Rainbow Dash's Awesome Nightmare Night Haunted House Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Adventure

by TheDriderPony

You Have Nothing to Fear...

You jump back and take to the air before she can get too firm a hold on you. No way are you getting anywhere near that freaky table!

"Aw, come on!" she whines. "You don't have to make this difficult. You imagine all the new potions I'll be able to invent using you as the base!"

"How about no?" All the hot air from the ovens is gathered at the top of the room and it's making flying difficult. Not impossible, but any pegasus less skilled than you would be flapping like crazy just to stay up.

The witch follows you from the ground, hopping over or around obstacles without caring what she knocks over. "Flying potions! Speed potions! Blue potions! Rainbow potions! Potions that make you unable to land! Potions that grow one of your head right next to theirs! You're holding back the advancement of magic. Stop being so greedy!"

She grabs a potion off the rack and chucks it at you. It misses and splatters against the ceiling, but a few drips still splash on your tail. After a second leaves start growing on the spots. The witch's eyes widen as big as dinner plates, her smile following soo after. "On second thought, keep being so greedy! I'd been meaning to dispose of these failures."

Your flight suddenly becomes dodging practice as she starts throwing failed potions as quick as she can grab them. You swerve and shift, rise and dive to throw her off, but even with her bad aim every missed throw makes another toxic patch of ceiling or wall it's no longer safe to go near.

You make a hairpin turn as the wall in front of you suddenly slumps into green jelly, fire from the inside of the oven behind it rapidly bringing it to a boil. A pink potion catches you in the foreleg and you hold back a scream as your flesh warps and twists into a slimy tentacle.

"Ha! Gotcha! More new materials! I bet I can make a flying-fish potion out of that!"

This just went from annoying to outright dangerous. You double your focus, but with her seemingly-endless supply of ammunition, you can't even get close enough to try and fight back.

You gasp as another one catches you in the wings mid-barrel roll, sending an icy chill through your feathers. No! If she takes away your flight, that could definitely be the end! Your pinions groan and crack before suddenly bursting into a fully grown pair of wings on the tips of your existing ones.

"Double pegasus!" she cackles. "Twice the wings, half the control! Get it now while supplies last!" And she's right. Though your wingspan is huge now you have no experience working with them.

You flail through the air, evading most of them through sheer luck, but more and more close calls means you get hit with small splashes of blowback. You squawk in alarm as something drips on your muzzle and it hardens into a long beak. Another catches you in the tail, turning it into seven rainbow snakes that writhe of their own will and throw off your balance. Your ears scrape the ceiling as they grow and split into a mighty rack of antlers.

A dozen more minor changes make you ever slower and less nimble until the killing blow finally comes when a grey potion turns your back legs to stone. The weight is too much and you plummet to the floor, squawking all the way down.

The witch trots over to you, happy as a clam, and inspects your new form. "Oooweee! This is positively absolutely fantastic! So many new ingredients to try, so many new potion ideas!" She musses up your mane, patting your head like some kind of sick pet. "We're going to such good friends, you and I! And to think, once I harvest all this off I'll hit you with a few healing potions and we can start testing the new batch! Endless potions!"

You try to speak, but you can only chirp. You try to move, but your legs hold you in place. You're trapped. Totally and completely at the mercy of a demented madmare who's never so much as heard the word 'ethics'.

She reaches into the pile of tools and pulls out a long and bloodied saw. "Here we go. Now the real fun can begin!”

The last thing you remember as you black out is her ever-widening smile and her maniacal giggling.

[She is ready. Add one (+1) to your Fear Meter]

---

You awaken to the sound of humming. Some old schoolyard rhyme, but you can't remember the words. The foyer around you looks much as you left it, it's only Trixie that's different.

Up on her balcony, she's changed out her costume for something new. It's a simple dress (though a voice in your head that sounds an awful lot like Rarity reclassifies it as a frock) with an apron. It's so old and tattered that whatever the original color was has faded to a greenish-grey. What's more concerning is the bloodstains around the hem and on her slippers.

Well, it'd be concerning if you weren't acutely aware that this is Nightmare Night and she's wearing a costume and it's all not real. You have to give her credit; Starlight wasn't exaggerating when she said you might forget what's real and what isn't.

"Well, well, well," Trixie titters, "look who's late to the party. Did you have fun on your playdate? Little Twinkie can be such a rascal when she gets excited. Too much sugar, too little oversight, I say. But she's a Good Girl at heart."

"If that's what you call good, I'd hate to see her when she's being bad."

"Oh you would," Trixie agrees, her tone suddenly serious. "You don't want to see the first version of her we made. We had to tone her way way down. We'd probably get arrested if we set that version on anypony."

With the revelation that you just faced the easy version of the witch, you leave Trixie behind to her humming (that's not as unsettling as she probably thinks it is) and decide where to go next.

---

There doesn't seem to be anything to interact with in this room, but there are three hallways that branch off that head LEFT, FORWARD, and RIGHT.

If your Fear Meter is full, you must select the fourth option.

Author's Note:

What Will You Do?

[LEFT HALLWAY]
[CENTER HALLWAY]
[RIGHT HALLWAY]
[BAIL]

Congratulations! You've found a hidden collectible! Trixie Costume #6 ["Uncle Jack's Favorite Little Monster"]

Try to find all 20 of them!

Art provided by Vatutina