//------------------------------// // Chapter 2 Part 1 // Story: Fabricated World // by Brolkier //------------------------------// Twilight reached the end of the newly opened hallway and found herself at the junction of several yellow corridors. To her left she could see a portrait of a red pony with its tongue sticking out and a table with a notebook sitting on it, while to her front and right she saw only open hallways. Always one for reading, Twilight decided to investigate the table with the notebook first. Taking a few steps towards the table, Twilight was greeted to a wad of spit being ejected from the painting and onto the ground in front of her. “Eww!” Twilight exclaimed, looking over to the painting. “That’s just rude and disgusting!” She walked around the spit on the ground and made her way to the notebook. “Now let’s see if we can find some answers.” She spoke to herself as she opened the notebook. Inside however, Twilight found nothing but blank pages. She flipped through all the pages a few times, but alas, nothing. “Some help that was.” Twilight spoke aloud, shutting the notebook with her magic. Twilight turned and decided to venture down the long hallway in front of her, saving the shorter one for later if need be. She walked down the empty hallway, wondering what might pop out as she got further along. Luckily however, nothing jumped out at her. Instead, she discovered a rather bizarre sight at the end of the hallway. Tucked away in a nook on the side of the hallway, rested a pair of red lips upon the wall. “Feed me.” The lips spoke, catching Twilight by surprise. “Feed you? Feed you what?” Twilight tried to respond, but the lips remained silent. So far, nothing seemed to want to cooperate with her in this area. She turned to leave the lips behind and made her way back towards the final hallway. Arriving at the turn, Twilight found a small note on the ground that had not previously existed there. “Now what?” Twilight asked herself, as she lifted up the note with her magic. She looked it over as she walked, reading: “Just when you’ve forgotten…” She wondered what the note could have been referring to, until she received a painful reminder. A black hoof jutted out from the wall next to her, striking Twilight hard in the side. It pushed her towards the other wall, causing her to wince in pain. As she eyed the wiggling hoof, she noticed a petal fall to the ground. Four remaining now. Twilight moved back to the middle of the hallway, keeping her distance from the hoof and the walls. She continued on till the hallway opened again, revealing a door on her left and a gruesome sight on her right. There, hanging from the ceiling, were several mangled life-size pony dolls. Each one had a rope around either its neck or one of its limbs, signifying that they had been hung, or left for dead. Twilight slowly moved her eyes from the creepy sight and spied a yellow door at the far end. She could try and see if the door was unlocked, but decided against it, not wanting to venture past the hanging dolls just yet. Instead, she made her way to the other closer door and went inside. Inside the room, Twilight found six portraits of different colored ponies and a single door in-between them all. She tried opening the door, but to no avail. Instead, messages written in ink appeared beneath each of the portraits, leaving Twilight to assume that she would have to read them all if she wanted to make any progress. “Guess I should get reading.” She spoke to herself, not keen on the idea for once. She made her way to the first portrait on the far left, depicting a green stallion waving kindly. Underneath, the message read: “Knock on the door three times to open it. Would I lie?” The implication of lying led Twilight to believe that each of the portraits were going to try to trick her, and that only one would be telling the truth. She only hoped that it wouldn’t be too hard to find the truth teller. The next portrait displayed a brown mare standing, a blank look on her face. Her message read: “Knock on the door six times to open it. Would I lie?” Just as vague as the first message, Twilight decided to read on before passing judgement. The following portrait showed a yellow stallion standing proudly, his chest out. His message read: “The white mare speaks the truth!” This message sounded too good to be true, but she continued on regardless. On the other side of the door was the next portrait, a blue stallion shrugging. His message read: “The only truth-speaker is the green stallion.” Another gimme, but Twilight moved on to the next one. The next portrait displayed a happy white mare waving excitedly. Her message read: “Knock on the door four times to open it. Would I lie?” The pony’s expression reminded her of Pinkie, but her clue was just as vague as the first two. She moved on to the last portrait, hoping for a useful clue. The last portrait depicted a red mare with an annoyed look on her face. Her message read: “I agree with the yellow stallion.” One more gimme, but it was just enough to give Twilight an idea of who was telling the truth. “Let’s see.” She thought. “The green stallion and the brown and white mares are the only ones giving me any kind of direction for proceeding, so one of them must be telling the truth. The yellow and blue stallions said that their respective choice was the right one, so neither of them should be right. The red mare just agreed with the yellow stallion, so her choice doesn’t mean anything. Therefore, the brown mare must be the answer!” Twilight walked back to the door and did as the brown mare instructed, knocking on the door four times. She heard a click from the other side and found that she could now open the door. Inside, Twilight found a grey statue of a pony holding out its hoof, a yellow key in its grasp. She removed the key with her magic and turned to leave the room. Before she left the room however, Twilight heard the sound of a struggle going on outside, with things breaking and violent sounds erupting. She waited a moment, before opening the door and stepping back into the other room. Back in the room with the portraits, Twilight didn’t immediately find anything wrong, until she looked back at the portraits. Each of the portraits revealed that their expressions had turned angry and sinister, with each of them covered in what she hoped was red paint and brandishing a knife. The only portrait not to share their changes was the brown mare’s, whom had been cut and stabbed to pieces, leaking red paint all over and onto the ground. Even though it was just a painting, Twilight couldn’t help but feel responsible for the apparent murder of the brown mare, whose expression remained unchanged. It was like her blank look was glaring back at Twilight, wondering what she did to cause such a fate. Twilight quickly exited the room, leaving the metaphorical bloodshed behind. Twilight took a few deep breaths, trying to calm herself from her previous experience so that she could face her next one, the hanging dolls. She looked upon the dolls once more. This time however, all of their eyes seemed to be looking at her, as opposed to the closed or sporadic gazes that they had before. This just added to the already unsettling nature of them, as she knew she would have to traverse them in order to continue. Twilight began walking under and past all the dolls, feeling their eyes follow her, not daring to look up to see if it was true. At the end, she used the yellow key she had obtained to open the door, and made her way inside. The room she now found herself in was the strangest and most comforting thing that she had witnessed since entering this bizarre world. She was surrounded by trees that seemed to be growing straight out of the carpet, with a picture of a branch with a lone apple on the far wall. She was reminded of Applejack, and wished that she and her other friends were here to help her escape this nightmare. As she took a closer look at the painting, Twilight noticed that the apple seemed to be standing out from the picture in more than just context. She used her magic to try and grab the apple and found that she could! She let out a sigh of relief, as she brought the apple to her mouth looking to see if it was as juicy as it looked. Before she took a bite however, a couple thoughts went through her mind. Firstly, why was she about to take a bite out of an apple that came from a painting, it probably tasted like paint!? Secondly, she remembered that there was another who wanted to eat something, and this would probably be better for it than for her. The lips. Twilight kept the apple levitated with her magic and quickly made her way out of the room. As she entered the hallway with the dolls once more, she noticed that now all of their mouths were open, hungry looks on their still creepy faces. She figured they probably wanted the apple she had, and her thoughts were confirmed as she walked under and past the first doll. She watched as the rope holding the doll from the ceiling snapped, and the doll fell down towards her. Twilight quickly jumped out of the way as the doll hit the floor hard, its hungry gaze still upon her. She dashed down the hall, hearing doll after doll fall from the ceiling, hitting the ground with a fleshy thud. She rounded the corner to find the wiggling hoof still sticking out of the wall. She stayed in the middle of the hallway this time as she passed it, which proved to be for the best, as another hoof jutted out from the opposite wall near the end, just missing her. Twilight raced down the empty hallway and back to the lips. The lips neither moved nor spoke upon her arrival, until she levitated the apple right in front of them. In a flash, the lips sprung from the wall and gobbled the apple in a single bite. Twilight could hear it chewing loudly as its lips opened and closed, until it made a loud swallowing noise. The lips then made a slight smile, before finally speaking again. “Thanks for the meal. You may pass now.” The lips spoke, before opening wide enough to reveal a dark inside. Twilight could see razor sharp teeth that were not present when it spoke before and was hesitant to get anywhere near them. However, with nowhere else to go at the moment, Twilight decided to trust the lips. She closed her eyes and quickly leaped inside its gaping mouth. After passing through, the jaws snapped shut. An eerie silence filled the hallway. The lips then proceeded to lick themselves, before turning to a sinister smile. /)(\ /)(\ /)(\ /)(\ /)(\ Twilight opened her eyes to find herself still alive, and now in a long open hallway. She could see that adorned on both sides of the hallway and running all the way down, were images of a guillotine slowly being raised. She began making her way down the hallway and was actually amazed at the paintings. She had never seen sequential paintings placed one after another like this, even if they were depicting an old device used for executions. As she reached the end of the hallway, the guillotine had disappeared into the top of one of the paintings and Twilight could see stairs leading down in front of it. Excited to be making progress, Twilight took a few steps towards the stairs. However, in that same moment, Twilight heard the sound of a rope giving way above her and looked up to see the guillotine racing towards her. She jumped back, the guillotine only managing to slice a few hairs off the front of her mane, before landing with a crashing thud on the ground. Twilight’s heart raced a mile a minute, as she tried not to hyperventilate from almost being cut in half. She then watched, eyes wide open, as the guillotine slowly started to raise again. She waited for it to disappear into the dark ceiling above, before making a mad dash down the stairs, her heart still pounding. /)(\ /)(\ /)(\ /)(\ /)(\ Twilight reached the bottom of the stairs in a cold sweat, stopping to try and let her heart rest and to catch her breath. She had only lost one rose petal after placing the rose in the magical vase, but it already felt like things were now trying to kill her. She took a minute until she finally managed to calm herself down, taking one more deep breath before standing up to move on. Everything around her had now turned a dark red hue, causing her to wonder if it was just the layout of the land or her subconscious portraying death around her. Either way she picked her head up and began moving forward. Twilight took a few steps down the short hallway she found herself in, until she caught something dart in her vision in front of her. She stopped for a second before racing after it. She rounded the corner at the end to find nothing in the following corridor. She breathed a sigh of disappointment, before continuing on once more. It was another short hallway that she found herself in, with the only difference being that this one held a painting that looked like something that came out of the mind of Discord. Pink clouds and rain with birds playing instruments; truly something that Discord himself would have made, if he hadn’t already. Twilight turned the corner to find one more hallway with a red door at the end. Approaching it, she found that she could open it and proceeded through. Twilight then found herself in a large open area, with two tall statues and several paintings strewn about. One of the statues was of a blue mare looking off to her right, while the other was of a red mare looking back towards the blue. Twilight looked around a little more to find other paintings like that of a pony smoking, a geometrical pattern, and one that seemed almost lifelike. The painting in question, was that of a red mare, sitting peacefully on a stool. Twilight read the placard beneath it: “The Mare of Red.” Twilight wondered where Guertena had gotten the inspiration for the mare, as she looked like somepony who may have been real. The question remained in her mind as she turned to try the door that she had also found while she was wandering the room. After making it a few feet away from the painting, Twilight heard a loud thud behind her. She wanted to tell herself that the portrait had just fallen over, but by now she knew better. Twilight turned to see that the mare in the painting had indeed been lifelike, as her top half was now sticking out of the painting, a sinister grin on her face. The mare quickly began crawling towards Twilight, pulling herself along with her hooves. Twilight made a mad dash for the door, but found it to be locked. “Locked!? Now!? Why now!?” Twilight screamed. She looked back to see the mare quickly approaching and took off in a gallop to escape her. She rounded the other statues several times, trying to keep them between her and the mare. Rounding the red statue once more, Twilight saw what looked like a small red key laying on the ground where the mare had landed. She moved closer to pick it up with her magic, barely missing a surprise swipe from the mare, who rounded the other side of the statue. Twilight dashed around her and over to the door, unlocking it with the key. She promptly slammed the door shut behind her once inside. Twilight now found herself in a room with a door and several shelves of books. This would have eased her mind, if it weren’t for the pounding that she soon heard from the door she had closed. Twilight tried the door to once again find it locked. “Now is not the time!” Twilight exclaimed. The pounding starting getting louder as Twilight knew the mare would burst through any second. “Think Twilight, think!” Twilight told herself. “There must be a way out of here somewhere. Maybe one of these books has a key inside!” Twilight frantically began pulling out books from the shelves with her magic. She didn’t even bother trying to see what they were about, only concerned with seeing if there was a key within the pages. With every few books Twilight pulled the pounding got louder, until she finally pulled on one book that wouldn’t come all the way out. After pulling on it, Twilight heard a click from behind the door and dashed over to open it. In the same instance she opened the door, the one behind her burst open, the mare crawling inside. Twilight went though and slammed the door shut behind her, this time hearing several clicks from what she assumed were locking mechanisms. Twilight took a moment to catch her breath as she heard the mare frantically pound on the door, before giving up shortly after. She turned to see where she ended up this time, finding not only two more doors to her sides, but also a vase of water in front of her! She levitated the rose from behind her ear over to the vase and watched it emit the same blue magic as before. A rejuvenating feeling swept over her as she breathed a sigh of relief. She noticed that there was a painting next to the vase that seemed to depict the vase itself within it. She read the placard: “Eternal Blessing.” “Eternal huh?” Twilight thought to herself. “I wonder…” Twilight placed the rose back into the vase and discovered that it emitted the blue magic once again. “Amazing! It still works! I wonder why?” Twilight spoke aloud. She then took another look at the vase and the painting and discovered that they were both blue, as opposed to the brown vase that she had used before. “So blue vases have more than one use. Interesting. I’ll have to remember that if I see any more around here.” Twilight told herself. Twilight placed the rose back behind her ear and decided to try her hoof at one of the doors. The first door she tried, of course, wouldn’t open. With only one other option, Twilight made her way to the door across the room and found, go figure, that it was open. When she opened the door, she witnessed a sight she thought she would never see. There, collapsed on the ground in front of her was one of her dearest friends. Twilight rushed over to her side, frantically checking to see if she was okay. “Rainbow Dash!” She called.