“Hehehe…”  The deep mocking laughter Black Brush knew all too well seemed to bore itself deep down into his very core, sending chills through his entire body as it echoed about him menacingly, the very tone just reeking of danger and Impossible to pinpoint in the infinite blackness that surrounded him.

        “Where are you!?”  He shouted as loud as he could, his voice sounding surprisingly braver than he thought it would.  

        “Oh Blackie…your ignorance is almost funny in a way, I might have it in me to laugh if it wasn’t so pathetic.”  That same voice continued to echo throughout the ethereal hall, continuing to send sparks of sheer terror throughout his very soul.  “What you don’t get is that I’m everywhere Blackie, in the shadows…in the light…behind every corner…always there…always watching.”  He now felt that presence, following him, watching him, surrounding him…NO!  This was a game!  A dirty trick!  He had to stay focused had to ignore it.  “Oh yes…I can smell the stench of death on you my little pony.”  He heard that deep laugh again, sounding off around him like the heavy bass sound of a drum. “You know what I always remember about the lives I take?”  I always remember the look in their eyes…that single solitary moment of complete and crushing fear as they realize the moment of their demise is at hand…”  Those words dug into his heart like a blade, a pair of purple eyes flashing into his mind before he quickly forced them away.

        “I swear I’m going to kill you.”  Black Brush growled heavily, his threat seething with anger.

        “Oh are you now?”  The voice asked, almost scoffing at the idea.  “Well tell me then killer…how much blood are you willing to spill?”  Black Brush was deathly silent, refusing to give the voice the satisfaction of an answer.  “Not talkative today are you?  That’s fine, just let me tell you one thing…if you ever want to get the revenge you so desire…there’ll be a river of it.”

        The voice halted, letting the words sink in like it knew they would.  

        “Trust me Black Brush, when the time comes, you’ll thank me for what I’ve done.”

Black Brush shot open his eyes with a start, a blinding beam of sunlight breaking through the thick cloud cover above and stinging his eyes, he reached up with a hoof attempting to shield his suffering retinas from the blinding beam, wondering to himself why on earth Celestia had to make the thing so darn bright.  He blinked multiple times as his eyes adjusted to the sudden change in décor, the golden rays of the sun, shining blue sky, and cheerful chirping of birds almost startlingly different from the suffocating blackness of his nightmare.  Taking one long look around to study the peacefulness of the nature surrounding him he sighed heavily as he placed his head back onto the cushion that supported it.

‘Just a dream,’ He thought softly to himself.  ‘None of that will ever happen again…you made sure of that.’   Though he wasn’t entirely sure he was convinced of that.

        “It’s about time you woke up sleepyhead.”  Sunset’s playful voice rang out over the steady crackling of the camp fire they had set up together the night previous.  Her friendly tone shaking him out of his dark thoughts and returning him to the cheery mood he’d managed to maintain since their departure.  “Breakfast has been ready for a while now.”

        He grumbled slightly as he crawled out of the red sleeping bag he’d spent the night in, rubbing away the sleep in his eyes with a hoof as he did so.  The smell of freshly cooked eggs and toast became more profound as his senses steadily began to begin functioning once again as the morning drowsiness began to fall away.  He took a brief moment to stretch, his limbs thanking him for the relief and his back popping with a loud succession of cracks.

        “You could have woken me up earlier you know.”    He replied drowsily before releasing yet another earth shattering yawn, he never really was much of a morning pony.

        She smiled at him as he sat down next to her, her cherry red mane blowing slightly in the breeze.  “Nah, you seemed like you needed it.  You’ve been up late at night trying to paint for the past week now.”  She reached over and took the pan out of the fire pit, placing it on the ground next to where they sat before separating out the eggs and toast into equal portions on the pair of plates she had prepared nearby.  She handed Black Brush a plate, which he gladly accepted, his empty stomach grumbling in a demand for sustenance.

        “Ah…you saw that huh?”  He spoke bashfully, before shoveling a mouthful of the toast into his maw, munching upon the food thankfully while attempting to hide his blush.

        “I didn’t so much see it as much as I heard you mumbling and grumbling into the wee hours of the night.”  She responded, taking a couple bites of her own food.

        “I see…I’m sorry if I kept you up.”

        “Oh don’t worry about it so much, if you lived with my family for a week you’d probably be able to sleep through a dragon attack.”  She replied playfully, before her tone became more serious.  “I’m guessing it’s not going well.”

        He gave a heavy hearted sigh as he placed the now half eaten toast back on his plate.  “It’s no use Sunset, now that we’ve left Colterson my heads a little clearer but…I still just can’t find any inspiration.”  He decided not to mention the nightmare; he didn’t want to worry her.

        Sunset gave him a kind smile and a gentle prod with her head.  “Hey, cheer up.  Maybe you’ll get some ideas when we get to Foalton.”  She offered, hoping to cheer him up somewhat.  He had grown progressively happier as the days went by and the pair continued to travel, slowly becoming more and more like the Black Brush she knew rather than the pitifully sad thing she’d been growing used to.  But she still took it upon herself to force him out of his occasional relapse into depression.  “How far away are we anyway?”

        “Hmm, I’m not really sure to be honest.”  He cocked his head to the side as he kicked his mind into overdrive, attempting to recall the distance they still had yet to traverse.  “Let me go check the map.”  He got back to his hoofs, once again stretching out the stiff joints as he walked to the opposite end of the camp, searching through the numerous saddlebags scattered about for the one that held all of his navigation equipment.  

        “No, not you, you don’t have anything important…you’re for food…your filled with paint…you have brushes in you…”  He continued to mumble to himself as he meticulously went through the task of dragging over and rummaging through each bag to scan through its contents.

        “You know you probably wouldn’t have such a hard time finding the stuff you actually need if you didn’t bring so much useless crud.”  He heard Sunset chastise from near the fire, apparently having overheard his ramblings.  “Aren’t you only supposed to bring essentials for something like this?”

        He shot her an annoyed glare, which she only responded to with a sly grin and a quick flash of her golden eyes.  “This stuff IS essential.”  He shot back, continuing to dig through the numerous amounts of painting supplies and whatever else he managed to stuff into his bags before they left Colterson.

        “I highly doubt that magenta is an ‘essential’ color Blackie.”  She said through a mouthful of egg, finishing off her breakfast with one large bite.

        ‘I LIKE magenta!’  He thought bitterly to himself, before levitating over one of Sunset’s bags and proceeding to undo the top, now on a personal quest to get back at her for making fun of one of his favorite colors.  ‘Let’s see we’ve got a couple books, a pair of horseshoes, a scarf…AHA!  Perfect!’   He smiled wickedly as he retrieved his prize.  “So Sunset would you consider Mr. Whiskers here an ‘essential’?”

        “Mr. Whiskers, what are you?  H- HEY!” She shot up with an annoyed yet embarrassed look on her face as Black Brush levitated her stuffed kitty cat back and forth mockingly a few feet away from her.  The patched stuffed animal practically doing a mocking dance right before her eyes, quickly she reached out, snatching her object of shame out of the air and causing Black Brush’s magic to dissipate.  She hugged the toy tightly to her chest, fighting off the mad blush now stinging her cheeks while giving Black Brush a death glare.

        He chuckled slightly at her show of embarrassment, before finally drawing the map he’d been looking for out of the bag.  “So I guess Mr. Whiskers is an essential.”  He continued to tease while looking over the map.  Ignoring the huff from Sunset and the rather rude name she called him afterward.  “Well we just passed Broken Hoof Gorge, and we’ve been on the road for about two weeks now so, if I’m reading this correctly we should only be about an hour or so away from town!”  He said happily, they were closer than he had anticipated, and though he enjoyed spending some alone time with Sunset he found two weeks on the road had given him a longing for a touch of civilization.

        “Well that’s fant-’’Sunset’s voice cut short and a faint thumping sound was heard from where she sat at the opposite end of the camp.  

        Black Brush’s ears twitched slightly at the sudden lack of sound.  “Uh, Sunset you okay?”  He began to swivel around to check on her when suddenly he was knocked to the ground with a painful thud and a crushing force was applied to his back!  

He quickly spit the dirt out of his mouth from the unwelcome impact with his face and the ground as he began to use his hoofs to scramble and kick in an attempt to free himself from his attacker.   When he felt two powerful, was that a talon?  Seize his flailing hoofs and pin him forcefully to the earth with a crushing grip while his assailant used their legs to squeeze the air out of his lungs and stop his foolhardy attempts to escape.  He forced open his left eye, since the entirety of the right part of his face was in the process of being smashed into the ground; he managed to lay his gaze upon the sight of a big and powerful griffon standing only a few feet away from where he lay.  He’d seen griffons in a few books he’d read before, and apparently they had earned quite the reputation as an entire race of strong and agile creatures.  But what they were doing here and why exactly they were attacking his camp was completely unbeknownst to him.

He didn’t really stop to think about that however, when he saw Sunset sprawled out upon the ground, motionless as the griffon standing behind her rubbed his giant clawed fist in a soothing manner he felt an anger he didn’t know he had explode from within.  His horn began to glow a pale grey as he seized the frying pan lying next to the fire pit with his magic, swiftly levitating it over and bringing it down upon the head of the griffon holding him down with a violent smash!  A loud metallic clang sung throughout the campsite as he felt the grip around his hoofs loosen somewhat as the shock and the pain no doubt rocketed through his attacker’s skull, but he still wasn’t free, so he did it again!  AND AGAIN!  When he finally felt the grip come completely loose and the pressure on his back increase as the griffon hugging his back slipped into unconsciousness.

He managed to shift the weight of the unconscious griffon more to the right so it fell off of him and to the ground with a gentle thud.  A dazed squawk slipping past the creature’s beak as he shakily got to his hoofs and sucked in a few much needed breaths.  His heart pumping wildly as he felt the adrenaline course throughout his body with a steady beat.  He stared the griffon down in front of him, it stood a good twelve to thirteen hands taller than himself, large enough to give even Shining Summer a second thought or two about engagement, with a long curved beak that looked like it could easily swallow his entire head if it wanted…it’s thick masculine body certainly looked intimidating, the heavy set of feathers surrounding his head were all well groomed and the light brown lion fur that covered the rest of its body was certainly impressive, he would almost be willing to call it majestic were he not positively seething with rage at the moment.  The griffon returned Black Brush’s death glare with a flash of its own dark hazel eyes, flicking its long thin tail back and forth playfully while sizing him up with a curious, almost amused, look.  And though Black Brush was trying his best to look intimidating, standing over the unconscious body before him proudly and shaking the now bent iron of the pan back and forth with his magic in a daunting manner, the griffon seemed far from impressed.

“Seriously dude?”  The griffon asked with a masculine male voice, his tone and choice of words certainly didn’t do much to accentuate the majestic look Black Brush had thought he had earlier.  “You’re gonna try and take me out with that thing?”  The griffon pointed at Black Brush’s pan with a smirk.

Braving a glance at it out of the corner of his eye he couldn’t help but feel…slightly embarrassed at the sight of it.  The middle of the pan was now curved inward; several slight hills and valleys now shaped the poor abused metal after he had used it to beat the living tar out of the griffon that was holding him down.  Doing his best to uphold the brave face he wore now he let the pan fall to the ground with a clang.  

The griffon chuckled.  “Yeah that’s pretty much what I thought.”

Black Brush smirked right back, if the pan wasn’t intimidating…maybe this would change that punks tune.  The griffon seemed slightly taken aback at this show of confidence, his smirk morphing into a slight frown.  Black Brush let his magic pull another object out of the mass of bags, the griffon watched like a hawk as a long curved object wrapped in leather floated out in front of the unicorn, that strange…unsettling grin stretching across his face as he began to remove the leather, revealing a menacing curved blade as the the faint grey glow surrounding it spun the weapon around dangerously.  

The griffon didn’t really know how to react to this…this unicorn…something was different about him, he’d seen plenty of them recently…they were all weak little creatures constantly going on about friendship and dumb stuff like that.  But this one, though he might look like the rest there was something else there as well, hidden just beneath the surface, he’d be impressed if he wasn’t scared witless at the moment.  But despite the unsettling feeling now sinking into his gut he still managed to stand his ground.

Black Brush kept on with the smile, his trick not having the full intended effect on the griffon…but maybe he just needed a little more of a push.  “What…not scared?”  He drug the blade lightly over the ground, a menacing scraping sound emanating from the contact…slow…threatening.  “You want to know something?”  A spark of red shot out of his horn, running into the grey mist circling his blade and tainting it with a darker crimson hue, “When you split the vein called the jugular…”  He brought his blade up and pressed it gently to his throat.  “…You become unable to scream.”  

He slowly began to drag the blade across his throat, taking great care to not press even slightly too hard, he wanted to make the griffon think he was cutting his own throat, not actually give him a live demonstration.  He bore into the griffon’s eyes with his own; holding him prisoner with his gaze as he steadily channeled his flow of magic towards where his blade met the soft fur of his throat.  Doing his best to ensure that the griffon never caught on as he began manipulating the water in the air to condense and take form, delving deep into his memories to recall an old trick his mother had taught him to make his costume for Nightmare Night all the more real.  He began to slowly feed his magic into the water now taking shape underneath his chin, changing its color to a dark crimson.  

“Wouldn’t that be a shame…to get your throat cut all the way out here?”  He kept egging on the griffon with his best attempt at a creepy serial killer kind of voice.  Before finally letting the now crimson red water begin to run freely down his throat and across the flat of his sabre…He resisted congratulating himself as he saw lines of horror begin to etch themselves into the griffon’s stone like face, he couldn’t believe this was actually working.  “To be left to bleed a whole hour away from help…”  He felt the cool red water running down his chest as it slid off the blade. Black Brush resisted the temptation to check and see how real his allusion seemed, though he did take a mental note to dry off his blade as soon as possible, he would have hated to see it get all rusty again.  

“Unable to shout…unable to beg…unable to even whimper.”  Black Brush widened his creepy smile a little more, really fitting into the role of a sociopath as best he could.  Drawing inspiration from the many horror books he’d read as a little colt, he was really getting good at this persona …maybe he should go as himself for the next Nightmare Night.  He didn’t take long to dwell on that thought however, instead focusing on pouring all of his creepiness into this one single moment.   When he saw the griffon take a small step back as he released another gush of his ‘blood’ Black Brush made the assumption that he and Sunset might just get out of this one…

Of course, that was just an assumption.

*CRACK!*

That was the last sound Black Brush heard before a sudden and shocking surge of pain rocketed through the back of his skull, his world going topsy turvey as a his sabre fell to the dirt with a muted clank, he opened and shut his eyes a few times to try and clear away the blackness playing at the corners of his vision, but in the end it was nothing but futile as he tumbled to the ground…allowing oblivion to swallow him up in its peaceful world of shadows.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

Dax breathed a sigh of relief as he saw the crazy unicorn tumble to the ground in a tangled mess of hooves and red.  The griffon was seriously about to bolt all the way back to town, there was no way he was going to end up bleeding out in the middle of the road.  Of course he wouldn’t tell the other griffons he was scared of a pony that would do some serious damage to his reputation.

“Yo, thanks Gilda.”  He told the griffon standing over the blacked out unicorn with a surprising show of humility.  “But I could have taken him.”  

“Whatever dude.”  The smaller female griffon grumbled quietly with a scratchy tomboyish voice before dropping the now snapped branch she held in her talon to the ground.

“What, you don’t think I could!?”  Dax growled back, staring daggers at Gilda as he leaned forward menacingly.  Considering Gilda’s history with ponies he already had little to no respect held for the female griffon, and he was way more than tough enough to take her down a peg or two if she started getting mouthy.

“No Dax, I’m sure you could have…just chillax man.”  She replied with a tremor of hesitation to her voice.  Dax knew she was scared, and he seemed satisfied with the show of submission, there was a reason he was in charge after all.

There was a pained groan from behind Gilda as the griffon that the unicorn had clocked with the pan earlier began to move and stir.  

“Oooh…Flappy no feel so good…”  The slightly dopey voice groaned while a smaller, much sillier looking griffin slowly rose from the ground.  

Flappy drew himself up to his talons, flapping his short and patchy wings a couple times as he systematically began to check if anything else was injured, or just the throbbing pain in his skull.  He was at least two thirds smaller than the other two griffons, even when he stood at his tallest, random splotches of gold staining his darker brown fur, and he missed several patches of feathers around his head and neck, almost as if he wasn’t full grown yet, despite being almost half a year older than Gilda and only a year or so behind his older brother Dax.  He scanned around the campsite with his right eye, the other covered by a black patch to cover up the disfigurement beneath.  Compared to the other two?  He looked like some kind of joke.  When his yellow eye settled on the red covered unicorn before him Flappy felt his stomach lurch.

“Did…Flappy do that?”  The griffon asked while pointing a curly talon at the mess of grey fur and red.

Dax laughed at his brother’s incompetence, Gilda kept silent and moved around to study the body a little more closely.

“No you cracked egg. “  Flappy flinched slightly at this comment, though he felt slightly relieved that he wasn’t the one who had sent the unicorn to the great beyond.  “Friggin nut job offed himself.”

“I hate to break it to you dude.”  Gilda said while prodding Black Brush with a talon.  “But this pony hasn’t croaked.”

“Flappy doesn’t think ponies croak Gilda…”  Flappy commented with a confused look.

Gilda let out a loud sigh of frustration.  “No you feather brain!  I mean he isn’t dead.”

“Oh, well why didn’t Gilda just say that?  Flappy doesn’t get why others mix words.”

“Shut up Flappy and go check those bags.”  Dax commanded, before walking over to get a better look at the unicorn.  “Looks pretty dead to me.”

Gilda shook her head.  “Naw see right here?”  Gilda reached down and scooped up the unicorn’s head with a single talon, the body part looking dwarfed in the large palm of the griffon.  “There’s no actual cut here.”  She craned up the neck for Dax to see, he leaned down and inspected it with a squinted gaze before confirming that Gilda was indeed correct.  She let his head fall back to the earth with a thud, not that she was intentionally trying to hurt the unicorn.  He was already clonked out pretty good so there was no real need to keep up with the pounding, but the last thing she wanted to seem like in front of Dax was weak…or worse than that…soft on ponies.

“Flappy thinks you were tricked Dax.”  The griffon spoke up, now sitting on his rump with a pleased look on his face, happy that he’d been the one to figure out what the pony had done.  “Those unicones are pretty tricky.”  Flappy said, unable to pronounce the word ‘unicorn’ correctly despite being corrected dozens of times.

Dax shot his younger brother another hard as stone stare.  “Well Flappy is gonna be thinking about how much he wished Dax didn’t rip out his other eye if he doesn’t start CHECKING THOSE BAGS!”  Dax’s raised voice caused the smaller griffon to wince as painful memories were recalled and he immediately shot over to the pile of saddlebags with a speed that could have impressed a certain rainbow maned pegasus.

Gilda frowned slightly at the mention of ripping out Flappy’s eye, she wasn’t exactly afraid to make a few snide remarks at the expense of another’s pride either but, man that was harsh even by her low standards.  She noticed Dax shoot the unicorn a cold unfeeling stare.

“He’s knocked out cold huh?”  The burly griffon curved the sides of his beak up in disgust.  “…Maybe we should make sure he stays that way.”

Gilda’s face took on a noticeable amount of shock; Dax didn’t usually talk about doing stuff like that.  She quickly scanned his face for signs of that last sentence being a joke, but when she only saw stone cold sincerity she began to feel her chest tighten in worry.  She’d wanted to get back at Dash for what she’d done…wanted to get back at all ponies to be honest because as far as she was concerned they were all pretty much the same.  But that…she looked back down at the unicorn, then over towards the pegasus lying prone at the other side of the camp…suddenly a thought crept into her mind that she hadn’t had in the longest time.  What would Dash want her to do?

“Flappy found lots of the shiny Dax!”  Flappy’s proud voice brought her out of her thoughts, and seemed to take Dax’s mind off of…whatever it was he was thinking about.

“Good, pick up the rest of the bags and start hauling ‘em back to camp!”  Dax looked at her, squinting his eyes and giving her a look that practically told her not to breathe even a single word of his previous intentions to anyone.  “You go help him.”  He ordered with a jab of his sharp talon over in Flappy’s general direction.  Who was preoccupied trying to figure out where exactly the big bag with the funny strap was supposed to go.

She watched him out of the corner of her eye as she walked over to the group of saddlebags, worry gripping her as he leaned down and grabbed the crimson stained blade in his left talon.  Toying with the sabre as he looked down at the unicorn with a menacing glare...as if contemplating how easy it would be to take the pony’s life…

“Think I’ll take this for myself.”  Gilda breathed a sigh of relief as Dax said those words.  “Alright you two, let’s grab the loot and get out of here.”  

All three took to the air, as they flew Gilda gave into the temptation of looking back, the two unconscious ponies gently fading away into the distance the farther they got.  She wanted to get revenge on these ponies for the humiliation she’d felt back in Ponyville.  They’d been running this scam for weeks.  Taking every bit these ponies had and beating them to a pulp should have made her feel better…should have made her feel like she was getting the revenge she craved.  So why…every time they did this…did she feel so dirty?

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Black Brush awoke to the feeling of smooth silk sheets wrapped snugly around his body; he attempted to recall recent events while subconsciously beginning to rub the back of his throbbing skull in a soothing manner.  Boy did he have a serious headache…slowly; bit by bit he began to piece things back together.  He and Sunset had been travelling, trying to get to Foalton, none of that was hard to recall.  Things started to get hazy around the time the griffon showed up, he remembered trying to scare off the griffon using his impression of the Smiling Slasher, one of the main villains to his favorite books.  And it had almost worked but then…a loud cracking noise and blackness.

“I must have gotten banged upside the head pretty good…”  Black Brush mumbled to himself as he began to force himself up, before shooting a steadying hoof to the side of his head as pain rocketed throughout it and his vision began to swim.  “…Okay really good.”

He cracked open a bloodshot eye as his blurry vision started to send images of his surroundings to his jostled brain.  He was propped up in a soft white bed, the smooth silk sheets strangely soothing and comforting, he didn’t know whether he thought that because he’d been sleeping on the ground for the past two weeks or if they had been imbued with some kind of magic spell.  Either way, he felt like he could just curl up for hours and let himself drift away in the peaceful world of sleep.  But he forced the desire away, focusing instead on studying the other details of his confines.

It was a large sterile white room, fresh scents of herbal remedies and medicinal mixes wafted about the air, giving the room a very clean smell to accompany its overall clean look.  Lined along each of the walls were several other beds not far unlike his own.  A few occupied with the sleeping forms of ponies wrapped in bandages or looking terribly ill.  Not among them however was a single earth pony.  Who moved about the room in a frantic and busied manner, the pony’s figure dainty, lithe, and quite obviously female.  Her red fur and tail looked terribly matted and poorly groomed said tail matching her fur color except for a single pink stripe careening down the middle.  She wore a single white cap atop her golden blonde mane, the hat adorned with a large red cross that stretched around the broad front of the headpiece.  Her ice blue eyes darted across the room, simultaneously checking the many charts attached to the side of each bed and over the slumbering forms of the ponies beneath the covers.

“Excuse me, nurse.”  Black Brush spoke up.  Causing the earth pony to shriek and practically leap into the air with fright.  Triggering another ache to perforate throughout his skull as the high pitch yelp only served to further aggravate his throbbing headache.  “…ow.”  He mumbled as he began to run a soothing hoof up and down the side of his aching cranium.

The nurse pony placed a hoof on her chest and took a few deep breaths as she began to quell the rapid beating of her heart.  She turned around, looking over her patient with a startled gaze.  “Oh my…I do apologize!”  She spoke with a sweet and caring voice.  “I get so used to the quiet around here that pretty much any form of noise is cause to startle.”  She approached him, her hooves clopping noisily against the hard tile floor.  “I’m Nurse Swirl, but everypony around here calls me Strawberry.”

“A pleasure to meet you Strawberry,” Black Brush nodded his head in greeting.  “I’m Black Brush; I take it I’m in a hospital right now?”  He continued to scan the room with a curious gaze.

Strawberry nodded her head in affirmative.  “You’re currently in the care of the Foalton medical staff, which consists of me and well…me.”

So he had made it to Foalton after all, he suddenly felt worry begin to gnaw away at him as he realized Sunset wasn’t in any of the other beds around the room.  “I see, well it’s great to see I made it here in one piece at least.”  He felt the pain throb in the bottom of his skull once again.  “…For the most part.”  He added underneath his breath.  “But I was travelling with a companion, her names Sunset.  Have you seen here?  Was she with me?”

“Sunset…”  Strawberry placed a hoof up to her chin in thought.  “I take it you mean the orange pegasus that’s been flying laps around the waiting room since I brought you here?”  Black Brush sighed in relief at the mention of his friend.  

“That would be her.”

“Ah yes, she was coming to right around the time I stumbled upon your raided campsite out on the road while getting some herbs for my medicines.  Poor thing is worried sick about you.”  Strawberry gave him a ‘how cute’ kind of look.  “You two must really have quite the relationship.”  

Black Brush felt his cheeks redden slightly at the insinuation.  “Well we’re not…”

Strawberry raised up a hoof to silence him.  “I’m kidding Mr. Brush.  Would you like me to bring her in?”  

“If it wouldn’t be any trouble.”

“Not at all, you seem well enough for visitors.”  Strawberry quickly trotted over to the brown wooden door in the corner of the room, quickly smoothing down her poorly combed mane before peeking her head outside.  “Sunset dear, your friend Black Brush is awake.”

“What!?”  He heard an ecstatic voice proclaim before the door burst open and Strawberry was flung to the tile floor with a thud.

        Black Brush managed to spot a blur of orange as Sunset tore into the room, her wings beating furiously as she floated in the air, scanning over every bed in turn until she found the one she was looking for.  Black Brush felt himself smile as her golden eyes settled upon him and a look of pure relief washed over her face as she allowed herself to float gracefully to the ground.

        “I was worried sick about you!”  Sunset shouted with a tone that would be considered angry by anypony other than Black Brush.  But he was well aware of the sentiment hidden within those words.  Her sudden outburst had drawn the attention of the pegasus sleeping in a bed next to Black Brush’s, the blue mare opening her tired eyes to cast him an annoyed glare, before she huffed and rolled over with an angry grumble or two.  

        “Please try and keep your voice down!”  Strawberry ordered while rubbing her sore flank.  “These ponies need their rest!”

        Sunset allowed an apologetic look to taint her expression of anger as she laid her ears back and mumbled a sorry to the flustered nurse, both for the outburst and the knockdown.

        “Do you have any idea how worried I was to wake up in the back of a chariot with all of our stuff missing and you covered in blood?!”  Sunset’s voice was now more of a seething whisper, but the intent was still quite clear.  

        “I take it you were pretty freaked out?”

        Sunset scrunched up her face in anger and she opened her mouth for some kind of aggravated reply, before she let out a sigh and her expression softened.  “Just don’t ever worry me like that again Blackie.”  She looked up, his emerald eyes apologetic, yet somewhat amused.  “…This is just like Nightmare Night all over again.”

        Black Brush chuckled slightly at the memory; back when they were young Black Brush had used his fake blood trick to scare Sunset witless.  He had covered himself in the stuff then pretended to be dead in her front yard right before her family went out for candy, as soon as she saw him she immediately bolted for the nurse.  Needless to say the night itself didn’t end well; the nurse had forced him to stay in the hospital for the night and no matter how many times he had explained that it was just a trick, a trick in poor taste yes but just a trick, the medical staff still refused to release him until his parents had arrived.  His dad had made him polish the fencing equipment for three weeks.  In his defense it seemed like a great idea at the time.

        “Sorry Sunset.  I thought maybe I could scare away the griffon that had knocked you out.”  Black Brush explained.  “But I kind of got whacked over the head before he took to his heels.”  He heaved a heavy hearted sigh.  “And you said something about all of our stuff missing?”  Sunset nodded.  “Great, so that bird bastard gives us both a case of head trauma AND takes off with all our bits…fantastic.”

        “I’m sorry, did you say a griffon did this to you both?”  Strawberry spoke up.

        “Yeah, must have been a group of them because I took another one out with a pan.  And the big one was standing right in front of me when I got hit so I’d guess there was around three.”  

        Strawberry sighed, looking aggravated.  “I should have guessed…those blasted griffons have been giving our town no end of trouble for weeks now.”  

        Both Black Brush and Sunset gave Strawberry a puzzled look.  “We’re not the first this has happened to?”  Sunset asked.

        Strawberry shook her head.  “No, these griffons have been attacking the ponies travelling along the roads around our peaceful little town for weeks now.  Over half the ponies here are victims of their ruthless attacks.”  

        Black Brush and Sunset looked at each other, the weight of the situation finally catching up with them; at least two out of every three beds were occupied.  And from the looks of the injuries sustained by the other ponies they were lucky with their encounter.  Pegasi had their wings broken; earth ponies looked like they had been stomped on by an Ursa Major, and unicorns resembled mummies with the amount of bandages they had wrapped around them.  This situation was obviously getting way to out of hand, and something needed to be done.

        Both of them turned their gazes upon Strawberry, their expressions tight, confident, and brave.  

        “How can we help?”

Next Chapter: Griffon Problems PT2. Estimated time remaining: 37 Minutes