In the dim light, a mechanical hand clamped around Tarnish’s muzzle and began to squeeze. The attack had happened so fast that there was little time for reaction. Howling in panic and terror, the pain was almost blinding. Starbursts exploded in Tarnish’s vision and the pressure continued to increase, causing Tarnish to believe that his face was about to be crushed. His throat filled with blood and he could hear the creaking of his bones as they neared the breaking point.

There was a metallic clang as Maud smashed the attacking automaton and Tarnish felt the chilly metallic hand let go of his muzzle. He fell to the floor, choking on his own blood, which flooded down his throat and gushed from his nostrils. A large white hoof almost stepped on him as the others tried to defend his prone body.

“Vinyl!” Octavia shrieked.

What lights there were strobed as Tarnish’s vision faded in and out. His whole face was on fire with pain and the pressure in his snoot felt as though it would explode at any moment. Again, he was almost stepped on as he curled up into a fetal ball and tried not to drown in his own blood. More automatons kept coming.

“How are they taking down Vinyl’s shields?” Maud’s calm question belied her frantic struggle to keep the two unicorns safe from grabbing, crushing mechanical hands.

The chamber was filled with a roaring, rushing whisper as a choir of voices all sang out at once, “Down in the darkness we hear his song and we listen for the day when he awakens.” Then, moving as one, the automatons in various stages of functionality all continued their assault.

Bipedal, Helianthus’ front hooves worked like pistons, smashing and crushing everything trying to grab her and bring her down as she stood over Tarnish. Beside her, Maud and Octavia struck out at anything that got too close. Vinyl kept trying to shove the automatons away, but her magic kept fizzling out on contact with them.

One of the automatons got its fingers around Octavia’s throat and wouldn’t let go. She began to strangle as her throat was being crushed with slow cruelty from the automaton’s unyielding fingers. With a straight-legged punch, Maud beheaded Octavia’s attacker and then tried to get the fingers around Octavia’s throat to let go by smashing the arms.

Bellowing with pain and rage, spewing and spurting blood with every laboured breath, Tarnish fought to get to his hooves. With his magic, he brought his shield to bear and pulled out Flamingo. Within seconds, the tide was being turned as Flamingo entered the fray. She was sharp, she was deadly, and down at the very core of her being, she was still a pegasus—a pegasus whose friends were in trouble.

“Like butter!” Flamingo shouted as she slashed an automaton in half. “You ain’t so tough!” With a downward slice, she went through the head and torso of an automaton trying to grab Vinyl. “It’s like cutting cheese! Soft, squishy cheese! I’ve never met a cheese I couldn’t cut!” When Tarnish smacked an automaton with his shield, Flamingo took advantage of it while it was off balance and chopped it down.

“Down in the darkness we hear his song and we listen for the day when he awakens.”

“NO CREEPY SINGING!” Flamingo screamed as she completed a swipe that cut three automatons in half at the waist. “YOU CUT THAT OUT! YOU CUT THAT OUT!”

In seconds, Flamingo had turned the tide of the battle and now the automatons were trying to flee, but there was nowhere to go in the chamber. She ran them down and hacked them to bits, stabbing them, slicing them, cutting them, chopping them, and even spanking them with the flat part of her blade.

“What terrible dreams the sleeper has and what joy have we as he awakens,” the surviving automatons all sang in unison as Flamingo continued to reduce them to scrap metal.

“CREEPY SINGING GOLEMS GET CHUNKED!” Flamingo shrieked as she beheaded a member of the creepy choir. The follow through stroke lopped off both arms. “WHO WANTS SOME? HANDS UP GOLEMS, WHO WANTS TO DIE?”

“He awakens!”

“HE BETTER GO BACK TO SLEEP BEFORE I CUT HIM TOO!”

“He awakens!”

Screaming with incoherent rage, Flamingo finished off the last of the automatons.

“Tarnish, you okay?” Maud, sitting on her haunches, held up Tarnish’s head in her hooves. “Do you think anything is broken? Do we need to turn back and get you out of here?”

Finding it very difficult to breathe, Tarnish didn’t know what to say. Now that his anger had worn off, he was in so much pain that he felt like crying. His nostrils were caked and scabbed over with blood. Already, the swelling of his muzzle was considerable. Everything had happened so fast—it was all so sudden—and he was still in shock over what had taken place.

“Maud, you’re bleeding… it’s bad.”

As Octavia spoke, Vinyl tore away the sleeve of Maud’s smock to expose the torn flesh. With the sleeve gone, the laceration could be seen. The cruel mechanical fingers of an automaton had grabbed Maud’s leg and squeezed. The gash looked worse than it was though, and the damage had been done in a bony area near the elbow. Vinyl doused it with iodine and then began to wrap it in gauze. After a few wraps, she tied it off with a knot and tugged it tight.

“Helianthus, you are bleeding too—”

“Octavia, it’s just scratches. I’ll be fine.” Helianthus lowered her head and began to study Tarnish’s muzzle, where he had been grabbed. “It looks pretty bad. The only way to know if anything is broken is to give it a squeeze and feel for breaks… and I don’t think any of us want to do that to Tarnish right now.”

“Octavia, how is your throat?” Maud asked.

“A little sore,” Octavia replied, “I’ll be fine. Stiff upper lip and all that. It’s nothing compared to poor Tarnish. He almost had his face torn off.”

“Looks like Vinyl got raked.” Helianthus extended her long neck and began to examine Vinyl’s withers, which were bloody. “Yeah, Vinyl got grabbed. Somepony get the iodine.”

There was a whimper from Vinyl, she was a total foal when it came to pain. Octavia grabbed her mate to steady her, pulled her close, and then nodded at Helianthus. The big mare took the iodine bottle from Vinyl, lifted it in her meaty, muscular fetlock, and shot a little squirt into Vinyl’s withers, which had almost become mechanically separated equine meat chunks. The burn of the iodine caused Vinyl to start sobbing, and she clung to Octavia for comfort, letting out muted gasps of pain.

Looking around, Tarnish studied the heaps of dismantled automatons and the chamber which he and his companions now occupied. The walls were made of centaur steel, along with the ceiling and the floor. The floor beneath his hooves thrummed, the cause of the vibration was unknown.

“Octavia, you’re lucky that your throat wasn’t ripped open.” Helianthus’ words caused a noticeable chill in the air, causing Vinyl and Octavia both to shiver. “I’m glad that you are okay. I was terrified that I wouldn’t be able to keep all of you safe.”

“We’re not done here.” Tarnish’s words sounded as though he had a terrible head cold and was congested. “You all heard what they said… he’s awoken. We need to put him back to sleep if we can. I don’t know what lies ahead, but I know I am the one that needs to end this.”

“I feel funny,” Flamingo said in a low voice. “I feel like I did when I saw the tree of harmony. I feel so full of purpose. I’m with you, Tarnish, to the end. I am the Element of Pinkness and I will be with you until the end, whatever end may come.”

Nodding, Tarnish replied, “Well then, Flamingo, let’s keep going…”

There was an annoying hum that resonated between the ears and made his teeth vibrate. The sensation made Tarnish’s nasal passages burn with agonising pain which he had trouble ignoring. He walked with his shield held up before him and Flamingo led the way through the centaur steel vault. Blood continued to dribble from his nostrils, down his lip, and off of his chin.

The narrow hallway opened up into another chamber, with the centaur steel forming a solid, seamless barrier all around them. In this chamber, there were cubbies in the walls and there were items stored here. Maledico’s projection raised one hand in a gesture for Tarnish to stop.

“These aren’t dangerous, these are treasures stored away to keep them safe.”

Pausing, Tarnish had a look around as more blood trickled from his nose. On a stone bust of a pony, there were a pair of glasses. He glanced over at Helianthus, as if asking for permission, and when she didn’t respond, he pulled the glasses from the stone pony head and then slipped them into his saddlebags.

There was a collection of various types of horn rings, a few shoes, a small silver pegasus statue, a wand with a ruby tip, a dagger with a leaf shaped blade, a few magical gemstones that glowed with their own light, a mirror, and a number of other trinkets that Tarnish looted and stuffed into his saddlebags. He left nothing behind and each display cubby was left empty.

After spitting out a wad of phlegm and blood, Tarnish continued through the next doorway.

The next chamber also had display cubbies, but they were empty. The darkness seemed to be getting thicker and the light spells seemed to be getting weaker. The globes of light mounted to the walls did very little to push back the darkness. There was an unmoving automaton on the floor of this chamber that Tarnish eyeballed, not trusting it at all.

Helianthus kicked it over and then let out a gasp at what she saw. Growing from the automaton’s gemstone eyes were black crystals that protruded from the pale yellow gemstones. The metal face was no longer smooth, but corroded, lumpy, misshapen, and pitted. The entirety of the automaton’s torso was covered in thousands of tiny words that Tarnish could not read, but looking at them caused his vision to blur and made his stomach queasy.

The light seemed dimmest around the strange words inscribed on the automaton’s torso. Little squiggles of darkness could be seen, like many tiny phantom maggots writhing, and Tarnish couldn’t tell if they were real or if they were a hallucination.

The automaton’s crystal infected eyes flared with light, causing Helianthus to leap backwards. Mechanical fingers made feeble twitches and the mechanical golem rattled. “Master, forgive me, I am an imperfect vessel! I’m sorry that I could not contain you! Please sing to me once more! It is so lonely without your voice! Sing to me, Master! Sing! FORGIVE ME!”

And then, the lights in its gemstone eyes went out and the automaton went still. Smoke rose from its face and there was an acrid smell of ozone. Helianthus looked over at Tarnish and then at Flamingo. Darting forwards, Flamingo chopped the golem to bits with a few swift strokes, then returned to Tarnish’s side.

“Stay close together,” Helianthus said to the others. “Stay close to Tarnish. Something here is foul. When we are done here, I shall speak to Celestia about cleansing us in sunlight and phoenix elixir. I fear that we are becoming polluted.”

Octavia shuddered from Helianthus’ dire warning, but said nothing.

The next chamber was small and there was an awful stench. Tarnish paused and looked at the other side of the room. There was a metal door laying upon the ground and the door frame was a curious structure made of wood of all things. It looked like petrified wood. The chamber was filled with a strange, throbbing energy and the lights were now very dim.

“We’re here,” Maledico announced. “The Crown of Corruption is close.”

“I feel it too.” Helianthus pushed her way past Tarnish, and stepped into the middle of the chamber. “There is a sickness here. Not even Discord in the depths of his madness was this vile. My skin crawls from whatever has been concealed here.” Holding her head high, she looked at Tarnish and said, “Tarnished Teapot… now is your time. Do not fail us.”

Turning about, Helianthus strode towards the open doorway, stepped over the fallen door, and the moment that her head passed through the wooden doorframe, the big mare disintegrated. Her body became a pile of stones, dirt, and curled up roots on the floor in the doorway. In the middle of her remains was a dried up and shriveled sunflower.

“HELIANTHUS!” Tarnish cried.

But it was too late, the big mare was no more, and she had left behind a curious corpse.

Author's Notes:

Soon.