TANTIBUS

CHAPTER THREE

The wooden floor was very uncomfortable and rough on her cheek and body and she slowly moved her head up. She opened her eyes. It was still pitch black as she couldn’t see anything. Was it night? She rose up, on her way to go searching after her bed. She must have fallen asleep on the floor again…

When she took her first step it made an unusually creaky noise. What shocked Twilight even more was the non-familiar voice that commanded “Who is there?!” to her noise steps. Was there a stranger in her home? Asking her who SHE is when that person clearly is the intruder? Twilight Sparkle felt her lips move and her vocal cords were vibrating; “My name is Maverick. Who are you?”

My name isn’t Maverick! Why did I just say that?! And what is wrong with my voice? Why is it so… male? And how come I can’t control it? The other person responded “Well, I am Decker. Do you have any idea where we are located for the moment?” The other person was also male and had a clear and over-class Canterlot accent. He was clearly not from the Ponyville regions.

Twilight Sparkle felt her mouth open but got interrupted by a sudden, tired groan coming from her left. She or he… took a quick turn towards that direction, still blinded by the darkness. Twilight’s uncontrollable voice named Maverick spoke again; “Are there more people here?!”

“Well, I am here.” A sudden female voice spoke from the right.

“So am I. Are you all alright?” Another, darker female voice spoke.

The groan came back from the same person as before. Twilight could hear hoof steps left and right from other ponies desperately trying to navigate this dark place. The voice of Decker came to assistance; “Are you okay?” he spoke while moving towards the groan.

Another groan came, followed by a voice. “Where am I?”

“I have my theories but I can’t know for sure. What is more important is if you are in a good condition.” Decker responded calmly.

“I’m fine, a little bit tired and dizzy that’s all.”

Then some more hoof-steps came followed by Decker’s voice, directed at everyone in the room. “How many are we here?”

There was a short silence before Twilight and Maverick responded; “One…”

Decker continued, “…Two…”

One of the female voices picked up the trail, “…Three…”

The other, darker female followed, “...Four…”

A third and previously unnoticed female voice said; “…Five…”

The ‘tired’ pony eventually responded; “…Six.”

There was a brief silence but “seven” was nowhere to be heard.

Eventually Decker took the initiative to take on the leadership role. “So we are six… Oh well, my ponies. I know where we are.”

“Where are we, then?!” Maverick shouted.

A sudden flash came as the simple yet decorative crystal chandelier lit up the room from the ceiling. They were located in a ginormous hall with an at least 10 feet tall exit door. Unfortunately, the door was sealed tight. The nature that this room perked out was of a really old castle with its wooden exit door, creaky floor, huge staircase leading upstairs, old fashioned paintings, the chandelier, and the furniture whose wooden shapes and corners had been carefully carved out by hand ages ago.

The place had an overall creepy atmosphere. The female ponies were all looking around and inspecting for themselves. The first male was light blue and crouched up against the wall and extremely nervous. He really did remind her of Fluttershy and how she would react in this creepy situation. The other male pony had a brown fur color, even darker brown mane color and was frantically writing down notes into his notebook. It turns out to be Decker as he spoke after finishing taking notes. “6 ponies; 3 female and 3 male. 2 pegasi, 2 unicorns and 2 earth ponies. This place sure likes patterns.”

Twilight had a look around and saw the different races. She saw the two unicorns, both female. She also saw the two pegasi, one female and the other was the male crouched up on the floor. But she saw only one earth pony, Decker, so she assumed that Maverick was an earth pony.

Maverick spoke up. “As I asked; where are we?!” He was getting frustrated. Twilight could feel that in his emotions. The other ponies were looking at him, then at Decker who responded. “Well… I think… I think we are in…”

A very sudden and quick earthquake dropped in and threw all of the ponies off their balance and onto the hard, wooden planks that made up the floor. They were launched back and Maverick landed in front of a broken mirror. He looked into one of the larger shards and saw a light brown and rather nervous face. There was no horn in his forehead and no wings on his back. All that could be seen was the blue mane that fairly matched the light brown skin color. Twilight asked herself; Why do I possess you? What makes you so special?

He turned around and glanced over at Decker who was interrupted a few seconds earlier. With a shocked and terrified face he pointed forwards and finished his sentence by yelling “We are in TANTIBUS!!!”. Maverick turned towards where Decker was pointing. The wall was covered in fresh, dripping blood shaping a small message to the visitors. THE RULES OF THE TANTIBUS CHALLENGE

Terrified screams came from left and right. Someone claimed it all to be a cruel joke and someone was on the verge of tears. Shortly after, a new paragraph was introduced. RULE ONE; ONLY ONE COMPETITOR CAN LEAVE TANTIBUS ALIVE

“Sweat Celestia!” shouted the female pegasi, still unnamed.

Letter by letter blood was painted on the wall as if made by a poltergeist. Soon, they could read the second rule. RULE TWO; THAT COMPETITOR MAY ONLY DO SO WHEN ALL OTHERS ARE DEAD

Maverick’s voice echoed in his own mind as only him and Twilight could hear it. He was praying to Celestia or whatever force that brings the time and existence that was most likely about to end for his part. Only one of them would leave and with a 16.5% chance of survival, the odds weren’t in his favor. His mind was searching for solutions What if I get the first hit? That would give me an advantage. There are three females, surely I am stronger than they are and… Snap out of it, Maverick! You can’t kill these ponies! How could I live with the guilt?! No, I would rather sacrifice myself. Twilight was shocked to hear his mood swings and begged as well for a way for this to turn out well, but she knew the rules. They were clear as night and day, and by the end of the day…

Five ponies would be dead.

---

A hoof appeared from underneath the covers and pulled the curtain to cover up the small window on the side of the wooden tree next to the bed. Twilight’s eyes could not adjust to the incredibly painful and bright shine from the morning sun that woke her up. When she came to think about it... Why did she not pull the curtain before going to bed? She thought for a second and remembered. Actually, she didn’t remember everything. Not yet.

She had left the window cleared from the curtain’s cloth because she felt more relaxed having the moon’s natural light shining over her, aiding her asleep. She had been very shaken up and nervous because…

Now… she remembered. The eyelids opened up and she pushed off the bed sheet. She took a quick glance to her left and on her nightstand she once again found the book “Spooky Tales & Legends”, just as she had left it before going to bed. She slowly adjusted her position so she faced the bedside table completely, and then used her magic to open the book. Page 82, The Dark Mansion.

“Tantibus…” Twilight remembered her extremely vivid dream. “It felt so real… Wait a minute!” Twilight jumped out of the bed, awoke Spike on her way and ran over to the bloody note. ”Decker and Maverick… They both had their own tombstone on that field I saw! Did I just relive their encounter with the challenge?! Was it real?”

“Twilight… What is going on?” reacted a very tired Spike.

“Just some research… You can go back to bed, Spike.”

“I’m hardly going to be able to do that now that I’m fully awake!” He groaned.

“I’m sorry. I had an… interesting dream.” Twilight Sparkle kept her discussion going in her mind. That light blue and shy Pegasus… was that Aeon? I need to find out if these ponies have really existed. Twilight Sparkle walked into one of the rooms in the library and came shortly out again, bringing a thick book with her.

“What are you doing now, Twilight?” Spike asked while rubbing his eye-lids to easier make out details with his recently awakened eyes.

“I’m trying to look up Aeon and some other ponies from this Spooky Tale & Legends-book in the personal register to see if they are real.”

“But Twilight… We only have Ponyville’s register here. You’ll only find ponies that were born in Ponyville in there.”

Twilight dropped down the register on the table in realization and turned to Spike. “That’s true.”

Twilight thought for a second on where to find registers that covered entire Equestria until she came up with an idea. “Well, Spike. Since you are already awake would you mind sending a letter to Princess Celestia?”

“Sure, I guess… Which one?” He mumbled.

“I have to write it first, silly.” Twilight grabbed a quill and an empty note using her magic and began writing. She began by a simple, polite greeting and then moved on to excusing herself for the odd request she had to find out information about a certain group of ponies. Then, she wrote down a list of ponies from both Aeon’s and Flaming Ace’s Tantibus challenges. She also wrote down the author Landon, who wrote The Dark Mansion. Finishing it off, she excused herself one more time for her silly errand and then said her goodbyes.

“There. Send it.” Twilight instructed Spike and shortly after; the letter was sent. Now she just had to wait for the response.

---

The response came shortly after Twilight had set up their breakfast. Rudely, Spike burped out green smoke along with the letter right before they began eating their eggs.

“Excuse me, he he. Here you go Twilight.” Spike chuckled as he handed over the letter from the princess.

My faithful student, Twilight Sparkle

Luckily, I didn’t have much to do as of currently so I took the time to look up your small errand in Canterlot’s royal library. I don’t really understand why you would want to find out this but all of these ponies have passed away, apart from this ‘Landon’ figure. I could not find his name anywhere which results in that he has probably never existed.

What shocked me the most is that most of these ponies passed away in groups at around the same two occurrences.

After that followed a list over the ponies that had died and at what time period they did.  They existed, and died at these two occasions. But Landon didn’t exist? Then who wrote the novel?

Twilight opened up the book again and looked around for clues. Then she brought up Princess Celestia’s letter to double-check. She read the last sentence again of The Dark Mansion.

I’m sorry…

“Wait a minute! Flaming Ace died two days after the novel was first published! Of course! Flaming Ace wrote it himself under a pseudonym. Who could else reflect Flaming Ace’s feelings in such a way other than himself? That poor thing, ending his life after such misery…”

“Burp!” Spike transferred another letter into her library. On unsteady legs he walked over and handed it over to her.

“Another letter from Princess Celestia?” Twilight asked. Spike simply lifted his shoulders unknowingly and returned to his breakfast. Twilight took a sip from her cup of apple cider and began reading again.

Dear Twilight Sparkle

I forgot to mention one of the ponies, Aeon. As it turns out, he is still alive and located in the mental institution of Canterlot for startling behavior and rambling in public. It is also filed that he never speaks, most likely caused by a trauma or a disorder as they found nothing wrong with his vocal cords.

If you would like to visit this friend of yours I’d be happy to provide you with a train ticket. Myself, I will be quite busy during the upcoming days so unfortunately you are on your own after you step off in Canterlot’s train station.

With all regards, The Princess.

In shocked surprise Twilight instinctively spit out the apple cider as she burst out yelling; “Aeon is ALIVE?!”

Thanks for reading my horror fanfic Tantibus. Since you have read the first three chapters you obviously like it, huh? Spread the word about Tantibus to your brony friends! It is going to be big! Also, before you ask; The character Decker is indeed heavily inspired by Doctor Whooves in appearance, speech and behavior. You have probably already noticed that anyways.

To all Tantibus fans. // ExceRainbowDash