Spooked

by Mr. Grimm

Trapped

Trixie felt her heart quicken its pace as she whirled around and gaped at the closed doors. The magician felt her knees grow weak as she gazed at the palled wood that seemingly moved all on its own. She stumbled over to the doors, breathing heavily through her grimace. The unicorn locked her hooves onto the brass knobs and twisted with all her might. They didn’t budge. Trixie tried turning them the other way. Again, nothing. The doors rattled furiously on their hinges as she pushed against them with her full weight. The mare let out a frustrated wail as she grabbed the knobs and threw herself backward in a frantic attempt to pry them apart. She only succeeded in losing her grip and falling over onto the damp floor.

Trixie sat up and gazed in dumbfounded fear at the doors. The fall had been enough to break her out of her panic. She was a unicorn--What was she doing? The mare quickly got to her hooves and aimed her horn at one of the keyholes. She knew from experience that lock picking spells were difficult. It was like sending a limb into the keyhole and feeling your way around, pressing down on the tumblers as you found them. Trixie’s horn glowed faintly as she sent the psychic probe into the lock. Her face twisted into fearful confusion. The lock was old, and its workings were unfamiliar to her. But her desperation forced her to press on. She slowly felt her way around the rusted innards, looking for anything that held the slightest resemblance to a tumbler.

An ecstatic smile made its way on to the unicorn’s face as she found one. Trixie pressed it down, and her effort was rewarded with a satisfying click. A little further in she found another. Trixie’s small smile grew larger as she realized that she was only a short ways from the other side of the keyhole. She felt around for the last tumbler, and almost jumped for joy when she found it. Trixie let out a sigh of relief as the whole lock let out a mechanical click. The unicorn tenderly touched the knob with her hoof and gave it a gentle twist. It turned perfectly. This victory strengthened the mare’s resolute, and she moved to undo the second lock. She was almost out.

Trixie’s mouth fell open as she heard the first lock click again. She stumbled as she tried to keep herself from falling. Her horn faded as she blinked back tears.

“N…no…” she choked. The magician gulped, trying to hydrate her terror-dried throat. Trixie’s already weakened knees gave out, and she sat and stared at the double locks, her mouth trembling in despair. The unicorn grimly understood the futility of her situation. She could have tried a dozen times to unlock the doors, but would only ever get one open before whatever was holding her relocked it again. This thought was coupled with an even darker realization: Trixie was trapped in the mansion.

The mare turned to look back at her surroundings. The moldering room was no longer only melancholy. It was terrifying. Trixie knew that everything within it had been left untouched for decades. It was clear from the extent of the decay, from the layers of dust. Every decaying object was a corpse of what it once was, and this place was the crypt they had been laid to rest in. The unicorn paled. She wasn’t trapped anymore. She was entombed. Nopony knew where she was, and nopony would ever think to look in this forsaken place. She would starve to death before long, and even if someday they did find her body, all that would remain would be a nameless pile of putrid bones.

Mindless panic crept into the mare once more. Without thinking she jumped to her hooves and began to pound on the defiant doors. Bits of mold and discolored paint flaked off with each strike. The blows echoed throughout the silent manor.

“Help!” she screamed for nopony to hear, “Help me!” But she already knew that help would not come. The nearest town was five miles away, and there were no houses nearby. But still she persisted, beating her hooves against the door until they turned red. Trixie gave one last slam, and then sunk to the ground. It was hopeless. She wasn’t getting out this way.

But a small candle of hope appeared in the darkness of her plight. Ironically it was born out of the doors that kept her in. There were two of them. It suddenly occurred to Trixie that such a large house would have to have more than one way in. But this thought was quickly snuffed out by another. Whatever had locked the front doors could just as easily lock any other door in the manor. Even if the magician found the courage to travel through the deserted manor, even if she found every door, it would be locked before she could open it. Once more Trixie was thrown into a spiral of despair. The unicorn sat on the dusty floor and put her face in her hooves.

The sound of wood scraping against wood suddenly cut through the quiet of the manor like a jagged knife. Trixie’s head shot out of her hooves, her face awash with fear. Her eyes were greeted by the same eerie tranquility she had first seen upon gazing into the mansion. The unicorn’s heart began to race as she looked over the ruined furniture. That same little irrational part of her brain told her that something was watching from between the tattered loveseats and half-collapsed chairs. It were as though she were peering into a thicket where an unseen predator waited motionlessly to pounce on its prey.

The noise sounded off a second time. Trixie’s blood froze in her veins as she saw a small wooden chair move all on its own, traveling an inch toward her. It did not give off any sort of glow to indicate that it was being manipulated by magic. Trixie shrank back against the door, scrunching up as tightly as she could. Her horrified eyes were trained on the chair as it once again moved in her direction, this time even further. Some part of her mind that wasn’t scared to death made her feel worse by realizing that she was being terrified by a chair, one of the most mundane objects imaginable. But it wasn’t the chair that she was afraid of. It was what was moving it.

The chair paused in its unnatural advance, the dust once gathered on its seat floating into the air surrounding it. Silence. Trixie waited for it to being again, too frightened to wipe away the accumulating sweat on her brow. The saline liquid trickled into her face and stung the edges of her eyes. She needed to blink, but felt that if she closed her eyes they might not open again. Trixie’s facial muscles twitched violently as they tried to resist the impulse.

In the split second she blinked, a series of high-pitched chimes shattered the dead silence. It felt like a physical blow to her heart. The unicorn’s eyes snapped open and looked for whatever was about to disembowel her. There was nothing but the chair, sitting where it had been moments ago. By now her fear-addled brain was catching up to what she had heard. It was the sound of somepony running a hoof over the first few keys of a piano. Immediately her eyes swiveled over to gave at the dusty piano near the couches.

The dark form blended into the shadows as the last light of the sun faded from the sky. It appeared to her as a massive black beast, baring its yellowed ivory teeth at her. It let out a dissonant roar as invisible hooves slammed down on the minor end of the keyboard, one, two, three, four times, growing louder with each strike. The noise was drawn out as the peddles were held down, becoming a vibrating growl. The mare’s palled face grimaced as she listened to the guttural murmur die out, returning the room to its eerie soundlessness. It was the calm before the storm, a storm that would never end.

Trixie screamed as a thunderous groan suddenly echoed throughout the mansion. It emanated from the very heart of the building, sounding as though a monstrous beast was waking up from a long slumber. Trixie became aware that she was running, though she had no idea where. The unicorn’s blood pounded in her ears as her heart worked double time, fueling her flight down a darkened hallway.

Comments

[ManestreamMMR]

AHHHHHHHH GRINDHOUSE!!!!!!!!!!

Excellent description

[That_one_guy]

Shit's getting paranormal.

[Twifight Sparkill]

"Listen! Do you smell that?"

Ah, Ghostbusters. I still love you.

[Violently Irrelevant]

Here's a reading for this chapter.

More coming eventually!