Author's Notes:

After many weeks, and a lot stuff in my life causing havoc and keeping me from truly getting into the mood of writing, here ya go!

So yeah, like I said. I hit so many walls while completing this chapter. Some of which almost made me want to give up on this and writing in general. I hate to admit it, but I just couldn't bring myself to keep going with the effort if it meant that I couldn't give it my all like I have. In the end though, I found my reasons to keep it going and get these last few chapters out for y'all. Just to clear up the air. No, I wasn't suicidal or such. I just got really depressed by a lot of things piling up in my life that really sucked the joy out of me. I wish I could give more details about it, but it's more a private matter that I don't wish to elaborate on for others' sakes. Ok, enough of the feels, don't want to bring myself back down again.

With that in mind, I will say that the last chapter is in the works and I can at least promise that it won't take quite as long since I've already got all the ideas and brainstorm pages up and ready for me to work from. Have fun y'all!

“One twenty-four… One twenty-three… “

He was taking too long, and with each passing minute that had come before and gone by, Twilight’s anxiety and fear grew stronger.

“One thirteen… One twelve… “

‘He said that he’d only take ten minutes.’ Twilight thought at the back of her mind in a desperate attempt to calm herself down.

Yet at the same time, the little unicorn remembered that he also said that he probably wouldn’t even need that long either. So, what was taking him so long? ...He probably just got distracted by something that caught his interest on the way in. Or, he was waiting for just the right moment to come strolling out the front door, Visionary and his crew in tow and wearing a pair of badass sunglasses, all while the abandoned lab somehow explodes in the background and the whole scene plays out in slow motion.

Twilight quickly shook her head to clear the absurd image of her last thoughts. How she ever came to think of it in the first place was a mystery to her. Perhaps Sam had become a bigger influence on her than she thought. Regardless, here she was, imagining ridiculous scenarios while Sam was risking his life on a whim.

“Harmony, damn him! Why does he always act without thinking?!” and now the poor unicorn was both frustrated had forgotten her place in her countdown, “One minute. That’s all I’ll give him, then I’ll have to act… fifty-nine… fifty-eight…”

Yet, what was Twilight going to do exactly? Sam had told her, quite uncharacteristically seriously, that she was to return to the castle and get the guards if his time limit ran out. Yet, at the same time, her concern for her friend begged her to stay and do something more. Whatever that was, she wasn’t sure yet, but she couldn’t bear the thought of leaving one of her friends behind. However, there was also the fact that when it came to matters like ‘dealing with conduits’, most of her expertise in magic was fairly useless.

“Thirty-four… Thirty-three…”

Though, if she was being truthful, that little hurdle wouldn’t be enough to dissuade her from putting herself in harm’s way when it came to helping her friends. She had faced down Nightmare Moon and Discord, two of Equestria’s greatest threats, alongside her friends from Ponyville and won. Whenever one of her friends needed her advice, or just an ear to listen, Twilight put aside her own work or problems to help them however she could. This should be no different, no matter how much Sam pushed her away. So, no matter what happens, as soon as Sam’s limit was up, Twilight resolved to do whatever she could to help him.

‘In fact,’ Twilight thought to herself, ‘why should I wait for some stupid time limit? It’s not like Sam would wait.’ She took in a deep breath and steeled her nerves. Strategies and plans formulated in her mind on how best to tackle this mission. She thought about it for a few seconds and determined that Sam had the right idea. Sneaking in would be the best option. Twilight wasn’t the most athletic nor proficiently knowledgeable in stealth, but she wasn’t about to let that stop her. With a fiery drive now in her heart, she took her first steps out from behind the cover of the dumpster to face the danger that Sam dove into headlong before her.

That blazing ember of determination died to a flicker the moment she laid eyes on the decrepit building of Visionary’s hideout. Something about it just exuded a certain malice that stopped the little unicorn in her tracks. Sam charged in without any hesitation. However, the more that Twilight stared at the building, the more her legs wouldn’t stop shaking. Outwardly, it looked no different than any of its surrounding brethren, yet, the aged, discolored walls of the building was more terrifying to her than any other.

Twilight scampered back behind the safety of her dumpster and tried to calm her hammering heart and panicked gasping. There was no denying it: she just couldn’t go through with it. And all of that just made her feel even more frustrated with herself on top of her fear. When the fear settled down, the frustration gave way to disappointment in herself. That, in turn, quickly became shame for running away when she was supposed to be brave.

“If Sam could do it, why can’t I?” Twilight asked herself as a bit of self loathing started to settle into her thoughts, “I know my magic would be useless, but I can’t just sit here and wait for something to happen.”

Peeking out from behind her cover, Twilight spied the old laboratory across the lott and shivered. She sat back down on the hard concrete and hung her head. There was nothing she could do, and it saddened her greatly how pointless her earlier faux-bravado had been. Leaning out once more to watch the building, she picked up where she left off in her countdown in a vain hope that everything would work out for the best.

“Ten… Nine…”

Any second now, Sam would strut out the front door.

“Eight… Seven…”

He would make a stupid joke about how he wanted to ‘cut it down to the wire’ just for the laugh.

“Six...Five…”

Twilight would ask, ‘What happened in there?’, to which Sam would reply, ‘Hey, you can’t rush awesomeness like me. Oh, be sure to tell Cappy that he can clean up the mess. I’m gonna go take a nap.’.

“Four……”

Any second now.

“Three……”

‘Please, let him be okay.’

“T-two…...One…”

That was it. No over-the-top exit. No explosion. Not even a peep. It was just Twilight and the empty street. It felt like the weight of all that mounting dread was slowing collapsing upon the purple unicorn and crushing her spirits. She had believed in Sam’s words, and now, there was no sign of him.

It was like the ghastly laboratory had swallowed him up the moment he set foot in the foreboding place. A twisting feeling settled in Twilight’s gut over every scenario her mind came up with that could have befell the reckless conduit, each more terrifying and upsetting than the last and all involving a common theme of her friend encountering Visionary Dusk and his own conduit enforcers.

“Sam, please,” the little unicorn desperately pleaded, “Just send up a sign that you’re ok.”

Twilight’s distressed cry went unanswered, and the street remained as empty as it had been from the time Sam had left her. Panic was starting to grip the lavender unicorn as she continued to search for even the faintest trace of her friend among what little of the building’s exterior she could see. Yet, her hope was dwindling.

She thought back to what Sam had told her before he left once more. Having the royal guards at her back to storm the abandoned lab was certainly sounding like a solid plan, but Twilight knew that upon her return she surely wouldn’t be allowed to take part in whatever raid they’d enact afterwards. She’d be waiting and worrying for everyone’s safety while she was stuck at the castle ‘for her own protection’, even though that was her friend in there, and she wouldn’t be content to just wait and see what would happen. Yet, the foreboding aura hanging in the air around the abandoned lab, even from so far away, frightened Twilight down to her soul.

Gazing out and down toward the alley that the captain used to depart back to the castle, Twilight spoke out loud to organize her thoughts, “This place is still in Canterlot. In the tunnels, it felt like we crossed a good part of the city. The architecture appears to be consistent with the lower ring’s industrial center. Teleporting back to the castle shouldn’t put too much of a strain on my magic. I should at least head out the same way the captain did. Better for my bearings, and I can give a more accurate location if I can gauge where exactly this place is by its surroundings.

“But if I leave,” Twilight turned her attention back to the abandoned lab, “Sam may be in trouble, and I wouldn’t be here to help. Teleporting to the building wouldn’t be hard, but… What could I possibly do if I go in there?”

Twilight’s dilemma made her shift her weight anxiously as she weighed her options, and she kept glancing from the abandoned lab to the alley with each pro and con she thought up. She had to make a decision, and the safer route of returning to the castle was looking to win out. Continuing to mutter under her breath, Twilight took one final glance in the direction of the abandoned lab, and shuttered at the intense sense of malice the place gave off.

Slowly, one hoof after the other, Twilight took her first steps in the direction of the alley. It saddened her that her logic made too much sense for her to argue against. Yet, she knew that there would be little to nothing she could do against these lopsided odds stacked against her. Sam and the Captain were right. After all she’d learned about Visionary Dusk and his cohorts, she wouldn’t stand a chance.

An ethereal, icy wind brushed up against her body and sent shivers up Twilight’s spine. Another look back at the abandoned lab, and the little unicorn knew the sensation had come from it. The terrible fear that haunted her every time she looked in its direction had increased two fold. She gasped involuntarily and realized that whatever it was was a bad omen. The feeling was the last bit of motivation she needed to follow through with her now unspoken decision, and her horn lit up with the accumulation of magic. She visualized the front gate that separates the castle from the city. It was easy for her to picture it in her mind with how many times she had been there herself. Placement envisionment: a necessity for any proper teleport to occur, whether it be by a clear, distinct memory or a line of sight.

Twilight’s gaze remained transfixed upon the door that Sam had disappeared through into the abandoned lab and swallowed the lump that was forming in her throat, “Help is on the way, Sam.”

With that, Twilight disappeared in a flash of lavender light, and the street across from the abandoned lab was empty once more.

The lock of the door on the side of the deserted looking building was pretty easy for Sam to pick. Yet, there was something about it that he took notice of while he worked. Having been a student of the arcane arts had helped him to recognize the distinct sensation of a spell at work when he came into contact with one. It was like he was trying to move through runny syrup. Annoying at worst, but it didn’t present any real challenge in the long run.

Though the muddied resistance that he worked through was indicerable for him to tell what type of spell that had been placed on it in the first place. If he had to guess, it was more than likely a form of anti-skeleton key spell to keep out unwanted guests. Thankfully, Sam didn’t need a wand and to shout ‘Alohomora’ to get past this sort of defense. He was basically a human lockpick set after all, though all of this just made him more reassured that he was in the right place to hunt down D.U.P. wannabes. Who else would need something like that on such a squatter-friendly looking place like this?

The tumblers gave satisfying clicks as each fell into place, and then, the entire lock turned. The wires sticking out from the lock retracted back into his fingers, and Sam smirked at another job well done. He cracked the door open and peered inside. It was dark, musty, and reeked of something foul. Holding back a gag, Sam checked the entrance for any signs of traps before proceeding to slip in through the crack in the door he made. Closing the door behind him as quietly as possible, Sam was pleased to note that there didn’t seem to be anything lying in wait for him behind it.

With no danger present, Sam took his first clear look around the interior of the abandoned lab. The side door appeared to have led him into a storage closet of some kind. May have been a groundskeeper’s room, seeing as there was a broken pair of shears and torn up, empty bags of what looked like fertilizer lying on the dusty ground. There was a doorway, separating the storage closet and the main lobby entryway to his left for him to see through with the door nowhere to be found.

Sam slunk up to the side of the doorway and peeked around the frame to get a better look at the rest of the first floor. It was about what he expected. Dank, dirty, and definitely in need of a good spring cleaning.

It was bit surprising how little sunlight was being let into the place with all the open windows, but it seemed like appropriate atmosphere for the such a place. Almost everything was covered in a layer of dust or cobwebs and had a nice, rotting away look to it. There was hardly any furniture or fixtures, no doubt either taken out when the place got shut down or looted. What was left was broken, shredded, or left to rot.

Even though it looked more like a lobby of sorts, there were still a few other doorways that led to various rooms that Sam couldn’t quite make out. There were no signs of them in use, like lights in the doorways, so they seemed to be unimportant. There was a fairly nice looking staircase leading to the upper floors at the back of the area that Sam could see and looked to be in good enough condition to use. Other than that, no real signs of the his true objectives in the area.

“Okay,” Sam whispered in relief, “Now, if I were a mad scientist planning world domination, well, maybe not world domination, but still. If I were that wacko, where would I be hiding in a place like this?”

Sam swept his gaze once more over the first floor and found that all he could come up with is that he would most likely have to search the higher floors. That concrete pillar on the roof at least gave him the idea that ‘someone’ had to have used a way to get up there, and therefore, he might find the clues he was looking for on the higher floors regardless. Sam took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, focusing his mind for the task at hand. This was no more different than any of the times he and his friends infiltrated the various outposts the D.U.P. used to set up about Memphis.

He even played Natie’s peptalk she used to give him before sending him off into scout an area, ‘Just stay quiet, check your corners, and for the love of god, don’t do something stupid.’

Sam smirked at the multiple times that ‘doing something stupid’ had actually come up during his time in Memphis. Mostly not by his own fault, but when you need to set off a couple, pressurized canister of acetylene as a distraction, you really don’t have a choice.

The wire conduit could feel the ghost of a feeling of a certain electric conduit slapping him upside the head for just thinking that. In any case, his mind was focused, and he checked the lobby one last time before creeping along the doorway and out into the open. He kept his footsteps light and his form crouched, avoiding anything on the ground that his foot could knock against and cause a noise. Other than the faint inhale and exhale of his breathing and the distant, muffled sounds of the rest of the city. There was hardly a sound to be heard within the old building.

‘It’s quiet… too quiet,’ Sam thought to himself.

Of course, the old movie quote running through his head did little to dissipate the oppressive sense of malice that permeated the air around him. He was already over halfway across the lobby, which left him a quarter of the ways to the staircase and the upper floors. Just like he thought before, squatters must have slummed it out here for a while, because the wire conduit found old blankets and rags that he assumed was bedding. Some stains looked ‘fresher’ than the ample rain damage, and the less said about what some of those smells were, the better.

‘Y’know, considering his old hideout. This has gotta be a step down for the crazy bastard,’ Sam thought as he reached the foot of the steps leading to the higher floors.

Leaning into the stairwell, Sam peered up into the upper floor. Or at least, what was visible from the staircase. Still no signs of the ones he was looking for, Sam’s paranoia was starting to grow. Something felt off to the wire conduit, like something or someone was watching him. It made him shiver, and the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. Yet, even checking over his shoulder, he found nothing out of place from the path he took. Even still, not wanting to take chances, Sam called on his reserves and wrapped copious amounts of wire around his knuckles and arms.

Though he was careful with his footing, the groans from the deteriorated steps sounded louder in the creepy silence of the building. Each sound made the conduit cringe, and he kept his wire wrapped arms at the ready to retaliate against any unsuspecting attacks. Clearing the landing, the wire conduit let out a breath he hadn’t realized that he was holding when he realized that nothing had attacked him.

The air up here felt just as stale and dusty as it did on the first floor. Other than that, nothing else really stood out to the conduit on first inspection. Yet, his heart was pounding, and his mind raced as the sensation of something being awry grew a little stronger.

The second floor was a lot different than the first. Instead of wide, open areas, the space that the stairs had led to was a large hallway stretching all the way to the other side of the building. The place was a little darker, as what little light that he could see came from the various doors on either side of the hallway. Some were a bit brighter than others, as the doors were missing from their frames, but it did little to truly let any sufficient light help illuminate the dark hallway.

‘Yeah, why not dial up the creep factor to eleven?’ Sam nervously thought in his mind whilst staring into the darkened environment, ‘All ya need is a chainsaw wielding maniac, and you could have yourself a proper haunted house here.’

Not to dwell too much on the fact, Sam took another deep breath before sneaking on down the sparsely lit hallway and up to the first doorway on the left. This one actually still had a door in the frame, but much of what could have been a garishly, sickly yellow paint has peeled away and left all but a few chips that loosely clung to the wood. There was a small window in the top half of the pony sized door, but Sam had to clear away some dirt just to get a smudgy view of the room’s interior. With only indistinguishable shapes and colors to be seen through the translucent glass, Sam was left with no choice but to open the door to get a better look of the inside.

It must be said that years of disuse on any door would cause the hinges to be a little rusty, but the shrill grinding noise that these hinges let out as Sam turned the knob and pushed on the aged wood was like a thousand nails on the world’s largest chalkboard. Granted, it wasn’t quite as loud as that, but in the muted building, it might have been as such. Seeing that he already got the thing open, there would be no more harm in at least checking the place out. Squeezing through the gap that he made, Sam slid into the room and nearly yelped in panic.

Having been too distracted by keeping an eye out in the hall for anyone that heard him, he had turned around to come face to face with a skeletal, equine body. He almost punched the thing out of fear, too, when he noticed that the thing wasn’t moving, nor demanding his cranial innards in ghastly moans. In fact, the skeletal body was just as such and nothing more than a skeleton of a pony propped up on a rack. Getting a chance to catch his breath and calm his nerves, Sam poked the thing and found that his fears of an undead legion coming to haunt him were also unfounded. He looked around the room that he was now in and came to a logical conclusion.

‘Just an ordinary lecture hall... A lecture hall where you’re greeted at the door by Mr. Bones here,’ Sam thought bitterly and then stared at the offending culprit, ‘You mind showing me a way off this wild ride, pal?’

He waited for his new, bony friend to answer, but received nothing in return for his inquisitive stare. Seeing as there was nothing else to be found in the ordinary room with rows of empty seats facing the large chalkboard at the front, Sam peeked out into the hallway once more before finding the coast clear to return.

Back out in the hallway, Sam shifted from one side of the hall to the other, checking each room that he passed to make sure they were clear. He came across a set of laboratory rooms, similar to the ones back in the castle that he could only assume must have been used in the same way. You know, if it hadn’t been stripped bare of all the equipment that wasn’t bolted down and then left to be taken over by the elements and rat droppings. Then, there was one of the doorless rooms that was just plain empty, aside from the bits of glass on the floor from a broken window or pieces of trash in the corners. The wire conduit got another jump from a rat that scurried across the hall in front of him, and he nearly lashed out at the hole in the wall that it scuttled away into and blew his cover.

Sam was almost to the other side of the hall when he came up to the final room on his right. In all the time that he’d spent in this place, he hadn’t seen anything that could be signs of Visionary Dusk or his lackies taking refuge within this abandoned place. Yet, even with that in mind, the wire conduit couldn’t shake off that earlier feeling that something was off about this place. Every so often, he would hear the creaking of something above him or the rustle of something off in the distance. Maybe it was paranoia, and maybe it was just the noises an old building like this made after years of disuse. However, Natie had always taught him that paranoia was just another way of your instincts telling you that you should be alert and ready for whatever was coming. Sound advice that had saved him and his friends back in Memphis on multiple occasions whenever one of them got one of those ‘feelings’.

All that being said, Sam had to put that feeling on hold for a moment as he worked on the lock for the final door in the hallway. He hadn’t even thought about the oddity that this door was locked until he had passed the threshold after unlocking the thing. Even then, his mind lost that train of thought once he got his first look of the interior of this final room.

‘Well, jackpot.’

The room was clearly lived in, especially by the three newer looking cots that were spread out about the room. In between two of the cots sat a table with what looked like a disassembled rifle on it, as if someone were in the middle of some maintenance with it along with its associated cleaning supplies.

Sam moved into the room a bit more and spied a map of Canterlot tacked to the wall on his right, with all kinds of markings and hastily scrawled notes on it. Beside that was what looked like a cabinet that was open for all to see the various pieces of familiar and unfamiliar equipment for the wire conduit. Though all of that paled in comparison to the final discovery that he saw sitting in plain view at the foot of the furthest cot within the room: a modified D.U.P. helmet that looked to belong to one of the unicorns that he fought back in the Geode Caverns.

This was it. This was the place that Cappy, Sunny, and he were looking for. The damn D.U.P. wannabes and their crazy leader of a unicorn were right here, and had been hiding right under their noses for who knows how long. Though, more than likely, it’s only been since they kicked them out of the cavern hideout. Even though this pleased the wire conduit that he successfully confirmed that this abandoned lab was Visionary’s new hideout, this left one last question that kept rattling in the back of his mind.

‘Where the hell are those assholes then?’

Just as he thought that, a sound got the wire conduit’s attention from behind him. It was like pieces of rock crumbling to the ground. Only, by what Sam had seen, this place didn’t have a concrete foundation or frame behind its drywalls. It was at this point that Sam had realized a critical mistake he made upon entering this room he found himself in, and his body stiffened in alarm. He forgot to check behind the door where it swung inward.

Without thinking about it, Sam spun and ducked in place. The wires around his left arm unraveled, and he flicked his arm out to lash at the position he heard the noise come from. He hadn’t been aiming for anything in particular, and he was glad that he opted for a sweeping strike to knock the rifle out of the griffon’s grip just as he heard the oversized bird thumb the safety.

“Shit!” Sam cried out as he took in the situation.

Before him was the griffon, perched on a concrete ledge he must have created into the top corner of the room behind the door. The griffon screeched and retracted his arm as a few of the wires snapped against the back of his claw when Sam knocked the rifle away. The firearm clattered against the wall and then the ground, but Sam wasn’t paying attention to it, as his surprised look met the hate filled eyes of the griffon’s. The momentary standoff was finished off with the griffon recovering quickly and crouching from his perch while spreading his wings, as if he intended to charge the human conduit.

Sam figured he had less than a second to brace for the impact and tried raising his wire wrapped arms to defend against the attack. That is, until a flash of sickly yellow light and movement caught his attention in the bottom corner, below the griffon’s perch. His eyes widened in panic as a barrage of concrete shards were already halfway between him and the unicorn pair that were hiding behind a chest high barricade with outstretched hooves, alight with more concrete that the shards obviously came from. There was no time to defend or dodge, and Sam was left with the wind knocked out of him as he staggered back from the hail of concrete directed at his unguarded chest. As the wire conduit stumbled, he was left defenseless against the griffon’s charge and the concrete infused punch directed straight to his jaw.

Sam was left no time to recover, as more and more concrete was blasted into his face as he was pushed back straight into the first cot’s footlocker and tumbled head over heel over it. Incoherent shouts which Sam could only assume were commands to keep up the pressure came from the trio that was thoroughly kicking his ass as more attacks were pushed on the disoriented conduit. The onslaught kept coming, and Sam could feel his body becoming too overwhelmed to heal the damage that was being done to him. Essentially, his healing factor just couldn’t keep up, and the pain was becoming unbearable. A sudden lull in the barrage was only interrupted by another charge from the griffon, as Sam was slammed into a locker and crumpled to the ground in a heap with a defeated moan.

At this point, the wire conduit was barely conscious. Every part of his body that was hit felt like it was on fire, and he was sure that he may have been coughing up a bit of blood by the end of it. He just wanted to curl up on his side, if he had the strength, and let his healing factor fix him up. However, rough claws and hooves grabbed his arms and began to pull him away. His body screamed at the lack of reprieve he was given, but any protest he gave was either ignored, for the ones that carried him didn’t care, or by the fact that all he could muster at the moment were a jumble of weak groans and whimpers.

A mess of colors and shapes passed by in his blurry vision as he was taken to parts unknown. Sam could feel that his body was dragged down a long, smooth surface until it felt like he was hauled up a series of bumps at even intervals, which did his injuries no favors. More sounds, or maybe it was shouting, could be heard just beyond the ringing in Sam’s ears, but nothing was ever clear enough to make out. He was at least glad that there were no more bumps, and he was dragged across another smooth surface for a short time. However, the wire conduit was suddenly brought to a halt and then hefted into the air. If the sudden sense of vertigo didn’t agree with the wire conduit, the immediate impact of his body against a hard, cold surface was even worse and left him feeling like he was about to snap into pieces.

Sam’s body finally decided to start cooperating, and his healing factor was finally kicking back in. Yet, that was short lived, as he felt someone gathering up his arms and slipping something over his hands before that same something locked tightly around his wrists. At the same time that that happened, he felt his healing factor suddenly ceased. No, it was more like all of his powers were suddenly shut off.

Sam would have panicked a little more about this if he could think a little straighter, but with his healing factor shut off, he was left in this haze of dizziness. It also seemed that whoever put whatever it was on his hands wasn’t done yet, as what felt like straps of some kind were pulled across his legs at the ankles and thighs. Then, more were pulled over waist and chest, which also meant his arms. All these straps suddenly got tighter, to the point that it felt like Sam was unable to move.

Luckily, this seemed like the last of the tightly bound straps, as Sam was left alone to recover a bit. That didn’t mean that he felt any better. His head was pounding, and his body ached. The ringing in his ears just wouldn’t go away fast enough and left the poor conduit with the painful, if belated, realization that his powers were effectively rendered inert. He tried talking, but all he got out was a weak moan that he could barely hear himself. It took far longer for his dizziness in his head to subside without the help of his accelerated healing, and even then, he felt like crap.

His hearing was starting to make a comeback, if just enough to define the sound of hoofsteps pacing around him. The pony they belonged to frequently stopped at different places before the owner mumbled incoherently to themself and noisily fiddled with stuff in the background.

The shapes and colors that spun in Sam’s vision were starting to gain a bit of definition at last, and he was able to tell that there was a painfully bright light facing him and forcing his one good eye closed from the harsh illumination. Another thought slipped into the conduit’s mind that his right eye, and consequently, the right side of his face was swollen and throbbed with pain. Desperate to find out where he was and why he was in so much suffering, Sam forced his left eye open and squinted past the light glaring down on him.

What the poor wire conduit was able to see made the rest of the color drain from his face as he realized where he was. His brain was slow to process it, but the unmistakable weight and sight of the device over his hands led his thoughts. Upon his hands were a standard issue set of D.U.P. conduit suppression cuffs. The cold yellow and black exterior of the metal contraption filled Sam’s body with an icy chill.

He forced himself to concentrate and understand the situation before him. He was then made aware of the rest of the bindings that were placed on his body and restricted his movements to futile wriggling. Sam reached into himself to draw on his powers, but to his dismay, it seemed that the device over his hands were the real deal and prevented him from using his abilities even in the slightest.

Sam was starting to hyperventilate at this point. He was defenseless, powerless, and far more in over his head than he cared to be in. He tried to futility thrash against bindings, but stopped when he realized that that wasted what little energy he had on this endeavor and would get him nowhere. So, he focused on gathering more details on the place that he was now in, if just to serve as a distraction to everything else going on.

Switching his view to his surroundings, he could at least find a bit of good news in that he was still in the abandoned lab. The decaying and mildew stained walls of the interior that the wire conduit had come to associate with the place were a dead giveaway. Of course, that was the only good news. With everything else he found, it could fill up a list of ‘bad news’ so large that it would make Twilight envious.

First off were his bindings. They left no room for him to try and squirm free, and the conduit suppression cuffs left him with no alternative options of escape. Then, came the realization that Sam was not lying on his side on the floor, nor standing upright. He was, in fact, forced into the position of lying on his back. Even more terrifying was the fact that the surface he laid upon was that of a flat, metal table.

It was easy to tell that whoever put him here clearly had no regard for his comfort, as there wasn’t even a pillow to support his head against the cold surface. Looking further out into the room he now found himself in, Sam’s panic grew worse.

The room he was in may have looked as decrepit and worn down as the rest of the building at first glance, but everything had been organized and cleaned to the best of the owner’s ability. But, that wasn’t the part that scared the conduit the most. What did scare him was the tables, hanging racks, and cabinets filled to capacity with all manner of cobbled together equipment and tools which Sam could only associate with the instruments of a mad scientist. There were even some preserve jars labeled with odd sequences of letters and numbers with what Sam could only guess at what the contents held within were. His money was on the possibility that the meat-looking chunks floating in the liquids were not just some very realistic halloween props.

Speaking of which, the shuffling of equipment stopped once more and was replaced with the swift canter of hooves approaching from the opposite side that Sam was facing. Once he did turn toward the noise to see just who this pony was, Sam’s heart skipped a beat. Visionary Dusk, in the flesh.

The pony looked just the same as the last time they came into contact with each other. However, there were some subtle differences to the unicorn’s appearance. Patches of off white fur were matted and dirty, and his orangish-red mane and tail looked far too oily and stuck up at weird angles in places, all clear indicators that the pony has been neglecting his hygiene, if the slight smell didn’t give it away. Even though his face was half buried in a stack of notes he carried in his magic, Sam could also see the distinct bags under his piercing lime-green eyes. Sleep was an issue for this pony as well, as Sam could tell. He kept muttering under his breath, like he was having a two way conversation with himself and was easily irritated with what the other said every so often. Though, the most striking detail was the unicorn’s eyes: half manic and half dead to the world around him. Like it didn’t matter what you said to the guy, he would either bite your head off, possibly literally, or just brush you off like an annoying fly.

Sam wanted to say something witty, or anything for that matter, just to break up the tension that filled the air, but no matter what, the words kept getting caught up in his throat from fear. The mad pony was soon hovering over the tied down conduit, and for a long time, Sam wondered what was going to happen. Visionary was still looking over his notes when he suddenly nodded to himself and set the stack of papers off to the side, only to be replaced by an old cassette tape recorder within his magical grasp. A button was pressed on the side of the recorder, and for the first time since they met, Visionary looked down at the conduit face to face. The look he gave Sam was bone chilling, like the wire conduit wasn’t even there, or he was just a piece of meat to be examined by the uncaring, clinical gaze that was upon him. It reminded him far too much of the scientists back at Curdan Cay and made the human conduit shiver with fear.

The older stallion finally cleared his throat and raised the recorder up to begin his dictation in the most dry, monotonous tone he could muster, “Log Number D-139. It seems that even though my mercenaries had failed in retrieving a new subject for the latest tests, and furthermore, apparently let themselves foolishly be followed back to this facility that I had painstakingly set up, their lack of success has actually been to my benefit. I am now in possession of Subject A-4, although not in the most pristine condition, but to finally have a chance to study the physiology of an intact ‘awakened’ conduit, I would have given just about anything for this chance.”

Visionary’s predatory gaze gave Sam the creeps. Though, as the mad pony talked, a trickle of anger seeped into Sam’s mind over how impersonal he was being referred to. That same trickle of anger was just what the wire conduit needed to bring himself to finally challenge the unicorn above him, in the only way he could for the moment.

“H-hey, asshole,” Sam croaked out, trying to put on a brave and cocky smile, “If all you wanted was for a night out with me, you could have at least bought me dinner first.”

Sam watched as there was a momentary flick from the unicorn’s ear, but other than that, it seemed that the mad pony was unfazed by Sam’s snarky remark.

Visionary Dusk took a deep breath and continued on, as if it never happened, “It was merely out of paranoia that I instituted a secondary alarm spell on all entrances of the building, though it seems that my instincts have served me well. This revised alarm spell that I devised was made to detect when the original sets of sealing spells were tampered with by means other than magic or brute force.”

Upon hearing this, Sam gasped. The lock on the outside door did feel like it had spells to protect it from what he knew of his limited knowledge of magic. However, he had failed to consider that the crazy bastard would have a new contingency for his tricks. The wire conduit mentally chastised himself for such a simple mistake.

“Having done this, when Subject A-4 activated the alarm, I prepared my mercenaries to suitably capture it for my research,” Visionary Dusk remarked, only to snort a second later, “They initially wanted to kill it on sight. What a waste of a perfectly good specimen that would have been. Yet again, I am the only one to see just how important my research is and the value that a live ‘awakened’ subject provides for it. In the end, I was able to persuade Aras that capturing Subject A-4 would be far more useful and beneficial for everypony here, including himself.”

The more the unicorn talked, the more Sam hated the guy, so much so that his fear was starting to take a backseat to his anger for the crazy bastard over his callous disregard for his humanity. It wasn’t also because of the fact that the guy sounded a little too smug that he was able to get his lackies to ambush Sam, like it was biggest stroke of genius in strategy.

“Hey!” Sam growled out, “You know, it’s rude to talk about someone like they’re not even there. Especially when they’re right in front of you, ya lunatic!”

This latest outburst got the unicorn to pause for a bit longer, and he gave an angry huff for being interrupted once more. Visionary Dusk decided to get his thoughts back on track, and he began to pace around the examination table that his precious ‘subject’ was strapped down to.

“My mercenaries are under the impression that just because this subject was able to successfully stumble upon this laboratory, that we must abandon this place. Of course, I was quick to point out that if the Royal Guard were indeed ‘not far off’, they would have had ample time to enact any sort of plan they had after Subject A-4’s intrusion. That would, of course, mean that they somehow were able to bypass all of my security spells without my notice,” the crazy unicorn said, as if he were gloating, “In any case, I shall now begin the preliminary examination of Subject A-4.”

Sam followed the unicorn in rapt attention as he made a full circle around the examination table he was on before stopping on his left side. All the while, Visionary Dusk scrutinized every physical characteristic of his quarry, like he was inspecting a piece of livestock. Sam wanted to spit in the ‘good’ doctor’s face, but held back, as he waited to see what the egotistical fuck was going to say. Besides, the idiot believed that he came alone. He was in for one hell of a surprise once Cappy made it back with backup. All Sam needed to do now was stall.

Making a few noises as he worked, the unicorn finally spoke again into the recorder, “Subject A-4 shows nothing remarkable, or defining characteristics that make him aesthetically unique physically from subjects A-1 through A-3.”

“Well, if your goons had the guts to face me instead of trying to shoot me in the back, you would have gotten a face more gorgeous than Chris Pratt, buddy,” Sam remarked snidely.

Visionary Dusk ignored the commentary again and carried on, “Black, short-cut mane with minimal facial hair, brown eyes, common facial structure typical for its species.”

“Again, so much better when I’ve got the chance to clean up, asshole.”

“Approximately one point five meters tall, with what I can only guess is a medium build for body structure.”

“Are you calling me fat?”

The slowly becoming annoyed unicorn furrowed his brow and doubled down on his concentration to focus on his work. He made his way closer to the table, and it was at this point Sam wished he had the ability to scooch just a little bit further away from the approaching pony. The wire conduit hissed in pain as the unicorn took his head in his hooves and turned it a few directions and proceeded to force his lower jaw down for a closer inspection.

“Aahh, AAAagh. Fuck, get your hooves off me, you damned, dirty pony!” Sam yelled as he broke free from the unicorn’s grip.

Sam yelped in pain as a hoof struck him across the left side of his face. The damned unicorn actually hit Sam, presumably because of his lack of cooperation. Though, Sam was more focused on the stinging pain that was now throbbing on his already injured face.

“Subject A-4 lacks control over auditory remarks during examination, and resists cues for compliance,” Visionary callously drolls, ignoring Sam’s wincing groans, “Although, I was able to confirm that Subject A-4 is indeed of the omnivorous nature, based on dental structure. There is also the fact that even in Subject A-4’s weakened state, it still has enough strength to make examination a chore. It is alright though. I have dealt with unruly behavior from subjects before.”

“Fuck you!”

This time, Sam did spit at the unicorn, and with a bit of luck, the wad of saliva hit just between the point of the top joint of his foreleg and neck. It seemed that this was what was needed to get the unicorn’s attention on Sam rather than his examination. Unfortunately, this is what got the unicorn to focus on the wire conduit rather than his examination. Sam kind of regretted that action when he was subjected to the most infuriated glare directed at him that could rival the good Ol’ Cappy.

Visionary Dusk stomped up to the examination table and hovered over Sam like an angry hornet. The look was enough to make Sam shrink back in fear as he tried desperately to crane his head as far away as the restraints would allow him from the crazed-looking unicorn.

“Let me make one thing clear to you, Subject A-4,” Visionary spoke in a dark, sinister tone, “You are nothing more than my subject as I conduct my research. I don’t care what you are, let alone where you come from, but in my lab, any ‘thing’ that I deem as my subject of study exists only for the betterment of my research.”

The chilling statement left Sam speechless. The D.U.P.’s scientists always treated conduits like monsters or freaks, but this bat-shit sociopath took this to a whole new level. It frankly scared Sam, and made him see this pony in a different light. Rather than an egotistical asshat, this pony... was truly a monster.

With his intimidation speech over, the unicorn took a calming breath and slicked back his mane to get the wild strands that fell annoyingly into his face. Even with the moment of grooming, it did little to fix the rest of his maniac visage and only emphasized how overzealous this pony’s ideals were in controlling his actions. He suddenly turned on his hoof and walked over to one of the numerous desks filled with tools to retrieve something.

Sam just lied there and tried to keep from folding under the dread that was encasing him every minute that he was in the unicorn’s presence. A few tugs on the restraints reminded him that he was trapped here, and his anxiety skyrocketed. Not just because the mad pony’s words kept echoing in his head, but as he watched the pony that hummed in triumph upon finding what he was looking for, he saw what it was that he went to retrieve in the first place.

In the pony’s magical grasp, was the largest syringe that the conduit had ever seen in his life. Although it may have been his mind upping the terror to skew his perspective, but that didn’t matter to the wire conduit at the moment. All he could see was a large, sharp, and shiny needle heading his way. Sam tried his best to break from the restraining straps, but the bindings held firm. All too soon, the needle was already hovering over him, with the maniac of a unicorn right behind it.

“A-alright, how about we all just take a minute, and slow this down?” Sam desperately pleaded, “We can just h-have a ‘Q-and-A’! Doesn’t that sound more productive, and less, I don’t know, filled with pointy things?!”

The unicorn was back to blatantly ignoring the wire conduit strapped to the table as he resumed his dictation to his sole listener, the recorder, “Blood samples will now be taken for both further study and to distill more ‘catalyst’ in the ‘Conduitic Infuser’. Five hundred milliliters will have to do for now.”

The unicorn’s cold hooves reached out and rolled the sleeve of his maroon shirt further up his right arm and felt over Sam’s exposed skin, presumably to find a viable vein to draw from. Though, the touch left Sam shivering and made him feel like he was getting anything other than a simple blood draw. Visionary Dusk grew tired of his subject’s constant fidgeting and pressed hard into the conduit’s arm to keep him steady while he worked. The increased pressure made Sam cry out in pain, as the damage from the battle earlier had taken its toll on his body in many places.

Visionary Dusk felt like this would be a lot easier if he was able to work his magic on the subject before him, but a conduit’s body, even when repressed, was still highly resistant to the effects of magic, even with the most simplistic spell such as levitation. However, finally finding the right vein, Visionary Dusk shifted the syringe to line up with the bulge under his subject’s skin.

The first attempt to draw blood ended with the needle missing its mark and stabbing into flesh. The sensation made Sam cry out even louder in pain, but all Visionary Dusk did was groan at the failure and ordered for his subject to ‘Stop moving’. The second attempt ended much like the first, and the unicorn was growing more frustrated with each lack of success. Between the constant pleas to stop and the squirming appendage trying to break free from his grasp, Visionary Dusk was finding it harder and harder to keep his concentration. Finally growing exhausted of the failures after the third attempt, the unicorn pressed down into the conduit’s arm as hard as he could with both forehooves to hold it still. The pressure was enough to make Sam scream even louder as he tried to free himself, but all that did was twist his arm painfully under the unicorn’s grip.

The needle finally hit its mark, and the sadistic pony grinned gleefully as he pulled back on the plunger to withdraw the precious crimson liquid. More and more of Sam’s blood filled the container until it was completely full before the unicorn yanked the needle free. Spurts of blood spewed from the open vein as Sam jerked his arm and howled out in pain from the harsh treatment. A few droplets landed on the unicorn’s grimy coat of fur, but he seemed to take more offense to the fact the blood itself was what soiled his body than anything else.

Pushing himself off of the conduit’s arm, Sam could already feel the appendage swell with discoloration from the hoof shaped bruises that now adorned his arm. He panted hard after the ordeal and felt like he was starting to run his throat raw from his screaming, all while Visionary Dusk excitedly examined the life fluid in the syringe while cantering back to another table against a wall.

“I hope y-you rot in hell, asshole!” Sam croaked out, trying to sound more intimidating through his hoarse tone.

The unicorn’s ears flicked in the conduit’s direction for a moment before he casually tossed a dirty rag over top of the exposed vein to quell the bleeding, as if in an afterthought that he should keep his subject in a somewhat decent condition.

Visionary Dusk retrieved his recorder that he left behind with his magic and brought it back up to himself to follow up his procedure, “Acquiring a suitable blood sample from Subject A-4 was… difficult. However, samples were retrieved without much complication, and I can continue with refining half of this sample in the ‘Conduitic Infuser’.”

The last statement was punctuated with the mad pony finally finding what he had come to the table for in the first place and hefted a strange looking device above him in his magical grasp. Sam watched in loathsome disgust as the unicorn fiddled with both the odd contraption and the syringe filled with his blood. A hatch popped open on top of the box-like appliance, and the unicorn levitated the syringe to hover over the new opening. With even more revulsion, Sam watched as the unicorn squeezed out half of the contents of the syringe into the device, and then, the thing started to light up. Intrigued by morbid curiosity, the wire conduit played witness to the device accepting his involuntary offering as it began to churn to life with strobing lights and whistling sputters of sound.

Several empty vials floated from the holding stand they sat in to the unicorn’s left. With practiced ease, the rest of the syringe’s contents were emptied evenly between vials that were corked and labeled before being replaced back into their respective positions. Visionary Dusk set the empty syringe and the device still hovering in his grasp back onto the table, satisfied that his device was running smoothly before making his way back to the examination table and his ‘Subject’.

“Plenty of samples have now been properly catalogued and saved for later use,” Visionary Dusk monologued into his recorder, “Being such a rare opportunity, at least until more ‘awakened’ subjects have been acquired, I will now begin testing Subject A-4’s tolerance to varying sensations and their reactions. This will also allow me to examine any non-visually apparent structures of Subject A-4’s body in comparison to previous test subjects, to verify any deviations that could account for A-4’s differing abilities.”

Sam grew wide eyed in fear at the crazy unicorn’s wording. Then, even more so when he saw the unicorn’s horn flare a little brighter as he gathered various tools and devices from around the room to hover beside him in front of the trembling conduit, all of which looked either far too sharp, ramshackled, or for lack of a better term, looked like they had no business to be used on another living creature by the deranged looking unicorn leering over the conduit.

“Fuck, m-man. I thought you were just a tad bit crazy,” Sam said, just to keep himself from devolving into a quivering mess, “N-now I see that you’re just bat-shit insa-aAAAAaHHH!”

A set of what could only be described as sewing needles were unleashed on various parts of the conduit’s already bruised and bloodied body. The unicorn hummed in contemplation as he took note of how far the needles were able to penetrate with the measured force and reaction. At the end of each needle was a tied off conductive wire, leading back to a device in the unicorn’s magical grasp.

He looked up at it and turned the various dials on it before pressing a big, obvious button at its center. What this did only served to cause Sam even more pain, as surges of electrical energy hit his body at the point where the needles pierced his body. He grit his teeth while his eyes widened in shock from the constant barrage of electricity making his body convulse.

Visionary Dusk narrowed his eyes and then turned the dials on the device up a few more cranks. He was rewarded with Sam’s agonized screams as his torture continued for the mad pony’s ‘research’. The unicorn finally relented by shutting off the device and halting the electrical charge and documenting what he saw in his notes, all while Sam was left to bare the after effects of the torturous experience

Next came a bottle of unmarked liquid, which the unicorn generously soaked a strip of cloth in. He brushed the sickly smelling cloth over Sam’s left arm, and it only took a few moments before the part of his skin felt like it was on fire. The red, irritated skin seemed to fascinate the mad scientist, as he quickly noted the reaction into his recorder. He even made notes of the different ways his subject’s joints moved, to better understand the underlying bone structure without the use of a full dissection, just yet. All the while, Sam blurted out more obscenities and curses directed at the unnaturally calm looking pony hovering over him.

Then, came the most terrifying tool Sam had seen so far, a somewhat dulled scalpel. The wire conduit barely heard the unicorn as he dictated his next test to open up a small section of his shoulder to get a look at his muscle framework and the anatomy of the different anatomy from the skin, inward. All Sam could think was that this crazy bastard was about to start carving him up like a Thanksgiving turkey, and he was powerless to stop this.

The knife descended slowly, and Sam pleaded for this madness to stop. He felt like he couldn’t breathe through the suffocating terror. His heart pounded in his ears, he was in so much pain already from everything else beforehand, and the world was already starting to fade away into nothing more than the torture that he was now being subjected to.

Neither he nor Visionary Dusk seemed to notice the flash of lavender light off to the side, as they were too busy focusing on their examination and their panic respectively. Visionary Dusk brushed the neckline of Sam’s shirt out of the way to gain better access to where he wanted. Just as the scalpel was able to pierce the conduit’s skin and unleashed a few rivlets of blood to seep from the fresh wound, another flash of lavender light lit up the opposite side of the room from behind the crazed unicorn. In the next second, the unicorn was no longer over the conduit, as an almighty crash and shout of pain took his place and left something unexpected behind. The scalpel fell away from Sam’s shoulder and clattered to the floor, and the wire conduit was unsure of what just happened, but was also thankful that he was no longer about to be cut into.

As the pain subsided, Sam was able to gather what was left of his wits, and he was able to spot why it was that the mad pony was no longer beside him as he was before. For in his place was a floating piece of two-by-four held aloft in a very familiar aura of lavender magic. Through the haze of the magic, Sam was able to spot a reddish stain on the side of the wooden plank and more pieces began to fall in place. Over the sound of his own ragged gasps he heard another, equally distressed breathing. It came from the direction on his right and the room’s entrance, and who he saw made him both feel relieved and surprised.

“S-Sparks?!”

Just as he mentioned, Twilight was standing in the doorway to the psycho unicorn’s room, shaking like a leaf. She looked terrified, and her eyes were wide with horror at what she had come across. Her horn was alight with its signature lavender tinge as she held the floating piece of two-by-four in the shaky glow of her magic. Her gaze was transfixed on a spot just below the table that Sam was strapped down to, so the wire conduit followed her line of sight. He was easily surprised by what he saw.

Clearly unconscious, the mad unicorn, Visionary Dusk, was sprawled out on the ground with a sizable gash on the side of his head, just above his left temple, no doubt where Twilight had struck him with her makeshift weapon. Blood was oozing from the wound and stained the pony’s fur with a crimson hue, and it already looked like he was forming a respectable welt. Other than that, and the fact that he was out cold, he seemed alive for the most part. Sam thought the bastard could do with a few more strikes though.

However, his train of thought was interrupted by the clatter of wood on the floor as the purple unicorn in the doorway dropped her weapon. Looking back up to her, Sam could see that she was not handling what she had just done all that well. He suspected that she didn’t intend to use so much force.

“Sparks,” Sam said, trying to get the unicorn’s attention.

She ignored him, or rather, she looked to be panicking too much to have noticed. Sam could only imagine what was going through the little unicorn’s mind, but he had to try and get through to her.

So, he tried again, “Sparks!”

The louder call of her name snapped Twilight out of her stupor, but she still looked just as frightened when her gaze fell upon the conduit. In fact, her eyes became misty, and the look of anguish on her face when she looked over Sam’s condition made the wire conduit wish he could take that pain in her eyes away.

“S-Sam,” Twilight whispered, shakily taking her first steps toward the restrained conduit, “By Harmony, what happened to you?”

Sam tried to smile and look unfazed by his pain, but the wince from just pulling that off still bled through. Even still, he tried his best to reassure his terrified friend.

“I’m fine. It’d take a lot more than this to really bring me down, remember?”

The reassurance didn’t seem to work, as Twilight now began to cry and rushed to the wire conduit’s side. Twilight was beside herself with grief as she looked over the damage inflicted upon her friend. Every cut, bruise, and wound she found on his body only made her feel worse and made her eyes sting with tears of regret. She tried to say how sorry she was for letting him go off on his own, and how his condition was her fault. Tears ran down her face, and no matter what Sam tried to say, Twilight continued to blame herself.

“Twilight, please! Listen to me,” Sam finally cut through the string of ongoing apologies.

Taking a deep, yet painful breath, Sam leaned as close as he could to the unicorn and brushed her hoof on the table with the side of his head. The minor action that he took seemed to have just the right effect, as Twilight’s hiccuping sobs died down to tearful sniffling.

Taking advantage of the moment, Sam pushed forth, “Twilight, none of this is your fault. I screwed up and let my guard down.”

“B-but if it wasn’t for me-”

“Then I’d still be here, getting ready to become more of a pincushion for that psychopath,” Sam cut Twilight off, tilting his gaze past the unicorn in front of him.

They both looked down over the table to see said unicorn still out for the count before turning back to each other. The comforting words bolstered Twilight’s confidence and gave her a sense of pride, even if her method of aid had been very brutal and made her feel slightly guilty.

“We need to get you out of here. Visionary Dusk could wake up soon.”

Trying to focus her mind on something else, Twilight began to work on the straps that held Sam down.

“Wait, wait,” Sam suddenly realized something very important, “Why the hell are you here? I thought I told you to go back to the castle to get help.”

Twilight fixed her best cheeky grin at the wire conduit that reminded Sam suspiciously of himself, “Oh, yes, because you would have followed mine or the Captain’s instructions if you were in my place.”

Sam narrowed his good eye at the defiant unicorn, but she did a good job at shrugging it off and continued to work. Twilight struggled with the straps as she looked for where they were tied down, but eventually found the anchors underneath the table.

“That’s besides the point,” Sam growled, “It’s too dangerous for you to be here!”

Twilight clapped her hooves on the table, honestly startling Sam a bit as the unicorn narrowed her eyes back at him, “No, you don’t get to use that on me! Not this time. I’m the one rescuing you this time, and there isn’t a damn thing you can do about it. Got it?”

Sam bobbed his head up and down dumbly at Twilight’s assertive statement, all while a satisfied, if slightly embarrassed, smile crept up on the unicorn’s face. The straps came undone one by one under the command of the purple unicorn’s magic, and in short order, Sam was free, for the most part. The various needles and, more importantly, his suppression cuffs were still in place

“How did you even get in here?” Sam asked as Twilight helped him to sit up from the table.

Twilight winced everytime Sam grunted from a needle being pulled out of his body, but focused more on answering his question, “The entrance that you went through. I tried teleporting directly into the building, but it seems that Visionary Dusk put up some powerful wards around it to prevent such actions. Next, I tried unlocking the front entrance, but there were more sealing spells around that too. The only way in was through the entrance you came through. Like everything else, your conduit abilities aren’t affected by magic and coincidentally disrupted that door’s detection spells along with the sealing spells, which made it easy enough for me to just follow your way in.

“This place certainly did terrify me, and I nearly ran right into Visionary Dusk’s assailants while I was exploring. Once I reached the second floor, that’s when I-I heard you, screaming in pain.”

Sam was relieved to hear that Twilight was able to successfully sneak past the griffon and his lackeys. Though, the part about how she was able to find him made him regret putting his friend through the experience.

As the last of the needles came out, Twilight capped off her tale, “Your… cries were coming from the third floor, so, I got up here as fast as I could. When I saw ‘him’ doing what he was doing to you, I-I just acted. I grabbed the first thing I saw in my magic and swung.”

Twilight looked down at the unconscious unicorn on the ground and cringed at the damage that she had caused. She’d fought creatures from the Everfree Forest, defended the capitol from the Changeling invasion alongside her friends, but to strike another pony? Even if what he’s done deserved it and maybe more, it made her feel guilty. Seeing the purple unicorn’s expression, Sam leaned down, even against his body’s protest, to bring himself into Twilight’s peripheral and catch her attention.

“Sparks,” Sam called out in a small breath, which Twilight thankfully noticed and turned to, “You didn’t do anything wrong. In fact, it took a lot of guts to charge in and take a swing like that, and believe me, if you hadn’t, I’d probably be in much worse shape than I am now.”

Even with the swollen half of his face, the reassuring smile Sam made gave Twilight the comfort she needed. Sam would have given her a hug too, but his hands were still trapped and time was running short.

“Sorry I gotta cut this short, but we need to get out of here,” Sam said with a serious tone.

Twilight couldn’t agree more. Her little burst of bravery was running out, and every second she stayed in this place made her even more uncomfortable. She held out her hoof to help Sam off the table, but as soon as the wire conduit planted his feet on the ground, his knees buckled. Luckily, Twilight was there to catch him from the side, though the hiss of pain he let out made it clear that he was in no condition to sneak out the same way they came in.

“Sam, you need to rest,” Twilight urged, fearing that wounds that she could see on the human’s body were far worse than they appeared.

“No,” Sam tried to push through the pain, but failed, “There’s no time. Dusk could wake up, or those D.U.P. wannabes might swing by any second now. Damn it. If only I didn’t have these cuffs on me, I could heal in no time.”

Twilight observed the cuffs on the conduit’s hands that he pointed out and realized that this device must have been what Sam had described as the cuffs that the ’D.U.P’ made conduits like him wear to suppress their powers. It made her both angry and curious how the unconscious unicorn on the floor had gotten his hooves on such a device, but more importantly, she wondered how she could get them off her friend if it meant it would help him recover.

“Sparks, what you doing?” Sam asked as he watched the purple unicorn examine the cuffs over his hands.

Without even looking up, Twilight replied, “Trying to find a way to get these things off of you. Damn, my magic keeps bouncing off of it. I can’t even run a scan on it to find a weakness.”

“Sparks, it’s ok. I’ll be fine. We can worry about it later. First, we need to get you out of here safely.”

“No,” Twilight stomped defiantly, “You’re injured, and if you won’t rest, then we need to find a way to get these cuffs off of you so you can heal. Gah, why does stuff from your world have to be so magic resistant?!”

Knowing that Twilight wouldn’t let the issue go, the wire conduit lifted his arms up and away from the unicorn’s scratching hooves. Initially confused, Twilight watched as Sam started to help by pointing out what he knew about the device.

“D.U.P. suppression cuffs can’t just be pried off. You need the key which goes to the slot on the access port on the top over my left hand.”

Twilight spotted the covered port that Sam directed toward her and instructed her how to slide the covering out of the way. The slot looked like any other keyhole, but the only problem was that they now needed to find said key to unlock the device.

Twilight scanned the room and worked her gaze over the clutter to find the item in question. She made two full rotations in place while searching before she was about to give up when the glint of something shiny on the wall caught her eye. She gasped as she laid eyes on a single key hanging on a nail, embedded in the wall on the right hand side of the door leading out into the hallway.

She tried grabbing it with her magic, but it seemed that it too was magic resistant and merely rattled a few times against the wall from her efforts. Groaning in frustration, she galloped swiftly up to the key to retrieve it.

She hadn’t realized how high it was up off the ground until she was underneath it, but that didn’t deter her. Planting her front hooves against the rotting drywall, she craned her neck as far as she could, but even then, it was just barely out of reach. Even when stepping up onto her tippy-hooves, she was still just shy of reaching the offending key with her teeth. She wasn’t about to give up just yet though, and with a resigned groan, she knew what she had to do.

Tilting her head down, she pointed her horn skyward and carefully maneuvered it underneath the tiny metal ring that the key was strung up on. Her muzzle was practically pressed up against the drywall, and her lungs filled with the musty scent of the decay from it. She ignored it as she focused on feeling her way up the wall with her horn until it bumped against the bottom of the key with a ‘clink’. It only took a few more moments before her horn found the inside of the ring, and with a satifiying yank, it came free from the nail and fell down to the base of Twilight’s horn, where the key dangled between her eyes.

Her little victory would have earned herself a smile, were it not spoiled by the sound of restrained snickering behind her. She wasn’t surprised to see her conduit friend still kneeling by the table where she left him, but what she didn’t expect was to find him trying to keep himself from bursting out with laughter. Sam also seemed to be in pain and winced every time his body shuddered with suppressed mirth.

“What’s so funny?” Twilight tilted her head in confusion and worry.

This only seemed to make the wire conduit double over and grimace from the action as he tried to hold back his laughter. Twilight became even more worried and rushed to her friend’s side, all while the key around her horn continued to clink against her forehead and the ring it was on.

“I’m sorry,” Sam got out between snorts of chuckles, “It’s just, your face!”

“My...face?” Twilight asked, even more confused than ever.

Though before Twilight could begin to worry about a potential injury to her friend’s head that might be affecting his cognition, the wire conduit glanced up to the Twilight’s forehead. The unicorn followed Sam’s gaze and had to cross her eyes to find what he was looking at. Though, the only thing she found was the key to his cuffs dangling between her amethyst eyes.

When it looked like Twilight was about to ask Sam if he was ok again, the wire conduit cut her off with his reply, “You, hehe, you look like a carnival ring toss game.”

Realizing what Sam was laughing at now, Twilight found herself to be unamused. Here they were, in the heart of their enemies’ base, and Sam was making jokes about her only option to retrieve his means of freedom from the cuffs on his hands.

“You idiot!” Twilight groaned and struck Sam in the shoulder.

Twilight immediately regretted that, as Sam’s face contorted in pain from the strike to his injured arm. Twilight tried to apologize, but Sam brushed her off.

“No, no. You’re right. Not the time for that,” Sam countered, “Let’s just get these cuffs off, and we can get out of here.”

Glad that Sam didn’t hold the strike against her, Twilight nodded in agreement and was glad that they could get back on track. She then tilted her head down to allow the key to slide off her horn and only heard a small snicker for that. Afterwards, Twilight fumbled with the key in her hooves until she realized that she wasn’t going to be able to manipulate it into the keyhole with her stubby appendages. Holding it in one hoof, she leaned her head down and grabbed the back end of the key in her teeth, carefully to keep her tongue out of the way to avoid having to taste whatever foul contaminants covered its surface. Together, Sam and Twilight maneuvered the key and the cuffs into position for Twilight to unlock the device. The key slid into hole, Twilight cranked her head to the side, and a resounding series of clicks came from the internal locks.

After that, the cuffs slid right off, and Sam’s hands were finally free. A relieved smile crept up on the wire conduit’s face as he wrung his hands a few times.

“You did it! Thank you, Sparks,” Sam said as he pulled the purple unicorn in for a hug.

Twilight accepted the gesture without complaint, just glad that she could help her friend in his time of need. The two broke the embrace and Twilight was surprised to notice that Sam’s injuries were already starting to disappear before her very eyes. It was a bit creepy to see the wires poke out of his skin where he was hurt and cover the injuries, all before sinking back into his skin and leaving no trace of the injuries behind, like he never had them in the first place. If it weren’t for their current situation, Twilight would have loved to document the process and get Sam in for another ‘Q & A’ about what it felt like. Though, now was not the time.

Especially since, at that moment, a set of footsteps came from outside the door and down the hallway. Although, they weren’t quite footsteps, nor even hoofsteps. They had the distinct sound of claws clacking against the wooden floors. They were swiftly making their way toward Sam and Twilight, and since the mad pony of a unicorn was unconscious on the ground, that only left a couple of options left as to who these footsteps belonged to.

“Hey, Doc!” the only griffon in Visionary Dusk’s group of assailants calling from the hallway spoke up, “Sorry to break it to ya, but we gotta go. One of my boys was checking the perimeter and saw the royal guards slinking around the surrounding buildings, no doubt setting up a raid with how they’re moving. I don’t care if you’ve got your precious ‘test subject’ on a slab, my partners’ lives come first from now on.”

The footsteps were getting closer, and Twilight was beginning to hyperventilate in her panic. Sam was unsure about what he should do. If he stayed and fought, Twilight would more than likely be caught in the crossfire.

“...Doc?” the griffon asked, now speeding up his footsteps.

Sam acted on impulse. He shot his right fist out, and a set of wires flew from his knuckles to the door, which he used to slam it shut. He then wrapped the handle in a bunch more wires to jam it closed, for there was no lock. Just in time too, as the griffon that he had come to know mostly through fighting was at the door and trying to jimmy the handle to open said door. When that didn’t work, he began to bang on the door and grumble from the other side.

Twilight was trembling by now and slowly backing away from their only exit as she whispered to her companion, “Sam, what do we do?”

“Doc, did you hear me? Open the damn door!” Aras yelled as he began to bang on the door even harder...

...all while Sam desperately tried to come up with a plan on how he would get past the angry griffon without letting Twilight get hurt. His masterful idea of gallantly charging past the griffon was swiftly booted to the curb, as the griffon had seemingly enough of the silent treatment and opted for a more direct approach of getting into the room. Shards of concrete pierced through wooden door at the point where the handle connected and blew it out toward Sam’s and Twilight’s side. Evidently, this also caused the purple unicorn to scream in fear before she could control herself.

“What the fuck?!”

The surprised statement on the griffon’s side pretty much confirmed that he heard the commotion and the ‘not-Visionary-Dusk’ voice on the other side. Before Sam and Twilight had a chance to react, the door to the room blew open, and before them was the griffon and leader of the assailants that had terrorized the citizens of Equestria alongside his employer, staring dumbstruck at what he had come across within.

Sam gave the griffon no time to regain his wits and charged at him with the force of a mini freight train. The griffon had just started to raise his guard when Sam slammed into him with a shoulder charge from his fully restored body. The hit sent the griffon tumbling back out into the hallway and into the opposite wall, where he sat stunned for the moment. In that moment, Sam used his time wisely and re-closed the door. Though, that was not all. He also took every piece of furniture that wasn’t bolted down and tossed them in a haphazard pile in front of the door to bar entry. He finally decided that one last measure could be taken and launched over a dozen wire strands long enough to reach around the makeshift barricade and stapled the ends into the wall around the doorway to further secure the whole thing. It wasn’t long before the conduit and unicorn could hear the rioting shouts of the griffon as he began to tear through the barricade from the other side.

“Well, that won’t hold for long,” Sam said as he bit his lip in concentration.

Twilight, on the other hand, was still panicking and shuffling in place on her hooves, “Sam, what do we do?”

Sam looked down to the distressed unicorn and saw just how scared she was. None too surprised, considering the situation, but he still had no idea how he was going to get them out while the griffon, and more than likely the other D.U.P. wannabes, were on the other side of the door. Sam frantically searched the room for anything that could help him, but all that was left after he knocked everything to the barricade was the side countertop attached to the wall, an unconscious psychopath, a bordered up window, a bunch of broken tools on the-

‘The window!’ Sam screamed in his mind.

Hustling over to the boarded up portal, Sam peered out into the outside world through the few cracks between the boards. Relief spread throughout his mind as he saw the empty lot facing back at him. Once more, joy took hold as he also saw what looked like the entirety of the castle guard standing in neat and orderly fashion taking up most of that abandoned lot. And who else should be at the head of this squadron of ponies in armor? The one and only, Captain Aegis Flare.

Sam smirked and backed up a few steps away from the window. Twilight, unsure of what Sam was planning, anxiously split her gaze between him and the barricade that was slowly being ripped apart from the other side. She could even see the frantic movement of the one who was tearing into the barricade through the gaps in the makeshift barrier. This only spiked her fear, as the griffon rattled off many explicit comments and ear piercing screeches as a griffon only could. Twilight was about to urge her friend that whatever plan he was working on should be hurried along until she saw what he was doing.

Braided wire cables extended from both his hands and seemed to twitch with anticipation at their master’s behest. Twilight watched in shock as the wire conduit took a deep breath, planted his left foot forward and swung with both arms with the wire cables following through. Sam’s weapons whipped forward and lashed at the wooden planks that covered the window adorning the opposite wall from the room’s only door, splintering them from the frame in a single swipe. What was left was an empty window frame and the light of the day spilling in to bring radiance and warmth that the inside of this whole building had been sorely lacking for who knows how long.

Sam smiled at his handiwork and let his wires reabsorb into his body. Twilight, too frozen in fear for everything going on, could only watch as Sam approached her with his usual smirk and picked her up with a slight grunt and held her in his arms like an oversized cat.

“Ready to get out of here?” Sam asked.

Twilight nodded dumbly, but had to wonder what Sam was planning in the first place. She came to the conclusion all too late as Sam took a running stance facing the now open window, and Twilight’s heartrate began to skyrocket once more.

“W-wait, wait! Sam, I’m not ready!”

Sam seemed to ignore the protests as he cackled like a madman, “Welcome aboard the ‘Conduit Express’! Going down!”

Twilight could only scream in panic once more as she tighten her limbs around Sam’s body in a death grip just as he leapt out the window and into the open air.