It was closing in… The darkness.

The 3 friends now becoming one short, went to go find their other friend. As they searched, Double Diamond and Party Favor were on edge, while Night Glider tried to deny the darkness that lurked here.

Meanwhile, in front of a certain huge, olden house, stood a stallion. He wore a black cloak, which was just a few shades darker than his almost completely black mane. His skin was a light purple, but it seemed much darker under his cloak. He had sharp, shinning wings and the cutie mark of a potion bottle and a white, sharp quill leaning against the bottle, his eyes hidden and practically unknown to almost everybody, but himself.

This stallion was very misunderstood by the whole town, even though he hardly shown himself to it. Everyone around him glared at him with stern, ugly, looks. He either ignored it, at grinned at what seemed to be their stupidity, even though he didn't seem to know them. Then again, they didn't know him either. Neither ponies had the right to judge anyone, but yet they did.

Anyway, this was in the past. Hardly anypony seemed to not even care who he was anymore. Hardly noticed him. He liked it that way. But he found it odd that lately, different ponies haven't been noticed unless they walked up to you personally. This stallion had no friends, except one. Of which is not to be known right now.

The stallion's sharp cloak and feathers, flowed in the soft breeze as he began to walk into this house. A slight smirk upon his face, as if he was being clever for whatever reason. He entered the house, and reached the basement. As he thought he was alone, his ears perked to the sound of crashing against metal repeatedly, and muffled calls for help. He quickly removed the hood that was attached to the cloak, away from his head, to hear better of where the sound was coming from.

He walked over, closer and closer to the sound. The muffled cries for help grew louder, as though who was coming closer was not coming to do so. The stallion approached a trap, and then pulled it down, revealing an odd cage that he hadn't seen before. Inside this cage was a beaten, and battered, Sugar Belle.

She had a black eye, bruises, scrapes, and so on. The stallion gasped in slight disbelief. How did this happen? He asked himself. The stallion looked over onto the wall to see some keys. He assumed they were for the cage, took them, and unlocked it. He quickly untied the gag that had been around the mare's mouth, as well as the tied rope against her hooves. The mare broke down into horrified tears, and hugged the stallion around the front legs, as she was still sitting, and the stallion stayed standing.

The stallion lifted the mare's chin and gave a warming smile. Sugar Belle looked up at him, in shock at the sight of his eyes. His left eye, seemed to be normal… But his right eye had seemed to be infected with a dark magic of some sort. His right eye was entirely black, and his pupil was a bright red.

The stallion noticed this, and chuckled at her shocked expression. He was rather used to the shocked or disgusted looks from other ponies. He understood that she hasn't seen anything like it before, though, and just let it be. He helped Sugar Belle up, and rubbed his hoof across the side of her face, looking at her cuts and bruises. He then lifted one of her front hooves, of which also had just as many cuts.

The mysterious stallion looked into her eyes with concern.

"Who did such things to you…?" He asked, with slight sadness in his voice. He felt bad for this mare. Especially since he knew her… Even though, she, didn't know him.

Sugar Belle looked down to think for a moment. Her thought process had seemed to slow just a bit after being put in shock, and then becoming light headed after calling for help for so long with hardly any room to breathe.

"I- I can't seem to recall…" She said, disappointed that she couldn't remember.

The stallion nodded, and walked the mare up the stairs, and had her lay down on an old couch that had been collecting dust upstairs. He walked into the other room to get aid for the hurting, pink unicorn.

In the meantime, the 3 others, who had no idea where Sugar Belle was, or what had happened to her, still made their away around town calling out her name. Night Glider's ears perked. She felt as if a whisper was calling to her. She quickly ignored it, acting as if it was the wind. She didn't want a part in this, "Dark Village" nonsense. She was stubborn like that.

Party Favor's voice decreased in sound as wind started to pick up. It scared him. Every time it got stronger, the sounds of the whoosh and swish of the wind, would over power his call for Sugar Belle.

Double Diamond got sidetracked, and stopped calling for Sugar Belle and long time ago on their search for her. At this moment, he was frantically looking through books about the history of this village, hopefully giving some hints of what might have happened to Sugar Belle.

Double Diamond read many things. Most of these things seemed unbelievable. Of course, they may have happened. But it didn't seem like the right time and place for what happened, to happen. For example, he would read something about things such as a third return of King Sombra, but it didn't happen…. Yet. Or a book would go on to say that Discord did awful things… But it wouldn't be the right time. It would be before the legends time. This worried him. And made his itch worse. The itch that this town is practically dead. At least, deep, deep inside… This village was dead. Somehow. Someway.