Flamingo’s light seemed to struggle against the encroaching darkness—or perhaps it was a paranoid trick of the light. Tarnish’s skin crawled with the sensation of thousands of tiny, tickly spider legs; it felt as though an invisible host of arachnids swarmed over every inch of his body. His mind tormented him with all manner of terrifying, horrible scenarios, each one growing worse and worse as his imagination succumbed to fear.

Right now, he imagined that they were gathering, grouping up in the dark until they became a vast, overwhelming swarm, and then, and only then, would they strike, pouring from the darkness like a nightmarish flood onto the island of light that Flamingo provided. The floor was damp here, a symptom of the slow decay and failure of this place. Somewhere, a pump had failed and had not been replaced.

Somewhere, up ahead, the sound of water dripping could be heard, and the faint echoes had an odd distortion to them. Flamingo was quiet now, bobbing up and down near the ceiling so that her light would shine its farthest distance. Daring Do pressed ahead, perhaps, in Tarnish’s own opinion, too far ahead. She walked with her head low, her ears never stopping in their ceaseless efforts to home in on each and every sound.

“Uh, guys…”

“What is it, Rainbow?” asked Daring Do in a low, annoyed grumble.

“I’ve really gotta pinch a loaf—”

“Miss Dash—”

“No, really. I’ve been backed up and everything hurts inside and I really gotta go but I think it is going to hurt me when it finally comes out. I’m scared it’s gonna rip me open. All those dried rations are doing bad things to my guts.”

Daring Do started to say something, she drew in an incredible amount of breath, but then bit her lip and was silent. For this, Tarnish was thankful. The last thing he wanted was a squabble to break out. He couldn’t remember when he had gone last and when his time came, it would be an epic evacuation, of that there could be no doubt. He felt bad for Rainbow, because there would be no privacy, no going off for a little time alone. Upon reaching this conclusion, he also felt bad for himself, because he would have to listen.

Why, this was almost married pony territory.

“Very well.” Daring Do’s voice was now one of remarkable poise and grace. “Back up against the wall and the rest of us will form a defensive perimeter.”

“This is the worst,” mumbled Rainbow to herself. “Just the worst.”

Tarnish, who had taken the position that allowed him to face the side wall of the tunnel, did so with all of the nonchalant grace he could muster for this situation. He reminded himself this wasn’t too different than learning how to share living space with Octavia and Vinyl. There had been awkward moments aplenty, but over time, the barriers between them diminished. Friendship was the great equaliser, and contrary to what many other ponies said and or believed, they were all friends. Just really close friends with shared living arrangements. Who tended to sleep in the same bed.

The best of friends, really.

As the sound of running water flowed behind him, he thought of Maud and Octavia. Were they in bed together now? Cuddled up with Pebble? Maybe talking about the future? Or maybe Octavia was composing, scribing musical notes to crisp, perfect sheets of parchment. Those were happy moments, when the house was quiet, save for the sound of Octavia’s pen scratching against parchment, and they were all given to study in those moments.

So lost in thought was Tarnish that he was quite startled by Flamingo saying, “Oh no.”

He turned his head just in time to see several spiders step out of the darkness and into the light. Most of them were quite small, all things considered, with grapefruit-sized bodies. But one… one of them was the size of a very large turkey. Why a turkey? It was, at the moment, Tarnish’s only working frame of reference that came to mind as he hefted his wrench overhead.

As more spiders revealed themselves, several wet, heavy plops could be heard, as well as a fearful moan of relief from Rainbow Dash—whom, it seemed, could not stop going now. The fear response for equines was quite powerful—the old drop and go—but at the moment the rainbow-maned pegasus was too busy dropping to be going.

“Spiders,” said Flamingo as she began to float in circles, panicked. “Spiders have come to watch Rainbow Dash poop.”

“If I write a book about this”—Daring Do dropped into a defensive crouch—“and if I include this part, both my editor and my publisher will be quite cross with me. They’ll accuse me of selling out and using potty-humour to sell more books to foals.”

Tarnish, whose emotions now churned like a seething caldera, felt like saying, “No.”

It was a strong, powerful urge. His temper was a raging fire within, fueled by grief, rage, frustration, and his desire to be back home with friends and family. And for the spiders to come now of all moments, when his friend was at her most vulnerable—that was just unacceptable. Red spots danced in his vision, muscles convulsed in his neck, and the urge to shout out his denial of everything was now overwhelming.

He thought of Pebble, of the tiny nursery they had made, with stuffed toys, soft, pleasant things, and books. So many books, because a love of reading started young. As he ground his teeth together, his muscles bunching, and the red spots bouncing around in his vision, Tarnish neared his breaking point. This was unfair and he wanted nothing more than to deny it, to shout it down at the top of his lungs.

On the verge of his breaking point, he lunged into battle, throwing himself at the forward advance, and he began to sing as a last ditch effort of sorts to hold on to his sanity. Fearing that Daring Do and the others would be upset if he lost himself, he focused with song, the sorts of songs that he hoped he would sing to Pebble one day—but first he had to survive this.

“THE ITSY BITSY SPIDER—” His bellowed cries echoed up and down the tunnel, and when the word ‘spider’ was said, he brought his wrench down in a violent overhead chop that smooshed a grapefruit-sized spider flat, popping it like a bulbous, overflowing pimple. The sound of the centaur steel wrench striking stone rang out like a clarion bell and rebounded up and down the tunnels.

“—CLIMBED UP THE WATERSPOUT!” This time, as the word ‘waterspout’ was said, he swung his wrench like a golf club and the turkey-sized spider bore the full brunt of it. With a rather wet sounding splat, it went sailing off in a spectacular arc, flying back into the darkness from whence it came, its hairy legs wiggling as if to say goodbye.

Other spiders came into the light, but Tarnish was prepared for them, and he sang his gruesome nursery rhyme.

“DOWN CAME THE RAIN—” This came out as a half-scream, half-bellow, his voice tearing and cracking mid-sentence. Angling his head low, he released a terrific cloud of steam that scalded the spiders, withering them, cooking the antagonising arthropods inside of their chitinous husks. “—AND WASHED THE SPIDERS OUT!”

By sheer happenstance, Vinyl joined in for the impromptu musical song and dance number, and when Tarnish shouted, “OUT CAME THE SUN!” she released a multitude of fireballs, which went shooting off in multiple directions, filling the tunnel with warmth and light.

Now, the spiders, ablaze, carried light with them as they retreated into darkness.

“AND DRIED UP ALL THE RAIN!” Tarnish screamed at the top of his lungs while waving his wrench about. “AND IF THE ITSY BITSY SPIDERS KNOW WHAT’S GOOD FOR THEM, THEY WON’T BE CLIMBING UP THE WATERSPOUT AGAIN!”

Standing amidst a cloud of smokey stench, the foul smell of burning hair and spider tickling his nostrils, Tarnish was defiant, his barrel heaving up and down as he gulped in air to clear his battle fogged head. He wasn’t done here—there were spiders to kill, to exterminate, to purge—but he dared not chase them into the darkness.

In the dreadful quiet aftermath that followed, all that could be heard was the soft rustle of spider legs making a hasty withdrawal into the darkness. Would they come back? That seemed likely, but that was okay, because Tarnish had lots of other nursery rhymes to help him hold onto his precious, fragile sanity.

“Mister Teapot…” Daring Do kept her distance as she spoke. “Are you with us? Are you okay?”

His barrel still heaving, he croaked out a response: “Yes.”

“It’s hard to tell, with you singing,” she said to him, her words soft and submissive.

“I sang so I wouldn’t lose myself again,” he told her, his every word ragged and cracking.

“Oh.” This was a soft gasp more than it was a word. “Well, if that helps, then by all means, you sing if it helps you hold on to yourself. We need you, Tarnish. Out of all of us, you are the one most capable of violence, so it seems.” Then, after a moment’s pause, she added, “Would you like a drink of water?”

“I would very much like a drink of water.” Tarnish could feel his usual polite nature returning, his scholarly, gentle, thoughtful nature that was still being cultivated by those who loved him most. Retrieving his canteen, he had himself a drink while Flamingo flew circles around his head.

“Everything,” began Rainbow Dash, “just came right out. When Tarnish smashed that spider, that was gross. I feel kinda queasy.”

Tarnish’s ears were ringing now, so much to the point that he could hear very little. He couldn’t hear if danger was coming, or going, which left him in an anxious state. As he sipped from his canteen, his ears, rigid as steel struts, pivoted about in a desperate search for sound. Every muscle all over his body twitched, his heart was thumping quadruple time, and he could feel the blood squirting through the tightened vessels in his neck.

“We should press on.” Daring Do peered down the tunnel in the direction they had to go, which had a considerable curve to it. “Unless of course, somepony else has to go.”

With a sheepish smirk, Vinyl raised her hoof.

The sight of the station caused Tarnish to sigh with relief, but then he remembered that the spiders also infested the stations as well as the tunnels. This appeared to be quite a large station, with access on both sides of the tracks. A part of him wondered what might be found beyond the entrances—just what did this immense station serve? The previous station was small, tiny compared to this one. In the dim light ahead, he saw the tracks veer off in two directions, and this presented a problem, as he wasn’t sure which way to go.

Whatever was guiding him failed to mention if he should go right or left.

A fight seemed to have taken place here. Ancient scorch marks could be seen on the stone pillars, the floor, and the walls. In some places, the stone had melted completely, and was left rippled, blemished for all of history. Vinyl moved to one of these places, lowered her head, and her horn glowed with a light that dazzled Tarnish’s eyes.

There were webs here—so many webs.

“What’s that?” Her primaries extended, Rainbow Dash pointed at a dessicated corpse on the floor.

Lips pressed tight, Daring Do went over to investigate. Tarnish, a helpful sort, moved over as well, and Flamingo followed, bringing her light. Daring was quite focused, and even went as far as to disturb some of the webbing by poking it with her hoof. When she did so, Tarnish felt electric chills flow along his backbone, and he feared what might sense the webbing being disturbed.

“That’s a goblin, I think. I don’t think somepony would sneak in here and assemble random bones together on a lark.”

“A goblin?” Rainbow Dash’s head tilted off to one side. “Like in Ogres and Oubliettes?”

In response, Daring Do said nothing, but continued her cautious, careful study.

“Yeah,” said Tarnish, while he kept an eye on Vinyl, who was studying the floor. “That’s a goblin. Daring and I, we had… we had, well, I guess you could call it an encounter with goblins.”

“You began tossing them into an industrial mineral grinder—”

“They shot you with poison darts and were planning to cook you!” he snapped, not wanting to argue about this, not now, not with all the tension still making his muscles tight.

“Well, they are only goblins. I suppose it isn’t so bad. Tarnish and I, we got called to a mining site where somepony found something—which I can’t tell you what it was. But we were called there, and we were establishing ourselves a bit of a dig, when a gaggle of goblins showed up and decided to make the mines their new home. Tarnish and I, it seemed, were to be their dinner guests.”

Tarnish could scarcely believe his ears; there was a warm, affectionate tone to be heard in Daring’s voice, and he was so taken off guard by it that he could not help but relax just a bit. Taking a deep breath, he tried to focus on calming down a bit, with the hopes of getting his muscles to unkink.

“For reasons unknown, Tarnish was largely immune to whatever poison the goblins used in their blowguns. He looked like a porcupine when he rescued me. He was covered in darts from ear to hoof. From what I understand, the mining company had to scrap their mineral grinder… no matter what they did, the horrible smell just wouldn’t wash out. Tarnish tossed goblins in there by the hundreds and a flood of goblin paste filled the mining camp. He was just so eager to protect me and to leave a good impression.”

The kind words left him bashful, and he shuffled on his hooves, at a loss for words.

“Hey,” Flamingo said, her words a frantic whisper, “do you hear that?”

Author's Notes:

Oh no, what now?