Salty Shores

by Garnot

First published 21st of November, 2011

From the black earth, to your house. The elder one awakens...

Salty Shores is a small mining town on the eastern coast of Equestria. One night, each of its salt reactors explode in quick succession, destroying the mines and much of the town.

There are no survivors.

The only suspect, labeled “dangerous” and “violent,” is placed under the care of an old scientist, working through the goodwill of the Equestrian Institute for the Sciences. Their guard, a young stallion of dubious origins, carries a shadowed past whose secrets even he cannot know.

A clinical case of psychopathy becomes something far more disturbing. A clean hospital becomes a place of darkness and despair. And in the place where it all began, Salty Shores quietly sits, burning in the embers of its own dead.

There is something lurking beneath the shores of Equestria. And now, it has begun to stir.

The Dark

I turned back to see that thing gaining ground. It was shrouded in black oily shadows that enveloped everything. I galloped as hard as my hooves would allow.

I wasn’t the only one running, but I was somehow ahead of the pack of terrified sinners. The hill ahead seemed to rise towards the sky, and no matter how much ground I covered, it wasn’t enough to outrun the darkness.

There was a sharp scream. I looked back.

To my horror, the murk had closed in the distance. Black tendrils from its murky depths scooped up any helpless pony in its path. Some managed to wriggle their way out, but it left them with horrible gashes that seemed to fester with something dark and vile. They soon stumbled over, bodies being consumed by something that rotted them from the inside out, turning their flesh into vicious red vile that dripped off their sides. This was soon followed by the sickening stench of festering pus as something sickly off-white flowed from their every orifice. Every nerve in their body screamed for the sweet embrace of oblivion. They prayed for death, but death never came. Instead, it seemed to be the first step into something far worse: a mix of living and dying mass that twisted their once natural features into something beyond words.

The smell; dear Luna, the smell...

One of the tendrils lashed out at me. Instinctively, I managed to duck. I picked up my pace. Fire shot up my thighs as my legs wobbled from the exertion. Still, I couldn’t stop. Stopping meant a fate worse than death.

The screaming suddenly intensified, becoming like screeches from Tartarus itself. They tore at my very being, driving me to the edge of sanity. If Tartarus was indeed a place, it would be here and now.

I gasped with fatigue, my lungs searing and my muscles aching. I looked back to see that thing quickly gaining ground. I tried to hasten the pace, but it only served to turn my already wobbly muscles into jelly.

Suddenly, I felt something grab hold of my right leg. I let out a scream as I felt liquid fire burn deep into the parts of my limb that weren’t protected by the markings.

I looked back at the culprit, my eyes widening at the sight of the creature’s vile tendril as it brought me new kinds of agony, raking at every nerve in my body. But that was only the beginning. The thing quickly yanked me back, dragging me right towards the unfathomable murk.

Several trees and small bushes passed me by, some close enough for me to try and grab a hold of.

I quickly snapped at the first branch I could get my jaw around, halting my movements almost instantly. The thing pulled on my limb harder, causing the branch to stretch beyond anything it was capable of. Still, I bit down as tight as I could.

Then the screams returned, only this time, something else made them. I dared to look down to see the black haze parting ways, revealing a mass of what I can only describe as as a maw of pure debaucherous antipathy and raw rancor, which quickly made its way towards me.

It wasn’t long before the whispering started, chanting words with no meaning. It made my blood run cold as ice and every hair on my head stand on end.

It drew closer and closer, the smell utterly unbearable and the chanting, that horrid god-forsaken chanting caused my mind to writhe in agony. The more I attempted to block it, the more powerful it became.

Then, just when I thought things could not get worse, that... that thing appeared...

It wobbled, twisted, writhed, strode, crawled, and flew forward all the same time. Its body was... the closest thing that comes to mind was a “hypercube,” as it seemed to grow and shrink with every one of its movement, never losing mass, fading in and out of existence. Whatever its “limbs” were supposed to be numbered in the thousands. No, hundreds of thousands. Its maws, of which I counted at least several hundred, dripped with the same oily bile that now tried to crawl up my leg, but was being held back by the intricate symbols I had burned into my skin earlier. Its eyes... thousands upon thousands of them, all staring at me with a mind that was beyond good and evil, right and wrong, sanity and insanity.

Truly, the thing before me was a being not of this world, not of this very reality. Its very existence was an utter affront to every known natural and magical law.

I wanted desperately to scream at the sight of it, but every fiber in my being told me to endure, to keep strong.

Once its eye was on me, The thing suddenly spoke in its foul guttural tongue. In that instant, I lost all rational thought and whimpered pathetically, letting go of the branch, as if some sick part of my being had opted to perish rather than stand against the thing.

I was dragged away in surprising silence, the part of my mind that still responded to instinctual stimuli desperately clawing at the soil with my hooves. It didn’t take long before I was dragged into that unnatural darkness and was consumed whole into some shapeless void.

The thing, with its thousands of eyes and mouths spoke to me in its language. As it did, I could feel my eyes start to become like fire.

Then, it showed me its true face, its true visage.

It was the last thing I ever—

Author's Notes:

First of all, I need to apologize. This has been a long time in the works (due to various reasons that are too long to put here).

At any rate, this is the new first chapter of the story. Enjoy the changes.

Detached

I woke up with a start, mind numb as the terror from that night receded back to its dark corner in my mind. It left me as blank as a filly’s flank. I tried to reach for my head, but I felt nothing.

It was then that I remembered. I looked at myself as I started to stir. The first thing my body did was curl up into a tight ball, grabbing hold of its legs in an attempt to cradle itself, much like a mother would its child. It shook, eyes watering, and teeth chattering. It stayed like that until the shone came into the small white room, at which point it quickly shied away from the beams of sunlight, almost as if coming into contact with them would cause it great harm. I again reached for myself, but my hoof passed right through the body.

I didn’t really understand how this had happened. Last thing I could recall was seeing that thing and it “blessing” me. Then, darkness. When I next awoke, I was staring at what at the time I’d believed to be my corpse. That soon proved to be false, as my body had stood up and walked out of the burning town just as it finally collapsed on itself. It somehow found a nearby cave and simply sat there, neither eating or sleeping. Rather, it took to carving odd symbols into the walls until the blood of my hooves mixed with the mud and the dirt. When the Equestrian Guards had found us, three whole sunrises and sunsets had already taken place. They looked on with intrigue at my body’s work before they dragged us away, my body being called the sole survivor.

I’ve lost count of how many days have passed since I was put in this mental institution. But judging my by body’s looks, I’d at least been here a week.

Look at my body; it was no wonder it rejected me. It was covered in burns and scars, all forming symbols that I’d burned into it using magick to keep the corruption at bay. They’d saved me then, but now served only as a reminder of my part in the calamity.

The rest of my being fared no better. My once raven mane was an oily mess, barely resembling anything presentable. My eyes, once a smooth lavender, now shone yolk white, devoid of pupils yet somehow bore a very basic instinctive sentience. Whatever makeup I had once worn was now either smeared into my coat or faded.

At exactly eight o'clock, my body started kicking and screaming. It had done this for the last two days, and always at eight o’clock. I could swear my body mumbled something incomprehensible, but it was difficult to tell apart from the primal grunts and snarls.

At nine sharp, it sat in the direct sunlight. It completely went against reason. My body always shied away from the dawn’s rays, yet there seemed to find no issue with the later morning’s sunlight. Rather, it simply stared at the rightmost wall, never diverting its gaze, not even when the doctors came and tried to make sense of our condition.

I’d tried countless times to get the attentions of the doctors by whatever means I could, but it hadn’t worked so far.

Fear. Anger. Hate. I felt every one burning and gnawing at the core of my ethereal being, but I couldn’t do a damn thing. All I could do was attempt to sleep and relive that same memory over and over again and gaze at my own body as it stumbled around without me.

A fitting punishment really, especially after what I’d done. The full weight of my actions didn’t sink in until I read the newspaper—The Canterlot Times—which one of the doctors had been gracious enough to bring into the cell with him on his morning check-up. The open page read:

Bitterly, I poured all my attention to the article while the doctor attempted to get my body to show signs of higher cognition.

It took me about two minutes, but when I finally finished reading the news, I felt a chill. I did what I had to do. Destruction was a far kinder fate than having it fall into their hooves, or be corrupted by that thing...

That was what I kept telling myself. Now, I was forced to suffer in this cell, awaiting the day my body simply decides it’d had enough of its own wretched existence and dies. I would say it was a fate worse than death, but compared to what that thing could have done to me, this was the equivalent of being granted access to the summerlands.

Nothing left now but to—

“Doctor, you sure this is the correct course of action?”

“Not like we’ve much choice. She’s not responded to any stimuli. As the sole survivor of attacks on Salty Shores, she’s the only link there is to the actual truth.”

“From what I’ve heard, the machine is still untested. There’s no telling what will happen when she’s exposed to it.”

“She’s practically a vegetable as is. She’s non-responsive apart from the occasional tantrum. But scans say there’s something... buried. Hidden in the darkest part of her mind.”

I heard the doctor arguing with a voice I was not familiar with as their hooffalls approached my cell. I could sense a slight tinge of desperation in their voices, as well as... fear?

Why fear? It’s not like that bag of bones was going anywhere. what did they think it would do? Wake up and dance some murderous can-can? It was even bound so tight that the only things missing were a whip, a pile of chains, and a safeword.

I strained to listen to the two ponies, whose voices had dropped several pitches.

“Do you really think the procedure will work doctor?”

“That machine is still untested, but it promises to do the one thing psychiatrists have dreamed of for years: get into a patient’s mind.”

“At what cost? I hope I don’t need to go into the ethics of your proposed idea Doctor. But let’s assume the procedure is carried out. Say there’s a screw-up by the operator and the machine malfunctions and causes irreversible damage, maybe kills her in the process. What then? Have you considered the dangers this procedure poses? More importantly, if the procedure is a success, what does that entail for the future of neuroscience and psychology? I don’t want to live in a world where the one thing that’s sacred above all others is readily open for anyone.”

“What else would you do if you were in my position? Leave her to exist like some wild animal? Even if she is responsible for killing thousands, she deserves a chance at being brought back. Besides, you can’t put a mindless body on trial.”

“Have you considered that maybe it’s for the best that she stays as mindless as possible? Who’s to say what she’s capable of if she becomes coherent again?”

“I have considered it, yes. In the end, I’ve decided that it’s best to get her back, especially if it means she can stand trial for her crimes against ponydom.”

“I don’t like the idea of this doctor, nor do I like the idea of taking a crazed lunatic out of her cell. But orders are orders.”

At those words, the doctor fell silent. The first in turn cleared his throat, and the two remained silent thereafter. A few seconds later, the two ponies got to my cell door. At that point I realized that I hadn’t been listening to two stallions speakings, let alone two doctors. Rather, the speakers had been a stallion and a mare.

The stallion was a doctor I had taken to calling “gray” because of his rather dirty gray mane and mustache. He was exceptional at looking average.

The mare, on the other hoof, wore a very steely face with burning magenta eyes. Her garbs were that of the Equestrian Guards, though from the gilded armor and white great coat, it was clear she was a high-ranking officer, a captain if her markings were anything to go by. The rest of her was rather unimpressive. Her mane was somewhat short, her frame was rather stout and so was her voice. Other than that, she had no real defining qualities from any other guard. Same white coat, same blonde mane.

The captain stepped aside as four other ponies entered my cell, gurney in hoof. Three of the guards wore gray infantry armor covering all but their forelegs and head.

The fourth guard struck me as odd, however. Unlike his peers, he wore nothing but a shell-coat and peaked cap with the Equestrian coat of arms printed on it, looking more like a cop than guard. Unlike the white guardsponies, his coat was a light charcoal and his mane looked as though it were made of pitch.

The more I looked at him, the more familiar I felt with him. Something about him was just... known.

I took notice of how the three guards walked up to my body, and unceremoniously strapped it to the gurney. As expected, my body tried to defend itself, but was no match for three fully armored equines. It took them less than two minutes to fully restrain my body, which then entered a rather uneasy slumber.

“I still don’t think that so called machine can do anything other than reaffirm how sick this piece of scum is,” the officer said, venom dripping from her every word.

“Its out of our hooves, Captain,” Doctor “gray” replied in a distant monotone. “What matters is that the subject is delivered to the institute for her evaluation. Do make sure she gets there in one piece.”

“She’ll get there. Don’t worry about that, doctor. I’m not into getting court martialed for disobeying a direct order.” The captain turned to look at my body, her glare sharp enough to cut granite.

The captain gave the doctor one final look and signaled her men to take me out of the cell. Soon as they moved the body, I felt myself being tugged alongside it, almost as if something was pulling my ethereal form. It Made sense I would go where my body went, since I wasn’t technically dead, just detached.

Still, no matter how hard I’ve tried my body would not take me back at all. Worse yet, it felt as if something was taking residence; something vile.

I was finally taken into the back of an auto-carriage, and strapped to the back wall. The three soldiers then took their places at the front of the vehicle, leaving the fourth one to sit next to me as a guard. Soon as the carriage started moving, I could see the young guard tense up, looking at my face with a mix of horror and sorrow.

The ride to the institute was going to be a long one.