There's desert for miles, you're traveling, but can't find the way back to town. You stumble upon ruins made of crumbling sandstone bricks. you wonder where you are, you look around, but can't even find your own hoofprints so, you decide to enter.
there you find rooms scattered through the darkness, you've got nothing to lose, so you enter your first room. pitch black, all you can do is feel your way through. you run into a string that startles you, but after regaining your composure, you decide to pull it. It reveals a skylight, and you find the room your in has nine doorways. You pick a random number for the thrill of it, you chose number three, so you enter the third door.
It's dark in there as well, you see a dim light about 100 feet down the room and decide to walk towards it, feeling your way to it. You reach the dim light, it turns out to be a mirror reflecting some image, it's blurry, you try to adjust the mirror, and try to dust it off. You see the entrance of the building reflecting through the mirror, you see a shadowy pony enter. You then get chills and look around, the room is still pitch black. You look back at the mirror and you see your self from behind, but there's another pony standing next to you.
You quickly startle and run past the mirror into the darkness, looking back to see if anything is chasing you, In vein of course. You stop running, to listen for hoofsteps, but hear nothing. So you gather your thoughts, thinking what the image was on the mirror, then you feel a handle right next to you. You decide to pull it, it opens a trapdoor, and you fall 8 feet down. Luckily it wasn't a long fall so the injuries are minor, just a soar hoof. You stumble to your hoofs, feeling around in the new dark room, you feel something wooden. You grab hold and pull. It comes loose and you stumble and fall into some sort of liquid. As you fell the wooden stick scraped the ground hard enough that it spark a flame, the dim light allows you to see the room. You quickly get out of the liquid realizing it was a type of oil, and rejoice at the fact that the flame didn't touch it. You back up and light the oil which was leaking from a wooden barrel. It burns brightly and hurts your eyes, you rub your eyes trying to regain composure. You notice a hole behind where the barrel was, you decide to enter.
It's a small hole, so you crawl. Carrying the wooden torch you have about 5 feet of clear vision. You crawl for about five minutes, starting to regret heading into the ruins in the first place, and then your torch goes out. It was old and didn't have much use left. You keep it with you as a blunt object for protection, just in case. You feel your way to a fork in the tunnel. You can feel some sort of markings in front of each path, one has a more jagged feel, the other smoother. They seem to be in some ancient language, putting two and two together you decide that the jagged marking are bad, and the smooth are good, so you take the right side path with the smooth markings, it has a sort of downward slope.
You crawl forward for another 5 minutes, you can now hear a noise, but can't quite make it out. You keep going, it gets louder and louder, you then realize what it is, but it's too late. You've been swept away by raging water, you're pulled under several times, and in trying to struggle for air you drop your old torch. You then fall 20 feet into what feels like a huge lake, gather your self and swim to the nearest wall. You pause and try to look for light again, you notice a series of small lights far away, you swim towards them.
After a tiring amount of swimming, you reach a small area of land where you saw the faint lights. You notice nine objects, what look like some sort of old artifacts, each with a different symbol. You decide to pick up the third one, going from left to right. A plate underneath drop down, and all the other artifacts fall beneath as well. A stone door opens. In there you can hear what sounds like echoing wind. You enter, and find a set of stairs. You climb them frantically in hopes they will return you to the surface. You reach the end, and you find a huge cave, with several holes near in the ceiling, so there is now plenty of light.
It looks like an oasis under the desert. You see something shiny in the middle, and you head towards it, it's another mirror. You hesitantly adjust it and dust it off until a vision comes into focus. You see an ocean, endless water. You adjust it some more, and find a beach. You the notice a Tsunami hit the beach. You try to adjust the mirror more but those are the only images you can see. not knowing the meaning, you decide to move on.
A few minutes later, you hear a rumble, it's getting louder. You then start to panic and run. You see another stone door about one-hundred feet away, you run towards it. Massive amounts of water start pouring through the holes in the ceiling. You realize what the vision meant, and start running faster. You reach the stone door with a huge wave of water heading towards you. You see another plate with matching markings on your artifact, you quickly set your artifact on it, and the stone door opens. You take it off, and bring it with you, the stone door begins to close again, It closes just in time to only soak your hooves with water.
Realizing how thirsty you were from the desert, you decide to try to drink the water, it's salt water. You realize more about the connection of the vision. You think to yourself if the mirrors are reflecting future, or causing it. The room you entered is lighted only by a dim, orange, ambient light. You notice it's hotter in there than the last room. This makes you thirstier, you press forward. The new room you're in has several intertwining pathways, that all seem to lead in the same direction. You navigate them, successfully to another stone door. This time you find a plate with different marking other than your artifact, you set your artifact on it anyway, but nothing happens. You retrace your steps looking for a key. You look everywhere but find nothing. You return to the stone door, trying to figure out how to get past. While looking at the stone door, you realize there's an artifact stuck into it, it has the same markings as the plate. You manage to pry it out and set it on the plate, the door opens.
To your astonishment, the next room is full of molten magma, you're instantly brought to a sweat. There are narrow paths through the magma, You follow them. The heat becoming unbearable, you start running. You see a third mirror, it's on a platform 50 feet up. You look around and find a ladder on the other side, you climb up. You reach the top in relief from the extreme heat, but nervously you adjust the mirror. Another image comes into focus; You see the oasis room you were in before, this time it's full of water. The vision is moving forward under the water, like it's retracing your steps. It breaks through the door holding back the water. Knowing what's coming you look around and find another stone door, you climb back down and run towards it. You start to notice it's getting harder to breathe. The room your in is filling with hot steam from the water hitting the magma, It's burning your eyes and lungs. You pace yourself, with the artifact in hoof, luckily it matches and the door opens. You quickly take it off the plate and let the door shut behind you.
You turn around and notice the room has three mirrors; The first mirror, shows your reflection, but you appear to be a filly, the second mirror shows your current reflection, you notice how tired you look. The third mirror shows the wall behind you as if you're invisible. You can't seem to figure out what the meaning is behind it. You adjust it, and it then shows you a vision. You see the previous room again, the magma and water have canceled each other out, and it's full of steam. The vision continues to move forward, it reaches the stone door that's behind you. You hear banging, the stone begins to crack, the door falls. You become frozen in fear as you see what was behind it, it was a pony, that looked identical to you. She stares at you. You, still frozen in fear, can't seem to react in anyway. She walks forward, gets in reaching distance of you. She puts out her hoof, and touches you, you lose consciousness.
You awake what feels like days later, but you can't move. You're chained to the wall. There is a mirror in front of you, you look into it and see yourself escaping the ruins. You see yourself find the way out of the desert, and then find your way back home. Your Friends are so happy to see you. They welcome you back and decide to have a big party. You see yourself enjoy food and drink, and spending time with your friends, the vision fades. You notice the regular reflection of the mirror returning. You see yourself bound to the wall, and notice you have no face. You try to feel it anyway possible. You rub your face against your shoulder, but it feels smooth. You realize that it is your actual reflection. You begin to panic again, but don't have much energy left to really do anything. The vision on the mirror fades back into view, you notice yourself with your friends, again.
There appears to be a blue aura around everyone but you, but you're slowly what looks like pulling the blue auras of the your friends to you. You realize that it isn't you in the vision, it's a doppelganger, and she's stealing the life essence of your friends. She then turn her head and looks at you through the mirror. You start shaking, and begin hearing a screeching noise, your vision becomes blurry. You're able to make out the doppelganger raising her hoof. She reaches through the mirror and touches you. You feel her hand pass through your chest like a ghost. You feel her grab your heart, and feel the pressure building up inside your chest. It becomes unbearable. You then feel a sharp pain.
The world becomes black.
THE END
Author's Note
This is a short story my friend wrote over my Skype.
With his permission, I edited it, ponified it, and posted it here.
I do not take credit for writing this, only editing and posting.
