Chapter 4
The Haunting
Admiral Biscuit
There’s something about the night. Something special, as if the veil between the mystical and mundane is thinner in the darkness. Perhaps it is.
In the bright light of the morning, all my thoughts of the night fled as if they were dreams, as if the light chased the shadows away. In the light of the morning, the idea of ghosts was silly. The idea that my house might be haunted was absurd.
And yet.
Sure, I’d seen things that were mysterious. The strange light in the flower garden; that was something I couldn’t explain. The way that my cupboard doors sometimes opened, that was another thing. I’d wiggled around the cabinets, just a bit, and the doors didn’t come open. But I’d never tried that at night, or first thing in the morning, when the house was still settled.
In the light of day, it was easy to imagine that the house might settle in such a way that the cupboard doors had a proclivity to creep open, one which they did not have during the day.
In the light of the day, it was easy to imagine that the ghost-light I’d seen in the garden was some unicorn spell that had gotten away. Their horns glowed when they cast a spell, and the target of the spell usually glowed, but what happened if they missed their spell? James Thurber thought that mis-aimed spells clanged off the moon, but it seemed more likely that they might just drift around.
Those were the kind of thoughts that I never would have had back on Earth, but here in Equestria 'magic' was a perfectly logical explanation for a phenomenon, and I still didn't know what the limits of magic were. It was something that I hadn't really asked too many questions about, not after I'd figured out that the average pony couldn't really answer the question properly anyways.
That was frustrating when I first moved to Equestria. Obviously, books on Earth had been written on the subject, and I had read some of them, but they were either written at a primer level, or a dense theoretical paper that might as well have been Greek. I'd foolishly assumed that unicorns could explain it better, but that wasn't the case. They could tell me what spells did, and what spells they knew and didn’t know, and that was about it. I’m sure there were unicorn prodigies like Twilight Sparkle who had a much deeper understanding, although odds are if she was given a question about magic, I wouldn’t understand the answer. What I really needed to find was a pony in the middle ground who maybe wasn’t a genius, but who could also explain how it worked so human would understand it.
Could a unicorn make a spell that would make it appear that there was a ghost in my house? Perhaps yes, but why? The only reason I could think of would be to chase me out, and there’d be more effective ways to do that. Repeated swarms of wasps, for example. Maybe a dumb teenage prank, but all the ones I’d participated in as a teenager were a lot less subtle.
I made my first of what would turn out to be many forays to the library. Ponies of course don’t use the Dewey Decimal system, and I was worried that the events from last night had already made the rounds. The last thing I needed was to get a reputation for being eccentric
Naturally, there weren’t any non-fiction books about ghosts in the library. Not even in the self-help section, which felt like a logical place to find them if ghost infestations were a problem facing the average pony.
•••••
After dinner, I went back up to the attic. I'd been thinking over the night before, and the one detail that had stuck in my mind was stepping on a toy. And sure enough, it was there, a little wooden duck pull-toy with one broken wheel.
I didn't have enough stuff to really need the attic, and that box hadn't been in my way. When I'd first moved in, I'd thought that I might track down the old owner of the house and see if he wanted it back, but that was a dead end now. And then I'd decided that I was going to take it to a secondhand shop, or maybe put it out on the street with a “Free” sign on it, but I hadn’t. Out of sight, out of mind.
I sat on the attic floor and turned the wooden duck over in my hands, thinking about how there had been a young pony in this house once. Perhaps more than one; the duck could have been passed from sibling to sibling. And at some point, the children had gotten too old for their toys, so they'd been boxed up and maybe brought upstairs as memories.
It didn't tell me anything, and after I'd brought a couple of empty boxes into the attic, giving me a convenient excuse to be up there, I tossed it back in the toybox.
•••••
For the next couple of days, nothing weird happened. The stallion who had been up on the roof with his marefriend apologized, and said that he’d pay for any damage. Since the roof hadn’t leaked the last time it had rained, and since I reasoned that roofs were probably designed to have pegasi land on them, I told him not to worry about it.
I watched ponies as they passed by my house, but none of them were crossing over to the other side of the street as they went by, or pointing, or making the sign of the cross as they went by. That didn’t rule out a spirit, I decided, but did suggest if there was one, it wasn’t well-known around town. Or else ponies didn’t fear it—I was really getting nowhere.
I would have put the whole incident down as some kind of panic attack or hallucination brought on by the stress of moving to a new town, if it hadn't been for a filly coming by to see if I had any extra boxes.
I did, so I went upstairs and opened the attic, and damned if the toybox wasn't tipped over on its side, with no toys to be found anywhere.
For the longest time, I just stood there looking at it, trying to formulate some rational explanation for how that could happen. There were no locks; burglars could have done it. But why steal toys? There was plenty of better stuff, and none of it was missing. And if it was burglars, why not take the box, too? It’d be a lot easier to carry that way.
I was completely lost in thought, so when I heard a girl’s voice behind me, I nearly jumped out of my skin. But it was just the filly . . . she’d wondered why it was taking me so long and come inside to investigate.
I helped her stack boxes on her wagon until it could carry no more, and then once she’d gone down the street, I went back upstairs to the attic. There were a couple of windows to let some light in, and they could open, but the hinges were stiff with disuse and there was a thick layer of dust on the sill. I was confident nobody—or nopony—had entered my attic that way.
The only other option was the attic stairs, and while that was of course a possibility, I’d cut the string shorter so it didn’t brush against my head, and a pony would have had to jump to pull it down.
Even if one had, why the toybox? Why not something else? All the other boxes were where I’d left them.
•••••
Building a box-fort was no real effort, and it tucked neatly into a corner of the attic, almost behind a diagonal support on one side, with the chimney stones on the other. I used my pocket knife to enlarge a knothole on one of the boxes—that actually took longer than I thought it would. All the while, I was wondering if I was insane.
Crouching behind it wasn't the most comfortable position ever, but it was something that I could handle.
I remembered reading in one of Clancy's novels how John Clark did recon disguised as a drunken bum, and then I also remembered that in the novel, Clark had been smart enough to bring food and water. I had neither.
I hadn't thought to bring a clock upstairs, so I had no idea how long I'd waited. Long enough for my throat to dry out in the dry attic air, long enough for my legs and back and neck to be reminding me that I wasn't ten years old any more, and almost long enough for me to come back to my senses.
I say almost because I always believed somewhere in the back of my mind that I was just imagining things. It was like there were two people in control up there, the rational one, and the one that believed in the paranormal, and they were taking turns.
If rationality had won out a few minutes earlier, I would have gone downstairs and perhaps given up the whole thing as a bad job, but then I heard a scrape and froze in position.
And then I saw her.
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So wee finally meet our spector, now will she go all like the one from the opening of the first Ghostbusters or not?
It was not until this point that I realized that the boxes were wood.
Ghost: “Asah, dude.”
I love that first paragraph. Also...
+1 for Tom Clancy reference :D
"understand" should be "understanding".
9277501
Are you sure because "I wouldn't understanding the answer" doesn't sound right
9277540
You're looking at the wrong understand.
"who had a much deeper understanding" works a lot better than "who had a much deeper understand".
And then I saw her FACE!-
I'm thinking there is no ghost, it is all in his head. The story is massively Trolling the readers. hehehe, Then he saw her is probably a mouse, that has been opening cupboard doors and knocked the toy over.
9277614
Now I’m a believer.
9277621
AND NOT A TRACE!-
9277545
THAT makes more sense 
Oh
Doesn't this guy have some sort of job? How can he spend all day sitting in a box?
I wonder where they toys went to. A different box, different room in the house.
Buried in the garden?
9277640
OF DOUBT IN MY MIND,
Boop her! Boop her spooky nose!
So does this mean that we'll have dialogue soon?
Four chapters. Nearly seven thousand words. And FINALLY something happened.
9277885
Eh? What do you mean? Plenty of things happened, seven thousand words worth!
9277950
He moved into a house and said 'i might have a ghost'. It's VERY slow
9277956
I know! Isn't it great?
9277802
I’M IN LOVE
9277958
I probably would've enjoyed it more as a full binge-read, honestly. Episodically, it feels TOO slow. I feel like it's been a month when it's only been a few days.
Might want to fix that. Otherwise, good chapter. Nice suspense.
Where's unicorn Bill Nye when you need him?
In any case, the interaction here promises to be fantastic. Looking forward to it.
Aaaand cut!
You darn tease.
It was Rule 63 Bob Barker, and she was eating a bologna and cheeseball sandwich.
Well, nice talking with you. Bye!
(The Warners look oddly disappointed.)
9278077
Unicorn Mr. Wizard!
9277885
Oh other stuff happened. Some Pegasi were playing Tonsil Hockey and our lead character met The Harbinger Of Ill Tidings in the restaurant.
9277785
He's an AmWay salesman.
9277614
"And that flank will haunt me for the rest of my days!"
She took one look at my hidey-hole, and squee'd in a light, airy voice. "A box fort!" And then she leapt right for me.
We stared at each other, side-by-side and now merely inches apart, both secure within my fortified corner.
9277968
OOOOOOOO
I'M A BELIEVER
9279454 I was thinking the same thing, but they're pegasi, which means that they'd be even more visible to other pegasi. Of course in the dark, those other pegasi would probably also be teens looking for a private place, like the proverbial Lover's Lane. Except with clouds. And frisky flying ponies.
9279446
CO2 is fucking cold, so having it blast your face in a dense, compressed burst will be disorienting to any mammal not specifically suited to cold.
On top of that, they're internally pressurised steel canisters, so getting hit with one would be a lot harder that a similar steel canister that lacks the pressurisation.
9279437
Grabbing at nothing at all,!
I have been told that's pretty much how my sense of humor is...
9279482
Flourescents make that buzz, can't think of one for incandescents though
9279464 Yup. Got the idea from the old "Conan the Adventurer" cartoon, and then constructed a rationale as to why it might possess special magical properties.
I mean, magically-speaking, something that leads to a star exploding certainly fits the bill for a powerful magical substance!
Is it Krasue: the friendly, floating, head of DEATH?
9279482
Well, the noise of a completed circuit. The wall switch tchk
Also the light in Starlight's office has a very visible cable.
Now that I've finished my own thing, time to catch up on tasty biscuits.
Love this, that slow development is just my thing. The toy box is a classic and it always works... I'm not sure she's nice or you intend to mislead or whatever, but I already like her. I figure since it seems a kind and good house, the paranormal occupant can't be all that bad. Famous last words and so, I know.
Oh the suspense is killing me. I like it!!!!
9277412
That would be quite the surprise for our poor protagonist. I mean, more so than it already is.
9277416
I couldn’t even tell you how many years it’s been since I saw that movie. Probably over 25.
9277421
While I’d assume that ponies have cardboard, since it’s been around since the 1850s (for hats, originally), I’d also assume that they still use more wooden crates than cardboard boxes.
9277473
9277501
correction made; thank you!
9277618
It is, in fact a ghost, and the protagonist is not crazy.