Chapter One
the Old Stallion
"Greetings Stranger!" shouted a voice.
I was dragged back into reality as I looked about for the source of the voice. Eventually, I saw a small shack not too far from the gate. Sitting in a creaky rocking chair on its front porch was an old stallion. How I managed to miss seeing the shack or hearing his rocking chair earlier I'll never know.
"Uh, hi there," I answered, "What is this place?" I looked back at the gate and saw that there were no more lights and the ticket booth no longer had eyes.
"This would be the Everfree Amusement Park," said the stallion with a chuckle, "it doesn't get many visitors these days. Just a few ravens and a cockatrice or two but that's about it."
"Being located in the Everfree Forest probably wasn't the best place to put a theme park," I pointed out.
"Believe or not," said the old pony, "the park was in a space clear of the forest. But ever since the incident the land has been reclaiming this lost playground."
"Incident?" I asked.
"There was a tragic accident involving a wedding that took place one summer day that left a number of ponies dead, including the groom of a bride."
"What happened to the bride?" I had to know, my curiosity was overwhelming.
"They say she went insane and had to be taken to the mental institute outside of Ponyville," answered the stallion. As he spoke, I thought I heard a hysterical laugh come from deep within the park and it sent a shiver down my spine. I frowned, something wasn't adding up.
"So what exactly happened?" I asked.
And that's when the old stallion began telling his tale...
~~~
"Some time ago in a town not too far away, there lived a stallion who worked in the Everfree Amusement Park. He was a strong, stoic lad who rarely spoke but meant well. In love with him was a mare from Canterlot who had run away from a life of luxury to be with her beloved. The two of them were rarely seen apart but the owner of the park didn't like having freeloaders loafing about so he gave the girl an ultimatum: Find a job on the premises or return home.
"The girl tried her best to work at the park but she found that she just wasn't suited for the job. A life of luxury hadn't trained her for hard labor and so the park owner forced her to leave.
"Not wanting to go back home, the mare knew she needed to find help from somewhere. Desperate for advice she sought out pamphlets and training manuals but while they told her the basic nuts and bolts of working in an amusement park, they couldn't get her in the right spirit. What she needed was a whole new approach: She needed a mentor.
~~~
"And whom did she find?" I asked the old stallion.
"A simple fellow, known only as the Carnival Baron," was his answer.
"The Carnival Baron?"
"The One and Only!" said the stallion, pride in his voice.
"And what did he teach her?"
"He taught her...everything..."
~~~
"For the mare finding the Carnival Baron wasn't the hard part, he traveled with his entourage aboard a train that crossed the country. It was proving that she had the resolve to do what it took to actually work.
"At first the Baron was skeptical when he first saw the well groomed mare with her sunflower Cutie Mark but he eventually gave in and assigned the girl to help with the props and staging department. Because they were a traveling show they needed to be quick with setting up and taking down the activities, from the numerous mini-games to the various carnival rides.
"To the surprise of all involved, the girl not only persevered but rose through the ranks by taking on harder and more difficult tasks. Eventually, the Baron decided to give the girl the ultimate test: let her manage one entire event from planning to directing. For the mare it was an opportunity to show her beloved and his manager that she had what it took. So she scheduled their next event in her love's home town.
~~~
"So what happened?" I asked. "Did her love turn her down?"
"Not at all," said the stallion with a big grin, "He was very happy to see her and was so impressed at the level of responsibility the mare had achieved that he proposed to her right there!"
"How did her parents react?"
"Not very well, unfortunately..."
~~~
"Upon hearing word that their lost daughter was now a part of a traveling carnival and that the stallion they disapproved of was set on marrying her, the girl's parents decided to pay the traveling carnival a visit. When they finally located her she was working on the carousel, preparing one of the swans for its riders. The two of them demanded to know what the girl was doing but she maintained her ground.
"Despite their best efforts, the parents could not persuade their head strong daughter to leave this lowly life. 'She deserved far better than this,' they tried explaining, 'that she could have anything she wanted.'
'As long as it's something you want me to have,' was the girl's retort, 'I'm my own master here.'
"Seeing as they weren't making progress with their daughter, they decided to have a word with the Carnival Baron but he was just as unflappable as their little girl. For he knew that she would never achieve happiness living in the shadow of her parents.
"Defeated, the girl's parents decided to simply disown their daughter and left.
"With her parents out of the way the girl could now focus on preparing for a life with her beloved. The stallion's manager allowed the two to have their wedding at the pagoda near the center of the theme park as it was a popular place for young lovers.
"But things would not pan out the way the girl wanted it. No one really knows what happened during the wedding because the only living witness the police could find was the girl herself and she was babbling in a crazed manner about how she had been betrayed. Everyone else was dead.
~~~
I sat there dumbfounded by the story the stallion was telling me. How could anypony snap like that? It seemed like such an extreme act to commit.
"Is there more to this tale?" I asked, my curiosity getting the better of me.
"A little bit," answered the old stallion.
~~~
"The girl was admitted to the asylum in a very broken state. Most days she just cried in the corner. Other days she would get uncomfortably close to the males on the staff. And on a few others she would prowl around the hospital and glare at the other patients.
"At some point, the girl's parents paid their daughter a visit and were shocked by what she had become: a raving lunatic with no connection to reality. The madness in her eyes was not going away any time soon.
"Guilt ridden, the parents tried everything they could possibly do to console their distraught child but she was just as unflappable as before, though now in a different way. Defeated for the final time, all they could do was pray as they watched their little girl deteriorate.
~~~
Looking around, I thought I could see a number of eyes watching me from the other side of the park gate. Their gaze was hypnotic.
"You OK, son?" asked the stallion, breaking me from the spell.
"Yeah," I answered dully, "I'm OK."
He allowed me a minute to compose myself before telling me the final verse of his tale.
~~~
"One day, the mare escaped her captivity and fled the asylum. She had beaten the nurses watching her into submission simply bolted for an open window. Despite the three story drop, the girl survived and ran off into the night.
"The police mounted a massive search for the missing patient, tracking her down to the old abandoned amusement park. After only a few minutes of searching, they found the girl fast asleep in the pagoda wearing her old wedding dress and veil. But when they tried to rouse her, they found out that she was in fact dead. An autopsy later revealed that she had died of a broken heart.
"A few days later, the park was condemned and was to be torn down. It never got too that point because something was scaring the demolition crews and preventing anyone else from getting anywhere near the cursed place. Those who did dare to enter were never heard from again. Over time, the ponies forgot about the place leaving the forest to reclaim the land.
~~~
"I'm here to make sure that nothing enters this place." said the old stallion.
As the old stallion was finishing up his tale I heard a voice call out to me from up above. Looking up I saw that Jewel had successfully retrieved her hair clip and was anxious to return home.
"I'm not liking this place," she said as she landed next to me. She eyed the old stallion suspiciously and he simply gave her a hearty smile.
"You don't have anything to fear from me," he said to her.
"We'll keep that in mind." Jewel urged me to ride on her back so we could make a hasty retreat. Looking back, I saw the old stallion waving back at me. I had a feeling, though, that I would be returning soon enough...
Author's Note
Up next, a journey through the archives of of Ponyville's Asylum and into the seedy underside of medicine...
Introduction
It was a chilly morning as Jewel and I took our weekly walk into the Everfree Forest. Even though the forest was a dangerous place to be, there was a part that was different from the rest. A part that living things seemed to avoid. Near a sign pointing towards two towns opposite of each other one could find a decaying trail. It would take you to a river where a broken rope hung over the water's edge. When we were younger Jewel and I would come down here and swing upon that rope. Being a Pegasus pony, she would often tease me by hanging in the air with the rope in her mouth leaving me to dangle over the river.
On this particular day, Jewel lost one of her hair clips in the water. It was a bright pink one so we were able to keep track of it as the river carried it off. What we weren't expecting is that we would eventually find it being grasped in the teeth of a little filly.
"Wait!" Jewel called out to the little filly, only to watch as she bolted off into the woods. Jewel took off after the little one leaving me to chase on foot. Unfortunately, the two were faster than I was and I soon lost them in the morning fog.
Completely disoriented, and a little bit scared, I stumbled into a clearing where the fog wasn't as thick only to see a large iron gate with cobweb patterns molded into its design. My gut was telling me to get as far away from this place as possible but I was too frightened to listen to my instincts. Instead, my curiosity got the better of me and I found myself walking towards the cobwebbed gate.
As I got closer to the gate, the more it felt like I was attempting to enter another realm. In my panicked state, I could have sworn that music was starting to play, drawing me even closer to the gate. Lights of a carnival started to flare up as my balance started to tilt and just moments before I dropped off the edge of sanity I watched in awe as a ticket booth on the other side grew large angry eyes and glared at me.
"Greetings Stranger!"
