Dream Makers

In which Bon Bon and Cherry Berry explore an attic, which (like all dark places) may or may not be inhabited by a grue.

West

South

Bon Bon held up a hoof in front of her face.  Yep, it was still pitch black—still inescapably, indisputably, undeniably black.  She tried lurching north, but the absence of light made it impossible to move in that direction.  She considered going west again, but harboured serious doubts that an exit had magically appeared in the few minutes since she had last tried.

“See anything?”

“Are you trying to be funny?” Bon Bon looked across at Cherry Berry—or at least in the direction her voice had come from—and glared.  It was a pointless gesture, all things considered, but it did make her feel better.

“Okay, maybe a little—why, are you smiling?”

“Oh, I am.  From ear to ear.”  Bon Bon stepped east and cursed under her breath as she stubbed her foreleg on something sharp.  The first time it had happened she had excitedly started to feel around the object in the hope that she had accidently stumbled across the entrance to the dungeon.  Then she had realised that she wasn’t in a dark and gloomy cave or dark and gloomy basement, but in a dark and gloomy attic.

A dark and gloomy attic that was apparently stacked full of boxes with sharpened edges.

“Hey, do you think it’s scarier being in a pitch dark room or a gloomy room?”

“I’d take a gloomy room, thanks.” Bon Bon probed forward, holding a hoof out in front of her.  “I’d like to know which direction the thing that’s gonna eat me is coming from.”

“I think I’d rather not know,” Cherry replied from some distant part of the attic.  “But I was thinking more along the lines of there being fewer things for your eyes to play tricks on you with, you know?”

“And more things for your ears to play tricks on you with,” Bon Bon said drily.

“Gee, thanks for that—just as I was starting to feel more comfortable too.”  Silence draped itself across the room for a few moments, before Cherry broke it again with a curse of her own.  “It’s fine, it’s fine,” she mumbled.  “I’m sure our eyes will adjust enough in a few minutes.”

“You said that five minutes ago!” Bon Bon stamped her hoof, impatience getting the better of her.  “Come on, Cherry, this isn’t fun anymore.  I know that noise freaked you out a little, but can we please go look somewhere else now?”

“And you’re certain we’ve covered every last inch of this room?”

Bon Bon groaned.  “Well can we at least go get a lamp from one of our carts if you want to keep skulking about up here?”

“But that would mean leaving the attic, and that would mean going back down into the room of howling evil.”

“Well what do you suggest, Cherry? Our eyes aren’t going to acclimatise up here, it’s too dark.”  Bon Bon paused as an idea started to form.  It was a funny but wicked idea, but she was so desperate to explore the rest of the house that she quickly quashed her morals.

“In fact,” she continued, “it’s so dark, we’re likely to be eaten by a grue.”

Cherry fell silent for a few moments, but Bon Bon was sure she could hear an increase in her friends breathing.

“A... what?”

“A grue.”

“W-what’s a grue when it’s at home?”

Bon Bon clamped down on her tongue to stop herself from laughing.  “I don’t know—nopony has ever seen one before... and lived to tell the tale.”  She took a breath to keep her voice steady.  “But they like the dark, and have sharp teeth, and like to slither—”

Cherry was suddenly at her side; Bon Bon could feel her whole body trembling.  “So, shall we go get that lamp then?”

Down