Chapter One of One – Screams Below the Shadows

His thick armor made small, repetitive clinking noises as he coldly walked down the corridor.

Clink. Clink. Clink.

It was an ominous sound to be heard in the Crystal Palace. The staff was all too familiar with the noise. It brought out two fleeting thoughts in their minds every time they heard it. The first thought was more of an observation: Master is coming. And the second, a more base instinct: Hide!

The staff did just that as the odious clink drew closer. A maid about to exit a room suddenly recalled something she had forgotten to clean, and rushed back inside with a hurried slam of a door behind her. A butler crossing to get to the dining room spontaneously decided to take the long route, and turned around.

Sombra was well aware that they did this out of fear. It caused a wicked grin to crookedly spout on his face. Fear was good. Fear fueled his magic.

Clink. Clink. Clink.

Crystal lined walls slowly faded from their sparkly blue and lavender colors and silently morphed into a much darker shade as Sombra neared a lone door at the end of the hallway. The dark unicorn's magic sensed his intentions and nudged the door open slightly for him. Almost unable to contain himself, Sombra used a hoof to push the door open further so he could walk through.

The stallion walked through, allowing the door to close behind him with a hissing creak. On the other side, he found a winding staircase leading down to the greatest depths of his palace. The crystal walls were lined with torches, forever ignited with a blood red fire to light his path way. He descended, his feelings of bottomless hatred and evil being cut out and replaced by something new with each step.

Excitement.

Clink. Clink. Clink.

Chilling air gripped the gray stallion as he reached the bottom step. The raw excitement he felt was barely restrained as he walked down the poorly lit corridor in front of him.

In the cell at the edge of the corridor, a single mare was being kept prisoner. Her pale, yellow crystal coat was lacking in its usual sheen. One would expect that after spending two days in the Shadow King's dudgeon with hardly any food. Purple hair covered her eyes, red from crying. There was a dark bruise on her left foreleg, a consequence of resisting when two of Sombra's guards abducted her from her home.

Remarkably however, that bruise was her only real physical ailment, sans the raw flesh surrounded by a thick iron chain that bound her to the floor of the dungeon. The chain allowed the mare to move two feet before snapping her still. It was barely enough to reach the puddle of rusty water nearby. Her mouth stung with the murky taste of said water; that small pool had been her only source in her short time in the bowels of the Crystal Palace.

The worst part about her imprisonment right now was the eerie, domineering silence that permeated her stone quarters. Her first night had been filled with her screams for help. Her first day had been laced with the idle chat of rotating guards outside her cell doors. Now, it was dead silent.

Clink. Clink. Clink.

A small gasp was elicited from the yellow mare when she heard that sound. Her turquoise eyes shrunk in fear. Immediately, she threw her body backwards, earning a small noise from the chain as it was stretched to its limit.

Sombra entered with a neutral face, though on the inside he was bursting with as much excitement as a sociopath could muster. The yellow mare on the otherhoof, was letting her very real fear hang out on display. Even as she quivered, she remembered her training. Always deny. The yellow mare repeated in her head. I know nothing.

"Hello, my dear." His cruel voice spoke. A twisted smile formed on his face. "How are you today?"

"W-what do you want from m-me?" The yellow mare asked, shaking in fear. "W-why am I here?" Suddenly her body was bathed in an aura of dark magic, and she was flung forward, jutting to a halt mere inches from Sombra. The Shadow King scowled.

"You know damn well why you're here." He snapped, the words spitting in her face. "As for what I want with you… well, that's quite simple. I want to know if you succeeded."

"S-succeeded?"

With another heinous scowl, Sombra's levitation spell ripped her upward, pushing the iron chain to its limit's as the yellow mare was suspended in mid-air. Directly below her, a red hellfire erupted. Flames licked the bottoms of her hooves, and she winced in pain.

"Do not play dumb with me!" Sombra roared. "Was the resistance mission a success or not?"

"I don't know what you're talking about!" The yellow mare insisted. The fires danced up her legs, blazing through her flesh. She whimpered in agony, but remembered her training. Always deny. I know nothing.

"You will tell me!" Sombra shouted over her caterwauling. Beads of sweat formed on the crystal pony's face. The searing heat from the fire was reaching that high.

"Never!" She suddenly screamed at the top of her lungs. The red flames ceased immediately, and the mare felt herself drop to the floor, miraculously unburnt. The same could not be said for her hooves. They were scorched red, welts and blisters decorated nearly every inch. The cringe worthy pain she got from them touching the ground was a testament that walking would be troublesome at best.

Mentally, she kicked herself. That one word gave away enough. Now Sombra was fully aware she was a member of the resistance. Any tiny glimmer of hope she had of getting out alive was snuffed out.

With a warped grin, Sombra's dark magic lit up and flashed a large bracket on the side of the wall. The mare felt her pupils dilate as she looked at the objects it held. Knives, saws, and various other instruments of torture she had never knew existed.

"This is going to be fun." The dark stallion hissed, finally allowing his excitement to shine through.

He began by freeing her. One short zap of magic snapped her cuffs off. Immediately, she tried to run. Sombra showed no surprise and used his magic to fling her back. Her spine took a beating as she was slammed into the stonewall and pinned there.

"They always try to flee." King Sombra tutted to himself. He turned to his rack of torture tools, and carefully took his time selecting one. Taking his face out of context, one might assume Sombra was a foal in a candy store.

A long, thinly curved knife began hovering off of one of the pegs. The blade was beautiful, sporting intricately carved patterns over it. Sombra had apparently made his selection. He walked over to the entrapped mare.

Clink. Clink. Clink.

"This knife," He began as he waved the blood-stained weapon in front of her eyes. "I had specially imported. It's Saddle Arabian, you see." The knife descended. "It has been explained to me, that the crafter there was able to make his blades so sharp, most cannot feel the initial incision."

The yellow mare could tell he took a dark pleasure in explaining all of this to her. Or maybe he just took a dark pleasure in knives. Or torture. From the corner of her eye, the mare noticed the knife levitating back into view, with a new layer of deep red liquid on it.

Her eyes widened as pain exploded in her leg. Looking down, she saw a gash, just barely above the fresh burn marks. The pain was immense, but she wasn't about to let Sombra get the satisfaction of hearing her scream. She bit her tongue.

The gray stallion swung the knife twice more, moving it so fast that the mare could only hear the air whistle as it was forced out of the way. Two more fiery slices of pain appeared, slightly above her first. Her lip quivered as she bit down harder on her tongue.

"Go ahead and scream." Sombra told her. "No pony can hear you." With gritted teeth, she furiously shook her head. Her resistance was met with a shrug. "Suit yourself." He did not slice again, but rather plunged the knife deeply into her kneecap.

This time, she let out an earth-shattering shriek of pain.

"Haha! There it is." Sombra gleefully cheered, sickeningly pleased with having elicited a scream from his guest. The yellow mare continued to scream in agony, the bones in her knee now shattered. "So," Sombra's cruel voice caressed her ears as he twisted the blade. "Will you give me the information I want? Or do I get to work on your other leg next?"

"F-f-f-f…" She fumbled with her words, pain causing her teeth to trip over her lip. "Fuck you." She finally managed.

A dark chuckle came from the Shadow King. "I can tell we are going to have lots of fun, you and I."

The dagger in her knee was ripped out without warning, causing a fire of pain to overtake her entire leg. Puss and blood poured out in equal amounts, running down her leg and irritating the burns on her hooves. Sombra sealed the wound with magic, but the pain remained.

She looked at him, curious as to why he even bothered. He tsked, "Can't have you bleeding out before I have what I want."

The knife slashed upward, catching her thigh with a long ways cut. He made three more before her brain registered the pain from the first and she screamed again.

"You know that you can stop the pain." He said, running the knife up slowly this time so she could feel it peel back the layers of flesh. "Just tell me what I need to know."

Unable to speak without howling in pain, the purple-haired mare bit her lip. The slimy grin crawled back onto Sombra's face.

The knife moved to her less damaged leg, and began cutting away. Each slice elicited another scream from the poor mare, which in turn elicited a wider smile from the Shadow King.

Eventually, the knife dug deep enough to snap the tendons in her leg. Brutal agony erupted in her body centered around a leg. The limb hung uselessly in the air, paralyzed, but still able to feel. Stabbing ferociously, Sombra opened many new wholes in the leg, all the while the mare screaming in horrible pain.

When he ceased, the knife was coated in her warm blood. The gray stallion raised the knife to his lips, and ran his tongue across it. He paused to savor the taste before swallowing with a satisfied sigh. Bile rose in the throat of the yellow mare as she struggled to not throw up.

Clattering to the ground, the knife added another permanent red stain to the stone floor's collection. Sombra – without looking – levitated a sledgehammer from his rack of torture tools. He preceded to bash in the remaining bones of her legs, face unchanging from the terrifying wicked smile plastered onto his face.

The yellow mare slipped into unconsciousness.

She was ripped from the pleasant, painless void moments later. Sombra had sent and electrical spell arching through her body to snap her awake. Screaming insured even before she registered the crippling injuries that used to be her legs.

Sombra had mangled them into unrecognizable stumps. Shattered pieces of bones covered the floor in front of her. What remained attached to her was jutting out in odd, twisted angles. She wanted to scream again, but found she couldn't; her throat was raw and sore.

The gray stallion magically gripped some of the torn flesh, and yanked it out. Muscles, nerves, veins, all fell to the floor. The more she cried in pain, the more he relished each slow removal.

"Celestia save me." She croaked out in prayer. Sombra chuckled darkly.

"Not even she can help you now." He whispered coldly in her ear. Now it was her turn to laugh. She laughed manically. Despite the pain in her throat she laughed louder than she had screamed. Sombra raised a quizzical eyebrow at her.

"She will, you bastard." The yellow mare croaked. "I completed the mission, all right. We sent out a distress signal two days ago. Princess Celestia should be here any day now, and your tyrannical reign will be over."

Sombra's expression turned from one of perplex to one of amusement. He emitted another dark chuckle. The mare grew a concerned look on her face.

"What's so funny?" She asked, voice full of fear for his answer.

"You think you've won." Sombra chuckled. "My dear, I've been preparing for Celestia since before you sent out your little distress call. It doesn't matter whether or not you succeeded. I'll be defeating her shortly." He leaned in, staring right through her shrunken pupils. "But first, I plan on watching you die, very, very slowly."

She gasped, and then convulsed as Sombra sent more electricity through her. The yellow mare allowed tears to bloom in her eyes. It was going to be a long night. The Shadow King was smiling for the same reason.

Sombra had to admit, he was impressed. The young mare had seemed feeble and weak when his soldiers brought her to him, yet she had endured nearly half an hour of torture. To Sombra however, it felt closer to three minutes. The mare likely felt like it had been three years.

He'd snapped each one of her ribcages individually, strangled her numerous times, and treated her forelegs as horribly as her hind. The yellow mare hadn't begged for the mercy of death yet, not that it annoyed him. He wouldn't grant it even if she pleaded for it. He still very much wanted her to beg however, just for the satisfaction of turning her down. It was, in his mind, the best part.

The varying weapons on his torture rack had gone unused for some time now. That was usual for Sombra. He preferred using his own magic instead of some blunt tool. It was more satisfying that way. At one point, he even choked the mare with his own hooves. The Shadow King couldn't deny it; he was having too much fun with this one.

There were still plenty unsullied parts of the mare for him to play with. Telekinetically, he gripped a fair share of her purple mane, and proceeded to rip it right out of her head. She lurched forward in pain, but didn't scream this time.

That upset Sombra. He wanted to hear her cry in agony some more. Sensing the yellow mare was just trying to spite him, he ripped out more on her mane. Little by little, clusters of purple follicles fell to the ground forming a large pile until the mare was utterly bald. She hadn't screamed once.

Furious, Sombra gripped a knife from across the room and pulled it over at immense speed. With more rage than enjoyment, he severed her tailbone. This time she screamed, allowing the evil unicorn to enjoy himself again.

Blood leaked out of the new hole in her body, and Sombra magically sealed this one as well. He wasn't going to allow his favorite pastime to end simply because his toy bled to death.

Quickly, he scanned her body, looking for the next vulnerable spot so he could keep the torture continuous. His eyes fell on one spot in particular, and gave a devilish smile of giddiness.

"Tell me, my dear subject." He said, addressing her. "Are you a virgin?"

Wearily, the mare wheezed. "You're going… to rape me?"

"Answer the question." Sombra insisted, pressing her body into the wall harder.

"Y-yes." Came her fearful reply. He gave another dark chuckle, which at this point caused the mare to flinch.

"Don't worry my dear, I'm not going to rape you." He assured. The mare allowed herself to show relief. Sombra levitated the knife into view. "This is." He hissed with warped happiness.

The mare's eyes widened with palpable fear, shock, and disgust. Before she could register any more emotions, Sombra swiftly moved the knife back, and plunged it into its soft, fleshy destination.

The following screams were the loudest so far, but even they could not breach the depths of his dungeons to reach the ears of somepony who cared.

A Necrotizing Fasciitis Spell was among the most forbidden magic in Equestria. It was so obscure, that Sombra had spent hours rummaging through his library to find it. Essentially, the spell ate away at the very flesh of a pony once cast, causing untold levels of misery for the victim. That's why it was the perfect spell to close the first hour of torture.

After thoroughly using the knife to violate the marehood of the pony pinned to the wall, Sombra decided to merely break her hips, crushing the bones and then crushing the pieces until they were nothing but dust. He made several more incisions with a machete across the belly of the mare.

She could no longer scream, and Sombra was not upset about that. The mare had screamed her voice away, fraying her vocal chords and burning her own throat. It was an excellent feeling knowing he could accomplish that. Now the mare only whimpered and sobbed.

As the Necrotizing Fasciitis Spell ate away at what little flesh was still on her four legs, whimpering and sobbing was all the mare could do. Sombra stood in still concentration, focusing all he had into the spell. He even held his breath. This caused him to cancel the spell as it reached her fetlocks.

Any bones left untouched by his flesh-dissolving magic fell to the floor, having nothing to hold them together anymore. He made a point of crushing them under his hoof for the mare to hear.

She was out of tears now, she had been crying for so long. Crying because of her failure, her lost life, and the immense pain that pounded her body past the breaking point.

The gray unicorn sealed off her wounds, depleting the last of his magical reserves. The mare was free from the wall, and tumbled to the ground. She would have put out her hooves to brace the impact, but they were no longer there. A tooth was chipped on the way down, but that was hardly a concern at this point.

Sombra pondered what to do next. No pony had lasted this long under his torture without him simply killing them from boredom. The mare had the resilience to keep this interesting. He liked that.

Deciding it was time to dirty his own hooves with the task of torture, Sombra struck the mare at her only undamaged body part – the face. His forelegs pummeled the mare brutally, breaking her jaw, her snout, and cracking her skull. Sombra didn't let up for quite some time, before moving down lower and bombarding her torso. He laughed as he hit her, again and again.

The mare ached by the time he stopped. She shook, for that was the only motion she was still capable off. Her vision was red, having been so for quite some time.

She prayed to Celestia to save her. She prayed to Celestia to smite Sombra for his evil. She gave up praying. Princess Celestia was not coming, and if she was, it wouldn't be in time to do anything for her.

Sombra was beginning to feel exhausted. The torture had been in progress for two hours. His own muscles were starting to ache from relentlessly beating the mare in front of him. He couldn't help but wonder what made her so resilient. She still refused to ask for mercy or death, which at this point the two were synonymous. She refused to give him that satisfaction, despite screaming until her voice broke and crying until her eyes were dry. Why wouldn't she beg?

With the smile barely on his face any more, Sombra lifted her up so she was looking directly at him.

"Why do you keep living?" He asked her. "Why not just concede and beg for mercy?"

Spitting out some blood onto his face, the mare wheezed out a barely coherent string of words. "My spirit will continue to burn on, despite my body's beating. Until death I defy you, Your Magesty."

Sombra delivered a kick to her stomach, to which she barely noticed at this point. He licked the blood from his lip. It seemed nothing he'd been able to do recently caused her anymore pain. There had to be some way he could elicit agony from her one last time before he was done. Some way to make her beg.

In an act of pure instinct, he drove his sharp, curved horn into one of her turquoise eyes. She gasped, racked in pain but unable to move. She opens her mouth to scream, but the only sound is air escaping. Sombra's crooked smile returned.

"Beg for mercy or I'll put out your other one!" He screamed, drawing his horn out of her eye socket and seeing the bloody mess left behind.

In one last pointless act of defiance, the yellow mare shook her head. Sombra cursed angrily, but drove his horn directly through her eye and so far in that she pierced the mare's brain. There was a spasmodic convulsion, and then she was dead before the gray stallion could remove his horn.

He let the limp body fall to the ground, furious. He kicked it over and over again, seething with rage. She had robbed him of the best part. The bitch couldn't humble herself to beg. Not once.

He spat on the corpse in front of him, and left the cell. He hadn't lied about his preparations for Celestia. He had been building an army for months now. Since there had been a distress message sent out, it was likely she and her sister would be arriving soon. He needed to recuperate his magic before they did.

The spiraling stairs were somehow colder during the ascension than the descent.

Clink. Clink. Clink.

---

So exams started up at me school, and I wrote this to express how I feel about that. interpret it anyway you want.