As the door clicked shut behind her, Lyra found herself in what was normally the upstairs party room. She knew this room well, having been in here dozens of times for all manners of celebrations. This room had seemed so friendly back then, with all its streamers, balloons, and generous helpings of cake.

Alas, those wonderful times had come to an end. Like it or not, now that this room had agreed to become part of the haunted house, it was to be considered the enemy.

If Lyra had learned anything during her history classes, it was that information was key when it came to dealing with an enemy. In order to obtain that information, she would stand here as a silent observer, watching, waiting for the perfect opportunity. One by one, she would discover this room’s secrets, and then, once the final piece of the puzzle was in place, she’d strike. Preferably while wearing a bandana and spouting a heroic one-liner.

Those history books had been amazing at hiding comics from her teachers.

However, as her eyes swept from one corner to the next, she knew more and more that she didn’t like the look of this.

All four sides of the room were still painted the same sunny yellow, but the wall to her right now bore an additional painting of a happy-looking valley. The windows, both the two to her left and the two in back by the balcony door, all had their normal sky-blue curtains drawn closed, but the color of those curtains seemed brighter. Almost as if they had been recently washed. Underhoof, the wooden floor shined with a polish so powerful that the spots of light reflecting from beneath the two corner lamps were like miniature suns. Compared to the rest of the house, stumbling about in the dark would be an incredibly difficult feat. A pink, frilly cloth covered the table along the left wall, and atop it stood an inviting assortment of bagged snacks, bottled drinks, magazines, board games, and a centerpiece of lovingly arranged flowers contained inside of a woven basket. Against the wall across from the table, three thick-cushioned chairs had been arranged into a half circle. With their close proximity, any ponies that choose to occupy them would easily be able to hold a conversation while they relaxed. The center of the room even contained a miniature potted tree, whose gentle branches stretched across the ceiling and seemed to be asking Lyra if she’d like to curl up on the large shag rug below to take a nice, refreshing nap.

No, Lyra didn’t like the look of this room one bit.

With how mundane and unassuming this room appeared, it was clear that something unreasonably horrible would happen the moment she let her guard down. All she had to do was figure out where the scare would come from, learn what it would attempt to do, and then either find a way to safely trigger it or, preferably, avoid it entirely.

The only problem was that she had no idea how she was going to do any of that.

The easiest thing to do would be to bumble about the room, poking and prodding at everything until she eventually found the true terrors that lay within. However, having already done that at the buffet, she knew how terrible the outcome would be if she tried it again.

Although, being a unicorn, she could easily manipulate all the objects from a safe distance. Except for the fact that Twilight had probably already taken that into account and had set the trap’s trigger to sense the use of magic. Lyra chuckled. It had been a nice try, but she was smart enough not to fall for such an obvious ploy. She would just stand here patiently for as long as it took to figure out her plan of action.

Unless, of course, standing here was part of the trap.

Lyra shot forward and spun around to face the door she had just came through. Her eyes quickly scanned the ordinary wooden frame, the dark-stained finish, and the curved handle that was in the correct location for handles. All these observations meant one thing: nothing at all had changed behind her.

She couldn’t rest, though. No, no. Not yet. It was only a matter of time before something would jump out at her, or fall on her, or materialize out of thin air. Possibly even all three at the same time.

Then a chill went down her spine. She silently cursed herself. Like a fool, she had forgotten to take into account the psychological effects of paranoia. Clearly freaking out and taking her eyes off the room had all been part of its fiendish plan. Now, when she turned around, everything would be horrible.

Again, she spun around, her head darting left and right. Everything wasn’t horrible. Everything was still unchanged. Why was everything still unchanged? Where would the attack come from?

Her heart pounded, and she could feel her ears dropping low. She crouched down, wanting to keep her muscles tense in case she suddenly needed to move as fast as her legs could carry her, but instead, her stupid body kept flinching and trying to shy away from everything.

This wasn’t fair. She had been so confident before. But then this room. This maddening room. Its deviousness clawed at her mind until she couldn’t take it anymore.

“Well?” Lyra shouted in a voice that sounded way too squeaky to her ears.

The silence that followed was deafening.

Somehow, Lyra found the strength to rise back to her full height. She swallowed down the lump in her throat and tried to control her breathing before she ended up hyperventilating. If it was inevitable that something was going to try and scare her, then she was at least going to face it head-on like the tough pony she was.

“What are you waiting for? I’m here. Aren’t you going to have some nightmarish thing pop out and scream at me?”

Still, only silence answered.

Lyra gritted her teeth. She knew the surprise was coming, but this stupid house was playing dumb. Well, she was through being toyed with. With as much defiance as she could muster, she stomped forward onto the rug.

“Look! I’m on the rug! I bet it’s only a matter of time before it catches on fire, or... or turns into snakes, or... fire snakes! Those are probably a thing. Somewhere.”

When the rug below refused to transform into flaming reptiles, drop out into a bottomless pit, or fly away on giant bat wings, Lyra shuffled off it and started backing her way around the room. She reasoned that spooky things always tried to creep up on unsuspecting ponies from behind. Therefore, if she were to walk backwards, then that would force the spooky things to appear in front of her.

Although, even though she was walking like this, her behind was still technically behind her. She probably should have thought her plan through a little bit more before deciding to act upon it. Whatever. It didn’t matter. What did matter was that something worse than the rug turning into icky seaweed was going to happen. She had to keep moving so she could find it before it found her.

“Yeah, you chairs, I see you over there,” Lyra said as she passed them. “Want me to sit down, huh? Rest my weary hooves? You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Then you could easily suck me into the cushions and transport me to your lint mines. Thanks, but no. Somehow, I don’t think I’d have fun being forced to dig for loose change for the rest of my life. Nice try, but I’m onto you.”

Now that she had wandered around to the other side of the room, Lyra took notice of the area that normally held the balcony. Between the cracks of the curtains, she could see that the windows on either side of the door had been boarded up from the outside. It unnerved her to know a potential escape route had been cut off, but it was just more proof of this room’s diabolical design.

The balcony door also had a sign on it that read, “Haunted house continued this way.” Lyra narrowed her eyes. Anything with a sign like that had to be trapped. However, she wasn’t able to check it yet. She couldn’t risk letting the chairs out of her sight now that she knew of the magical portals hidden within them.

Then, she felt something bang against her hind leg.

Lyra whirled around and gave a fierce battle shout that didn’t sound anything at all like a cry of terror. However, her voice lost its enthusiasm when she realized she had only backed into the refreshment table.

Various flavors of snacks and sodas splayed out before her. Oh sure, they looked normal enough, but they were probably loaded with super-sugar, which had a million times the fattening powers of ordinary sugar. One bite and she’d be so large that she wouldn’t be able to fit back outside.

The magazines and board games couldn’t be ignored either. Even if that was the latest issue of Canterlot Music Weekly. She hadn’t had a chance to read that one yet. Her eyes widened. There was a book of number puzzles! Lyra loved those things. Even though they were impossible to solve without adding extra boxes and ignoring that whole ‘using each number only once per line’ rule.

But she was getting distracted! Now that she realized what was happening, she was able to take her eyes off the enchanting puzzles. It was a good thing that her will was strong enough to have resisted the devious attraction spell that had obviously been cast upon the activity book.

The table also held one other item that couldn’t be ignored. A single look, and Lyra knew she had finally found the monster hiding in plain sight.

“Clever,” Lyra said as she nodded at the bouquet. “I was almost tempted to bury my face in there to take a long sniff of your lovely, fragrant scents. I bet you’d still like me to do that, huh? However...” Her hoof shot out at the dangerous flowers. “Your trick won’t work! I know all about that poison joke stuff that grows in the Everfree!”

Her hoof jerked back and forth, giving each flower its own punishing point. “Which one of you is it? Maybe you! Sure, you may look like a daisy with your white petals and yellow center and, well... well, you probably are just a daisy. And you’re probably a rose, and you’re... a tulip?”

Lyra dropped her hoof to the ground and shook her head. “Honestly, I have no clue what most flowers are named. But I got my eye on you. All of you! If any of you try anything funny...” She leaned in closer so that every terrified petal could stare into her eyes and know without any doubt that she was serious about her coming threat. “I. Will. Eat. You.”

As she backed away from the table, Lyra assessed her remaining options. There weren’t many places left that the scare could come from. That is, unless Pinkie had somehow managed to modified the walls. However, it wasn’t very likely that the Cakes would have agreed to something like that. Although... just because something was unlikely, didn’t mean it was impossible.

Lyra’s eyes widened. How could she have been so blind not to recognize the blatant threat? There were walls on each side of the room; the attack could literally come from any direction.

“Oh, I see how it is,” Lyra yelled, spinning around in a futile attempt to not let the walls get behind her. “Get me distracted with all the doo-dads and then glorp! You’ll have some hidden pipes start gushing out a horrible viscous fluid like... like, I don’t know, tapioca.”

She stumbled to a halt as her stomach lurched at just the mention of the dread pudding. However, that sickening feeling paled in comparison to the horrible sense of realization that came over her; she may have been giving a certain somepony ideas.

Her hoof went up to the fear-o-meter. She hoped she was wrong, but she couldn’t take the risk.

“Twilight? Are you listening?” Lyra asked, then continued without waiting for a response. “I swear upon my cutie mark, Twilight Sparkle. If my body comes into contact with tapioca while I’m in here, I will march out there, and we will exchange words. You got that? Words! Plural!”

She waited, but, like before, there was no indication one way or the other that the fear-o-meter provided any form of long-distance, verbal communication. Lyra dropped her hoof and sighed. “I’m still really glad you can’t hear me through this thing.”

Even without a magically adept unicorn jotting down new ways to terrify her, Lyra still had the problem of being completely at the mercy of this room that had so far done absolutely nothing to try and scare her.

She blinked.

Pursing her lips, Lyra wondered if perhaps the sign on the exit had actually been telling the truth. Maybe she really was supposed to continue on. It wasn’t like there was much else to try. Still, she would need to be careful. After all, that sign could easily fall off and give her a paper cut.

As Lyra turned around to start her cautious approach towards the balcony, she made the mistake of looking at the tree in the center. Then, everything made sense. The trap wasn’t at the sign; it was right here before her! The tree’s branches were stretched out across the ceiling every which way. No matter where a pony walked in this room, they would be within grabbing distance of its limbs.

By the time she had realized the tree’s true, blackhearted nature, it was too late, for it had already begun its attack. The branches swayed back and forth; obviously a leafy version of a sinister laugh. Soon the gnarled, wooden claws would reach out and snatch her. Then the tree’s narrow trunk would splinter and bulge, its bark ripping open into a hideous maw twice her size. She’d be swallowed in one bite!

Once she was fertilizer, malformed pods would bud and start to grow among the leaves. Eventually, the pods would split open to release plant-pony clones of her into the world. The evil Copy-Lyras would blend into society and act normal enough, but every week, another pony would be led here, to this very room, and the process would begin anew.

Lyra whimpered and found at some point she had curled up defensively into a ball. Why would Pinkie put something like this in here? Hadn’t she intended to let children into this haunted house?

Only one hope remained. Lyra summoned up the few remaining drops of courage she had left and forced herself to look at the tree. She let her lower lip tremble and put on her best pair of puppy-dog eyes. If this monster had any semblance of a soul, perhaps it could feel pity. Even if it were only for a fleeting moment, it would still allow her to live a few more seconds of glorious life.

The tree responded to Lyra’s plea by gently continuing to sway its branches at her.

Unsure of what that meant, Lyra remained still for a while, then stood up as her cheeks began to burn. She held a hoof to her forehead and sighed. At least nopony had been around to see her cowering before the harmless potted plant.

It was odd that the branches were still moving, though. None of the windows were open, and she certainly didn’t feel a breeze. There was also an almost-too-quiet-to-hear thumping sound coming from nearby.

It only took a moment for her to follow the sound to its source: an upside-down cardboard box next to the tree’s pot. The box wobbled at an unsteady rhythm, lightly bumping into the tree while it did so. Lyra wasn’t really sure how she could have possibly missed something so obvious—although, the room did contain many interesting, non-scary things, so if anypony asked, it was plausible for her to say she had just gotten caught up in the moment.

Still, a wobbling box meant that something inside it was moving, and judging by the size of the box, that something could easily be a somepony. A certain pink pony, to be exact.

Lyra smirked. She had Pinkie right where she wanted her. Finally, the day would be over, candy would be secured, and she would be able to return home a hero.

Now that her task was nearly complete, Lyra supposed that she could spare a minute to have a little fun at Pinkie’s expense. After all, there was no reason all of today’s scares had to be one-sided.

“Gee,” Lyra said, fighting not to laugh. “I guess I was wrong. There isn’t anything scary about this room at all!” She let her voice get quieter and lightly stepped on the floor so that it sounded like she was moving farther away. “Oh well. I’ll just have to move on and—gotcha!” Her magic sent the cardboard flying into the air.

The pink-and-yellow pegasus that had been hiding beneath the box turned her wide-open eyes upon Lyra and let out a shriek.

In this circumstance, Lyra could only think of one thing to do: scream back.

So it was that Lyra found herself screaming at a pegasus, who in turn was screaming back at her, and Lyra figured the only reason either of them hadn't stopped screaming, was because the other one was still screaming. Thankfully, ponies had a natural defense to prevent being caught forever in a perpetual scream feedback loop.

Once Lyra had expelled that last of the air from her lungs, her voice gave out and she was forced to suck in a long, ragged breath. She stood there, gasping in and out while holding a hoof to her chest in an attempt to keep her heart from breaking free. Across from her, the pegasus cowered on the floor and appeared to be trying to bury her mane further beneath her forelegs.

It took several long seconds until Lyra felt she could even attempt to speak. “Flu-Fluttershy?” Still a little light-headed, she decided to wait a few more breaths until she felt well enough to continue. “D-don’t do that. You... you nearly gave me a heart atta—ack!”

Suddenly, Fluttershy had her forelegs wrapped around Lyra’s neck. She trembled slightly as she pulled Lyra closer into a hug. “Oh, thank you. Thank you. Thank you,” she said softly between breaths. “I knew somepony would come rescue me eventually. I just knew it.”

Lyra awkwardly patted Fluttershy’s shoulder in what was hopefully the comforting gesture to let somepony know that, ‘Yes, everything is all right now. By the way, do you think you can please stop squeezing my neck so that I can actually talk? Thanks.’

While Fluttershy’s grip may not have been tight enough to prevent Lyra from breathing, it was still more than a little bit uncomfortable. Especially since, if Fluttershy didn’t start supporting more of her own weight, they were both going to end up toppling over onto the floor.

After a minute of increasingly desperate patting, the gesture got through. Fluttershy let go and sat down on her haunches, seeming to deflate with a heavy sigh. She closed her eyes as she held a hoof to her chest. Lyra thought she caught a few more whispers of “I knew it.”

“So, Fluttershy,” Lyra said as she also sat down, “you’re probably—well, no—you’re definitely the last pony I expected to find in a haunted house. Why are you, um, you know, here?”

Fluttershy shook softly and didn’t look up. She started a hushed explanation that was too quiet to follow. Lyra craned her ears, but had little luck understanding more than a word or two. However, judging by the way Fluttershy’s voice steadily rose in pitch until it was no more than a series of squeaks, she was likely about to go emotionally critical and unleash a torrent of dammed-up tears.

Lyra raised a hoof to stop her before that could happen. “Whoa. Hold on. Ease up. Take deep breaths. In and out. In... and out. That’s it.”

Lyra looked to the snack table and selected a bottle with a picture of an apple on it. Using her magic, she uncapped the juice and levitated it down to Fluttershy’s reach.

“Here. Drink this and try to collect your thoughts. Not too fast, though. Drink as much as you need. There you go. Okay. Do you feel any better, now?”

Fluttershy shook her head.

“Do you think you can talk loud enough to explain to me what happened?”

“I’ll try.”

After a couple more steadying breaths and another sip of juice, Fluttershy began her explanation.

“I didn’t want to help with the haunted house. I didn’t want anything to do with Nightmare Night. But Pinkie wouldn’t stop begging me. She wanted all of us to do this together. But I just wanted to stay home where it would be safe and not at all frightening. Then she told me that I could have a whole room to design, and that I could make it nice and pleasant instead of scary.

“I liked that idea. Everypony could rest and calm their nerves. They could play games, talk to each other, or just take a nap. Twilight even offered to stay in the room so she could teleport anypony that wanted to leave outside.

“I came here this morning with a box of supplies. The outside was really scary, and I almost went back home, but Rarity and Pinkie were there and had already offered to help me, so I tried to be brave. We worked together to set everything up. They even had some new things to add like this tree and furniture. It took us awhile, but... well, in the end, we made this.” Fluttershy looked out at the room and a smile slowly came to her lips.

Now that Lyra knew that there were no deadly surprises waiting for her, she had to admit that the room was actually kind of soothing in a ‘sure, things may have been bad before but, hey, free drinks!’ sort of way.

“We all went outside after that, and everypony else was there,” Fluttershy continued. “They were going to go somewhere to have a late lunch and discuss something about testing for the evening. They invited me, but I was feeling exhausted and just wanted to lie down at home.

“As I was flying back, I realized that I left my box behind. I didn’t want anypony else to have to clean up after me, so I came back to get it. I was ready to leave when I... I saw...” She gulped and quickly said, “There was a horrible, scary swamp out in the hallway!”

Lyra looked over her shoulder at the door. “You saw a swamp out there? Huh... I guess it must be something different for everypony. Beats what I got, at least.” Seeing the questioning look on Fluttershy’s face, Lyra added, “You probably don’t want to hear about it. But it was only an illusion. It couldn’t hurt you.”

“I know. I remember Twilight explaining how it worked. I tried to ignore it and walk past, but...” Fluttershy shut her eyes and shivered. “It... it was so real. It reminded me of—I just couldn’t make myself do it.”

“Yeah, it did seem pretty real. I can’t say I blame you. But what about the balcony?” Lyra nodded towards the other doorway. “Couldn’t you just fly off of it?”

“I would, but there’s another room on the other side now, and it’s, well...” Fluttershy frowned and looked away. “I’m not actually sure what’s in there, but Rainbow Dash didn’t make it sound good.”

“That must be the room I saw on stilts earlier,” Lyra said to herself, then addressed Fluttershy. “And the windows in here are all boarded up from the outside?”

Fluttershy nodded.

“Sheesh. Trapped in your own creation. At least it’s not a bad place to stay.”

“Well, I thought so too at first. I knew the others would be back eventually, so I ate some snacks and tried to read a magazine. Everything was fine for about an hour, but then I started to hear things. Creaks, and moans, and thuds that sounded like they were right behind me.”

Fluttershy wrapped her forelegs across her chest and bit her lower lip. After a few seconds, she looked towards Lyra but didn’t quite meet her eyes. “It just kept getting worse after that. I even thought I heard somepony walking down the hall, b-but when I called out, the hoofsteps suddenly stopped and something banged against the door. I didn’t know what it was, so I... I panicked and hid. I covered my ears and told myself that I only had to wait a little longer. I knew my friends would rescue me soon. I kept whispering that to myself over and over.”

Lyra winced. While there had been no way of knowing anypony had been on the other side of the door, she still felt like a big jerk for making all that noise. “Yeah, that... that was me in the hallway. I, uh, I’m really sorry I scared you.”

“It’s okay. You didn’t mean to.”

“Well, anyway...” Lyra said, then shook her head. “I can’t believe you’ve been stuck in here all this time. I haven’t even been in this house a half hour, and already I just want to find Pinkie, get my candy, go home to my party, and never come back.”

“I know. It’s just been awful. I—oh!” Fluttershy’s ears perked up and she finally made eye contact for more than half a second. “Did you say Pinkie came back?”

“Yeah. I’m the one they got to start testing the haunted house. She promised me some candy if I meet her at the end. It’s been...”—Lyra fished around for a word that was polite but not too much of a complement—“...an experience.”

“Do you think when you see her, maybe you could tell her I’m in here? I mean, if it’s not too much trouble.”

“Well, yeah, of course I will.” Lyra started to stand but then Fluttershy’s words hit her. “Wait. Are you saying you want me to leave you here alone? Are you sure you’ll be okay?”

“Yes. I’ll... I’ll be fine. I feel better now that I’ve had somepony to talk to.”

Lyra stood the rest of the way up and walked towards the balcony but kept an eye turned back over her shoulder. While Fluttershy’s lips may have been smiling, the rest of her face told another story. Her ears had lost their temporary perkiness, and her eyes kept darting to her box that had fallen near the wall. Already, Lyra could make out the small shivers that would soon grow into full-fledged trembling.

It was moments like this that somepony had to step up and be a hero. Unfortunately, it didn’t look like Fluttershy was eligible, so that somepony would have to be Lyra.

“Alright, look, Fluttershy,” Lyra said as she turned back around. She took a deep breath and straightened her posture. “My conscience won’t allow me to leave you here alone. So, I’m going to take you with me to find Pinkie.”

Fluttershy gasped and quickly shook her head. “Oh! N-no, it’s fine. Really. You shouldn’t worry about me.”

Lyra rolled her eyes. “Obviously you’re not fine. I bet right now you’re starting to imagine that, as soon as I leave, horrible, writhing monsters from the nightmare dimension will break down the hallway door and drag you off, kicking and screaming, all the way to their Castle of the Everdark, where they’ll force you to be the royal back-scratcher for their overlord, who is a creature that has ten thousand teeth but no mouth.”

Fluttershy made a “meep” sound and hid her face behind her mane. She squeaked out, “Now I am.”

“You see? This is why you need to come with me.” Lyra turned sideways and struck a pose that she hoped radiated pure bravado. “We’ll be an unstoppable team. Nothing will stand in our way. Together, we’ll find Pinkie in no time. Er... by the way, do you happen to know where the final room is?”

Fluttershy kept her eyes shut and shook her head.

“Darn. I was hoping we could skip to it,” Lyra said, dropping her pose. “Oh well, we might get lucky and this next room will be the one. So, are you ready to be rescued?”

Fluttershy shook her head again. Or maybe she hadn’t stopped shaking it yet. “B-but I can’t come with you,” she stammered, then looked over her shoulder and started scooting away. “I-I’m not as brave as you are. If I s-saw anything s-scary, I... I... I just don’t know what I’d do!”

“Which is why you’ll be wearing a blindfold.”

Fluttershy stopped her retreat and slowly turned back to Lyra. “I... I will?”

“Yep. If you can’t see something scary, then it won’t be able to scare you.”

After a few seconds of consideration, Fluttershy said, “I guess that makes sense. But what about—”

“Right,” Lyra quickly exclaimed before Fluttershy could think of any more ways to frighten herself. “So, all I need to do is find something to use as a blindfold.”

Lyra walked around the room, searching for anything she could use. The tablecloth seemed like a good choice, but it might prove awkward to use without cutting it into strips first. However, Pinkie probably wouldn’t like it if Lyra destroyed the cloth. Besides, it didn’t look like there was anything sharp lying around. The cushions on the chairs were right out; they would be way too heavy. The magazines could be a good choice, but it would be awkward holding one over Fluttershy’s eyes while walking. Especially since Lyra didn’t quite trust her magic not to fail the next time she was startled. It might be possible to fold the pages into something useful, but, after her disastrous attempt at breaking the world record for most paper cranes created within twenty-four hours, the mayor had forbidden Lyra from practicing origami within town limits. That only left the plants to make a blindfold out of. Was it even possible to weave leaves and flower petals together into a band?

She tapped her forehead in thought. There had to be something else she could use. Something like the headband she kept hitting with her hoof.

Smiling to herself, Lyra congratulated her brain for proving, once again, how smart it was at problem solving. The fear-o-meter would make the perfect blindfold. Twilight probably wouldn’t even mind if her data became slightly less valid because of this. It was for a good cause, after all.

Twilight also probably wouldn’t suffer any negative consequences from having her fear-sensing empathic-link moved onto the head of a pegasus who was incredibly afraid at the moment. And if she did? Well, that was the reason why aspirin had been invented.

Lyra used her magic to remove the fear-o-meter and hold it out for Fluttershy. “I should have thought of this sooner. You can wear this around your eyes. It’s a fear-o—headband!” She scarcely breathed as she looked at Fluttershy, who hopefully hadn’t noticed her slip-up. After a few seconds of no reaction besides a slightly increased frown on Fluttershy’s face, Lyra continued, “This is a headband I received from Twilight. And it is in no way anything else besides that.”

Fluttershy eyed the fear-o-meter for a moment, then tentatively reached out to hook it on her foreleg. She looked at Lyra as if searching for a reason to refuse.

“If you don’t want to go, we can stay here,” Lyra said, at first slightly surprised to hear the words come out of her mouth, but then realizing they were true. “I know it seems like I’m being pushy, and—well, okay, I admit I’m being pushy. It’s just that it’s going to be dark soon, and I really want to get home in time for my party. But I can tell that you’re nervous, and I’m not going to force you to do anything you don’t want to. If you want to stay here, then I promise I won’t leave your side until Pinkie, Twilight, or somepony else finds us. Even if it means I’ll be late getting back.”

Fluttershy glanced down at the headband then back at Lyra. This motioned repeated itself a few times before she swallowed hard, took a deep breath, and slipped the band over her head. After a little maneuvering to get her mane untangled from it, she set the headband in place across her eyes and stood up to face in Lyra’s general direction. Her mouth opened, but it took her a moment to form words. “I’ll come with you. I really don’t want to be stuck in here any longer. I’ll try to be brave.”

“Thanks, Fluttershy. I’ll be sure to make it up to you once Nightmare Night is over and you’re feeling better. Think you can follow my voice?”

Fluttershy nodded. A smile almost crept to her lips before it faded into a frown. “Let’s hurry. Rainbow Dash talked a lot about how her room would be the one that scared everypony the most.”

Smirking to herself, Lyra walked to the balcony door and placed a hoof on the handle. “Oh, I know all about Rainbow Dash’s repertoire of Nightmare Night pranks. They may be shocking—sometimes literally—but they’re fairly harmless. Trust me when I say that there’s nothing she could have come up with that we would seriously need to worry about, at all.”

To prove her point, Lyra pressed down on the handle and swung open the door. Immediately, wind whipped at her face, forcing her to shield her eyes with a foreleg. She stood there for a dozen or so seconds, listening to the leaves rustling, magazine pages flipping, and a squeaking sound that may or may not have been coming from Fluttershy. Finally, the wind died down enough for her to lower her guard.

The room before them was like staring into a storm. Possible because it was a storm. Dark, swirling masses of clouds covered the floor, ceiling and walls, forming a tiny hallway with a fork leading both left and right. Every so often, a tiny spark would emit from the clouds and nip at the air in a crackling pop. Heavy mist traveled on the wind, with some of it spilling out into Lyra’s face.

“And then I open a door to an indoor thunderstorm,” Lyra said weakly, swishing a foreleg before her to clear the mist. She sighed and hit a hoof against her forehead. “I tempted fate. Why did I tempt fate?” She turned back to Fluttershy and gave a hopeful grin. “Still, thunderstorms aren’t all that scary.”

“They can be.”

On cue, the storm rumbled with thunder, causing Fluttershy to yelp and flinch away.

“Alright, new plan,” Lyra said as she quickly closed the distance between them before Fluttershy could try to flee again. “Do you think it’d be better if I covered your ears too? You wouldn’t have to listen to the storm that way.”

“Maybe,” Fluttershy said at a near-whisper. It took her several seconds before she turned her head back towards Lyra. “But how would I follow you?”

“Good question. Let’s see, um... ah! I know.” Lyra turned around and levitated the end of her tail so that it barely touched Fluttershy’s mouth. “Bite onto my tail and just follow whichever way I’m tugging. That should work, right?”

“I suppose so,” Fluttershy said, then tentatively reached out to grab a mouthful of hair. Her face briefly squirmed with displeasure. Regrettably, while Lyra’s favorite shampoo may have been vanilla-scented, it definitely wasn’t vanilla-flavored.

Fluttershy said something through her teeth that was probably something to the tune of, “Let’s do this before I change my mind.”

With her magic, Lyra gently pulled at the sides of the headband. Fluttershy’s ears were already hanging limp, so it was a simple task to tuck them under the band in what was hopefully a comfortable position.

“Can you hear me?” Lyra asked in a slightly louder than normal voice.

No response came from Fluttershy, so the plan must have been working.

Lyra took a few steps and felt her tail hair pulling taut. She slowly continued forward, trying to ignore the tears that were forming in her eyes. Thankfully, Fluttershy moved before anything could be torn loose.

With her charge in tow, Lyra eased up to the door. Things had suddenly gotten serious, and she had a new mission set before her. Candy was important, but candy could wait until Fluttershy was safe.

Together, they walked into the storm.