A Darker Home

“Well, the top floor is clear. I suppose the only thing left to do is to recheck downstairs," you say to the girls as you re-enter the dark hallway.

You pat the box of matches in your pocket for safe keeping. At this point, who knows what will come in handy? Who knows if Gertrude could possess Twilight next. Or, maybe even something entirely new could come out to try and kill the three of you. Whatever it could be, it has you on guard. Especially since Gertrude shown herself or made any moves against you guys in the last hour. The three of you make your way down the creaky hallway towards the stairs.

Once you hit the door, you’re overtaken by a sense of vertigo. The dark stairway seems to go down for miles. You take a deep breath, knowing they weren’t this steep last time. This has to be in your head. Just relax. Taking point, you descent the stairs one step at a time.

"Alright, so downstairs we have the entrance room, storage room, the room none of us like, and the classroom," Twilight says.

A sudden pressure on your back shoves you forward. You grab the walls for support and miss a step. Your breath is taken away as you regain your footing. Twilight and Fluttershy jump from your sudden reaction.

"Y-you okay?" asks Fluttershy.

"Yeah. I must have, uh. Been a bit of a clutz."

You take the rest of the stairs much more carefully, focusing on your footing and holding the wall with a hand. When you reach the bottom of the stairs, you turn to the girls.

"Which of the terrible rooms should we check out first?"

Twilight thinks to herself for a moment and responds.

"Why don't we check out the storage room? Seems like it would be a really good hiding spot."

The thought of the open box of dolls enters your mind.

"If we have to," you sigh.

You walk towards the open door, clenching your fists. This was one of the last places you wanted to check. Something wasn’t right about the contents of that room, and you could feel it. The hair stands on the back of your neck as you walk towards the opening. A sharp pain from your foot stops you. Looking down, a porcelain pony doll lies shattered on the wood floor. The head shattered into millions of pieces, and only it's eyes remained intact, looking back at you.

You push the pieces to the side of the hallway with your foot, trying to get the image of those piercing eyes out of your head. Moving into the storage room, you freeze in your tracks. Hundreds of piercing eyes are illuminated by Twilight's horn from the dolls that are scattered across the entire room.

Fluttershy turns around and stands in the hallway.

“Well, I’m sure the two of you can handle this just fine. I’ll stay out here and, uhm, keep watch,” she says.

Twilight walks into the room as if it were any other room in the house.

"These... weren't all like this before," you mutter.

Fluttershy begins to shiver while Twilight begins moving boxes trying to find the filly.

"The sooner we get done, the sooner we get to leave. Isn't that what you've been saying?" says Twilight. “Let’s just finish this so we can get out of here.”

Taking a deep breath, you steel yourself and begin to look through the boxes again. The timid yellow pegasus moves into the room and stands close to you. To be honest, you couldn’t blame her. Standing in the hallway, all alone, might have been worse than just helping out.

Some of the boxes had their original contents disturbed, but it seemed like most of them were the same as when you were in before. It just seemed more surreal now that hundreds of tiny eyes were focused on you. Watching you as you moved from box to box. Twilight became overly interested in a box of books and wasn't looking quite as hard as she probably should have been. You sit down on a searched box and sigh.

"Don't think anything is in here," you tell them.

The door slams shut.

"Ooowwww," the filly says.

The three of you turn, and a little filly is rubbing her head.

"Dang it, you found me. I bet I was the first one, too," She looks to the floor utterly defeated. "I was so close too. I almost managed sneak out of the door, but I even messed that up."

You turn to the little filly.

"Hey now, don't be so hard on yourself. You’re Summer right?" you ask.

She looks up at you, surprised.

"H-how do you know my name?"

"Your friends told me. The ones we already found."

Summer smiles and looks away.

"They are all so nice to me. I really don't deserve such nice friends."

You look to Fluttershy, who is visibly concerned for the little filly.

"Hey now... that's not the right way to think at all. Why do you think you don't deserve them?" Fluttershy asks.

Summer sits on the floor and picks up one of the porcelain dolls.

"That's easy... Because all of this is my fault."

"Now that can't be true at all-" Twilight says.

"IT IS!" The filly screams, turning to Twilight with fire in her eyes. She looks to the floor and sits on the ground. “It’s my fault that all of this happened. That we’re all dead. That you’re being haunted. Everything is my fault. I tried to help Melody with her cooking, and she just gets hurt! I try to help Glitter with the cleaning and she gets locked in the closet! I try to get school help from Robin... and... and-- "

Summer tears up and looks at the floor.

"... I blew up the classroom on accident because I can't do anything right. I was just trying to work on the science project." Words fail you as you try to console the crying filly. "When she saw the big hole. She just went to her room, and didn't come out for hours. When she did come out, I was the first one. I was locked in the closet with this thing in my chest... It hurt so much."

She curls into a ball on the floor. You take a step closer, reaching out your hand.

"Summer... you don't have to say anymore if you don't want to," you say.

She shakes her head and continues.

"The worst part was, when I left my body... I tried to do everything I could to stop her, but I didn't know how to control things. When she got to Melody, it was all over too fast for me to do anything…"

Fluttershy wraps herself around the little spirit in an attempt to console her.

"She forced Glitter to drink some of the cleaning fluid and locked her in the closet on top of my body. Joy was stabbed in the shower so many times that I lost count. Rose was beaten until she stopped moving. I... couldn't save them…"

Summer sinks deeper and deeper into her sobs.

"None of that was as bad as what happened to Robin…"

Twilight is stroking the filly's mane, trying to console her.

"Shhhhh. It's all over now," Fluttershy says.

The three of you sit together, taking care of the poor little spirit.

"I could have saved them," Summer cries.

"It's not your fault, Summer," Twilight says.

"I'm a failure."

"You aren't a failure, sweetie," chimes in Fluttershy.

Summer dries her eyes begins to quietly calm down.

"W-where are they now?” she asks. “My friends? Where are they?”

You do your best to put on a reassuring smile.

"A better place," you say.

"Can... Can I see them?"Summer asks.

You look at the door and Summer seems to understand.

"I remember Glitter talking about this place once."

Summer moves away from Fluttershy's warm embrace and looks at the door with a worried look. She reaches up with a shaky hoof, to open the door, but pulls it away.

"I... I can't. I never told any of them…"

She turns away.

"What if they don't forgive me? Do I deserve this? Maybe I shouldn’t. I should just stay here, miserable as a punishment to myself,” Summer says.

"They will, Summer. You have nothing to feel sorry for," says a new voice.

From the back of the room the final filly, Robin, steps into Twilight's light.

"I know they will. This isn't your fault," she says. “I never blamed you and I still don’t. And if you really need to hear it, I forgive you.”

Summer looks up at Robin.

"Are you sure?" she says. “I-I… should have told you.”

Robin smiles down at her.

"Of course, Summer. The six of us are sisters, and there is no way we could be mad at our little sister. We love you," she says.

Summer sniffs, feeling more tears coming on. She nearly tackles Robin with a massive hug.

"Now now, no more tears... we got to go see everyone else," the final filly says. Summer walks up to the door, but stops to look at Robin. Robin nods to her. "It's your door to open, not mine."

Summer raises a shaky hoof to the door knob. The room slowly fills with white light, as the rest of the girls stand on the other side.

"Summer!" exclaims Melody

"Summer, we've been waiting for you!" says Glitter.

"Come on slow poke! Let's have some fun." chimes Joy. Rose stands off to the side with a wide smile. Summer's face lights up, as her coat begins to turn a more natural shade of blue.

She turns to Robin.

"Are you coming with me?"

Robin shakes her head.

"I’ll be there soon. I promise."

Summer looks to you, Twilight and Fluttershy.

"Thank you so much for helping us, all of us. I can't wait to see you all again some day. Just be sure to take your time!" she says.

Summer trots into the white light, when Robin calls out to her.

"Hey! Don't forget this!"

She picks up the ball from the back of the room, the one that bounced into your earlier, and throws it to the girls.

"Thanks, Robin!" Summer cheers.

"You are the best, Robin!" Melody calls.

"See you soon!" Rose shouts.

"Bye guys…" Robin says back weakly.

Robin slowly closes the door, leaving you all in darkness. She sighs, then looks down to the floor. You take a step back, examining the final filly in the house. This is it. You won. This means you should be able to escape soon.

But then, why is Robin so sad? Why don’t you feel any more sure of your freedom then when you started?