A Canterlot Ghost Tale

by volrathxp

Chapter Nine: Night Twenty-Seven

A Canterlot Ghost Tale

Chapter Nine: Night Twenty-Seven

Bon Bon screamed until she was hoarse. She had to run, but where? Where could she run that the thing could not find her? I can't move... she thought to herself. Why can't I move?!

Lyra's eyes widened with fear. The thing that had been controlling her was this monster? She had to get Bonnie out of there. She tried to take a step but couldn't, paralyzed by the creature's unblinking red eyes.

The beast licked its lips, grinning widely.

“Yes... you see now how futile it is to run,” it said in it's grunting voice. “This place belongs to me. There is nowhere you can go that I cannot hunt you down.”

“L-l-leave us alone!” Lyra shouted shakily.

The beast chuckled softly. “How quaint,” it said. “The little pony wants to be the hero now. I'd choose your words carefully, pony. I'm feeling rather peckish at the moment.”

Lyra tried to nudge Bon Bon, but couldn't even lift her leg. The thing was going to eat them! They had to get out of there! She growled underneath her breath, struggling to move even just a tiny bit.

A light caught Lyra's attention out of the corner of her eye. A picture hung on the ruined wall behind the monster. It was the picture of her and Bon Bon on vacation. It shimmered brightly until something else appeared in the image between the two mares. A filly. She smiled happily up at them.

You can do this! A voice in Lyra's head shouted. He can't touch you right now. You can beat him! Grab Momma and get out of there! Help is on the way!

Lyra blinked. Shaking her head, she moved to lift her hoof, finding the action far easier this time. She grabbed onto Bon Bon's shoulder, shaking her as hard as she should. “Bonnie! We've got to move!”

Bon Bon's mouth closed and her head turned to Lyra. “Lyra...?”

“That's right, it's me. Bonnie, come on. He can't touch us, otherwise he'd have done so already. So let's get out of here already!” Lyra replied.

Bon Bon nodded, following behind Lyra towards the doorway. She heard chuckling from behind her.

“Yes... run. I want to see you scamper, little pony,” the creature said. “I want to taste your fear. It will make the inevitable so much sweeter.”

Bon Bon shuddered as she pushed open the door after Lyra. The door had deposited them back into the hospital hallway from before. The cream-colored mare sighed and slumped against the concrete wall.

“We can't get out of here, Lyra. It's over. This thing... whatever it is, it has us for good,” she said.

“Bonnie,” Lyra said. “We have to keep moving. We can beat this thing. After all... we've got each other, right?”

“It's no use,” Bon Bon replied. “This is the kind of stuff that the Princesses handle, Lyra. How can we even begin to stop this thing?”

Lyra grimaced, placing a hoof on Bon Bon's side. “You've got to believe. Believe like you did for me. Remember? You're the one who helped remind me who I was.”

“I had a little help with that,” Bon Bon said.

“Cute little filly?”

“How did –?”

“Yeah, I saw her too,” Lyra said, sighing. “I'm not sure what's going on here, but she told me that help's on the way. We have to trust that. Now come on, let's keep moving before that thing decides that it's done playing with us.”

Bon Bon looked down at her hooves and only nodded. She followed behind Lyra as they began to navigate through the maze of the hospital. After what felt like an eternity, the two mares stopped to get their bearings.

“I could have sworn we've seen that orange cone already,” Lyra said.

“We don't have time for this,” Bon Bon said, pushing past Lyra to open one of the nearby doors. Darkness pervaded the room beyond it, but from what the cream-colored mare could make out, it was an operating room. “Nothing here.”

“That thing is messing with us,” Lyra said. “Trying to get us turned around. We can't let it.”

“Too late, Lyra,” Bon Bon said. “It already has us right where it wants us.”

“But why the hospital then? Why are we here and not the house? It doesn't make any sense,” Lyra tried to reason.

“What do you mean?” Bon Bon asked. “That thing made up the whole hospital thing, didn't it?”

Lyra grew quiet. Bon Bon raised an eyebrow.

“Lyra? It made that part up, right?”

“No... there really was a hospital visit. You really did try to kill yourself,” Lyra said, sighing. “At first I thought it was because of the problems we had with the house, that obsessing over it so much had finally made you snap. But that wasn't it. It was that thing. It made you try to do that to yourself, by using me. It had already gotten to me.”

“I... I see,” Bon Bon said quietly. “So then... Doctor Care was real. The whole Unicorn Foal Syndrome thing, too.”

“Yes. You were repressing your first visit to him for some reason,” Lyra replied. She put a hoof up to her chin. “You know... come to think of it, I don't even really remember your first visit either.”

“So... what, I'm crazy?” Bon Bon said.

“No!” Lyra protested. “You're not crazy, Bonnie. I mean... look at where we're at. If you're crazy, so am I. I just... I wanted to help you. The stress was getting to you, so I took you in for an evaluation. And then that night happened, and you tried to... you know.”

“It's fine, Lyra. I understand. I'd have done the same for you, after all,” Bon Bon replied, reaching in to give her wife a nuzzle.

Lyra frowned. “Still doesn't explain how we ended up here, though.”

“You're right, that doesn't make any sense,” Bon Bon said, kicking a hoof. “If the hospital was real then how does this thing know about it?”

“We could both be dreaming,” Lyra said. “And this is some sort of shared dream space that the monster has chosen to inhabit.”

“If we are dreaming, then where's Princess Luna? She usually helps guard against bad nightmares, you know that,” Bon Bon said softly. “No, we're really here. Something about the inside of that house... it brought us here.”

“Regardless of how we got here, one of these doors has to go somewhere,” Lyra replied. The seagreen unicorn grimaced and reached out with her magic, opening the next door further down the hall. She blinked. It opened to the outside world. The dark streets of Old Canterlot greeted her eyes. “Bonnie, over here!”

“What is it?” Bon Bon replied. Her eyes saw the outside as well. “You found it. You found it!” She jumped up and down in place.

“Easy there, sweetie. We can't assume anything. This could be one of that monster's tricks,” Lyra said softly.

Further down each side of the hall, the lights began to shake and rattle. Bon Bon looked up and flattened her ears. One by one the lights began to shut off. The walls began to discolor and rot under the sway of the darkness. The floor started cracking and something very big in the dark was moving closer and closer to them. The doorway to the outside world began to stretch away from the two mares. A deep laughter filled the air.

“You will never be free of me,” the voice of the creature said. “Feel free to keep running. I do so enjoy the hunt.”

Two giant red eyes popped open in the darkness. Bon Bon's own eyes widened as she stared into the smoldering pits of despair. The beast was close. Very close. There wasn't any time to consider that this might be a trap.

“Not enough time!” she shouted, pushing Lyra down the hallway.

The two mares galloped down the hall, the floorboards cracking and rotting beneath their very hooves as they soared towards the open door at the end. Howls of glee echoed down the hallway, and the darkness began to get closer. Bon Bon yelped as something nicked her on the rear. The monster would take them. It would have her foal. She couldn't stop it!

“Keep running, Bonnie!” Lyra yelled. “We're almost there!”

Bon Bon growled under her breath and kept trying to keep up to her wife, but her pregnant frame could only take so much. She tripped, falling forward to the ground. The darkness roared above her. “Lyra!”

Lyra stopped on a dime and turned around. “Leave her alone!” she shouted. Her horn glowed, spewing forth a burst of magic light at the darkness. It shrank back, giving the unicorn enough time to help lift her wife with her magic. Steadily, Lyra and Bon Bon made it to the exit and leaped through.

The lights turned off behind them, a fevered howling piercing the still night. It continued until the door finally closed. Bon Bon sat up, blinking. The house stood there, mocking the two mares with its very existence. Howls of pain and rage erupted from the structure until finally they died down.

“We did it,” the cream mare said. “We got out!”

“I... I can't believe it,” Lyra said, shuffling to her hooves. “It can't have been that easy...”

“Are you two alright?” a voice said from behind them.

Lyra turned to see an elder unicorn standing up the road. Her eyes narrowed at the pony.

“Archibald?” Bon Bon interjected.

The unicorn blinked and continued on as if he hadn't heard her. “I came out of the house to see what was causing such loud noises, and I found you two instead. Are you alright?”

“We're fine,” Lyra said shortly.

“We... we escaped the house!” Bon Bon shouted. “It almost had us, but we got out!”

The elder unicorn frowned. “I see. You both appear to be in some distress. Please, follow me to my house. I will brew up some tea and get you calmed down.”

“We'll be alright,” Lyra replied.

“Lyra, we could use his help, he knows how to beat the house,” Bon Bon said.

Lyra grimaced and then sighed. “Bonnie... Archibald never existed,” she said quietly.

Bon Bon looked down at her hooves. “Oh, right. Well we could still use the help. We have to let somepony know about the house.”

“Ladies?” the unicorn said. “Are you okay? What happened to you?”

Lyra turned and smiled. “Sorry, you were saying something about tea?”

********************************************

“So you're saying that the house at the end of the street is...” the old unicorn said as he dipped his sugars into his tea.

“Haunted,” Bon Bon said. “More like possessed, really.”

“I see. And you also say that I look like a neighbor, a professor of some sorts,” the unicorn replied.

“You'll have to excuse that part, sir,” Lyra interjected. “My wife... she's on a program to assist with some medical issues she's having. She believes you are this Archibald she says she met. Rest assured, we only moved in a few weeks ago.”

“Yes... the lyre player for the Orchestra,” the old unicorn said. He took a sip of his tea. “So, this house... it tried to trap you inside then?”

“Yes,” Bon Bon said. “We only just escaped with our lives. We have to call the Princesses, the Royal Guard, anypony to come and stop that thing!”

“Calm down, Bonnie,” Lyra said. She turned and rubbed on her wife's shoulder. “Remember the foal.”

“Yes... well, how do you know for sure that you actually escaped the house?” the unicorn suddenly asked, interrupting the two before their argument could take place. Lyra's eyes snapped up to meet the older pony's own.

“What? What do you mean?” she said.

The older unicorn grinned. “I mean, how do you know that you're not still trapped inside?”

“Because... wait...” Lyra started to say. “I... I don't understand.” Her eyes widened.

“Yes... you are starting to figure it out,” the older unicorn said. His horn glowed and his features suddenly began to shift. They started to take on the appearance of another, notably the same that Bon Bon had described to her as that of Professor Archibald.

“Professor...?” Bon Bon said, eyes widening.

Archibald raised an eyebrow and grinned again. Sharp teeth lined his jaws. His eyes glowed bright red. Two leathery wings sprouted from the older unicorn's back as his coat began to shift to the same consistency as dragon scales

“I told you before, you cannot outrun me,” he said, grinning menacingly. “I will have your foal, and I will be reborn.”

Author's Note:

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Comments

[Mad Maudlin]

Why is everything in bold?

[volrathxp]

5180531

No idea. I will look into it.

Edit: fixed!

[Brody Deitrick]

ok archy meet my hoof!