Fanfics that creep you out.

"What could be wrong with you, sweetie?" Rainbow shrugged and the conversation ended. But a few years later, she found herself the only girl who had signed up for flying lessons.

"Mom, is something wrong with me?"

"What could be wrong with you, sweetie?" She noted her mother's very defensive tone.

"Nothing, I guess."

"It's the flying lessons. You don't feel like the other girls."

"Yeah."

"That's okay! Not everyone is the same, sweetie. You're beautiful because you're different."

"I guess..." But a few years later, the other girls at school were talking about their interest in the stallions at school, and Rainbow Dash could not stop her own boredom. She was more interested in the girls who were talking. "Mom, is something wrong with me?"

"What could be wrong with you, sweetie?"

"Uh, this is kind of awkward, mom."

"You can tell me anything, sweetie. I'm your mother." She explained, and... "Well, ponies like that are called lesbians, sweetie."

"Is it okay to be a lesbian?"

"You're you, Rainbow Dash. And that's all that matters. You're beautiful because you're you."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure, sweetie." Rainbow Dash accepted this, but a few years later...

Rainbow Dash stumbled through the streets. How many ponies was she with last night? She couldn't remember. The alcohol clouded everything. She needed to find her old house. There it was. She pried open the door. "Mom, there is something wrong with me."

"What could be wrong with you, sweetie?"

"Shut the hell up, mom. We've gone through this a million times, and every time you convince me that there's nothing wrong with me. Now tell me. Tell me what is wrong with me. Because there is something wrong with me, and you know it."

"You're right... Are you sure you want to hear this?"

"Yes! Yes, I want to hear it, you bitch!"

"That's no way to talk to your mother, sweetie."

"Tell me!"

"Fine... I never wanted you to know this, but I guess you're just growing up too quick for me to keep up with."

"Mom, I've already grown up."

"Now, sweetie, mares have vulvas, and stallions have penises..."

"I know all that shit! I'm an adult! Hell, you've told me before! Now tell me what's wrong with me!"

"Language, sweetie." Rainbow Dash scowled. "Okay, so your father and I had agreed that if you were a filly, we would call you Rainbow."

"And what would you have called me if I were a colt?"

"We would have called you Dash." There was a pause, as Rainbow Dash considered this. "Now, there's a rare genetic condition that causes a pony to be born with both sets of genitals." Rainbow Dash gaped at her mother. "Ponies like that are called hermaphrodites, sweetie. Well, we did decide that Rainbow Dash was a perfectly nice name, but we didn't want you going through life as a freak like that. Now, they could have sewed the vulva shut, and then you would have lived as a male. But that wouldn't have really worked, eventually it would have opened up again. So instead, we took the better route, and removed your penis, sweetie." There was another pause.

"What the fuck?"

"I know, right?" said her father. He pulled the lever on the machine. "I spent a long time on her. Now the important things are automated."

"I'm so glad you're a mechanic, honey," said her mother.

"Not just any mechanic-a magical mechanic," said her father, with a gleam in his eye that could only be produced by talking about himself. "But it's important that you're a stewardess, too. That gives us a steady supply of readymade food to refill it with. ...they don't mind, do they?"

"No, they make way too much airplane food. They're happy to get rid of the stuff."

"So, for now we're setting it up in the closet so she can't make any trouble, right?"

"Right. Maybe later when she's older we'll open it up a bit." And so Rarity's childhood was set up. Every eight hours, a little sealed bag of pretzel oats dropped from the top of the closet, and every twenty four hours a bottle of water dropped from the top of the closet.. The first time, it was a bit of a puzzle and she was getting absolutely starved, but once she figured out that she could open the bags with her horn she never went hungry again.

Every couple of weeks, Rarity would be let out to show to relatives. She looked forward to these brief occasions, as they allowed her to see something other than the inside of a closet. Admittedly, it was a rather large closet, but still... The window was the most fascinating part of the house, as it showed all sorts of mysterious ponies outside... Normally, in the closet, the only other pony just copied everything that Rarity did, and she was behind glass anyways.

One month, there was no need to take Rarity out of the closet. As the days turned into weeks, Rarity wished desperately to get out, but her small young hooves were insufficient to claw her way out. But eventually, Rarity came to peace with her situation. This was where she was supposed to be. This was her home. She would make do with the things that she had. She had already played with the large items hanging in the closet, but now they demanded serious analysis.

Eventually she determined that they were supposed to fit around a body like her own. She structured her mind around the various patterns that made them up-and, for real mental excercise, blended those patterns or devised new ones to create even more interesting attire. Eventually, her mother came back in to refill the machine with food bags, but now Rarity was uninterested in coming out, so she stuck in her home. Further experimentation eventually led to the revelation of a box with needles in it. After several mistakes, she figured out that this allowed her to transplant some of her plans into reality. She even made some dresses in her own size. But then one fateful day came when her mother opened the door to the closet and didn't close it.

The first thing that Rarity noticed was that it was hard to bare that much light all of the time. The second thing she noticed was that the rest of the house gave her even more supplies to experiment with. There were a lot of boxes lying around labeled "LEARN EQUESTRIAN STANDARD QUICK". They allowed her to talk to pretty much anypony, and to read and write, which Rarity supposed would be more helpful if she had someone to communicate with other than herself, her frankly uninterested parents, and that ripoff pony behind the glass.

Rarity had a lot to learn-where all the rooms in the house were, the use of assorted items, analysis of the events outside the windows. But everything she learned, she just used towards her original purpose in life, of making dresses. On at least one occasion, someone attempted to have a conversation with her through the window. It was brief and awkward, but it did remind her that there were other ponies out there. Rarity supposed that in a year or two, her parents would let her out to the world where she had practically infinite subjects for dresses.

One day, another pony appeared in the house. She reminded Rarity of herself, but she was much smaller... something like Rarity was long ago. This was fascinating, and finally gave a purpose to Rarity's ability to communicate. Soon, the infant, Sweetie Bell, could speak. She was growing on the same pretzel oats and water as Rarity, though the machine was set to dispense twice as many now to accomadate for this. Now Rarity would have a subject other than herself to test dresses on... And someone other than herself to talk to...

Sweetie Bell came with her own ripoff pony, which was also behind the glass. Rarity decided that this called for a trip beyond the glass. It was pretty hard glass, so she had to run into it from a distance with her horn. It broke, but she crashed into a wall. There was nothing behind the glass. Rarity had to rewrite her definition of reality a bit, but not her purpose...

"Hi, Fluttershy!" said a passerby. She was in the category of ponies Fluttershy recognized but did not know the name of.

"Hi! How are you doing?" This same sort of event occurred several times on her way to her house. Once at her house, she let Angel get onto her back, and then she walked outwards. The truly microscopic bunny nervously looked around, but it was still cheerful as it held tightly onto Fluttershy. Even with her weakened wings, Fluttershy's status as a pegasus put an extra spring in her step that made it fun to walk. She continued on to nowhere in particular, greeting everyone on her way there. Until, eventually, she encountered him. "Hi, Fluttershy."

"Hi, Gustspeeder!" Angel was getting much more nervous.

"My dad's a Wonderbolt!"

"I know, Gustspeeder. You've told me before." Fluttershy punctuated the sentence with a loud, friendly giggle.

"Do you think I could be a Wonderbolt, Fluttershy?"

"You're a pretty good flier. Way better than me."

"You're good... in other ways."

"Aw, thanks. You're a great friend, Gustspeeder. There's nopony else quite like you."

"You're great, Fluttershy. I wish I could spend, uh, more time with you."

"That'd be neat. You ought to take me flying some time."

"Yeah, I'd take you while flying." There was a pause, and Angel scratched at Fluttershy's mane, but she shook him off. "Hey, how'd you like to see something really neat?"

"And what would that be?" asked Fluttershy.

"If I told you, it wouldn't be a surprise, now would it?"

"I guess not. So where do I go?"

"Well, it's in my dad's house..."

"Sure! I'll come right in!"

"Specifically, down here." He pointed towards a damp downward stairway of clouds.

"In the basement?"

"Yeah." Fluttershy shrugged and then walked down the steps. "So... what's the surprise?" Gustspeeder pulled the basement door down hard and locked it.

"This." And with that he lept forward.

About a year later, Fluttershy was sitting on her own roof at her residence in Ponyville, next to her most trusted friend in the world, Angel. Even before the incident, animals had been inexplicably friendly with her, but afterwards they consisted the vast majority of her friends. Any interaction she tried to make with another pony filled her with discomfort.

At this point, she considered her name. It was kind of fitting, if you thought about it. She did remember on some level what she was like before, but she could never go back to that personality. She was much shier now, but for good reason. You have to be careful. If you go around trusting everyone you meet, Celestia only knows what will happen to you...

"Scootaloo, I... I think there are some things we need to talk about."

"What?"

"Well, your whole Crusaders thing is kind of a neat concept, and I'm glad you're taking initiative. Maybe, if I was still a filly I'd be interested. I think it could really go somewhere. It makes me proud of you."

"So what's the problem?"

"Well... who are the other members?"

"Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle. What are you-"

"Where are the meetings?"

"They're in a treehouse."

"And who gave you that treehouse?"

"Applejack. What's your point?"

"Well, uh, don't repeat any of this to any of your friends, okay?"

"Okay, mom."

"The Apple family has only been welcome in Ponyville recently, and in many households - including ours - they're still not welcome." And with that, Scootaloo's mother launched into her tale...

"A long time ago - long, long before the Nightmare Moon incident earlier this year - it was up in the air whether the prophecy of the release of Nightmare Moon was real or not. It eventually did turn out to be real, but that's besides the point. So, about half of the ponies out there believed it was true, and about half of the ponies out there didn't believe it was true."

"Now, of the half that believed it was true, pretty much all of them agreed that the proper way of disspelling eternal night, once it came about, would be to renew the Elements Of Harmony. But there was one very, very small sect that said that the way to fight darkness was with more darkness. It was a sect of unicorns that used their magic powers to create monsters to fight Nightmare Moon when she came back."

"No one really liked them. The ponies who didn't believe in the return of Nightmare Moon thought they were nuts, and the ponies who did believe thought they were rebelling against the very concept of good. To make matters worse, the beasts they created were uncontrollable and dangerous. Some of them were slain in the ensuing centuries, and some of them still roam Equestria today. The state of some of them is unknown. You have these people to thank for the Parasprite outbreak earlier this year."

"Eventually they caused enough trouble that Princess Celestia herself demanded that they explain themselves. Now, they could have just talked to Princess Celestia. But they couldn't stand to be wrong, so the whole cult moved out to a compound in the middle of nowhere. They stayed there for over four hundred and fifty years. Most of Equestria didn't really have much contact with them. Some of the scouts that were sent out to try to reason with them didn't come back, and it's unclear whether they were killed or assimilated."

"The thing is that, being stuck out alone in the middle of the forest, they had a rather limited gene pool. It didn't cause much trouble for the first few generations, but eventually, as the cult mixed with itself, it became forced to participate in inbreeding. That's when two ponies who are related have children together. It has awful effects on the offspring. The exact extent of the mutations are still unknown, but it is known that at some point they lost their horns and magic abilities, essentially becoming, for all intents and purposes, earth ponies. It's suspected that they're mentally... challenged, as well."

"Apparently everyone there wasn't happy about it. On the decision of one Miss Smith, they finally rejoined the rest of Equestria about fifty years ago. Some people - I'm one of them - are still rather weary of them, but others have just flat-out accepted them. They've become rather popular for their invention of apples, which they named after themselves. I haven't eaten a single apple, and I never intend to. To be honest, I'm pretty sure they haven't gotten past the way of life they've had for hundreds of years. Applejack was, hmm, rather plump in the months before Apple Bloom appeared, and, well, she always struck me as being too close to that big one..." Scootaloo started to gag. "Do you understand why I don't want you hanging out with the Apples?"

"Yes, I understand..." Scootaloo pondered the issue of how to hide future meetings from her mother as she left the room.