~ Spike’s Mansion ~
“Beginning of the Night”
The weight of the night were upon his shaking shoulders. A thick darkness filled the entirety of the foyer, not even the glow of the moon passing through the windows of the mansion. The only thing piercing the blackness were the faint circular rays of light emitting from his flashlight.
The creaks of the staircase accompanied his every step. Spike felt a shiver slither through his back as he reached the second floor, shakily shining his light across to make certain that nothing awaited him in the places he could not see, until the handle of a double door caught the light glint.
Spike gulped at the familiar door, knowing it to be the one he previously fled from, before summoning his courage. He stopped before it as the air became suddenly chilly, his every exhale now visible to his eyes.
'T-There’s no doubt about it,’ Spike thought to himself as he dug into the pockets of the blue overalls he was wearing, compliment by a green long-sleeved shirt and a hat of the same color, only with the letter ‘s’ on its front. ‘T-This is the door the professor and I barely escaped from. T-The key s-should be in here.’
Spike pulled his claw out of his pocket, a key ring and keys dangling before his eyes. He gulped once again at the prospect behind these keys – they would take him into the many dark rooms the mansion had to offer, forcing him against whatever awaited him inside.
If it weren’t for these keys, the drake would be able to justify not having to traverse the mansion. But such thoughts were a waste of his awareness as he felt the coolness of the metal, taking the key bearing the same eblon of the door into his claw, doing his best to keep the damn thing still as he inserted into the door’s lock.
Click!
He slowly pulled out the key as it scraped against the interior of the keyhole, barely able to keep his claw still as he deposited the ring back inside his overalls, and brought his claw back to the handle of the door. He held it over the knob, internally debating if he had what it took to face whatever terrifying thing that awaited him on the other side, glancing back to the thing he wore on his back.
A portable vacuum.
Sighing, the drake put his claw on the knob, turned, and opened the door. He clenched his eyes and stepped inside, feeling something give him an extra push as he lost his grip on the door. It slammed behind him.
By the time he reopened his eyes, the new room was bathed in darkness. The floor was covered with a thin layer of dust, the tables covered entirely with some kind of clothes, and as he stepped further into the room, it felt like the eyes of the portraits lining across the wall followed him.
A purple flame was alight over the candles at the front of the room. There was no heat emitting from them, which Spike quickly noticed, as well as not burning the candles that they were lit upon.
He brought his claw up to it, meeting no resistance in terms of heat as only a few inches separated the two. Spike prepared himself to touch the purple flame.
“Hehe!” The room shook. “Don’t burn yourself!”
Spike yelped and leapt into the air, turning back on his flashlight and shooting it in every conceivable direction. There was nothing in the room besides that which he previously saw, nothing living nor dead stalking him.
But he knew he heard a voice.
“Hey dragon!” Or, rather voices, as another one spoke to him somewhere from his right. “Do us all a favor and put out that purple flame, eh?”
There was still nothing else in the room. Spike remained ever on guard as he never stopped surrounding the area with his light.
“I think the poor creature think’s we’re going to attack him somehow from our homes!” A voice of an older lady rumbled through the wooden floor, causing Spike to hop up onto the old chair to avoid it. “They don’t make curtains like they used to, especially when they’re a dragon. But I suppose those six lost wandering the halls put on a more interesting show.”
“The six!” Spike exclaimed as he momentarily forgot his feat, still slicing sideways through the darkness with his flash night. “You wouldn’t happen to mean six mares that were wearing pendants around their necks, would you?”
“That depends, BOY!” A quake shook the room itself, making the drake lose balance as he fell forward. He crashed against the floor with a thud, quickly shining his light from his prone position at the portrait above the purple flames. “Why have you come to our mansion? Give us your name and your reasoning.”
“S-S-Sp-pike!” The shivers wouldn’t stop shaking the baby dragon’s body incessantly as he struggled to rise to his feet. Once standing again, he shone his flashlight at the portraits, whose faces changes once his eyes laid upon them. “I-I was given this m-mansion when I won a contest in a c-comic. T-The girls checked it out first, b-because they thought it was some k-kind of prank.”
All the faces of the protesters were upon him. Their faces changed in the darkness, as he directed his light on the one who had commanded the information from him. “They never came home e-even when it started getting dark, so I went through the E-Everfree and wound up here.”
“Spiiiike!”
Spike turned around at hearing his familiar call, seeing nothing but the darkness when that blanketed the room. When he turned back to the portion of the older stallion, all he found was just a pair of blood red lips staining through the portrait. “So you’re the one that we’re supposed to entrap for eternity!”
Spike flew backward in a scream, landing upon his rump and desperately crawling backward. It seemed like the bloody lips were going to fly after him, but they couldn’t escape the fabric of the portrait they inhabited.
“The dragon’s who’s a coward! The true owner of this mansion was very clear on what we we’re supposed to do with you.”
Spike quickly flashed the light across the room to catch anything attempting to attack him in the darkness, only finding more pairs of lips, each bearing colors like celestia blue and comment green, all trying to escape from their fabrics.
Their lips then tore apart, revealing a void capable of sucking away the baby dragon’s soul should ever dare to get too close. The sight of such madness overloaded Spike system into dashing to the door of the room, gripping the handles with the strength of a manitocr to pry it open.
But the door wouldn’t even budge. It was sealed with something utterly beyond the physical world. Laugher echo from behind his back, causing the baby dragon to dash to the room’s corner, curling up into a small ball, and keeping the light focus on the scary thing on the other side.
“What’s the matter, Spike? Don’t like the dark, do yeah?”
“You don’t want a kiss from our beautiful lips?”
“Doesn't anyone else find it simply divine that he hides away with the faint hope that somepony will save him.” The voice of the older women gave a cackle at the though, the events of the day playing through the forefront of her now non-existent mind. “That they’ll arrive in the nick of time with a light bright enough to purge this mansion of its darkness. That they would summon the power of the accursed Elements of Harmony to vanquish all that is unliving back to their graves.”
She broke out into laughter, sounding unfitting for a lady such as herself. “Such cliches will only bring you despair! Besides, the reason why we have you trapped in here, is so that you can’t go and save them.”
“S-S-Save them?” Spike phrased through the clamping of his mouth, using the wall as a support for his buckling legs to return to his feet. The fact that we was talking to something not of this world through pure darkness was quite frightening, but something happening to his friends scared him a whole lot worse. “What...what do you mean by that?”
The voices of the dead joined together in a cacophony of laughter.
“Your friends are long gone, Spike!”
“Their greatest fears stalking them through the halls, splitting them apart into solitude.’
“Divide harmony and chaos will be upon even its bearers!”
“They stand on the threshold to the next world, don’t you already feel their lack of presence?”
“Don’t worry if ya can’t, because by the end of tonight, they shall be gone forever!”
Spike’s frantic breathing caused his lungs to hyperventilate. His knees fell to the floor as he light rolled out from his open claw, pupils enlarged with shock. The girls were gone, the depths of the endless mansion sucking them whole. They wouldn’t be coming to save him; they couldn’t even save themselves
“Why else would we go through the trouble of sealing your fate with our boredom?”
“Yeah, we totally would’ve gotten you the last time, if not that midget wearing the backpack you have now didn’t almost suck us up. It’s because of him and you that our master sealed us back inside these portraits!”
“We’re not even allowed to come out and play because he fears that we would just kill you on the spot.”
Another roar of laughter made the room tremble.
“I suppose our master is right! But what would he want with a cowardly baby dragon?”
“This room keeps him sealed so that light and vacuum don’t have a chance of ruining our master’s night.”
“It is the only thing that can capture our forms…”
“...that’s it! Scared shorty, why don’t you use that vacuum to bring about total darkness to the room?”
Spike shook his head and began to yell. “Why would I ever do that?”
“Because those flames are what keeps us sealed away.”
“Then I’m gonna keep it that way,” Spike replied.
“Don’t you want the chance to at least try and find your friend’s?” One of the ghostly voices asked from the dark corner of the room that the baby dragon couldn’t see. “Our power is what keep those doors sealed, so as long as we’re alive, you will die in this room without accomplishing anything.”
Spike looked down at the flashlight on the floor before him, picking it up. He banged it on the side to allow for more light to shine, before resting it on the purple flames atop the candles. “How do I know this isn’t some trick that won’t just result in my death?”
“Oh, it will.”
“Indeed!”
“Our dark master sealed us here to keep you perpetually frightened, but we much rather spend our time killing you.”
“But you do have that treacherous vacuum on.”
“So you have something to fight back with, as we all have our chance at freedom.”
“What do you say, baby? Does not the thought of your friends having their souls ripped from their bodies not frighten you?”
“Look at his face! He looks like he’s ready to wet himself.”
Spike was afraid he was going to drop the light again as he couldn’t quell the fear that was rocking his body inside out. Somewhere, in the deepest recesses of this mansion, the girls were barely clinging to their lives as he just stood around feeling scared for himself.
They had gone through a more terrifying experience than he, yet here he stood, almost wanting to die just to avoid looking at these ghost that could do him no harm. He knew that he should’ve be afraid, to just not be afraid of the girls and traverse all that the mansion could throw his way.
But no matter what he tried to reason, Spike just couldn’t stop his legs from shaking.
He wanted to do nothing more then to throw himself onto the couch, curl himself into a ball, and just sleep until it was all over. To hide underneath the blanket to escape their scary faces, to plug his ears with the cotton to no longer hear their voices.
Yet, he took out the nozzle to the vacuum. Against all his fears that shook his very being to its core, Spike sucked in the purple flame and turned off his own light. Pure darkness reigned over the room, the voices amplified by the blackness.
“The fools done it! He’s really done it!”
“Do you hear those scratches against the wall, baby dragon?’
“That means they’re coming.”
“They’ll take you away like they did your taller friends, to the frigid basement.”
“Where you’ll endure the same blissful agony!”
Spike felt himself like a ghost, unable to see his form nor feel his body; all the shivering had made his nerves numb. He felt like a fickle purple spiti floating in nothingness, the bigger ones coming to claim miniscule soul.
But there was one difference between the oranges and purples that had faded into the room – Spike still had his light and his vacuum.
Kaching!
Vurrrrm!
Spike flashed the light on the two ghost that had appeared before him, who had a big orange mass and cocked their semitransparent arms in order to reach into his being. The flash of light brought their very existence into the physical world, the ends of their ghostly tails being caught by the sucking winds of the vacuum.
“Gabuda!”
Spike held on for dear life onto the nozzle as the ghost flew around the room in a frenzy, weighed down by the vacuum slowly sucking them in as they tried desperately to knock the baby dragon off from their trail. But all attempts of shaking him off or running into furniture proved fruitless, feeling their own hearts grow weak, as they beings were sucked into the machine.
Plup!
“Impossible!” One of the ghostly voices exclaimed.
“He sucked in their spirits! He actually did it!”
“We didn’t want to get involved due to the tiniest percentage of him actually winning…”
“...but it appears we’re ALL GONNA HAVE TO GET INVOLVED!”
The pairs of lips all flew out of their portraits, munching on the nothingness of their trek and sending it into their own individual voids. The two pairs of lips came at Spike from the front, one at each of his sides.
“TIME TO DIE, SPIKEY!”
Spike quickly flashed the light on them as he pointed the vacuum's nozzle in a different direction, watching as the hearts behind the lips transitioned into the physical world. But it was not enough to stop them in their journey to claim his life.
“Nice try, but such simplicity won’t work on us!” All the lips were but a few feet from him now, all opening their void to him. Then, the vacuum powered sucking in not the ghost, but the cloth upon the table.
Candlesticks and other minscule objects were thrown into the air and smashed against the hearts that had been made visible, causing them to be momentarily dazed as the cloth itself rose into the air.
“Oh no you don’t!” the voices cried as they converged into the single spot, but they found no baby dragon underneath the matters – they all smacked together into a huddled mess. Then, their cores burned once more as flash emitted behind them; then they felt something suck on their very beings. “NO!”
Spike didn’t care that they all tried to split in separate direction, each one abandoning their other just to save their glowing tails. The baby dragon only upped the power and refused to move from his spot on the ground. “ The girls were torn apart because of the fears that split them, so in a way, they’re still more braver than the ghost who would abandon the other just for a better chance of survival!”
“Let us go at once!” One of the ghost tried his hardest to fly away, but the streamed proved to be too strong, as he used the last of his strength. The ghost was torn out from the pair of lips he had been using, being sucked into the vacuum
Plup!
“They’ll find you.” An old, upright lady formed out of her frail lips, her mane gray even if it weren't for the fact that she was a ghost. “Those who we once shared this mansion with will find out what you’ve done to us, and there will be hel—”
Plup!
“Who do you think you are!?” This time, a younger ghost came out of his lips, mane flowing down to his tail. “Nothing but a scared loser who only survived because some old dude gave you a vacuum! You’ll never be able to save your friends through the labyrinth that is this mansion, if your legs are shaking like a little—”
Plup!
“Wait!” The voice of the older gentleman cried out, the same one who hung over the purples flames. “I’ll give you the key you need to escape this place; I’ll escort you out so that no ghost can touch you!”
Spike did not heed his words, only tugging harder at the nozzle to the vacuum. Just as he was about the suck in the final ghost, the light to the room magically came on. The ghost pushed against the rim of the vacuum as half of his body had already been sucked in, releasing in the loss of pressure when the vacuum finally turned off.
“...did you do this?” Spike asked, not looking down to the ghost.
The ghost turned around to see the gigantic body and face of the dragon, knowing that, since most of its body had been sucked away, that he had been reduced in size. When he spoke, it sounded more like squeaks than the deep voice he normally had. “Unfortunately not, though this doesn’t make any sense, unless…”
“Winner of the mansion!” A grand voice talked from the front of the now lit room, gaining the attention of the two who inhabited. They turned and felt their jaws almost dropped as they looked into a portrait, as it was no longer just that. “Do you like your new home? I’ve already gone through the trouble of having your friends move in.”
Spike looked at the painting to see Sombra. Oh nO! He says he will make the six painting of the six, who bang depsartly to get out, into treaued souls to regain his power. He asks the draek why he doesn’t jsut grow in size, but spike know the ghost will take over his mindlessness
Sombras asks if he has the courage to make it through the terros of the manson all by himelf.
Spike says he does, sucks up the ghosts, and makes way fro the next room.
He will brave the terrors of the night so he can spend the morning with his friends.
