Bonus Review: A FLEet|ng LIght |n thE DArknEsS · 2:22am Nov 6th, 2012
I looked outside, and the sky was dark. No sun, no clouds, not even any stars, or the moon. It was just black.
Fictional journal entries are—by their very nature—filled with telling. Oftentimes, showing then takes the form of “not telling” or: showing by omission, which can be a powerful tool if used correctly. If nothing else, A FLEet|ng LIght |n thE DArknEsS manages this quite well. It is a true horror story, and it manages to establish a “monster” that—while never truly revealed, merely hinted at, and even then, vaguely—plays on one of our most basic fears: darkness.
At its most basic level, A FLEet|ng LIght |n thE DArknEsS is about Twilight and her friends dealing with this fear, and being driven to madness because of it. Watching their slow descent into insanity, especially Fluttershy’s, is like being Alex from A Clockwork Orange. We are forced to watch the characters we know and love fall apart before our eyes. Initially, it’s fun. Seeing them deal with disappearing foals and mysterious sightings is entertaining, and it provides an intriguing mystery. Then the dynamic changes. Fun becomes horror, as we see Twilight begin to lose her mind, and watch as Fluttershy struggles with being separated from her animals. Like riding the Br’er Rabbit water-slide at Disneyland, the tension builds with each new journal entry. Higher and higher it rises until, at the very peak, we see what these ponies have become. Spike is left speechless, unable to let go of Twilight. Rarity shuts herself away, Fluttershy screams from her prison, and Pinkie patiently waits. Then... it ends, with one final, cryptic note from Twilight.
This is a fic that rewards you for paying attention to the narrative, and even makes subsequent readings well worth your time. It's likely that you'll miss some stuff the first time through, but it's so short and so good, you won't mind multiple readings.
I heartily recommend that anyone interested in real horror—and journals—give this a chance. At a little over eight-thousand words, it’s well worth the short time it will take to read. So go read it, seriously, Flashgen could use the views.
