Eterna Puppets

''"Is that you.. my love..? You came for me...! W-Where did you go..?! Come back...! Come back..!!!" - ''Eterna Jade, calling for Rainbow Dash.

''"You thought you'd get away didn't you?! You cunt!! Piece of fucking shit!! I'll kill you!! I'll rip your fucking head off!!" -'' Eterna Rainbow Dash, shouting in anger.

''"Hide and seeeek... hiiiiiiide and seeeeeek..." ''- Eterna Pinkie Pie, searching for the hidden Fluttershy.

The Eterna Puppets are the horrific illusions of Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, and Jade that were held deep in the cellars of the bakery, underneath where the Cupcakes incidents occurred. They appear as frightening shells of their true selves, each sharing a few traits while at the same time holding their own unique appearance. They were specially designed by Eterna Fabulous as the perfect horrors to break the minds of Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy as they travelled down the basement.

Appearance
Each of the puppets holds a similar feature like the others. For instance, they each share a horrific and bloody appearance, their cutie marks apparently slashed or scratched off and other multiple lesions and scars along their bodies. Their eyes appear as nothing more than black sockets, with immense amounts of dried blood in and around them. A certain tool or marking is found along their necks as well.

Eterna Jade
Jade's puppet appears to have suffered many more cuts and slashes to the body, later mentioned to be self inflicted. A strange wooden harness appears stabbed through her neck at various points as well. Her eyes are frozen in a lovelorn stare. Her wings are completely limp and lifeless, dangling on her sides as she walks and limps along, also mentioned to be her own doing.

Eterna Rainbow Dash
Rainbow's puppet is shown to be more scarred in the hooves and mouth, revealed later to be intentional as she repeatedly struck solid objects in anger. A solid metal chain and collar is attached to her neck, tightened enough to cause the skin underneath to crack and bleed profusely. The puppet features deep cuts around the missing cutie marks, large metal nails driven through the hooves and an 'I' incision along her abdomen.

Eterna Pinkie Pie
Pinkie's puppet is heavily bloodstained, especially in and around the mouth. Her hooves are drowned in dried blood as well, and her skin is missing in several areas. Her hair and tail appear to be drooping and long instead of being puffy like Pinkie Pie's original hairstyle, signifying the alternate personality 'Pinkamena' from the Cupcake incident.

Eterna Jade
Jade's puppet is always crying out for a lost lover. She wanders around in tears, searching and crying out for her love, which in actuality is the living Rainbow Dash from her college days. Once she's found Rainbow, the real or the puppet, she instantly attaches herself to her and tries to stay with her. She's shown immense fits of rage, especially when torn away from her love or seeing any threat to keeping her from her.

Eterna Rainbow Dash
Rainbow's puppet is the epitome of pure rage. She is always cursing and making severely violent threats, even when no one's around. She makes herself bleed by aggressively punching and kicking the stone walls of the cellar, cursing loudly in the process. She is the only one of the three that cannot see, and as such always flys around in a patrol, never wanting to be surprised by anyone or anything.

Eterna Pinkie Pie
Pinkie's puppet suffers from incredible insanity, unable to make fully coherent statements and speaking to herself as if she is more than one pony. She is shown to be very keen on the taste of her own flesh and the skin of others to the point of being a complete cannibal. She wanders around the cellars singing various variations of the real Pinkie Pie's songs, adding her own horrible twists to the lyrics to fit her growing hunger. She also seems to feel no pain whatsoever nor does she feel remorse, taking bites out of Eterna Jade as if she was a simple snack. She's not afraid to add herself to her menu when needed.

Depiction in the series
The three puppets are first shown in the episode 'Eterna Darkness', which opens with Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash investigating a secret doorway that led to a cellar in the basement. After quickly meeting with a bored Eterna Fabulous, the ponies are first introduced to Eterna Jade, who pours out her heart to Rainbow Dash in a loving tone at first, which began to escalate into rage soon after. The ponies escape her long enough to encounter Eterna Rainbow Dash, who starts to cause confusion between her and the real Rainbow Dash. After several hours of hiding from the puppets, the ponies soon attempt to fight back against them. This quickly proves useless however, as the puppets themselves show no reaction to being physically struck. Faced with this new dilemma, the ponies return to hiding. Another encounter with Eterna Jade gives Rainbow Dash the knowledge that the puppets can suffer emotional and mental pain, despite their soulless appearance. Pinkie Pie reminds Eterna Rainbow Dash of the Cupcake incident in order to scare her off, Rainbow Dash gives in to Eterna Jade's loving demands to calm her which also gets her to fight on their side when Eterna Pinkie Pie attempted to attack and eat them. Seeing their success, Eterna Fabulous 'kills' her Rainbow Dash puppet in a manner similar to how Phoenix Wright had shot Jade early in the series. Eterna Jade becomes enraged, and murders Eterna Pinkie Pie in her violent outburst. The ponies manage to escape the basement and return to Ponyville soon after, without ever getting the chance to confront Eterna Fabulous herself.

Speculations
Many key elements to the puppets are given through the episode that they appeared in. More specifically, that they were soley created for the very purpose of breaking the mental psyche of the three ponies that entered the cellar. The bodies of the puppets were sliced and cut to show suffering and their eyes were missing to take away their emotion.

Eterna Fabulous' ability to read the hearts of the ponies also lead into the creation of the puppets. She discovered Rainbow Dash's past interactions with her ex-girlfriend Jade, now Bloodmare Jade, and created the Jade puppet for that reason. Jade's constant lovelorn cries were also added for the emphasis of being forgotten, despite the true actions that transpired between them. The Rainbow Dash puppet was derived from the withheld anger and betrayal that she had felt in the basement of the bakery, just as she was about to suffer her own demise at the hands of Pinkimena, which is how the real Pinkie Pie managed to subdue the puppet as well.

Eterna Pinkie Pie is then left assumed to be the broken personality Pinkie had during the Cupcake incident, although it showcases her deeper descent into insanity that Pinkie Pie herself would not face thanks to the work of Dr. Mint in her experiments, though not completely.

Trivia

 * The entire story of the puppets and the cellar is a shout out to the expansion for the PC game 'Amnesia: The Dark Descent'. The three suitors of the 'Justine' extra game share the personality traits of the puppets as well as Eterna Fabulous herself serving as an expy of Justine.


 * A little bit of a plothole forms in the shape of Eterna Jade. Neither Rainbow Dash nor anyone for that matter had seen or heard about Jade's fall from Cloudsdale after she pulled her wings free from her body, which adds confusion as to how Eterna Fabulous knows to make her puppet's wings limp and lifeless. This could be a sadistic choice to just adding to the suffering however.


 * Eterna Jade is seen exiting the cellar before the ponies could leave it.


 * Although it is hinted that the puppets were just illusions, the fact that they were able to physically touch and harm the ponies shows either that they were real creations or that the 'illusion' of being hurt caused their brain to assume them hurt.