighed after finishing her story. Her eyes watered a little, and she sniffed. "...Horrible..." was all Noir Shade could say. "Unfortunately, it'll help if everypony told me their experiences with Pennywise... who'd like to go next? "I'll go next." Said the Rainbow-maned pegasus. She cleared her throat. -----Point of View: Rainbow Dash----- Well, one day, I was resting in the clouds after a bunch of practising my aerial tricks and stunts. I was real content, then, all of a sudden, I hear somepony calling my name. It's some sort of pegasus wearing a suit a bit like the Wonderbolts, but real dark. And he seemed to know me, even though I'd never met him before, because he was outright challenging me. Well, I wasn't just gonna let that pony call me out and walk out of it. He darted off to where I thought would be the place the race was beginning. I followed him, and when we got there, the race started up. I was perfectly able to catch up with him fine... and that's when he'd get a lot faster. He just... kept managing to accelerate a lot more when I nearly manage to get in front. This freaked me out, and ticked me off. It can't be possible. Nopony can accelerate that way just whenever they want. I didn't want to believe it, so I just kept trying... but no matter what, he seemed to always be ahead... then he started flying downwards really fast. I followed him down there, but some sort of smoke pellet he dropped mid-air hit me in the face. When the smoke cleared away, I saw I wasn't flying at a pegasus, but now, there was the mouth of some monster that looked like one of those things called 'dinosaurs...' I managed to stop myself from falling into the mouth, but I crash landed into a wall. I got a few cuts and scrapes, but I hadn't broken any bones. I looked to where the dinosaur was... and I saw that Pennywise clown from the Circus, holding a bunch of balloons. "Hi, Rainbow Cra- that is... Dash," He said, mocking me with a sinister air, "How was the Circus? You have fun?" I was really mad now. "Don't talk to me about circuses, you psycho clown! You're gonna pay for your crimes!" He started laughing like the maniac he is, "Remember you were the hero of this town for a while? What an opportunity missed, that day! Seems to me, your name won't be going down in history. With any luck, your friends will remember you as their friend." He started walking closer... I found myself backing away. "And I'll remember you, with as much luck, as a tasty treat." "Y-you're not gonna eat me... I-i'm the fastest pegasus in Equestria!" I tried to say with confidence. But it just wasn't happening. That just made his hideous grin wider. "It's okay to be afraid, Dashie... in fact, it's good that you are... you all taste so much better when you're afraid!" He said, menacingly. I swallowed hard. Then I noticed the balloon to my left. Normally, I wouldn't be afraid of balloons, but anything to do with that... monster... scares me, and I'm confident enough to say I speak for everypony. The balloon popped... unlike Twilight and Pinkie's stories, though, I didn't get covered in blood. It just popped... and Pennywise disappeared. I breathed heavily. Just as I was gonna fly away from there, a hoof stabbed through the ground and grabbed my leg. I screamed, hitting the zompony's hoof with my free leg. I was lucky enough to get it off me, and I stepped back, hovering in the air in case they tried it again. I watched the hoof for a while. Then, another one appeared out of the ground, until half a zompony rose from the ground, and looked at me. I could hear Pennywise's voice coming from it, even if it didn't move its' mouth. "They all float down here... and when you're down here, with me... you'll float too!" "After I escaped, I stayed on my cloud, not daring to leave it for a day..." Rainbow finished. "...This is getting scary... like something out of a horror novel..." Noir Shade said. He hesitantly asked... "Who wants the honours?" "I shall go next." The fashion-pony, Rarity volunteered. -----Point of View: Rarity Belle----- I was happily resting in my beauty sleep. I heard a knock at the door, and I did my best to ignore it. After a while, it was simply too much to bear, so I got out of bed and went downstairs. Sweetie Belle wasn't awake yet. I opened the door, and I was horrified and appalled by what I saw... It appeared to be a Mummy... it WAS a mummy. It reached out at my throat, but I used my magic to direct the hand to its' face, and make it slap itself 5 times. "Get out, I will not allow an urban legend of your fashion sense into my home! I do hope I have made myself clear, STAY OUT!" I said, closing the door on it. There's a time for fear, and there's a time to take action. My time for fear came after taking action. I went to find Sweetie Belle and warn her. She was just awakening in her room. "Sweetie Belle, a Mummy has attempted to invade the boutique, do not allow it to enter under any circumstances, to keep us and our beautiful home safe!" Sweetie Belle sighed in irritation. "NOW you choose the time to start believing in legends such as that? You just told me last night they didn't exist." "I know, and I'm very sorry, it seems I was wrong. Please get out of bed, we need to defend ourselves!" "Okay, okay..." Sweetie Belle said, obviously not taking me that seriously. We waited at the entrance for a while, hoping the Mummy wouldn't try to get in again. We waited for what seemed like years passing to me... nopony tried to open the door. I sighed in relief. "It seems it's gone... if it was ever there at all... I might have been given a rude awakening, and overreacted... I'm sorry about that, Sweetie Belle." "Mmmppphhh!" "Sweetie Belle?" I said, looking back. "Hel-mmfff!" I heard Sweetie's voice cry. "Sweetie Belle!" I cried, rushing to where I heard the voice. I saw a clown, carrying her, and moving in to take a bite at her neck... but it wasn't just a clown... it was Pennywise. "Not my sister!" I yelled in anger at him, using levitation to throw a needle at his back. He flinched at the pain, and dropped Sweetie to the ground, landing painfully, but thankfully, having no signs of being bitten. Pennywise turned around to face me. I could see his ghastly make-up, but that was hardly what caught my attention... his eyes were orange, and his teeth were as sharp as Pinkie said. He roared monstrously at me. I looked in horror. His eyes then turned a bright blue, and his teeth looked equine... but he was just as frightening as before. "I like what you've done with the place." He said, grinning maliciously. He ran off somewhere in the house, and I followed him. I found him performing an assortment of clown-like tricks all over the place... he was on a unicycle, juggling, then he threw the juggling balls in different directions, breaking the vases that all of them hit. He somersaulted off of the unicycle, allowing it to roll into a lamp, knocking it over, and anything else near it. I then watched as he ran to one room, only to come back with many balloons, and let them all go, until they eventually popped and let the blood inside them ruin the room. I stood in disbelief, looking at the wrecked room, ignoring the blood that had gotten on my coat, then looking back at Pennywise, walking out of the door, looking back at me once more with a manic grin, and then outright guffawing at my misery, before leaving, closing the door behind him. I was afraid, but I couldn't let him just get away, so I opened the door and looked around... but he was nowhere in sight... he couldn't have disappeared that fast... _____________________________________________________________________ End of Chapter... EpilogueEPILOGUE _______________________________________________________ 30 years later... Twilight Sparkle examined herself in a mirror. She used a spell to levitate a magnifying glass, and examine her mane. A grey hair. That's one of the signs. She sighed, and looked around. She wasn't all that bothered about it. She was just sad that meant less time doing what she likes doing, less time to spend with her friends, and less time to spend with her new companion. Some time when she was 23, she had started going on adventures with Doctor Whooves, as he had an overdue book that he said he'd pay back on a certain date. Usually she doesn't mind too much when a fellow pony borrows a book for a long time, but he made the mistake of organizing a day to give it back. Gradually, she found out he was an alien who liked to travel with others, and she eventually became his travelling companion. After a while, they had decided to marry. Although he lived for a lot longer than ponies, she didn't mind that much, as she had found her Special Somepony. She was starting to miss Spike a little bit. He'd eventually grown rather large for the town, so now resides somewhere near Ponyville. She still visits him from time to time, but she wishes that her ideal little brother were still here as company in the library. And a lot of things have changed. Most of her friends have gotten married too. Some are happy, some aren't. The Cutie Mark Crusaders found their Cutie Marks, after some time, and are living their talents to the fullest. Applebloom is an artist, Sweetie Belle is a professional singer, and Scootaloo is a Stuntsmare. Rainbow Dash is quite proud of the kid. Twilight shifted the thoughts of how things have changed out of her mind, and headed downstairs. The Doctor technically lives with her in the tree-house library (Which hasn't aged too well), but is usually found within his TARDIS, which is his time machine, usually found inside the tree-house. It's like a house inside a house. After a bunch of comments of the concept related to a movie about going deeper into dreams within dreams, Twilight felt she didn't want to live in Ponyville sometimes. She used her magic to activate the Television (They did eventually shorten the name) and see the news. It started up at the news, and the newspony was talking about youths who recently robbed multiple stores, and then found dead with some blade cutting through them. Twilight felt pretty uncomfortable with this, and changed the channel. The channel shifted to the next news channel, which had just finished talking about Sweetie Belle's next single. Twilight listened to the newspony announce the next topic. "In other news, a mass shooting took place somewhere in the woods, emulating an event that had happened to a group named the Ridley Gang, who were shot many years ago by townspeople, who later ignored the incident. The youths who had shot the victims have been taken into custody, and have been identified with blank looks on their faces." Twilight's curiosity raised. Was there a mind control going on? Or even a disease? She wasn't sure. She watched further. "Camera footage was procured, showing the events of the shootings. We warn you, this is rather graphic." Twilight wasn't sure she wanted to see this, but if she could see what was wrong, she would have an idea of some possibilities. The camera was a birds-eye-view at first, showing many ponies firing the recently developed 'firearms', and dying with blood spouting out. These were created for self defence, but, as Twilight had previously predicted, it would lead to new murder cases. Sometimes, the ones with best interests in mind cause pain and suffering to others... Twilight really wondered why this was. Unicorns could use these easy, with levitation, but Earth-Ponies and Pegasi had to have straps on their arms, and had to push a button on the side of the firearm in order to fire it. Probably why it's called a 'firearm.' The camera then cut to the ground, where someone holding the camera practically trotted freely along the woods. There really wasn't much to see except the occasional bullet passing by, and usually, Twilight only really heard that instead of seeing it. Then, the camera cut to a part of the woods which was much sunnier. She could see the shadow of the camerapony as the camera was lowered, which obscured where the camerapony was going. Suddenly, the camera dropped, and it was clear the camerapony was hit by a bullet, as a sound of it falling to the ground was heard. Twilight gasped as this suddenly happened, and at why the news channel would show this. Then, some humming was heard. She heard hoofsteps near the camera. A figure came into sight, and she practically screamed when she saw who it was. A farmer, with ghastly white make-up on his face. The lips were painted red, the edges falling downwards. The muzzle was painted red too. And he had a frizzy red balding. Worst of all, he cast no shadow at all. He looked to the camera, and Twilight's worst fears were confirmed. As soon as she looked into it's dancing blue, bloodshot eyes, she instantly knew what she was looking at. It grinned at the camera (or her) and walked off. The video ended, and the channel cut back to the newspony. Twilight quickly turned the Television off, then looked to her side. A new invention in the last thirty years... it's a sort of communicative device. They call it a Telephonical device. She instantly took it, and started calling her friends up. ________________________________________________________ TO BE CONTINUED
InvestigationsAs stated before, an investigation regarding Pennywise The Dancin' Clown transpired. A detective by the name of Noir Shade was called upon to question witnesses and anypony from the carnival. Happy Days told his side of the story, and so the detective added it to his notes. From the notes he received, and the examination of the corpse, he has determined that Pennywise is not a clown. That may be some sort of form it uses for familiarity. Either it's a changeling, or is just able to change its form, like a changeling. Elsewhere, a Manticore was wandering the woods. It was a weary manticore, not having much to do with any other forest dwellers. It found a tree stump, and sat there to have a rest. Sniffing the air for prey, it smelled something... this was a new scent, however... Out of apparently nowhere, a balloon appeared in front of it's face. It growled, and popped it with a nail. It popped, inexplicably covering its' face and the area surrounding the balloon with blood... It roared at the air, challenging what unfamiliar creature appeared to annoy it. A Timber-Wolf appeared in front of it, its mouth curled in a threatening grin, like a hyena. It was smaller that the Manticore, it should prove no problem. The Manticore stared in horror as the Timber-Wolfs' size grew, until the form resembled a creature definitely never seen before... the Manticore could not describe it if it could speak... the Manticore looked into the creature's glowing eyes, and died of shock. Feeding time. The Mane 6 were walking along Ponyville to the office of Noir Shade. It wasn't really his office, it was a small room they had availible in the Townhall he was offered. It was about a month after the incident, and after that time, a lot of younger residents found that some sort of hallucinatory clown fitting Pennywise's description was appearing before them, and would taunt them, sometimes with a monster attacking them at the end. This has happened with all the Mane 6, and they were going to Noir Shade's office for that reason. *Knock Knock* Noir looked up from his work, at the door. "Come in," He said, pleasantly. 6 ponies, lavender, pink, alabaster, orange, cyan and butter-yellow colours, entered the room. He recognized them as the Elements of Harmony. "Oh, good evening. What can I do for you?" He asked. "We'd like to report some... strange happenings to us throughout the month." The lavender mare, Twilight Sparkle, said. "I've been hearing a lot about these, and only a few of them told me of it. Nevertheless, any information you have might be helpful." "Okay..." Twilight began her story. -----Point of View: Twilight Sparkle----- Okay, umm, I'd gotten back from shopping one day, and I arrived at my treehouse. Spike told me that somepony came looking for a book. I went to check if the books were put in their proper place, because, well, I prefer them to be organized that way. And I found a book I hadn't noticed before. There wasn't a cover on it. I decided to open the book, and I found there were a lot of pictures, some of them illustrations drawn on the book, and others were messily taped on the page. Some of them were of various balloons, a few of those balloons had faces written on them, and sometimes even messages, but I couldn't make out what they were saying. All of the pictures were in black-and-white. I decided to look a bit further in the book, and I found pictures of that Pennywise clown you mentioned, at a lot of circuses, apparently performing. I'd taken a moment to ponder the possibilities that he was a performer before, and so I had taken my eyes off the book. When I looked back, most of the pictures had changed entirely. They were still Pennywise, except, what they were doing in the picture, had changed entirely... now, it seemed as if they were pointing at the other pictures of themselves... the one in the far right looked as if he was motioning for me to turn the page... I took a closer look at that picture, and for a moment, I thought he winked at me. Rubbing my eyes, I thought my uneasiness was playing tricks on me. I turned the page, and it was one big illustration. A balloon, in an overhead view of the crowd... then the picture started moving... the crowd was walking in the book, as if it was real life. The balloon started hovering closer to where the camera would have been... I stepped back, not liking this apparent magic... there would have been a scientific explanation if magic wasn't involved... then the balloon... it floated out of the book... and randomly popped... there was... blood all over me, and the book was empty... save for the fact it seemed to not just have blood all over it, but it seemed to be bleeding... I could swear I could hear laughter from elsewhere... I just looked at myself in horror. "Twilight, everything okay?" Spike called from downstairs. I didn't want to tell him that a... thing like that had basically taunted me... he's still young, I didn't want to scare him. "I'm fine, Spike!" I called back. I immediately levitated a cloth to my face, and wiped the blood off of it. I thought about the situation for a moment... I felt I should keep the book in the basement for a while. "I decided I should bring the book in today, though." Twilight said, reaching into her saddlebag, and levitated a brown book towards Noir. He checked the page Twilight left off of. There was so much of the blood dried out that it seemed like a pattern on the book. He put a hoof to his mouth for a moment, feeling like he was going to be sick, then cleared his throat. "Thank you for bringing it in... I guess..." He said, closing the book. "Anypony want to go next?" "I do." The pink mare, Pinkie Pie said. Noir hadn't noticed, but right now, she looked less colourful, and her mane and tail were straight. She cleared her throat and began her story, with a bitter edge in her voice. -----Point of View: Pinkie Pie----- (Author's notes: If you're squeamish or generally don't like anything relating to blood and guts... I suggest turning back now... there's a dark tag for a reason, you know. Although, I agree with one of the comments, we need a 'horror' tag.) Well, if you paid attention to Ponyville, you'll find that I'm the party pony of Ponyville. I like to throw parties, bake, and have fun... I'm not so happy right now as you've noticed... It technically visited me twice... it's okay if I call it It, right? Yeah. Okay. I was bouncing along to the shop I always go to when I need to get extra ingredients. The Cakes were busy with their foals, so I needed to get the ingredients, and I was happy to be doing that. I bounced along to that shop I was talking about, and requested the ingredients I needed. They had it in stock, fortunately, so I paid the requested bits, and they hoofed the ingredients to me in a paper bag. I thanked them, put the paper bag in my saddlebag. I turned around and... I saw Pennywise standing at the door, grinning and waving at me. "When's your next party?" It asked... "Don't forget to bring some balloons!" I stared at him, with my mouth agape. My legs were trembling. "Is something wrong?" The pony at the counter asked. I looked at him... couldn't he see It standing at the door? Was I going crazy? I looked back at Pennywise, and he had a bunch of balloons with him this time. "Here's some balloons for you in case you don't have enough for the party," He said, with a tone that sounded eerily friendly but unfamiliar, "They all... floooooaaaat..." He said, grinning once more, and his eyes... they changed colour into something monstrous... and his teeth... they were all really sharp looking, so sharp I wasn't surprised that he was capable of eating ponies the way he does... He then lets go of the string he was holding, and the balloons started floating towards me and the pony at the counter. She just looked at me with friendly concern, and she didn't let that expression leave her face...even has the balloon popped and blood was splattered all over her face. I just tried to tell myself that it was all probably some nightmare I was having over worry, and I told her in the best attempt of my cheery personality, "Nope, nothing's wrong!" I said, looking back to where It was... but he was gone. And a balloon popped up in front of me, and got blood all over my face too. I stopped myself from screaming, trying to remember, 'Giggle At The Ghostly.' It was really hard, because I wasn't sure if he was a Ghostly, or if he was really there... I did the best giggle I could, and felt most of my fears wash away. I then just walked back to Sugarcube Corner. Not bouncing, not running. Just walking. I got to the kitchen, and put the paper bag on the table. I decided to check what was in it, taking the contents out of the bag, one by one. Yep, I got what I needed alright. I put the ingredients on the table, and I thought I'd make some cupcakes to cheer myself up. I looked in some drawers and got the baking equipment I needed. I put them elsewhere on the table, and I looked back at the ingredients, I had no choice but to put two hooves to my mouth, and put on the best laughs I could... There were... organs. Literally, there were pony organs where I placed the ingredients. And they looked like they were still working... I saw a heart beating, lungs inflating and deflating, there was even an bloodied eyeball, staring back at me. I looked up from them, and... Pennywise was standing at the door again, with that grin on Its' face. "Hi there, Pinkie Pie. Seems you and I have similar taste." It said, laughing. I just wasn't sure if I could laugh anymore... I just shook my head in disbelief, and I felt my mane and tail deflate into straightness. I heard hoofsteps come from upstairs, heading downstairs. Mrs. Cake walked through the door, and I felt I was gonna be called a cannibal... again... "Oh, hello, Pinkie, did you get the ingredients?" She asked. I just stared at her as she walked past Pennywise, in disbelief. "Oh, there they are. Thank you for getting them, dearie. Life gets harder when you're a mother, I guess!" She continued, picking up the heart that she believed to be bread. She squeezed it a little bit, checking to make sure it was soft enough... that just squirted blood in her face... she didn't notice that either. I put a hoof to my mouth, I felt I was gonna be sick... I looked at Pennywise, who was cackling, and saying lame jokes, about someone named 'Albert' in a can, and how we should let him out... "Well, all the ingredients are fine, Pinkie. Thanks again! By the way, I like your new mane-style, looks really good." I just nodded in disbelief, as Mrs. Cake walked back upstairs. I looked back to Pennywise... It squeezed Its' red muzzle like it was a real clown nose. "Beep, beep, Pinkie! Come back any time! I'll show ya how to floooooooaaaat..." It began, dragging 'float' on for a few seconds, "They all, floooooooaaaaat down here!" I closed my eyes, shaking my head. When I opened my eyes, It was gone, but the ingredients were still organs... I ran to the bathroom and vomited... ____________________________________________________ End of Chapter...
Flashbacks Pt. 2"But I'm alright... as long as my dear sister Sweetie Belle is..." Rarity finished her story. "Where is she now?" Noir asked. "At home, sleeping. Pennywise hasn't visited again all this time, so she said she would be safe." "Alright. Who wants to go next?" He asked anypony. "Ah do." The mare in the Stetson said. -----Point of View: Applejack----- One day, Ah was outside th' farm, applebuckin' the trees. After finishin' one, Ah started t'go to another one, then Ah tripped on somethin'. Ah figured it was a rock, so after gettin' up, Ah took a look't it. Looked more like a rotten apple. Ah didn't wan' it so close to our farm, so Ah picked it up, an' threw it real far. Noddin' with pride, Ah continued t'walk to the next tree. Ah tripped again. Ah took a look't it, it was another rotten apple. Ah looked to the ground, mainly to the direction the tree was at. Ah didn't see any after this one, so Ah threw the apple away, jest like the other one. Ah turned to face the tree, and walked to it... an' Ah tripped a third time. Ah was just mad an' confused now. Ah saw there wasn't any rotten apples after that one, so why was there another one? Ah looked aroun' t'see if anypony was playin' tricks on me. And then Ah saw that Pennywise clown y'all talked about. He was sittin' on a tree stump that weren't there before, examinin' a rotten apple, jus' like the other three, then throwin' it away, as if he wasn't aware of mah presence... Ah could tell he was, 'cause he turned his head t'look at me. His smile turned to a grin, an' he waved his hoof at me. "Hi. Nice accent," He said, "By the way... lovely apples, I must say." Ah scowled at him. Ah heard some sorta crack from mah bag carryin' th' apples, as if somethin' was openin' inside it. Ah looked in, an' some of them were revealed t'have things inside 'em. There was a bloody eye, cockroaches, tongues, some sorta weird pink paw with nails, an' a beak, openin' and closin' as if it were tryin' to breathe. Ah ran back into th' farmhouse. Ah felt ah was still a bit tired, an' ah was havin' some sorta daymare or somethin'. Ah heard to voices come from upstairs. "Howdy, sir. What can we do ya for?" Came Applebloom's voice. "We don' have extra make-up if that's what yer needin'." Make-up? Ah was dreadin' the fact it was probable he went and visited mah sister in th' time I was occupied with mah ruined apples. "Heh, heh, you're a funny kid," Speak'a the devil... Literally... "I came here for some food." Ah wasn' gonna let him eat mah sister, ah started gallopin' upstairs. As Ah opened th' door, Ah was just'n time t'see Applebloom backin' away from that clown. Ah rushed at him, and went t' applebuck him in th' flank. He stepped forward, and looked back at me, with that monstrous look on 'is face. Its' eyes started glowin' as his grin got wider. Ah couldn't look away. Mah chest started gettin' more n' more painful, as if mah heart was gonna explode. Ah was then knocked over by somepony. Ah clutched mah chest, and looked back t'where Pennywise was, but he was gone. "Sis..." Ah heard Applebloom's voice whisper, "You okay?" "B-been better..." Ah replied. "Ditto..." She responded. Ah looked back at her... and the devilish monster'd taken a bite at mah sister's foreleg... "The doctors say that she'll survive... the bite didn't take a chunk of it at least..." Applejack said, finishing her story. "As long as she's okay, I guess..." Noir Shade said, rubbing his head in his hooves, feeling very stressed after all the stories so far. "I guess that leaves us with Fluttershy..." "O-oh... U-u-um... ...Okay..." She began her story, now trying her best not to stutter. -----Point of View: Fluttershy----- It was me and Rarity's Spa Day, the time we use to speak to each other while making use of the treatments at the Ponyville Spa. We were in the hot springs, and she was just finished telling me the story she'd told to you, as my encounter had happened after hers. "O-oh my... that's so horrible..." I murmured in shock. "It is..." She replied. "I'm so worried about Sweetie Belle, despite her insistence that she will be fine... maybe I'm starting to realize more of how precious life can be..." "W-well... it seems to be over now, at least..." I said, trying to keep things calm, before moving to the bad news... which... I probably should have said first... oh, dear... I'll just... continue... "I-it's not just you, though... I was told by Twilight that had happened to her. S-she also told me that Lyra, Bon-Bon, Pipsqueak, Featherweight, Roseluck and Snowflake have encountered him..." I didn't mention that Pinkie had told me what happened to her, because I Pinkie Promised not to tell anypony, since Pinkie wanted to tell them when she was ready. "Oh, dear... will it ever end?" "I hope so..." "...I can't take it anymore, I need to check on Sweetie Belle!" Rarity said desperately. "You don't mind my leaving, do you?" "Oh, n-not at all... do what you need to do..." I replied, nodding. "Thank you... I promise I shall stay all the way the next time! Goodbye, Fluttershy." She said, before rushing out of the water, and getting most of the place a bit wet... I relaxed in the springs for a moment, before getting out. I went to go and have a shower. After turning it on, I stood under it, washing my coat and my mane. I could hear the shower running, but it had stopped pouring the water on me. I looked up, and noticed it extended... I walked under it again, not taking advantage of it still running, I was still wondering why it wasn't where it was before... "It's okay, Flutters..." I heard a distorted voice, coming from the drain. I gasped, immediately heading to the wall. "Hi. I just wanted to say... Hellloo." I thought I heard him mutter something about others not usually running this fast, then chuckling to himself. "Hot enough up there for ya, is it? Maybe I should try the springs!" As he was saying this, he was lifting the drain, a white gloved hoof opening it, and throwing it to the side, so there was a little circular hole in the middle of the room. "This is a little inconvenient... just hold on, while I make a few... adjustments," the voice continued, with two hooves gripping the hole, and pushing it, making it longer, and wider. The source of the hooves pulled himself up, and... I think it's fairly obvious who appeared... "Here I am, Flutters!" Pennywise exclaimed. I squeaked in fear. He grinned, and rested his head on his hoof. "There's no good in trying to run, Scaredy-mare. I'll be there, even in your nightmares!" He said, with a terrifying amount of sinister cheerfulness. "So I'll see you in your dreams! Oh, and come back any time. If I may make a suggestion... bring some friends with you. Seven's a party!" He said, grinning, before his eyes had changed to orange, and his teeth became sharp spikes, as he growled and laughed at me. I rubbed my eyes, to see if I was just imagining things... for a second, I thought I was... he was gone. I sighed, relieved. But I was very curious in this state. So I gingerly tip-toed to the hole-turned-chasm, and looked down it... it was pitch black down th- "AGH!" I screamed, stepping back, as fire suddenly blasted out of the chasm. I heard a very familiar roar emerge from it. It was... a... "A d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-DRAGON!" I screamed, galloping out of the spa quickly, not bothering to see anypony's reactions to my wet coat and mane. I managed to get home, where I stopped at the door and closed it behind me, looking back at Angel Bunny, my favourite pet, who looked relieved to see me, and saddened of something that had happened. "Angel Bunny? What's wrong?" Angel made a motion that meant I was to follow him. He went out of the door, and I followed. We found some of the other woodland animals cradling injured children, and some burying them... I fainted. Fluttershy looked down at the ground after the story was finished, and did her best to stop herself from crying. *Knock Knock* "...Er... who's at the door?" Noir asked. A head poked through the door, belonging to a blue stallion with pure blue eyes and a short brown mane. "Err. Hi. I came to report someth-" He said, before noticing the Elements of Harmony, momentarily pausing, probably from not expecting them to be there, before looking back at Noir. "Err... sorry. I'll come back later." "Wait just a moment," Noir said. "Are you here because you believe you saw Pennywise?" "Y-yeah. My name is Live Light..." _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ AUTHOR'S NOTES To those who have seen my other fic, The Recluse, this is a different fic from that one, and the events from this version will be entirely different than that of The Recluse. Though, it may be referenced. _________________________________________________________________ End of chapter...
Visitor"Very well," Noir Shade said to Live Light, "You can come in. I think I can bear one more story. As long as it's not too gruesome, anyway." "Alright..." Light said, entering the room, then looking to the Mane 6, then looked sort of nervous. "Err... Where do I sit?" "There's a seat over there," He pointed to an unoccupied seat, a bit away from the Mane 6. Light nodded, trotted over to it, and sat on it. He looked to Pinkie Pie for a bit, and gave a bit of a wave. Pinkie, still looking depressed with her mane and tail straight, gave a wave with a sad smile regardless. "*Psst...* You know each other?" Rainbow whispered to Pinkie. "I'll tell you all about it later," she replied. "Okay, Live Light, tell me about yourself," Noir began, taking a notepad out of his jacket, "Where do you live?" "Well... I live in a bit of a bleak house, with my adopted son, 7 years old." He replied. "Married?" "No." "And how long have you been in the house?" "...Few years, give or take." "Anything you used to do?" "Well... I used to help Pinkie Pie with some of her parties. That's... pretty much it." "He's a writer, too." Pinkie Pie added. "...Yeah, and that." Light nodded. "Alright then..." Noir said, after noting all that down. "So... want to share what happened?" -----Point of View: Live Light----- Alright. So, I was writing down notes about a novel idea I'd finally come up with. 'The Impossible Corpse.' Basically, it's about a sort of corpse... belonging to a murderer... and it doesn't decompose. Still working on it. Anyway, I was writing down notes for that. My adopted son, Tyler, entered the room. "Dad, I'm gonna go to sleep now," he informed me, "Goodnight." "'Night, Tyler." I replied, smiling and nodding to him. He went to his room, to go sleep. After finishing with the notes, I decided I'd call it a night. I was currently upstairs in the house, and my bed happened to be in the same room as my workplace. I walked over to it, and threw the covers over the bed. I decided to check how dark it was outside, so I walked over to the window, and opened the curtains. It was really dark, it seemed, because I couldn't see anything out there. Just blackness. I thought about it for a while, and thought that while it was possible, that's never happened to me before. I got a flashlight, and shined it on the window. It turned to a lighter shade, and from that, it seemed as if the colour was moving... I tapped at the window with my hoof. It wasn't that it was really dark, it was that it was covered by things... things that I don't like at all. And those things were hornets. I don't remember there being hornets in Ponyville. Although, that's probably because I hardly ever go outside. After I had tapped the window, the hornets buzzed off of the window momentarily, where I could see the rest of Ponyville, and it was indeed dark, but not as dark as the hornets made me think. To be exact, it's not just hornets that frighten me. It's really any small thing that has the capabilities of stinging. That's why I try to stay away from bees, wasps, hornets, crabs, I even think that the spiders that don't bite are gonna bite me. It's always the small things. It was a really disgusting sight, seeing all those hornets at once. And now, after I had disturbed them, they were throwing themselves at the window, apparently trying to break it. I quickly covered the windows with the curtains, hoping they'd forget about it and move away. Well, they stopped attacking the window at least. I decided to take a moment to look outside again. It was a natural darkness for Ponyville. The hornets seemed to have cleared off rather quickly... I heard Tyler yell in fear, and his hoofsteps were getting closer to my room. I waited until he entered the door, then I quickly threw myself at the door and tried to keep it closed, as if the hornets were trying to get through again. "Tyler... what's wrong? Hornets?" I asked, assuming they were really there. "N-no... well, kind of... there's a giant insect creature trying to get me." I just blinked. I wasn't sure if it was worth believing him, the only strange thing with this situation is that hornets don't usually entirely cover windows. I heard a heavy knock at the door. I yelped. I looked through the door's peep-hole. ...There was... a giant hornet... and it was standing on hind legs... and it looked ready to kill. "...Tyler..." I whispered, my voice shaking, "Go hide in the closet... everything's gonna be okay..." He nodded, and quietly went to hide in the closet. After a few minutes, I looked through the peephole again... It was gone... I didn't hear any hoof- ...Footsteps in this case. I stopped leaning at the door, and stood in front of it. I inhaled, then slowly turned the knob to open it. When I opened it, there was a clown standing there. The one mentioned in the circus. He wasn't grinning at me, not even smiling. He just looked at me with a blank expression, almost one of disappointment. I stared at Pennywise for a moment. I thought for a moment he was just waiting to see if I'd react before he tried to cannibalize me or something. And then he just started talking about things. "You know... I never meant to go here." He told me. I narrowed an eye in confusion. Did he mean he didn't mean to go to my house or to go to Ponyville? "To be honest, I would have preferred much if I'd kept my original template," He continued. "Switching from hind to equine is a little uncomfortable." And now I was just pretty sure he was delusional. "You don't have to think me delusional," He said, as if reading my mind, "It's merely predator's instinct." He grinned as he said this. "Your fear of stings... gave me a lot of time to think of how to use it... nice one." "...You..." I began, "released the hornets?" "Oh, sure. And I released the giant hornet man," he said with obvious sarcasm in that creepy voice. "Look behind you." He said suddenly. I'm not sure why I did... but I looked behind me. I saw nothing out of the ordinary. I looked back, and there was a big balloon in front of me. It popped. And... I had a really bloody coat after that. Pennywise cackled maniacally at this. "Made you look!" I just got mad and punched him in the face... and... well... I actually hit him, and he fell back, not moving. I backed away. And I closed the door. I looked through the peephole. He disappeared. That's never a good sign. I heard my notepad's pages flickering. I took a look at it. I then looked at a picture of the place-holder character I put in some pages. I like to call this character Mr. Hop. It's a little cute bunny. If I can never think of a good novel idea, I always make a story about Mr. Hop, and his innocent way of life, and all the people he meets. Although, they're usually too short for my liking, or too happy for my taste. Well, he seemed to have animated himself, hopping around happily. Then a clown drawing, resembling Pennywise... as one of those fictional creatures, called humans, enters the picture, and his drawing becomes deformed until he turned into some sort of Timber-Wolf, and viciously eats the innocent fictional rabbit. Animated blood comes out... and it turns into real blood, leaking out of the notepad. I watched in horror as my sign of innocence got mauled and devoured. After the remains are all eaten, the Timber-Wolf turns back into human-Pennywise, rubbing what I presume is his stomach, then looking at me, grinning maliciously. He starts to walk towards me, as if the drawing were really a camera, but stops when you could only see his head and his apparent shoulders. He starts to apparently write something, then sticks it in front of him, effectively replacing the picture I drew of Mr. Hop with the following letters... 'I.O.U' I look out the window, and see him walking away, in pony form. He looks directly at me, and waves, before walking off, nopony apparently noticing him. "And... that... is my story." Light finished. Twilight looked skeptical, yet worried. Rainbow Dash looked confused. Rarity looked unnerved. Applejack looked uncomfortable. Pinkie Pie looked extremely worried. Fluttershy had her hoof to her mouth, looking worried and sympathetic. "So... he's a shape-shifter then," Noir decided. "...Wait, what?" Light asked. "He probably as the ability to change form," Noir replied, "He didn't send the hornets, or the mutated hornet. He was probably the hornets the whole time. He was practically demonstrating this to you in your notepad." "But... why?" Light enquired, confused. "Remember how he'd written I.O.U? My guess is that he decided that he wasn't finished with you. Obviously, he's finished with no one, but he has something very special in store for you. And before you ask, I'm not sure." Light looked extremely uncomfortable at this notion. "...Well... what now?" "I think you and your son should be moved to another pony's house," Noir replied, "At least until we can figure out his... IT's motives." "Oh... okay." Light reluctantly agreed. "Err... so... Pinkie, should I go with you?" "No... I'd like to be alone for now... If you understand anyway..." She replied. "Yeah... who should I stay with though?" "Well... maybe Fluttershy could take you." She suggested. "...Okay." "U-um... are y-you alright with that?" Fluttershy asked. "...I guess. Are you?" Light asked her. "Oh, I-i don't mind." "...Okay then." End of Chapter...
JournalPENNYWISE CHAPTER 6 Fluttershy, followed by Light and his son, Tyler, walk over to her cottage. She wasn't too sure who Light was at this point, but he's obviously been through a lot. She's rather kind. Maybe too kind. "W-we're here..." Fluttershy said, as they arrived at the cottage. Light and Tyler looked around them, with amazed looks on their faces, admiring the plants, the grass, and all the animals around it. "It's simply beautiful..." Light said. "O-oh... really?" Fluttershy asked, blushing a little. "Yeah, it's awesome!" Tyler replied. "What he said." Light added. "T-thank you both..." They all went inside the cottage. They were quite impressed with everything from the inside as well. All the nice furniture, decorations, and the place smelled good too. "You have a really nice house, Miss Fluttershy!" Tyler said. Light seemed to be spending a lot of time walking around the place, examining every bit of the place. When he was finished, "Yep, very nice indeed!" "Thanks again..." Fluttershy said. Noir Shade's Journal Day 33, Entry 1 New information about Pennywise the Clown has been very helpful. From what I've gathered, he is not equine in nature at all, and is, in fact, a being that perhaps no definitive shape or form. As I thought, it uses the appearance and personality of a clown as a sort of method of familiarity. From Live Light's encounter, the clown was originally not a pony shape. Perhaps the fact it chose to identify itself as the fictional species of 'humans' means that it comes from a world where humans are real, or it merely likes this form due to the unfamiliarity. However, I'm going to go with the former, as it doesn't explain why he can't become a human clown at this point. A slight bit of testament to the creature not being equine in origin is a new victim we've found, in the Everfree Forest. While looking for a possible den for It to hide in, detectives found the remains of a Manticore, torn up in a way nopony has seen, yet similar to how Cobalt Royale ended up. Anypony claimed by this creature were not just victims. They were prey. Soon after the Elements of Harmony (and Light) left, a balloon appeared beside me and popped (with nothing splattered onto me). Aside from hearing mocking laughter from somewhere, nothing else seemed to have happened to me. Seems to me It's trying to test me. The Mane 6 were at Sugarcube Corner, discussing recent events. Everypony around them noticed how different they seemed since It came to Ponyville. Strands of hair were sticking up in Twilight Sparkle's mane, Applejack had been bucking trees with only the most perfect of apples, Rarity's boutique was doing much less, Rainbow seemed to stay grounded a bit more than usual, Pinkie Pie's mane and tail were still as straight as the time she thought her friends abandoned her, and Fluttershy seemed somewhat fidgety. "I simply can't find the time to work on dresses at the boutique," Rarity began, "I'm too worried about Sweetie Belle to continue work..." "I'm not usually this paranoid..." Rainbow said, "Same here." Applejack said. "I'm not sure what to say..." Twilight began, "This creature just defies all matter of logical explanation... it's like he was created to annoy us." "Or frighten us." Pinkie said. "Worked so far." "Well, you coulda tried giggling at the ghostly, right?" Rainbow asked. "Remember what I said about it being hard to tell if It was a ghostly or not? Try to remember, next time you ask a question with an obvious answer." Pinkie replied, with an irritated tone to her voice. Rainbow flinched. "...I'm sorry, Dashie..." She offered, "I just feel really useless, nowadays..." "It's alright, Pinkie," Rainbow replied, accepting her apology. "So, Fluttershy, how are your guests?" Rarity asked Fluttershy. "Oh... they're fine," She replied, "Tyler's very nice, and Light's fine too... when we see him." "What do you mean?" Twilight asked. "Well... I gave him permission to work in solitude, inside one of my sheds." She explained. "Did we ever get rid of all the... 'decorations'... your impostor left one day?" Pinkie glumly asked. "I helped with that," Twilight explained. "Never know when a changeling is gonna take somepony's place, I guess..." "Anyway..." Fluttershy continued, "He studies in there a lot, mostly on his novel. But he does come around when I serve dinner." "Well... as long as his son trusts 'im, he should be fine." Applejack said. Fluttershy nodded in agreement. Noir Shade's Journal Day 36, Entry 1 We got another complaint today, from a stallion called Haystack. He said something about It taking the form of his father, and taunting him. It followed him, telling him things like, "You remind me of someone I know..." and proceeded to call him things like 'Fat Boy,' wondering if he had 6 other friends in a group named 'The Losers' Club', and commenting how nice it would be to have a little reunion. Eventually, Haystack apparently eluded him, but was unsure where It knows him from... perhaps an equal from his world? End of Chapter...
The Next StrikePENNYWISE CHAPTER 7 ____________________________________________________________ Happy Days. Exactly what the eponymous, lonely clown wished for. He'd considered doing written works, like novels, instead of the physical comedy clowns needed. He felt he wasn't that good of a writer. His descriptions of things isn't as good as he'd like. He'd find it easier if he was talking about nonsensical things, and people are probably too old to find that appealing or entertaining. Plus, he felt his name would be vaguely creepy... Funny Bones... He was still in his make-up. He wasn't sure why. Walking through some fields, he came across the sight of Ponyville. For the past 36 days, he had been living in a hotel, partly in fear of the killer clown, and partly of depression. However, he felt as though he needed to do something about this, after a long time for thought, and so returned to Ponyville to see if he could find Pennywise. He entered Ponyville, and, after shopping for a while, decided to move back into his old house. He took a look at it. It was a relatively small house, but it was home. It was bright green, with yellow linings, and wide windows. He began to walk into the door. Suddenly, blue hermit pegasus. He was tackled to the ground by a pegasus, a blue one. He was then turned around so his back was on the ground. The blue pegasus looked him over, then looked a bit shocked for a moment. "Oh, sorry sir..." He apologized, "I thought you were... somepony else..." Happy was reminded he still had his clown make-up on. "Let me guess... Pennywise?" He asked. "Yeah... he's visited a lot of townsponies, and practically intimidating them." "How so?" "Well... ..." The pegasus looked a bit bothered, "...You wouldn't believe me if I told you..." "If the whole town thinks what you're thinking, hopefully it's a bit different than that Zecora thing that happened." Happy said, shrugging, before getting up. "What's he doing?" "Okay, well... he turns into what scares ponies, and frightens them." "..." "..." "..." "..." "I like that way of thinking, usually, but that's just disturbing," Happy finally said. "What d'you mean?" Light asked. "Well, I always wanted to be an author, and write some weird, funny stories. I opted for being a clown instead. Writing just wasn't for me, I guess." "I see... so... do you believe us or not?" "Well..." Happy looked momentarily thoughtful, "It sounds a bit weird, but I don't -not- believe you. I mean, he did eat someone as if he was some animal predator." "Right... anyway, I'll introduce myself..." The blue pegasus began, "I'm Live Light. What's your name?" "Funny Bones. But call me Happy Days. It's my clown name." Noir Shade's Journal Day 37 In the few days that have transpired, hardly any appearance from It has happened so far. Happy Days, the clown that I questioned on the events surrounding Cobalt Royale's death has returned to Ponyville. After a rough greeting from Live Light, he now lives in his house, alone. I gave him a greeting sometime yesterday. I confirmed with him the information surrounding Its' supernatural nature. He just nodded, and tried not to think much of it. Probably from this already being shared with him by Light. Still waiting for a sign... All I've received are balloons. Pipsqueak. Moved from Trottingham to Ponyville. Wore a pirate suit to his first ever Nightmare Night. He is perhaps one of the main reasons for saving Nightmare Night from almost being permanently cancelled. Now fearing for his life. His parents tell him that it will all be fine. The Clown won't come for him. He doesn't know him. It was night time, of the 37th day. He breathed shallowly, looking around the dark room, with only his lamp and a flash-light as a source of light. He listened to the sounds outside that surround the house. He heard owls hooting, crickets chirping, and wings fluttering. *Crunch* *Crunch* He heard two sounds... they were in the rhythm of a pony using two of their hooves to walk, but it sounded nothing like hooves touching the ground. He inhaled sharply, but quietly. He heard those steps again, but four of them, this time. Something heavy hit the ground. A few seconds later, it sounded as if a record were inserted into a player. Circus music... The Clown was outside his house... He heard the crunching, a little more fast paced, combined with sounds of the air being cut through... his imagination told him he was performing acrobatic tricks to an invisible audience... possibly to attract youths such as himself. Pipsqueak shut his eyes, and imagined the happiest music he knew. The Circus music outside stopped. He could vaguely hear some dark chuckling. He kept the music in his head, hoping it could let him think less of the situation. He could hear the doorknob for his house's entrance turn, and the door eventually opened. The floorboards slowly creaked, dragging out for a long time with every step the presence took. His eyes looked around, but he kept imagining the music. Soon, the stairs began creaking too, each creak getting closer as It ascended. His breathing quickened slightly. The presence was near. The creak had reached upstairs. I'm on the Top of the World lookin' down on creation & the only explanation I can find... It got closer to his bedroom door. Is the love that I've found ever since you've been around Your love's put me at the top of th- *Knock Knock* "..." Pipsqueak didn't answer. "Pip?" Came the voice of Sweetie Belle. "... Sweetie Belle?" Pipsqueak replied in his Trottingham accent, quietly, but loud enough for Sweetie to hear. "Can I come in? Please?" She asked. "...Uh... okay." He slowly and quietly got out of bed, tip-hoofing to the door, and looked through the peephole. Nopony there... He was suddenly tackled, and being held to the ground with a white gloved hoof to his throat. It was The Clown. He felt his breath leaving him. "I'm impressed, Pipsqueak..." It spoke, "Your fear is... exquisite." Pipsqueak punched the ground a couple of times, trying to make a noise. He wasn't sure if his parents had heard or not. The Clown's head got closer, and It opened his mouth to feast. The door opened abruptly, and Pipsqueak's parents ran in and tackled The Clown. It overpowered them both, and held them both to the wall by their throats. "Well, this is a little strange..." He comments, "Not a lot of adults have ever believed in me before... this could be quite the party..." Pipsqueak looked to his parents. His father pointed his hoof in the opposite direction of Pipsqueak. He shook his head. His father narrowed his eye, silently telling him he was serious about this. Pipsqueak shed a tear, and ran out of the house. Noir Shade's Journal Day 38 It struck again, after the long wait... It attacked Pipsqueak, the small colt who is best known for preventing the cancellation of Nightmare Night. He said 'The Clown' had pretended to be Sweetie Belle in order to get his attention, and then attempted to strangle him. His mother and father came to save him, but his father told him to run. This is the last he's seen of them so far. No bodies were found. This leads me to believe they are still alive somewhere, as Pennywise hasn't left any remains at the scene. There are, unfortunately, no leads to their whereabouts. Happy Days is currently looking after Pipsqueak. Pipsqueak also mentioned something about It saying something about how adults usually don't believe in him. Some thought about this will be needed. In other news, I received a red balloon. It had text written on it, asking me if I was enjoying this investigation... ________________________________________________________________________ End of Chapter...
SnowponyPENNYWISE CHAPTER 8 ________________________________________________________ Noir Shade's Journal Day 39 Strange occurrence today... I found officers barging into Sweet Apple Acres, and dragging Caramel Apple out. The only thing I forgave about this was the fact he was wearing clown make-up. It was obviously not him, as we've established Pennywise assumes multiple forms. I tried to reason with the officers taking him, but they seemed to disregard me, except for one who pushed me away. I was able to commandeer their prison chariot and take them to headquarters. When I looked inside the confinement section of the chariot, everypony except for Caramel had not a clear idea where they were or what they were doing. Now that I think of it, I didn't recognize any of them as employed officers. I questioned Caramel about what he was doing in clown make-up. He claimed that there was some sort of balloon in his face before it happened. He couldn't explain the part of how he put the actual baggy suit on, however. It seems Pennywise may be capable of influencing others somehow... in any case, I let him go. Today, I got three balloons at the same time, the entire message reading, 'I'm sure you've noticed, I look good in another one's skin, Haven't tried yours' Pinkie glumly walked across Ponyville. She heard about what happened to Pipsqueak. As she wanted to try to make the others smile again, she decided to pay him a visit. She took a look at his old house. It was sealed off for further investigation. She looked to his current residence, the house belonging to local clown Happy Days. She sighed, and walked to it, knocking on the door. After a while, Happy Days answered the door. At least, she thought it was him. He'd washed his clown make-up off. "Oh. Hello, Pinkie Pie," He greeted, "Bit surprised to have a visitor..." "Yeah... err... I know it sounds weird, but... is it okay if I see Pipsqueak?" She asked. "Well... not sure, he's a bit uneasy at the moment... and how do I know you're n-" "If you're not sure about me, you can be in the same room. I understand." Happy thought for a moment. Nowadays, nopony was trustworthy. But if she's fine with him being in the same room... "...Okay. He's upstairs." He said, widening the door, "Come in." "Thanks..." Pinkie thanked, walking in. The interior looked rather clean, the sort of clean you find in a house that was recently cleaned... he did only come back some days ago. There were hardly any pictures, and despite the cleanliness, most of the interior seemed empty and dull. "Err... your mane looks good..." He offered. "Really...? I don't like it... thanks, though..." She replied, "Uh... you look nice without your make-up... less unfamiliar." She nodded, before going upstairs. Happy followed after. Pinkie opened the door to Pipsqueak's room. He was tucked in a bed, wide awake, looking at a televisional device that was paused at the opening titles. The title read 'The Snowpony.' Pinkie smiled a little. One of her favourite films, despite being 26 minutes long. She remembered what she came here for soon enough, and looked to Pipsqueak, who was now looking at her, curious as to why she was here. "...Hi, Pip," Pinkie said, "How you doin'?" "...Well, I've been better, but... I feel safe during the day, at least," He replied with his Trottingham accent. "Understandable," Pinkie said, now noticing Pip was kind of curious as to why she's now using big words that aren't made up, and continued, "Given what's going on... I'm not feeling my usual self. I'm sure you can tell by the way my mane is..." Pip nodded, even though he thought it was rather nice himself. "So, Miss Pie," Pip began, "What can I do for you?" "Well... I know it wasn't a pleasant experience, but... could you tell me what happened when It visited?" She asked. "...You mean The Clown?" "Yeah... The Clown..." He sighed, and looked thoughtful. Pinkie thought he wasn't going to go through with it for a moment. "...Well..." He began, "He came around at my house, after placing a record player on the ground, and then inserting a record with circus music in it... the music was cheery... but eerily haunting... I thought of the music that made me happy... and almost as if he could hear it too, he went in my house... I think he noticed my fear..." "He started walking over to my house rather slowly... and assumed the form and voice of Sweetie Belle in order to trick me to open the door... he got in anyway, though... and my parents came in to stop him... that's when my father made me run, and I never saw them after that..." Pinkie thought for a little bit... "Did It say anything to you or your parents that was a little... interesting?" She asked. "Well... something he said that was a little confusing was when he said that usually, not a lot of adults have usually believed in him..." He replied. Pinkie looked thoughtful for a moment. That was very confusing. She thought back to her encounter with It... She remembered how, for some reason, Mrs. Cake, who was practically her aunt, had ignored the fact there was blood all over the place, and even held up a beating heart, thinking it was bread... and the first thing It ate was a child... And considering the town has seen a lot of creatures other than themselves, also finding the Nightmare Moon story to be real, most of them probably believe in the impossible... but some don't... "...I think I have it figured out, a little..." Pinkie said. "What is it?" Happy Days asked. "Well..." Pinkie began, before looking back at Pipsqueak, "I think we should discuss it outside Pip's hearing..." Happy gave her a questioning look, but she went out of the door, and he followed. "Well?" He asked, "What have you figured out?" Pinkie nodded, before speaking, "It seems that It takes the form of what scares the others so that they're afraid when they're eaten... but it's one of the things that has to be seen to be believed... and the ones who don't believe it can't see it anyway... this is usually what happens with adults. It could eat adults, but usually, hardly any of them would believe it. This isn't a problem with children. This, combined with the knowledge that everypony tastes better to it when afraid, and children are usually more afraid of things than older ponies, tells us that It prefers to eat the youngest foals it can find. It's only a preference, though." Happy looked uncomfortable with the thought, but nodded to show he understood. "Would explain his attack patterns so far..." He said, "I wonder why he was torturing everypony else, though..." "Probably so we'd be afraid. And I think everypony's brave enough to admit it's working..." Pinkie replied. Happy nodded. "Should we tell the authorities about this?" He asked. "Yeah. Would be best," Pinkie said, "...Can we wait for a moment though?" "Why?" "Well, Pip's watching something I haven't seen in a while... I'd like to see it too. It always used to make me happy if things went wrong." "Well..." Happy thought for a moment, "Okay then." Pinkie grinned as much as she could (Only a little), and walked into the room, with Happy following. Pinkie walked over to Pip. "Hey, Pip... are you watching The Snowpony?" She asked. "Well... I might... not sure if I want to, though..." He replied. "It's one of my favourite films... you wouldn't mind un-pausing that, would you?" Pip took a look at the screen, still at the titles, then back to Pinkie. "Alright then." He reached for his film player's remote, which was connected to it with a wire, and pressed the play button. The film started up, and Pinkie sat on the floor, looking directly at the televisional device's screen. A family sat at a lake, watching the birds fly freely, the fishes swim swiftly, and the sky's colours reflecting off the water. The sun glowed brightly. The family consisted of a mother, father, daughter and son. This was a thing they'd do on the weekends. Enjoy the outdoors. They loved the outdoors. "Alright, time to take a picture!" Dad said. "Alright!" The Son said. He, his sister and his mother ran to the edge of the lake. The Dad placed a stand on the ground, placed the camera on it, and set it to take a picture in 5 seconds. He then ran next to the group. The photo clicked. Pinkie watched as the Snowpony took off to fly with the little colt. She loved that scene, it reminded her of how nice it would be to fly, or at least have some sort of golem of snowy awesomeness that could fly without wings, just with pure magic. Her coat began to have a brighter saturation of pink, and her straight mane began to have strands of hair sticking out. As well as that, her grin had gotten a lot bigger. She was humming to the song. After the flight sequence, she grinned happily when Pony Claus appeared, and giggled as the group of snowponies danced, memories flooding back to her. She went back to a happy smile as the colt and the snowpony hugged each other after they'd flown home. And she shed a tear as morning came, and the snowpony had melted, the colt gradually realizing that it wasn't a dream, when he looked at the scarf Pony Claus had given him. Her mane and tail was now all frizzy and messy, as usual. She sighed. "I love this little cartoon," She said. She looked to Pip, "Thanks for letting me watch it again." "No problem, Miss Pinkie. Glad to see you're your usual self again!" He replied. "Yeah, probably won't last, but we'll see!" Pinkie said. "Well, see ya, Pip!" She said, bouncing out of the room. Happy followed. "So, you gonna be okay?" He asked. "For a while. Still pretty bummed about you-know-what, but as long as nothing gets thrown at my face too soon, I'll be fine long enough to make others happy! Not sure if I should throw a party, though. It could ruin anything!" She replied. "I guess. Should I tell Noir about the thing you thought up and you can do what you do best?" "Good idea! See you around, Happy!" She said, before out the door. Happy sighed. Pinkie Pie then came back, walking through the door. "By the way," she began, "I don't know your real name, just your clown name. Wanna share?" "It's Funny Bones." He replied. "Hm... that could be a clown name too. Anyway, why do you wanna be called Happy Days instead of your real name?" "Ehh... Funny Bones reminds me too much of my heritage. Won't talk about it." "Okie-dokie-lokie! But really, you should use your real name more often. Everypony will like you for who you really are! Well, I better go now. Bye!" She said, before zipping out of sight. Happy looked confused for a moment, wondering where she went, then shrugged. Pipsqueak sighed, moving his hoof to turn the film player off via the remote. Then, the film started rewinding... he hadn't mis-pressed anything... or pressed anything at all. It rewinded to the Trotting In The Air scene. As they were flying in the snow, a large bird suddenly appeared on screen, and grabbed the two of them, taking them elsewhere... this never happened before. He heard familiar cackling after that... the televisional device turned off after that. Pip looked to his left. There was a blue balloon, that just floated... floated. After their picture, they went over to the camera, taking it to a seat, and inspecting the picture they had taken. The picture was of them, The Father and Daughter smiling, the Mother and Son grinning, and the Clown cheerily waving to the camera, with an equally cheery expression on his face. ...Clown? "...I don't remember a clown being near us..." The Father said... "Neither do I..." The two looked around. Their children were nowhere to be found. "...Kids?" The Father asked. "Where are you?" The Mother stood up and trotted off to go look for them, calling their names. The Father looked at the photo with a horrified expression on his face. The picture's background was the same, except it was at night, the Mother and Father had indifferent expressions on their faces... their children were nowhere to be found. There were lines on the grass that looked like somepony had dragged something... or somepony somewhere, and bits of the grass were also reddened. And the clown was still there... but he was now grinning viciously, and holding balloons too. _______________________________________________________________________ End of Chapter... [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&list=ULj5GIHITJnFE&v=zNM_WS-rcOc&feature=endscreen]
SolutionPENNYWISE Chapter 9 Noir Shade's Journal Day 41 It has come to our attention that Pinkie Pie has realised the method of Pennywise's Modus Operandi. We already know that It uses one's greatest fear to take It's prey. But it seems It is weak against those who do not believe in It. Therefore, most adults do not see or hear It, and generally ignore It without knowing. It is easier to eat children, as they would believe in many things potentially impossible, and are easily frightened. Today, there was a balloon floating into my office, with a string carrying a rolled up paper. I had taken a look at it. It depicted Pennywise, depicted as a human, which may be his form where he comes from, under a sewer and offering a paper boat and a balloon to a younger human in a yellow raincoat. I started wondering what the significance of it was... I noticed there was now blood-red writing on the paper, telling me to look behind it. There was a picture of a sort of circus. Except there were a bunch of humans all over the place, some who looked like locals, a few people with balloons, a person on stilts, and some acrobatic clown somersaulting closer to the camera. As soon as I realized who this was supposed to be, I heard a monstrous growl as he pointed directly at me, ran closer, and climbed up a lamppost so he could look at me face-to-face. It was bad enough I was looking at what looked like an actual human directly, it was scary from the fact it was Pennywise, and he was addressing me directly. "Hi, Noir! How's it hangin'?" He asked me. I didn't answer. "Come in here with us, there's all sorts of surprises here! And balloons, too!" I shook my head quickly, as if in some sort of willing conversation. "But of course, there's the problem with me being your enemy..." He began, "That makes you my prey... but I have a bunch of stuff planned for ya!" I scowled, trying to forget any fear I have. "After all, Clowns are for entertainment, but who says they can't have a bit of fun before dinner? Speaking of dinner, take a look in your refrigerator! If it's not running, that is!" I calmly put the paper on the desk. I went to the refrigerator, as if I was a child following orders from a parent/guardian... I don't know why, I just felt intrigued. I opened the refrigerator, and the room is then flooded with balloons, of all shapes, sizes and colours. I threw what got in my face away from me, and I found a disturbing sight... the dismembered head of an officer. I put a hoof to my mouth, feeling like I could vomit. To make matters worse, the head opened his eyes, and looked directly at me. "Hello, Detective, nice to see you. How's the investigation going?" He asked. I just stared in shock, not quite believing what I'm seeing. "Obviously not very well if I'm here like this. At least I've gotten my severance pay," He joked. I wasn't sure whether I was frightened or slightly amused by the fact he was practically attempting a stand-up routine. "Hmm," Pennywise's voice filled the air, "This looks a little familiar... I guess I'm getting repetitive." He then giggled maniacally. "And it's true what they say," the officer continued, "In the deadlights, everything floats. They all float down here, and you will too!" I immediately closed the door on this. "Thanks for participating in our unnatural act!" Pennywise exclaimed as if he were some sort of magician at the circus, "Come back any time, and bring your friends! They'll surely be surprised for my next act!" He laughed maniacally once more, before I ran to the paper and tore it to shreds. If I get more experiences like this, I'll be driven mad... Applebloom and Scootaloo were walking to Rarity's Boutique to visit Sweetie Belle, considering all the things that had happened. Scootaloo wouldn't really admit this, especially not to Rainbow Dash, her idol, but the situation has made her a bit nervous of clowns. Not quite all the way to afraid, just nervous. Applebloom now just wanted to hurt any clown that she happened to see... though, she was told to be nice to Funny Bones. They arrived at the Boutique, and Applebloom knocked on the door. In a matter of seconds, Rarity answered. "Oh, hello, girls. I assume you'd like to see Sweetie Belle?" She asked. "Yeah, Miss Rarity," Applebloom replied, "Can we see 'er?" "I don't see why not. Your visits certainly keep her spirits up." She stepped aside so they could come in. The Crusaders nodded, and walked in, heading to Sweetie Belle's room, where they assumed she would be. Sure enough, they found her in her room, reading a book. Though they couldn't see what exactly it was she was reading, they assumed it was a book she had borrowed from Twilight's library, which she usually read. It was basically a book about how to improve one's singing, as the other two Crusaders once suggested that she should try singing, but she wasn't feeling sure her voice was good enough for a Cutie Mark, so she got this book. She tried a few methods, but they either involved breaking glass or making her not sound like herself. Rather than accept her voice was probably perfect, however, she decided to keep on reading. She looked up from the book, and her face brightened up. "Hi, girls! How are you?" She asked. "We're fine, Sweetie Belle," Scootaloo said, "In fact, we're more than fine!" "Uh huh... why?" Sweetie asked, wondering why they were 'more than fine' when there was a Killer Klown from Outside Equestria... and then she noticed she had spelt Clown with a K... Must be the alliteration in this book, she thought. "Well, we were watching our TV's, an-" Scootaloo began, "TV? Really?" Applebloom asked. "...Saying Televisional Device is too slow..." Scootaloo said. Applebloom shrugged. "Anyway," Scootaloo got back on track with what she was saying, "We were watching our TV's, and then there was the commercial with a sort of expert in the supernatural who calls himself Bob Grey." "What kind of name is 'Bob'?" Sweetie Belle asked with an unsure look on her face. "What kind of name is Tyler?" Scootaloo countered, referencing Live Light's adopted son. "...Mean example, but fine." Sweetie Belle said, "Anyway, you're pretty sure he's the solution to our problems?" "Yeah, pretty sure, he looked friendly and awesome. Not as awesome as Rainbow Dash, but still!" Scootaloo replied. Applebloom deadpanned, "Seriously though," She said, "He did look convincin'." "Well... if you two are fine with it, then I guess it's okay to go... where's he at?" Sweetie asked. "Th' commershull said he'd be in th' room next t' that detective fella, Dusk Shadow, or somethin'." "Noir Shade." Scootaloo corrected. "Yeah. That." "Okay then..." Sweetie Belle said, "Let's go now!" End of Chapter...
ConfrontationPENNYWISE Chapter 10 _______________________________________________________________________ Fluttershy walked into her cottage, after feeding all the animals. She takes a look around, and sees Angel Bunny holding some sort of note. Fluttershy wondered who put a note in here while she was gone. She walked over to Angel, who handed the note to her, and she read it. Dear Fluttershy, I've gone to see a Mr. Bob Grey, who, according to a commercial, is able to deal with supernatural matters. Not sure how many others are going, but I feel I need to say something. I've told Tyler about it, and he has decided to stay in the cottage. If you haven't seen it, you should go find a friend who has a televisional device (We really need a new name for that) and see it yourself if you feel like contacting him... just a thought. Yours sincerely, Live Light Fluttershy wasn't too sure who Bob Grey is supposed to be... What kind of name is 'Bob'? She decided that she would head to Sugarcube Corner, as she knew Pinkie had one of those televisional devices, and she was also wondering how Pinkie was doing at the moment, so it'd be like killing two birds with one stone. ...Oh, my... that's a horrible example... Fluttershy walked over to Sugarcube Corner, looking around warily. She opened the door, and looked inside. There were a lot less customers in this place. The ones who did come here looked tired and depressed. Mrs Cake was watching them all with a concerned look on her face. "Oh, hello Fluttershy," Mrs Cake greeted, "Can we get you anything?" "No thanks... Can I see Pinkie?" Fluttershy asked. "Of course, she's upstairs in her room," Mrs. Cake answered, "Still on about that 'It' creature she talks about. She has such an imagination." Fluttershy's eye twitched. "...It's... all over the news..." Fluttershy said in monotonous disbelief, "And you're saying it's her imagin-" She remembered the information about Pennywise's power coming from ponies believing in It. "...Never mind... thanks anyway..." She went upstairs to see Pinkie. She opened the door to Pinkie's room, and found Pinkie looking out the windows intently. Her mane and tail were frizzy again. She smiled, and walked over to her. "Hi, Pinkie," she greeted. No answer. She curiously looked at Pinkie, and on closer inspection, it wasn't Pinkie, but some sort of still replica of her. She suddenly heard hoofsteps behind her. She slowly turned around, and 'eep'ed when she saw a masked figure behind her, backing up into the wall. After looking a bit more, she saw it was Pinkie. "Oh, sorry Fluttershy!" She said, taking her mask off. Her mane was as frizzy as her replica, so she was definitely in an 'okay' mood in these circumstances. "That's okay, Pinkie... um... what's with the... other Pinkies?" Fluttershy asked. "That's to fool It and make It think I'm an easy target. It may not seem like much, but given everypony else's extreme measures, a method like this will be fake enough to seem real! I mean, have you seen everypony else's? Lyra's protecting herself with human shaped mannequins! 'Cause that's apparently what It really looks like? Well, usually looks like anyway..." Pinkie stopped to take a breath, which was rather unusual for her. "Anyway, what can I do you for?" She asked. "Um... could I watch your televisional device please?" She asked. Light's right, that needs a shorter name... "Light said something about a Mr. Bob Grey, who's apparently an expert at the supernatural..." "Huh? Haven't heard anything about that," Pinkie said, scratching her mane. "Then again, I haven't watched much TV in a while. Maybe it's about time!" She hopped over to her televisional... screen, and pressed the standby button, taking it out of standby and activating the TV. The two mares sat down and looked at it as it warmed up. After it warmed up, white subtitles that said something about Grey and a number quickly faded into black. "Oh... we missed it..." Fluttershy said, disappointedly. "Hello, Ponyville," a pleasant and reasonable voice came from the TV. It sounded as if the source of the voice should have been in a children's show. The source of the voice was a brown coated stallion with a short, blonde mane, dressed in a business suit. "My name is Mr. Bob Grey," he said. "Didn't that advert just come off, Pinkie Pie said, confusedly. "I should be telling you that I'm an expert at handling situations like the monster that is haunting this town..." He began, "But I have something specific to say to you mares, Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy." Fluttershy eep'ed, leaping back a few feet, Pinkie Pie uncomfortably shifted away. "I'd like you to spread this to your four other friends," Grey continued, "You ponies act like you could make a great sitcom. And yet this land seems to come under peril so much, it's like this weird place relies on you to do everything. Maybe you should just stop, and let others have a go. Of course, there's no point in trying. Everybody grows up." "...Is that.." Pinkie said... Grey reached under his desk, and pulled out a cloth, and rubbed it over his face. It turned into the visage of true fear itself, Pennywise. "Hi, kids," It said, "Guess who." Pinkie's mane deflated again. "As I was saying..." It continued, "Everybody grows up. But I'm astounded by how many adults here notice me... I think my most memorable case was the one where a mentally unsound adult thought I was sent by 'Langoliers' or something... sounds like a construction profession. But whatever I am, I am eternal. I am the eater of worlds. And of children. Their fear is like... salt on the meat. I preferred where I was before. But the fact your adults believe in me just means I won't have an empty stomach for a while. So if you don't want your friends eaten, leave town and cry about it elsewhere." "Now... if you'll excuse me, I'm waiting for my next appointment." Pennywise put the cloth over his face again, and looked like Grey again. "Goodbye," he said, pleasantly waving. The screen cut to a different advert almost immediately. "..." "..." "..." "...We need to find out where he works," Fluttershy said, "Light said he was going there, and who knows how many others are going too?" She rushed out the door, with Pinkie following her. The Cutie Mark Crusaders knocked on the door leading to Bob Grey's office. After a while, Grey opened the door. "Oh, hello, there," He said, pleasantly smiling. "I assume you came here about recent events?" "We sure did!" They said in unison. Grey smiled again, "That's good, that's very good. Come in," he said. They all walked in, and he closed the door behind them. He walked over to his chair, and sat on it. The room was nearly empty, save for the office table and chair Grey was sitting on, and a cupboard near the door. There was a yellow balloon next to Grey. "Mr. Grey," Scootaloo began, "Why d'you have a balloon next to you?" She asked. "That's so I can study the way things float," He said, "But I have enough experience to know of the joys of floating." His smile seemed to get rather... wider. "So... y'like balloons?" Applebloom asked, kinda creeped out. Sweetie Belle looked at it like something was very wrong with what she was seeing. Grey noticed this, and had an indifferent look on his face. "Want the balloon?" He asked. Sweetie Belle looked to him with a worried look on her face, but didn't answer. Grey scowled. "Don't you want it?" He said. "Don't you want it?" He repeated, his tone getting aggressive, until it didn't sound like him anymore. The Crusaders backed away to a wall, and looked at him. There stood before them, Grey, with orange fuzzy buttons growing out of his increasingly colourful suit, a pale white beginning to cover his face, which twisted shape in a gruesome manner. His mane hair started to retract into his head, and it grew out the sides, but in red. "Don't you WANT IT!?" Pennywise snarled at them, before grinning maliciously. Suddenly, the door opened with a slam. Pennywise looked at it, rather confused. Noir Shade bursted through it. "Oh, hello, officer. How's your day going? Come to see the next demonstration?" Pennywise asked. "Be quiet," Noir retorted, "Get out of Ponyville. Now." "You see, kids..." Pennywise said, "This is why clowns don't do much clowning nowadays... too many ponies with irrational fears for clowns..." Noir lunged at him, and Pennywise grabbed him with a monstrous, scaled arm, gripping him at the neck. Then came the sound of gasping, coming from the door. Everypony (and thing) looked at the door to find Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie standing there with mortified looks on their faces. Well, mortified is an understatement. Pennywise threw Noir to the wall, causing him a great deal of pain. It then walked to the chair, and sat on it as if nothing happened. Fluttershy scowled at him, "What do you think you're doing!?" She yelled, unexpectedly, and not taking the time to notice that. It just forced a smirk, which just made it look like It was somewhat nervous. "What happened to Light!?" Fluttershy demanded. "Who, the one worse off than Wheezy?" Pennywise asked rather monotonously. He paused for a moment. "Last I saw him, I was in his dreams." "What do you hope to accomplish with all this!?" She yelled. Pinkie rubbed her ear because of the shouting, and the CMC just held their ears. "I dunno," It answered, "Food? Like your carnivore animals? Sorry I landed here, I guess," It finished with a hint of sarcasm. Fluttershy was now staring directly at his eyes. He looked rather unsettled, until his eyes started glowing white. Everypony but Fluttershy looked away. She kept her stare, trying to beat his deadlights. Everything was silent. ... ... ... ... A snarling sound was heard, and the sound of a window crashing was heard. Everypony opened their eyes. Pennywise was gone. They looked to Fluttershy, who looked extremely shocked, before fainting. End of Chapter...
BrokenPENNYWISE CHAPTER 11 _________________________________________________________________ Noir Shade's Journal Day 43 The few days have been eventful since Pennywise said he had something planned for me. He adopted an alias of a Mr Bob Grey. Was Bob the sort of name they had where he was from? Did he even come from a world of humans? Perhaps he appeared there, and used the inhabitants as his prey. This is all he really is. A predatory animal, with a degree of intelligence... if Pennywise isn't the true form, I don't want to know what is. As Grey, he had planned to lure a number of civilians as food. He had almost gotten three fillies, but after learning of the strange appearance of a door directly next to mine, I investigated, and found him threatening the fillies. Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie came in, and for some strange reason, Pennywise looked a little bit like this was an unwelcome addition to his meal... almost a little nervous. Fluttershy proceeded to stare into his eyes, which apparently, nopony can endure without feeling crushing fear... it seemed to be affecting Pennywise, but he gave some sort of stare of his own... his eyes had started glowing... I don't know what that's supposed to mean... after a while, he escaped. Fluttershy looked shocked, and fell into a coma. Light arrived about 15 seconds later. To say the least, he was pretty shocked himself, and immediately got Fluttershy to the hospital. The fillies looked extremely frightened. They tried to shrug it off, telling us they were fine, but I could tell they didn't feel safe anymore. As for me, all I can do is write what messages It sends me... It left no trace of where It was headed. Today, It has yet to send me anything. Day 45 It sent something, two days after I last wrote in this journal. It sent me a few illustrations of Itself, sent with stringed balloons. The first illustration depicted him balancing on a ball, juggling, with others watching. Everything was human. The second was one of the moving pictures... he was in a sort of library, in the same room as someone who had looked directly at him. He had spawned multiple balloons from the ceiling, which, when they popped, released blood on the person they were next to... no one noticed but that man. He frantically ran to someone, apparently yelling. It was like watching a silent movie... I could hear circus music, but nothing else. Pennywise spoke to the man. Trying to read his lips, he seemed to be telling him he was too old to stop him, and he should leave 'Derry.' He then proceeded to make an admittedly hilarious looking routine to distract him. The last illustration was Pennywise, once again in human form, looking at me. It seemed to be a still image. I looked on the back, and there was writing all over it, like a schizophrenic had written in a hurry. The most I could decipher was... 'I looked into It's Deadlights, and I wanted to be there.' I turned it over again, and the illustration wasn't still... it was moving again. Pennywise looked at me, his eyes beginning to glow. I felt great terror. I accidentally dropped the paper, and snapped out of it. I immediately picked up the paper and scrunched it up into a ball, throwing it in a trash can. It slowly began flattening itself, before I put a lighter in there, burning it until it was no more. I decided to head home, and get some sleep. Day 47 No word on how Fluttershy is doing. Clown sent me another message, like the one from yesterday I decided to ignore and not mention in the journal. There were pictures of balloons. All shapes, all colours. Strangely relaxing. Day 52 Mental stability seems fairly drained, wouldn't you say? If you're -my- journal, I command you to answer me. Well, answer me. Fine. Anyway, You're probably not interested, but... whatshername isn't out of her coma. Maybe she should stop trying to wake up. I'd like to sleep for a long time. Wouldn't you? Day 52, Night time. Balloons keep me safe. I need balloons. Day 53 The Clown gave me balloons to help me sleep. He's a very nice clown. Hardly anyone has visited me since Day 50. I don't know what happened, I don't think I was there. Day 53 I like it here. I'm warm. Day 53 Balons... ned bllans... Day 1 ! ? & ^ % :) :D Day 0 I finally made it. I'm in the deadlights. It's true what they say down there. They all float down there... and you will too. They all float. Light closed the journal of Noir Shade, the last entry making it clear he's not among the living anymore. He watched Fluttershy, and sighed. He was sitting with Funny Bones and the rest of the Mane 6, in a white room with Fluttershy, who was in a coma on a hospital bed. They were hoping for her to wake sometime soon. Fluttershy stirred, exhaling. She inhaled, as if to smell the nature of her cottage. She didn't smell much... just like someone sprayed things around to make a room clean. She slowly opened her eyes, and looked around curiously. She noticed she was in a hospital. She took another look around, and saw her friends, along with Light and that clown he befriended. "Fluttershy! I'm glad you're okay!" Twilight said, getting off of the chair and walking over to Fluttershy. The others followed suit, which made Fluttershy cringe a little, as she isn't comfortable with a lot of ponies looking at her at the same time this close. They all stepped back a bit, which calmed her slightly. "H-hi, everypony," She said, "What happened?" "According to Pinkie, you Stared at Pennywise, who gave some sort of Stare of his own at you..." Rarity answered. "I've gotten to the end of the journal," Light said. "Well, what happened to Noir then?" Twilight asked. "It seems after the 45th day of his journal, he started going mad until his entries were barely legible, like baby talk. His last entry was Day 0... and he wrote the following... "I finally made it. I'm in the deadlights. It's true what they say down there. They all float down there... and you will too. They all float." He finished. "What's he trying to say?" Fluttershy asked. "In his earlier entries, Pennywise had sent him an illustration of himself under a sewer coaxing a little child into it... by floating, he probably means dead bodies floating in sewer water," Light explained grimly, "And later, he wrote that he received a picture of the Clown apparently using It's Deadlights. The glowy eye things. If he's -in- them, the Deadlights must be it's essence." "That... makes sense..." Twilight said, "How did you figure that out?" Light had a blank expression on his face for about five seconds. He answered with a simple shrug after that. Funny Bones looked at him for a moment, with a mix of concern and suspicion. "...We have to stop It," Fluttershy said to the group, "Now." "...Fluttershy, are you sure about this?" Twilight asked, speaking for the group's concerned expression, "I mean, I've written to Princess Celestia about this, but it seems something's stopping her from intervening, because she's not replied or appeared to do something about this." That explains her absence, I guess... Funny Bones thought, But... how? "If she can't stop it, Twilight, we have to," Fluttershy insisted. "If he's obsessed with bodies floating in sewers, his lair must be a sewer. We have to go down there, and end this." "Ah dunno..." Applejack said, "S'awful risky..." "If it isn't us, who will it be?" Fluttershy asked. "We need It gone... it's the only way us ponies will receive some good rest." "...I'm in." Pinkie said. "Ditto." Funny agreed. ... ... ... "Me too." Rainbow Dash said. "As am I." Rarity said with a nod. ... ... "I guess I'm in too..." Twilight said. "Count me in." Applejack said. "...Same..." Light said... rather monotonously. "We'll go when Fluttershy is released from the hospital," Twilight said. The others agreed, nodding. End of Chapter...
LairPENNYWISE CHAPTER 12 ______________________________________________________________ Fluttershy put on her saddlebags, before looking at herself in the mirror. Her mane was slightly messier than usual, but she didn't bother fixing it. After being let out of the hospital, she and Light had headed home to prepare, as had everypony else. She swallowed. She and her friends were going to the sewers to face It. She had thought to bring meat, as a sort of distracting meal for It, a sort of Mace spray provided by Angel, and a few rocks. She breathed in deep, looked away from the mirror, and headed for the door. "Wait a moment," Light said. Fluttershy looked back. "I'm gonna need to talk to Tyler about this. You go. I'll catch up." "...Okay... be careful." Fluttershy replied, before heading for the door. She opened it, and looked outside. A storm was beginning, and it was raining. She felt a tapping on her back left hoof. She looked back, and saw Angel Bunny standing there, giving her a concerned look that said, 'Are you sure?' Fluttershy sighed, and looked at him. "Angel... I have to do this. It has done enough harm to us. If we let It continue, It'll continue killing everypony... and all the other animals here..." Fluttershy explained. "I'm doing this for us, Angel. For all of us." Angel looked at her for a while. He shed a tear, then hugged her hoof. Fluttershy couldn't help but shed a tear as well. It wasn't too common for him display this sort of affection. And it happens on what could be the last time they would see each other. "I...I-i gotta go, Angel..." Fluttershy reluctantly said. Angel slowly let her go, keeping a brave face. "I promise to come back. Love you, Angel." Fluttershy arrived to the Sewer covering known as a 'manhole.' There, she found Twilight, Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Pinkie and Funny Bones waiting, with their own saddlebags wrapped around them. "Where's Light?" Bones asked Fluttershy. "He said he was going to speak to Tyler about where he was going, and that he'd catch up with us..." Fluttershy answered. "He's not going to catch up with us if we go now," Twilight said, "We'll have to find some way to tell him." The group spotted a familiar grey coated pegasus mailmare flying across. Twilight had an idea. "Hey, Ditzy, could we ask you to do something for us please?" Twilight called. The group descended into the sewer with the ladder. The sewers looked just as expected. Dark, damp, and had all sorts of things around the corridors. The smell was simply terrible. Twilight's horn glowed as she used her magic to create a pulse. Everypony could smell freshness, and sighed in relief, as they wouldn't have to suffer with the smell. Bones noticed something on the ground. "What's that?" He pointed a hoof. Everypony looked, and saw one of the fuzzy orange buttons Pennywise would wear on his suit. After a moment of wondering why it was there, Twilight duplicated it multiple times, and decided to use it as a method of keeping track of where they were in the sewers. They continued onward. It's Thoughts Ever since my appearance in this world... I've had a pretty good amount of meals. So many adults have the potential to believe, and yet, there are still some who do. I'm not surprised, as I shouldn't be. After all, there are other monsters out there. But the reason why I stand out among the rest... I am the one thing everything will fear. Beings like Tak cannot rival my power, the Langoliers remind me of evil meatballs covered with fur, and the Tommyknockers didn't deserve their nursery rhyme. Gan apparently does not exist in this world... good. But as powerful as I am... I have my limits... as proven by the Loser's Club... These midget horses, however... they're nothing special, surely. The seven ponies slowly and carefully trotted through the damp corridors of the sewers. On occasion, they would see a decomposed body part, an item of clothing, accessories, and even discarded and bloodied currency. Rarity tried her best not to faint here. She did feel being here was rather undignified for a lady, but that doesn't matter much with a beast such as Pennywise inhabiting Ponyville. Twilight hoped to get rid of this monster. She wasn't sure whether she would go as far as killing, but if she did, it would certainly not be as bad as what It did to others. Applejack didn't want a thing like that threatening her little sister. She honestly wished to end It in the most punishing manner possible. Rainbow Dash feels the need to get revenge on It for doing all that it's done, and giving her a paranoia of clowns. Pinkie Pie simply wishes to smile again. She doesn't feel right about killing, but it's the only way, in her opinion. Funny Bones wishes to put the memory of Cobalt Royale to rest. He wants to stop this thing. Fluttershy definitely wanted to stop It, but she was feeling rather concerned on how Light was doing... There was a growling sound, and everypony stopped in their tracks. They heard the vengeful voice of Pennywise speak to them. "Leave, now! While you still can!" "Show yerself, ya coward!" Applejack yelled. The sound of chuckling filled their ears. "You still think you can see me?" He chuckled some more, until his ghastly visage appeared like some floating aura. "You'll never see me. You'll see only what your little minds allow your eyes to see. So turn back, for if you stay... you shall be caught... in my Deadlights. Like all the others." He smirked evilly at the ponies. "Like all the others." He began chuckling, until it turned into guffawing and mocking, maniacal laughter, as his image slowly shifted into thin air. "We gotta find 'im..." Applejack said. "And fast," Rainbow added. ... ... ... Applejack looked around. Rainbow was there, but nopony else. The group has been seperated. "...Where is everypony?" Twilight and Rarity looked around for their friends. "How could we have gotten separated so easily?" Rarity asked. "Remember what we're here for, Rarity," Twilight said, "We don't know the limits to what It can do. Expect the unexpected." With that, she trotted forward through the corridor. "...Easier said that done, darling..." Rarity said to herself, with a deadpan expression, before following Twilight. Pinkie Pie looked around the place nervously, while Funny Bones took a moment to verify the situation. "Where is everypony..." Pinkie murmured warily... "If we're seperated like this, it'll be easier for It to get us..." "We'll be fine." Bones said. "No, we won't, Funny, no! We won't!" Pinkie yelled hysterically, "We're sitting ducks now! How am I supposed to believe we're going to be fine!?" She was surprised when she was suddenly pulled in an embrace. "Because I'm not letting us get hurt if It finds us..." he said, "Until then, try to be confident for me, alright?" Gradually, Pinkie began to feel all warm inside, and hugged him back, smiling. "I'll try..." "U-um... hello?" Fluttershy called out. There was nopony with her. She swallowed hard. She had to be as brave as she could. She carefully trotted onwards. She noticed her corridors were getting increasingly bloody, gore-y, and desolate. There were webs appearing all over walls, corners, the ceiling, even the floor. Some of them even held body parts in them, probably as food being saved for later. She comes across a box in the middle of a corridor. She has a look at it. On the inscription, it says Jack 'Attack' In The Box Don't open until Christmas ! Fluttershy looked rather confused. She wasn't sure what 'Christmas' is, and the fact Pennywise apparently owns a Jack-In-The-Box (What kind of name is Jack...?) means it's probably trouble. She shook her head, and continued on. She checked behind her, in case the Jack-In-The-Box attacked for some reason. It was still sitting there. Fluttershy sighed, and trotted on. She saw messages written in blood, such as, 'IT,' 'THEY FLOAT,' 'WHO' and 'HELP.' This served to unnerve her further. Eventually, the messages had turned to drawings, looking like they were drawn by schizophrenics, sometimes even drawing menacing and disturbing faces. She started walking a lot faster. After some amount of time, she had reached an extensive room. The room had a large amount of blood, guts, and webbing. The webbing even had other ponies wrapped in them, stuck to the wall. Some were dead, some were unconscious, and a few were catatonic. She saw Pipsqueak's parents. They were alive. She saw the remains of a manticore, which shocked her extremely, as she couldn't imagine what form It would take to take down a creature of this magnitude. And then she saw... Live Light... not wearing his cloak... catatonic, and looking like he hasn't eaten in days. She stared at him, shocked. He stared at the ground blankly. "Hey there..." His voice filled the room... but the source wasn't Light. The source was at a dark corner. She slowly turned her head to it, and saw two pure blue eyes staring at her, narrowed in a scowl. The source walked closer towards her. Light's familiar appearance came out of the shadows, wearing his cloak, but somewhat torn and ragged. Fluttershy, confused, looked from the catatonic Light, to the Light standing there. Gradually, realization dawned upon her, and she looked at Light in horror. He was suddenly missing his wings, in a clown suit, having a red, wild balding, and wearing clown make-up. His face twisted into a more familiar shape. It grinned maliciously. "Told you I'd catch up..." Pennywise said with murderous glee. End of Chapter...
BattlePENNYWISE CHAPTER 13 _______________________________________________________________________ Pennywise stood in the shadows, smirking at Fluttershy. It takes a moment to look around the room, as if admiring what it has done with the place. It looks back at Fluttershy. "Welcome, Fluttershy... do tell, what do you think of my humble abode?" It asked. It didn't get an answer. "Thought as much," It continued, "Simply marvelous, isn't it... I feel I could do a little more with this room, though. Maybe the addition of lavender, orange, pink, cyan, white, and yellow... I think that sounds nice, don't you?" Fluttershy stepped back a bit, obviously preferring her yellow coat on herself. She felt a cold, solid object gripping her hoof, and realized it was a corpse's hoof, protruding from the ground. Its grip was strong, and she couldn't free herself from it. Pennywise just smiled at the attempt. "I told you to leave, but you just had to please your curious little minds, didn't you?" It asked with a sinister edge in his voice. "I-it's n-n-not right t-to do this..." Fluttershy responded. Pennywise shrugged. "Your animals do the same, but you don't punish them. Not nice to show favouritism, you know..." "M-my animals a-are nothing... like you..." She stuttered. "You're right..." Pennywise replied. "They're not intelligent." He smirked. "Y-yes... they are!" "Nuh-no. Thuh-they're not." Pennywise countered mockingly. "I can underst-stand them... you c-can't..." Fluttershy said. "Is that what the little tattoos you have on your flanks-" Pennywise stifled a giggle at the thought of tattoos on a rear, "Is that what they represent?" "Yes... it is..." Fluttershy replied. Pennywise smirked. "Things really are different than they are on Earth... only some kids aren't mad or abusive, or bullies who are mad and abusive." "Th-that's... horrible..." "It is, isn't it? And for a while, that's how I thought all humans acted." So he does come from a human planet... Fluttershy thought. "After all," Pennywise continued, "I did arrive in a meteor on a planet called Earth, inhabited by a bunch of these humans. I arrived in a little place called Derry..." He smiled as nostalgic feelings hit him. "Oh, there was so much I did around there... I awoke there, and made the sewers my home... kinda like this one. I think my most memorable and favourite kill was when I first awoke during the... 1950s, I believe. I found a little boy playing with a paper boat his big brother Bill made him. The boy's name was Georgie Denbrough. I promised him a lot of fun, some cotton candy, and all sort of surprises. Balloons, too." Fluttershy watched It as it spoke of all the things he had done. "And then... I took him... ripped his arm off... and I showed him how to float... like the balloons..." He made no attempt to suppress his grin. "Then, I began my feeding spree, and to start that, I gave Bill a bit of a scare... and I found some others to frighten... you know by now I need fear to devour what I need? Well, fear is exactly what I got from them... it was so fun to scare them with the things they were frightened of the most..." "But alas... it was not to be... they all became friends, into some 'Lucky Seven', then ganged up on me, eventually, and the girly-boy used his inhaler as a weapon, saying there was battery acid in there. I escaped... and waited..." Fluttershy's reaction to Its' story was a mix between contempt and fear. It talked about these things like they were some fond childhood memory. "In 30 years... I came back... and I killed someone under a bridge. Next, I learned those seven kids that had bested me were coming back... or at least, six of them were..." He chuckled to himself, "Seems that Stan the Man wasn't enough of one." "But since they were adults, now... I couldn't hurt them... now, they just half-believed. I got their old bully, Henry Bowers to attack them... he only managed to hospitalize one. Eventually, they'd found me, in the true form they could comprehend, and I'd killed only the girly-boy, because he thought his little inhaler trick would work on me again..." "They killed me, though... but they forget... I am eternal... I may not exist in their dimensional plane... but I can cross over... and now... here I am!" It finished, grinning. "And to this day... while I still liked when I killed little Georgie... it was most regretful indeed." Fluttershy looked at It, and it didn't look as if he regretted it at all. It seems that the only thing It would regret about it is that it would have inspired this 'Lucky Seven' to kill him. Then she wondered... perhaps if she could talk to him for a bit, he could calm down, and, if that's not the case, allow the others enough time to find her, and save her quickly. "...Wh-what were the Lucky Seven like?" She asked. "They were perhaps the most innocent kids in Derry... they all had their problems, though," Pennywise said. "For example," it started, "Bill, the brother of Georgie, had a big stuttering problem. Kinda like you, except he was a bunch braver. You're kinda like a cross between Bill and Eddie Kaspbrak, the shy girly-boy with the inhaler. He thought he had asthma, but really he's delusional. His mom was real manipulative. 'You don't need any friends except for your mother,' she said. A little too Norma Bates, but oh well. Then there was Ben Hanscom, who they called Haystack, who was really fat. I thought I saw him in here. Probably not the same one. And Beverly Marsh. Easier to get into than an art college." "There was also Richie Tozier, real lighthearted, and a real comedian, into a lot of movies. A bit like your friend Pinkie, except he's not possible murderess. Or murderer. Whatever. We also have Mike Hanlon. You midget horses with candy coloured coats might not believe this, but back on earth, sometimes people were made fun of because of their colour. Mike was one of those people. All I did was just try to kill his father's military group as a giant bird. When everyone else had left Derry, after I had escaped them, he was the only one who stayed. Boring." "And finally, we have Stan. Always skeptical about everything. Even me. I quickly managed to change his mind about that, though. Maybe psychic, but we didn't care about that. Even though he was the last one to believe me, he was the first one to know what the very best thing to do was, instead of coming back to kill me, and that was by killing himself. He even left a suicide note, signed in blood. ...It." Fluttershy looked at It as it stared blankly at nothing. "I mean, I know that what you all refer to me as," Pennywise said, "But can't everyone have a better imagination?" "You'd like that very much, wouldn't you?" Came a raspy voice Fluttershy was glad to hear. Everyone turned to looked at Rainbow Dash and Applejack arriving and entering the room. "Oh, hello there," Pennywise said, cheerfully. "Did you notice my decorations?" The two newcomers looked around the room, and saw all the bodies stuck the walls, held by webs. They looked at Light, and now they were frightened and confused. "What's Light doing there?" Rainbow Dash asked. "The same thing he was doing when you met him," Pennywise replied, "Being at the wrong place at the wrong time." "What's going on?" Came another familiar voice, Twilight's voice. She and Rarity appeared in the room, and looked at the 'decorations' as well. "Uh... I think we found our friends..." Twilight said quietly. "But where's Pinkie and... what'shisname?" Rarity asked. "Doesn't seem like they're here yet..." Applejack responded, "Prob'ly a good thing right now..." "You know, this seems like the perfect blend of prey..." Pennywise stated. "Enough to satisfy my hunger, and not enough to overpower me. Then came the sound of galloping hooves. Pennywise's expression deadpanned. Everypony else looked to the source. In the fog, two silhouettes could be seen. They knew who they were just from looking at the shapes. True enough, Pinkie Pie and Funny Bones emerged from the fog, skidding to a halt upon arriving. The two of them took a while to look at the entire room. They took another moment to look at Light. And another to process what just happened. Pennywise also looked around, due to boredom. "...You... keep ponies here..." Pinkie said... "And... you wait until they're awake to be afraid?" "Hmm. Sounds about right." It responded. Pinkie stared at It for a moment, then rushed at him to attack. Pennywise's arm changed into a sort of large, scaled arm, grabbed her, and threw her back. She collided with the wall painfully, but got up, walking next to her friends. Twilight used her magic to free Fluttershy's hoof from the limb that was gripping her. Fluttershy stepped back. Twilight opened her saddlebag, and levitated five necklaces and one tiara. The necklaces were given to her friends, and the tiara was placed upon her own head. Pennywise looked at them for a moment. He then burst out laughing hysterically. "...What's so funny?" Twilight asked. "Y-you have a... girly tiara..." Pennywise responded between laughs, "And it's like you're... pl-playing dress up on the go!" As he cackled, Twilight looked to her five friends. They all nodded, and their eyes began to glow. Pennywise took a moment to look at them. His eyes widened in surprise. He stepped back into the shadows and disappeared. The Elements of Harmony looked to where he was before, confused. The room started to rain blood. There were sounds of others crying in agony, fear, and despair, and there were large spiders crawling around the walls, onto the ceiling, and then descending from their web, to get closer to them. Rarity cringed from the uncouth display. Fluttershy found it hard to think straight. But there was one thought that resided in her mind as this happened. ...Lucky Seven... "Everypony..." She said, "Get into a circle and hold our hooves together." "What good will that do?" Bones asked. "Just... listen to me... please?" She asked. Everypony did as she said, and they all got into a circle, and held their front hooves together. The bloodied rain continued to patter onto their coats, and the agonising screams of possible previous victims continued. As the blood fell, it landed on some of the bodies used as decoration. Pipsqueak's father looked as though he was crying blood because of it. Everypony closed their eyes and tried to block everything out. ... ... ... Silence... Everypony opened their eyes. They looked around, although still keeping close and holding hooves. It had stopped raining, the screams had stopped, and the spiders were nowhere to be found. "Where did your accessories go?" Bones asked. Twilight looked at her friends, and saw that they weren't wearing the necklaces that represented their elements. Her tiara was also missing. After a bit of looking around, they saw the tiara and necklaces on the floor. "I'll get them." Bones said, letting go of the hooves. "No, wait!" Fluttershy said. As soon as Bones touched on of the elements, Pennywise had risen out of the ground in a second, and grabbed him with two scaled claws, and walked over to a wall, pushing Bones into it and keeping him pinned there. "You all taste so much better when you're afraid..." Pennywise growled, grinning maliciously. "And you... are... NEXT!" He opened its mouth, revealing its fanged teeth to take a bite at Bones, ignoring his petrified expression, when It felt something hit his back leg. It looked at the ground next to the leg, and saw one of its fuzzy orange buttons. It looked behind him, and Fluttershy stood there, holding a can of mace. "This is battery acid, demon." She said darkly, and sprayed it across Its face, imagining it as sulphuric acid, just as It let go of Bones to strike her. It screamed in agony, confirming Fluttershy's theory, as it gripped its face. However, it was quite horrifying to see Its face become undone, melting away slowly. Twilight levitated a silver shard out of her saddlebag, being glad it hadn't created any holes, and threw it at Its head. The shard had opened his head up, and his Deadlights poked through it. It snarled and aimed the deadlights at the group. They recoiled and averted their eyes. As soon as it had stopped shining on them, they heard another snarl. They looked, and saw It somersault in the direction of a small drain. Its back hooves had strangely managed to fit through it, and as It gradually, yet quickly, fell through the drain, Its face melted further, making most of the skin-turned fluids land next to the drain, and slither through it. The group looked down the drain. ...Darkness... A scaled arm (The claw looked more like a mouth) grabbed at Bones again, covering his entire head and trying to pull him down. Twilight levitated the silver shard, and stabbed at the arm repeatedly until it let go of Bones' head (Not without scratching him with Its teeth) and fell back down the drain slowly. "We have to find a way down there..." Pinkie said. "But It's dead!" Rarity argued. "We have to make sure!" They heard Pennywise give a scream of agony, which sounded more like a growl, and then a dragging groan that got quieter as it went on. They heard nothing more from it. Fluttershy fainted. They all looked to her, and rushed to her. Twilight put her hoof to her neck to see if she had a pulse. It was a little slow, but it was there. They also noticed her breathing shallowly. They all sighed in relief. "I'm glad that's over..." Pinkie said, her mane slowly getting a bit frizzy. "We should get everypony who's alive out. I'm sure Pip will be happy to see his parents again." "Agreed." Bones agreed. Twilight nodded. She looked to Light, and started making cuts on the webbing keeping him stuck to the wall. It was very durable webbing, but it eventually gave in to the cuts, and released Light. As he fell, she used levitation to stop his fall, and slowly placed him next to Fluttershy. She then proceeded to do the same for everypony else. By the time this was finished, some of the unconscious ponies were placed on the backs of the Mane 6 (The ones who were conscious) and Funny Bones, but Twilight had to use levitation to handle the rest. Along the way, Fluttershy had woken up, and volunteered to carry some of the levitated bodies, making Twilight's job easier. They had made it to the surface, which they were lucky to have done so fast, as the orange buttons were starting to melt, probably due to It's demise. Everypony unconscious was placed in the hospital and being monitored. Fluttershy stood in the hospital room of Live Light, watching him. Pinkie Pie walked in, her mane and tail all frizzy, but not yet in the mood for partying. "Hey, Fluttershy. How ya doin'?" She asked. "O-oh... just fine..." Fluttershy said. Pinkie looked to Light. "I hope he's alright. He used to help with my parties you know!" She said. "Y-yeah... It said that..." Fluttershy whispered sadly... "So, um... how's Funny Bones?" "He's doing good, he'll be looking after Pipsqueak for a little while longer until his parents wake up." "Oh... that's good..." Fluttershy said. She sighed as Light lay in the bed, unresponsive. She noticed Pinkie wasn't saying much, and so looked to her. She was looking from Light, to Fluttershy and back again. "Oh, I see what's going on..." Pinkie said. "Wh-wh-what do you mean?" Fluttershy asked, knowing full well what she meant, and blushing hard. "Don't worry, I Pinkie Promise your secret's safe with me!" She said, before quickly looking around. "As long as you keep a secret I have too, anyway..." "O-okay... what is it?" "Well, uh... ...I think I 'like' Funny Bones..." Fluttershy took a moment to think about this. "Hm... okay." "...Wait, okay? That's it?" Pinkie asked, a bit confused. "If I think of it as 'okay,' it might be easier to keep a secret," Fluttershy explained, "I'm not really the best one to talk about secrets to..." "Well, yeah, but I trust you, don't worry. And you can trust me!" Fluttershy nodded. "I guess I can... after all, it's fairly obvious you're not a carnivorous shape-shifter..." Pinkie smiled only slightly, "Yeah I guess... let's not speak of that again... I still get the feeling It'll be around one day..." "Why?" Fluttershy asked. "It's just a feeling... remember the promise we made when we got out." "If It comes back, we'll be sure to do something about it." Fluttershy said, nodding. Pinkie nodded, gave Fluttershy a friendly hug, then went away. Fluttershy looked to Live Light. She smiled. End of Chapter...
The CircusThe Circus. A travelling company of performers, gathered for the entertainment of the ponies inhabiting the towns they visit. Some are great, some are okay, some are bad, some simply caused the worst of days for a circus to go to town. The Top Hat circus was visiting Ponyville, as organized by former circus magician Top Hat, now the manager of his own circus. He had everything, large tents, acrobats, trapeze acts, balloons, musicians, tightropes, and clowns. Lots and lots of clowns. None of the residents were really afraid of clowns at the time, but they knew there were coulrophobes for sure. From their understanding, it was because clowns were always smiling or laughing, sometimes even sad and crying. And they hid their faces in their make-up, and so trust was an issue. In Ponyville, however, there weren't that many circuses that visited. And the ones that did, were successful, and there was no reports of deaths or accidents related to clowns. Nopony had a reason to be afraid of them, and so accepted them. This circus was pretty big. A lot of ponies went outside to see what was there to enjoy. There were some who didn't attend however. Twilight Sparkle, for example, was too busy studying to attend. Rarity Belle was occupied with her dress-making. Applejack was more interested in her apple-bucking. And Fluttershy never was fond of crowds. Ditzy Doo was busy, but the flying acts were making it increasingly difficult to deliver the mail. Pinkie Pie attended, everypony knows she can never pass down a good old-fashioned party. And Rainbow Dash wasn't busy, and saw no harming in going too. A lot of foals wouldn't pass up the opportunity to experience entertainment at this amount. The Top Hat circus was one of the most successful, celebrated and trusted travelling companies. It's gone now. There was a young 5 year-old colt, who came here, accompanied by his Mommy and Daddy. His name was Cobalt Royale. His parents were rather rich, but modest too, and publicity shy, so they decided to live in Ponyville. Cobalt also has a big sister, who isn't into circuses. Nonetheless, Cobalt loved her very much, as much as his Mommy and Daddy. Cobalt got to go on the Ferris Wheel, be entertained by a clown on a unicycle, watch a trapeze act, and see a puppet show. This was going to be the best day of his life. They were on their way to see the new magician. Cobalt had his head in the clouds. He was trotting forward, looking at the attractions surrounding him. Halfway through, he looked to his parents.... or at least where they should be. The only thing surrounding him now were other, unfamiliar ponies. He called out for his Mommy and Daddy... but his cries were never heard over the chatter, the mirth, and the circus music. He was panicking now, on the verge of tears. "Hi there." Cobalt looked behind him, startled. It was a clown, wearing a baggy costume adorned with multiple colours and textures with three orange fuzzy balls appearing at the front area, in a vertical fashion. His mane was a frizzy red balding around his white painted face, with red lips curled downwards a bit, black eyebrows of paint, and his muzzle was completely red. His tail was like his mane, red and all over the place. Wrapped around his hoof was a string that carried multiple balloons. It seems a member of staff noticed him crying out for help. "Uh... hello, mister..." Cobalt replied. "You're lookin' pretty lost. What's wrong?" The clown asked. "I can't find my Mommy and Daddy." "Ooh, I see how that's a problem. Where were you all headed?" "To see the magician..." "That's not too far away from here! Come with me, I'll show ya!" The clown offered. "My daddy told me not to go with strangers..." "Oh, very wise of your father, kid, very wise indeed! My name is Pennywise the Dancin' Clown! What's yours?" "Cobalt...." "Nice to meet ya, Cobalt. Now we know each other! Gee, right?" He said, comically. "I guess so..." "Now, let's go find your parents, shall we? Here... have a balloon... it floats!" Pennywise said, as he extended his balloon-bearing hoof." "Okay, then..." Cobalt agreed. Pennywise began walking. He looked back to Cobalt, who hadn't begun following him yet. "Come on, Cobalt, don't be shy!" He called. Cobalt thought of the things that made him happy, and went with the clown that he assumed had come to help him. There was a clown elsewhere, who was great with balloon figures. But only a few ponies ever visited him. Despite his make-up being designed to look happy, he just wasn't. Things had happened in his life, and he was feeling rather bitter for it. He either frightened or bored the foals who ever visited him in the towns visited by the circus. They only knew him by his clown name, Happy Days. Happy looked around the place, glumly. There were a lot of ponies having fun. He wished he had the enthusiasm for it. He sighed, not concentrating on his troubles. Then, he saw a clown with a bunch of balloons escorting a little kid somewhere. He then realized something about that clown... I don't remember seeing a clown like that... He knows a lot about the other clowns, and he didn't recognize that one... whenever he gets a bad feeling, he knows he should do something about it. He galloped over to Top Hat. "Mr. Top Hat!" He said. "Ah, hello, Happy Days. Anything eventful on your end yet?" Top Hat asked. "There's a clown escorting a kid to a tent... and he's not one of our clowns." Top Hat widened his eyes. "Anything special about this clown?" He asked apprehensively. "He had a red wig, he was bald, and he was carrying balloons with him." Happy replied. "Please lead the way, we should hurry." Happy ran to where he last saw the unfamiliar clown, with Top Hat following. They looked around frantically. "Look!" Top Hat cried, pointing to the sky. Happy looked. There was a yellow balloon with a smiley face on it floating above a large tent. They immediately ran inside the tent, and were horrified by what they found. If you look in the newspapers today, you'll see the incident of the unfamiliar cannibal clown, Pennywise The Dancin' Clown. How he had convinced a boy to go with him, and end up having being chewed and eaten like a Manticore victim, correction... even worse. Happy Days will be remembered as the Sad Clown who tried to help an innocent foal. The disaster caused the circus to close out of the shame and fear. But what ponies will wonder was: Who was this Pennywise? Some figured he was a mental patient obsessed with clowns, and wanted to use this obsession to fit into the background of the circus and satiate his hunger with an unpleasant food choice. Others believe he was a clown who wanted to take his revenge on other ponies. Most of it is all wrong. Pennywise The Dancin' Clown is not a clown, but fear Itself. It was true that It entered a circus so It could do what It needed nearly undetected. In another universe, it was thought to have died. It crossed over to Ponyville to preserve itself. Its appearance there will open up many investigations of Its purpose and existence, and how it can devour a foal as if It were not anything remotely close to the pony form. It welcomes them to try. Because all the ponies know, and probably will ever know... was that this was definitely the worst of days for a circus to come to town.
FlashbacksPinkie sighed after finishing her story. Her eyes watered a little, and she sniffed. "...Horrible..." was all Noir Shade could say. "Unfortunately, it'll help if everypony told me their experiences with Pennywise... who'd like to go next? "I'll go next." Said the Rainbow-maned pegasus. She cleared her throat. -----Point of View: Rainbow Dash----- Well, one day, I was resting in the clouds after a bunch of practising my aerial tricks and stunts. I was real content, then, all of a sudden, I hear somepony calling my name. It's some sort of pegasus wearing a suit a bit like the Wonderbolts, but real dark. And he seemed to know me, even though I'd never met him before, because he was outright challenging me. Well, I wasn't just gonna let that pony call me out and walk out of it. He darted off to where I thought would be the place the race was beginning. I followed him, and when we got there, the race started up. I was perfectly able to catch up with him fine... and that's when he'd get a lot faster. He just... kept managing to accelerate a lot more when I nearly manage to get in front. This freaked me out, and ticked me off. It can't be possible. Nopony can accelerate that way just whenever they want. I didn't want to believe it, so I just kept trying... but no matter what, he seemed to always be ahead... then he started flying downwards really fast. I followed him down there, but some sort of smoke pellet he dropped mid-air hit me in the face. When the smoke cleared away, I saw I wasn't flying at a pegasus, but now, there was the mouth of some monster that looked like one of those things called 'dinosaurs...' I managed to stop myself from falling into the mouth, but I crash landed into a wall. I got a few cuts and scrapes, but I hadn't broken any bones. I looked to where the dinosaur was... and I saw that Pennywise clown from the Circus, holding a bunch of balloons. "Hi, Rainbow Cra- that is... Dash," He said, mocking me with a sinister air, "How was the Circus? You have fun?" I was really mad now. "Don't talk to me about circuses, you psycho clown! You're gonna pay for your crimes!" He started laughing like the maniac he is, "Remember you were the hero of this town for a while? What an opportunity missed, that day! Seems to me, your name won't be going down in history. With any luck, your friends will remember you as their friend." He started walking closer... I found myself backing away. "And I'll remember you, with as much luck, as a tasty treat." "Y-you're not gonna eat me... I-i'm the fastest pegasus in Equestria!" I tried to say with confidence. But it just wasn't happening. That just made his hideous grin wider. "It's okay to be afraid, Dashie... in fact, it's good that you are... you all taste so much better when you're afraid!" He said, menacingly. I swallowed hard. Then I noticed the balloon to my left. Normally, I wouldn't be afraid of balloons, but anything to do with that... monster... scares me, and I'm confident enough to say I speak for everypony. The balloon popped... unlike Twilight and Pinkie's stories, though, I didn't get covered in blood. It just popped... and Pennywise disappeared. I breathed heavily. Just as I was gonna fly away from there, a hoof stabbed through the ground and grabbed my leg. I screamed, hitting the zompony's hoof with my free leg. I was lucky enough to get it off me, and I stepped back, hovering in the air in case they tried it again. I watched the hoof for a while. Then, another one appeared out of the ground, until half a zompony rose from the ground, and looked at me. I could hear Pennywise's voice coming from it, even if it didn't move its' mouth. "They all float down here... and when you're down here, with me... you'll float too!" "After I escaped, I stayed on my cloud, not daring to leave it for a day..." Rainbow finished. "...This is getting scary... like something out of a horror novel..." Noir Shade said. He hesitantly asked... "Who wants the honours?" "I shall go next." The fashion-pony, Rarity volunteered. -----Point of View: Rarity Belle----- I was happily resting in my beauty sleep. I heard a knock at the door, and I did my best to ignore it. After a while, it was simply too much to bear, so I got out of bed and went downstairs. Sweetie Belle wasn't awake yet. I opened the door, and I was horrified and appalled by what I saw... It appeared to be a Mummy... it WAS a mummy. It reached out at my throat, but I used my magic to direct the hand to its' face, and make it slap itself 5 times. "Get out, I will not allow an urban legend of your fashion sense into my home! I do hope I have made myself clear, STAY OUT!" I said, closing the door on it. There's a time for fear, and there's a time to take action. My time for fear came after taking action. I went to find Sweetie Belle and warn her. She was just awakening in her room. "Sweetie Belle, a Mummy has attempted to invade the boutique, do not allow it to enter under any circumstances, to keep us and our beautiful home safe!" Sweetie Belle sighed in irritation. "NOW you choose the time to start believing in legends such as that? You just told me last night they didn't exist." "I know, and I'm very sorry, it seems I was wrong. Please get out of bed, we need to defend ourselves!" "Okay, okay..." Sweetie Belle said, obviously not taking me that seriously. We waited at the entrance for a while, hoping the Mummy wouldn't try to get in again. We waited for what seemed like years passing to me... nopony tried to open the door. I sighed in relief. "It seems it's gone... if it was ever there at all... I might have been given a rude awakening, and overreacted... I'm sorry about that, Sweetie Belle." "Mmmppphhh!" "Sweetie Belle?" I said, looking back. "Hel-mmfff!" I heard Sweetie's voice cry. "Sweetie Belle!" I cried, rushing to where I heard the voice. I saw a clown, carrying her, and moving in to take a bite at her neck... but it wasn't just a clown... it was Pennywise. "Not my sister!" I yelled in anger at him, using levitation to throw a needle at his back. He flinched at the pain, and dropped Sweetie to the ground, landing painfully, but thankfully, having no signs of being bitten. Pennywise turned around to face me. I could see his ghastly make-up, but that was hardly what caught my attention... his eyes were orange, and his teeth were as sharp as Pinkie said. He roared monstrously at me. I looked in horror. His eyes then turned a bright blue, and his teeth looked equine... but he was just as frightening as before. "I like what you've done with the place." He said, grinning maliciously. He ran off somewhere in the house, and I followed him. I found him performing an assortment of clown-like tricks all over the place... he was on a unicycle, juggling, then he threw the juggling balls in different directions, breaking the vases that all of them hit. He somersaulted off of the unicycle, allowing it to roll into a lamp, knocking it over, and anything else near it. I then watched as he ran to one room, only to come back with many balloons, and let them all go, until they eventually popped and let the blood inside them ruin the room. I stood in disbelief, looking at the wrecked room, ignoring the blood that had gotten on my coat, then looking back at Pennywise, walking out of the door, looking back at me once more with a manic grin, and then outright guffawing at my misery, before leaving, closing the door behind him. I was afraid, but I couldn't let him just get away, so I opened the door and looked around... but he was nowhere in sight... he couldn't have disappeared that fast... _____________________________________________________________________ End of Chapter...
EpilogueEPILOGUE _______________________________________________________ 30 years later... Twilight Sparkle examined herself in a mirror. She used a spell to levitate a magnifying glass, and examine her mane. A grey hair. That's one of the signs. She sighed, and looked around. She wasn't all that bothered about it. She was just sad that meant less time doing what she likes doing, less time to spend with her friends, and less time to spend with her new companion. Some time when she was 23, she had started going on adventures with Doctor Whooves, as he had an overdue book that he said he'd pay back on a certain date. Usually she doesn't mind too much when a fellow pony borrows a book for a long time, but he made the mistake of organizing a day to give it back. Gradually, she found out he was an alien who liked to travel with others, and she eventually became his travelling companion. After a while, they had decided to marry. Although he lived for a lot longer than ponies, she didn't mind that much, as she had found her Special Somepony. She was starting to miss Spike a little bit. He'd eventually grown rather large for the town, so now resides somewhere near Ponyville. She still visits him from time to time, but she wishes that her ideal little brother were still here as company in the library. And a lot of things have changed. Most of her friends have gotten married too. Some are happy, some aren't. The Cutie Mark Crusaders found their Cutie Marks, after some time, and are living their talents to the fullest. Applebloom is an artist, Sweetie Belle is a professional singer, and Scootaloo is a Stuntsmare. Rainbow Dash is quite proud of the kid. Twilight shifted the thoughts of how things have changed out of her mind, and headed downstairs. The Doctor technically lives with her in the tree-house library (Which hasn't aged too well), but is usually found within his TARDIS, which is his time machine, usually found inside the tree-house. It's like a house inside a house. After a bunch of comments of the concept related to a movie about going deeper into dreams within dreams, Twilight felt she didn't want to live in Ponyville sometimes. She used her magic to activate the Television (They did eventually shorten the name) and see the news. It started up at the news, and the newspony was talking about youths who recently robbed multiple stores, and then found dead with some blade cutting through them. Twilight felt pretty uncomfortable with this, and changed the channel. The channel shifted to the next news channel, which had just finished talking about Sweetie Belle's next single. Twilight listened to the newspony announce the next topic. "In other news, a mass shooting took place somewhere in the woods, emulating an event that had happened to a group named the Ridley Gang, who were shot many years ago by townspeople, who later ignored the incident. The youths who had shot the victims have been taken into custody, and have been identified with blank looks on their faces." Twilight's curiosity raised. Was there a mind control going on? Or even a disease? She wasn't sure. She watched further. "Camera footage was procured, showing the events of the shootings. We warn you, this is rather graphic." Twilight wasn't sure she wanted to see this, but if she could see what was wrong, she would have an idea of some possibilities. The camera was a birds-eye-view at first, showing many ponies firing the recently developed 'firearms', and dying with blood spouting out. These were created for self defence, but, as Twilight had previously predicted, it would lead to new murder cases. Sometimes, the ones with best interests in mind cause pain and suffering to others... Twilight really wondered why this was. Unicorns could use these easy, with levitation, but Earth-Ponies and Pegasi had to have straps on their arms, and had to push a button on the side of the firearm in order to fire it. Probably why it's called a 'firearm.' The camera then cut to the ground, where someone holding the camera practically trotted freely along the woods. There really wasn't much to see except the occasional bullet passing by, and usually, Twilight only really heard that instead of seeing it. Then, the camera cut to a part of the woods which was much sunnier. She could see the shadow of the camerapony as the camera was lowered, which obscured where the camerapony was going. Suddenly, the camera dropped, and it was clear the camerapony was hit by a bullet, as a sound of it falling to the ground was heard. Twilight gasped as this suddenly happened, and at why the news channel would show this. Then, some humming was heard. She heard hoofsteps near the camera. A figure came into sight, and she practically screamed when she saw who it was. A farmer, with ghastly white make-up on his face. The lips were painted red, the edges falling downwards. The muzzle was painted red too. And he had a frizzy red balding. Worst of all, he cast no shadow at all. He looked to the camera, and Twilight's worst fears were confirmed. As soon as she looked into it's dancing blue, bloodshot eyes, she instantly knew what she was looking at. It grinned at the camera (or her) and walked off. The video ended, and the channel cut back to the newspony. Twilight quickly turned the Television off, then looked to her side. A new invention in the last thirty years... it's a sort of communicative device. They call it a Telephonical device. She instantly took it, and started calling her friends up. ________________________________________________________ TO BE CONTINUED
