//------------------------------// // Descent // Story: Rarity's Dark Secret // by Jojoleopard //------------------------------// It had been the third time Detective Sweetie Belle looked at the sepia-toned photograph of her sister as she sat in her motel room, still dressed in her trench coat and trilby. She let out a long sigh, then looked up and gazed at her faint reflection on the television screen as the rain poured outside, beating against her windows like little feet walking across the glassy surface. She was still drenched from the pouring weather, but she made no move to change out of her attire. She had dedicated every second of her life to find out what happened ever since the day her sister had disappeared. It had come with no warning, nor was there any indication that Rarity was going to run away from home or the likes. Sweetie Belle had been on the case ever since. She had been working as a private investigator in Manehattan for seven years now and it had already been four years since she had last seen her sister. Apple Bloom and Scootaloo had told her to move on, but Sweetie Belle had refused. She knew her sister was still somewhere out there and she had to find her, no matter what. And that had all changed just this morning, when she had finally found a clue after so many years of looking. As she swirled a glass of whiskey in her left hand, her right placed Rarity’s picture down on a short table in front of her and picked up an envelope with a coiled spine around an insignia stamped into it. She had gotten that off a suspicious looking man in the subway earlier, who possessed the exact same shimmering green brooch on his collar that she had seen on her sister once before. It had a gold frame, along with wings coming out near the top, folding down over the gem in its center. It was too unique of a piece for everyone to just have it, so she decided to tail him and eventually looted this envelope off his pockets. Inside it were instructions to some kind of very private meeting that was going to be held tomorrow night down the maintenance halls of the same subway station. Sweetie Belle knew she had to give credit to whomever had come up with this note. It was incredibly detailed and there were so many steps to get to the meeting place. She didn’t know how they were going to find out whether a member had completed all the steps, which meant they were either watching from cameras along the way, or they were trusting the integrity of its members. Other than the instructions, there were no other names or notes as to what this meeting was about; this was simply a list of steps one would need to do along the subway’s maintenance tunnels and nothing more, nothing less. There hadn’t even been a name as to who this was from, or who it was for. That was good for her. As Sweetie Belle finally got off her now water soaked bed, she adjusted the hat atop her head and left the motel. No one would know that she wasn’t supposed to be there and that would be the perfect chance for her to find out just what was going on. If there was a chance she could see her sister again, she had to take it. The subway station wasn’t that far from the motel, but the rain was still falling from the sky like spears from heaven, pinging down against Sweetie Belle’s coat sounding like jackhammers at a construction site. The investigator just kept her head low to avoid the rain getting in her face. It was now already close to three in the morning and the instructions had said to be there by four. It seemed that she would still be making good time. Her hand pressed against the envelope in her coat pocket and she pressed two fingers into it firmly. This was the closest she’d ever been to finding her sister in years and she felt as though that envelope would just fly out of her pocket by some miraculous gust of wind, or it would just vaporize and leave no trace. She couldn’t have that. She had to make sure she had that envelope all the way to the station. It was her only lifeline now. Sweetie Belle only allowed herself to breathe again once she stepped under the subway station’s shelter, giving her body a shake to dislodge loose droplets of water before moving towards the escalators heading down underground. She was finally here, through the heavy rain. Drying her hands to the best of her ability, Sweetie dipped a hand into her pocket and fished out the envelope, breathing a sigh of relief once she found that the only damage to it were a few droplets on its surface. The letter inside was still fine and dandy. There was only one thing left to do now, and that was to follow the instructions and get to the meeting point safely. As she walked down the dimly lit corridor of the subway station, Sweetie noticed that there were very few people around, seeing as it was quite early in the morning now. That would make her job easier, seeing as she needed to get down one of the maintenance tunnels, which was prohibited to her unless she was working here.  Sweetie Belle pulled out the instructions from the envelope and read the first line. You will first enter the maw of the concrete beast and proceed three steps down. Then you will spin on the spot three-hundred and sixty degrees before walking the rest of the way down. It was oddly specific and she didn’t know how anyone could know if she had done it or not, but it was here and she had to blend in anyway, so in the end, she figured it wasn’t harmful to her person. She pushed the door open to the even more dimly lit corridors for maintenance, looking down at a flight of steps just a meter from her position. She walked over and took three steps down, then twirled around, stopping at the exact same spot, then down the rest of the steps. So far so good… Sweetie Belle looked at the next item on her list and found that it was further down, at the next turn. “When you get to the first turn ahead, point at the left wall, then down at your feet, almost like you are degrading someone,” she read aloud. “Okay. Whatever.” The detective walked down the corridor, keeping her eyes on the lights above. There were rows of fluorescent tubes lining the stained white ceiling above, and they were poorly maintained. Some of them were losing power and some of them didn’t even work at all. Occasionally, the lights would flicker and the corridor would suddenly look like a hallway to Tartarus, or at least, Sweetie Belle thought Tartarus would look something like that. She kept thinking about what she might find as she walked towards the bend in the path. There was always a chance that she would be better off if she turned around and walked away, but her sister had been missing for so long now and she wanted her back. Perhaps even finding out what happened to her would be closure enough, but a small voice in her mind tugged on her, willing her to leave this place now. But she would not listen to it. This was the closest she’d ever come to finding her sister again and she was going to take it, no matter what. The bend of the corridor came soon enough and doing as the instructions said, she pointed at the left wall, then lowered her arm until she was soon pointing at her feet. She didn’t know what it meant to point down at someone degradingly, but she did her best, even sticking out her tongue to prove her point, when without warning, something clicked and a portion of the wall flicked open with a hiss of steam, causing her to jump a step back. Now we’re getting somewhere. Sweetie poked her head through the doorway, but it was too dark to make anything out, not even a pathway or stairs. It was simply a dark void ahead, almost as though the floor fell away just through here. She wondered if she should risk a light and announce her presence. Then she realized she was standing in the middle of a lit doorway and anyone in the gloom would have seen her already. So Sweetie Belle took out her matchbook and lit one of the little sticks. It didn’t cast much light, but it was comforting all the same. Within the darkness, she found another set of steps leading down, but before she took another step into the dark passageway, she looked at the list of instructions again. She had only done two things on it so far, and there was still a whole lot more to do. Descend into darkness and knock on the walls to your left and right as you proceed. You must show the Great One courtesy and knock before entering. “Uh huh.” Sweetie Belle put her paper aside and began descending. Each footstep echoed around the tiny and cramped passageway and bounced off the walls, rebounding back into her ears, making it sound as though a whole troupe was marching down beside her. Sweetie Belle cast it out of her mind and paid it no attention, instead, listening to the instructions and stretched her arms out to either side. She began rapping her knuckles across the somehow ice cold walls to her sides, echoing even more sound across the stairway. The walls were coated in a thin layer of grime and her knuckles would come back with greenish stains on them, but she couldn’t falter now and she kept knocking the walls on her way down. The bottom didn’t come soon enough, but when it finally did, she let out a sigh of relief and stopped knocking on the walls and wiped her hands across the bottom of her trench coat. “One more step done.” Sweetie looked around, but still she saw no one. Up until now, there was not a person in sight, not even one to check if she had completed the steps on her instruction paper. “Okay, what’s next, Sweetie Belle?” Raising the match to the sheet, she eyed the next step and read it out in a soft voice. “Spin four times, then look up, then step forward. Your time is at hand. And so is His.” Sweetie eyed the darkness ahead, which was another tunnel stretching away into the unknown. This was definitely not part of the subway tunnels, and she wondered where it could possibly lead. Doing as her instructions said, she spun on the spot four times, then looked up. Only checking out the ceiling now, she noticed that something had been graffitied into the brickwork above in some kind of red paint. It was a sigil of sorts, consisting of a circle and edges of a star around a round-shaped reptilian head with a spine going down the middle of its head. And now that she thought about it… Sweetie Belle pulled out the envelope from her pocket and placed it beside the one on the ceiling to examine the seal that had been on it. The now broken seal had the same sigil imprinted on it, ever so faintly. “What does this mean?” She put the envelope back in her coat pocket and lowered her head from the ceiling to gaze forward; her eyes widened in an instant. The dark tunnel that had been in front of her had been squarish before, but now, it was as though something had gone through and twisted it around and around, turning the hall ahead into a spiral that had a very faint green glow coming from ahead. Far ahead. The detective crept on cautiously ahead, keeping one hand on a revolver in her coat’s inner pocket as she moseyed along. Her feet had to constantly adjust to the strange terrain, but she made good progress. Sweetie Belle wondered who had built this place, and how. Surely such a project would require a lot of money, materials, and workers. And the hallway had just been straight earlier and now it was all curvy and twisty, making it very hard to proceed. She didn’t know what was going on, but she had to know. She had to know if her sister was here. Lifting the instructions to the light again about partway down the twisty tunnel, Sweetie Belle read the next line, raising one brow as she did so. “Before you descend the stairway to madness, you must first tap the railing three times. He can feel the slightest of tremors in his domain and He will permit your entry. Huh.” The instructions were beginning to mention a lot of ‘he’s’ and she didn’t know what that was supposed to mean. It sounded like it was making out these tunnels to be some kind of living entity, but that couldn’t possibly be right. A tunnel couldn’t be alive. After stepping through three more twists of the strange tunnel, Sweetie Belle found that the glow of the light ahead had gotten brighter. She didn’t know if it was because she was closer or if it had indeed gotten brighter, but it was surely brighter now. Bright enough for her to toss her match aside. Just as well, it was about to burn out anyway. She eventually arrived at the end of the tunnel and looking down now, she could see that the light source was coming from deep down a stairwell, twisting round and round in a spiral, looking almost like that of an eye, or a tentacle. She remembered the instructions telling her to tap the railing three times, so she did. It was made of some kind of hollow metal and the sound resounded across the silent space like a jackhammer at a construction site. It had been surprisingly loud, loud enough to make Sweetie jump under her skin and her the hairs on her arm to stand up. For a while, nothing else made a sound, except for her deep breaths, but then she began to hear something. At first, she thought it had been a fly near her ear, but it never stopped, even after she waved her hands around her ears and it started to wobble, going up and down in pitch and volume and the railing looked as though there was a wave passing through it.  It was at this point that Sweetie Belle’s gnawing suspicions began to really take root. There wasn’t just some kind of kidnapping scheme going on here. Something about this entire place was wrong. Someone had to be down here, making all these strange instructions and noises. She took out her gun and checked the load. All six chambers were loaded. She cocked the revolver’s hammer back and continued forward, staying in the shadows so that she would be more difficult to discover, should there be someone down here to do the discovering. Someone… or something. Sweetie took each step carefully and slowly, thinking that at any moment, the next step could be her last. She didn’t know what was going to happen, but she imagined stepping down on one, only for it to fall away beneath her, or spew toxic gas, or even for spikes to grow from it, spearing her all the way through to her head. She shook her thoughts aside and shivered. She was only making it worse for herself now and there was nothing to do but to keep going. Backing out now would be a huge waste of her time and she would be throwing away any chance she had at finding Rarity. The up and down sounds were getting louder now, as was the intensity of the light. Sweetie Belle looked at the next step and her skin began to crawl. More. The time approaches and the Unveiling is at hand, to satiate His belly, a sacrifice must be deposited. Cast it into the light. Destroy it. Sweetie Belle slid up next to a column and held her gun at the ready. She had only brought the ammunition in the gun, so if there were more than six hostiles, she would have to resort to either her fists or using the revolver as a bludgeon. She did not like the sound of the next set of instructions at all. This all felt very… cultish to her, and she had dealt with a few cults in her time as a private eye, but there hadn’t been anything like this. The instructions said she had to sacrifice something, but it said nothing more of what she was supposed to sacrifice. She patted down her pockets, but the only thing she had other than her instructions, envelope and her gun, was her wallet. Not sure what else she could do, she flipped her wallet open and grabbed a hundred dollar bill. Perhaps that would suffice as a sacrifice. After all, a hundred dollars was a lot of money. Holding it over the edge, Sweetie Belle let it go and watched as her bill floated down gently, fluttering towards the light below. Once it had disappeared from view, she continued down the stairway, a little faster than before, but still cautiously. There was no confirmation whether her sacrifice had been successful or not. No sudden burst of brighter light from below, no arms coming up to grab her note, no noise to indicate it being received, she didn’t know how anyone was supposed to tell anything down here. “When you are halfway down, you are to kick your feet together. This is to symbolize your elation for the Unveiling,” Sweetie Belle read the next step. “What are these sickos up to down here…?” She looked down over the side, trying to determine where the halfway mark was. Even now, she was unable to see the bottom and without being able to do so, she couldn’t tell where she was supposed to kick her feet together. Maybe just one more spiral down. I’ll just do it there. She kept going down the stairway, and once she was directly under the spot she had been in, she grabbed ahold of the railing with both hands, then took a quick breath before skipping up and kicking the bottom of both her feet together. Before she could land, the railing seemed to bend under her weight, almost like it was made out of jelly. Sweetie Belle suddenly found herself falling over the ledge and she scrambled around madly, trying to grab something to prevent her fall, but everything she grabbed was like mush and slipped through her fingers. Her screams echoed around the stairwell as she plunged deeper down towards the light. The hum around her grew louder now and she continued to try and grab the railings or the steps on the way down, but everything still slid out of her grasp and she could see no way out of this now. This was the end for her. Just as she was about to accept her grim fate, Sweetie Belle felt a tap on her shoulder and she opened her eyes again. The bright green light ahead was gone and instead, she was looking down another hallway, but this one was filled with ornate velvet cloth hanging down on the side with gold trimmings and they were tied down to the ground with similar colored ropes. Golden braziers hung along the sides lit the space, casting a green, but comforting glow in this new expanse. To her, this was night and day from the previous rooms she had gone through to get here. “At last, our final initiate,” a voice came from behind her. “We have been expecting you. I trust you had a pleasant drive to Manehattan?” Sweetie’s hands were on the ground and she moved them around. The ground was soft to her touch, but at the same time, it looked like solid wood below. Wood that had something seriously wrong with it. She got up and looked at the speaker standing behind her. It was a man by the looks of it, but he had on a white mask with a spine between its eyes, going up to the very top of the mask. There were no mouth or nose holes, and he was dressed in dark purple robes with a red scarf around his neck. She was about to ask him what was going on, but then she remembered she was somewhat undercover. She had to act the part. “Thank you. Yes, the trip down here wasn’t too bad, considering the time of day,” she said and straightened her attire. “Though, it was pouring outside, hence my wetness.” The man let out a nasally laughter, then ran a hand along the right side of his robes. “Then it’s a good thing you will receive one of these. All members must change into their ceremonial robes for the Unveiling. Down here, we do not go by our real names. You may call me Night Veil, His greatest follower, second only to the Speaker, but I can assure you, my devotion knows no bounds.” This guy is a looney. Sweetie Belle cleared her throat. She had to act naturally. “My, that is incredible. You must be proud of your achievements.” “Not as proud as you will be. You will be the final batch of initiates. Ever.” Night Veil lifted a hand to gesture down the ornate hall. “You initiates are the last to board the ship to a new world. Your salvation is at hand and any after you will not be so lucky. Come, you must be itching to change out of your drenched clothes. Right this way.” Sweetie Belle followed Night Veil down the hallway, instinctively reaching a hand into her coat where her pistol was holstered. Unfortunately, she remembered that she had been holding it when she fell off the stairway. Her holster was empty and she had likely dropped it when she was struggling to gain a hold. That’s not good… The fanatic soon led her out of the hallway and into a huge room with a domed ceiling high above their heads, finished with dark beams going across its remarkably tiled surface. The walls were made of opaque black stone, and green candles were placed at regular intervals around the perimeter. There was a strange etching on the floor, where there seemed to be an elaborate sigil drawn in white chalk, different from the one she saw on the tunnel ceiling and on her envelope, also peppered with green candles. This one was shaped like a row of five tentacles with a spine going around its perimeter. Finally, there was a scattering of gems and other precious stones arranged in a rough pentagram in the center of the sigil. All around were other robed and masked cultists, some of the chanting slowly in an incomprehensible language. What have I got myself into? Sweetie Belle thought with no small amount of apprehension. This might’ve been the biggest mistake of her life.