Arc would have been getting ready to bound around the walls, looking for opportunities to strike with both hooves while darting away like a yellow, colt bullet. But he was still floating above the carriage floor and growing sick of it. Tyro would have loved to have bellowed to everyone that they probably ought to rely on the Unicorns to find the source of the haunting here and destroy it. But he was still in Arc's body so had nothing but fancy acrobatics to help with his situation. What Arc did do was wave his hooves above his head, trying to get attention. "Anypony ever dealt with what in the hey we're dealing with here?!" He tries shout over the commotion. "An' Can anypony get me down?!"
Tex saw that Spike was protected well enough by the Diamond Dog Rexar, and also Daress. He eyed the spider warily, and set himself between the beast and the rest of the group as best he could, ready to dodge any attacks it offered as well as counter with a few solid blows of his own.
(Combat Rolls Made & Hidden) The Spider's eyes glowed an eerie green. The glow was quickly matched with a stare from Arc Gust's locked eyes, going wide with madness. The specter held both of his hooves out to either side, as the room began to fill with a chilling cold. A deep cackle came from his spectral visage. Arc Gust, or more precisely the fox inside, began to feel like his mind was being pulled through a tunnel. Looking down, the floor appeared to open before him, and in the black oblivion, he began to plummit, unable to stop his descent into darkness. To the rest of the group, he would be seen on the ground, flat on his belly, screaming uncontrollably, as the fear felt all too real. Opportunity arose for those poised to strike, as Power Surge, Tex, and Rifter caught glances from one another, and made a group effort to strike at the ghastly enemy blocking their way to the monstrous spider keeping a mental hold on their friend. With a swift strike of his metal rod, Jhera finds that the conductivity of the rod actually drags the specter's form out of the tan pony's body like a light sheet in the air. The specter seems rather unpleasantly surprised. "What is this?! You cannot touch me!" The tan pony's body collapses to the side with the spirit disconnected from it. A claim quickly busted, as Rifter's talons tore into the specter and sliced the surface of the ghoulish pony flesh, rending open wounds that immediately looked ages old. Powerfully, Tex lashed out with his hooves and the poltergeist got thrown off of the rod, and was sent reeling. Collapsing to the ground, he shook his head. "No mortal weapon can touch me! Has my power so diminished over these years?" Amid the specter's lamenting, the ponies see the spider's eyes glow brighter, and white spider's silk webbing springs from the floor around Arc. Tying around his forehooves, the spider lifts up a connected strand and begins to pull him in.
Rifter looked back to his team, and opted to save Arc and let them handle the specter. He flew towards the spider, with his claws outstreched and ready to swipe.
Quill/Rexar suddenly found himself at an impasse. The specter seemed distracted by the three attacking it, and it seemed that at the moment, Arc was incapacitated (Quill knew a Fear spell when he saw one). Rifter might have some trouble taking the spider himself, so Rexar decided to lend a...paw, believing that Spike would be safe behind the actual knight in the group. He crept toward the spider, his spear at the ready. When he thought he was within range, he thrust at the spider. "HHRAGH!"
This was actually more familiar to Tyro than most would have thought as he plummets through what could or could not be air. It seemed more like a vacuum as he wasn't having any fur rustled or anything. He was looking around curiously, wondering about what in Equestria was going on. He kept telling himself that he'd try and wake up immediately if he was plummeting towards a giant stain-glass window. The outer body experience wasn't new either but that's probably lingering too much on the past. Right now, Tyro was running over what exactly was happening. He's slowly plummeting downwards after being stared at by a spider. While that rarely seems like a good thing to happen, he failed to find a link or an explanation for why he would suddenly be floating away from Arc's body into a black pit. So, maybe this meant his game was over? Or something? Was this meant to happen? He quickly decided it wasn't meant to happen as it seemed to have no correlation to anything "game-like". There ought to be a big 'Game Over' sign or something right? No-one expects a yawning cavern of darkness, do they when they play other games? So...How to get out of this? This wasn't something he'd had to do very often so Tyro tried flapping like a bird. Then stretching towards Arc. Then willing himself back towards Arc by thinking things like "Up!", "Fly!" and "Away!". He was even considering trying to spin his tails but he knew that wouldn't work without unscrewing his spine in the process. He also attempted to flap and will himself up. Then will-power and stretching. Then, rather more awkwardly, a combination of all three where he stretches with every beat of his wings/forelegs while screaming "FLY!" in his head.
(I have a feeling that was a Game of Thrones reference...) Power watched as the others attempted to remove their struggling ally from his chastisation. He rolled his eyes. The spider wasn't their problem right now. He turned himself to the poltergeist and raised his rod threatningly. "Ah've notished you don't like magh rod, now do ya?" He covered another step of ground between the two. "Soulden't you be lettin go ah mah fiend now? Or have you forgotten the feel already? Ah'd love to sow you again!" He giggled a bit, part of him hoping the ghost would refuse, giving Power another chance to bash its ectoplasmic skull in.
Norm saw the spider pulling Arc and broke it with his claws. He then carried Arc to a good distance and began to look for a spell in his book that might help Arc, which was yelling in fear at the floor. Quickly scanning the pages, he arrived at the white magic part of the book and quickly saw a healing spell. Not thinking it, he quickly cast the spell towards Arc and the spell began to shine on him. Norm then decided to do something for the team and he placed on everyone a small shield spell, strong enough to withstand light attacks. He then stood by Arc, hoping to see that te spell worked.
Tex saw several of his companions dart over to assist Arc. That should be more than enough to take on that spider, he thought. Besides, I'm sure Power Surge needs a helping hoof. And I much prefer pony-sized things to giant arachnids, even if they are ghosts... He stood slightly behind and to the side of Power, and with a flat look of concentration that was devoid of emotion, focused his attention on the ghastly spook.
(So Many Rolls Made!) Rifter dashed at the spider as it pulled on its webs. Suddenly, the spider turned its vision to the griffon dashing at it, and those eyes emitted an eerie glow, as the distance between Rifted and the spider seemed to grow further and further. It was like flying down a tunnel after it, but ever persistant, Rifter kept going after it. Until suddenly, the word compressed before him and he found his beak smashing against the far wall. The pain felt... very real to Dark Shine. The spider released the webbing from its grasp and crawled backwards up the wall to dodge away from Rexar's spear. It hissed and spittled a thick glob of grey saliva on the floor below it. Norm was able to then tear the webbing binding Arc and carry him a short way as he started reading off his healing spell. Tyro, who was seeing himself falling, suddenly saw the floor coming up. That horrid sensation of "I'm about to hit the ground really hard" tingled in his brain. Upon impact, his head shook like waking up from a bad dream, except the part where he was being carried by a diamond dog. He was out of it long enough to notice that Norm was reading a spell that was making Arc feel... tingly and warm. The poltergeist growled "I can see that my methods don't work quite like they used to. Well, one poor ticket-taker's soul is better than nothing!" With that, the ghost phased backwards, and disappeared with another sinister cackle. The spider, however, wasn't retreating very quickly, as it stared down Rexar. Quill began to feel it pulling at his mind, and there was a sensation of tunnel vision on those eyes. Then, he realized quickly that it was trying to mess with his head, and snapping out of it, he was able to over-power its force of will!
With the ghost gone, Tex turned to the spider. Seeing that it was up on a wall, he sighed and looked around for some object that he could throw at it.
Both Rifter and Dark Shine were in pain. "Darn spider. For that one, I'll tear you a new eye hole!" Dark Shine however was still in a bit of shock. Oooh, That hurt me too, carefull Rifter...
Snapping out of the spell, Rexar laughed and shouted, "HA! You think you can trick me?! What a joke!" Quill inwardly shuddered. That sensation, for as momentary was it was, was still quite unsettling. Rexar glared directly at the spider and prepared another attack with his spear.
"GAH!" Tyro hates those dreams where your brain get's so lost in its own creation that it yelps whenever you fall off a cliff, moments from being stabbed or being fed into a Stuffed Toy Machine. The mind seems so powerful, it could fool even itself. Still, what the heck just happened? Arc comes round in someone's arms while his body starts to feel like it was being filled with warm water with a current passing through it. He stretches and rolls onto his front while rubbing an eye with the back of a hoof. "What in Celestia's name happened there?" Arc asks, looking around and lowering the hoof. "I kinda follow the ghosty woo-woo stuff but what was all the falling into a pit stuff?" His head still felt lighter than usual as though his energy had been drank away by something but unsure what. He's unsure he'd ever like to see another spider again.
Norm almost fell from the sound that Arc made when waking up. The spell already recovered Arc from the weird dream he had and said "Sweet Clestia boy, don't scare me like that! Anyway, to answer you question, it appears you were in a very aweful nightmare and you were screaming like a mad stallion on the floor. Luckily I pulled you from that nasty place with my magic." He helped get Arc to his hoofs "and also the ghost left the place, but the spider is still here." he said while pointing at the spider which was fighting the other ponies/griffon.
Rexar's spear struck true this time, and wounded the spider greivously as one of its legs actually fell from its body. The strike caused it to lose grip and fall. It cought itself half-way down the wall and quickly recovered, making a fast act of despiration, it spotted Tex... Tex found a heavy statue on a short table, and went to line up his shot at the spider. The room was a little hazy around him, but he was able to back-kick the statue towards the spider! Quill suddenly felt a strong pain in his left shoulder, as Rexar was just lining up for another shot at the spider when he suddenly got smacked in the side by a stone statue of a griffon! The pain made him stagger. To Legion, however, it looked like the statue hit his mark dead on! Then why was it the diamond dog who stumbled and yelped?
Rexar sumbled a bit, then found the pony that attacked him, grinning in satisfaction. "Hey! Watch it! I'm on your side!"
Rifter decided it was time for revenge and once again, flew towards the spider, preparing to slash it to pieces. Dark was not so enthusiastic, but let Rifter do his thing.
Legion, who up until now had been letting Tex do his thing, had nonetheless been paying attention. Because he didn't have to concentrate on staying alive (which he let Tex do), he could pay attention more easily. And so he noticed when everypony else started doing things like, oh, laying on the floor and flailing about and screaming wildly for no apparent reason. So when it appeared that Tex had hit the spider, yet one of his comrades stumbled and grunted in pain, he realized that the spider was making everypony see things! He quickly took over from Tex and said, "Sorry" to Rexar. Then he set about attempting to figure out how to get around the illusions the spider was causing. Perhaps there was no way to avoid them, but he doubted that. Hmmm...every time he's seen somepony on his side do something stupid, they'd been looking at... Legion had a plan. It probably wouldn't work, but...hay, why not. He approached the monster carefully, never looking directly at it. Whenever possible, he used his sense of hearing to discern its location, and if he couldn't hear it, he looked at it out of the corner of his eye. It wasn't the best way to fight, but it certainly beat smacking your allies with statues. And even if it didn't work, it was still better than a head-on charge.
Arc thanks Norm for his work and then figures that the best plan to get back at the spider was a head-on charge. Tyro was a little more reluctant but there seemed little other option. Arc dashes forwards and leaps up, running across the top of the backs of the seats in the compartment to then jumps straight for the spider with a hoof aimed straight at an eye.
