As far as great ideas go, Twilight stumbled across the best one of all - throwing Pinkie Pie a shocking, frightening horror birthday surprise party! But as the six friends walk into the old dilapidated house on the hill, and the moon rises high above them, pranks turn sour and tempers boil, and the six friends find out that perhaps, the best ideas might not be so great after all. As the gang succumb to the dark horrors of the house and fall to machinations of their own design, Equestria gains another sordid legend to tell.
Chapters (8)
This should be interesting... count me in, man.
Six walk in?
But how many will walk out?
Will def read later.
Hrm. Curious.
Sounds promising. I usually read fics after midnight, if I can't sleep after this you have my full attention.
1701256
Maybe in later chapters =) It builds up.
1701222
That's the money-making question right there! I'm taking bets.
1701207
Aww, You know I love you =D Custard Hug!
1701326
Hmm, really now?
Seven...How about two.1701333
Seven you say! SEVEN! How did you know that I was going to put in a slasher pony in a hockey mask in the house that goes around and beats them all with a hockey stick Casey Jones style and... well I guess he's not SLASHER pony anymore then.. but.. Then they all escape and the BASHER PONY FOLLOWS THEM OUT SO THAT MAKES SEVEN HOW DID YOU KNOW THE PLOT YOU CHEAT YOU DA-
I mean... no. But good guess. =D Well, anyone who reads any of my other things would know I have a tendency to sort of hide subtle comments and easter eggs and references all over my works, and I will say that I've already sort of hinted as to how it ends up in the prologue. But we shall see if your guess of two wins you the super grand prize!
I kinda expect for Pinkie Pie to go insane or something
but I'll just have to find out...
1701326
*Steel whips the custard off his arms and coat.*
Auuugh, this is gross... you have any idea how hard it is to get dessert out of clothing? Equestria doesn't sell human clothes!
But the love is appreciated. Scuze me, I gotta go try and clean this stuff out...
*Steel wanders off, mumbling something about the tar pits of the South.*
"A specific silence," indeed. Some of us would have to take a whole paragraph to convey that scene.
So far, genuinely creepy in the best sense of the word.
1701392
ASKDJLASKJDLAKSJD
DON'T GIVE HIM SEQUEL IDEAS! D:
i1300.photobucket.com/albums/ag83/TrollestiaSubject/Lyra/67111_525239224172088_1054248260_n.png
Faved
1701392
1702039
Oh now, that would be too simple, wouldn't it? Besides, I already have a horror fic where everyone goes insane. You can check it out if you want, it's called Love . Sick and it's on my user page.
-Pimp Mode-
The story's pretty popular, as I understand it, amongst the underground of writers. It's well known by the pre-readers and a lot of the mods, as well as some big names in the editing circles. It never reached PUBLIC fame, but it was featured in the first EQD Q&Neigh as a 'favourite fic' of the mod Daffodil. And people seem to either really like it or really hate it, so I guess you can give that a read. This story here is actually the spriitual successor to that one. In order not to repeat the same pattern, there's a different SORT of 'craziness' in this story. =)
-End Pimp Mode-
1701994
Why thank you =) Yes, I try to write... effectively.
wait...
are they all dead or where they just fakeing it?
Interesting. Time to see where this is going.
1729615
They're dead. Pinkie went insane.
This is creepy.
So Fluttershy finds each of her friends and then kills them so their misery will end?
1772283
Essentially, yes. But the idea is that that is HER punishment. Each of them is being cursed in their own way... and Fluttershy's curse is to follow without question and do horrific things without control - just as Twilight had her do in her role.
Wow. Sad, creepy, dark story. Just wow.
1772739
Thank you =)
Well. That was really something. I must say, you really can build an atmosphere. The house itself had a character all its own, thanks to your descriptions. I loved all the little things like how the doors didn't creak, and the interior was so well preserved. All these details were so unique and they built such a consistent scene that I could really picture the old paint and unlit hallways in my head.
Also, you make really great use of suspense in this story. The scene where Fluttershy visits Twilight is set up and executed so perfectly. I could see all the pieces lining up through that whole chapter, and as it all fell into place it had a certain sense of inevitability to it. All of the chapters were fresh and different from one another, from Rarity's costume thing (I'll admit, I could see that one coming from the moment she was assigned to costume duty. But then, surprise wasn't really the point to that one.) to Rainbow Dash's isolation experience, to Applejack's chapter (which you did warn me was heartbreaking, but jeez, was it ever!) Each chapter played cleverly on the insecurities of each character.
The one chapter I'm not wild about was Pinkie's chapter. I mean, it was great for tying the whole thing together and all, but it doesn't really feel like it explored the depths of Pinkie's personality the way the others did. Also, you could stand to make the influence of the House on everypony's minds just a little subtler. It's a tricky balance, to be sure--too subtle, and the reader fails to pick up that it's the House at all, and just thinks you're writing the protagonists out of character. But too much, and it overrides the will of the characters, lessening the value of the insight into their psyches the story affords us. Because that's why we're really here, isn't it? We don't read and write this stuff because we like seeing our favorite ponies get mangled, we read and write it because it lets us examine how our favorite ponies' minds work when they're thrown into situations that are never going to come up in the show.
Overall, a very fantastic piece of prose, quite chilling, downright unpleasant at times in all of the right ways. It's a shame you don't have more followers, because you are a damn fine writer.
1791178
It always comes to that I always tend to use her as the wrap-up, so her roles are diminished in my stories. I think I'm stuck with that habit... but yeah, that's a good thing to pay attention to. Need to expand her role!
I always mess up with Pinkie! Arrrhhh!!
And as for the decision to make the influence less subtle, that was a pretty hard choice to make. I DID go back and forth many many times wondering where and how I should elaborate on that most of their actions were switching back and forth between themselves and an unknown influence (which doesn't, by itself, have many rules in the first place). The hardest one, I think, was for Fluttershy, because she needed the most 'corruption', in that there was probably no way she could perform her role with only a little bit of suggestion. If she had more scenes where she fought with herself and had to struggle, it would have detracted from the individuality of the other scenes, and she was meant to play the role of the unwitting harbinger. So yeah, it was very tricky for that case. I like to think of it that Fluttershy's mind was already so weak in the first place that she allowed the House to influence her far deeper than the others - in the same way that Pinkie's influence lies mostly in her feelings and Applejack was strong willed enough to actually fight it (which lends itself to the tragic harlequin layout).
That said though, I actually could see them all having diminished direct effects... I think I should have been subtler with a few of them. I can see it working with Rainbow and Twilight, but Rarity's is much more of a direct thing, and I'm not sure how it might work for her case. Any ideas?
But thanks for the insights, surely, I will take them up to heart to apply for the future.
And I'm relieved to hear that you liked it!
1792031 Pinkie can be tricky. Even without the distraction of wrapping up the main plot, she's just a plain tough balancing act to manage. Make her too wacky, she'll get on people's nerves, but if you tone her down too far, she isn't Pinkie anymore.
The guiding star for the level of influence to use should be what best displays the internal workings of each of the characters' minds. Fluttershy, for example, (who you did very well, I might add) might have worked better if she was motivated by guilt. Instead of being mind-dominated to believe that she was helping her friends by killing them, she could continually perceive herself as consistently failing each of her friends in turn. Instead of being constantly driven by the will of the house, she would only need to get a little confused each time she meets another of her friends. The deed gets done, her head clears, and she gets a fresh heap of guilt to fuel further mistakes. By the time she comes around to Pinkie, she'd be relieved when the party cannon is finally revealed. But you already handled Fluttershy very well, so this is just a possibility.
I'm not really sure I have any ideas for Rarity's scene. Maybe, instead of literally fusing to her costume, she could have gotten out of her costume already, but she still believes she's stuck in it. That could be an opportunity to explore and subvert her sense of vanity.
I'm glad to help (if indeed you could rightly call any of this 'help'). Have a good time, whatever you go on to write!
1792750
To respond, Fluttershy actually did work along those lines. The subtleties, which you probably picked up on, was in that she does what she's told without question. Twilight, Dash and Rarity's were much more clear, but AJ and Fluttershy's links were that - AJ convinced Pinkie to go at the start (but failed), and her scenario revolves around having to convince Fluttershy to not do what she was going to do (and failing). Fluttershy's was about following orders against her desires, which she does a lot in general, and the 'influence' of the house was to just tell her, do this. Why? Because. And she does it, but soon it starts to become 'natural' to her and she has trouble telling apart the idea of the act and the ramifications. I did also inject a bit of the idea of failure into it, and the voices of her friends that spoke were the things that convinced her that she was doing good -- also just like how it might happen in a 'real life' situation.
The house wasn't directly controlling her actions. As stated from the start, how it sort of works (at least how I tried to make it) was that it fills in the gaps in the cracks of the brain. All it was doing for Fluttershy was muddling her sensibilities and playing off her beliefs in that her friends know better. It's very vague, I admit, but then, I like to leave such things open for interpretation as well. What I'm writing here is just how I pictured it when I wrote it, but any interpretation is fine.
Although admittedly, having her actually -happy- that she was going to die was something I hadn't considered, and I actually love that idea. Where were you 3 weeks ago when I needed to brainstorm?
My original draft for Rarity had her simply turning into a monster. But I decided to muddle it again, and keep it vague, and I decided to actually just go with a physical-appearing change (although whether it was TRULY physical or just in their minds is up for debate) because I'm a big fan of body horror and I just wanted to have one scene which had the elements of body horror in it, and Rarity seemed like the perfect choice.
If I had to do a scene with that idea where I was going for an entirely psychological approach, I would definitely have to use yours, which would be perfect for in that theme. It Parallels Twilight's condition perfectly, and has the vanity angle as well.
Honestly, you have some really wicked ideas here. I just might have to bother you in the future if I ever did another horror fic. Maybe we can even work together! Collabo! =D
1772283
I guess.
1792817 Yeah, drop me a line if you ever feel like doing something like that. I would love to pretend I'm being of assistance.
1794297
How about gettin' rid of that STINKIN' THINKIN'?
You're a great writer.
1729615they're dead
Is this based on And the There Were None?
1821607
I've been asked this before! Nope, it isn't, though =)
chapter 3+ (using fimfiction chapter count, therefor chapter 1 = prologue)
-> more horror so far
chapter 4+
-> It slowly corrupts them one by one and shows struggle,
the outcome is a bit less obvious
the corruption is different, less wholesome,
-> Love . Sick has complete corruption that twists them into
different characters, really. While this has a more subtle hold... which is better... for reasons. >.>
also liking how the whole different viewpoints showing that parts of the previous scenes did not actually happen (or of the current scene)
and the added mystery of what exactly is happening.
and also more subtle clues that they are actually affected
chapter 4
... also wow, fluttershy killing them all came unexpected
chapter 5
"But… something was missing. Something had turned off. When she came down the hallway, she knew there were lanterns set up in the balcony behind her, thanks to Applejack. But now, it was dark and dull again, and not a flicker of a lamp could be seen."
took the first 2 sentences of that as RD noticing that twi died
... poor RD. That was just plain horrible.
chapter 6
Also really liking how the resistance of the shown character (their understanding of the situation) as the story progresses.
chapter 7
... you like keeping pinkie for last, don't you?
kay so much for the running commentary while reading. This story is definitly better than its predecessor and quite engaging.
and now for commenting on comments:
Keep Rarity's scene as is for the most part ... just remove/change a few responses from Fluttershy for less confirming that there's been fusing and more Rarity just thinking that it happened and still suffering the effects from it. (let her describe the oil and all, as it is currently)
And then when fluttershy's side is shown after rarities death, describe what she is seeing in a way that only makes sense if the costume wasn't fused.
Also I'd say the effect on twilight was just right, it set the whole thing up to be purely psychological, exposing their weakness and then warping their perception around it. With that set up, RD works perfectly as well. And in both cases Fluttershy seems to reveal that their suffering is imaginary for the most part.
... when you ask for a comment, you get a long comment ^^
edit: Oh right, I've actually got one complaint - the setting's too modernised for equestria, pretty sure they don't have widespread usage of electricity. (and I think there's a word of god stating that they don't have electricity at all and it's all magic powered if it looks like an electric appliance.)
2085939
That's ok, I like long. I love long. =3
/)o^_^o(\
Ya, I do =D
I don't know why, honestly. It just happens that way.
Well, either way, glad you like it, and yeah, it's better, innit! Maybe my next one will be EVEN better.
And great advice on the costume! Not sure why I didn't think of that before. I think I had planned hers to be bodyhorror a long time ago and it just stuck. I should have had that to keep the theme consistent. Good idea though!
Are they imaginary... or is what Fluttershy seeing the imaginary things? OH HO HO HO!
Unfortunately I fall into the camp of people who regards 'word of god' as a FORM of headcanon until proved in the show. I personally, in my own canon, allow electricity in Equestria. There's been a lot of devices in the show that simply can't run without electricity and makes no sense to run off magic purely. For example, surely all the baking equipment in Sugar Cube corner (like the giant mixer, or taffy puller or all the ovens) use electricity to some extent, and none of the ponies in the bakery are unicorns (save the baby, but let's not even go there =) ) and having a dedicated unicorn around to power the machines is less realistic than 'having electricity'. They also have DJ turntables, spotlights, microphones...
So, after due consideration, and I respect this complaint.
But let's just have it part of the canon in which electricity exists. =)
The only thing that I'm sort of as a joke to myself, purposely ignoring is the fact that PHONES don't exist. It's very weird because things of FAR more advanced technology than the phone exists, but you never ever see a phone. So something in my fics that I avoid is adding telephony just as a little thing. I'm sure they COULD exist though, eh?
2088251
Well it works. Pinkie has the necessary abilities to be believable, and it provides another change of how things play out preventing the reading from seeming repetitive.
There's another one planned? :D yay!
Clearly its both, the house is actually inhabited by Sombra and/or Changelings.
Suppose that makes sense ^^
Urgs, don't remind me. The whole setting makes less and less sense the more episodes are shown >.> ... though actually exploring this dissonance between their apparent level of technological development and the lack of widespread usage of said technology might be interesting.
(Or one can look at the newest episode and the "tiny gem vs huge INDUSTRIAL blowdrier" and just go with "the writers just don't give a damn" ^^)
Also about phones: If no one invented them, they don't exist, simple as that ^^ Just because all the necessary parts might be there, doesn't mean someone had the idea (or need?) to combine them.
edit: thinking on it, there's got to be some huge industry somewhere, or some completely different solution, or half the things in the show would make even less sense than they do oO
2088286
Actually, maybe she'll be the focus next time 'round. In the past two she's had a really sort of 'small' role. Perhaps it'll be the madness of Pinkie... There's an idea.
Well, I'm actually working on a bunch of dark fics now. Have you heard of the Little Town project? I've gathered a bunch of writers to contribute dark stories to a sort of collaboration series. I'm already writing one in the works about Mayor Mare and a little too much greed....
But possibly for the spiritual sequel to this one and Love.Sick I'll keep it by itself. You know. Once an idea strikes me. I'm playing around with the return of the concept of 'helplessness', so the main character is tortured by her inability to do anything but watch her friends decline.
Yes. I think subscribing to this would be for the benefit of us all.
Clearly the giant blowdrier, for example, was built as a way to test the wonderbolts at the academy in 'storm flying' techniques......
2088327
Woha that group was founded by you? o.o neat! I've read about that group in one of WD's blogs ... and well, quite liking the idea since I personally agree that gore != horror.
And a horror story about politicians and greed? oO Now that does sound interesting. There isn't a publicly readable chapter of that yet, is there?
While I'm already at replying:
Discord is aware while turned to stone (and apparently aware of more than just his immediate surroundings, if I recall correctly). That's such a huge contrast from his reality reshaping ways that I bet something can be worked from there. Granted, there'd be no "friends declining" bit, but I suppose one might find another hook.
Alternatively, there's an upcoming bandwagon of alicorn!twilight and so far I haven't seen a "twilights friends are dying from old age, she can't cope with that and tries her best to prevent it, but ultimately fails and breaks down" (perhaps with a side note of accidentally killing one of them.) Bonus points for dooming herself in some way or another in the process.
Or a classic: Celestias failure to prevent Luna from becoming NMM.
Jup, it also opens up the possibility of just outright ignoring whatever bullshit they toss in next ^^
2088358
Ya, that's my project. =D
Not a publicly readable chapter as of such. I have a little bit written, and it's in alpha stage, so probably will have some changes to be made. The presentation is through a non-defined 3rd party 'unreliable narrator' through which the reader ascribes his or her own qualities; so in essence the narrator can be whatever type of pony, or whatever gender, you wish. The point of that perspective is to allow the neutral unfolding of the plight of Mayor Mare, but through a closer interaction rather than just unveiling it as it would a story.
You can see what I have so far here, but it is only the start of it, and as mentioned, in draft status. It has a slow build up, more typically found in my other pieces of work, just to create the atmosphere.
Oh... this will happen. A lot. If not already. I know I've heard some of my mates throw this idea around like MONTHS ago, even before the twilight debacle.
In any case, I actually rather depart from the established lore for these horror fics, but anything else I might use for the Little Town thingie.
I have to applaud you for your writing skills, even though you killed them all. I cringed the most when Twilight Sparkle made a final plead for help, before she was impaled by a thousand glass shards.
Many people say that a fic can't be sad and tragic at the same time, since sad is "something really bad came out of the blues and killed them" while tragedy is "a character fights, and loses, the battle against her central weakness, and dies". However, since, while on the one hoof, Twilight Sparkle was killed by her obsession for order (a trait I share with her dearly), Fluttershy was driven to cold-blooded murder by her meekness. On the other hoof, Rarity and Rainbow Dash handled the situation quite well, and they died only because, A: they were cursed by supernatural evils that they had absolutely no control over, and, B: cruel fate let them meet Slautershy. On the third hoof, Applejack did her best to save everypony, got betrayed in an "" moment, and even forgave Fluttershy before she died (I loved it when you wrote about the final thoughts in AJ's head. Really, why didn't you have the generosity to give Twilight some paragraphs for her final thoughts?!), and on the forth hoof, I just failed to understand Pinkie Pie, not a bit at all.
So, for Rarity, Applejack and Rainbow Dash, they did nothing wrong, and their death was not tragic, just very sad.
For Fluttershy and poor Twilight, it was a tragic story. But even so, their tragedy was still painted heavily with sad, since they were under very strong psychological attack at their weak spots, an attack unexpected, supernatural, and with the cold, hard strategy that rivals that of Chrysalis.
For Pinkie Pie, I find her a simple, out-of-character, plot device whose only function was to give my favorite pony (Twilight IS the best pony
) the
tragicsad idea to throw a party in the cursed house, then be controlled by a dark, red mist, then go around and keep AJ stuck in the room so that AJ could be murdered, then go to load her cannon, then go to tell Fluttershy the whole story of their death, then blast Fluttershy into pieces. I just don't get it.On a side note, I think Fluttershy's death was the least traumatic. It was too fast for her to feel anything. (BTW, I think having her actually -happy- that she was going to die was something that would have been RIGHT IN THE FEELS
) Twilight was impaled, and had at least a few seconds to feel the excruciating pain before she died. Rainbow probably didn't die swiftly, since Fluttershy was too weak to kill her clean off. She might have endured some neck-sawing and non-lethal stabbing before dying of hemorrhagic shock. As for Rarity and Applejack... need I say more?
Although, one thing remained unanswered: in one night, all the bearers of harmony were dead. How would Equestria cope with it? How would Princess Celestia swallow the fact that her faithful student was impaled by glass shards? And I thought Twilight had made it clear in S1E09 that there aren't anything supernatural in Equestria, so what was this cruel, murderous mist?
2306962
Hi, Furrypony, thank you for the very long and very elaborate comment! Man, I do love reading these. =) I apologize for taking so long to respond, but I've been busy recently. But I'm here now, so let's swing into it!
Allow me to answer your questions and concerns one by one!
First of all, let me thank you for the kind words and I hope you enjoyed it regardless of the problems. When I was writing it, I had a central idea of two themes. Everything else was sort of variable, like how the mist affected them, and yes, the mist is not meant to be explained. If anything was a device, the mist was, in the form of a macguffin. But to me, the idea of the story was behind the journey and the ultimate inability to escape fate that drove the story forward. I considered it that they were all doomed from the first time that Twilight set hoof in the house.
One of the two themes I wrote on was that the mist affected something related to what each pony had to do in the plan to prank Pinkie. Twilight was the planner, it attacked her with her need to keep to plans. Rarity had to dress up in a skin to frighten her, it gave her a new skin. Rainbow dragged Pinkie down the hall, she was... dragged. Fluttershy FAILED her mission, and her task was 'getting over failure' which meant that she was successful at... doing something no one else wanted. And Applejack convinced Pinkie to go, and she had to convince Fluttershy to let HER go.
The other theme was that it all sort of affected them in their weakspots, but you sort of already picked that up.
Because all you'd hear in her head is "omgomgomg I must fix the bed I must fix the bed argh the beeeedddd" and for the scene, presented from the perspective of Fluttershy, I felt it might have been more eerie to not go into Twilight's mind in that way, otherwise it breaks the tension of the scene. Otherwise, I was saving the sad bits for Applejack, as the only thing in AJ's chapter was that whole feeling of the loss of hope, and there ain't anything better for that than a little bit of inner monologue. =) Really gets you in with the character and kicks you where it hurts, eh!
Personally, I found that Applejack's bit was the 'tragic' one. I classified it as tragedy because of the elements that she was the only one who COULD escape, she actually BEAT the mist, and was only conquered by her love and trust, and hope was cruelly snatched away. Dash wouldn't fall into that because she succumbed to the visions (or were they real?) and she couldn't fight back. Applejack lost everything due to friendship and trust, and to me that's a tragedy. But, your interpretation is perfectly fair too! I suppose it's what we FEEL is tragic, huh? But it's nice to see different interpretations of it.
I would agree that Stabbyshy and Twilight Sparkle is also more tragic though, and the others are a bit sad.
Let me explain Pinkie Pie in my vision! As mentioned before, the plot device wasn't Pinkie herself. It was actually the Mist. She was only struck by it during the pranking scene, as you picked up, but it wasn't her who gave Twilight the idea. In the prologue, when Twilight went to the house for the first time, she already was 'possessed' by the mist, and it was in fact the mist that gave her the 'idea' in the first place.
Everything else happened in turn. Pinkie Pie's deal was that she was getting addicted to her pinkie sense. Every time her pinkie sense went off, it gave her massively good feelings. And no, I'm not alluding to other certain specific feelings.
It's just a mystical feeling that is really addictive and really good. So she started to follow them, and try to be around when her friends died in order to get the feelings, then started to manipulate the environment to HELP Fluttershy kill the others, in order to get more of the feelings. Finally, when it was only her and Fluttershy left, she thought she could get one final 'pinkie sense jolt' by offing Fluttershy herself, but at the moment that it happened, the Mist loosened its grasp on her and she realised what she had done. So Pinkie's story is also tragic in that sense.
I threw in a little joke there, if you notice at the very start of the story, RD mentions that it's always 5 ponies who die? That's because most horror stories and movies have 5 characters dying. So I decided to play on that trope a bit and have Pinkie be the 'survivor'. But her demise is when she realised what she'd done after she was released and then went off to kill herself in the Everfree Forest or whatever it is you think she did in there.
So when she locked AJ and Fluttershy in, she was hoping that Fluttershy would off AJ to give her that pinkie sense shock that came when one of her friends was killed. Remember. Friendship is magic. I was playing off the idea that Pinkie is nothing without her friends. So her friends surely helped her feel good... but in a certain way!
Man, I should have thought of that! You're absolutely right. This is a terrific idea. Damn!
I didn't think about it that much, but if you notice I tend to gloss over the gory bits and the actual detail of the actions for most of them because I believe imagination fills it in how we want to in the scariest way possible. Rather than writing another cupcakes or rainbow factory I prefer my horror non-visceral and more descriptive and moody. =) So I'd say that this is a success right here! The only one I had a bit more description was with Applejack, which was required because it was a omg feels bit, and Rarity, but it was just cloth ....! Wasn't... wasn't it?
I really wasn't thinking about how long it took them all to die, but there's a reason why I wanted Fluttershy to go fast. It was to show that Pinkie didn't give a flying toot. It was jarring, hopefully, and different from the other deaths to have a bit of that shock as well, like oh. Pinkie actually is just CRAZY and isn't messing around. Maybe this wasn't transferred well enough, but I couldn't see Pinkie giving Fluttershy a slow and drawn out death at that junction. Unless you read it that the entire time she was giving the story as the time it took to kill her, because let's face it, Fluttershy sort of knew where it was going, didn't she?
Now, to answer your final point, this story DEFINITELY isn't canon, nor does it lie in the canonity of the show. I took a lot of liberties, and just wanted to tell an amusing, not-too-serious horror story that doesn't have to lie in the show's reality. It's horror to be enjoyed as the genre.
So: Let me answer your final questions!
Celestia had a bit of a cry and then passed the elements of harmony on to the next bearers. The mane 6 weren't the first bearers and certainly wouldn't be the last. They were made in the form of 5 necklaces and 1 tiara. Unless Celestia had 5 necks and only one head, it makes sense that they were made for the explicit purpose of being used by a team. There were previous bearers and there would be future ones. I imagine a sequel to this story where the CMCs, the new bearers of the elements, 3 years down the road, find the house again after it mysteriously reappears one day and try to find their families and friends for the legend of the house lived on as a whisper....
Had a bit of a cry. Also I don't think she ever found out. The ending is vague on purpose, because you can imagine what happened to Pinkie or whatever, maybe the story got out, maybe it didn't, maybe Pinkie ranted it to someone before dying and they thought it was the story of a madwoman, who knows? Point is, the house has been doing this for a while now, and it doesn't leave traces of bodies or blood. Leaves people's STUFF, yeah, but not bodies or blood. No evidence of that! So there might be no way that Celestia would know! Or maybe Pinkie found her one day and started blubbering some weird story and Celestia had her committed.
Twilight is frequently wrong, and silly poo poo head.
I imagine the Mist is actually the emulsified form of Cranky Doodle Donkey's soul.
Thank you for reading.
This story is starting to make me depressed..........................must....................... keep................ reading.............
2554082
Ah yes, Chapter 5 ^_^
The feels chapter. ^_^
I'll assume the house is messing Twilight up such that she would yell at Fluttershy like that.
2873957
That's one of the interpretations.
The part of Twilight Sparkle will be played by Vincent Price.
The part of Fluttershy, by Jack Nicholson.
And everything was right in the world.
2885642
Legit =D
I am trying to coalesce my thoughts into something coherent, but I'm failing to do so. (side note: I've spent the last 2-4 days with this comment partially written up, but I always fall asleep before I finish writing down my ramblings, so half the things I say probably don't make sense to me anymore).
I was creeped out, but not as much as Love . Sick. Not sure why; this one is definitely better written. Maybe it's because Love . Sick Twilight was pretty normal while we got to see everyone else change in increasingly absurd ways. This story, on the other hand, has all of the Mane 6 being warped one way or another (perhaps not AJ, but she wasn't the focus of the story like Twilight was in Love . Sick).
Technically speaking, the only issues I had were some sentences structured to sound old-timey. I don't have examples off the top of my head, but it was distracting enough to break immersion occasionally.
Twilight's chapter creeped me out, probably because I was still adjusting to the atmosphere at this point.
Rarity's chapter was rather obvious, which, while not necessarily an issue, did make me end up skimming parts of it.
I don't know if it's because I have some attachment to Rainbow, or because of some other factor, but I did end up skimming a lot of that chapter.
I think I liked AJ's chapter the best. It was obvious to me how she would meet her demise, but the attempt at redemption was touching.
I notice (from the two stories of yours that I've read) that Pinkie is a palette cleanser -- she appears at the end to tie up any loose ends. There was no point to this statement.
I dunno. Maybe I just don't read enough horror to give insightful comments about horror stories.
Ah yeah, I apologize. I actually grew up on modernism, and I just had a penchant for archaic sentence construction. It certainly didn't mean to break flow, but it's just a part of my style. I know exactly what you mean though. I do a lot of syndeton, run-ons, and switching of nouns and adjectives. I'm sorry if that broke the flow for you!
And also, I would have to say that the point of the horror that I write is for the atmosphere. Unfortunately, skimming was probably not what I would have intended with the story, although of course this is not meant to be a 'omg you did it wrong' in any way.
All I mean is that in the genre of horror, you have two main types of story. One which sort of grips you through a fearful mystery and attempts to surprise, or the sort that is there just because you know exactly what you're getting into. For this story as well as Love.Sick, I was writing specifically the latter.
I didn't really bother to make it creative because the intent was for the reader to be immersed into the atmosphere and the characterization. In both stories I tell the reader exactly what's going to happen at the start because it's no longer of consequence. The idea was to just let people read along and enjoy it in other ways. So skimming would probably take some of that effect out of it, as the fic wasn't written to be an unfolding mystery; more like a series of things that happen that you are along for the ride.
Horror's definitely not for everyone, so either way, thanks very much for giving it a try and thanks very much for your feedback. That is always welcome, and I do entirely understand where you're coming from. ^_^
And yes, I tend to use Pinkie as a palette cleanser. I'm not entirely sure why, myself. I guess since this was meant to be a spiritual successor to the first story, I figured I'd keep some things consistent. You can bet if I do yet another one, Pinkie will be right there at the end as well.
If you'd be more interested in a more traditional story with a more interesting mystery, I would recommend checking out some others that I write. I certainly don't only write horror, so maybe you'll find something you prefer in other genres.
But of course, as always, thank you for the time for the comment, and thank you for reading. I appreciate it!
House on haunted hiiiiiiillll...
RUN FOR YOUR LIIIIIIIVVVEEESSS!