It was a dark and stormy night, and Rainbow Dash couldn't seem to stop bragging about it
"Even I didn't expect it to rain this hard when I pulled in the clouds; I guess the fronts hit each other juuuuust right. This is pretty much ideal, plenty of rain, an overcast day or two to let it soak in, then clear Spring skies. It's going to be beautiful." The weather pegasus put her forelegs behind her head, looking quite pleased with herself as she hovered effortlessly, drifting around the library.
Applejack sighed in exasperation, "We know, sugarcube. Ya told us earlier. An' then ya told us again. And again. Seems like you've told us about twenty times now, and I'm getting sick of it. No more weather. Ain't no other pegasi here, so you're just borin' us with shop talk."
For her part, Twilight Sparkle was just glad that this sleepover was going better than her last one; Applejack and Rainbow Dash got along well, despite their competitive natures. She was a bit disappointed by her other friends' absence, but she understood. Rarity's show was a big opportunity for her, Fluttershy's wounded animal friends were more important than a little gathering, and though Twilight hadn't understood Pinkie Pie's excuse in the least, she knew that the pink party animal wouldn't miss a gathering without a good reason. Spike, predictably, had volunteered to accompany Rarity.
Dash spoke again, harsh but not hostile, "Oh yeah? So what should we talk about? Got any suggestions, groundbound?"
The Earth pony seemed to struggle to find an answer. Twilight Sparkle had more or less let the other two decide the course of the night after the two of them had outvoted her on the beauty treatment issue, but now she knew exactly what it was time for. A glance at her newly acquired grandfather clock confirmed that it was just half an hour till midnight. The unicorn smiled to herself; it was a perfect time for the next phase of the sleepover. She spoke up before Applejack had a chance to respond to Dash's challenge. "Actually," the unicorn said, "I have an idea. It's dark, rainy, spooky. Perfect for scary stories." Twilight's horn glowed, and she magically extinguished all the other lights. Rainbow Dash landed, and she and Applejack glanced at each other, grinning, before Twilight's horn also went dark.
Dash's rough voice hissed from the darkness, "I like the way you think, egghead. I'll go first." The three settled into their pillows as she began her tale.
The pegasus was clearly not an experienced storyteller, and seemed to have confused 'scary' with 'violent'. Still, her throaty voice was well-suited to her almost lovingly detailed descriptions of decapitations and disembowelments, and by the time she ended her story, Twilight Sparkle was, if not scared, at least deeply disturbed.
Applejack, on the other hand, seemed to do quite well now that she wasn't trying to insult Rarity with her ghost stories. Her narrative voice, honed by countless tales told around a campfire, was perfect for spooky tales of the supernatural. While Dash's tale had been as brash as the pegasus herself, Applejack showed an uncharacteristic subtlety. The tension built and, to Twilight's delight, the unicorn found that she was quite delightfully terrified by the tale. She was almost sad when Applejack leaned forward, ending with a low, conspiratorial whisper, "...an' some ponies say that on dark, stormy nights, ya can hear the screams of the three young mares, still desperately tryin' to escape."
The mare's timing was impeccable; as soon as she finished, the clock struck midnight. A deep, resonant tone counted up the hour, and Twilight counted with it. One. The three ponies all but held their breath as they listened to the notes. Five. The only other sound was the dull patter of rain on the leaves of the library. Nine. Twilight felt a shiver run up her spine as a dread without object overtook her. Twelve.
As soon as the clock's last chime faded from the air, a discordant, metallic boom echoed through the library.
Thirteen.
Twilight Sparkle leapt to her hooves in panic. "What was that?" she asked, voice a frantic whisper.
"Ah don't know," Applejack said, matching her friend's tone, "but it sounds like it came from the basement. We... we oughta check." She didn't seem pleased by the prospect.
Twilight lit her horn, casting a dim illumination over the library, and led her friends to the basement entrance. The unicorn gave the door a magical push, and it swung open slowly, creaking loudly on unoiled hinges. The noise seemed deafening after the relative silence. The three ponies passed cautiously through the entryway, pausing at the top of the stairwell to the basement proper. Only the first few steps were visible in the dim light, and the way down seemed to disappear into a great black void. The sound of rain was muffled here, and the silence hung heavy in the air.
Twilight started down. The stairs squeaked and groaned, old wood shifting under the weight of the three ponies. The unicorn's horn created an island of visibility adrift in the dark room; the ponies knew that they were only a few yards above the basement floor, but to their perception, the gaps to either side seemed like yawning chasms, bottomless and forbidding. Twilight sighed in relief once her purple glow revealed the last step and the basement floor.
She trotted over to her workbench, and lit an old kerosene lantern with a spark from her horn. It was low on fuel, and the illumination it provided came and went as the flame guttered, but the harsh firelight was better than just her horn, though only barely. The basement was revealed to the three ponies. Twilight's scientific equipment dominated the room, still and silent, covered with dark displays and unlit indicators. A few other workbenches lined the walls; one of the previous occupants had apparently been a sculptor, but magic rendered hammers and chisels useless to Twilight Sparkle. Dozens of the tools hung, lined up carefully by size and gauge, rusting away, forgotten. The few bookshelves kept in the basement held works not suited to a modern audience: old correspondence and journals left to the library in the wills of the deceased, a few tomes in languages unrecognizable, and books of magic that would be dangerous if accessible to the general public. Twilight had tried to catalog the shelves when she'd taken ownership of the library, but she had never finished. Each item she'd examined had felt more and more wrong to the unicorn, as though the books themselves had objected to her scrutiny. Now, the dusty shelves seemed to shift with mirth in the dancing lamplight, mocking Twilight's failure.
The unicorn spoke uneasily, "Nothing looks like it's fallen. Do either of you see anything?"
Rainbow Dash spoke up from near the stairs, "Maybe it was this? Something hitting this door?" The other two ponies made their way to where Dash stood, and the pegasus pointed behind the stairwell. A metal door loomed, black cast iron visible in a few spots not covered by a dingy coat of blood red rust. Most ponies had little use for latches and locks, but this had both, in the form of a very detailed pony head. The lower jaw hung open, and Rainbow Dash poked it with a hoof; the jaw moved, ancient mechanisms squeaking. The door was clearly intended to open when the pony's mouth closed, but it was locked.
The keyhole was right between the cast-iron pony's eyes.
"Uh, what's on the other side of this here door, sugar cube?" Applejack murmured, her voice barely above a whisper.
"I don't know," Twilight replied, "It was locked when I moved in. I figured I'd check it out when I found the key." She paused.
"And?" The Earth pony asked.
"And I never found the key." The three ponies stared at the door for a moment. The door shook as another boom echoed through the library, and the ponies shied away in fright; something had clearly struck the metal from the other side. Twice more booms rang out, rattling the portal and breaking flakes of rust off of its surface. Eyes wide, Twilight found that she couldn't break her gaze from the door.
Only Rainbow Dash had the courage to speak. "W-who's there?" the pegasus called out weakly. She was met with silence for a few seconds, then, ominously the latch began to rattle, the cast iron pony's jaw working up and down. "Somepony's trying to get in," Dash observed.
"Well, it's locked." Applejack stated.
"Girls," Twilight Sparkle whispered, a hint of panic creeping into her voice, "A pony would be able to open the door. It's locked from the other side." The the other two ponies shot her a panicked glance as the rattling of the door's mechanisms got louder and faster, more urgent. Finally, it stopped and the stylized latch fell back to rest, mouth open. In the dim, flickering light, the cast iron pony looked like it was trying to scream.
The metallic banging began again at a frenzied pace, and the door started to dent outward from the force of the blows. The three mares wailed in terror and rushed up the stairs. Twilight's horn glowed as she toppled a bookshelf over, blocking the door in an attempt to delay the progress of... whatever it was.
As soon as the trio returned to the ground floor, Twilight Sparkle began to shiver. The air was icy cold, and her hornlight barely lit a fraction of the room, leaving the rest in ominous shadow. Applejack was the quickest, and made it to the door first. The Earth pony struggled to open the door, grunting in frustration. "It won't open," she called out, "I'm gonna try to buck it down!" The Earth pony turned and wound up for a mighty kick, but when her bare hooves struck the wooden door, they produced naught but a metallic crash. The wood wasn't even scratched. Applejack's jaw dropped. "It felt like metal," she said, "It sounded like the door down there...."
Twilight could only look at her friend in horror, but Dash seemed to get angrier at the Earth pony's news. "I'll get you both out if I have to carry you out. I'm going to break a window." The pegasus said. She flew out of the range of Twilight's light. From the crashes and thumps, the unicorn knew that Dash was trying her best, but after a few seconds, the pegasus growled in frustration and called out from the darkness above, "The windows are frosted over, they should be brittle, but for some reason I can't break them!"
A tremendous crash sounded from downstairs, the bangs of metal and thumps of books cacophonous to the unicorn's ears. Something had broken the door down. "So," Twilight said, turning to face the open basement door, "We're trapped." She could hear the creaks of the stairs as something made its way up toward the ponies, and the flickering lamplight cast a formless shadow on the landing. Seconds ticked by, and Twilight held her breath as she waited for the creature to come into view.
The lights went out. Twilight couldn't even see her own glowing horn. She gasped, futilely turning her head, hoping that some hint of illumination could be found in the inky darkness of the library. There was none. The sudden silence was deafening.
The familiar sound of a book hitting the floor shocked Twilight. The noise repeated, and all too soon the unicorn could hear a downpour of books all around her. Something knocked her from her hooves, and she fell hard.
Twilight found that she could see; her hornlight illuminated a small circle around her, but the walls and bookshelves of the library were nowhere to be found. More startlingly, Applejack and Rainbow Dash had also disappeared. The unicorn took stock of her surroundings. She seemed to be standing on books. The tomes made a regular, level surface as far as her light revealed.
Something pressed upward against her hoof, and she raised it quickly by reflex. She looked down, and found that something had raised the books under her. Cautiously, she kicked away a book leaning against the object, morbidly curious about the aparition.
The cast iron pony latch stared up at her.
Twilight ran, as fast as she could. A part of her mind wondered how the door had followed her upstairs, how all this could be happening, where the walls had gone. The rest just seemed to want her to go faster. She looked back, and saw that the door was behind her; it had risen out of the sea of books. Silently, the monolith seemed to glide toward her with no visible means of propulsion. Twilight paled.
The door was gaining on her.
The unicorn faced forward, focusing on speed, and suddenly a familiar wall resolved before her; she dashed into the basement entrance and skidded to a halt on the landing, trying her best not to fall off into the basement below. Behind her, Twilight heard a prodigious crash. Terrified, she forced herself to look.
At first glance, it seemed like the metal door had crashed into the frame of the basement entrance. Then Twilight noticed that the wood door was gone. Not knocked off its hinges, not splintered, just... gone. The monstrous portal had replaced it completely. Cautiously, Twilight moved toward the stairs, but found that they had disappeared, replaced by black emptiness.
She was trapped on the landing. Alone with the door.
A voice whispered, low and seductive, "Come inside Twilight Sparkle. There's nowhere else to go. It's all so easy, just a few steps and it'll all be over..."
"No! I won't! You're not real! You can't hurt me!" Twilight said, voice shaking in mortal terror. The door seemed to loom larger, growing taller by the second.
The voice seemed almost amused as it replied, "Oh, Twilight, Twilight, you wound me. Why would I hurt you? I only have your best interests in mind. I want to take you away from this place. I can give you peace. Peace forever." The voice seemed to come from every direction, and none.
There was a click from the lock. The jaw of the latch closed. The door swung inward, and Twilight gazed into the black void behind it. The opening seemed to breathe, exhaling the stale, dead air of a tomb.
"There's a party on the other side, Twilight Sparkle. All your friends are waiting for you. They can't start without you. Don't you want to join them? Rainbow Dash and Applejack want to keep the slumber party going. Come in, Twilight. Come in."
Twilight took a step forward. Her heart hammered in her chest. Every part of her seemed to scream out, protesting against the possibility of walking through that dread portal, but she had no choice. There was nowhere else to go.
The voice whispered its appoval, "Yes, Twilight. It will all be over soon. You don't have to fear me. You'll never have to fear anything, ever again."
And then Twilight was through. Behind her, the door closed with a bang. Creatures surrounded her; she could hear them breathing in the darkness. Twilight shuddered in terror, resigned to her fate.
"April Foal's!"
The lights came on with a flash. Twilight stared in shock at her friends. Pinkie Pie was bouncing in excitement. Rarity looked extremely pleased with herself. The purple unicorn stammered, "W-what?"
Rainbow Dash laughed, "You should have seen the look on your face! Best April Foal's prank ever!"
"But it's only March thirty-first...." Twilight sparkle said, but then realization struck her; everything had started just after midnight. "How did you? Everything was so... so real."
Rarity chucked uncomfortably, "Well, that was me darling. Maybe I went just a tad overboard, but I was very much in the zone. My illusion magic has been improving by leaps and bounds, you see, and I wanted to make it as convincing as possible. I have your instruction to thank, of course. Sorry I... er... tried so hard. I just wanted to impress you, dear."
Applejack cut in before Twilight could respond, "Rarity was real impressive, sugar cube. She had you levitated the whole time, nearabouts, an' your legs were workin' like a clown at a rodeo."
Twilight couldn't believe what she was hearing, "And the whispers?"
Fluttershy squeaked from the corner, "Sorry, Twilight."
"She came up with the whole idea too," Spike said, "What can I say? The filly knows scary."
Twilight's jaw worked soundlessly. After a few seconds, she was able to manage a few words.
"Confound you ponies."