Fallout Equestria

Chapter 42.

"You."

As if in a trance, Velvet Remedy took a step towards the weeping willow with its buttery yellow bark and draping pink leaves.

"It's... you..."

The tree creaked and groaned, an eerie wind blowing through the curtains of hanging pink, rustling them with a mournful whisper. The soft and airy whimper caught my imagination. I could almost believe the wind carried words.

Stay away!

Velvet Remedy moved slowly closer. "It is you, isn't it?" she intoned in a strangled voice. She sounded like she was on the verge of breaking. Or screaming.

I picked myself up off the grass. I looked to my E.F.S. compass, hoping to spot the whereabouts of my friends, but saw nothing. My Eyes-Forward Sparkle had gone down in the crash. Or had I never brought it up? The fatal explosion of the Sky Bandit was still ringing in my ears, and I wasn't thinking straight.

Xenith, crouching low, her belly against the grass, crept up to the stone bunny. She reached out a tentative hoof and touched it, her hoof pulling back instantly as if she had reached out to touch molten lava. The fierce stone bunny statue remained a fierce stone bunny statue.

I brought up my Eyes-Forward Sparkle. It flashed a notice at me: new transmission detected. My eyes fell to the compass, which was glowing entirely red. It was as if the entire forest was hostile.

Behind me, I heard Calamity call out, "Reggie, there you are! Seen Life Bloom?"

"No," Reggie called back, her tone just a little snide. "Ain't he the one with the invisibility cloak?"

Xenith reached out and nudged the statue. It wobbled and fell over. Her eyes widened and she leapt back defensively.

The wind picked up. The rustling through the leaves was a haunting sound. It made the weeping willow sound like it was sobbing.

"How... how can this... be you?" Velvet asked, her voice almost childlike now.

Xenith stood up, approaching the fallen bunny statue. With a strangely sad look on her face, she leaned her head down and picked it up in her teeth, setting it back upright. "Doombunny," she said finally. "Turned to stone by a cockatrice. A worthy end for a worthy opponent."

Only a cockatrice can reverse its own magic. I remembered. The one who stoned Fluttershy's pet had surely died, if only of old age, lifetimes ago. He had stood guard here -- unmoving, unwavering stone.

Xenith bowed to Angel. "Doombunny, forever Fluttershy's protector."

The wind picked up, seeming to tear at the tree, the ghostly moans of its branches filled with misery and infinite sorrow.

"I'm here," Life Bloom called out, appearing as he shook the hood back from his head. "Is everypony all right?"

"Yeah, thanks for askin'," snarked the griffin.

The twisted, buttery-yellow tree creaked. The little blue vines shifted about its gnarled roots. Once more the soft, painful howl of the wind seemed to form words:

Get away!

Velvet Remedy took a step closer.

"Get away!" Xenith yelled, charging at Velvet Remedy and striking her with a forehoof hard enough to send her tumbling several yards down the sloped clearing.

Blue vines erupted from the ground in a shower of dirt and grass. Lashes of twisting, sinister ivy flailed after their victim. One of the blue vines brushed Xenith.