Tantibus

THE THIRD CHAPTER

The wooden floor was uncomfortable and rough on her cheek and body. Twilight must have fallen asleep on the floor again… Or had she rolled off of the bed in her sleep? It had never happened before, but it was always a minor concern of hers. She wanted to get up and start searching for the bed, but she could not as much as move a muscle. Sleep paralysis? I thought that only happened to ponies with narcolepsy or in extreme cases of social isolation? Twilight wondered and then figured that she had no choice but to just wait it out. But instead, her eyes were slowly made to open. Something did not feel right about it. Her eyes did not exactly open by her command.

It was still pitch black and she could not see anything. Was it still in the middle of the night? Her body slowly rose up, utterly beyond her control, and this was cause for panic. What the heck is happening to me? It’s like I’m sleepwalking while in sleep paralysis at the same time. That can’t be possible… right? Right?!

When she took her first involuntary step it made an abnormal, creaky noise. What shocked Twilight further was the unfamiliar voice that picked up the sound and commanded “Who is there?!”. Was there a stranger in her home? Asking her who she was when that pony clearly is the one intruding on her property? Twilight Sparkle felt her lips move and her vocal cords were vibrating; “My name is Maverick. Who are you?”

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

Twilight Sparkle felt her mouth open but was interrupted by a sudden, rasp groan coming from her left. She or he… quickly turned towards that direction, albeit still blinded by the darkness. Twilight’s uncontrollable voice named Maverick spoke again; “Are there more ponies here?!”
“Well, I am here.” An unknown female voice announced from the right.
“So am I. Are you all alright?” Another, deeper female voice inquired.

The groan came back from the same pony as before. Twilight could hear hoofsteps left and right, likely from the other ponies desperately attempting to navigate this dark place. The voice of Decker came to assist the wailing pony; “Are you okay?” he asked while making his way for the origin of the cry.

The source of the noise spoke at last. The voice was light and faltering, but definitely male. “Where am I?”
“I have my theories but I cannot know for sure. What is more important is that you are in good health.” Decker replied calmly.
“I’m fine. A slight ache and some dizziness, is all.”

Then some more hoofsteps were heard followed by Decker’s voice, directed at everyone in the room. “How many are we here?”

There was a brief silence before Twilight’s avatar Maverick responded; “One…”
Decker continued, “…Two…”
One of the females picked up the trail, “…Three…”
The other, deeper female voice followed, “...Four…”
A third and previously unnoticed female said; “…Five…”
The ‘dizzy’ pony eventually concluded; “…Six.”
Silence fell upon the room, and ‘seven’ was nowhere to be heard.

Eventually Decker took it upon himself to take on the leadership role. “So we are six… Oh well, my ponies. I know where we are.”
“Where are we, then?!” Maverick reiterated.

A sudden flash silenced them all as the simplistic yet decorative crystal chandelier lit up the room from the ceiling above. They were located in a ginormous hall with an at least ten feet tall exit. Unfortunately, the doors were sealed tight. The ambience that this room emitted was that of a really old castle, as punctuated by the central chandelier. Aside from it and the wooden double exit doors, they found themselves observing the aged floor, impressive staircase leading upstairs, archaic artwork and furniture whose wooden shapes and patterns had surely been carefully carved by hooves ages ago.

The place had an unsettling atmosphere overall. The female ponies were all looking around and inspecting for themselves. The first male was light blue, crouched up against the wall and noticeably distressed. He really did remind Twilight of Fluttershy and how she would react in this strange situation. The other male pony had a brown fur color, darker mane and was frantically writing down notes into his notebook. He identified himself as Decker with his voice after finishing up a page: “Six ponies; three female and three male. Two pegasi, two unicorns and two earth ponies. This place sure loves patterns.”

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

Maverick spoke up. “As I asked; where are we?!” He was getting frustrated. Twilight could feel that. She was a momentary part of him, and felt confusion and impatience suppress any other emotions. The other ponies were looking at him, and then at Decker who faltered. “Well… I think… I think we are in…”

An unforeseen and immediate earthquake threw all of the ponies off their balance and onto the hard, wooden planks that made up the floor. Maverick landed in front of a broken mirror. He looked into one of the larger shards and saw a light brown and rather troubled creature. There was no horn in his forehead nor any wings on his back. All that could be seen was the blue mane that spread itself out across his ears and neck. Twilight asked herself; Why do I possess you? What makes you so special?

He turned around and glanced over at Decker who had been interrupted for the second time a few seconds earlier. With a terrified expression, Decker pointed past him and finished his sentence by declaring “We are in Tantibus!”. Maverick turned his attention towards where Decker was pointing. The wall was covered in fresh, dripping blood shaping a small welcoming message to the visitors.

THE RULES OF THE TANTIBUS CHALLENGE

Terrified screams and gasps came from left and right. Someone claimed it all to be a cruel joke and another was on the verge of tears. Shortly after, a new line wrote itself in front of them.

RULE ONE; ONLY ONE COMPETITOR CAN LEAVE TANTIBUS ALIVE

“Sweet Celestia!” shouted the female pegasi, still unnamed.
Letter by letter, blood stained the wall as if through black magic. In just a moment, they could observe 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 he and Twilight could hear it. He was praying to Celestia or whichever force responsible for the existence that was in all likelihood about to end for his part. Only one of them would leave and with a 16.5% chance of survival, the odds were not in his favor. His mind was racing to find 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… What am I thinking…? 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 mind unravel and found herself also begging 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 this day…

Five ponies would be dead.

A hoof surfaced from underneath the covers and pulled the curtain. In one motion, it covered up the small window next to the bed. Twilight’s eyes could not adjust to the quite painful and bright morning sunshine that had just woke her up. When she came to think about it... Why did she not cover the window before going to bed? She pondered for a moment and remembered why. She had left the window cleared of the curtain’s cloth because she felt more relaxed having the moon’s natural light shine over her, aiding her sleep. She had been very unsettled because…

Her eyes and mouth opened promptly and she pushed off the covers. She threw a quick glance to her right and on her nightstand she found the book ‘Spooky Tales & Legends’, just as she had left it before falling asleep. She readjusted her position so she faced the bedside table completely, and then used her magic to open the book up for her.

Page 82. ‘The Dark Mansion’.

“Tantibus…” Twilight recalled her incredibly 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 each 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?” croaked a 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 resumed her discussion in her head. That light blue and shy pegasus… was that Aeon? I need to find out if these ponies really existed. Twilight Sparkle walked into one of the rooms of the library and shortly came back out again, bringing a thick book with her.

“What are you doing now?” Spike asked while rubbing his eyes to easier make out the details with his recently and rudely awakened vision.
“I’m trying to look up Aeon and some other ponies from this ‘Spooky Tale & Legends’-book in our library’s 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 set the register down on the table in realization and turned to Spike. “That’s true.”

Twilight contemplated on where she could find registers that covered all of 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 started with a simple, polite greeting and then moved on to excusing herself for the odd request that she was about to propose. She just had to find some information on a certain group of ponies, that’s all. 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 had written ‘The Dark Mansion’. Finishing it off, she excused herself one more time for her silly errand and then wrote her goodbye.

“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 green smoke along with the letter just before they began eating their eggs.

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

My faithful student, Twilight Sparkle

Luckily, I had an open window in my schedule today, so I took the time to look up your small list of ponies in Canterlot’s royal library. The first group you write about do not appear anywhere, except ‘Flaming Ace’ who is deceased. The rest, including ‘Landon’, seem to not exist. However, this other group of yours intrigued me. They existed and all seemed to have gone missing around the same time. But that was very long ago, and they have been pronounced dead since.

After that, followed a list of the ponies that had vanished or died and at what time period they did. So the group from ‘The Dark Mansion’ was completely fictional. That makes sense… But not Flaming Ace? Celestia writes that he was real but died later. But surely, it must have been Landon that was the real one? If not him, who wrote the novel?

Twilight opened 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 else could reflect Flaming Ace’s emotions in such an intimate way other than himself?” Twilight’s conclusion had brought her joy, but the glee then quickly faded from her face as she considered the weight of the realization, “That poor thing, ending his life after such misery…”

“Burp!” Spike forwarded another letter to her library. On unsteady legs he approached and handed it over to her.

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

Dear Twilight Sparkle

You have to excuse me. It appears that I was wrong on one of the ponies. As it turns out, the pegasus Aeon is still alive and located in the mental institution of Canterlot for alarming behavior and self-inflicted injuries. It is also filed that he never communicates verbally, the most probable causes being listed as either trauma or an unknown mental disorder as they had found nothing wrong with his vocal cords.

If you would like to visit this candidate 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 would be on your own after you step off at Canterlot’s train station.

With all regards, The Princess.

In shock, Twilight instinctively spit out the apple cider as she exclaimed; “Aeon is ALIVE?!”