Spire of Madness

You will arrive along the olden rails. They wind with a troubling serpent-like suggestion through the snow-stricken wasteland; leading only, I fear, to evermore tenebrous places. There lay few troubles and threats along the way save for the endless winter. Press this advantage and spend your final moments of peace and tranquility among your companions before you step into the capital of monstrous decadence where you will face vicious violence, and perhaps other damnably transcendent terrors.

So steel yourself! And remember, there can be no bravery without madness. The old tracks will take you to hell but in that gaping abyss...

We will find our redemption.

Twilight Sparkle had read through the entire letter several times over in the process of coming here, specifically this second part that was seemingly instructions and forewarnings. The Immortal Matriarch had, in her panic, gathered up her friends and rushed to aid her dear brother. But now she wondered if she had done the right thing; leaving the entire land of Equestria behind in her sole pupil's hooves, was it sane?

Accompanying her inside the wagon were her closest friends and cohorts. The raw strength of youth may be spent, but their eyes hold the secrets of a hundred clashes.

Applejack; the swarthiest of the six. Once responsible for healthy food and honest work, this simple workhorse brings a hardy back to lean on in hard times.

Fluttershy; the gentlest and most caring of the group. Struck with blindness in an unfortunate and scarring accident, she had turned to her bestiary for sight and trifling companionship. Kindness tends to get one nowhere.

Pinkie Pie; the most maddening and maddened of them all. It has been several years since her entire family had been presumed dead after a mysterious event on their Rock Farm, the event which eternally damned the pink mare's mind. She will be laughing still at the end, yet she may as well be the one closest to knowing things as they truly are.

Rarity; the eternally generous, even while the same generosity leads her into the spiral of agony and doom. Not too long ago she had been cursed with a lingering illness, an unknown and self-contained disease of which none know how it truly feels enduring; contacted from a deep and forgotten creature for the sake of protecting an individual irrelevant in the bigger picture. This mare understands that adversity and existence are one and the same.

Rainbow Dash; loyalty and ego in one fleshy package. She knows what her actions led to, an experience and a failure to remind her of imperfections and faults forevermore. In secret, only she mourns and hides the truth from one faithful day when lives extinguished. She puts up a brave front; a pretense of her old self for the sake of all dear to her.

And of course, Twilight Sparkle herself; a worthy, if mildly afflicted leader and a sister in battle. Victories and defeats have taught this mare well. The Alicorn knows what self-sacrifice means for the good of the other; a mother and friend to her ponies.

For a while, there was a silence; save for the obvious sounds of the moving train and the eternally deep and troubled breathing coming from the bandage-covered and uncomfortably masked mare of generosity. Soon, the door to the wagon of the six opened and a dark gray crystal Pegasus walked in, clad in royal armor and bandages for the various wounds across his virile body; holding his helmet in one of his forelegs. The herald of the Crystal King.

He immediately faced the Alicorn, looking upon her with golden-colored eyes.

"Your Majesty, we are arriving at the Crystal Throne soon. I assume that you are prepared?" the stallion spoke in a quivering voice, touched with reluctance and fear of the unknown he had faced once before within the crystal halls. "I am yet unsure if the... 'Thing' had spread throughout all of the Empire. I pray, as terrible as it might be, that only the capital has been infected." the servant finished, putting his helmet back on his head.

The lavender Princess let out a sigh, the venerable paper she had been levitating; the doom-say of her brother, she put it away into one of the many bags they had packed. "Let me clarify this, you said that Shining himself wrote this? This hardly looks like the writing style or wording of my brother." she skeptically remarked while completely ignoring his previous speech, still not quite assured of this new bitter reality.

"I have not seen his majesty write it personally, but I can with complete adamancy assure you that he has... Changed over time. At first, he was rather laconic in his speech-- Of course, this is all AFTER the... Disappearances." the guard cringed a little at the word, although everyone was already aware of the reality that only one precious Alicorn remained and she was right there before him.

"Then, after he had begun digging for this 'power' his majesty had learned of, his speech patterns became very... Olden and mayhaps even verbose. It seemed like a disease, honestly. Everypony around him had started adapting some parts of it. Even I as I stand here have picked up on it."

Twilight closed her eyes and took a deep breath, meanwhile the blind mare sitting next to her with quite a pack of animal friends with her laid a single, yellow hoof on her friend's shoulder. "Twilight...?" Fluttershy inquired, but never followed up on it.

"So... There is a creature or creatures loose inside the castle-- Or possibly even outside. Creatures we know nothing about other than they have the ability to temporarily blind ponies, or living beings in general. You've experienced this, you said?"

"Y- Yes your majesty, I have. My sight had turned red with blood-- It was not quite complete blindness as much as it was an attempt at forcing my eyes shut due to the unstoppable stinging. One clear look at the thing was enough, and I am afraid to say that it has disappeared from my mind; as if every mental picture of it I could think of was burned away. I did, however, notice that once I had retreated the blood flow stopped and it was as if nothing had ever happened." the guard paused and hung his head lightly.

"If the evidence of the dried blood on my face was not there, I would have thought it was a forced imagination. It is clearly powerful magic; but even being the mere guardspony that I am, I know for a fact that it was not conventional; I am most apologetic in my failings as the guard of his majesty, but none of us have trained to battle something without sight."

Twilight let out yet another sigh, but before she could speak up again or reassure the royal servant, the train began screeching to a halt. No horn, no warning of arrival. There was no point to alerting whatever hostile beings there were in the city. The train had made enough noise as is, despite the blizzard outside.

Twilight and her group had unboarded the train, pushing into the loud and swirling whiteness before them. The city was all but obscured within the blizzard, some resemblance of shapes were observable in the distance; most notably the spire that reached tall into the sky. With cloth bags and bare essentials, the seven ponies made their way forward accompanied by one of Fluttershy's animal companions which was a black and feral-looking dire wolf. It easily over-shot all of the ponies in the group when it came to height, even Twilight who had grown quite a bit in her later years although it was not as noticeable unless she was standing up completely straight.

The collective of equines and a tamed wild-beast proceeded to inch closer and closer to the exceedingly damned capital throughout the blinding snow which now gathered upon their features. It was of course not their first trek into this once-great land, but they were wary and on edge, lest some featureless abomination strike at them in stealth that the loud winds would provide easily.

The Crystal Spire, once a sign of love amongst the crystal ponies, now glowed magically and unsettlingly in the distance. It provided a red fog across the city that clashed greatly with the white snow. As if a filly had tainted a father's painstaking painting by spilling color upon the masterpiece; it was unnatural, skewered, ruined. Yet, worst of all... Familiar.

In a surprising revelation, the party had arrived into the actual city proper without any hardships and the blizzard appeared to die down within the borders. The grip of silence among the fellowship, however, still remained. It appeared as though the reddened mist was rather easy to see through, although it left blurry and smudged encasings within the visions of the ponies. "Wait- Hold up-" Rainbow Dash whispered out and broke the hold of silence as she blinked rapidly and in rather panicked fashion attempted to figure out what was wrong with her eyes. She would soon notice the rest of the group had similar reactions.

"This... Was not here before." the Pegasus guard accompanying them informed with clear concern and pure confusion.

"I can't notice anything magical within this mist... Fog... Thing-- I don't think it's physically in our eyes either-" the Princess spoke as she looked fairly concentrated, moving her eyes about slowly while trying to figure out just what was going on and, well, doing her best to stay calm.

"Sweet-Ce-Lestia..." it was Applejack's voice. It seemed while the others struggled to adapt to this new feature, she had moved on towards the actual spire and what she saw was the extent of its destruction. Large chunks of the building had been missing in almost perfect circular shapes, giving it the appearance of some sort of insect hive. Yet, despite so many obvious holes, some in places that would ruin its structural integrity; the spire still stood tall as ever, beckoning, taunting, seething without intellect or sentience.

"Applejack--" the lavender Alicorn hissed out as she hastily pulled back her middle-aged friend back into the group using her horn and its magic. "What do you think you're doing!?" Twilight demanded in a hushed yet clearly upset voice.

"Ah- Ah jus' figured if nopony ain't checkin' the place out ah might--"

"You can't just-" Twilight's voice almost rose to a growl but she collected herself at the last second. "We can't just split up, none of us know what could be around here. Not even..." Twilight turned to the Pegasus guard and trailed off, catching herself in the fact that she had never even bothered to hear out or ask for an introduction of the Pegasus that had brought her brother's writings.

"Morningstar, Princess. My name is Morningstar." he informed plainly.

"...Not even Morningstar knows what's up with this place-- And he was here when it happened." the Alicorn finished her words as she finally released Applejack from her magic.

"I... Really don't like this." came a soft whimper from Fluttershy, at which Pinkie giggled and just as quickly returned to her grinning silence.

"Well... What's the big idea then Twi?" Rainbow Dash piped in her usual tomboyish tone.

The big idea... Right. Twilight's eyes shuddered left to right for a few moments, looking just about all over the place and only avoiding making contact with Rainbow herself.

"We... Go in." Twilight finally said in an uncertain but soft tone, giving the spire a good, long stare. "...I don't believe we have much time to waste. We might as well start with the castle. I don't see anything or anyone around-- Whatever it was might still be just within the building. Oh, Celestia, I hope we're not late."

"Well, ah s'pose it's a good place as any to begin." Applejack added with a shrug.

With a few odd glances among each other, some expressions of concern and minor nods, the group headed off inside, their shadows blending into the complete darkness of the interior...

...Within the Spire of Madness...