怪談とポニー Ep1 - Canterton High: Ponynormal

“I just figured it out.” Flaunty kept lighting the steps under their hooves, as the girls carefully headed down, listening. “The scene I saw… It was that incident, the school got closed after. What we know about it at least…”

“Did you all see…” Misty threw a quick glance at the girls.

“…the growing crap on the wall?” Windy finished for her gloomily, Lacy and Flaunty nodded. “Yes. I saw… something. The stain, whatever it was… It looked most of all like a giant bruise to me,” added she with the confidence of experienced. “The hay I want to find out, what it actually was!” she shook the bangs.

The ground floor seemed pitch black, despite their flashlights – the foliage outside and the dirt on the windows ate out half of the scarce light coming through and even the lightning couldn’t dispel the darkness completely. But at the same time, it was enough to cast long crooked surreal shadows of the girls and everything else in the hallway, be it an open door or some debris on the floor.

Quickly checking around as far as the flashlights allowed, the girls turned left to the entrance doors, doing their best not to produce any sound: the acoustics there was wild, maybe due to the tiled floor or some other reason.

“Shhhh…” faint dry creak from behind made them freeze, Misty put a finger to her lips, squinting. The sound of dripping liquid reached their ears, but otherwise the hallway remained quiet.

Silently Misty pushed the girls forward, Flaunty lifted Lacy and both sisters soared, flying as quick and quiet as they could while staying that low. Their unicorn friend tried to follow them hoof to hoof, not walking but rather sliding her hooves along the floor and fighting with the stupid idea to look at the toilet doors, where the sound they heard came from.

When she caught up with them, the girls crowded at the exit door; the latter trembled and dinged lightly, mercilessly shaken by Windy. The pouring rain outside muffled all the sounds, gathering into a large pool in front of the entrance.

“It doesn’t open!” hissed Windy Mane, rubbing her elbow, which she just tried to break the glass with. “And the glass is too thick…” She looked around nervously, the right end of the drawstring hung below girl’s chest, the left almost hid in the hood of her jacket.

They could see the exit, they could hear the rain behind the thin obstacle, but they couldn’t use the exit no matter what the girls did.

“What about trying this?!” hiding in the darkness for a second, Flaunty returned with a large flame extinguisher in her hands.

“It doesn’t matter now if we break something,” answered she on the silent question in sister’s wide-open eyes. “We are too close, not to try. Stand back you all!”

Grabbing the metal cylinder more comfortably, Flaunty raised it higher, inhaling and aiming at the glass part of the door. Three girls obediently stepped back and unwittingly squinted, expecting the loud crash.

“Hhhhhhuh!!!” she brought down the extinguisher, looking away to protect herself from the glass shards.

That gave some unexpected result, the glass caved in slightly with a boing, as if it was made from rubber ten times thicker, and sprung the projectile back. Flaunty couldn’t hold it, jumping aside not to hit her legs badly; the flame extinguisher slammed heavily onto the floor and rolled aside with loud metal rumble… not leaving a notch on the door!

“What the actual hay?!!” Flaunty threw up her fists, glaring on the unharmed glass wildly. “Unbelievable!”

The girls froze on the place, staring at the doors like thunderstruck: the simple glass being able to endure such a strike was beyond their comprehension. Misty wanted to say something, when her ears registered again the same sound similar to the dripping liquid as before, making her almost jump-turn to the dark hallway.

Ready to hide at every moment it could be necessary, the girls approached the hallway crossing, scanning the space around with the flashlights. Following the sound, they could finally locate its source close to the students’ lobby. Brightly lit by their four flashlights, a dark dot appeared on the time-worn grey wall near the left wing stairs. It grew quickly and spread on the surface, in a few seconds it became apparent that most of the stain was actually not black, but rather maroon with darker violet veins passing through it and snaking on the wall as the terrifying thing swelled. It now looked like an actual fresh large bruise with a black spot in the centre, as if the gigantic hit was directed exactly there.

“Go back!” breathed out Misty, grabbing Lacy’s hand and pushing the pegasi sisters back into the long hallway. Sticking to the opposite wall to keep maximum distance with the horrible phenomenon, the girls slid out of the entryway and desperately looked around, searching for some hiding spot.

“Yeah,” Flaunty bleached and looked nauseous. “It… looks… Nevermind!”

“I don’t know what it is, Flo,” Misty tried to calm her racing heart, pulling her friends further into the corridor – the nearest rooms were perfect traps, small, without another exit. “But I guess it didn’t end well for those molesters…”

However, the girls couldn’t hold themselves from glancing back and lighting the creepy thing. During the last few moments it underwent considerable changes: grew larger, becoming thinner on edges, with its bloody nature becoming more visible. The centre spot of that giant “wall bruise” bulged out, the whole thing pulsating and glistening wetly.

“I think I’m going to get cranky…” sobbed Lacy, clinging to Misty. The girls couldn’t get their eyes from the bloody stain on the wall, time stopped.

The central bulge stretched out even more as if being pushed from inside. With an inexpressible sound of ripping flesh, it burst open and a palm with slim fingers appeared. It could be called elegant, if not the long sharp claws on them. The blood-covered arm followed, somepony tried forcefully to get out. When their lights glowed on the horn appearing after the arm out of that strange “hematoma”, long, helical and covered in dark blood, something inside the girls faltered, turning them breathless for a second.

Meanwhile, somepony kept squeezing themselves out of that terrifying warp. The head, shoulder, another palm, grabbing the edge of the supposed opening it came out of. The hair – pitch black, long, wet-looking – seemed endless; framing the face with thin traits, they flowed from the fleshy hole after their owner. The sound of the body squeezing through the soft matter soaked in blood made the backs of four investigators crawl with goosebumps.

When another arm and the shoulders came out completely, the creature pushed against the edges of the opening, pulling its shapely body outside to the waist. The warp appeared at about three-foot height, thus the figure was to lean on the floor; its back arched, revealing the voluptuous breasts and thin waistline. It was a mare, which could be seen as beautiful no doubt, if not for the dark blood covering all over her and her long black hair, which clung moistly to her body.

The long slender legs followed her firm shapely hips and the mare picked herself up to a kneel on the floor, while her pitch black tail still streamed out of the wall. On her elbows and knees, she arched like a cat, raising her mane-framed face to the light and inhaling loudly, feeling the floor with her delicate yet dangerous fingers. A smile curled her lips, nose trembled and the large eyes opened wide. Darkness was splashing in them. The smile became wider, her mouth opened seemingly from one ear to another, distorting her fair features, making the skin on jawbones stretch and revealing the multitude of needle-sharp teeth.

“RUN!!!” Letting out a loud squeak and momentarily unfreezing, when the bloody mare started to get up to her hooves with a cold hiss, Misty Lagoon pulled the girls back and the four friends rushed like mad into the dark hallway. One flashlight hit the floor and went out, bursting into splinters.

Perhaps Misty never ever before ran like that: she flashed through the hallway, pulling Lacy by her hand, Mane sisters following on the tips of their hooves. Measured confident echoing hoofsteps behind were the best stimulus for the girls. The high pitch, girly, anticipant laughter from the darkness behind made them miraculously double the speed.

The blocked exit doors. The security room – small, with the single door. The locked principal’s office. Misty’s thoughts raced, outrunning her legs, she tried to think for herself and the friends who trusted her. There was the common room with two doors, but they opened to the same hallway, delivering the girls perfect ability to run in circles before somepony fell. Unhurried steps clearly told them that the creature they met had plenty of time for fun and wasn’t going to give up easily.

‘There must be another way out!’ tense breathing of the friends urged Misty to savvy faster. ‘There in the park, we can easily outrun that… thing!’

Thus Misty relied on the most prudent, as she thought, idea – she rushed to the cafeteria, pulling her friends with her. There must be more places to hide, some storage room, a kitchen and finally an obligatory door outside. Deep in her soul, she rejected the thought that the latter could be blocked like the main entrance.

Jetting the last few meters of the corridor, pulling Lacy by the hand, Misty stormed into the luckily unlocked cafeteria door. Seeing that some of her preys were escaping, the unicorn creature let out a blood-chilling hiss, long fingers grabbed one of the lockers; appearing very strong, they ripped it off the wall with its fastenings. Fortunately for them, Flaunty and Windy threw a glance over the shoulder right in time to notice the locker being launched into the air easily with one powerful throw.

“Eeee!” the girls managed to jump back to the opposite wall before the heap of metal slammed against the cafeteria door and fell across, blocking it firmly.

‘That road is cut!’ Windy jerked sister’s hand, whispering in her ear. “Quickly! To the pool!” And the girls ran like mad, totally forgetting about their wings, the use of which was, frankly speaking, doubtful in those circumstances.

Sliding on the floor tiles, sisters reached the hallway end, barely avoiding crashing into the windowsill, turned left sharply and whisked into the short corridor to the pool, noting for themselves that the chasing hoofsteps fell behind at least. The next moment they dashed through the pool door and closed it.

“That will buy us some time!” Windy Mane looked around, she snatched a forgotten by somepony cleaning brush and shoved it through the door handles. “Maybe…”

The deafening crash made Misty brake and look behind, she noticed how the locker, thrown by their chaser, blocked the door from outside. But not that image made Misty freeze for a second, her fingers unclenched, letting go Lacy’s palm.

The ghost… And Misty was one hundred per cent sure it was a ghost due to the way it appeared. The ghost mare slowed down her chase; instead of catching up with the pegasi fillies, she stopped behind the cafeteria glass wall. Leaning on the thick glass, as if she was trying hard to see something through it, the horrendous unicorn mare snuggled to its surface, pressing her palms against it and peering into the darkness of the room. When Misty’s ray of light fell on her, the stunned girls could perfectly watch her silhouette in tiniest details: hands slid on the surface feeling it, gorgeous even in that situation breasts pressed against the glass, flattening just a little bit, boasting their firmness, her slim frame shone, glistening with blood. The mare brought her face closer, strangely it looked almost normal at that moment; with a tiny smile, which could even look friendly otherwise, she knocked on the glass with her fingernail.

The sound seemed to reach the depths of their hearts. With a loud squeak Misty unfroze and rushed to the door she spotted behind the counter deeper in the room.

“Misty!” Lacy was only a step behind, following her friend, as the latter seemingly had a plan.

Giving up to a fierce kick the door flung open. Almost unconscious Misty tumbled inside. The next moment she felt as if she was hit on the head with something soft and heavy. The last thing she registered was the light of her lamp tossing up to the ceiling, as her consciousness fell into the whirlpool of darkness…

Lacy noticed her friend bursting into the back room and rushed after her without a second thought. What was waiting behind was a thousand times scarier than the palpable darkness in the storage or kitchen ahead. She was to hurry for one more reason – it was Lacy’s lamp, which fell and crashed on the floor of the hallway. They had one light for two with Misty, Lacy inwardly noted that she couldn’t see it in the doorway. She ran inside by inertia, already doubting that decision, when the floor slipped from under her hooves, taking away balance and confidence along with itself…