My Little Immortal: Friendship is Gothic

by Posh

Chapter Twelve

Somepony - Granny Smith, perhaps, or one of the myriad well-wishers that lingered in the waiting room, chomping at the bit for news about the bedridden filly - had brought Applejack dinner while she was asleep, leaving it on the room's beside table for her when she awoke. She hadn't asked for a meal; she hadn't a trace of an appetite in near a week, so the hay fries and black bean burger sat cold and untouched, filling the room with the smell of stale fried food. Her mouth had been too dry to pass up a good drink, though, so Applejack sipped listlessly from the twelve ounces of apple juice that had come with her order, part of her wishing that it were hard cider instead.

Apple Bloom hadn't stirred once since her brief lapse into consciousness hours before. She continued breathing steadily and rhythmically, but said and did nothing more. That may have been for the best, Applejack realized, given the thing that was using Apple Bloom's body at the moment. And the thought that her sister's persistent comatose state was a net positive made her blood churn and curdle.

Weeks of worrying over Apple Bloom's rebellious behavior; days of wondering whether Apple Bloom would ever regain consciousness; hours of impatiently counting down the minutes until Twilight returned with a solution... Time no longer seemed to pass normally to Applejack, though. Weeks, days, hours - they may as well have been years. Felt like years, even. And after all that time had passed, Applejack felt helpless, like a marionette, dancing to the rhythmic demands of a sadistic puppeteer, too exhausted to keep going, yet damned to keep on keeping on.

And thirsty. She felt very, very thirsty. She sipped from her juice again.

A sudden gust of wind filled the room, tossing her untouched meal against the wall and flinging her juice onto the floor. The wind was accompanied by a high-pitched whine and a flash of bluish light. Applejack shielded her eyes with a hoof, successfully protecting them from the worst of the light. The wind ruffled the bedsheets and the curtains at Apple Bloom's window and tossed Applejack's hat from her head. At first, Applejack thought that Ebony was active again, and she nearly shouted for the doctor to sedate her. But when she groped blindly at Apple Bloom's beside with her free hoof, she felt her lying still in her bed, and gradually, the gust cleared without the filly stirring once.

When Applejack lowered her hoof from her eyes and turned around, she saw Twilight Sparkle standing in the room, accompanied by no less than Princess Luna herself. Applejack's heart skipped, and a most Rarity-like thought crossed her mind: I look an' probably smell like hell; ain't no way to greet a Princess.

Well, she might look like death warmed over and refried, but the least she could do was remember her courtesies. Applejack started to bow, but Luna held up a hoof and shook her head. "That will not be necessary. I am here as a friend this evening, not as a Princess." She glanced at the mess that Applejack's meal had made on the wall and winced. "The kind of friend who storms uninvited and unnanounced into somepony else's home and makes an utter ruin of their supper plans, that is."

Applejack shook her head. "Weren't hungry anyway."

"All the same," said Luna, "remind me later that the crown owes you a meal, and the palace kitchens shall be at your disposal. But let us attend to business first." She nodded at the unicorn beside her. "Celestia received Twilight Sparkle's letter and forwarded it to me. She felt that it would be more..." Luna paused as she fished for the right word. "Appropriate if I handled this situation instead of her."

"Because o'how y'all were Nightmare Moon that one time?" asked Applejack.

For reasons Applejack couldn't place, Luna blushed luminescently. "Er... not... quite." She coughed a most artificial cough to signal a change in subject. "Twilight has already explained the situation in detail to me, but there are a few things on which I would like some clarification from you." She looked Applejack in the eye and fidgeted nervously. "Apparently, Apple Bloom mistakenly made contact with this 'Ebony' via a... ahem... Ouija board?" She sounded almost ashamed.

Applejack nodded. "Yes ma'am. Got it at Pinkie Pie's yard sale a couple weeks back with her allowance."

"And where, pray tell, did Pinkie Pie get it?"

"When I asked her, she said it came out of a big ol' black trunk with a heavy black lock clamped over it that she found in her Granny Pie's old attic when she went back home t'visit," said Applejack. "There was a buncha other stuff in there too, weirder than the board: a creepy talkin' one-eyed gorilla doll with a bandanna that talked backward an' made barfin' noises when you tugged on the pullstring, a sealed jar o'jelly with 'Lord Smooze's Godly Flesh' writ in red ink, a typewriter that jots down whatever anypony says in fron' of it, a rainbow-patterned rod that kinda looked like a co - "

"Yes, thank you," Luna interrupted hastily. "This trunk, was it labeled with anything? Any warnings about containing dark artifacts or black magics? Perhaps something like 'Blackest Arts Within Are Stow'd'?"

"Pinkie didn't say." Applejack frowned, growing suspicious at Luna's behavior. "That's an awfully specific recollection though. You, uh... know somethin' about this?"

Luna groaned and facehoofed. "Oh, yes. To my utter shame. Mother above, Celestia swore up and down that she destroyed that centuries ago..." She lowered her hoof and met Applejack's gaze again, looking thoroughly abashed. "The Ouija board is mine. As are the other items Pinkie found inside. They are ancient artifacts of black magic which I owned as a filly, at an age when I was much younger and much sillier and much more prone to immature acts of rebellion."

Applejack's jaw dropped. Twilight, for her part, had levitated out a pencil and a notepad, and was furiously jotting down notes at the descriptions of Luna's childhood menagerie of demonic playthings. "Beggin' your pardon, Princess, for speakin' outta turn, but you... owned a Ouija board that could summon dark spirits from the nether parts o'the universe? As a toy? When y'all was a teenager?! 'Cuz I'm jus' a simple country pony, an' where I come from, stuff like that's a little outside the norm, iffin' you catch my drift!"

Luna looked down at the linoleum floor and pawed at it bashfully. "I was going through a phase... and at any rate, I grew out of it eventually. I packed my childish things away in my old toy chest, slapped a melodramatic warning sign upon it, and had it shipped to Canterlot for storage. I inquired after it when I was released from Nightmare Moon's grip, but Celestia told me she had the chest sent away and destroyed. How the Pie family ended up with it, I have not the faintest idea." She sighed. "I apologize profusely, my friend. That I should cause someone so dear do you so much pain without realizing..."

Applejack shook her head. "Not a thing to apologize for, Princess. Y'all couldn't'a known. I'm sorry if I came across as harsh. Jus'... not quite what I was expectin' to hear, is all."

Luna smiled gratefully. "Truth be told, I always felt like the Ouija board was a flop, as far as black arts toys are concerned. Not once did I ever successfully make contact with anything more heinous than mischievous poltergeists that made profane remarks about my mother's promiscuity. That it could summon something so hate-filled and powerful is almost unfathomable." She trotted to Apple Bloom's bedside, lowered her horn to the filly's forehead, and closed her eyes in concentration. "Yes, I feel it. Powerful, hate-filled... prone to erratic outbursts and sexually reckless behavior. And it is burrowed deep inside Apple Bloom's soul." She looked at her two friends. "We must needs act quickly."

"Act how?" asked Twilight. "I told you; I already tried a mind-bridging spell. All it did was make Ebony angry."

"Indeed," said Luna. "But only after you made direct contact with the possessing entity. That was your mistake." She beckoned the two other ponies closer, and they edged toward Apple Bloom's bedside. "We do need to take action," said Luna, "but our approach must be different. I propose that I cast a mind-bridging spell between the four of us - that we all enter Apple Bloom's mind, and that we disguise ourselves as participants in this profane, gothic nightmare realm. We act out roles in this Ebony's fantasy, and try to steer events toward a conclusion that will, hopefully, weaken her hold on Apple Bloom sufficiently to wrench the filly away from the fiend, and return her to the void from whence she came." She paused. "Return the fiend to the void, that is, not Apple Bloom. I realize that was semantically ambiguous."

Twilight bit her lip nervously. "I don't know, Princess Luna. What if we fail? Is it possible that this Ebony will consume our souls as well? That we'll all share in Apple Bloom's fate, our conscious minds forever subsumed beneath this pale, blood-spattered foundation of faux-gothic horror?"

Luna frowned. "Well, when you put it that way..."

"Let it try," said Applejack firmly, locking a resolute gaze upon Twilight. "Let it jus' try an' take my soul. Y'all can sit this one out, Twilight, an' I won't think less o'you, but I'm goin' in there. An' if it tries to swallow my soul, I aim to make the bucker choke on it."

Twilight smiled. "I'm not gonna bother trying to top that speech. But I'm in."

Impressed with Applejack's mettle, Luna bowed her head and closed her eyes. "Come closer now, my friends, and steel yourselves" she said. "The experience might be a little... rough."

Applejack bowed her head beside Apple Bloom's and shut her eyes tightly. She felt a warmth around her head as Luna's magic enveloped her, and felt the room around her slip away. You hang on tight, little sister, she thought. I'mma comin' for you.

Author's Note:

Yeah, life has a funny way of surprising you, doesn't it?

Comments

[Nonagon]

I realize that was semantically ambiguous.

I would willingly slog through a barrel-thick stack of abysmal Goffic fiction if I knew it would come to an ironic turnaround of this quality.
Which is to say, rofl.

[World Builder]

Our faith in equinity hath been doubled!

[Kitty Creeper]

This is beautiful, and you are beautiful for writing it.