I stepped off of the train and onto the landing platform and stretched, my armor making a clanking sound as I rolled my shoulders back. I saw a few guards approaching me breathlessly, and raised an eyebrow at their tired expressions.

“What’s the matter, guys?” I asked casually, and one of them caught his breath just enough to coherently describe the situation.
“It’s good you came as quickly as you did; we’ve seen a strange creature prowling the edges of the city, and it looks like it’s trying to find a way in,” he explained, bewildered.

I nodded. “What sort of creature?” I asked, and the guards looked at each other nervously.
“It looked a lot like you, only… different. It had pale, decayed skin, the lower part of its face was missing, and it had long, patchy, black hair. It wore a pretty heavy-looking suit of armor, and some say it used magic to create a massive sword. Ever since it showed up, all it’s done is run its hand across the magical wall surrounding the city, and the spots it touches turn black for a few moments. Any idea what it could be doing?” he asked, almost sounding fearful. I thought about this for a moment.

“He’s probably looking for a weak spot in the wall,” I responded, and suddenly got an idea. “If he wants to get in so badly, why don’t we let him in?” I said, brandishing my sword. “You just make sure there aren’t any civilians around, and I’ll take care of him,” I said confidently.
The guard eyed me nervously. “Are you sure about this?” he asked slowly, “I mean, no offense, but you don’t look like you will be a match for him.”

I laughed. “How hard can it be? He’s an armored zombie, not the Obsidian King!” I said humorously, remembering my epic battle the previous year. “Tell me, where is he now?”
The guard pointed down the main street. “We’ve been tracking his movements since he arrived, and he should be on the other side of the city by now. Good luck,” I heard him add doubtfully as I ran off with my friends, the princesses, and the other humans following close behind.

~-~-~-~-~

Sanguis Cruciatus stroked the invisible wall, watching it become darker and take on a broken glass texture as he did, only to suddenly reform when he moved away. He was getting tired of this; it was time to see how much his power had stood against the ages.

He set down his massive claymore and pressed both hands against the barrier, watching it become broken and sickly black. He forced all of his power into his hands, watching as the affected area looked worse and worse, until the section of the wall he was touching shattered.
The warlord picked up his sword and stalked onto the crystal streets as a pony guard approached him.

“Halt!” The guard shouted, trying to stop Sanguis’s approach, and the warlord let out an unearthly growl. He swiped at the guard, grabbing him by the throat and lifting him into the air.

“You have something I need,” he said in a whisper as cold as the grave, and his hands suddenly darkened, and the guard’s eyes widened as his life was drained out of his body. His tan pelt slowly turned gray, and his eyes rolled back in his head. Sanguis narrowed his eyes, tossing the limp body aside, and continued to stalk the streets.
Just then, he saw a young boy flanked by several ponies, all blocking his path. The boy wore a suit of white armor, and held a large crystal sword at his side.

This boy thinks he can stop me? the warlord thought, confused. Let’s show him just how wrong he is...

~-~-~-~-~

I stood in an open area near the edge of the city, where the creature I had been warned about had just busted open a hole in the magical barrier and killed a guard.

“Alright, dead-head,” I said loudly to the armored zombie that had just tossed aside the dead guard, “I’ll give you one chance: you can either leave now, and we’ll forget you ever came here, or I’ll make you regret ever coming out of the ground.”
It stared at me with glowing blue eyes, confused, and turned around and started walking away.

“Huh. That was eas-” I started to say, but I suddenly jumped to the side as the creature had suddenly leaped into the air, smashing his sword into the spot I had occupied moments before.

Luna, Cadence, Twilight, and Rarity all tried blasting him with magic as he approached, but he shrugged off the bolts like pellets. The four human soldiers shot him with their assault rifles, but their bullets just stuck inside his body, barely doing anything. He waved a hand at them, knocking them to the ground with an invisible force, and proceeded to decapitate them one by one and in quick succession with his impossibly huge sword as they lay on the ground, stunned. With each one he killed, I saw a dark stream of energy flow up his blade and into his body, and realized, horrified, what was happening.

He’s stealing their vitality, I thought, and saw him turn to me. Half of his face had been restored, and he now glared at me with one normal eye, which still seemed to glow an icy blue in the iris. His hair that lay on that same side had gone from being patchy and black to long and silver. His half-lip curled into a snarl, and he charged at me with the sword held behind him.
I quickly dodged to the side, deflecting his swing as he passed, and tried to lead him away from my friends and my “father”.

“Get out of here, now!” I shouted at them, and they ran off, making sure they kept me in sight.
I hope they stay away, I thought as my adversary began to rapidly slash at me, I don’t want anything to happen to them. Even though I blocked every strike, the shock still made it a painful fight.
Who or what is this thing? I thought as his blade just barely grazed me, creating a long scratch across my chestplate. I ducked under a horizontal swing and kicked at his leg, knocking him to his knees, and brought my blade down on him. It sunk into his shoulder, cutting him halfway down his chest, and I smiled with sick satisfaction. My victory was cut short, however, when I heard him… laugh.

“A courageous effort,” he said in a deep voice as he stood up, dropping his sword and pulling my own out of his chest, “but you’ll have to do better than that.” As he said this, the massive gash I had made in his upper body sealed, and he tossed my blade behind him with one hand, pushing me backwards with his magic using the other.

I jumped to my feet and held up my hands defensively. “Who are you?” I demanded, and he laughed, a strange mixture of a healthy, human laugh and a cold, raspy chuckle.

“You may call me Sanguis Cruciatus. I’ve awoken from my eternal slumber to finally take back what should have been mine since the days of the war: this world!” he shouted triumphantly as he spread his arms, gesturing around him, and kept advancing on me.

I scowled and threw a sucker punch when he was about a foot away from me, but he responded by reaching up and catching my fist, crushing it in a bony hand like a soda can. I screamed as I felt my fingers snap, and I held my hand gingerly as I backed away. My gauntlets didn’t make it any better, as the metal had twisted and stabbed into my already-injured hand.

He held up a hand, which I now saw held a curved, black dagger, and he swung it at me as I jumped out of the way, landing on my side. I struggled to crawl away as he drew near, but he planted a foot on my back, holding me in place.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve gotten to torture anyone like this,” he whispered as I struggled to free myself, “so I’ll thank you for that much. But, you’re still an obstacle that must be removed.”

Just then, he drove the dagger into my back, and I felt the metal blade scrape against my shoulder blade. I cried out in pain as he twisted it, tears streaming down my face in buckets as he pulled the knife back out ever so slowly. He gave me a twisted smile as he stepped on my elbow and stomped, shattering the joint. I thrashed painfully, screaming continuously now, and was able to throw myself a good distance away from him. I was running on basic instincts now, like when you see an animal already wounded by a predator. I ran over and grabbed my sword in my good hand and started to wildly slash at my enemy, my anger and pain further fueling my attack. I severed one of his arms and broke his exposed skull, which was finally enough to make him start to retreat. I started to run after him, until I suddenly lost all feeling in my limbs, and collapsed on the ground. I saw my friends running after my attacker, continually blasting him with spells that seemed to actually work now that he was wounded, but he suddenly vanished, as if he turned invisible. I struggled to get to my feet, but my legs and good arm suddenly buckled beneath me, and everything went black.

~-~-~-~-~

“Allen!” Robert cried as he ran to his son’s side while the ponies chased off the strange man. Allen had fallen unconscious, and Robert pressed his head to the child’s chest to find he was still alive, but knew it wouldn’t be that way for long.
“We have to get him to a hospital!” He shouted, lifting Allen in both hands as he tried to carry him away, but Cadence stopped him.
“Robert, there’s nothing we can do. Our hospitals aren’t outfitted to care for humans,” she said worriedly.

Robert narrowed his eyes. “Don’t you have some kind of pony magic you can use to fix this?” he asked desperately.
The pink alicorn shook her head sadly, and Luna approached, gasping when she saw the extent of Allen’s injuries.
“Our magic can’t heal something like this in a human,” she said sadly, and Robert fell to his knees hopelessly. Luna hugged Allen’s near-lifeless body with her forelegs, and Robert suddenly realized why it had seemed so strange when she had talked about his son on the train.

She loves him, he thought, unsure of what to think of this change in events.

“Cadence, isn’t there anything we can do?” Luna begged, and the princess of love thought about this for a moment.
“There is one thing we can do, but it will have... consequences,” she said slowly. Robert looked up at her quickly.
“What is it?” he asked hopefully, “what can save Allen?”

Cadence looked at the human seriously. “It will change him. He won’t be entirely human anymore, but he will still be the Allen we all know. Are you sure you want to go through with this?” she asked him, and he nodded vigorously.

“Anything to save my son,” he said certainly, “I owe him that much.”

Cadence nodded, and turned to Luna and Twilight. “I’ll need you two to give me some magic; this is a very draining spell,” she said as the two alicorns began charging their horns, and Cadence began glowing with a mixed blue and purple aura. Then, her own horn glowed a bright pink, and there was a flash of light as she touched her horn to Allen’s chest.
When the spell’s effects had finished, Robert couldn’t stop staring at what lay before him.

“We had better get him to a bed,” Luna said quietly, “so we can explain when he wakes up.”
Robert nodded, his expression unchanging, and carried the still form away, guided by eight ponies, who all wore grim expressions on their faces.

~-~-~-~-~

I snapped my eyes open to find myself lying in a hospital bed, my entire body wrapped in bandages. I looked around the room, bewildered, and looked down at my arm, the one that had been mangled during my fight with Sanguis. It was bent in a strange way, and I couldn’t feel my fingers.

Oh my god, they cut them off! I thought, letting out an involuntary moan, and stood up quickly, suddenly overcome with a dizzying sensation. I staggered out of the room as a couple of nurse-ponies stopped me.

“You can’t be walking around yet!” they protested, and I broke into a limping dash down the hall as they pursued me. I slipped and fell as I turned the corner, and after quickly using the wall to return to my feet, took shelter in a nearby bathroom. To my relief, I heard the galloping nurses pass by my hiding place.

Let’s see what happened, I thought shakily, and turned to a mirror. My head was wrapped in white bandages, just like the rest of my body, but something about it seemed different.
“Oh god,” I said aloud, tentatively poking at the massive spike that jutted from my head and through the bandages: a large, grey horn.

I reached my shaky hand to my face and slowly pulled off the white wrapping, finding my face looked just as I remembered it looking. I sighed, somewhat relieved as I pulled the rest of the bandages that covered my head, and froze when I saw where my ears once were; the spot was empty. Further unraveling revealed they had traveled to the top of my head, and had taken on a shape that matched a pony's ears.

I suddenly had a bad feeling about why I couldn’t feel my fingers, and unwrapped my stump hand to find my suspicions were true: where a normal, five-fingered hand used to sit was a dark grey pony’s hoof. Unwrapping the rest of my arm revealed that it was bent so awkwardly because it was actually a foreleg. I had also become aware of a lump on my back, and when I completely revealed myself, I found there was a single, grey, feathered wing.

I stood there, staring at my underwear-clad reflection as the revelation slowly dawned on me.

I’m… I’m half pony, half human, I thought, my eyes as big as dinner plates.

I gawked for a few more moments at my strange new appearance, and suddenly gagged as I swayed and fell to the floor, unconscious once more.