Haunted Horror'sby NeuroChaptersChapter 2 First Encounter!The X-HaunterThe KeyPortrait Ghost Encounters!Chapter 1 Rainbow Dash is Missing!Chapter 2 First Encounter!Chapter 2 First Encounter Time: 8:45pm Location: Mansion Entrance Twilight gazed up at the stone mansion, The doors and windows of it made it seem like it was menacingly staring right at her! She climbed up the short granite steps, two large pillars stood at the sides of her, giving support to the granite slab above. Twilight sat down to wait for her friends, seconds seemed to stretch to minutes as she waited, alone, but no none came. "Maybe they just got a little lost in this fog." Twilight said to reassure herself. "TWILIGHT HELP ME!" Rainbow Dash's voice called out from within the mansion. "Rainbow where are you!?" Twilight shouted as she got up and turned towards the large double doors. "Hel-" Rainbow Dash shouted but her voice was cut off. "Rainbow!" Twilight shouted, hoping she'd reply. No reply came. Twilight used her magic to forcibly open the doors and charged inside to help he rainbow mane'd friend only to reveal nothing. Twilight scanned the large room, dust littered the floor, a smashed mirror lay next to two more, yet smaller double doors and a large staircase to her right was all she could make out, but no Rainbow Dash. The doors closed, trapping her inside and throwing the room into darkness. Out of shock Twilight forgot to use an illumination spell and wandered aimlessly in the dark for a few seconds before the candles in the room suddenly lit, causing a dim orange glow to envelop the room. The sounds of footsteps from the room to her left broke the eerie silence, Twilight looked to the old door, a dull neon red emanating from the crack below the door. Twilight slowly walked to the door, "Maybe Rainbow Dash is in there" Twilight thought, as she got closer the footsteps faded away and by the time she had reached the door there was silence, even the red glow had faded away. Hesitantly, Twilight opened the door with her magic. The first thing that stuck Twilight as odd was a lone candle with a bright green flame but no light came from it. Twilight walked closer to study it, the door slowly creaked shut, by the time Twilight know the door was closed, turning around she saw something horrific, it was black, blacker than darkness with red eyes that seemed to stare right into your soul, and it was moving closer to Twilight! Backing away, Twilight bumped into a desk and held the green flame causing it to fall off and extinguish, distracted by this Twilight failed to notice the thing in front of her to close the gap. By the time she noticed she was an inch away from it, then she noticed it had long sharp claws, it was fast, too fast for Twilight to dodge the incoming swipe. Twilight was thrown to the back of the room, three long, red gashes on her side, Twilight wanted to run but the blow had knocked the wind out of her as she gasped for breath. Twilight felt the room get colder, her vision getting darker she knew this was the end as she slowly slipped into unconsciousness, the last thing she saw was the door behind the horrific creature open... *** Time: 9:30pm Location: ??? Twilight slowly opened her eyes, her vision too blurry to see where she was as she lay on a makeshift bed. A few minutes passed, her vision started to adjust to the brightly lit room. Still exhausted Twilight slowly turned to her side to get a better view of her surroundings, the room she was in was small, a single candle on a stool, lit most of room. Movement from behind a bunch of stacked up furniture at the far end of the room caught Twilight's attention, "A-anyone t-there?" Twilight called out, slightly scared in case it was that creature which had inflicted the wounds in her side. The shadowy figure stepped into the light to reveal that it was a grey mare with a yellow mane and crossed eyes, which could only mean that it was the local mail mare, Derpy! "Hello Twilight, I see you're finally awake." Derpy said as she walked closer to Twilight. "Derpy! What are you doing here?" Twilight questioned. "Well... I was delivering mail when I saw that a letter needed to be delivered here, but I may have accidentally ran into a thunder cloud cause the last thing I remember was a bright light... And then I... guess I woke up here." "But Derpy if you got stuck by lightning why are you not injured?" Twilight said as she found the energy to get out of bed. "I dunno Twilight, but when I woke up here I found this laying next to me." Derpy said as she dragged a strange device that looked like a vacuum cleaner. "What is that?" Twilight walked to the device to get a better look at it. "Well, from what the Manual says it captures ghosts." Derpy went into her saddlebag and showed Twilight the 'X-Haunter manual.' "Wait it captures ghosts? But Derpy ghosts are just a fairy tail to scare little foals." "Well what do you think that creature was that attacked you?" Derpy said. "Well... It could have been a... a... oh I don't know but it was definitely not a ghost!" Twilight said in frustration. Suddenly the door slammed open on its own. "Who ther-" Derpy got cut off as she fell to the floor, being dragged by some unseen force into the darkness! "Twilight help m-" Derpy voice got cut off once again. "Derpy!" Twilight shouted as she galloped to the door, only to slam into the now shut door. Quickly, Twilight looked through the keyhole and what she saw horrified her, Derpy was unconscious and being dragged through two large double doors opposite of the entrance doors. Twilight tried to focus her magic to teleport outside the now locked door, only for the purple aura around her horn dissipate. "Why can't I use my magic?" Twilight thought The door unlocked itself with a 'click', wasting no time, Twilight opened the door and galloped to the double doors, where Derpy had been dragged through, but as she went through them she entered back into the room as if she had just come in through the entrance doors. Twilight looked closely at the strange doors to see in the centre of the right one was a large round indent, as if something had to be inserted there. The room got colder as Twilight realised she wasn't alone... [Author's Note: I'm still accepting pre-readers since I have no one to pre read my stuff.] [Edit: replaced last paragraph due to it making the next chapter harder to write.] The X-HaunterThe X-Haunter Time: 9:40 Loaction: Entrance Hall Twilight walked into the centre of the room, still confused as to how that door could be connected to the entrance doors. 'SNAP' Twilight heard a sound coming from directly above her, looking up, she saw the chandelier come crashing down towards her, thinking quickly, Twilight lunged forward, narrowly avoiding a grim fate as the chandelier crashed to the floor where she was half a second ago. Though as the chandelier collided with the ground, the glass on it shattered and flew everywhere and a stray shard of glass grazed Twilight's right hind leg causing a single drop of blood to leak out of the tiny cut. An orange glow flew past Twilight's blurred vision, Twilight rubbed her eyes to get rid of the blurriness and franticly looked around the room for that strange orange glow. Nothing. The large entrance hall was void of light and deathly silent, except for the sound of a dripping tap that echoed from somewhere upstairs. "Maybe it was just my imagination" Twilight thought as she retreated back to the safety of the lit room. Twilight looked at the X-Haunter and manual, a tear forming in her eye as it reminded her of Derpy getting captured, and slowly made her way to it and opened up the manual. X-Haunter contents page P2 Instructions P3 Limitations P4 Elemental Upgrades P5-10 Notes Twilight slowly turned the manual to the next page and started to read it. Page 2 Instructions To capture ghosts with the X-Haunter you must first stun the ghost with a bright light such as the light from a flash light. While the ghost is stunned you must quickly point the nozzle of the X-Haunter at said ghost and press and hold the button located on the nozzle. Once the ghost is caught in the air current the X-Haunter will slowly drain the energy out of the ghost, indicated by the ghost's colour changing to grey. When the X-Haunter has drained the ghost of all energy it will proceed to capture it and store it in the Spectral Containment Unit (S.C.U) until the ghost is put in a Spiritual Processor (S.P) - see page 3 for more information. Along with capturing ghosts the X-Haunter can also be upgraded with elemental talismans - see page 4. The X-Haunter is also equipped with two saddlebags for storage and is augmented with a weak telekinesis talisman. Page 3 Limitations The Spectral Containment Unit can only hold up to a total for 200 ghosts at any one time, if the limit has been reached an alarm will sound for five seconds and the X-Haunter will shut down until the S.C.U has been emptied, be warned, some ghosts may take up more space than others. The X-Haunter is immune to most attacks, though it is possible the button may stick if it is covered in ectoplasm, due to how the X-Haunter is built it is recommended to be used by unicorns. Page 4 Elemental Upgrades The X-Haunter can be upgraded with elemental talismans, these talismans include ice, fire, water and magic, the X-Haunter is already equipped with a weak magic talisman which grants weak telekinesis but may be equipped with a greater magic talisman. Once a talisman is equipped you need to capture a elemental ghost, these can be found anywhere where there is fire, ice and running water with the exception of magic which can be used at any time by unicorns. To use the elemental's flip the switch located on the bottom of the nozzle. Twilight flipped the page to see that the rest had been torn clean off the manual and closed it, her gaze now settled on the X-Haunter, she knew that to save Rainbow Dash and Derpy she would have to go deeper into the mansion and fight off the horror's that lurk in it. Twilight knew she had to do this. She had to, no she will save her friends.Twilight equipped the X-haunter and ventured back into the dark hall, outside the wind had picked up and distant thunder could be heard. Twilight tried the strange door once more, hoping that it would let her pass. Nope, once more Twilight ended up back at the front of the hall, sighing in defeat, Twilight decided to walk up the left staircase and found herself in front of another door, similar to the one she just opened, though it was missing the round indentation. Slowly, Twilight opened the door to thankfully see a different room and walked in. The room was a slightly big room with white sheets covering the furniture and a set of drawers with a lamp on top of it. Twilight turned the lamp on, only for nothing to happen. "M-maybe the power's out" Twilight said, a hint of fear in her voice, Twilight shook off the fear, she bad to be brave to save her friends. Twilight took a closer look at the room and spotted a small door on the top right of the room, Twilight was about to open it when she remembered the drawers and decided to look through them for anything helpful. Most of the drawers were empty except for one which contained a note with hastily scrawled words on it. "Beware of the dark. They lurk in the darkness waiting to att-" the rest of the note was illegible due to some dark substance covered the last of the words. Twilight levitated the note into her saddlebag and walked to the door, something behind Twilight fell causing her to spin around and see a tall ghost moving closer to Twilight. Thinking quickly, Twilight pointed her flashlight at the ghost, causing it to be stunned, Twilight levitated the nozzle of the X-Haunter at the spectre and pushed the button, causing the ghost to be trapped in the suction of the X-Haunter. Though, that doesn't mean the ghost wouldn't try to escape as Twilight soon found out when he was being dragged across the room as the ghost franticly tried to free itself, Twilight put her hoofves infront of her trying to slow down the ghost enough that she'd be able to fight back. sadly it didb't work as the ghost flew through a chair causing Twilight to slam into it and the X-Haunter to release its hold of the ghost. For a moment the world became slow and blurry for Twilight as she lay on a toppled chair, slightly dazed from the impact, and unaware of the ghost that was now floating closer to her, by the time she saw it, it was too lazed as the ghost grabbed her by neck and threw her into a table at the other end of the room, causing it to break in half, and causing an audible grunt to escape from Twilight. Even though this time Twilight wasn't stunned she couldn't do anything as the ghost blocked her path to the flash light which she dropped when she impacted against the chair, all seemed lost for her, until a surge of electricity caused by a thunderbolt, turned on the lamp, if only for a moment which was long enough for Twilight to grab the X-Haunter and turn it on, this time though the ghost was weakened from the last time and was too weak to fight back and inevitably ended up inside the machine. Suddenly, the lights in the room turned on, showing the dust-caked room in full detail and showing Twilight the damage the ghost had done to her, a few light cuts covered Twilights back from being thrown at the table, though nothing major. If Twilight had the energy she'd jump from excitement as she was now one small step closer to rescuing her friends, but all of the adrenaline that was pumping through her body during the fight now ebbed away, only now Twilight felt fatigued from the fight and dropped to the ground and drifted into unconsciousness... [Author's note: This chapter took to long to write than needed, sorry.] The KeyThe Key Twilight awoke an hour later, dull pain ebbed throughout her body, the previous encounter had taken its toll on her, though despite the pain, Twilight got up, with an audible grunt and walked towards the door, levitating the flash light over to her, Twilight turned it on, ready for another attack. Twilight opened the door, to reveal a room covered in darkness, though for some reason this room seemed unnaturally dark to her, though Twilight just shrugged the feeling off and walked into the room. Twilight pointed the flash light at the walls, looking for another door until she had found a small wooden door at the far end of the room, Twilight ran to the door, not wanting to fight another ghost, though each step she took seemed to make the room stretch, causing the wall with the door to get farther and farther away from her. Twilight broke into a full gallop, but soon ran out of breath and stopped to catch her breath, looking up, Twilight saw that the room was now back to its normal length. Though, as soon as she stepped forward her hoof fell through the floor, causing most of the floor to fall down into an endless pit, leaving twilight trapped on a small patch of carpet that hadn't collapsed, at least for now. "This can't be possible, this room must be playing tricks on me!" Twilight said as she lowered one of her hooves into the black void, and found out there was still a floor there, though, invisible. Slowly and cautiously, Twilight eventually made it to the end of the room and opened the door to reveal a square room, much like the room where she captured the ghost. Twilight shuddered as she remembered the encounter as if it had only happened a moment ago, she soon snapped back into reality as she felt the room get colder, she wasn't alone in the room any more. Twilight looked in every direction, trying to find the ghost, after a few minutes of franticly looking, Twilight dropped her guard and looked around the room. Clothes and hats littered the floor, three wardrobes and a cracked mirror were the only furniture, and yet another door at the opposite side of the room. Though, fresh, cold air emanated from it, Twilight rushed to the door and opened it and saw it led to a stone balcony that overlooked a graveyard. Twilight looked down and saw that it was a good distance to the ground which ruled out jumping down from there. Sighing in defeat, Twilight walked back into the other room to search for anything that would help her get deeper into the mansion. The first wardrobe was completely empty, save for a top hat and a white shirt, the second had an old key that had a few cobwebs on it, and an old camera, Twilight levitated the key into her saddlebag but kept the camera out to inspect it. Though before she could a magenta coloured ghost broke through the last wardrobe, sending pieces of wood flying across the room. Before Twilight got a chance to react the ghost charged into her, causing the camera Twilight was holding to drop onto the ground, along with her flash light. The force of the ghost slamming into her had caused Twilight to impact against the opposite wall and cause some cracks to appear on it, the ghost backed off a bit to prepare for another charge, though Twilight was slightly dazed, she managed to roll to the right, narrowly avoiding the ghost which disappeared into the wall. Twilight quickly stood up and grabbed the flash light and readied herself just in time as the ghost reappeared through the wall it had went through, Twilight pointed the flash light directly at the ghost. The light coming from the flash light dulled until it went out, the ghost was closing the distance between them, Twilight franticly thought of how to get out of this situation, suddenly an idea popped into her mind. Twilight grabbed the camera and rolled forward, the ghost just skimming over her back causing her to shiver from the coldness, turned round and took a picture of the ghost, the flash of light stunning the ghost, though before Twilight could use the X-Haunter her vision blurred, a vortex of blue surrounding her for a few moments until it vanished. Twilight looked at her new surroundings, she was back in the Entrance Hall, though safe, Twilight knew the ghost might find her so she quickly galloped into the safe room. Back in the safety of the light Twilight took the time to see what had happened to the flash light, and found out that the batteries were dead, Twilight searched the room and found two fully charged batteries and put them in the flash light, though fully charged they wouldn't last very long so Twilight added finding batteries on her list of to-do things in her mind. Light filled some of the Entrance Hall as Twilight walked out of the safety of the lit room and into the unnatural darkness and walked up one of the dual staircases, each step causing it to creak and echo throughout the hall until she was met with the same double doors she had entered not long ago, although this time Twilight turned to the right and walked up to a small single door that had cobwebs on it. Twilight tried opening the door, locked, Twilight levitated the key out of her saddlebag and put it in the keyhole and slowly turned it until she was met with the satisfying *click* of the door unlocking and opened the door. Unlike the other doors this one led to a narrow hallway with 3 doors on both sides of the walls and a dusty old portrait of a sad looking pony on the far end of the hallway. Twilight tried the first door to her left, locked, then the one to her right, locked as well, the next door was boarded up so no luck trying it. Twilight turned to the next door and noticed out of all the doors in the hallway this one did not have a door mat, Twilight tried opening the door only for the door to open and slam her into the wall and cause a crack to appear. The force of the impact caused Twilight to be stunned for a minute until her vision cleared and the pain to fade away, it was only now that Twilight noticed that the door led to a wall and she swore she heard a ghostly voice laughing in the distance. Twilight stood at the far end of the hallway, she had tried all the other 5 doors to find out they were either locked or a trap, Twilight held her breath hoping this door would be unlocked. She slowly turned the door knob with her basic magic until she was met with the sound of the door creaking open and let out a sigh of relief and entered the room... [Author's Note: Don't expect another chapter soon as I am way to lazy and that I have no motivation to write this. :l] Portrait Ghost Encounters!Portrait Ghost Encounters! AKA "I couldn't think of a better title" The room Twilight entered was unlike any other room, it was a small room with bookcases that held books that were coated in thick layers of dust. In between the bookcases was a lit fireplace that covered the room in a dull orange glow and made the room considerable warmer than the others. In one corner of the room Twilight spotted a desk in one of the corners with an open book on it and several books, each of their covers faded, stacked up on one side of the desk. Twilight walked up to the desk to inspect the open book, though she found it's faded, yellow pages were blank, though she could detect traces of a spell on it, and took it to study it later. Suddenly the silence in the room was broken by a creak coming from somewhere behind Twilight, causing her heart to stop for a moment in fear. Slowly she turned around to find an empty rocking chair slowly moving back and forth, Twilight having reassured herself that it was probably just the air coming in from when she opened the door and when the rocking chair stopped moving, turned back to the desk and gazed at the stack of books and levitated a green one over and looked at it. The book was bound in green leather with golden words on one side, though they were faded and illegible - suddenly another creak broke the silence of the room causing Twilight to go back into defensive mode and instantly turn around, ready to fight. Nothing was there, nothing except for the rocking chair moving back and forth, though sightly faster than before. In the distance Twilight could hear a low howling noise that seems to come from in the hallway, so Twilight cautiously moved to the door and put her ear to it. It was definitely coming from the hallway. Slowly, she turned the door knob with her magic until she was met with a satisfying *click* and opened the door, causing it to creak, and poked her head out into the cold, dark hallway. Everything seemed to be as normal as everything else was in the mansion. Cold, dark, and lifeless. Twilight started to think about what could have caused that noise but she soon found out what it was, the door that lead back into the entrance hall burst open, pieces of paper and large amounts of dust pouring in, all unlocked doors being blown open due to the strange, powerful gust of air and eventually the air slammed into Twilight causing her to fall onto her back. When Twilight got back up she noticed that the door was now closed and the room she was in was in total darkness and the floor was littered with paper and books that had been blown off because of the strong wind. What Twilight failed to notice was an eerie blue mist coming from the rocking chair, by the time she noticed, the entire floor was covered in the mist, a blue light enveloped the rocking chair, dull at first but slowly became brighter and brighter until Twilight had to shield her eyes with one of her hooves. The bright light slowly dulled and eventually Twilight was able to remove her hoof and was able to see another ghost which was currently sat in the rocking chair, slowly rocking back and forth and reading a book. Though this ghost was unlike any of the other ghosts Twilight had encountered so far, it looked to be a ghost of a stallion who wore an old cap and vest, thankfully Rarity wasn't here to see this or else she would have fainted at the sight of the fashion disas- "My friends!" Twilight suddenly realised that she had told her friends to meet up at the mansion, and she was sure it was well past 9PM and they were nowhere to be found "M-maybe they couldn't get into the mansion a-and they gave up and are now sleeping in their homes." Twilight almost reassured herself when a scream echo'd throughout the mansion that sounded like Rarity which caused her pupils to shrink to pinpricks and caused the blood in her veins to turn cold. Twilight rushed to the door but soon found out that the door had locked itself, trapping her in a room with the strange ghost which appeared to be more interested in reading his book than fighting. Twilight had no time to formulate a plan, she had to get out of this room and save her friends from untold horrors that lurked in the mansion. Twilight faced the ghost that was still sitting in the rocking chair and shined her flash light at him only to find that he dissipated before the light could hit him and reappeared when she took the light off of the rocking chair. Before Twilight could do anything else, a book slammed into her side causing her to momentarily lose balance but managed to regain balance quick enough to stop her from falling and then turned to the book cases to see several books had appeared on the shelves and were violently shaking, until one launched itself at her, Twilight ducked and narrowly avoided being hit. Suddenly Twilight heard a yawn coming from the ghost in the rocking chair and turned around to face the ghost who was stretching his hooves and shined the flash light at him once more. 'Ding'. Twilight instantly levitated the nozzle of the X-Haunter over and pushed the button causing it to trap the ghost in it's suction, though this ghost was much more powerful than the other ghosts and before Twilight knew it she had been dragged along the floor and slammed, head first, into a bookcase causing her to let go of the nozzle and let the ghost escape. Twilight slowly got up, her vision slightly blurred causing her to almost walk into the desk before her vision fully cleared and she was able to see the ghost once again sitting on the rocking chair and reading a book as if nothing ever happened. Due to the blow to her head she was barely able to register the bookshelves shaking and narrowly avoided getting hit by a copy of Starswirl The Bearded's teleportation theories, though due to the books trajectory it ended up hitting the ghost in the head, dazing him. Now was her probably only chance to capture this ghost *click* the ghost ended up once more caught in the X-Haunters suction, the blow to his head weakening him enough that Twilight was barely able to hold her ground, the helpless ghost's frantic movements to escape becoming slower and more fatigued as it got closer and closer to the nozzle of the the X-Haunter. Several moments passed that felt like hours to Twilight as she put all of her strength into capturing the ghost, her eyes closed as she concentrated until the tug from the ghost disappeared. Twilight opened her eyes and saw that the room was now fully light, the bookshelves instantly ceased their shaking and the warm slowly returned to the room. A glint of gold from the corner of Twilight's eye caught her attention, she slowly walked, her hooves shaking from the adrenaline slowly fading from her body, to the rocking chair and pulled out a small key, but before she headed back out into the dark hallway, Twilight decided to rest for a few moments to catch her breath. Eventually Twilight made her way back into the hallway and looked at the key once more to find a 3 engraved on it and decided to search for the room it belonged to. After a few moments Twilight was able to find the right room, right at the very back of the hallway and unlocked the door to reveal a large bedroom that had a large fancy bed with two small tables at either side and a desk with a dressing mirror on top. Right next to the mirror were large curtains that were closed, a few slivers of moonlight shining through a few gaps, deciding to light the room up more to make searching for the next key easier, Twilight opened the curtains causing a large draft to blow into the room due to part of the window being shattered. It was only then Twilight knew she wasn't alone, as she caught a glimpse of a female ghost with a tan coat and a blond mane sit up from the stool at the dressing mirror, walk up to the curtains and close them, then went back to brushing her mane. Twilight's first reaction was to take out the flash light and shine it at the ghost, but again she found it ineffective and turned it off to save the battery. Suddenly an idea struck her, the answer to capturing the ghost was right in front of her eyes and within a second Twilight drew back the curtains thanks to her limited magic. The wind coming from the broken window irritated the ghost causing it to get up once again to close the curtain but before it could Twilight switched the flash light on and stunned the ghost, then she pointed the nozzle at the ghost and switched it on, the ghost now no longer stunned, began franticly flying around the room. Unlike the other ghost this one was marginally weaker, but still had more than enough strength to cause Twilight to be pulled all over the room, thankfully though she managed to not collide with the bed, but her luck ran out when she slammed into the dresser. Unlike last time this ghost didn't return to what it was doing before, instead it charged right at her, missing her by an inch. Twilight quickly got back up again just to be slammed into by the ghost and land on the bed, the ghost just about to charge again when suddenly a flash of lightning lit up the room bright enough to stun the ghost. Twilight took advantage of this and used to X-Haunter, the ghost much weaker from the fight couldn't escape and ended up inside the machine. The lights in the room flickered, then turned on, showing some details in the room that couldn't be seen in the darkness, a smashed, empty picture frame lay in a corner of the room with a few shards of glass laying around it, an old key taped to the dresser mirror and a few bloodstains on the carpet. upon closer inspection it turned out to be Twilight's as she just now noticed a small gash on her side from when the ghost charged at her. "I'll need to find some bandages to cover it up" Twilight said to herself. Using her magic Twilight took the key and levitated it into her saddle bag and once again entered the darkness of the hallway. "It can't get any worse than this, can it?" Twilight randomly thought. ...How wrong she was. [Author note: Hopefully will get another chapter out sooner than this, so have a terrible cliffhanger.] Chapter 1 Rainbow Dash is Missing!Haunting in Ponyville Chapter 1 Rainbow Dash is Missing! Time:??? Location ??? Twilight slowly drifted back to consciousness, her whole body was numb, her vision blurry and her head pounding. Her vision was just able to make out that she is being dragged somewhere, the cold, damp stone floor and walls must mean she is somewhere in the basement. Twilight tried to move, only to find out that she was too exhausted and drowsy to move. Twilight felt herself drifting back into unconsciousness, a blinding light the last thing to enter her vision as she blacked out once more. *** Time: 2:34 pm Location: Sweet Apple Acres Twilight walked up a lone dirt path that led up to Sweet Apple Acres after being told by Spike that Applejack came by while she was in a deep sleep, caused by her late night reading of Ancient Magics by Starswirl the Bearded. Spike had told her that Applejack had to talk to her about something urgent concerning Rainbow Dash and that she’d wait for her at Sweet Apple Acres. In the distance Twilight could see a massive red barn and a smaller home meaning she was only a few minute walk to her friend’s house. The sky was a beautiful cyan with not a single cloud to obstruct the view due to the local mail mare, Derpy Hooves delivering the wrong weather report instead of delivering it to Manehatten which is now having a mild thunderstorm. The air was filled with the strong scent of apples, birds could be heard chirping in the distance as Twilight passed the Apple tree’s that littered the landscape to the right of her. Before she knew it she was at the front door to the Apple family home, using her magic she knocked on the door with her left hoof three times. The door opened a few moments later to reveal Applejack “Hello Applejack, so what’s this urgent thing you needed to talk to me about?” Twilight said with a concerned look on her face. “Howdy Twi, it’s bout Rainbow ah think she mighta gone missin'!” “What! What would make you suspect she’s went missing?” “Well we were supposed to have a race two hours ago and I'm might sure its unlike Rainbow to miss a race!” "Okay, do you have any idea where she might have gone?" Twilight said, noticeably worried for her cyan friend. "Well last ah saw of her she flew to that there mansion." Applejack said while pointing her hoof to a distant mansion in the Everfree Forest which had popped up one week ago. Though its sudden appearance was strange the ponies in Ponyville shrugged it off as another crazy thing that happens in the Everfree. "Alright then, you go round up the girls and we'll meet up there at 9pm." Twilight said as she trotted away to get some supplies for the trip. *** FLASHBACK Rainbow Dash was napping on a lone cumulus cloud on a warm, summer afternoon, blissfully unaware that the cloud had drifted from Apple Acres to the edge of the everfree forest. Rainbow was enjoying a dream about her becoming a Wonderbolt, that was until an earthquake made her wake up, sitting upright Rainbow Dash scanned the area for the source of the disturbance to find herself staring at a strange mansion that she swore she had never seen before. Curiously, Rainbow Dash spread her wings and took off to investigate the mansion that looked as if it had been there for a hundred years. Because of her speed it only took a few moments until she was landing in front of the mansion, with her hooves firmly planted on the warm ground Rainbow tucked her wings back to her sides. Rainbow Dash knocked on one of the two large, aged oak doors and stepped back as the right door opened a bit to reveal darkness. Opening the door wider, Rainbow walked inside and shivered as she felt the temperature plummet. The door slammed shut, sealing Rainbow Dash inside the mansion. A muffled scream could be heard a few moments later, sadly too quiet for anypony in Ponyville to hear her cry for help as they got along with their business, that is everpony except for a pegasus who had herd Rainbow's muffled screams... End of Flashback *** Time:5:23pm Location: Ponyville Library Twilight walked up to her home, which was also used as the town's local library, and opened the door using her magic. The air was cold and the room was dark which reminded her that her number one assistant, Spike had left a few hours ago because of some important business in Canterlot. Using her magic she lit the fireplace and some candles that were placed around the room. Twilight walked into the kitchen to prepare her dinner, The crackling of the fire in the fireplace could be heard. Sometime later, Twilight woke up beside the fireplace, a few glowing embers all that remain of the fire. Twilight figured that she fell asleep while reading Ancient Magic's Volume two and eating the last of her daffodil sandwich, looking up to a clock that was above the fireplace, she saw it was only 8 o'clock which meant she had an hour to get to the mansion and if she started walking now she'd have ten minutes to spare. While getting up Twilight levitated a scarf and a coat to her, even through it was summer the nights still got pretty cold. The door to Twilights home opened as she walked out, remembering to blow out the few candles that were lit. Twilight trotted down a lone dirt path that led out to the everfree forest. Most of the walk was uneventful but as she got closer to the mansion the once light fog around her got thicker and thicker. Soon she walked up to a rusted iron gate to the left and right of it was a tall iron fence with spikes on top of each pole, using her magic Twilight pushed the gate, each inch it moved causing it to creek until it suddenly snapped off it's hinges, startling Twilight. Looking around to see if anypony had noticed, Twilight continued down the dirt path which now had root jutting out of it and the occasional stone, it was not long until she finally reached her destination, the mansion! [Author Note: Well that's chapter 1 done, only 30 more or so (depending on how long I want this) chapters to go! Again, please give me some feedback as to anything I may have done wrong especially because I still need pre-readers! If you want to be a pre-reader send a message my way! Also chapter is up later than expected due to me constantly getting 502 gateway errors.]
Chapter 2 First Encounter!Chapter 2 First Encounter Time: 8:45pm Location: Mansion Entrance Twilight gazed up at the stone mansion, The doors and windows of it made it seem like it was menacingly staring right at her! She climbed up the short granite steps, two large pillars stood at the sides of her, giving support to the granite slab above. Twilight sat down to wait for her friends, seconds seemed to stretch to minutes as she waited, alone, but no none came. "Maybe they just got a little lost in this fog." Twilight said to reassure herself. "TWILIGHT HELP ME!" Rainbow Dash's voice called out from within the mansion. "Rainbow where are you!?" Twilight shouted as she got up and turned towards the large double doors. "Hel-" Rainbow Dash shouted but her voice was cut off. "Rainbow!" Twilight shouted, hoping she'd reply. No reply came. Twilight used her magic to forcibly open the doors and charged inside to help he rainbow mane'd friend only to reveal nothing. Twilight scanned the large room, dust littered the floor, a smashed mirror lay next to two more, yet smaller double doors and a large staircase to her right was all she could make out, but no Rainbow Dash. The doors closed, trapping her inside and throwing the room into darkness. Out of shock Twilight forgot to use an illumination spell and wandered aimlessly in the dark for a few seconds before the candles in the room suddenly lit, causing a dim orange glow to envelop the room. The sounds of footsteps from the room to her left broke the eerie silence, Twilight looked to the old door, a dull neon red emanating from the crack below the door. Twilight slowly walked to the door, "Maybe Rainbow Dash is in there" Twilight thought, as she got closer the footsteps faded away and by the time she had reached the door there was silence, even the red glow had faded away. Hesitantly, Twilight opened the door with her magic. The first thing that stuck Twilight as odd was a lone candle with a bright green flame but no light came from it. Twilight walked closer to study it, the door slowly creaked shut, by the time Twilight know the door was closed, turning around she saw something horrific, it was black, blacker than darkness with red eyes that seemed to stare right into your soul, and it was moving closer to Twilight! Backing away, Twilight bumped into a desk and held the green flame causing it to fall off and extinguish, distracted by this Twilight failed to notice the thing in front of her to close the gap. By the time she noticed she was an inch away from it, then she noticed it had long sharp claws, it was fast, too fast for Twilight to dodge the incoming swipe. Twilight was thrown to the back of the room, three long, red gashes on her side, Twilight wanted to run but the blow had knocked the wind out of her as she gasped for breath. Twilight felt the room get colder, her vision getting darker she knew this was the end as she slowly slipped into unconsciousness, the last thing she saw was the door behind the horrific creature open... *** Time: 9:30pm Location: ??? Twilight slowly opened her eyes, her vision too blurry to see where she was as she lay on a makeshift bed. A few minutes passed, her vision started to adjust to the brightly lit room. Still exhausted Twilight slowly turned to her side to get a better view of her surroundings, the room she was in was small, a single candle on a stool, lit most of room. Movement from behind a bunch of stacked up furniture at the far end of the room caught Twilight's attention, "A-anyone t-there?" Twilight called out, slightly scared in case it was that creature which had inflicted the wounds in her side. The shadowy figure stepped into the light to reveal that it was a grey mare with a yellow mane and crossed eyes, which could only mean that it was the local mail mare, Derpy! "Hello Twilight, I see you're finally awake." Derpy said as she walked closer to Twilight. "Derpy! What are you doing here?" Twilight questioned. "Well... I was delivering mail when I saw that a letter needed to be delivered here, but I may have accidentally ran into a thunder cloud cause the last thing I remember was a bright light... And then I... guess I woke up here." "But Derpy if you got stuck by lightning why are you not injured?" Twilight said as she found the energy to get out of bed. "I dunno Twilight, but when I woke up here I found this laying next to me." Derpy said as she dragged a strange device that looked like a vacuum cleaner. "What is that?" Twilight walked to the device to get a better look at it. "Well, from what the Manual says it captures ghosts." Derpy went into her saddlebag and showed Twilight the 'X-Haunter manual.' "Wait it captures ghosts? But Derpy ghosts are just a fairy tail to scare little foals." "Well what do you think that creature was that attacked you?" Derpy said. "Well... It could have been a... a... oh I don't know but it was definitely not a ghost!" Twilight said in frustration. Suddenly the door slammed open on its own. "Who ther-" Derpy got cut off as she fell to the floor, being dragged by some unseen force into the darkness! "Twilight help m-" Derpy voice got cut off once again. "Derpy!" Twilight shouted as she galloped to the door, only to slam into the now shut door. Quickly, Twilight looked through the keyhole and what she saw horrified her, Derpy was unconscious and being dragged through two large double doors opposite of the entrance doors. Twilight tried to focus her magic to teleport outside the now locked door, only for the purple aura around her horn dissipate. "Why can't I use my magic?" Twilight thought The door unlocked itself with a 'click', wasting no time, Twilight opened the door and galloped to the double doors, where Derpy had been dragged through, but as she went through them she entered back into the room as if she had just come in through the entrance doors. Twilight looked closely at the strange doors to see in the centre of the right one was a large round indent, as if something had to be inserted there. The room got colder as Twilight realised she wasn't alone... [Author's Note: I'm still accepting pre-readers since I have no one to pre read my stuff.] [Edit: replaced last paragraph due to it making the next chapter harder to write.]
The X-HaunterThe X-Haunter Time: 9:40 Loaction: Entrance Hall Twilight walked into the centre of the room, still confused as to how that door could be connected to the entrance doors. 'SNAP' Twilight heard a sound coming from directly above her, looking up, she saw the chandelier come crashing down towards her, thinking quickly, Twilight lunged forward, narrowly avoiding a grim fate as the chandelier crashed to the floor where she was half a second ago. Though as the chandelier collided with the ground, the glass on it shattered and flew everywhere and a stray shard of glass grazed Twilight's right hind leg causing a single drop of blood to leak out of the tiny cut. An orange glow flew past Twilight's blurred vision, Twilight rubbed her eyes to get rid of the blurriness and franticly looked around the room for that strange orange glow. Nothing. The large entrance hall was void of light and deathly silent, except for the sound of a dripping tap that echoed from somewhere upstairs. "Maybe it was just my imagination" Twilight thought as she retreated back to the safety of the lit room. Twilight looked at the X-Haunter and manual, a tear forming in her eye as it reminded her of Derpy getting captured, and slowly made her way to it and opened up the manual. X-Haunter contents page P2 Instructions P3 Limitations P4 Elemental Upgrades P5-10 Notes Twilight slowly turned the manual to the next page and started to read it. Page 2 Instructions To capture ghosts with the X-Haunter you must first stun the ghost with a bright light such as the light from a flash light. While the ghost is stunned you must quickly point the nozzle of the X-Haunter at said ghost and press and hold the button located on the nozzle. Once the ghost is caught in the air current the X-Haunter will slowly drain the energy out of the ghost, indicated by the ghost's colour changing to grey. When the X-Haunter has drained the ghost of all energy it will proceed to capture it and store it in the Spectral Containment Unit (S.C.U) until the ghost is put in a Spiritual Processor (S.P) - see page 3 for more information. Along with capturing ghosts the X-Haunter can also be upgraded with elemental talismans - see page 4. The X-Haunter is also equipped with two saddlebags for storage and is augmented with a weak telekinesis talisman. Page 3 Limitations The Spectral Containment Unit can only hold up to a total for 200 ghosts at any one time, if the limit has been reached an alarm will sound for five seconds and the X-Haunter will shut down until the S.C.U has been emptied, be warned, some ghosts may take up more space than others. The X-Haunter is immune to most attacks, though it is possible the button may stick if it is covered in ectoplasm, due to how the X-Haunter is built it is recommended to be used by unicorns. Page 4 Elemental Upgrades The X-Haunter can be upgraded with elemental talismans, these talismans include ice, fire, water and magic, the X-Haunter is already equipped with a weak magic talisman which grants weak telekinesis but may be equipped with a greater magic talisman. Once a talisman is equipped you need to capture a elemental ghost, these can be found anywhere where there is fire, ice and running water with the exception of magic which can be used at any time by unicorns. To use the elemental's flip the switch located on the bottom of the nozzle. Twilight flipped the page to see that the rest had been torn clean off the manual and closed it, her gaze now settled on the X-Haunter, she knew that to save Rainbow Dash and Derpy she would have to go deeper into the mansion and fight off the horror's that lurk in it. Twilight knew she had to do this. She had to, no she will save her friends.Twilight equipped the X-haunter and ventured back into the dark hall, outside the wind had picked up and distant thunder could be heard. Twilight tried the strange door once more, hoping that it would let her pass. Nope, once more Twilight ended up back at the front of the hall, sighing in defeat, Twilight decided to walk up the left staircase and found herself in front of another door, similar to the one she just opened, though it was missing the round indentation. Slowly, Twilight opened the door to thankfully see a different room and walked in. The room was a slightly big room with white sheets covering the furniture and a set of drawers with a lamp on top of it. Twilight turned the lamp on, only for nothing to happen. "M-maybe the power's out" Twilight said, a hint of fear in her voice, Twilight shook off the fear, she bad to be brave to save her friends. Twilight took a closer look at the room and spotted a small door on the top right of the room, Twilight was about to open it when she remembered the drawers and decided to look through them for anything helpful. Most of the drawers were empty except for one which contained a note with hastily scrawled words on it. "Beware of the dark. They lurk in the darkness waiting to att-" the rest of the note was illegible due to some dark substance covered the last of the words. Twilight levitated the note into her saddlebag and walked to the door, something behind Twilight fell causing her to spin around and see a tall ghost moving closer to Twilight. Thinking quickly, Twilight pointed her flashlight at the ghost, causing it to be stunned, Twilight levitated the nozzle of the X-Haunter at the spectre and pushed the button, causing the ghost to be trapped in the suction of the X-Haunter. Though, that doesn't mean the ghost wouldn't try to escape as Twilight soon found out when he was being dragged across the room as the ghost franticly tried to free itself, Twilight put her hoofves infront of her trying to slow down the ghost enough that she'd be able to fight back. sadly it didb't work as the ghost flew through a chair causing Twilight to slam into it and the X-Haunter to release its hold of the ghost. For a moment the world became slow and blurry for Twilight as she lay on a toppled chair, slightly dazed from the impact, and unaware of the ghost that was now floating closer to her, by the time she saw it, it was too lazed as the ghost grabbed her by neck and threw her into a table at the other end of the room, causing it to break in half, and causing an audible grunt to escape from Twilight. Even though this time Twilight wasn't stunned she couldn't do anything as the ghost blocked her path to the flash light which she dropped when she impacted against the chair, all seemed lost for her, until a surge of electricity caused by a thunderbolt, turned on the lamp, if only for a moment which was long enough for Twilight to grab the X-Haunter and turn it on, this time though the ghost was weakened from the last time and was too weak to fight back and inevitably ended up inside the machine. Suddenly, the lights in the room turned on, showing the dust-caked room in full detail and showing Twilight the damage the ghost had done to her, a few light cuts covered Twilights back from being thrown at the table, though nothing major. If Twilight had the energy she'd jump from excitement as she was now one small step closer to rescuing her friends, but all of the adrenaline that was pumping through her body during the fight now ebbed away, only now Twilight felt fatigued from the fight and dropped to the ground and drifted into unconsciousness... [Author's note: This chapter took to long to write than needed, sorry.]
The KeyThe Key Twilight awoke an hour later, dull pain ebbed throughout her body, the previous encounter had taken its toll on her, though despite the pain, Twilight got up, with an audible grunt and walked towards the door, levitating the flash light over to her, Twilight turned it on, ready for another attack. Twilight opened the door, to reveal a room covered in darkness, though for some reason this room seemed unnaturally dark to her, though Twilight just shrugged the feeling off and walked into the room. Twilight pointed the flash light at the walls, looking for another door until she had found a small wooden door at the far end of the room, Twilight ran to the door, not wanting to fight another ghost, though each step she took seemed to make the room stretch, causing the wall with the door to get farther and farther away from her. Twilight broke into a full gallop, but soon ran out of breath and stopped to catch her breath, looking up, Twilight saw that the room was now back to its normal length. Though, as soon as she stepped forward her hoof fell through the floor, causing most of the floor to fall down into an endless pit, leaving twilight trapped on a small patch of carpet that hadn't collapsed, at least for now. "This can't be possible, this room must be playing tricks on me!" Twilight said as she lowered one of her hooves into the black void, and found out there was still a floor there, though, invisible. Slowly and cautiously, Twilight eventually made it to the end of the room and opened the door to reveal a square room, much like the room where she captured the ghost. Twilight shuddered as she remembered the encounter as if it had only happened a moment ago, she soon snapped back into reality as she felt the room get colder, she wasn't alone in the room any more. Twilight looked in every direction, trying to find the ghost, after a few minutes of franticly looking, Twilight dropped her guard and looked around the room. Clothes and hats littered the floor, three wardrobes and a cracked mirror were the only furniture, and yet another door at the opposite side of the room. Though, fresh, cold air emanated from it, Twilight rushed to the door and opened it and saw it led to a stone balcony that overlooked a graveyard. Twilight looked down and saw that it was a good distance to the ground which ruled out jumping down from there. Sighing in defeat, Twilight walked back into the other room to search for anything that would help her get deeper into the mansion. The first wardrobe was completely empty, save for a top hat and a white shirt, the second had an old key that had a few cobwebs on it, and an old camera, Twilight levitated the key into her saddlebag but kept the camera out to inspect it. Though before she could a magenta coloured ghost broke through the last wardrobe, sending pieces of wood flying across the room. Before Twilight got a chance to react the ghost charged into her, causing the camera Twilight was holding to drop onto the ground, along with her flash light. The force of the ghost slamming into her had caused Twilight to impact against the opposite wall and cause some cracks to appear on it, the ghost backed off a bit to prepare for another charge, though Twilight was slightly dazed, she managed to roll to the right, narrowly avoiding the ghost which disappeared into the wall. Twilight quickly stood up and grabbed the flash light and readied herself just in time as the ghost reappeared through the wall it had went through, Twilight pointed the flash light directly at the ghost. The light coming from the flash light dulled until it went out, the ghost was closing the distance between them, Twilight franticly thought of how to get out of this situation, suddenly an idea popped into her mind. Twilight grabbed the camera and rolled forward, the ghost just skimming over her back causing her to shiver from the coldness, turned round and took a picture of the ghost, the flash of light stunning the ghost, though before Twilight could use the X-Haunter her vision blurred, a vortex of blue surrounding her for a few moments until it vanished. Twilight looked at her new surroundings, she was back in the Entrance Hall, though safe, Twilight knew the ghost might find her so she quickly galloped into the safe room. Back in the safety of the light Twilight took the time to see what had happened to the flash light, and found out that the batteries were dead, Twilight searched the room and found two fully charged batteries and put them in the flash light, though fully charged they wouldn't last very long so Twilight added finding batteries on her list of to-do things in her mind. Light filled some of the Entrance Hall as Twilight walked out of the safety of the lit room and into the unnatural darkness and walked up one of the dual staircases, each step causing it to creak and echo throughout the hall until she was met with the same double doors she had entered not long ago, although this time Twilight turned to the right and walked up to a small single door that had cobwebs on it. Twilight tried opening the door, locked, Twilight levitated the key out of her saddlebag and put it in the keyhole and slowly turned it until she was met with the satisfying *click* of the door unlocking and opened the door. Unlike the other doors this one led to a narrow hallway with 3 doors on both sides of the walls and a dusty old portrait of a sad looking pony on the far end of the hallway. Twilight tried the first door to her left, locked, then the one to her right, locked as well, the next door was boarded up so no luck trying it. Twilight turned to the next door and noticed out of all the doors in the hallway this one did not have a door mat, Twilight tried opening the door only for the door to open and slam her into the wall and cause a crack to appear. The force of the impact caused Twilight to be stunned for a minute until her vision cleared and the pain to fade away, it was only now that Twilight noticed that the door led to a wall and she swore she heard a ghostly voice laughing in the distance. Twilight stood at the far end of the hallway, she had tried all the other 5 doors to find out they were either locked or a trap, Twilight held her breath hoping this door would be unlocked. She slowly turned the door knob with her basic magic until she was met with the sound of the door creaking open and let out a sigh of relief and entered the room... [Author's Note: Don't expect another chapter soon as I am way to lazy and that I have no motivation to write this. :l]
Portrait Ghost Encounters!Portrait Ghost Encounters! AKA "I couldn't think of a better title" The room Twilight entered was unlike any other room, it was a small room with bookcases that held books that were coated in thick layers of dust. In between the bookcases was a lit fireplace that covered the room in a dull orange glow and made the room considerable warmer than the others. In one corner of the room Twilight spotted a desk in one of the corners with an open book on it and several books, each of their covers faded, stacked up on one side of the desk. Twilight walked up to the desk to inspect the open book, though she found it's faded, yellow pages were blank, though she could detect traces of a spell on it, and took it to study it later. Suddenly the silence in the room was broken by a creak coming from somewhere behind Twilight, causing her heart to stop for a moment in fear. Slowly she turned around to find an empty rocking chair slowly moving back and forth, Twilight having reassured herself that it was probably just the air coming in from when she opened the door and when the rocking chair stopped moving, turned back to the desk and gazed at the stack of books and levitated a green one over and looked at it. The book was bound in green leather with golden words on one side, though they were faded and illegible - suddenly another creak broke the silence of the room causing Twilight to go back into defensive mode and instantly turn around, ready to fight. Nothing was there, nothing except for the rocking chair moving back and forth, though sightly faster than before. In the distance Twilight could hear a low howling noise that seems to come from in the hallway, so Twilight cautiously moved to the door and put her ear to it. It was definitely coming from the hallway. Slowly, she turned the door knob with her magic until she was met with a satisfying *click* and opened the door, causing it to creak, and poked her head out into the cold, dark hallway. Everything seemed to be as normal as everything else was in the mansion. Cold, dark, and lifeless. Twilight started to think about what could have caused that noise but she soon found out what it was, the door that lead back into the entrance hall burst open, pieces of paper and large amounts of dust pouring in, all unlocked doors being blown open due to the strange, powerful gust of air and eventually the air slammed into Twilight causing her to fall onto her back. When Twilight got back up she noticed that the door was now closed and the room she was in was in total darkness and the floor was littered with paper and books that had been blown off because of the strong wind. What Twilight failed to notice was an eerie blue mist coming from the rocking chair, by the time she noticed, the entire floor was covered in the mist, a blue light enveloped the rocking chair, dull at first but slowly became brighter and brighter until Twilight had to shield her eyes with one of her hooves. The bright light slowly dulled and eventually Twilight was able to remove her hoof and was able to see another ghost which was currently sat in the rocking chair, slowly rocking back and forth and reading a book. Though this ghost was unlike any of the other ghosts Twilight had encountered so far, it looked to be a ghost of a stallion who wore an old cap and vest, thankfully Rarity wasn't here to see this or else she would have fainted at the sight of the fashion disas- "My friends!" Twilight suddenly realised that she had told her friends to meet up at the mansion, and she was sure it was well past 9PM and they were nowhere to be found "M-maybe they couldn't get into the mansion a-and they gave up and are now sleeping in their homes." Twilight almost reassured herself when a scream echo'd throughout the mansion that sounded like Rarity which caused her pupils to shrink to pinpricks and caused the blood in her veins to turn cold. Twilight rushed to the door but soon found out that the door had locked itself, trapping her in a room with the strange ghost which appeared to be more interested in reading his book than fighting. Twilight had no time to formulate a plan, she had to get out of this room and save her friends from untold horrors that lurked in the mansion. Twilight faced the ghost that was still sitting in the rocking chair and shined her flash light at him only to find that he dissipated before the light could hit him and reappeared when she took the light off of the rocking chair. Before Twilight could do anything else, a book slammed into her side causing her to momentarily lose balance but managed to regain balance quick enough to stop her from falling and then turned to the book cases to see several books had appeared on the shelves and were violently shaking, until one launched itself at her, Twilight ducked and narrowly avoided being hit. Suddenly Twilight heard a yawn coming from the ghost in the rocking chair and turned around to face the ghost who was stretching his hooves and shined the flash light at him once more. 'Ding'. Twilight instantly levitated the nozzle of the X-Haunter over and pushed the button causing it to trap the ghost in it's suction, though this ghost was much more powerful than the other ghosts and before Twilight knew it she had been dragged along the floor and slammed, head first, into a bookcase causing her to let go of the nozzle and let the ghost escape. Twilight slowly got up, her vision slightly blurred causing her to almost walk into the desk before her vision fully cleared and she was able to see the ghost once again sitting on the rocking chair and reading a book as if nothing ever happened. Due to the blow to her head she was barely able to register the bookshelves shaking and narrowly avoided getting hit by a copy of Starswirl The Bearded's teleportation theories, though due to the books trajectory it ended up hitting the ghost in the head, dazing him. Now was her probably only chance to capture this ghost *click* the ghost ended up once more caught in the X-Haunters suction, the blow to his head weakening him enough that Twilight was barely able to hold her ground, the helpless ghost's frantic movements to escape becoming slower and more fatigued as it got closer and closer to the nozzle of the the X-Haunter. Several moments passed that felt like hours to Twilight as she put all of her strength into capturing the ghost, her eyes closed as she concentrated until the tug from the ghost disappeared. Twilight opened her eyes and saw that the room was now fully light, the bookshelves instantly ceased their shaking and the warm slowly returned to the room. A glint of gold from the corner of Twilight's eye caught her attention, she slowly walked, her hooves shaking from the adrenaline slowly fading from her body, to the rocking chair and pulled out a small key, but before she headed back out into the dark hallway, Twilight decided to rest for a few moments to catch her breath. Eventually Twilight made her way back into the hallway and looked at the key once more to find a 3 engraved on it and decided to search for the room it belonged to. After a few moments Twilight was able to find the right room, right at the very back of the hallway and unlocked the door to reveal a large bedroom that had a large fancy bed with two small tables at either side and a desk with a dressing mirror on top. Right next to the mirror were large curtains that were closed, a few slivers of moonlight shining through a few gaps, deciding to light the room up more to make searching for the next key easier, Twilight opened the curtains causing a large draft to blow into the room due to part of the window being shattered. It was only then Twilight knew she wasn't alone, as she caught a glimpse of a female ghost with a tan coat and a blond mane sit up from the stool at the dressing mirror, walk up to the curtains and close them, then went back to brushing her mane. Twilight's first reaction was to take out the flash light and shine it at the ghost, but again she found it ineffective and turned it off to save the battery. Suddenly an idea struck her, the answer to capturing the ghost was right in front of her eyes and within a second Twilight drew back the curtains thanks to her limited magic. The wind coming from the broken window irritated the ghost causing it to get up once again to close the curtain but before it could Twilight switched the flash light on and stunned the ghost, then she pointed the nozzle at the ghost and switched it on, the ghost now no longer stunned, began franticly flying around the room. Unlike the other ghost this one was marginally weaker, but still had more than enough strength to cause Twilight to be pulled all over the room, thankfully though she managed to not collide with the bed, but her luck ran out when she slammed into the dresser. Unlike last time this ghost didn't return to what it was doing before, instead it charged right at her, missing her by an inch. Twilight quickly got back up again just to be slammed into by the ghost and land on the bed, the ghost just about to charge again when suddenly a flash of lightning lit up the room bright enough to stun the ghost. Twilight took advantage of this and used to X-Haunter, the ghost much weaker from the fight couldn't escape and ended up inside the machine. The lights in the room flickered, then turned on, showing some details in the room that couldn't be seen in the darkness, a smashed, empty picture frame lay in a corner of the room with a few shards of glass laying around it, an old key taped to the dresser mirror and a few bloodstains on the carpet. upon closer inspection it turned out to be Twilight's as she just now noticed a small gash on her side from when the ghost charged at her. "I'll need to find some bandages to cover it up" Twilight said to herself. Using her magic Twilight took the key and levitated it into her saddle bag and once again entered the darkness of the hallway. "It can't get any worse than this, can it?" Twilight randomly thought. ...How wrong she was. [Author note: Hopefully will get another chapter out sooner than this, so have a terrible cliffhanger.]
Chapter 1 Rainbow Dash is Missing!Haunting in Ponyville Chapter 1 Rainbow Dash is Missing! Time:??? Location ??? Twilight slowly drifted back to consciousness, her whole body was numb, her vision blurry and her head pounding. Her vision was just able to make out that she is being dragged somewhere, the cold, damp stone floor and walls must mean she is somewhere in the basement. Twilight tried to move, only to find out that she was too exhausted and drowsy to move. Twilight felt herself drifting back into unconsciousness, a blinding light the last thing to enter her vision as she blacked out once more. *** Time: 2:34 pm Location: Sweet Apple Acres Twilight walked up a lone dirt path that led up to Sweet Apple Acres after being told by Spike that Applejack came by while she was in a deep sleep, caused by her late night reading of Ancient Magics by Starswirl the Bearded. Spike had told her that Applejack had to talk to her about something urgent concerning Rainbow Dash and that she’d wait for her at Sweet Apple Acres. In the distance Twilight could see a massive red barn and a smaller home meaning she was only a few minute walk to her friend’s house. The sky was a beautiful cyan with not a single cloud to obstruct the view due to the local mail mare, Derpy Hooves delivering the wrong weather report instead of delivering it to Manehatten which is now having a mild thunderstorm. The air was filled with the strong scent of apples, birds could be heard chirping in the distance as Twilight passed the Apple tree’s that littered the landscape to the right of her. Before she knew it she was at the front door to the Apple family home, using her magic she knocked on the door with her left hoof three times. The door opened a few moments later to reveal Applejack “Hello Applejack, so what’s this urgent thing you needed to talk to me about?” Twilight said with a concerned look on her face. “Howdy Twi, it’s bout Rainbow ah think she mighta gone missin'!” “What! What would make you suspect she’s went missing?” “Well we were supposed to have a race two hours ago and I'm might sure its unlike Rainbow to miss a race!” "Okay, do you have any idea where she might have gone?" Twilight said, noticeably worried for her cyan friend. "Well last ah saw of her she flew to that there mansion." Applejack said while pointing her hoof to a distant mansion in the Everfree Forest which had popped up one week ago. Though its sudden appearance was strange the ponies in Ponyville shrugged it off as another crazy thing that happens in the Everfree. "Alright then, you go round up the girls and we'll meet up there at 9pm." Twilight said as she trotted away to get some supplies for the trip. *** FLASHBACK Rainbow Dash was napping on a lone cumulus cloud on a warm, summer afternoon, blissfully unaware that the cloud had drifted from Apple Acres to the edge of the everfree forest. Rainbow was enjoying a dream about her becoming a Wonderbolt, that was until an earthquake made her wake up, sitting upright Rainbow Dash scanned the area for the source of the disturbance to find herself staring at a strange mansion that she swore she had never seen before. Curiously, Rainbow Dash spread her wings and took off to investigate the mansion that looked as if it had been there for a hundred years. Because of her speed it only took a few moments until she was landing in front of the mansion, with her hooves firmly planted on the warm ground Rainbow tucked her wings back to her sides. Rainbow Dash knocked on one of the two large, aged oak doors and stepped back as the right door opened a bit to reveal darkness. Opening the door wider, Rainbow walked inside and shivered as she felt the temperature plummet. The door slammed shut, sealing Rainbow Dash inside the mansion. A muffled scream could be heard a few moments later, sadly too quiet for anypony in Ponyville to hear her cry for help as they got along with their business, that is everpony except for a pegasus who had herd Rainbow's muffled screams... End of Flashback *** Time:5:23pm Location: Ponyville Library Twilight walked up to her home, which was also used as the town's local library, and opened the door using her magic. The air was cold and the room was dark which reminded her that her number one assistant, Spike had left a few hours ago because of some important business in Canterlot. Using her magic she lit the fireplace and some candles that were placed around the room. Twilight walked into the kitchen to prepare her dinner, The crackling of the fire in the fireplace could be heard. Sometime later, Twilight woke up beside the fireplace, a few glowing embers all that remain of the fire. Twilight figured that she fell asleep while reading Ancient Magic's Volume two and eating the last of her daffodil sandwich, looking up to a clock that was above the fireplace, she saw it was only 8 o'clock which meant she had an hour to get to the mansion and if she started walking now she'd have ten minutes to spare. While getting up Twilight levitated a scarf and a coat to her, even through it was summer the nights still got pretty cold. The door to Twilights home opened as she walked out, remembering to blow out the few candles that were lit. Twilight trotted down a lone dirt path that led out to the everfree forest. Most of the walk was uneventful but as she got closer to the mansion the once light fog around her got thicker and thicker. Soon she walked up to a rusted iron gate to the left and right of it was a tall iron fence with spikes on top of each pole, using her magic Twilight pushed the gate, each inch it moved causing it to creek until it suddenly snapped off it's hinges, startling Twilight. Looking around to see if anypony had noticed, Twilight continued down the dirt path which now had root jutting out of it and the occasional stone, it was not long until she finally reached her destination, the mansion! [Author Note: Well that's chapter 1 done, only 30 more or so (depending on how long I want this) chapters to go! Again, please give me some feedback as to anything I may have done wrong especially because I still need pre-readers! If you want to be a pre-reader send a message my way! Also chapter is up later than expected due to me constantly getting 502 gateway errors.]
