Midnight couldn't believe it. The Ponymother was likely intending on giving Dove over to the necromancer. The thought of such a thing made primal instincts, long dormant, rise up in her. She would not let them take her filly. If any pony tried she would find a way to stop them. Sunset said she was going to get Dove to safety. Midnight had to trust that there was somewhere they could go.

Her wing was wrapped protectively around her filly, who was sleeping in her saddle bag. Midnight's fur was fluffing due to her mood. She found that she kept running her tongue across her fangs as if to test the sharpness of them. She would sink them into any pony that tried to lay a hoof on Dove.

Their party was moving quickly through the streets. Water Shadow said there was a long unused passageway that traveled underground, down in the mines below the city. The passageway out was actually well away from the city, but the alicorns said that once they were far enough down the passage the teleport block around the city would be cleared, and then they could teleport every pony far away.

Midnight was a little confused about how they could teleport all the way to their final destination once the teleport block was cleared, or at least most of the way. She knew they could have done that over a thousand years ago, when Harmony still stood, but they had nowhere near that kind of power now. Water Shadow had given some brief explanation, but it went over Midnight's head. The alicorn likely had even been very clear, but Midnight was having trouble focusing on anything but guarding Dove.

"Once we're at the mines I'm going to take all your suits off," Sunset told them, getting a collective gasp from all the non-alicorns in response. "I can override them with a few quick commands and they'll fall right off. I'd do it before then, but all of you running around naked would attract even more attention if Peridot hasn't started hunting you yet. They'll have to remain in place until we're sure she is hunting us, but we can't have her being able to track your suits' signals beyond Ocid."

"You can take them off?" Sweet Pea asked with amazement. "I didn't think anything could take them off."

"That would make little sense. The suits are reused after their previous owners are done with them. We don't put them into the Bakery, it would be a waste of hardware," Sunset replied back as we moved, looking annoyed at the unicorn's ignorance.

"But putting ponies in the Bakery isn't a waste," Cotton Tail muttered, earning a smack of a hoof from his mother.

"I'm making no effort to defend the system here. I personally am sickened by it, that isn't our concern at the moment though," Sunset said to the stallion in a patient tone.

Midnight wasn't concerned about the system at all at the moment. If the suits tracked them, and she needed to avoid being tracked, then having them come off was of concern for that and that alone. What mattered right now was keeping Dove with her and safe, not the ills of Ocid's society. It might be something she would have had stronger feelings about normally, but right now her feelings were focused on a much more singular goal.

"It seems strange to me that it's important for the sake of one filly and not the rest of Ocid," Cotton Tail snapped back at Sunset, before turning to his mother. "Mom, you should be more concerned about it. You're getting close to going to the Bakery yourself. Why shouldn't I think it's important when my mother is in danger of going to the Bakery."

"Hush, Cotton, we have discussed this. That isn't important right now," Night Mist scolded her son.

"Will you all be quiet, we need to not draw any attention to ourselves," Water Shadow snapped at them all, as she made shushing motions.

"Says an alicorn travelling with us," Moon Fury quipped. He had a point. It was kind of hard to not draw attention to ourselves in the company of alicorns. Water Shadow gave him a level look, but ignored the comment.

We did grow silent after that. Midnight silently hoped that the fact most citizens of Ocid preceded just to keep their heads out of others concerns would keep them from gawking too much at the odd collection of ponies traveling together through the streets.

A news display flickered away from an advertisement for wine to a news broadcast. The familiar crystal mare appeared on the screen.

"This is a special alert to all guard units currently operating in Night's Heart. By order of the Ponymother, all guards not stationed at the Bakery are to cease all current activities. Pegasus filly zero-zero-zero-zero-zero-zero-zero-zero-zero-one, designated Dove, has become the only current target for apprehension. The filly is believed to be in the care of thestral mare seven-eight-four-nine-five-two-seven-one-nine-zero, designated Midnight Glow. The tracking information for this mare is currently being sent out to all of your suits. The filly must be captured alive, and brought to the Ponymother immediately. Use of deadly force to quell any and all resistance to the filly's capture has been authorized. The survival of Ocid depends on the prompt completion of these orders. All other citizens are hereby given temporary leave of their shifts and ordered back home immediately. In one hour the only ponies authorized to be on the streets shall be the guard. Ponies in violation of the curfew will have their number noted by the computer and face punishment if in deliberate violation. This curfew will persist until specific order is given by the Ponymother, and will have its ending announced by the computer. The Ponymother thanks you all for your cooperation. Ocid survives."

"Bloody pony feathers," Sunset swore, and smashed a hoof into the ground, creating a small crater. "She is moving faster than I feared she would. She must have already searched your home and the brothel, and found my quarters empty. All of you hold still for a moment , we're taking the suits off now. We can't have them able to track us any further.

"Command override code solar-solar-lunar-one-nine-strength-empathy-healing-empathy-six-honesty-seven variation four-two-one-five," Sunset quickly said the seemingly nonsense command without taking so much as a breath.

"Suit override code accepted. Ocid survives,"Midnight heard the computer in her suit say, echoed by the others in a strange computerized chorus. Then she felt the suit suddenly go loose, and the seams and straps release. It felt strange not having it tight against her body, like a large part of her flesh had just sloughed off.Midnight was aware of sensations on her body that had been muted by the suit for years now, and was honestly a little creeped out by them.

Sunset and Water Shadow quickly stripped the suits off each of the thestrals and the unicorn. Midnight gave her own flank a quick glance after the suit was completely off and her eyes widened. Now sitting on her flank were five silvery hearts, joined in an silver ethereal chain. It was her cutie mark, and she had no clue what it meant. That symbol was anything but obvious in its meaning and no hint of realization came to her as she looked at the mark. It was nice to know she had some sort of purpose or talent at least.

"Well, this is appropriate," Sweet Pea said beside her. The unicorn was looking at her own flank. On her light green fur now sat a foal's bottle surrounded at four corners by four small pink hearts. What Sweet Pea had for a purpose in life was clear, care for foals. She may have been forced into her job like every other pony, but in this case it was the most appropriate job for her. Midnight felt slightly jealous that her friend's mark was so clear while her own was so obscure.

Midnight looked around quickly at her compatriots' cutie marks, unable to hold back curiosity, despite the situation. On Cotton Tail's flank was a golden two-sided balance scale, perhaps something involving fairness or justice perhaps? Night Mist had a rainbow-striped lightning bolt that was the ancient symbol of loyalty placed on the background of a golden sun that matched their shared mistress's mark, clearly loyalty to Sunset was what Night Mist was all about. Moon Fury's was a strange black star made up of crooked arrows facing out in eight different directions, she had as much clue about that one as she did her own.

"We can gawk at cutie marks later," Sunset said sternly. She gathered up the discarded suits in her magic and ignited them. "We keep moving now. They're already going to be coming here since that is the last signal's location."

There was no more moving quietly through the streets at this point. All the ponies were now moving at a full run with Water Shadow taking the lead for direction. On and off she would pull them to a halt in between buildings and put up some sort of shield around them with her magic. Moments after doing this each time a vehicle would pass by them, seeming not to notice them. They would then take off again once the patrol was out of sight.

Midnight knew that they were still being spotted by cameras throughout the city. The only reason they didn't have the guards on them already was the sheer amount of camera images that had to be monitored. At some point whoever was scanning the camera feeds would spot them and direct the guards to them. It was just a matter of time.

They paused again, and ducked out of sight, as another guard transport started passing by them. All of the them held their breath as the transport was passing.

"Waada woo!" Dove exclaimed loudly as she woke up. Midnight hurriedly wrapped a wing over her infant to try to quiet her, but it was too late. The transport stopped right where it was at and opened up its doors. Guards began piling out and rushing towards them quickly.

The two alicorns launched into action, throwing up shields to deflect the blasts from the guards' energy guns, and slinging spells of towards the guards. Within seconds all the guards were completely collapsed on the ground. Midnight thought at first that they might be dead, but then she noticed the signs of breathing indicating that the alicorns had simply put them to sleep.

"That almost certainly gave away our exact position," Water Shadow said. She then gathered up several of the guards' weapons and floated them over to the four thestrals and the unicorn. "Take these, and be ready to use them if need be. Sunset and I can deal with a large number of guards ourselves, but it's better if you all are capable of putting up some sort of fight."

"I have no idea how to use one of these. We aren't trained soldiers," Sweet Pea whined as she took the proffered weapon in her magic.

"Strap it on one of your forelegs so that it will aim away from you when you raise it. There's a bite clip on it that will extend out towards you when you point it directly at a target. Bite down on clip and it'll fire, or in your case use your magic to trigger the clip for the same effect. We never did come up with a gun design that worked both safely, and without hassle, for non-unicorns," Sunset quickly explained. "Hurry up and get equipped, we aren't doing any more hiding."

Midnight quickly armed herself. In order to test how the gun's firing mechanism worked she raised the hoof it was strapped on and then pointed it down the road. A long extension quickly came out towards her face that had an odd handled bar, which she assumed to be a bite clip. It would be easy enough to bite down on, but she would have to be aiming at something not moving to the sides, while being stationary herself, to actually use the thing. Trying to fight with it against some pony similarly equipped, who was experienced in its use, would leave her helplessly exposed to their fire. She knew the guards were going to be practiced enough to not have those kinds of restrictions. Hopefully she wouldn't be forced to have to try using it. She lowered her hoof and the bar quickly detracted back to the weapon.

She took a glance down at the sleeping guards and noticed one of them wearing the extending blade weapon she had seen used before. She quickly unwrapped that from the guard and strapped it on her other foreleg. She then imitated the positioning of her foreleg that she had seen guards use before and the blade extended quickly out. Putting her foreleg back down caused it to quickly retract back into the apparatus before her hoof touched the ground. She was in severe danger if she was close enough to use this, but she felt she could more effectively use it if forced to. Whatever it took to protect Dove.

"Now that every pony is ready let's get moving again," Water Shadow said as she took off down the street.

The Mare of Shadows lay sprawled out on top of the stone casket in the center of the room. There were ponies' bodies thrown everywhere about the room and a few diamond dog ones as well. There wasn't a drop of blood to be seen though, every last one of those corpses had been drained of everything, and the power of their blood put into her spells. It had been a lot of bliss given up to do what she needed to do and that left her feeling rather unenergetic. It would take her weeks on her own to get back to her regular energy level, even if her power level was perfectly fine.

She kept her head planted on the grey stone as she watched her work finish itself. The three alicorn bodies were no longer just bodies, but free thinking creatures of her own making. They were still pulling their awareness together at the moment, it would take a few minutes, but they would be able to function independently of her. She would be sending them out as hunters to track down Sunset Shimmer and the Pegasus filly. Each of her creations would be able to overpower an alicorn on their own once they found her. She could go out hunting herself, but this covered more ground, more quickly. Once they located her prey she could get to the location quickly if they hadn't subdued the alicorn yet.

And she did want the alicorn brought to her alive. There was a lot of power to be gained by severing her life herself. Plus she had an old grudge against Sunset Shimmer that she needed to settle that she intended to make the alicorn suffer long and hard for. Sunset would take a long time dying, she would make sure of it. The alicorn's suffering would also go a long way to helping her recover her bliss quickly. The fact she had to deal with this filly was a small blessing in that it would flush the alicorn out of Ocid.

The Mare considered why her masters were so concerned about a lone pegasus filly. The fact that it was the seeming rebirth of the tribe wasn't really much of a concern. One pony was much like the rest, even if they had some small magical and physical differences between their tribes. If they had earth pony and pegasus births in great numbers all of the sudden it wouldn't really matter. Pegasi didn't have any particularly concerning abilities, weather manipulation, cloud walking, naturally better at flying than the thestrals, but nothing to really care about. One pegasus wasn't going to have much impact on weather, and the other abilities were of no consequence. It was a puzzle, and she didn't like leaving puzzles unsolved. The filly would need to be brought to her alive as well so she could gauge it's magic. Perhaps it had some extraordinary ability granted from its cutie mark, as Grogar seemed concerned with that detail. There were ponies from time to time that had such magic. If it had some great ability she would find a way to harness it before finishing it off. No need to give up something that could be of advantage to her when she went to deal with the other acolytes.

Her creations were stirring in ways that let her know that they were aware now. It was time to give them their orders and get them on their tasks.

Night Mist had decided that there are some things a mare shouldn't be doing for the first time in her sixties, and getting into a gun fight was one of those things.

They were deep in the lower levels of the mining facility, and they had heavy gunfire coming down on them from multiple directions. The Ponymother had changed all the security code clearances, and the door they needed to get through was not opening. The door was extremely thick and resistant to magic to boot, forcing them to have to find a way to get the computer to open it. In the meantime more and more guards were coming into the large room.

Her mistress was working hard to try to hack the door to open, but that left the rest of them trying to keep the guards away. Water Shadow was focused in trying to keep them all shielded from the blasts, so she wasn't doing much fighting herself, and she was primarily focused on keeping Sunset safe while being completely exposed. The rest of the group was spread out. The crates they were using for cover blocked the gunfire, but they were not able to shelter more than one pony at any given location. Night Mist was one of the furthest away from the door, and once it opened she had no idea how she would reach it safely.

She looked around at the others. Moon Fury was cut off equally far away in the other direction from the door, but he seemed to be much more proficient with using the gun than her. He was clearly no expert, but the guards were having difficulty advancing on his position.

Her son was near her, a mere ten pony lengths away. That distance was all open ground and made it so it might as well have been on the other side of Ocid. He had tried to get over to her a few times, which was foolish. He had always been far too protective of her though.

Sweet Pea was just beyond him, another two or three pony lengths down. Sweet Pea actually seemed to be far more capable of using her pilfered weapon well than the guards firing on them, likely because she could trigger it with magic. The unicorn's snipperlike shots were the primary thing keeping the guards at bay right now. When Sweet Pea ran out of shot the rest of them were going to be in even more trouble.

Midnight Glow was the closest to the door. She only took an occasional shot from time to time, which more often than not fired off towards the ceiling or floor. The young mother was far more concerned with keeping her foal shielded behind the crates. The young filly, shockingly, was giggling through all of this loudly, blissfully unaware that she was in mortal danger, but very much aware of the pretty light show the gun fire was causing.

Night Mist tried sticking her hoof out again to try to take a few more blind shots in the guards' direction. Immediately when she stuck the hoof out the area around her was bombarded by the guards' fire. She quickly withdrew it back and sat shaking in her spot. She wasn't cut out for this kind of thing. She was very convinced she was going to die in this room. Hopefully the others would get away safely, but there was no way she was going to be able to transverse the area between her and the door, even if they got it open.

She had no real regrets about her decision to help her alicorn try to escape the city. Chances were that they would put her in the Bakery anyway if she had stayed behind. She was an acolyte, if she had no alicorn she had no job, no purpose. She had lived a good comfortable life, gotten to see her son grow into a strong stallion, and served her alicorn well for over forty-five years. Many ponies didn't even live as long as she had served in her position. She was ready for to meet her end here if it came to it.

"Sunset you can't get away," the voice of the Ponymother came across the room, announcing she had arrived.

Sunset Shimmer didn't give the Ponymother any sort of response, and kept trying to hack the door. Night Mist didn't know if there was any actual progress being made on it, but if any pony could do it then that would be Sunset Shimmer. The alicorn had all but built the computer system here by herself. Night Mist was sure the alicorn would eventually get through. Whether the rest of them were still alive by that point was still yet to be seen though.

Giving a silent curse to herself that she was even doing such a thing, Night Mist tried taking another try at shooting in the direction that the Ponymother's voice had come from. She took a deep breath, raised her forehoof to get the bite grip to extend again, and put her mouth lightly over the grip to be ready. She personally hated the Ponymother, but the idea that she was trying to shoot at the Ponymother was making her even more shaky. What they were doing was treason, but taking a direct shot at the Ponymother was a whole other level of treason. The Ponymother was the only target she had any idea of where to shoot at though, based on the direction of the voice.

Before she could position herself there was a loud hiss and the sound of a mechanism grinding to life. Her mistress had managed to successfully hack the door, and it was now opening.

"Hurry! It'll only be open for less than a minute and then will close again with a random lock code in order to delay them," Sunset shouted to them. The alicorn turned and added additional shielding that now enveloped all the party except for Night Mist and Moon Fury.

Night Mist was going to have to transverse a large open area to get to the shielding and then through the door, all in a short amount of time. Perhaps if she fired off a few shots before she bolted she could buy herself those precious few seconds that she needed. That might make the guards firing in her direction have to duck and cover long enough for her to make the run. It didn't seem likely, but it was worth attempting.

She positioned the weapon and took a quick breath, then she turned and started firing blindly in Peridot's general direction. After getting three quick shots off she lowered her hoof quickly, and tried to start running.

Before she could take even a step excruciating pain shot through her leg that the gun was strapped on. She dropped down to the ground, unable to function through the searing pain. She barely was able to open her eyes enough to look at her hoof, and she saw it was a bloody mess. She had been shot straight through where the weapon had been strapped. The weapon was no longer attached, and she couldn't focus enough to look for it. She didn't think this was a fatal wound, but it was extremely painful. She wasn't going to be able to run, if she could even bring herself to stand on three legs. She was either going to be executed here, or captured and taken to the Bakery.

"Mom! Hold still, I'm going to come get you," Cotton Tail shouted over to her.

"Don't you dare!" She shouted back, perhaps more harshly than she intended. The pain was still so intense it was all she could do though. "You're going to get out of here. Do you hear me? I'm old and this was coming soon anyway. I made my peace with it. I'll not have you sacrificing yourself for me."

Her son was shouting back some answer, but she couldn't make it out. Her vision was fading out as she lost blood, and the world faded to black.

Well, at least this isn't boring.Moon Fury thought to himself. There had been a high chance of death for two of his important playthings up till now. Thankfully those two looked like they were getting out of here safely. Those two being the little pegasus and the other being the unborn foal that unicorn whore was currently carrying in her womb.

Dove was something completely fresh and unique, the side effect of random chance pushed to the extreme by his siring her. It would be a true shame not to see what the pony could eventually do in time. He himself had no clue, it was chaos that spawned her, and there was no telling what form of ordered being it had settled into. She had power, he could feel it, even if the ponies couldn't, but he had no clue what the power actually did. He would be very disappointed if he never found out what he made.

The foal that the unicorn was carrying was of lesser importance, but still something he looked forward to seeing. He had decided to play some more after the interesting results with Dove, and tried something a bit different with that one, and several others that were even now growing in wombs of whores around Ocid. Reflections of old magic, from long dead ponies, were in them rather than pure random chance. Long dead ponies that had once shaped this world. Perhaps nothing would come of that game, but he was curious as to what these ones might do in this world. It wasn't strictly reincarnation, as he lacked access to their actual souls, but he hoped he made close facsimiles. The one this unicorn was carrying was one he had a particular soft spot for, and losing it would have definitely been saddening.

Moon Fury looked at the now closed door. He had originally planned to have gone through it with the rest of the party. There was no real danger to him from these weapons after all. Plans changed when he had come down with a dreadful case of compassion. It was truly infuriating.

Night Mist was passed out in a pool of her own blood across the room from him. Who would have thought so much blood pumped through one of those hooves? He had sent his magic out to make sure she didn't bleed out. Luckily the computer had not picked up on the tiny sliver of magic that had cauterized the wound. He had spent a lot of time with that pony over the years, and he had to admit he would be upset if she died. He really was far too sentimental. It was the fault of hanging around ponies too much over the millennia, but it wasn't an entirely unwanted feeling.

Her idiot son had refused to go through the door when it was open, and was trying to find some way of getting to his mother. If the blasted stallion had just gone through the door, like he should have, this could all be dealt with cleanly and secretly. Now Moon Fury had to go about saving two ponies. If he didn't save Cotton Tail then Night Mist would be all depressed when he did finally save her, and depressed ponies were depressing for him to deal with. Moon Fury resolved to just take a vacation from this world for a few centuries after he was done seeing how his projects turned out. These ponies gave him such a headache sometimes.

There were some positives to this situation though. There was another game he had been considering playing for a long time now, and this might be the perfect time to start it. Moon Fury had some interesting pieces to play with, if he dealt with the current situation with care. Perhaps it was time to really start doing some major chaos.

Night Mist was sadly in plain view of the guards. They weren't firing at her, since she had ceased to be a threat to the guards in her current state; they most likely thought her dead at the moment. The fact she was clearly in view made it impossible for him to extract her without giving away that he could teleport things, even under Ocid's teleportation block. When Peridot finally realized that the thestral mare was alive she would want to interrogate her, there was time to rescue Night Mist later.

Cotton Tail was neatly out of sight for the moment. That meant he could be taken out of here and they wouldn't see the teleport. Moon Fury would save the impetuous stallion for now.

Decision made, Moon Fury made the stallion go elsewhere.

"Warning! Non-pony magic of unknown origin detected!"

Oh, screw you computer. Moon Fury growled to himself. He sent out another wave of magic to block out their memories of Cotton Tail's removal and the alarm going off, then made himself be elsewhere as well.

Peridot didn't know what was going to happen to Ocid now. The alicorns had betrayed them all, and then stolen the nation's one hope of survival away. She had ponies working hastily to try to hack into the door that they had escaped through, but there were a series of other similar doors down that passageway that would prove to be obstacles. She had already sent troops out to where the cave system exited out, but since the alicorns were now where they could teleport they could end up anywhere. She had as virtually no hope of actually catching them by simple pursuit, and this was all just going through the motions.

She looked down at Night Mist. The acolyte was still alive. Somehow the bleeding from her wound had stopped before she could bleed to death. That was a small bit of good news. Hopefully she would give up some information under interrogation. Something to tell her where to look for the filly.

Peridot glanced at the pony's cutie mark and grimaced. It was only a small hope that the mare would give anything useful. That mark made it clear she was loyal to the core for Sunset Shimmer. She had already arrested Water Shadow's other two acolytes and would be interrogating them as well. Hopefully some pony would give up information before she sent them all off to the Bakery.

She had to have something for the Mare of Shadows by tomorrow. There was no producing the filly, but perhaps information would buy them some mercy. There was no way Ocid could withstand the full assault from from the undead army that was waiting to descend. She would leave no stone unturned in her pursuit of something to give to the necromancer to buy her ponies time.

Why had the alicorns done this? This was a betrayal on the level of what Pinkie Pie had done centuries before. One filly's life was not worth the lives of every other pony. They couldn't even form a small colony somewhere, there were no males among them. Even if that unicorn had a colt that was just one male, that wasn't enough to form a stable population, even with the heavy inbreeding that would definitely happen.

Something seemed off in her thinking; like she was forgetting something again, but she couldn't pull up the thought. She shook her head, it was likely just the current stress of the situation messing with her mind.

Peridot quietly raged inside her head despite her calm expression. She would break every bone in these acolytes' bodies and have them drugged so they wouldn't be able to pass out, then when she was satisfied that there was no more information to be gained she would send them through the Bakery alive and awake. They deserved to feel every piece of meat being ripped from their bodies, traitors deserved even worse.

She spit on Night Mist and walked out of the room.