//------------------------------// // The Prison of Despair // Story: Catherine: Love is Over? // by _No_One_Remains_ //------------------------------// Night 2, Prison of Despair- Floor One Shining Armor’s eyes jolted open as an ice-cold wind blew over him. He heard the terrified screams of a dozen ponies echo around him. He looked around, finding himself in the black void once again. This time, however, there were at least five other ponies around him, similar in shape and appearance to the pony from last night. Each pony had a single distinguishing characteristic, although they were subtle differences. The ponies hesitantly wandered through the large purple door in the middle of the black void, their heads twisting and turning in different directions, trying to figure out where they were. One after another, they entered through the door and found themselves in a horrific and gruesome tower. All around them, cages lined the massive brick walls that reached upward around the tower of blocks in the center. In each cage was another pony, identical to themselves, solid black with no defining features whatsoever. Armor looked around his surroundings, seeing all of the ponies screaming for help in their cages. There was more than just one tower of blocks in the center of this nightmarish room. Several of the ponies from within the black void were gathered on separate towers, climbing past different obstacles. Armor recognized one of the ponies on his tower. The pony had a blue mustache. The pony with the blue mustache turned to look at Armor. He said, “I’m glad to see that you made it out of last night’s tower alive. However, tonight’s tower will not be quite as simple.” He pointed a hoof upwards. Whereas last night’s tower was a simple staircase, tonight’s resembled more of a wall with footholds every few blocks up. Armor’s jaw dropped as he noticed the steep wall-like tower above them. “How are we supposed to climb this?!” he shouted. The pony with the blue mustache was just about to say something when a mysterious voice echoed around them. “I would like to welcome you to the Prison of Despair. This is the second floor of the tower. Assuming you can climb these walls, you will be able to see the light of day again.” The voice was hollow, eerie, and seemingly came from nowhere. Armor screamed, “Who the hell are you and where the hell are we?!” The voice called back, “You needn’t concern yourselves with that. Who I am is no matter for your concern. I may tell you if you survive this floor, however.” The pony with the blue mustache scoffed, “As if we can trust a voice with no body? Just tell us how we can find our way out of this place!” “The only way to escape is to climb. Try pulling and pushing the blocks around to make a staircase. It may sound simple, but you might just be surprised.” The voice laughed as it finished saying this. Armor looked at the block in front of him. Above him, a block was suspended in seemingly midair. Thinking about forming a set of stairs, Armor grabbed the block beside him and pulled it out, connecting edges with the block above him. He slipped from the platform, but his hooves held on to the corner of the block he had been standing on moments before. The pony with the blue mustache shouted, “Are you insane, sir?! That’s suicide!” Armor slid his hooves to the side, latching on to the block beside him and pulling him from the hanging position. He was now standing back on solid ground. “That was…scary. My hooves just latched on and wouldn’t let go…” Armor looked at his hooves, unsure of just why they had stopped his fall on their own. The mysterious voice laughed, “Very good, pony. You did well to form a passage up. Perhaps if you continue using your brain like that, you can reach the top.” Armor shouted upward, “What the fuck is going on here?! What’s the point of all this?” The voice said bluntly, “It’s all fun and games. Just remember that if you have no block to stand on, you can climb along the edges of the blocks. Perhaps you two can work together and reach the top?” The two ponies shared nods of agreement. Armor climbed up the steps he had just formed, the pony with the blue mustache (PWBM) following him. Reaching the top of the steps that had been formed, the two found themselves at another dead end. With a loud rumbling sound, a few rows of blocks fell from the bottom of the tower. A terrified shriek echoed in the void as a pony fell down into the nothingness. PWBM noticed a pair of blocks suspended a few rows up above them. He moved to the end of the row and pulled a block from the wall. Sidling along the corners of the blocks, he pulled it closer to the opposite edge. Armor watched as PWBM stood on top of it and pulled another block from the wall. The uppermost block flashed blue as it connected to the pair above it. PWBM leaped from the newly-pulled block and landed beside the first one. “If we use our brains and think about it, we can simply form stairs by crawling along the edges and abusing the physics of this strange place.” PWBM pulled the first block back one step, forming a staircase leading to the pair of blocks above them. Armor hung off the side of the blocks, sidling past the first block on the stairs. He lifted himself back onto the platform and followed PWBM up the new staircase. “That was quick thinking, pal.” Armor sighed as they continued climbing up the wall of blocks. Taking turns pushing and pulling blocks and planning routes to continue upward, the pair eventually made it to the very top of this tower. Up above them was a solid platform that wasn’t made of blocks. In the center of the final row of blocks was a large golden block with a rope hanging right above it. Armor stepped up onto the golden block. “Go ahead and pull it. I assume it will take us to the landing above.” PWBM nodded, and Armor leaped up and pulled the rope down. With a rumbling sound, a series of golden blocks fell one by one, connecting at their edges, building a staircase upward to the landing. Armor and PWBM cheered as they climbed the staircase. They found themselves stepping onto a landing filled with pews and a small building on the far side. Above the building, bells were ringing loudly. There were a few other ponies sitting on the landing, either on the ground or in a pew. A pony with a black necklace sighed in exhaustion, “At least we get a break… What is this, some kind of chapel?” A pony with a red tie wheezed, “I think so. Seems like this is just the way to another tower.” He pointed a hoof upward, noticing a bunch of block towers hanging in the air above them. PWBM plopped down beside the two new stallions. “I suppose we’ll have to continue climbing until we reach the door?” Armor sighed, taking a seat with the trio, “Looks to be that way. Why are we here…?” The mysterious voice from before called to the ponies on the landing, “I’m glad to see you all made it this far. Whenever you wish to continue climbing, just step into the confessional and have a seat. I should warn you, though: The towers will only become harder from here on out.” The pony with a red tie (PWRT) shouted at the voice, “What kind of sick game is this?! Why do we have to keep climbing?” The pony with a black necklace (PWBN) sighed, “Because we want to live. You don’t have to climb if you don’t want to, but I’m not letting myself die here.” The mysterious voice laughed, “My, aren’t you determined? You are forced to climb because someone from your world put you here. It’s as simple as that. Now, I would suggest you keep climbing, lest you let yourselves fall with the landing…” The voice faded away, its laugh still echoing. Armor looked at the trio of ponies and chuckled, “We don’t have a choice, fellas. I’m going on ahead. Try not to get killed on your way up.” PWBM slapped a hoof on Armor’s shoulder. “I wish you the best of luck. We’ll meet up on the next landing, be it tonight or tomorrow.” “Assuming this will still go on tomorrow…” PWBN scoffed. PWRT laughed, “Of course it will! Didn’t you hear the voice? It said somepony wanted us to be here! That means we’ll keep coming back!” Armor laughed, “Then we’ll keep climbing! Promise me you guys will survive. We’re going to meet again, got it?” He turned on his hooves and headed for the small building at the back of the landing. “Good luck, my friend!” PWBM called to him. Armor approached the building with a sense of foreboding. He drew back the red curtain of the door on the right to reveal a small booth with a single-person bench and a small window. It looked just like a chapel confessional booth. There was a small portrait on the back wall of the booth. It depicted Armor hanging from a ♀ symbol. The mysterious voice called, “Perhaps you ought to sit down now. I mean, we can’t start the interrogation without you being comfortable. Hahaha!” Armor looked at the small bench and took a deep breath. He sat down and asked, “What is this place?” The voice answered, “This is where stallions are sent to be judged for their wrongdoings. I thought you would have figured that out, what with all the ponies locked away in here.” Armor remembered seeing the ponies trapped inside the cages at the start of the tower. “They’re being punished for doing wrong? So why the hell am I here? I’ve done nothing wrong!” “That isn’t for you to decide, Shining Armor. You may be a guard captain, but you are not one to judge your crimes. Now, to the point. I’ve answered a question of yours, now you answer a question of mine.” Two ropes fell from the roof of the confessional, one on either side of Armor, and the voice laughed. “You must kiss one of the following: a cephalopod-like alien or a beautiful corpse. Which one do you choose? Your options are respective to the left and right ropes.” Armor’s eyes widened at the question. “What kind of fucked up question is that?!” “Just answer the question. The sooner you do, the sooner you can get back to climbing.” The voice sounded irritated. Armor looked back and forth from rope to rope. “A squid…or a dead person…?” As much as he hated to make the decision, it didn’t take long to do so. His hoof grabbed the rope on the right and pulled. “So, that’s your answer? Very well then. Allow me to take you to your next trial.” The booth began to rumble loudly before lifting itself from the ground. Armor watched as the landing below him grew smaller and smaller as the booth lifted ever higher. Finally it stopped moving, and he was pushed from the booth by an unseen force. He found himself standing at the bottom of another tower of blocks. Night 2, Prison of Despair- Floor Two The imprisoned ponies still surrounded the tower. There were several other ponies already climbing the other towers. Armor looked down, but saw nothing but a giant black void once again. He looked up the tower and found it was a simple enough puzzle. All he would need to do is remember to cling from the side of blocks to maneuver around them. The first few steps were simple. Push a block here; pull another there. After a few steps, however, the walls got higher and the steps got fewer. There were two blocks suspended above him a few steps up. Looking around and examining the row he was left with, Armor tried to find a way to form a bridge. He remembered PWBM’s technique earlier: To pull out a block and stand on top of it, then pull out the block above it. By doing this, Armor was easily able to push the blocks in a certain order that would build a staircase up to the two suspended blocks. He climbed up and found himself standing on a solid, flat row of blocks. There were a few easy steps up before Armor reached another wall. He stopped to think about the situation for a second. Unlike last time, there were no suspended blocks for him to build to. He tried to see if he could build a staircase from scratch. After a minute of thinking without success, the mysterious voice called to him. “You aren’t stuck already, are you Armor? I’ll give you a little hint: If you can’t climb up a wall, try knocking it down. A block will only connect to the corner of a block beside it. If you remove the support blocks, the others will fall.” “Why are you helping me?” Armor scoffed. When the voice didn’t reply, Armor decided to try and use the new trick to get up the wall. He started pushing all the blocks from the two sides of the wall. After pushing the first three from the left, the three columns they had supported fell into place one after another. They built a simple staircase up the wall. All Armor needed to do was pull another block out and use it to get to the staircase. Armor flinched as a loud ringing sound echoed out of nowhere. He looked all around, trying to pinpoint the source of the ringing. A voice called to him from below. “The ringing means you’re almost at the landing! Keep climbing!” Armor looked down to find PWBN below him, climbing up the blocks Armor had just moved. Armor called back, “Are you sure about that?” PWBN laughed, “Don’t you see the golden block?” He pointed a hoof up past Armor, the golden block shining brightly. There was another rope above it. Armor looked down at PWBN and nodded. Without wasting any time, he continued his trek up the tower. He moved a few blocks here and there to make a step to climb on. Finally, after another dozen rows of blocks, Armor stepped up on the golden block, ready to be done with this tower of blocks. He leaped up and yanked the rope from the air. Another set of golden blocks fell down as a staircase up to the landing. Armor climbed up with enthusiasm, PWBN close behind. The two sat down on the ground near the staircase and waited for the other two ponies from the previous landing. After a few more minutes, PWBM and PWRT showed up, exhausted and totally out of it. Armor laughed, “Glad to see you guys alive!” PWBN sighed, “I think the next tower is the last for tonight. You can see the faint glow of the door up there.” He pointed a hoof up, showing the other three the faint white light. PWRT groaned, “This sucks. We actually have to climb another one to get out?” PWBM scoffed, “Quit complaining about these hardships. Just think, tomorrow night you’ll be ready for another round! I imagine we’ll all be back tomorrow, correct?” Armor shook his head in disappointment, “Yeah. More than likely, anyway.” The mysterious voice called to them once more, “You really should hurry, everypony. The night is almost over, and you’re all still trapped in here.” Armor laughed, “Not for long, you freak! We’re getting out of here tonight!” The other three ponies looked at him with curiosity. Armor returned their gaze with a determined expression. He smiled and nodded, standing to his hooves and taking a few steps toward the confessional. The three waved their wishes of good luck and watched him enter the small booth. He was greeted by the mysterious voice again, this time with an excited tone. “You lived! I’m truly surprised you did it! But we shouldn’t dilly-dally here. I’ll get straight to the question.” Two ropes fell to Armor’s sides. “Does your job always come first? Yes or no?” Armor thought about it for a second before raising a hoof. He said, “Not always. There are times when loved ones and personal matters are more important than a job.” He pulled the rope on his right, representative of the ‘no’ option. “So that’s what you think? Oh well… I hope you’re ready for the big one tonight. The next tower is the last one for tonight. If you don’t think fast enough, you might find yourself on the wrong end of a hoof. Hahaha!” The voice’s laugh echoed as the confessional booth lifted into the air… Night 2, Prison of Despair- Final Floor Once more, Armor watched as the landing below him shrank into nothingness, instead being replaced by a dark void. He listened to the screams of other ponies around him, all of them trapped in cages and falling from their towers. Armor was pushed from the booth and left standing on the first row of blocks of the final tower. He saw the white light of the door at the very top. He laughed as he looked the wall over. This wall looked nearly identical to the previous one. None of the blocks looked hard to access or any harder to traverse. The only thing different that he noticed about this wall was that some blocks were black instead of white. He didn’t think that the color was too important, so he had an optimistic and cocky attitude about this last tower. A horrific roar echoed from the void below him. “You’ll never escape, Armor! I won’t let you escape!” Armor looked into the blackness to see a pair of pink, golden-tipped hooves appear from nowhere. One hoof carried a large knife in it while the other was empty. There were locks of different-colored hair wrapped around the two arms. Armor thought that the voice sounded familiar, but he wasn’t sure. It was distorted and hollow. Before having much time to think about what was going on, Armor found himself staring at the pair of hooves and the shining knife. He leaped back and up a single step as one hoof brought the knife cutting across the bottom row of blocks. The blocks went tumbling into the darkness as the creature roared in anger. The mysterious voice laughed, “Tonight you’ll be facing the Fist of Grudge. It’s a killer, don’t die!” Armor looked up behind him and started thinking about his path upwards. He leaped to his hooves and immediately started pulling out block after block, trying to make a staircase as he had the previous tower. He had to be wary of the pair of hooves flailing around wildly behind him. He narrowly moved out of the way as the empty hoof crashed into the block he was standing on, cracking it. Luckily, Armor had finished making his staircase in no time, and darted across the cracked block and up the others as fast as he could. He watched as the knife cut across the few rows of blocks below him and knocked them into the void. His heart pounded as he realized he had narrowly escaped falling to his death. The empty hoof flailed in his direction, missing the tower completely. The creature screamed, “I’m not letting you get away!” Armor screamed back at it, “What the hell are you, anyway?!” He scrambled up another few blocks before coming to another wall. The entire row of blocks in front of him was black. He tried to pull one out, and found that it did move, if only very slowly. They were heavier than the white ones, and it took him longer to build his stairs up. After he had pulled out the sufficient number of blocks to reach the next level of the tower, he darted upward. As he reached the top, he lost his footing and fell down a block. The empty hoof flew right at him. He hurriedly leaped up to the next step, and the hoof cracked the block he was standing on. He ran to the other side of the row, trying to catch his breath and think about how to proceed. The creature grew quiet for a moment, and Armor heard a faint ringing sound. He looked up with hopeful eyes to see that the door was only two steps above him. He cheered and jumped for joy as he realized he was almost out of this mess. He tried to pull out the last few blocks he would need, but none of the blocks on this row would budge. He took a look at them and realized they were different. They were black, just like the heavy blocks, but they had the emblem of a sheep’s head engraved into them. “You’re fucking kidding me! Why won’t they move?!” Armor pushed and pulled with all his might, but these blocks wouldn’t move at all. The mysterious voice called to him, “Looks like you’re up shit creek without a paddle, eh? I would hate to cheat you out of surviving such an amazing encounter. I’m not supposed to do this, but here’s a present from me to you.” A bottle appeared on the block beside Armor. He picked it up and read the label. It said ‘Energy Drink: Allows for two steps to be taken in one.’ Armor popped the top and gulped it down, a golden light engulfing him. His muscles started to burn and his nerves began jitter. He felt so pumped full of adrenaline that he jumped from the spot he stood and latched on to the block two steps above him. Without wasting time, he darted over to the golden block and climbed on top, placing a hoof on the door. It slid open slightly, letting a little more light shine in. The creature threw its arms up to meet him at the highest level of the tower. It thrashed its arms wildly. It screamed, “Don’t you run! I WON’T let you escape... You won’t...escape...!” The hoof with the knife went flying at Armor as fast as it could. Armor shoved the door open a little wider, and a beam of solid white light pierced through the two hooves and shredded them with its intensity. The creature screamed in agony and anger as its arms were disintegrated by the pure light. Armor raised a hoof in the air and cheered as he watched the creature leave. “Woo-hoo! I did it! I survived another night!” He had a smug look on his face as he stepped into the white light of the doorway. The light engulfed him as he passed through, the nightmare around him melting away into nothingness… “For man, as for flower and beast and bird, the supreme triumph is to be most vividly, most perfectly alive.” –D.H. Lawrence