Chapter 14: Calling Down the Moon
Mucmarfóir goggled stupidly at the red-lit horror that had been somehow compressed inside Grault's skin. The egg-shaped body was at least ten strides high, including the assortment of tendrils and legs that kept being extruded and re-absorbed into It. The surface was puckered with mouths and eyes, and from its top, four thick tentacles stretched another twenty strides into the air, twisting about almost idly.
Looking back, Mumcarfóir would laugh at the fact It resembled a giant killer spring onion.
But at this point in time he was frozen with fear, staring up at It, so much like the one he'd seen years ago. He could hear the yells of Muc. The crackle of flames. And above it all, the despairing, agonised screams of his sister as she was drawn into the writhing, eye-dotted dark mass.
From the battlefield, a figure came charging in a dead run, warshoes gleaming, heading straight for the transfixed Shetlander.
It finally seemed to notice the paralysed pony at Its feet. One tentacle dipped almost lazily towards the meal that obligingly failed to flee.
Mucmarfóir's vision exploded in painful white, and as the stars cleared from his eyes he realised that the reason everything was hurtling past him was because somepony had apparently grabbed him up in a firepony's carry. Sharp pains in his forelegs told him his rescuer hadn't removed their warshoes first.
Lifting his head, he turned see his rescuer. An ice-blue eye in a shaggy brown head, snout flecked with woad, looked straight ahead as he continued his gallop back to the lines.
"Ri… Rian…"
"Shup," Rianblade gasped as he barrelled between fighting ponies and battling boars towards where several unicorns were moving among shapes lying on the bloodied grass. Some moaned; others flailed in pain; others did neither, awaiting their shrouds.
A medicorn looked up as Rianblade approached. "Who you got there?"
"Mu – Mu – Mucmar – Mucmarfóir," Rianblade finally managed to get out, thoroughly lathered. "Poor – sod – got a – lookit – that thing – right close."
His knees buckled and he slumped to the ground. Running on wet soil in warshoes is hard. Doing so with another pony on your back is understandably harder.
Twilight Sparkle sank to her knees, coughing painfully. There was blood in her mouth. There are languages known to magic that, technically, aren't pronounceable with Equestrian anatomy.
Her element burned on her head, causing her friends to wince and cover their eyes. Not that she did that for long. Their elements were blindingly alight as well, giving their faces a sinister look. Only Fluttershy was exempt, and that was because she had collapsed in a dead faint.
"Did..." Her head dipped in another spasm of coughing. "Did it..."
"Work?" Applejack had pushed her hat down over her eyes. "I ain't lookin', I'll tell ya that much," she admitted in a trembling voice.
"I t-think it did," Rainbow Dash lifted a hoof upward.
In the sky above, what should have been a half-moon was waning, briskly but without any fuss. Around it, stars bent as if through a magnifying glass.
The moon was answering the call.
As it waned, it swelled, squashing the stars aside into a parody of a halo, which glinted off the towers and spires of a previously unseen, dark city.
There was, almost inevitably, something wrong with the angles of those towers. Part could have been the distortion of space between Equestria and its satellite, making those towers and buildings look dizzyingly high, but there was more to it: corners that changed direction as you looked at them, planes that flipped inside out, that sort of thing.
One spire in particular arrested attention. Distorted perspective made it seem to lunge from the cityscape like a pointing finger, and something black fluttered and flapped on it.
"It's coming," Twilight breathed. Applejack just moaned and attempted to hide in her hat. Rainbow Dash cringed with her wings over her head. Pinkie just looked up with interest.
"Do you think it's Nightmare Moon? Does she like parties? 'Cos when this is over we can throw her a party before she goes back and…"
The black thing swelled and leaped off the tower, dark wings spreading to seemingly blot out everything in a lightless void.
Both ponies and Muc screamed, grovelling on the ground, eyes shut in fear.
There was a small thump.
Somepony nuzzled Twilight.
Twilight cracked open an eye. Stars still made a cramped ring about the moon, and her element illuminated the filly who…
Filly?
Twilight blinked.
It was a little filly Nightmare Moon. Complete with armour. And looking at her curiously.
"What…" Twilight managed to ask in as intelligent a way as she could manage.
"You called me?" the impossible filly asked, "You want to play with me?"
Applejack had snuck an incredulous peek at the first piping enquiry, then dove under her hat again at the second.
"Ah… well, we could… play, I guess, but…" inspiration failed Twilight. What sort of games did this… thing like to play? And could they be survived? The questions whirled around in her head.
Nightmare Moon's attention was caught by screams. Huge green cat eyes watched as two screaming Shetlanders were caught by It before vanishing into It's mass with appalling sucking sounds.
The little not-a-filly's face lit up. "Yummy!" she squealed in delight, before pelting towards the towering abomination, little wings buzzing to compensate for a disturbingly uncoordinated gait.
"What's she doing!" Twilight cried, causing the rest of Harmony Incarnate to finally look up and stare at the apparently suicidal foal.
"Whatever it is, I'm stayin' out of it," Applejack declared.
"But she'll be killed!" Rarity wailed, then realised what diving on the ground had done to her mane and groaned.
"Girls," Rainbow remarked, "uh, is that a baby… Nightmare Moon?" Her voice rose in disbelief.
"Sure looks like it," Twilight answered absently, squinting at the little form that was now wrapped around one of It's leg-equivalents.
"Is she… is she biting it?"
"Uh… yeah…" Twilight was utterly nonplussed. "I think she… is."
"Eeewwww!" Pinkie's face contorted into a gurn of disgust. "That must taste awful – hey, do you think I should go get some cupcakes or fudge or something? Or just hold on to them for a party –"
It bent a tentacle downwards with an almost baffled air, plucking the filly up to where roughly twenty-three and a half of It's eyes puzzled at it for a moment. The filly looked back, then resumed trying to pull the end of the tentacle back up to her mouth.
A large mouth opened on It's side, and squirming and kicking, the baby Nightmare Moon was pushed into it.
The mouth closed.
The tentacle began to withdraw.
Harmony Incarnate wailed in horror.
Then It lurched as the tentacle was sucked back in.
It's other three tentacles wrapped around, attempting to pull the fourth out, but apparently it wasn't working. It actually staggered, absently crushing several Muc and ponies who didn't get out of the way in time.
"What the… hay?" was the question of the night.
Somepony threw a magical light, revealing that the tentacle was still being sucked into where the mouth had been – along with the surrounding mass.
"Ah thought that thing ate Nightmare Moon," Applejack managed to say at last.
"Looks like… like…" Twilight began, barely capable of comprehending what she was seeing.
A second tentacle was caught in the suction now. It actually screamed, a ghastly polyphonic whistle that stampeded well past the range of Equestrian ears.
"'Tis the buckin' other way 'round!" Roanald gasped.
Many of the Muc, seeing their god in danger, raced towards it, which in retrospect wasn't a good idea as they ended up being consumed or crushed. Some of the others attempted to flee, but the Equestrians weren't having any of that. Yet a third, dimly aware that the ponies had something to do with this, went on the rampage, but were quickly outnumbered and killed.
It fell over, and seemed to be deflating like a beachball with a slow leak. It's screaming was actually weaker now, Its two remaining tentacles flailing about for anything it could grab onto, whether it was rock, tree or somepig or somepony unable to get out of the way.
"Do you think she was hungry? 'Cos that's a lot of thingy for one little filly to eat, don't ya think?" Pinkie prattled a smidgeon hysterically. "I mean never mind cupcakes since I think she wouldn't be able to fit even one in but I think I know where some wafer-thin mints are or would that make her I dunno explode or something…"
"Wouldn't want to be against her in an eatin' contest," Applejack jested feebly.
The tentacles began to shrink, still flailing.
Four minutes later, It was nothing more than a blobby mass about a stride across, with a small armoured head poking out the top and gobbling away.
Less than a minute later, there was a large space of barren earth, the lights of flares and the twisted stars revealing a small alicorn filly in armour that was now noticeably tight around the middle.
Nightmare Moon licked its lips, blinked, and then emitted a thoroughly anticlimactic hiccup.
Harmony Incarnate just stared at the thing that wasn't a filly, stunned.
The filly sauntered up to them with that wing-assisted gait that didn't reward looking at closely.
"All gone!" Nightmare Moon reported brightly, "Can we play now?"
The six mares all blinked rapidly. None were particularly interested in finding out what games cosmic horrors liked to play.
"Uh…" Twilight's brain attempted to think in several different tangents at once before tripping over its own hooves.
"Well, lassie," a paternal and avuncular voice broke in, "Ah think yon ladies are a little busy right now, but you see yon piggies?"
Roanald pointed a hoof at one of the closer Muc, who was snorting in a wary fashion. The porker had seen what had happened to It, and couldn't decide whether to attack or flee.
"We've been playin' with 'em, but we need tae be awa' hame now," the Laird went on with aplomb, "I know! You could take 'em tae your home, an' play wi' them on the moon!"
Nightmare Moon's eyes went as huge as her smile, and she actually bounced a stride and a half into the air, clapping hooves together. "Playmates!"
The Muc's eyes darted around looking for an escape route.
Now the filly that (almost definitely) wasn't a filly began jumping into the air, higher and higher, as she began to repeat a very old nursery rhyme over and over.
Fillies and colts come out to play
The shadows weren't obvious at first.
The moon doth shine as bright as day
The Muc began backing away nervously.
Leave your supper and leave your sleep
Rainbow Dash was the first to notice the night brightening, and looked up for a moment, before burying her head under her wings again.
And come with your playfoals into the street
It was almost comical to watch first one, then another of the Muc frantically trying to run as they slowly ascended in the too-bright moonlight. Its colour left a feeling like somepony had smeared half-congealed cooking oil on your eyeballs. Or maybe that was because of the terrified pigs emptying their bowels from a great height.
Come with a whoop! Come with a call!
Come with a good will or come not at all!
The massed pegasi apparently didn't have a good will. They were quitting the sky as fast as the hapless boars relentlessly rose into it, following in the wake of their tormentor – a little armoured filly with wings that seemed to span the sky.
Up the ladder and down the wall
Nightmare Moon landed on earth again, and licked Roanald's nose, before leaping into the air once more.
A one-bitty loaf will serve us all…
There was a clap, like the beating of giant wings, and for a moment the sight of the bloated moon, and its black city now aglow with windows that were not windows, was blotted out.
Then the sky returned.
The half-moon smiled down. Around it, the stars twinkled indifferently.
"You find milk, and I'll find flour, and we'll have a pudding in half an hour…"
The members of Harmony Incarnate blinked, no longer blinded by their elements, then realised the shaky voice was Twilight's.
"But when the loaf's gone, what will you do? For those who would eat must work, 'tis true…"
"Twi'?" Rainbow went over to the shaking unicorn and shook her gently. "I think it's over. She's gone now."
"You sure?" said a voice from under a hat.
"Ah'd say so," Roanald replied, "now if ye lassies'll excuse me, there's summat I need t'do."
"Huh?" Rarity looked at him.
"Do what?" Applejack peered out from under her brim, observed no evil foals, and lifted her head to look at the Laird as well.
"This," and he promptly fainted.
Author's Nits
1. "Boys and girls come out to play" is a very old rhyme first recorded in 1744. They didn't have child labour laws back then.
2. I've had the image of the colthulhu ex machina looking like a filly Luna or Nightmare Moon for ages. Originally it would have been a direct crib off a Tumblr that I can't find now (it had a Luna that communicated with a GameBoy).
3. I know, I should have set this up as a crossover with the Colthulhu Mythos. But I didn't know where it was going. Oh well.