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"Can I interest you in anything?" a chest heavy earth pony asked, coming from the back room as the entrance bell rang. He had a deep brown coat and a slate grey mane and tail, a white apron across his torso.

"Yes," Saga answered, "My table has been through a warzone and is best a firewood right now, so I need a new one." the pegasus said, moving from area to area, trying to find one that wasn't so flashy.

"Well, we do have tables." he said in a monotone voice, though more in jest.

"I see that, but I am looking for something… unique. Something that is… me. Simple, useful and functional. Most of everything here is a bit too… elegant."

The storekeep's eye raised up, a wry smile across his face. "Well, I can always do something custom. Get the perfect height for the customer."

"You could? That would be great!" Saga grinned. She wanted something traditional, boards and legs, that is all.

"Well, let's go to my design table, see if we can make you anything." he nodded, turning around and sieappearing into the double doors of the back room.

Saga followed him inside. The back room was the workshop. Raw lumber, table saws, planes, drills and several sharp teethed chainsaws sat to one side. The opposite side had stacks of table tops of all sizes, table legs, nails, glue and clamps. On the floor in the center of the assembly room there was a large piece of paper. From this angle all she could see was four U's near the center drawn in marker. There was a bit of writing that bled through from the other side, but it looked like a scrapped table design, being round and all.

"Stand on the marks, the hoofprints and I can start taking measurements, turn 'em into something useful." He stated, tapping the paper and moving off to the side and began to pick through the round tops.

Saga moved to the paper and stood still, her attention drawn to the side. "It was a rectangle, the old table." she said, watching him pick through several round wooden tops.

"Well, can we try some round ones? Can always change if you don't like them." He said, trying to convince her to at least try the new shape.

"Alright." she sighed. An artist's muse was something of a pain in the flank sometimes.

"Alright, I'll just put this one here," he grunted, hefting a peice of wood atop her back. He centered it and put a yellow level on the top, adjusting the the piece so it say perfectly square on her back. "Don't move, this is the most important part."

Saga became confused. Not only was the pony acting odd, stacking a tabletop on her back, he seemed utterly disconnected from any input reguarding her wants and desires for the table.

"And this one too." he mumbled, holding the smaller round wooden coin in his muzzle. He came close to her face and mumbled again. "Hold this." he said.

Saga rolled her eyes and reached a hoof up to take it. Or she thought she did, her hoof refusing to move from the floor. It had already fallen asleep, standing in this pose. Instead she took it into her muzzle, holding downward at an angle. Today was beginning to feel extremely odd.

The craftspony trotted around her, looking at her from all angles, shifting and adjusting her pose outward and always checking the level. He went to the draft table behind her and began to sribble down on a piece of paper pinned to the board.

Saga had enough. There was a perfectly good rectangle top over to the side, four legs and sideboard. he could just slap the legs on that, finish it off and she could be on her way.
'Forget it' she mumbled to herself. Best to just go home and glue the legs back on. They lasted a few weeks last time, she could go a few more days without a table.

In a sense of shock, Saga flapped her wings and began to turn her body, slide the large round wooden top off her back, only to realize that a majority of her body was not responding anymore. She looked down to her hooves and was confused.

Each of her front hooves were smooth, no trace of the fine fur that coated her, and it wasn't her normal color either. Her hooves, and now most of her chest were a dull grey, like stone, veined in a darker color as it had formed over a millenia with different materials. However, she had been standing nowhere close to the time required to petrify anything.

Her heart sunk, or more appropriately stopped. While she had been standing on the paper, the image on the other side had been glowing. An incantation scroll. Her annoyance with the shop keeper had kept her mind off the slowly advancing spell.

It started at her hooves, turning the shoes she wore into stone, then creeping upward. Hoof, ankle, knee, all had succumbed to the line of white inching across her form. The pegasus noticed it now.

The white magical aura felt like the sun, its warmth cast on her in a small slit, moving upwards like rising water. Her body felt funneled into a smaller form, like putting on a suit that was a size to small. In reality it was her flesh compressing under the aura, pulling in every part of her nearly an eighth of an inch.
She was aware of her stone body though. She could fell the shape, the position of each one. Any strength she mustered to convince them to move was stopped, as soon as her body met stone, the signal was lost. Stone can't respond to it, there were no discernable muscles or bones anymore to receive the commands.

She went into a panic, realizing the extent of the spell once she tried to move more than her hooves. Wings, back and tail, all were stone already. Her right rear hoof responded, though for a few seconds. It became increasingly heavy, pulling at her as every molecule was transformed. Its job of springing her upwards and away from the spell paper became impossible. It merely raised a few inches off the floor and then stopped.

Saga screamed, triggering her lungs to push the air out. They were stone as well, incapable of any activity. Breath literally caught in her throat, her eyes began to search for an answer. Why was this happening? What in Equestria?

"Almost done." the pony infront of her smiled.

She began to feel a roar, a rush from her chest as the magic approached. It sounded like a great wind, reverberating in her body. She moved her head, feeling the muscles in her neck begin to push less and less with the advancing line. The noise became louder, like an avalanche of gravel was being poured ontop of her.

The feeling of her body, being taken away from her control seemed to have happened so fast. The line around her neck seemed to move agonizingly slow, waiting. Without being petrified, her entire head locked up, unable to move, frozen. The earth pony carefully reached across the paper and grasped her head in his hooves, turning it slightly so that she was looking out over her left side. He put a smaller level on the wooden coin stuck in her muzzle, tilting and moving her head to get it just perfect.

The aura moved faster now, clenching tight around her neck and roaring into her ears as the change progressed. It moved across her cheeks and lower muzzle, rendering the paralysis moot. It crept across her teeth, tounge and outward onto the wooden platter, turning it into stone as well.

The last few moments of normal freedom were slowly taken away as her muzzle lost its vibrant color. Saga's eye darted across the room, trying to elicit a scream that her body was incapable of. As she swept across the room one last time, the lower portion froze, centered over her muzzle, looking outward. Slowly her world was drained of color, muted tones of the wall and wood came through, but it seemed less vibrant. The walls were visible, the wood and doors, but the farther away objects became, the more they looked like a grey washed background. Ponies outside the shop that were more than fifty feet away were grey shapes on a grey background. Anything farther than that was a montone grey mist.

Smell and taste were gone. The thick fiber taste of the wood, the light piney scent, gone as her senses were turned. Her brow and forehead went, the roar echoed in her ears right as they were consumed, licking at her eardrums like a hurricane. Then it was silent, or quiet. The deafening roar had become a whisper, a wagon wheel crossing stone. The earth pony said something, though his distance made is sound like his head was wrapped in towels. A few words came through, but anypony would have to be right on her to hear the converstaion.

She felt ripples in her body, the heavy bass tones of stone popping into existance, the gravelly sandpaper coursed through her body as her eartips and mane became transformed. The white rings hovered for a second, before rolling upwards into the air and dispersing.

The pegasus was fully aware of herself. She was able to feel every part of her body as normal, feel herself and the position she was in. Everything was thick and heavy though, there were no commands that could be given that they would obey, her brain as well was stone. Everything felt peaceful, this lack of communication she wasn't used to had it's perks. No pain or discomfort, she merely was, merely existing.

Her essense, soul or whatever anypony labeled it as, had been trapped within the stone. It was a saving grace in addition to being a prison. Her form was now complete, unbreakable due to the spell. She began to think about her fate, what would befall her.

(Slightly shortened to fit the character limit, full story at the source)

Upvotes at import: 46 | Stars at import: 35
Posted previously at: 2016-01-07T07:59:42 | Posted previously by: Ereiam