I See You

by Minty_the_sweet

Castle

Twilight's castle is a surprisingly large place. Starlight told me to wait by the door, to not move till she got the Princess of Friendship, and then they'd question me. It's nearly night, Luna's moon is visible through a window on the wall, but the sky still has a tint of colour. Usually by now I'd be home, safe in my bed with my music on and with my sensory pad until I fall asleep. Sensation keeps me grounded through the darkness of the night - now all I have is cold hard crystal, and the ticking of a clock on the wall.

The clock is unbearably close to seven. I pace, hearing my hoofsteps echoing through the castle. Time looses all sense when I look away from the clock - stretching and warping. Sometimes I swear it's been hours, but a quick glance reveals it to have been only a minute. Tick, tick, tick - the sound reverberates in my head.

I look down one of the halls. There's two halls and a door, one leading left and another leading right. A staircase leads up to somewhere, but I haven't the foggiest idea what. Really, I could leave - this place makes my fur stand on end, but the thought of Roseluck makes me stay. I really like her, she's nice, and knowing that I might be involved makes it all too much to bear.

Then I hear it - subtly, on the barest hint of perception. I look down the left hall, trotting closer. The noise gets louder, but so is indecipherable. I look at the clock - it's frozen right before seven. No more ticking, no sound save for that odd noise. I'm not a complete idiot; there's no noise really there, time hasn't stopped. My hooves rub against the cold crystal floor to try and rub away the noise in sensation. All I need to do is wait for Starlight and Princess Twilight and I can help Roseluck.

The noise remains, still omnipresent but unrecognisable. Now though it has a pattern. A steady cadence, a brief minuscule pause between each instance. It sounds familiar, but for the life of me I can't figure it out.

Run

A voice, recognisable as the voice from the hospital, speaks to me. I can't help but snort a little at it's presence. "Why?" the voice takes longer than expected to respond. My ear twitches as the unrecognisable noise changes, a decibel louder than before.

They're coming for you

The noise, as if to emphasise the voice's point, grows louder still. Even as it becomes noticeably audible instead of just barely perceivable, it's still strange. Noise, pause, noise, pause. It sounds almost wet, but there's something else to it. Like something knocking against something hollow. Really it's too faint to even try deciphering what it is. I swallow down my fear, and stay perfectly still. "Who's coming?"

Them

The noise gets closer. I stay still, even as my body screams for me to run. All I have to do is keep rubbing the tiles, just focus on the tiles. Not the noises, not the voices, nothing but the tiles. Something wet thuds against the ground to the left, disturbingly close. I look to the right, away from the left even as everything tells me I should see what's coming for me. "It's not real, it's all in my head, nothing is there" I remind myself, closing my eyes as I focus solely on the cold numbness in my hooves.

A deathly rasp comes from the hall, impossibly distorted. It couldn't have come from any living mouth. There's too much dissonance - like wind blowing through the holes in a pipe, but wet and filtered through rocks. I cringe at the noise as my mind screams at me to run. Cautiously, I open my eyes and look left. The darkness is a thick blanket concealing whatever horror is concealed in it, but the noise is everpresent.

Then the darkness moves, parting around the shape of something mangled, and wet, and equine, and... blue. "F-father?" a horrible simulacrum slithers into the light. Muscle and bone are exposed as the creature shambles on splintered hooves, each step an agony as it breathes through a rotten throat. My nose wrinkles as the overwhelming stench of metal and decay abrade my senses. I lock eyes with the creature; despite their glassy deadness, they're still the same electric blue as my own.

"H-h-hel-l-l-p m-m-me" The abomination wrasps as its twisted limbs drag it across the floor. That's when I notice the trail behind it of things that should be kept inside.

I take a few shaky steps back, but my muscles feel stiff as death. "You're not real. Y-you're not real" I try to affirm that fact. The one fact keeping me sane. My father smiles with yellowed teeth as red tears fall from his cold, dead eyes.

Want to take that risk?

My hooves thud against the cold tiles as I run away. Something is screaming and it takes me a few seconds to figure out it's me. I need to run. I need to escape from whatever that horrible thing was. Am I going up the staircase or down the right hall? It doesn't matter. I can't be near that thing.

I scream even as my throat burns. I scream still as I reach a fork in the road. I go left and reach a door. I open the door. I jump inside, magic darting around to find something to lock the room behind me. My screaming is cut off when I taste blood and my throat gives out. Pain overwhelms me as I curl up against the cold tiled floor and cough up the thick metallic fluid in my lungs.

Darkness overwhelms my vision as the comforting void envelops me.

~***~

H-hello? Can anyone hear me? Please, I'm trapped. I don't know where I am, everything is dark and what I can make out... it doesn't make sense. My name is Roseluck, the last thing I remember was going to sleep and waking up in this... it's not even a place it's more like the concept of a place mixed with a nightmare. If you're hearing this, p-please help. We don't know what else to do but hope someone hears us and answers.

Please, time is running out. I don't know how much longer Moonlight's spells can keep Them at bay. You're our last hope- oh goddesses, I hear them. They're so close, why are they so close?! OH GODDESSES I SEE THEM!! HELP US, WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE PLEASE SA

~***~

Consciousness comes in drips punctuated by the mind breaking subjugation of a migraine. All I can make out are bleary purple hues with a splash of turquoise and distorted noise. In some blinks though, the shapes change. From vaguely equine blobs to spindly bipedal creatures of indiscernible origin. They look almost like a dragon crossed with a yeti and something from H.P Hoofcraft - there was a definite maddening quality to them like they didn't belong in this reality.

Eventually though the inequine shapes blended with the pony blobs - forming the silhouettes and eventually faces of two of Equestria's strongest magic users. Both were definitely worried and quite confused - even with my limited ability to tell emotion I could tell that much. "Can you hear me now?" I try to focus on the voice, but I'm still too muddled to discern which one of them is speaking.

"Y-yes" a wad of some thick metallic substance clogs my throat for a second at my attempt at speech. I have enough sense to reach a hoof in front of my face as I cough up whatever foul liquid was trapped in my lungs. It comes up surprisingly easily and splatters across my fur - staining it a dark burgundy colour. I can feel more of the dried substance in my fur and practically reek of the foul stuff. Blood might be a life giving substance, but I do far prefer to keep it inside as a general rule.

Starlight's magic helps me to stand upright as my body protests. My head feels like it has taken a hammer to it, and my throat is even worse. Generally I just feel like shit, not a particularly unfamiliar feeling for me, but not a pleasant one. "W-water. N-need water" I croak out, coughing up more blood onto the cold crystal floor.

Almost instantly a glass of water is placed in front of me. I look to Twilight and Starlight, the latter of which shrugs. "You'd been out for a while. After what we heard, I had a feeling you'd need something to drink" I don't dare argue with Starlight's logic on that one. I don't dare use my magic what with my already terrible headache and instead grasp the water between my hooves. Drinking like this is certainly less simple, but it's better to be safe rather than sorry.

The water does little to help my aching throat, but at least it does something. After a few more sips I look back up at the two and sigh. "I-I saw something, wh-while I was w-waiting" my voice is scratchy, gravelly as I try to force the words out of my ruined vocal chords. "I see th-things like that all the time, b-but there w-was just something... off about it. It f-felt realer th-than usual, more defined"

"What do you mean? What do you see all the time?" Twilight scoots a little closer.

I cough into my hoof and take another sip to prepare myself. "Wh-when I was a filly, I saw things. S-sometimes they started off harmless enough: a filly playing with her mother, my father reaching out to give me a hug, m-maybe even my sisters talking to ponies I couldn't see. Th-they never stayed harmless though. When I-I was young They didn't have to try h-hard - make teeth grow sh-sharp and long, twist th-their shape a l-l-little to the wrong side of the spectrum. Then th-they started twisting my body... I got put in C-c-canterlot Mental Hospital after I tried popping the e-eyes on my skin with a sewing needle" more coughing, more blood. I really shouldn't be straining my chords like this, not after what I just did to them. This could be important though, any detail could help Roseluck. "I-I learnt a set of rules to keep them manageable. Celestia's sun hurts them - th-they manifest more in darkness, only rarely in the light as small l-little tricks. Th-they can't fool touch: overwhelming that sense makes it harder for them to trick the other senses. L-l-l-lastly-" I almost collapse as a fit of spluttering takes over. One of them presses a hoof to my back and gently pats it as I splatter crimson all over the blue crystal.

"What? What's the last rule?" I try to swallow down the wad of blood in my throat, not wanting to sully the princess' castle any further.

I look Twilight dead in the eyes and feel my chest tighten. "Don't ever listen to what they offer, because the price isn't worth it" my legs collapse underneath my weight as I choke on my own blood. Darkness once again overwhelms me as my own body betrays me, hacking and coughing without a chance for breath as I drown in my own fluids.

~***~

I walk forward through the Wall, and on the other side I am welcomed. Tentacles and claws rake across my form in greeting, a thousand mouths all screeching in joy. Today I bring home sustenance, today I bring home another small victory. The flesh of reality is a treasure in the Beyond - a delicacy most prized. It must be eaten fresh, must be savoured quickly before it is tainted any further by Our Home.

Today's prize is pretty. I savour her eyes, yellow and filled with life. Y̸͎̼̯̰̳̝̌a̾ͥ̀̒c͎͂͛̋ͫͪ̑͢'̱̮̞̈t̯̘̪̦̪̿̽ͨ̏͗͝h̆͂͗̿̓̃̓҉͙̦̟̤̗̞a̽a͈̱̣͔̼d̬̜̗̮͈̲ͯ̑͑̓̐͆͛͠h̦͎̾͐r̢̬̬̼̣̹̹̈́́͂ͮ'ͯ̂̀vͫ̓̽҉̩̟͚ḩ̦ͦ̏̄̄̑ͦiͯ̇ͧͯ̄̆͏̰̠̙̲r̶̺͔̩ dines on her pretty blue mane, soft and dainty as mortal life. Each of us takes our due, savouring every scream until Ì̶̱͍̓c̶̗̯̯̲̿t̷̡̘̙́̂̓͜a̵̯̠͛̋̀m̷̳͎̱̩̐b̷̨͇̌̚͠ṛ̴͕͐̈́͠i̶͎̘̮̩̔̓͝͝s̷̫̖̭̄̃̃͠ dissolves her throat with one swipe of his acid talons.

Tomorrow we dine on the others and their fear. For now though, we wait in the Beyond for our little Naocnod to bring us our due.

Author's Note:

If you couldn't tell - this is inspired by The Corner of (Our) Eyes which I can't recommend reading more. I have university assignments coming up so you probably won't hear from me for a while, but I'll work on this when I can.

To those who can't bear to wait - I'd recommend looking through this group: https://www.fimfiction.net/group/1316/the-library-of-lovecraftian-and-lovecraft-inspired-fiction. It's really good