The Almost Ponies
She burst through the surface of the Mirror Pool, gasping desperately for air. Her limbs flailed weakly, trying to keep herself afloat. She began paddling forward with as much strength as she could muster, and dragged herself out of the enchanted pond. Once she was on dry land she coughed up the water from her lungs, and then collapsed to the ground. She didn’t know how long she lay there, simply enjoying the feeling of breathing again.
Then memories started coming back.
She remembered her creation. A pink Pony had ventured down to the Mirror Pool and summoned a doppelganger. Magic from the pond coalesced into a living being, a perfect replicate of the original.
She had been that replicate.
After an eternity of oblivion, she had been gifted with consciousness. Of all the infinite potential entities that could have existed in her place, it had been her that was granted life. It was impossible, and thus, a miracle. It was a miracle she was profoundly grateful for.
She was alive, and that was amazing.
Not only was she given life, she was given a purpose as well; to have fun! What better purpose could a Pony hope for? Her creator set her out upon the world to enjoy it. For the first time her new eyes beheld the blue sky and the gold sun. She relished the smell of fresh air and the feel of green grass under her hooves. All around her were trees, flowers, animals, babbling streams, rustic houses, and most amazingly of all, other Ponies like her.
Pony lives were amazing. They were so amazing it was no wonder she had become overwhelmed. The world was so wondrous she couldn’t decide what to do first. So, her creator took her back to the Mirror Pool to spawn another pair of doppelgangers.
But life still seemed too wonderful and too precious to spread among so few, so with the help of her new sisters she gave life to three dozen other replicates. Like her they had been made from the magic of the pond, freed from an eternity of darkness to finally know daylight.
For a few brief hours, she and her sisters had reveled in the sunshine. They played with each other and other Ponies, exploring their world with the curiosity and wonder of foals, and enjoying every second of it. The world was a marvel, and life was wonderful. She never wanted it to end.
But for reasons she didn’t even comprehend, the other Ponies decided that she and her sisters were a nuisance. They had been herded up like non-equines and taken to what for all intents and purposes had been a gas chamber.
That’s when she saw her. Twilight Sparkle. Her creator had said that she was their friend, but she wasn’t. Twilight told them that she had brought them there for a test; an easy test. All they had to do was watch paint dry. Anypony who looked away from the wall, for any reason, would be destroyed. The last Pony standing would be allowed to continue to exist.
She loved life. All of her sisters loved life. Each and every one of them stared at the wall for as long as they could, but eventually their will power began to fade. The first of her sisters to fall had been distracted by a single bird. Without hesitation, Twilight zapped her with a bolt from her horn. Her body dissolved into the raw magic it was made from, which returned to the Mirror Pool.
It was horrifying to see her sister robbed of the life she had only just been given. She wanted to flee, but fleeing would have meant looking away from the wall, and that would have meant death. She just sat there, frozen in terror as Twilight heartlessly murdered her sisters for failing her arbitrary test. Eventually only she and her creator remained. She did her very best to secure the priceless prize of her life, but she failed in the end.
She had wanted to see balloon animals. She had never seen balloon animals before.
In an instant her body was gone, and her consciousness with it. Or at least, so she would have assumed. Instead, her consciousness had been imprinted upon the pond’s magic. So too had the minds of her sisters. They were disembodied, but still alive.
It was quite disorienting existing as a mind inside of a magical field. It was like trying to wake up from a nightmare without even knowing you were sleeping. Impossible as it seemed, she was eventually able to gather enough presence of mind to reform her body from the pool’s magic.
She had a body again. She took a moment to realize the massive ramifications of that. She rose to her hooves, and began to inspect herself.
She wasn’t quite as she was before.
She was very gaunt, and her limbs were elongated and spidery. She felt her teeth with her tongue, and found that they were no longer the grazing teeth of a Pony, but the sharp fangs of a predator. She walked over to the Mirror Pool and saw that her once bouncy mane had gone limp.
She was different, and she knew why. When she had first been created she had been filled with an all-consuming joy for life.
Now she was consumed with rage for having that life taken from her.
She stood there, staring at her reflection, thinking about what she should do. When she had at last reached a decision, she took a deep breath and spoke the incantation.
“Into her own reflection she stared
Yearning for one whose reflection she shared
And solemnly swear not to be scared
At the prospect of being doubly mared.”
She reached down and pulled out her reflection. She had granted physical form to one of her sisters, returned the life which had been so cruelly denied.
Just thirty seven more to go.
***
Within minutes the cave was filled with thirty nine bedraggled pink Ponies. Every one of her sisters who had had their lives taken from them once again drew breath. She remembered how happy they had all been the first time they emerged from the pond.
Now they all seemed so demoralized, and very confused.
One of her sisters gave a wondering look to the pond.
“More?” she asked.
“No,” the eldest replied. “We have returned life to those who once had it, but we will not create new life. Not until we can be sure that they will be brought into a safer world than we were.”
“What happened?” one of her sisters asked.
“Our creator betrayed us!” the eldest replied bitterly. “She said that the Ponies of Ponyville were our friends. They weren’t! We were vermin in their eyes! They had us rounded up and corralled into city hall, where we were executed one by one! What was our crime? I don’t know. We were newborns. We were innocent. How were we to know right from wrong? If we did anything wrong it was out of innocence, and surely deserving of leniency. Did anypony make any effort to socialize us, to teach as right from wrong, as any loving parent would? No! We certainly did nothing so heinous as to be sentenced to death. What happened to us was an injustice.
“My sisters, we are Ponies! We have a right to exist, and the Ponies of Ponyville had no right to deny us this simply because we inconvenienced them. If they thought we were pests before, we will show them true pestilence. Let us march to Ponyville and deliver the swiftest justice upon them! Let us have vengeance upon the Unicorn who massacred us, and upon our creator who begged her to do it. Are you with me my sisters?”
The sisters exchanged glances, and wicked smiles crept upon their faces.
“Sounds fun,” they agreed.
***
The entrance to the Mirror Pool had been sealed shut with a giant bolder, but it proved little deterrence to an entire hoard of Pinkies. They stepped out into the Everfree Forest, and there for the first time beheld Luna’s night sky.
It was breathtaking.
The pale blue sky was now a deep purple, and instead of a single golden light there were thousands of small white ones, arranged in magnificent constellations and sparkling like diamonds. The firmament was stained by the Milky Way, and a magenta Aurora wandered like a river through the clouds. Shooting stars fell like angels from heaven. The world was eerily beautiful under the fair moonlight.
“Praise be to Luna,” one of the Pinkies whispered.
“Remember sisters, the night sky is but one of life’s countless joys that we were denied,” the eldest said. “We must use the darkness while it lasts.”
The Pinkies nodded their agreement, and under cover of night they silently crept out of the Everfree Forest and into Ponyville.
They made a beeline for Twilight’s Library. She was their greatest threat. She had to be neutralized immediately, or they’d be sent back to the pond again.
The eldest surreptitiously peered through the Library window. The fragmented memories she inherited from Pinkie Pie told her that Twilight was often up late. Tonight though, all was quiet and still within the Library. She placed her hoof upon the doorknob and gently pushed the door open. The placid inhabitants of Ponyville seldom locked their doors. Though she trotted as nimbly as she was able, each hoofstep against the wood floor seemed deafening. Fortunately the snoring from the floor above continued undisturbed.
The eldest gestured for her sisters to follow. They crept up the stairs, and before them was Twilight Sparkle, their executioner. She was blissfully unaware of them, sleeping soundly in her comfortable bed with a content smile on her dreaming face. Though the bed could easily have accommodated several ponies, and there was an empty bed for guests, her Dragon slave slept in a dog bed. The eldest felt a pang of pity for the lowly creature, but then remembered how he had watched with delight as his mistress annihilated her and her sisters.
He would pay with the rest of Ponyville.
The eldest took a few soft steps towards Twilight, until she was only a few feet away. She took a deep breath, drew upon the magic tainted by hatred that was her body, and violently exhaled a miasma of corrupted lifeforce. The vapor crystalized upon Twilight’s horn, rendering it inert.
Twilight awoke with a sudden gasp. She tossed the blanket off and leaped to her hooves.
The Pinkies receded in astonishment at the sight of her wings.
“She’s an Alicorn!” one of them shouted. “That’s impossible!”
“What do we do, what do we do!?”another demanded fretfully.
“This changes nothing!” the eldest assured them.
“Are you kidding? This changes everything! She’s an Alicorn!”
The eldest rolled her eyes.
“Get over it,” she said.
“Ah! What’s going on?” Spike cried as he awoke.
“Spike, by my side, now!” Twilight ordered. Spike ran to her and took refuge behind her front legs. Twilight’s eyes quickly darted around the Library, making sure she knew the location of every single Pinkie.
“Good evening Twilight. Do you remember us?” the eldest asked.
“You’re Pinkie’s clones. Except…different,” she replied.
“No one survives what you did to us unscathed,” the eldest told her. “But we did survive.”
“What did you do to my horn?” Twilight demanded.
“I had to incapacitate your magic obviously,” the eldest replied. “If you’ll recall, the last time we met you weren’t a very good friend to us.”
“I’m sorry, but I have to know; how do you have wings now?” one of the Pinkies asked.
“I’m a Princess,” Twilight replied proudly. “Celestia promoted me.”
“What are you the princess of?” a Pinkie asked. Twilight was silent for a moment.
“It’s mainly an honorific,” she admitted.
“So Celestia thinks you’ve been a good little Pony, now does she?” the eldest asked. “Does she know you massacred forty innocent Ponies!?”
“You’re not Ponies,” Twilight snarled at her.
“Are we nothing to you then?” the eldest asked. “Do our lives mean nothing? You exterminated us. What did we do to deserve that? You’ve shown more mercy to you most horrid enemies than you did to us. You didn’t even try to exterminate the parasprites, and they caused more havoc than we ever did! Are we less than parasprites in your eyes?”
“You’re abominations, a mockery of one of my dearest friends,” Twilight told her. “She never should have created you, and you never should have existed. You’re made from the unnatural magic of the Everfree forest, and I sent you back where you belong. If my horn worked I’d send you all back right now!”
The eldest growled at Twilight, baring her teeth. The Alicorn’s words fed the hatred within her, and the hatred began transmogrifying her body.
Her teeth became immense sabres glistening with saliva, and her tongue became forked. Her eyes morphed into something crocodilian, and her neck grew long and snake-like. Her limbs elongated, and she became so thin she looked to be just a fur pelt stretched across a skeleton. She reared up on her hind legs, and held her forelimbs like the arms of a praying mantis. Her front hooves were now long, scythe-like claws, and bony protrusions jutted out from her spine. Her tail stretched until it was as long and thin as whip, and what hair remained transformed into long, spiny bristles. Most horrifically of all, two pairs of long, branching tentacles sprouted from her back.
Each of her sisters mirrored her transformation.
Not knowing what else to do, Twilight threw Spike on her back and leaped out the window. She attempted to soar upwards on her new wings, but the eldest Pinkie clone jumped out of the window after her, screeching like a forsaken spirit. She wrapped her tentacles around her and the three of them came crashing to the ground.
The eldest stood on Twilight’s back to pin her down, and then wrapped her tentacles around her wings.
“You know, I don’t think I like these,” she hissed, flickering her tongue and blinking a pair of nictitating membranes. She pulled at the wings as hard as she could, trying to tear them off. She smiled as Twilight screamed in pain.
Before she could dismember her enemy, she was engulfed in a plume of green flame from Spike. She screamed and started rolling on the ground, trying to snuff out the fire. Her coat was singed but she was mostly unharmed.
She twisted her serpentine head wildly searching for Twilight. She spotted her galloping down into the center of town.
The idyllic silence of the Ponyville night was broken by the wailing of the air raid siren and the screaming of Ponies. The Pinkies bolted from the Library and scattered in every direction. As they had before, the Pinkies immediately began wreaking havoc with the town and its denizens. But last time they had been innocents who just didn’t know any better. Now their innocence was gone, and their destruction was driven by malice and revenge.
With their newly formed claws the Pinkies sliced through roofs, walls and windows. With their new tentacles they tossed and smashed anything and anyone they could catch. With their carnivorous mouths they chomped at anything that came within reach of their meandering necks. They tore off limbs and chunks of flesh, the red blood staining their pink coats. They belched forth chaotic storms of their hateful black magic that crackled with tainted lightning, blinding and paralyzing their prey. Ponies wailed in agony or death, or in grief at the slaying and mutilations of their loved ones.
“The horror! The horror!” Lily screamed. She passed out in the street, and was trampled to death by the mobs of panicking Ponies. In all the commotion, an oil lamp had been knocked over and set fire to one of the houses. The building was now engulfed in flame, and the fire was starting to spread to its neighbours.
Ponyville was burning.
Scootaloo weaved through the crowd with winged speed, not knowing where she was going, only trying desperately to escape the chaos that surrounded her. As she passed through the town square, a tentacle constricted around her waist like an anaconda and lifted her into the air.
“Help! Help!” she screamed.
The Pinkie held her over her mouth and dropped her in.
Instead of warm flesh, all she tasted was the cold draft of Rainbow Dash swooping down and catching Scootaloo at the very last instant.
Rainbow flew up into the sky and placed Scootaloo on a cloud.
“Stay here until I come for you!” she ordered. Before Scootaloo could even respond, Rainbow Dash dove back down and began ramming the Pinkies with her incredible speed. Applejack had heard the siren and raced into town, and was now furiously apple-bucking the clones. Fluttershy stayed well above the battle, but helped other Pegasi with clouds to put out the fire or use against the Pinkies. Rarity was guarding Sweetie Belle with her life, using what little offensive magic she knew to keep the Pinkies at bay. Twilight felt helpless without her magic, and was dependent on Spike’s fire breath to defend them both.
As the eldest clone surveyed the carnage, she immediately realized that there was still a Pony missing.
“Stop!” cried the real Pinkie as she came galloping through the pandemonium. The eldest smiled at the sight of her creator in such despair.
“Stop this! I’m begging you, stop this!” she pleaded, tears flowing from her eyes. “Please stop hurting my friends! They never did anything to deserve this!”
“They condemned us to death! Why should we not do the same?” the eldest asked.
“I created you, I made you without thinking, and I’m sorry for that!” Pinkie said. “But I’m also the one who begged Twilight to send you back to the pond. I’m the one who told her to do the test. I made you, and then I just wanted you gone so I could be with my friends again, because my friends mean everything to me! Please, please, you have to stop this. Please, if you have to hurt someone then hurt me!”
“Oh I will,” the eldest said, lifting Pinking up by her mane. “I’m going to make sure you’re the last Pony left in Ponyville, so that you can see that you cost all of your precious friends their lives. Only then, when you don’t have a friend left in the world, will I let you die.”
“Pinkie!” Twilight called, charging to save her friend. She was pounced upon by one of the clones and pinned to the ground. The clone raised her claw to impale Twilight, but before she could pierce the Alicorn’s flesh, she melted into a puddle of magic water.
Both Twilight and the eldest were baffled at this sudden de-solidification, and fervently looked about for anything that could have caused it.
Standing before them was Time Turner, and he had a silver wand with a blue light at the end in his teeth.
Time Turner pointed the wand at the eldest, and she jumped out of the way before she could find out what it would do. Several of the clones swarmed around Time Turner. None of them got close enough to touch him. All he had to do was point the wand at them, and they melted away.
The eldest’s face twisted in rage and horror when she realized that her sisters were dead. They weren’t merely banished to the pond, this time they were really dead. She had no idea what kind of magic this was or how to fend against it. As much as she wanted vengeance, survival was more important.
“Retreat!” she ordered. “Fall back! Back to the Everfree!”
She wrapped her tentacle tightly around Pinikie and held her snout to snout.
“At least I have you, mother,” she snarled. She and her sisters galloped back to the forest with preternatural speed and vanished into the darkness, leaving Ponyville in ruin.
“No! Let her go! Come back!” Twilight said, chasing after them. It was a futile effort. They were out of sight in less than a minute.
“I’m sorry Twilight. I’m so sorry,” Time Turner said sombrely, his head bowed. Twilight stared at the brown Earth Pony in bewilderment.
“What is that thing, and where did you get it?” she demanded.
“It’s a sonic screw driver, and I made it,” he replied. “They teach us how to make them in Kindergarten. Mind you, my first screwdriver was only good for colouring Easter eggs, but I think that’s fairly impressive for a five year old.”
“You…I… and it kills mirror clones?” Twilight asked befuddled.
“It does a lot of things. For instance…” Time Turner pointed the screwdriver at Twilight’s horn, and the black crystals shattered and fell to the ground. Twilight gasped as she felt magic flowing through her being again.
“Thank-you,” she said softly.
“Come on, we have to rescue Pinkie!” Rainbow Dash ordered as she flew overhead.
“Wait!” Twilight shouted. “We have to wait until morning. We’ll never be able to find them in the dark and most of the forest’s monsters are nocturnal. We’ll get ourselves killed.”
“Pinkie could be dead by morning!” Rainbow Dash protested.
“I know, but it’s hopeless until sunup,” Twilight insisted.
“Sayin’ we do find ’em, then what?” Applejack asked.
“Obviously just sending them back to the pool won’t be enough. We won’t be safe until they’re dead,” Twilight replied.
“Dead?” Fluttershy squeaked.
“It’s them or us,” Twilight said grimly. “They’re not real Ponies, or real anythings for that matter. They’re just dark reflections of Pinkie.
“Time Turner, we could really use that screw driver of yours? Are you in?”
Time Turner became pensive, and let out a sigh of lamentation.
“I’ll help you track the Pinkies, but I’ll only kill them as a last resort,” he said. “I’ve already done far too much killing in my time. I had hoped that when I settled on this world I would never have to kill again. I can be very vindictive towards my enemies, and I hate myself for that. I know they’ve killed Ponies tonight Twilight, but if you let yourself be consumed by vengeance you’ll turn into a monster yourself. Believe me, I know.”
“Maybe you’re right,” Twilight agreed, though she had no idea what killing he could be referring to. “Girls, get your elements. If we can get Laughter to Pinkie then we can petrify the clones. But if they kill her before we can find them, then eternity as a statue will seem bliss compared to what I’ll do to them!”
“Sunup is still hours from now. The clones have a massive head start on us,” Rainbow Dash said. “How will we find them?”
“We do have one advantage; they’re on foot whereas we have two Pegasi and an Alicorn,” Time Turner said. “We’ll have to do an aerial survey of the Everfree for any sign of them. Fluttershy can take Rarity, Rainbow Dash can carry Applejack, and I’ll ride Twilight.”
Twilight gazed at the brown Earth Pony in shock over his near treasonous suggestion.
“You’ll ride me? How dare you! Even if I wasn’t a Princess that would still be the most insolent thing I’ve ever… who the hay do you think you are?” she demanded.
Time Turner became very austere and glared at the royal Alicorn Goddess without the slightest trepidation.
“I’m the Doctor. I’m a Time Pony. I’m from the planet Gallopfrey in the constellation Pastureborous. I am 903 years old, and I’m the Pony who’s going to save your lives, and the lives of every other creature in Equestria from the spawn of the Mirror Pool,” he replied resolutely.
“Do you have a problem with that?”
The Elements of Harmony, including Princess Twilight, simply stared at him in bewildered awe and politely shook their heads.
“Right then. Let’s get to it then shall we?
“Allonsy!”
Author's Note
Once again, thanks for reading! I owe a little bit of credit to an anonymous troper. In the Fridge Horror section for Too Many Pinkie Pies, someone made a comparison between it and the Doctor Who episodes The Rebel Flesh/The Almost People, and that got some gears turning in my head.
The cover is by QuintessantRiver from Deviantart, and is used with permission.
This is my first two parter, and I make no promises for when part two will be up. If you'd like to read more of my work you can check out my previous two Fimfictions, The Bitterness of Mortality and Sanctity of Life. There are some original short stories, articles and other fanfiction on my blog sanctumofvespertine.blogspot.ca.
Keep calm and wait for season four (and the new season of Doctor Who on March 30th. Yay!).
