The tunnel felt cramped and it looked as if it went on forever.
The light spell Twilight was using was slowly burning through her mana, and Rarity had been complaining about a headache as well, the Unicorn's light flickering from time to time as she lost the will to keep it up.
"Are we there yet?" came the whine from the subject of Twilight's thoughts, and she shrugged in return.
"I don't know, Rarity. Are we close, Pinkie Pie?" the Alicorn asked, and Pinkie happily replied.
"Almost there!"
"How close is almost?" Twilight wondered, but then Pinkie suddenly disappeared from sight and Twilight stopped moving at the edge of a drop down into a water well.
Rarity and Fluttershy came to a stop behind her, making some surprised noises, and Twilight peered down into the darkness to see where Pinkie went.
A splash was the first sign she got of Pinkie still being there, and then the sound of a pony splashing about and spitting out water.
"Are you ok there, Pinkie Pie?" Twilight asked, focusing on a similar, but slightly different, spell as she did.
Her horn sparked brighter for a moment, then a ball of light detached from its tip and floated lazily ahead of her through the large room. She sent some beams of magic into it to make it grow brighter and larger until she could see the entirety of the cylindrical room, including the splashing pink pony some twenty feet below.
"Whoo! What a drop! The water's fine! You should come join me!" Pinkie exclaimed, turning over on her back and treading water as if the place was a swimming pool made for her to use.
Twilight shook her head and looked up at the roof of the basin. It was a good thirty feet up, which would mean a mere ten feet of water was still remaining in the basin. A door and small flight of stairs was located near the top of it, but it would not be accessible unless the place filled up with...
"Eep!" Rarity exclaimed!
"What's it now, Rarity?" Twilight asked, but she quickly felt it as well as water started to flow past her hooves from behind, pouring into the basin Pinkie was swimming in.
"Seriously, guys, you should come and have a swim," Pinkie suggested again, and Twilight smirked at that.
There was something to be said about Pinkie's madness. She didn't always seem to have a full head of brains, but in the end always came through.
"Girls, you have to trust me and jump," Twilight spoke for Fluttershy and Rarity's sake, then took the plunge herself, using her wings to slow her descent until she hit the water.
She looked up to see Fluttershy preventing Rarity from jumping herself, but then meeped as a large flow of water didn't give her friends much of a chance to protest; they shot out of the tunnel like bullets from a gun!
If it wasn't for Fluttershy quickly spreading her wings, and Rarity clinging to her Pegasus friend for dear life, they would have impacted against the wall opposite the tunnel's entrance!
Instead they stopped going forward about halfway into the place and then plummeted down into the pool which was starting to rise up quickly.
Twilight eyed the staircase overhead and swam around until she was just shy of directly underneath it, calling for her friends to join her as the water level continued to rise faster.
It didn't take long for the tunnel entrance to be fully submerged, and all but Pinkie were anxiously looking up at the doorway which would be their only escape from drowning if the water didn't stop rising at some point.
The moment her forehooves managed to grab hold of the staircase, Twilight used her wings to get her a quick boost and then galloped up to the door, pushing her shoulder up against it. It was locked.
"Gah! Of course it would be!" she chided herself, focusing once again on her magic and blowing the lock apart in one fell burst of energy.
The door opened outward and she rushed through it, keeping it open for her friends. "Quick!"
Rarity, Fluttershy, and then a bouncing Pinkie quickly made it through before Twilight closed the door to keep the water out. Just in time as well; it just wouldn't stop filling the basin!
Another blast of magic and the door was magically sealed, Twilight sinking down through her hooves beside it. All the magic she expended had made her so incredibly tired...
"Who wants a cupcake?" Pinkie wondered, and spread some cupcakes around the group of wet ponies.
"Pinkie, dear, where in Equestria have you been hiding these?" Rarity voiced the question Twilight was too tired to ask, and the Alicorn decided to just nibble on the cupcake in front of her.
"In my saddlebags of course," came the merry reply, followed by the sound of Pinkie stuffing her face with confectionery.
"But you're not wearing any..." Rarity sighed out in frustration.
"She's not?" Fluttershy wondered, eliciting another sigh from the Unicorn.
"Do you see any on her? We're all wearing saddlebags, and... OH!"
Twilight grimaced as the sound of Rarity tearing through her saddlebags to see whether anything in them got wet, and letting out varied expressions of excitement and distress at her findings, filled the room.
"Oh, Rarity. That's such a nice scarf," Fluttershy commented after an excited outcry, and the two babbled some over it and their cupcakes.
Pinkie Pie sat down in front of Twilight and stared down at her. "Told you the dancing frogs would get us."
Twilight nodded as she didn't know what else to do, trying to savor the taste of her cupcake.
"We're safe here. You should go sleep," Pinkie entrusted to her, then fell over on her side and promptly started to snore.
"I don't even want to know how you know, Pinkie," Twilight muttered, closing her own eyes for just a brief moment.
A yawn was heard to her side, either Rarity or Fluttershy, but Twilight really couldn't care less. She was just too tired.
"Let's have a quick nap then, girls... and then... er... something... tomorrow..." the Alicorn mumbled before blacking out.
A speck of light illuminated the darkness of the small room they were in as a Unicorn filly's head poked through a wall into it.
The young ghost's eyes looked the four over for a moment, but then she retreated into the room on the other side of the wall and started to pace nervously around a collection of bones.
"What if they don't come here to play? The Gloom will find me. I can't let it find them!"
She returned to the wall and stuck her head through it again, but jumped from fright as Pinkie's face was staring at her from only inches away!
"Ssh," Pinkie offered, putting a hoof to her own muzzle.
The ghost carefully moved back down, gravity not having as much a hold on her as it would the four in the room, and looked at the three sleeping mares before returning her attention to the pink one.
"I know a little game," Pinkie offered, and the ghost's ears immediately perked up.
"A game?"
Pinkie nodded and held up two crude drawings of an orange Earthpony and a blue Pegasus in her right hoof, and a smaller drawing of an orange Pegasus in her left. "We need to find these ponies. Can you help us?"
The ghost filly nodded slowly, pointing at the drawing of the orange Earthpony. "I saw her. She was nice. But The Gloom found me before she joined my parents."
Pinkie nodded and produced a popsicle out of nowhere. This wasn't a normal popsicle however, it was glowing with blue light and the little ghost filly could look right through it!
"Thanks! Have a popsicle!" Pinkie grinned, handing the treat over and bouncing back to her friends to lay down and get some sleep.
The little filly stared at her a moment, then at the popsicle she now held in her hoof, and tentatively licked at it.
One lick was all it took for her to close her mouth around it and pull back to the other room, her happy squeal barely dampened by the brickwork.
Pinkie smiled brightly at hearing it, and closed her eyes to get some sleep. Tomorrow would be a busy day.