The Light in an Eye
The wind blows through the branches of the Golden Oaks, whispering its lone song, as the boughs creak and scrape in the night. The full moon shines down through the window, casting the interior of the structure in a muted calm that borders on unease. Up the stairway to the living area, the dim glow of a single candle plays in stark contrast to the shadowy dark below. Residing inside the golden field of light rests a single unicorn, lavender coat shining with a glossy sheen, eyes closed and muzzle slightly open upon the inside spine of a thick volume.
To a pony, a single sound out of the ordinary can disrupt a normal cycle of sleep, the worn hinges of a door creaking, the click of a writing desk's drawer unlocking, the rustle of a raven perching on the branches of the tree outside the window, a lone whisper will awaken most anypony without fail. When Twilight Sparkle awoke in the middle of the night, it would be considered unusual. But then again, barely anything of this night could be seen as usual to the unicorn.
Awake, Twilight Sparkle gently blows out the still burning candle, snuffing it's defiance to the darkness with nary a thought, before proceeding down to the kitchenette for a clear glass of water and a nibble of a limp piece of bread. With a gulp, she finishes her bread and water, and trots out into the main room to stow the book she fell asleep to. Upon reaching the proper section, with a tired flourish of her horn, the tome is rightly where it should be on it's shelf.
A light tapping breaks the unicorn out of her sleep-induced stupor; tap tap tap, and with a start she glances left and right, trying to determine from whence the mysterious sound was unearthed.
tap tap tap
Rapidly she glances towards the basement door, trying to remember if she turned off her equipment when she was last down there. Approaching the wooden barrier, it parts in her way with a decrepit creaking from its rusty hinges. She tries the switch, but with a loud popping noise, the lighting fixtures fail to illuminate the dark stairway into the abyss.
tap tap tap
Drawn forth by the sound, she illuminates her horn and proceeds to slink down the stairs; her slow progress borne from unease and caution. At the bottom of the stairway, resting on the floor, a greatly worn hoof-stitched doll, with loose buttons on what could be seen as its face, and patches betraying it's age. With a sigh of relief, the unicorn trots over to pick up the doll, determined to return it to its proper place on the edge of her work table.
tap tap tap
With a start, she drops the doll and turns to look towards the source of the sound. A carved wooden box, dulled with age, resting near the portal-mirror she was experimenting with earlier that week. Approaching the box, her eyes are drawn to the worn motif carved into the oak. A unicorn kicking up on it's back hooves, like it was startled or showing off, bordered with ivy climbers on the trunks of two decrepit husks that could have once been trees. In the space beyond those trees lie swirls of smoke concealing the hunting eyes of predators thirsty for blood.
tap tap tap
Startled from the seeming trance, Twilight Sparkle shakes her head side to side, before levitating the curious box carefully onto her table. Satisfied that her curiosity towards the wooden object could wait until the morning, she calmly proceeds back upstairs, closing the creaky basement door, and puts her empty water glass in the sink. A great yawn escapes her muzzle as she trots up to her room, and she chuckles about how tired she is. Collapsing into her bed, she quickly falls into a deep sleep.
tap tap tap
The profound tapping reaches into her dreams, the joyful colours in her mind turning uneasy as she starts to toss and turn. She doesn't awaken, but her sleep is compromised in the most interesting of ways. A light fog envelopes her body, distorting the muted dark of the bedroom. Tossing turns to thrashing, and her dreams turn to fear. The fog surrounding her thickens, obscuring her features, and emitting a sinister light. Not really a light, more of an absence of light, a seeping darkness that seemingly drains the light from everything around. The room's colours fade to a greyscale, and the unicorn's quaking intensifies even more.
tap tap tap
The fog becomes thicker, almost solid; as the un-light radiating from it spreads through the room; muting the sound of the unicorn's thrashing.
tap tap tap
The fog fills the room, completely blocking all sight and sound to the interior space.
tap tap tap
As quickly as it came, the fog recedes, pulling into a rectangular object on the nightstand next to the bed; the unicorn's thrashing has ceased entirely as the wooden box snaps shut, leaving the room in a state of eerie stillness. The unicorn doesn't even twitch when the rain starts to fall upon the window pane, moon obscured by a thick layer of clouds.
A few hours later, as the clouds clear and the sun rises, the lone figure of an infantile dragon enters the room. Spike pauses to listen for Twilight Sparkle to wake up as she usually does…
Confused by the lack of sound, he climbs onto the bed to wake her, vaguely aware that the blankets are tangled tightly around the unicorn's body. Approaching her head, he tries to shake her awake. Failing that, he spreads open her eyelid and freezes. The unicorn's eye is a dark orb of the darkest shadow, no pupil or iris marring the perfect black circle. With renewed vigor he tries to shake her awake, yelling out in increasingly frantic cries, before stopping and placing her head back on the pillow. He listens carefully for the sound of her breath, but cannot hear a thing. Manically glancing about, he spots a carved box of wood on the nightstand. He crawls over to grab it in his claws. Opening the box, he looks inside; there rests a lone gem, the color of Twilight's eyes before the night, pulsing with a strange glow. Suddenly, the gem turns towards him, as if it were an eye glancing in shock, before crumbling into dust.
Upon the destruction of the gem, unicorn's body shrivels into a dried husk, causing the dragon to drop the box to the floor. The dragon flees the room to get help, not noticing the box resting closed back on the nightstand.
tap tap tap
