Equestria has had a long period of peace since the defeat of Tirek... not counting Twilight's solo outing in that other dimension. For the moment, it seemed that any threat to the equine citizens were too intimidated by the princess and her friend's ability to wield the seemingly unmatchable Rainbow Power. It seemed that for the moment their was nothing to threaten to the world, no monsters to fight, and above all, nothing to fear... Twilight Sparkle was about to learn that their was most certainly things left to fear.
Night-Mare Night...
The princess of Friendship trotted through one of the many halls of her large cavernous castle, levitating a candle with her. It was taking a little getting used to, but Twilight was conditioned to the way her hooves clacked against the floor, consequentiall making the sound echo through the empty halls. It still bothered her slightly due to the odd occasion when she was sure there was somepony else walking through the halls with her. Although, Twilight not being the most superstitious pony helped her quite a bit in that regard; especially given what night is was.
The halls were lit by several candles mounted on the walls, giving the inside of the castle a warm homey feeling.
Outside, the evening sky was filled with clouds, preventing the moonlight from illuminating the land. Not that the absence of light took anything away from the night's festivities that Twilight had chosen to retire from early. Their was still so much work that needed to be done on the castle to make it feel more like a home and not an empty cave.
She turned and entered the round table throne room. Several boxes of Twilight’s salvaged belongings, as well as a few boxes filled containing and assortment of donated items from her friends, sat in the middle of the room.
She placed her candle in the middle of the room, then walked toward one of the boxes and opened it. The box in question was from Rainbow Dash, it contained a complete series of Daring Do books. Twilight looked at the book on top of the pile and saw a small post it note stuck in between the pages.
Twilight gently pulled the note out of the book, then read it aloud “These aren't for keeps” Twilight shook her head slightly “I didn't think she'd part with these so easily” Twilight thought to herself.
A small whispering sound caught Twilight's ear, she looked up for a moment before quickly going back to the boxes.
She then opened another box. Confetti shot out of the box as she opened the flaps. This box was obviously from Pinkie Pie, and it was filled with colourful packing peanuts. Twilight stuck her right hoof into the box and felt around for whatever was in it. She fished around for a few moments but found nothing inside, it was completely filled with nothing but packing peanuts.
Twilight quietly groaned, it wouldn't have even made the top ten list of the weirdest things Pinkie had done.
Twilight closed the box and as she did, she heard the faint sound of a door closing.
“Odd” she thought to herself. She hadn't heard the creaking of a door opening. Twilight opened Pinkie's box again, then shut it as she had done before. The sound of the box closing didn't match the sound she had heard before, although she wasn't quite sure she had actually heard anything the first time.
She once again returned to the boxes.
Several minutes went by as she looked through the contents. Each box from her friends rang with their eccentricities. As more boxes were opened, more trinkets and items littered the floor. A few dresses and doily’s from Rarity, an assortment of wood carvings from Fluttershy, and oddly enough, an old friend of Twilight's she thought she had lost was in a box from Applejack.
Twilight levitated Smarty Pants in front of her. She smiled as she recalled her countless hours of studying she had spent with her toy by her side, but something was different about it. A smile had been stitched across the dolls muzzle. Twilight thought nothing of it, it made the doll look a little more realistic... the sound of a small tap at the door took Twilight's attention away from her doll. She glanced toward the source of the sound only for a moment before turning her attention back to her Smarty Pants, she then instantly looked back to where she had looked.
An empty corridor was all she saw. But for a moment, Twilight thought she had seen somepony... or something. For a moment, she thought she had seen a tall black figure peeking out from behind the door, staring at her.
“Pfft... I must have hung around with too many ponies in costumes” she said aloud, trying to fill the silence. She then stood and took a few steps toward the door. The door was then engulfed in Twilight's magical aura, and she slowly began to shut it. The door suddenly slammed shut as if somepony had pushed it from the other side.
Twilight flinched a bit in response to the sudden noise that pierced the silence. The sound echoed around in the room and Twilight subconsciously yearned for the silence to return. Her desire was soon granted as the resonating sound dissipated.
“Okay, that was weird” Twilight said to herself. She then turned back toward her collection of castle warming gifts.
She was then stopped in her tracks by the sound of a light tapping on the outside of the door.
“Hello... is anypo” Her words were suddenly cut off by a loud pounding on the outside of the door.
This was no illusion, somepony was out there, somepony was trying to scare her, and somepony had just gone a little too far.
“Stop that!” Twilight yelled.
The pounding sound ceased, the room fell silent once again.
“Time to find out who's behind this” Twilight thought to... odd... Twilight was sure she had used her inner monologue for that thought, yet she heard her voice despite not feeling her lips move. Twilight had no time to think about it, she needed to end this bizarre prank.
She trotted toward the door, but quickly stopped, something wasn't adding up, her hoof steps made many more sounds than she was actually taking. She stopped and listened as the sounds echoed away. She looked down at her hooves then tapped one fore-hoof on the ground a few times. The result was the same, for every one hoof-step, the sound of two hoof-steps could be heard.
Twilight closed her eyes and shook her head. How could she be letting this happen. Twilight, who just a few months ago fought a tyrannical centaur, how could she be getting worked up over being alone in her own castle.
Twilight stepped closer to the door. Paying no mind to the additional hoofsetps that still clacked along with her. She stretched out a fore-leg and pushed the door open a crack.
The corridor was dark, lit only by the light that escaped from the throne room. Twilight peered down the hallway. It was empty, it was quiet, nopony to be seen.
“Rainbow Dash” Twilight called “This isn't funny... if you're there then come out where I can see you” her words echoed down the corridor. She was getting quite tired of the reverberations, which only added to the eery atmosphere of the night.
Their was no response from the supposed prankster.
The tapping suddenly returned, which startled Twilight. Whoever the prankster was, they must be hiding behind the door. Under this assumption, Twilight exited the room and jumped to look at the other side of the door, hoping to catch the prankster in the act.
“Gotcha” she yelled.
There was nopony there... yet the knocking persisted.
Twilight looked around the corridor. Whoever was pranking her was most likely silently laughing to themselves. Twilight looked at the door, she scanned both sides of it to try and find the source of the tapping, which seemed to grow quieter as the seconds went by.
“Must be some sort of sound spell” Twilight though to herself. She paused, yet again it seemed as though Twilight had spoken when she meant to think.
She took one last glance around the corridor before walking back into the throne room to resume going through her boxes, ignoring the strange tapping on the door. The tapping must have been the result of situated sound spell, and those always wore off eventually.
Twilight looked at her boxes, something was amiss, or more accurately, something was missing. Smarty pants was nowhere to be seen. Twilight walked to her small collection of items and began to look through them for her misplaced study buddy. She went through every single bobble and trinket but couldn't find any trace of her doll.
A thought suddenly clicked in her mind. The tapping must have been a distraction for somepony to take Smarty Pants. Twilight groaned and narrowed her brow a bit. Her attention however was stolen by something that seemed more eery than the tapping, or the stealthy theft of her friend... the sudden cease of the tapping sound.
Twilight looked toward the corridor, and she could see something small and grey at the end of the corridor. Smarty Pants sat on the ground, positioned as though it was looking down the corridor to it's left.
Twilight once again existed the throne room and as she had done before, she looked behind the door, almost certain somepony would be waiting... but there wasn't. She continued down the hall, very slowly walking towards her doll. She was half expecting a length of trip wire, or a trap of some kind to be waiting for her... but there wasn't.
Twilight was beginning to get frustrated, if somepony was going to be playing a trick on her then she at least would have preferred it to be something somepony might see as funny, this was just... unnerving.
Twilight quickened her steps, the less time she spent in the corridor the better. Her horn glowed as she went to levitate her doll.
But Smarty Pants didn't move. The doll stayed in it's position. Twilight put a little bit more effort into her spell. The doll remained motionless.
“What?” she said to herself. Twilight then reached out to grab her doll and met considerable resistance. With each of her fore-hooves she pulled on the dolls fore-legs, but the dolls back hooves remained planted on the ground as if held there by some unknown force.
After awhile of struggling, Twilight released the doll and it slunk back into it's sitting position.
Twilight sat on the ground and groaned as she stared at her doll. She then took note of where the doll was looking. Twilight followed it's empty gaze and peered down the hall.
Twilight froze as she saw two large white pupil-less eyes staring at her from the dark hallway.
Twilight blinked and the eyes suddenly came closer. She looked back at her doll, but it was gone. Twilight however had more urgent matters to deal with. She looked back in the direction of the eyes and they had once again drawn closer, the beings closer proximity to the light revealed a faint outline of it's body. The creature's skin was pitch black, it stood much taller than Twilight, and it boar a multitude of scars on it's muzzle.
Twilight blinked again and the creature moved even closer.
Twilight's jaw dropped and her eyes widened in utter disbelief of what she was seeing.
“Hello” said Twilight. The creature did not respond. She stood up and slowly began to walk backwards toward the throne room.
The being remained frozen in it's disturbing stare.
Twilight lost eye contact with the creature as she went further back down the hall. She then turned and sprinted toward the door but it slammed shut just before she could reach it... the tapping sound returned, louder this time.
Twilight turned and saw the being peering around the corner, pointing one of it's three long, stick like fingers toward Twilight.
She turned back to the door and began to pull on it with her hooves and with her magic, but the door did not budge. She glanced back at the creature... it was closer once again, now nearly all the way around the corner. The light revealed more of it's body. The creatures arms motionlessly hung by its sides, while one of it's long legs lunged out into the hallway, the other leg had yet to round the corner.
Twilight took several deep breaths as she attempted to rationalize the situation. It was obvious that the creature only moved when she wasn't looking at it. So it seemed that all she had to do was keep eye contact with it and push the door at the same time. But the eyes were the most disturbing part of the creature; they were blank and inexpressive, but still gave off some sort of disturbing feeling, like the creature was beyond anypony's control.
Twilight pushed her back up against the door and continued her struggle to open it. Without warning, the door suddenly gave in on Twilight, and she fell backward into the throne room, consequentially breaking eye contact with the creature. She scrambled back to her hooves and looked at the creature. The candles in the hallway had been extinguished, and all Twilight could see were the eyes, which were now more than halfway down the hallway.
The princess quickly got to her hooves then slowly walked toward the door. She reached a hoof out to close it, but before she could, it slammed shut on it's own. The tapping sound ceased, and an eery quiet filled the room. She suddenly yearned for the tapping sound to return, if just to fill the silence.
A collection of thoughts came to her mind “What was that thing? Why was it after her? Why can it only move when she...?” Twilight once again caught herself speaking what she was trying to think, causing her to groan in aggravation, and stamp her hoof on the ground, and once again the sound of one hoof hitting the ground created two sounds. It was obvious that all these strange happenings were somehow related to the creature, but it seemed their was nothing she could do to stop it at the moment.
She turned back to her collection of things and to her surprise, she saw Smarty Pants sitting in the middle of the room and once again, it seemed to be staring at something. Twilight followed the gaze which seemed to be directed at some point right beside her. She looked, but nothing was there. She then moved closer to the middle of the room and as she did, the little toy's head moved around slightly. She ceased her movement and looked back at the door behind her, half expecting the creature to be standing there watching her. But it wasn't, the door remained shut and Twilight remained perplexed.
There was nopony in the throne room but Twilight. Twilight looked back at the toy, then walked to the side to test where the doll would look, and as she did, Smarty Pant’s gaze turned further to the right. Twilight once again followed the gaze, but there was nothing there but her shadow. Twilight stared at her shadow which was sprawled across the wall... the shadow's head then began to turn as if to look at Twilight. Two large white eyes quickly opened on the shadow's face.
The shadow stared at Twilight. Almost a minute went by as Twilight kept the disturbing staring contest going; she dared not blink, out of worry of what that might happen. She suddenly felt something grab her leg. In a split second reaction, she looked down to see Smarty Pants clinging to her leg and squeezing painfully tight. She violently shook her leg but the doll would not let go. She looked back up to the shadow, but the eyes no longer stared at her, instead they looked forward to the centre of the room. The painful clinging quickly ceased and Twilight looked at her leg to see that Smarty Pants had disappeared.
The tapping sound returned... Twilight slowly looked up to see Smarty Pants sitting behind the candle in the middle of the room. The dolls close proximity to the candle caused it's shadow to extend to the wall, but the shadow was not that of Smarty Pants. The shadow was of a tall anthropomorphic figure.
A thought in Twilight's mind suddenly clicked; the only time the creature had appeared was when Smarty Pants was present. It had used Smarty Pants as a means to draw Twilight out of the throne room. Perhaps the doll she had held before had never been Smarty Pants at all, it could have been the creature the whole time.
An uncomfortable feeling took hold of Twilight, not a feeling of fear or paranoia, but a feeling of nostril irritation. Twilight suddenly sneezed, unintentionally blinking during the process.
Twilight looked back to up to see the candles flame extinguished. The doll gone, replaced by the creature, once again staring at her.
Twilight refused to be scared. She took a step toward the creature and said “I-I'm not afraid of you. I know you can only move when I'm not looking at you. You may think you're watching me, but the truth is, I-I'm watching you”
The creature gave no response. It simply continued to stare at the princess.
Little over a minute went by and the two's staring contest persisted. Twilight's eyes eventually began to feel dry, and after nearly two minutes of staring Twilight's eyes gave in, she blinked, leaving herself vulnerable for less than a second.
Her eyes instantly opened and the creature was only a few feet away from her, with one arm raised in the air as if preparing to strike her. The closer proximity of her silent tormentor caused her heart to race and her breath to become shaky. From her close proximity to the thing, she could clearly see several painful looking smile shaped scars on it's face in much clearer detail.
“D-d-did somepony do that to you?” asked Twilight.
The creature did not respond.
“What are you?”
The creature did not respond.
“D-d-do you want to hurt me?” Twilight asked before accidentally blinking again. In the split second she had her eyes closed, she thought she had heard something yelling.
The creature was now inches away from her face, positioned with one of it's long fingers dug into the left side of it's face. From this proximity, Twilight could see tiny black iris's in the middle of the creatures white eyes.
Twilight repressed the urge to jump back as she continued to stare into the creatures eyes. Her fear of the creature seemed to be dissipating as the shock value of it's overall bizarreness lessened; although it was still far from welcome.
She took advantage of this break from her fear and stamped her hoof “What are you?” she asked in an authoritative tone.
She blinked again, this time on purpose. Once again, she heard something, however this time it was accompanied by the sound of tearing skin. She opened her eyes and what she saw frightened her... then saddened her.
The creature had punctured it's own skin with it's finger, then dragged it along the width of it's face. The cut left a disturbingly large smile on the it's face.
Twilight was suddenly filled with pity for the creature. Why had it done that to itself, it made no sense. It was too ironic; in the creatures attempt to make itself more disturbing, it had only made itself seem rather pathetic. Twilight's expression softened and she reached out to the creature, and without fear, she blinked.
However, her eyes didn't open. She suddenly felt a clammy hand over her eyes and another hand harshly grabbed her jaw.
The yelling returned, this time consistent and unbroken. What sounded like a million screams of pain and torment bellowed into her ears at an unimaginable volume.
She covered her ears but she could not stop the sound from screeching into her mind. The sounds echoed around in her head. She prayed for the silence to return, she wanted the silence, she wanted to be able to see. She suddenly felt herself being pushed back against the wall. She flailed her legs about, hoping to strike the creature but hit nothing but air. She suddenly felt herself being whipped around the room like a rag doll.
And then... a sudden stop... everything stopped. The screaming noise ceased, and the creatures hand was taken off her eyes, but she still felt the other hand on her jaw. She slowly opened her eyes and she saw what she expected to see.
The creature was still staring at her... but it was different now. The creature's eyes now had larger pupils with tiny white dots in the centre, and it's smile was far more curved. The changes were slight, but they made the creature look far more sinister.
Twilight's mind froze, she couldn't think of anything she could do. She just wanted the horrible experience to be over. She shut her eyes so she wouldn't have to look at the horrible eyes anymore. But closing her eyes offered no escape as the image of the creature was burned into her mind.
“Are you afraid?” a voice asked in a high pitched and heavily distorted tone.
Twilight gritted her teeth and shouted back “No!”
She then felt the creature squeeze her face even tighter.
“Lies make frowns... truth makes smiles” the words were followed by a sinister chuckle, that soon trailed off into sobs.
Twilight felt her body shake “Fine! I'm afraid of you! Are you happy now!”
The creatures hand then moved to her throat, and began to squeeze.
Twilight struggled for any air she could inhale, but the little oxygen she could get into her lungs could not sustain her consciousness. She slowly felt her body become limp and all the feeling in her faded away.
The world fell silent as it was at before.
Twilight hesitantly opened one of her eyes. She felt the hard floor against her cheek and she opened her other eye. She felt the comforting glow from the candle in she had brought with her. Twilight slowly got up to her hooves and looked around. The smiling creature was nowhere to be seen.
Twilight sighed “It must have just been a dre...” Twilight raised an ear in response to a sound she had never wanted to hear again.
The tapping sound had returned.
“No” Twilight thought to herself “I'm not going to let this whole thing happen again!”
Twilight's horn began to glow and she charged toward the door. She burst through the door and jumped onto the figure that waited outside, pinning it underneath her legs. Twilight raised her horn and prepared to disintegrate the intruder.
“Twilight, stop!” a familiar voice yelled.
Twilight paused for a moment, then looked down to see who she had caught. To her surprise, Spike cowered beneath her.
Twilight stepped back off of Spike, then stuck out a hoof to help him up. Spike hesitantly took the helping hoof and pulled himself up to his feet.
“What the heck was that!” asked Spike, in an understandably upset tone.
“I... uh” Twilight struggled to explain herself as she looked around, but there was no sign of the smiling creature “Um... I guess the night got to me. I'm sorry”
“Well...it's alright, I know you wouldn't vaporize me... at least not on purpose” Spike then took note of how Twilight's eyes were scanning the room for something “Are you okay, you look like you've seen a ghost”
“I think I had a nightmare”
“About what?”
Twilight looked back into the throne room. She then replied hesitantly “... I don't know...” Twilight then looked back at Spike “But it doesn’t seem so scary now. So why are you back so early?” Twilight asked her companion.
“Early? It's almost mid night”
“Oh... I must have been asleep for longer than I thought. I suppose it's time both of us get some shut eye”
Spike nodded in response, and the two walked away down the hall. The two came to the corner of the hall and Twilight paused as she heard a small child like chuckling sound. Twilight turned and for a moment, she thought she saw a hand stretching out from behind the door, waving at her. Twilight blinked several times in response to the sight, but nothing happened... nothing was there.
“You coming?” Spike called from further down the hall.
Twilight continued to stare at the door for a few more moments, then called to her assistant “Yeah, I'm coming” Twilight kept her eyes on the door as she went around the corner. She hurriedly trotted down the hall to catch up to her companion.
The End : )