The vendors were out again. Twilight watched from the darkness of an alley as one by one they were swarmed by thieves, their wares stolen in broad daylight. She eyed one with racks of colorful potions, sitting amongst a plethora of flasks and lab equipment for refining and maintaining the concoctions. The man behind the counter, a wiry-looking human with strips of pallid gray skin about his eyes, plied a straight knife to ward off the frequent grasping hands of passersby and customers alike.

She stretched her leathery wings, which had by now grown to a more practical size for flight, and swung them forward experimentally. She eyed the tools her target had arrayed at his stall, weighing just how much of it she could take in one go, and what she would need for her research.

She began focusing her energy to teleport across the square. "Ok... ok. It's fine. Poof, sweep, poof. You've teleported lots of times before, no difference... Except he has a knife!"

She shook her head to dislodge the thought, and positioned her wings for the grab. She noticed that the man would stab his own counter repeatedly when no grasping hands were present, pulling it back out and stabbing again in a perfect rhythm.

bang, slip, bang, slip, bang

Twilight released the spell and in the shroud of a blackened fog shot her wings forward and down, and loosed another spell. The moment before she’d gone, the furious face of the vendor was clear, but he was still pulling his blade up, giving her the instant she needed to vanish.

"Gods damn it!" he howled and pounded both fists on the empty counter, making the entire stand rattle. “I’m doomed... My supplier will be furious!”

He pulled the knife up and noticed a black stripe about mid way up that started to run.

He let out an amused sigh. “I hope it hurt.”

"Oh my gosh, I did it!" Twilight laughed as if she pulled off the biggest heist in Equestria.

She laid everything out across the desk and admired the bounty. A sharp smarting in her wing made her magic falter, dropping and shattering a flask.

"Ah... I teleported on that, didn’t I?" she giggled. The close call was more exhilarating than terrifying. A puncture in her wing dripped onto the floor. She felt a mounting thirst with each drop.

A small cage of rats squeaked fearfully at her approach. The blood of the city rats usually tasted of rotten onion juice, but she wasn't ready to take anything bigger. She floated one out and felt remorseful by its flailing and squeaking. Her special teeth extended and, not to prolong the creature's anxiety, quickly brought it up, impaling it on her teeth. She fought her gag reflex, trying to get down its foul tasting blood, and tipped her head back to avoid it touching her tongue. When the rodent's trickle ceased, she hurriedly spat out out and wiped her teeth of its fur. Only two rats remained in the cage.

"I'll have to leave more bait out."

Twilight had come to make this space something of a temporary home, despite it being only a single room. She’d cleaned out the rot and filth the previous inhabitants, rearranged what sparse possessions they had to her liking, and assembled the books she found most important to her research, those on mutation and warp magic. However, before beginning, she had to dispose of the stinking rat.

The Doctor facehoofed as Applejack snapped and moaned at the severed hand he dangled before her face. She writhed and twisted in her restraints, already beginning to rip her own legs off. Her lower jaw hung down to her neck before shooting back up, splattering acidic saliva. He slid the hand close enough that she chomped on it, not taking the time to chew. Her moaning eased and she began speaking intelligibly.

"Grimes...Golden...Pink... Pearl..." She swayed her head with the listing. "Bottle Greening... Paula Red..."

"Just stop." Whooves muttered.

"Whut happen'd to the hand? Did I beat it? And where'd that rope come from?"

The stallion tucked it behind himself. "It's nothing, and no, listing apple species didn't distract you. You ate it... along with the foot, other hand, and ear from the other tests."

"What!?" She looked at the fingernail that fell out of her mouth. "Get me off 'a this." she said angrily.

He held his breath while releasing the clamps over her legs and she landed with a wet thud.

"Well, the mutations stopped for the time being,” he said bittersweetly. “That's good."

"Nothin’ was wrong with me to begin with."

"Are you serious? What do you think we’ve been doing for the past half hour? Where do you think all the other parts went?"

"I dunno whut you did with 'em, but I didn't eat 'em!" She picked him up and searched his person. "Where'd ya’ll hide it, huh?"

“Applejack, stop!” said Whooves as he was shaken about. “Why would I try to make you think you’re sick?”

Applejack slowed down, her eyelids growing heavy. She started sniffing the air, like an animal catching a scent, and loosened her grip. The Doctor got away in time to avoid the caustic green slime dripping down from her salivating jaw. She looked extremely sleepy, slowly stood up, and limped toward the door.

"Applejack, not again...” he said, slapping her cheek and trying to wake her up. “What in the world up and died outside?"

Applejack’s face hit the door with a solid thud, splatting her acid on it. She reeled back and stood wobbling for a few seconds and staring absentmindedly at it before advancing on it once more, repeating the slam. Again and again she blindly struck the door as Whooves went back for the rope. He paused as he held it, looking between the ends and his digitless hooves.

He shook them in the air and cursed the heavens. "Of course! I can't tie a knot!"

Twilight levitated the lifeless rat beside herself as she navigated the complex, wondering if her idea for getting rid of it would be taken well or not. Her ear curiously turned to the sound of a repeated thumping against one of the doors and Applejack's moaning on the other side.

"Applejack, are you alright?"

"Not really,” the voice of the Doctor said. “Have any meat around you?"

"Uh... a rat. Why?"

"That'll do. Hold it in front of the door and open it."

Twilight dangled the animal out and opened the door, letting Applejack lunge at it and snatch it in her teeth.

’That works, I guess,’

Twilight watched as the rat was messily devoured and Applejack steadily came too again.

"Ah...bet yer...tryin’..ta make me feel bad, 'n... Twi! when did ya get here?"

’To make you do that.’ “Just wanted to make sure you were doing well in seeing if you can control your urges. By the sound you made, it doesn’t look like it went over well.”

An aggravated snarl creased Applejack’s face. "Ah didn't eat anythi'n!" But when she saw the severed rat's tail and bits of meat fall from her mouth, she made a dismissive agitated shout and ran back into the room.

Whooves put a hoof up to stop Twilight when she attempted to follow. “She won’t listen to anything about her affliction. There’s a reason it’s called the Curse of Unbelief. And why did you have a rat with you?”

"I actually brought the rat to see if she'd do that again. I got curious."

The Doctor’s brow furrowed at that. "She's not a guinea pig, you know."

"I know. Just... thinking. We should know how these changes work."

“Just try not to talk about it to her. It’s like salt in an open wound.” Whooves pinched between his eyes. “It’s just one thing after another. Applejack barely remembers seeing Rarity, and you haven’t been able to find Rainbow Dash...”

“Do you think she’s alright?”

“Well... I don’t know how she’s doing now, but she’s too important to the Storm of Chaos. The gods would see her to somewhere relatively safe.”

“But still. We can only imagine what’s happening to her right now.”

Apple Bloom had come to take quite a liking in a particular stallion, with a very familiar accent, who took to her like family. His cutiemark was a worm-infested rotten apple and he traveled as part of a warband, a roaming mob intent on looting and slaughter.

When they asked about his name, he said, “Everypony I know calls me Pox, so why shouldn’t you?”

He was a big one, enough so that Apple Bloom could easily sit on both his back and liquefied, dripping face with absolute disbelief while Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo followed on the ground.

“What do ya mean ‘there’s more’?!”

“I mean, gettin’ yer cutiemark is just tha first step. Gettin’ yer mark gets you ta be a follower.”

“And what comes next?”

“Then warrior, chosen, champion, lord, and if you’re a good filly, spread Nurgle’s rot all over the world, he’ll let ya be one of his favorite children, a daemon prince. That means Immortality, and a place second only to the Everchosen himself!” He heard his passenger give a despondent moan and let herself fall over his neck. “What’s wrong, Apple Bloom?”

“My friends and I spent so long tryin’ ta get our cutiemarks, and no”w that we have ‘em, we find out it’s just the beginning.”

“Well, the real fun isn’t in gettin’ there, it’s the journey. One soul at a time, each kill gets ya closer.””

“What rank’re you?”

“Chosen. Took me nine years ta get this far, and look what grandpa Nurgle gave me for it.” He took off his helmet, which had a large bony spike curving upward from the forehead, only the bone didn’t leave with the helmet. It was fixed on him, like a crooked unicorn’s horn.

“Woah!” Scootaloo gasped, “That’s real?”

“Sure is. I’ve run through more ponies with this than I’m ready ta count.” It was most characterized by its coating of old, blackened blood, indicating he’d never cleaned it. “I noticed ya didn’t get yer cutiemark yet. What do ya think it’s gonna be?

Scootaloo took a glance at her blank flank. “I don’t know, and I hate being last! Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom got their marks weeks ago!”

“Don’t worry yer head too much. It’ll come when you need it most.”

Despite that, Scootaloo hung her head low. “Who knows how long that’ll be?”

Pox chuckled. “Stick with us, and it won't be too long.”

Rarity’s eyes shot open in a cold sweat. Every facet of her being was aching with a ferocity she’d never known. Something was cupped over her mouth and nose, moving and scraping at her teeth. Rarity tried to lift her arm, but her skin burned. I felt like her whole hide was two sizes too small.

She forced her arm to her face and felt a lumpy, five armed object clasped firmly to her face. One of its arms went up the bridge of her muzzle and to her mane line.

She pulled at the appendage, which ardently refused to release its suction grip on her face. Rolling over to get up, she spotted the damaged rift gate and squealed.

“Hey, you awake yet?”

At hearing the voice, Rarity stumbled off the surface and onto the floor. Her body screamed at every joint. Her captor casually walked in and used her telekinesis to pick Rarity up and sit her down on the desk.

A heavy iron glove weighed down on her hand with glittering warpstone gems in the knuckles.

“That glove will help stop you from using your magic surges. Before I could get it on you, you were frying yourself to a crisp.”

Rarity looked down and found what she was talking about. Her body was almost blackened, caked in oil-moistened ashes that was once her fur, her extra eyes were shriveled to no more than giant blind raisins, and her hide looked like dried leather.

"I really thought you were going to die," Lyra snickered, “Now Bon Bon, get off her face.”

Tickling the underside of the thing stuck on Rarity’s face, it shook and peeled its arms off. Rarity watched a fuzzy blue starfish scamper up Lyra’s arm and perch on her shoulder.

Lyra chuckled while Rarity spat and wiped her face of the residue left by such a repulsive creature. “He practically saved your life. As he ate the plaque off your teeth, he kept your windpipe open by... You really don’t want to know how. Just think of him like an asthma inhaler.”

Rarity’s throat felt numb, but she could feel an unpleasant squeezing sensation in her shoulder. One of her eyes was trying to blink, but with its deformed shape, it was squished out of the socket and dangled by it's optic nerve.

Lyra snapped her fingers, producing a small, intense flame like a blowtorch, and she brought it to the exposed nerve. Rarity snatched her arm and shook her head disapproval.

"It’s going to come off anyway,” Lyra said. “Either it comes off now, or it dries up very painfully and falls off.”

She looked back and forth between the fire and her hanging eye, and tried to put it back in, unsuccessfully. Lyra levitated the eye and swiped her flame at the nerve, quickly severing and cauterizing it with a short yelp of pain from Rarity. The remainder of the nerve slithered back into her body.

“I’m having a cult meeting here in a few days, and I think we just got a new member.”

Rarity didn’t really know what that meant, but Lyra shook her by the shoulder with an ominous laugh.

“I’ll show you that this is the way. That Tzeentch’s plans are worth dying for!”

Under her wings wasn't the best place to carry it as it poked her, but levitating it proved impossible as the book literally breathed the stuff of chaos. Twilight cursed the individual who created such a book as she carried it through the library.

While searching for a safe spot to read it in the labyrinthine corridors, the sound of rustling papers grew louder behind her. She stuck close to one side to avoid the figure who passed by.

They were cascading in what she thought was a ridiculous amount of chains, scrolls, steel spikes and arrows poking through their cloak. Skulls clattered on a necklace, branded with stars on their foreheads. Out of the walls of text that whipped up at Twilight’s face, the name ‘Cheerilee’ stood out.

‘Cheerilee?’ Twilight wondered. ’What did they do to you?’

“Uh, Cheerilee?”

The figure’s ears flicked in Twilight’s direction and they turned a worn hood and black-veiled face to her. Cheerilee's voice was the definition of ghostly, producing hollow, aimless tones before she truly started talking.

“Twilight Sparkle... fancy meeting you here. That’s a very good reading choice you have.”

“Thanks. It’s really uncomfortable to carry though. Do you still teach?”

“Oh yes. I teach the one true faith. Do you need assistance in finding your way to the gods’ grace?”

Twilight nearly shook her head at that. Here was the schoolhouse teacher she used to know for some time, standing with scrolls written in Black Speech nailed into her body and carrying the blasphemous venom of chaos on her tongue.

“To uh, some degree,” Twilight said hesitantly, pawing at the floor. “I think I need a more in-depth look.”

Cheerilee nodded as Twilight hoofed her the vicious book and read the introduction.

The essence of the universe shall be open to you. You will know the light of truth. The greatness of Chaos shall be open to you. The gods await your answer.

“There are very advanced arts in this. I admire your enthusiasm. You can come by my school house in two days, while I prepare the beginning of your curriculum. It might appear small, but it’s suitable. It is between this library and the Betrayer of Pain.”

“Thanks, Cheerilee. It’s mostly how the warp changes creatures I wanted to know about.”

“For this kind of endeavor, you will need an assistant. Somepony to help you in experiments.

Twilight thought over the list of possibilities. Applejack wouldn’t hear a word regarding mutations, Rarity was still missing, as was Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy was a basketcase, Pinkie Pie was out of control, doing heaven knows what with Vinyl Scratch, and The Doctor had his hooves full keeping Applejack and Fluttershy sane.

“I don’t think I have anypony who could help me,” she finally said.

Cheerilee tapped her lip for a moment. “I think I know where you can find somepony.”

The slave market, a river port of human and pony trafficking, and slave handlers hocking their living products to the highest bidder. Mutilated and quaking unfortunates were corralled like farm animals, awaiting to be sold off with empty eyes.

Cheerilee had given Twilight a single fair-sized bit of refined warpstone to purchase one to aid in her studies. The concept of owning another being didn't sink in well.

’But here, the ends have to justify the means’

A streamlined black ship with sails like a dragon’s wings dropped its docking platform with a rattling slam. Tall, slender figures under the black banner of a crimson serpent creature marched out in formation around their quarry. Leading them was a sneering elf wearing a horned headpiece and hair that flowed like an oil spill down his back. He scanned around with repulsive disgust at the mutants and denizens of the city, but there was money to be made nonetheless.

There were pegasi among the soldiers as well, but their wings bore no feathers. Instead, the had the wings of bats, and equally eerie slitted pupils.

’They look just like the Lunar Guard,’ Twilight thought. ’But what are they doing with the Dark Elves?’

Before she took a step toward them, something pulled at Twilight's tail, drawing her attention. A toothy dwarf, wearing a tall cylindrical hat, whistling innocently, shuffled toward a wagon hooked to several ork and goblin slave stock.

"You like what you see, yes?"

Twilight didn't know what to make of it. Orks were supposedly aggressive by nature. Though most of them gave scared passing glances, one very large among them was unafraid and kept its head up with a hateful gaze.

"Come, come! See what we have to offer, yes.” The dwarf slapped each greenskin, but didn’t touch the biggest one. “They come in all sizes: gnoblar; goblin; ork boy; and nob."

Twilight scrutinized one of the boyz, taking in its tusk-like teeth, algae green skin, and beady red eyes. She then had a lightbulb moment.

"A friend of mine said you guys have a funny accent. Go ahead and say something."

The ork’s eyes shot wide and he bared his teeth in anger

"Yoo fink an orkses aksint iz funey?! How bout dis!? WAAAAAAAAGGGGGHHHHHH!"

Spit splashed over Twilight’s face and its rank breath blew her mane back. Sparkling green light emanated from the wagon until the ork’s head was suddenly blown off its shoulders.

The dwarf lowered his hissing blunderbuss. “You really didn’t want that one anyway, did you?” Twilight was still a deer in the headlights and shook herself back to reality, wiping off her face and fixing her mane. "Nevermind. Perhaps an ork boy is a little much. How about a gnoblar, yes? Smart enough to get the job done and just dumb enough to accept any job. Goblins on the other hand, chronic backstabbers."

"But dat's da powah uv Gork, brootal kunni'n." said a goblin snarkily.

An ork kicked it. "It'z Mork dat's brootal kunni'n, ya styoopid git."

"Oy, Da runt's roit! Gork's da moast kunni'n." another boy argued.

Their simple-minded debate instantly exploded into kicking and biting in their shackles. The dwarf's attempts to quell the little riot were for naught and the nob laughed at him the whole time.

Twilight quietly tipped away. The orks just weren’t her type.

The dark elves had a good sack of gold from quickly selling their stock to the slave hungry warmongers of the city, and only one slave left; a grey-blue bat-pony, his entire body covered in scars that looked as if they were artistically carved into his flesh; like vines, like burning veins.

“Last item of the day!” the lead elf announced. “Going for three ounces!”

Twilight looked at her wyrdstone coin. It had 1oz carved on it.

“A fine specimen here! One of the few in number, Noctral bat-pony race! Two ounces!”

Twilight held her coin tighter, but the elf put his arm down and tuned to one of the spearmen and muttered, “No one’s going to take this one and it’s not worth carting his stinking hide back. Throw him in the river.”

Twilight stomped a hoof in frustration as the soldiers returned to the ship, but not the slave. One of the elves was moving him toward the edge of the dock, and put his boot at the stallion’s back.

“Wait!” Twilight bolted over, waving her coin and the elf hesitated. “I’ll take him!”

“You have two ounces?”

“No just... one.” Twilight levitated the coin up and the elf took it.

“Profit’s a profit,” he chortled, and kicked the noctral over.

Twilight magically caught him and set him back on land while the elf boarded the black ship laughing. She picked up the end of his chain link leash and looked at him for a minute.

’I own this stallion... I just bought another pony’s life...’

“H-hello.”

He didn’t respond, kept his eyes down to the ground and was shivering slightly. Twilight felt like the monster she looked like.

“Hey, Mister... Stallion.” She put her hoof under his chin and raised him to look at her. She tried to crack a smile, but it inadvertently showed her fangs and wrinkled her face into a half-smiling snarl. “Do you have a name?”

His shaking, catlike eyes spoke of nothing but fear.

“You don’t remember?”

He shook his head.

“How about um...” The name Kislev came to mind. The pronunciation was like a dance of the voice, and just sounded funny. “How about Kivsin? Do you like that name?”

Once again, he didn’t speak but managed to nod painfully.

“That’s great!” beamed Twilight. “So I guess I’m you new... owner. I’m Twilight Sparkle, by the way.” She put her wings around him and lit her horn for a teleportation spell. “I’ll take you back to where I’m staying and we’ll see about getting that collar off.”

Kivsin watched as the world around them was consumed in a black fog, then he found himself in a single room apartment as it dissipated.

“Welcome to your new home!” said Twilight, letting him go. She pointed to a pile of clothing that used to belong to the previous inhabitants. “That’s where you sleep, since these people evidently don’t believe in beds, and is there anything unique about a noctral’s diet?”

Kivsin spotted the cage of rats and tapped it.

“So noctrals are meat eaters? I never knew that. You can have one if you want.”

Kivsin smiled brightly as he bowed his head, took a squealing rat from the cage and bit it clean in half with his carnivorous teeth. He devoured it in two hasty bites like an animal, smacking the blood off his lips.

“Now let’s see about this collar.” Twilight examined the brace around his neck. It fit very tightly and she could hear that his breathing was strained, like it was forever on the verge of choking him. “Now hold still.”

She focused her magic in a thin stripe down the width of the back of the collar and, like a psychic hammer and chisel, applied a sharp thrust of force and cracked it. She started prying it open, which brought his fur and even patches of skin peeling off with it.

“How long have you been wearing this collar?”

Twilight found an even more eye opening sight, four spikes from the inside of the collar slipping out of his neck. She levitated a couple of cloths over and put them in Kivsin’s hooves. “Put these hard against the sides of your neck when I say ‘now’, okay?” He nodded.

“Now!”

Twilight ripped the collar off and Kivsin planted the rags against the bleeding holes with a struggling gasp and choughed the same red droplets. The first sound he made was a shrill squeak as the heavy brace clattered to the floor. He rolled his neck with a succession of pops in the spine and took his first unhindered breath in ages, deep and long.

He silently mouthed a ‘thank you’, which made Twilight feel just a little bit better about her situation.

“You’re welcome. I don’t know how the Dark Elves treated you, but you won’t get any of that from me."

It wasn’t bad being with this Sparkle alicorn. Quite nice actually. He wasn’t whipped and beaten on a near daily basis, where he slept didn’t reek of stale urine, and he wasn’t locked up in a cage with barely enough room to stand up.

For a few days, he’d helped Twilight with her studies, which much of the time consisted of being the test dummy for testing spells. In one instance, he’d been temporarily left with only one eye.

For now, the master was gone, off to someone's house, this Cherry... Happily. He couldn’t remember, and he was alone. He curled up on his makeshift bed and waited for her to come back like a dog. He tried not to think as such an act would only prolong an unpleasant experience by making one focus on it more.

’An empty mind, is a healthy mind...’

He was taken from this lack of contemplation by the door, which had been rebuilt out of folded up metal sheets and scraps, rattling.

‘That didn’t take long at all,’ he thought, picking his head up.

After a second, the jiggling stopped, and a black pincer came piercing the steel like nail into wood. Kivsin jumped up and grabbed the knife on the desk as the claw cut an opening in the door like a can opener. Shaking in his fur, the door came crashing down with a blur of pink streaking in.

It was but a fraction of a second before the blinding speed of this figure had its legs around him in a constricting hold that almost enveloped him in her squishy body. A long tongue forced him to look up into a pink mare’s grinning face.

“Wow! So you’re the pony Twilight was talking about!” she bleated elatedly. “You’re just like the spooky night guards! You even got the wings and the fluffy ears!” Suddenly, she planted a hoof to her forehead. “D’oh, how could I forget! I’m Pinkie Pie, and Twilight told me you were Kivsin. I just couldn’t wait to meet you, so I came straight here.”

The whole time, Kivsin wasn’t listening to a word, trying to get his knife-bearing hoof around, but Pinkie snatched and threw it away as she let out a slightly pained belch.

“Ugh, excuse me. I think it’s just somepony I ate.”

Kivsin whimpered as he felt the pony’s lumpy stomach lurch against his back. ’Somepony she ate?!’

“You know...” Pinkie ran her tongue slowly up and down the side of Kivsin’s face. “I think I’ll have you meet her.”

With a weak voice, Kivsin could only muster a vigorous shaking of the head in opposition as Pinkie brought her mouth down over him. Her widened esophagus grabbed his head and started pulling him in , as well as her hoof and claw pushing his whole thrashing body further down he throat. She tilted her head back with Kivsin's hind legs kicking in the air and his body swelling her neck, and swallowed to bring him down to where only the tips of his hooves were left sticking from Pinkie's lips. She moaned slightly as the texture of his ragged fur tickled her throat and in another contraction, he was gone into her.

Her throat opened ahead of him and in the green-lit sac below, another voice said, “Well who is this? Kivsin I presume?”

“Mhm,” Pinkie affirmed, savoring the taste of her snack as more of Kivsin was piled in and stretched her stomach more. Kivsin landed next to a grey earth pony with only two legs, holding a piece of glowing green stone for light.

“And a bat-pony, how exotic! Oh look, he’s panicking.” Octavia wrapped her tentacles around Kivsin as he was trying to force his way back up. “Calm down, you.” She pulled him back down and he was bewildered as to how she could be so calm. “Listen.”

Their cell was groaning very threateningly and contracting tightly around them. Pinkie strained to stop it and steadily it relaxed back into a slow churn.

“Don’t fight it too much,” she grunted. “Tummy likes it when they fight and it could digest you guys in just a couple of minutes. Look around.”

The pool of gastric acid had a reddish shade to it and there were still bits of meat stuck to the walls that were slowly being dissolved away.

“That’s what’s left of a stallion who didn’t listen. I think he only lasted about ten seconds before tummy broke his neck with how strong it crushed him.” Pinkie rubbed the top of Kivsin’s head. “So just relax. Isn’t it warm and soft in there, my tummy goop smooth and soothing. It’s not often I get to have two ponies, so I wanna enjoy you and make you two last until Twilight comes back. Then I can say we already met. It's like a special feeling, to have somepony inside you, like you're sheltering or protecting them.” She gently massaged the top of Kivsin's head and giggled. "And it's so ticklish! Just the sliding around and soaking up the flavor right out of your fur."

“You see?” said Octavia. “Not much to worry about.”

Pinkie laid down on Kivsin’s bed, shifting her contents onto their sides, and hugging her belly contently as a creeping wave of sleepiness took her. “Mmm... you guys are delicious.”

Octavia and Kivsin heard her start to snore and they got off each other after being tossed around. “I wonder,” she said, slowly tracing her hoof along the patterns of his scars. “where are you from-”

“PINKIE!”

The shriek frightened them both and Pinkie snapped up from her short-lived nap. Twilight ran in, her horn ablaze in both anger and panic.

“Tell me you didn’t eat Kivsin!”

“I didn’t eat Kivsin,” Pinkie said back stoutly.

Twilight wiped her forehead of the gathering sweat and asked, “Then... where is he?”

“In my tummy.”

“But you just said you didn’t eat him!”

“Because you told me to say it!”

Twilight slapped both hooves to her face and shouted, “Spit him out!”

“Okay, okay. Just so you know, We already got acquainted, Octavia too.” Her stomach contracted, sending a pair of pony-shaped bulges up her neck and Octavia was first out, then Kivsin in another heave, splattering onto the floor.

Twilight telekinetically pushed the two mares out the door in a huff, “You both, get out of here!” and slammed the cutout opening back into place.

“I can’t believe this! She just barged in here and decided ‘Hm, I wonder what bat tastes like.’”

Kivsin wasn’t listening much as he was still thinking about that grey pony, that mare Octavia.

“Don’t get sick now. Just one more to go.”

Twilight walked in a slow circle around the square plaza, searching for her last target. Cheerilee had assigned her to take three skulls from as many victims, and two skulls were already balancing on her horns, both human. She spotted one; a pony, small and helpless.

“Perfect.”

Twilight put herself in a grabbing posture with wings curled and mouth open to bite.

Poof

She quickly bit down, her fangs piercing right into her victim’s trachea and choking his scream out. Using her greater size, she held him in a locked position while she drank of his red ichor. His struggles weakened the more blood she drew out until he stopped moving and she couldn’t feel his pulse anymore. Then she got to work on retrieving the last piece of her assignment.

She looked away as her magic peeled the deceased stallion’s face back, took out the eyes, and wiggled the skull until it snapped off the spine. She opted to levitate it at her side instead of putting its still wet bones anywhere on herself. With another spell, she extracted the soul and hastily hid it under her wing with the other two.

Even with such coveted morses hidden, she took no lesiure in getting back to Cheerilee's dilapidated school house where she was fixing a broken window.

The chain-laden mare hammered the last nail in with a hoof before turning to the sound of approaching hooves. "You took quite some time out there. Quickly, what is death to a cultist?"

"That death is a service?" Twilight quickly said back.

"And?"

"And... Their death brings them to a familial bond with Nurgle, pleasure to Slaanesh, blood to Khorne, and it's just the death of another tool for Tzeentch."

Cheerilee nodded and took the skulls inside where Kivsin was finishing decorating a pedestal bearing a large and ornate goblet. "You won't regret this. It was the best decision i ever made."

She arranged them around a dark goblet with a small bit of wyrdstone powder at the bottom and sparked her chains inside, erupting in a riot of colors and flame. It produced a strange coldness, despite its brightness. Cheerilee stuck her hooves into the flame and drew them out, carrying the ether with them.

"Are you ready?"

Twilight nodded, sitting tall but nervous. The robed one pressed her hooves to her chest hard and they passed in, filling her with a biting cold and wracking pain. "Hold still!"

After what felt like an eternity to Twilight, Cheerilee pulled back

The black gem rest in Cheerilee's hooves, and her intrigue was unseen behind her veil. It burned black, consuming the scarce light around it, silently emitting waves of dark tendrils to the floor and ceiling. Souls, though unique from person to person, were supposed to look the same throughout their lives but this black pearl had been burning inside Twilight her whole life. The alicorn sat hunched over with a hellish pain in her chest, feeling like she would implode any second.

Cheerilee raised Twilight's black sun to the chalice and before she could drop it in, a great, flaming gloved hand seized it. A thunderous chuckle emitted from the flame and Twilight began to spontaneously laugh with it. They grew more hyper, to maniacal cackling. The flayed corpses about the room writhed and screamed as if they were still alive. The flame blasted the ceiling in a column of pink and purple warp essence and fizzled out. Cheerilee's hood was singed and Twilight calmed, coughing and the empty feeling was gone.

Kivsin helped her up. "Are you alright, miss?"

"Don't... call me... miss." She gasped. "I think... I'll be ok, I’m just... so thirsty...”

A nightmare. Luna couldn't have imagined the holiday in her name would become a horror. hundreds of people and ponies wearing costumes and masks of daemons and the villains of Chaos were corralled at intersections and hacked apart or shot en masse by cheering, laughing crowds. Those dying seemed willing as they left their homes in evil dress and happily rushed to join the receiving end of a crossbow firing squad. Piles of bodies were burned by Bright Wizards who, at the snap of their fingers, lit the mounds ablaze. Few still played the old games. Pumpkin catapults, bug tosses, and such seemed to only attract the children and foals.

Celestia joined her, despairing the madness.

"We are sorry, Tia. We should not have asked for the celebration."

"You couldn't have known what it would become. Come back from the balcony. This is almost as terrible as the siege." She returned to the palace.

"Sister, we... we weren't... At the siege, the cannons, the bells. It was just so frighten--" Her voice cut off to a strangled gasp, followed by the sound of many wingbeats.

Celestia turned around, and Luna was gone. There was a figure in the sky - no, several, flying away, one screaming and was silenced. She ran to the balcony and noticed several of the statues of bat-winged pegasi were gone.

Luna beat her wings in resistance to the noctrals carrying her off in shackles, dangling her belly up. One of them wiped their face, clearing the ash and chalk paint and showing their greyish blue fur. Another, carrying a unicorn, dropped him on top of her and interfered with her attempts to smite them with magic.

"Hurry! Hurry!" They all shouted at him.

He struggled to balance on Luna's writhing torso and drew a series of needle components. The receptacle contained a swirling, dark, sparkling mist, similar to Nightmare Moon's mane and he began hastily assembling it. Celestia and several guards were closing quickly behind them, increasing his stress and fumbling.

"Your imprisonment ends tonight, milady! By the aid of Manfred von Carstein, most benevolent count of Sylvania, we have recreated thy true power. I return it to you!" He thrust the needle into Luna's neck. "Drink of this energy and awake, O Lady of the Night. Rule your people and purge The Empire of the false princess!"

The black, ephemeral mist rushed from the needle and into Luna’s body. Her eyes became glassy and unfocused and her frantic struggles stalled for a moment as a feeling of dizziness washed over her.

The unicorn sighed, knowing his job was done. He let himself drop off and silently fell, landing on a pile of flaming bodies from the celebration. The bat ponies stopped, released Luna and were quickly surrounded by the gold-clad pegasus guards. They hissed at the sight of Celestia and unsheathed knives. Expecting resistance, the soldiers slowly closed until the targets put the blades to their own necks.

"Hail to the Night!"

The ponies fell, blood streaming above them. Bones shattered as they hit the ground and lay motionless.

Celestia quickly swooped in and embraced her sister. “Luna? Luna?! Did they hurt you?”

Her sharp, yet compassionate tone cut through the fog clouding her mind, and Luna shook her head. “N-no, we don’t think so. They pricked with a needle or something, but we feel fine.”

The sun princess gave a quick nod and a barely perceptible sigh of relief, before turning back to the cadre of guards, her expression set with vicious determination. "We're going back to the palace immediately! I want it locked down and every carving and statue scrutinized thoroughly!"

They started back, and Luna rubbed her temples. A slight headache started, and she assumed it was from being hung upside down. The blood must have rushed to her head.