It took a few seconds before Twilight realized she had fallen to her haunches in shock. She got up and trotted next to Rainbow Dash. She didn't say anything, figuring it would be best let Rainbow have her silence. She watched Rainbow Dash glance back and forth between the large gray doors, lining the seemingly endless hallway. After a few minutes of this, a though occurred to her and she spoke up.

Hey, Rainbow?"

"What's up, Twi?"

"Do you... know where you're going?" Twilight asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Nope."

Twilight stumbled to a stop and glared at the cyan pegasus.

"Are you telling me that we've been wandering around a maze of hallways with no clue as to where any of our friends are?"

"That's about the gist of it."

Twilight gaped at Rainbow Dash.

"I don't - you can't just... then where are we even... ugh!" she threw up her hooves in exasperation, "how are we supposed to find the others in a place this big? All the halls look the same and every door we've come across so far has been identical."

"We'll find them the same way I found you," Rainbow replied flippantly.

"And how exactly did you find me?" Twilight asked.

"The memory," was Rainbow Dash's simple answer.

"Oh..." Twilight responded quietly, "so you're idea is basically to find another scientist and-"

"Eat them, yeah."

Twilight mulled that over for a moment and decided that it was as good a plan as any - gruesome and twisted as it was. That she was even slightly in favor of the slaughter and consumption of a potentially innocent pony left no doubt in Twilight's mind.

Whatever that virus was, it had definitely done something to drastically alter her and Rainbow Dash's mental state.

I can't believe I'm vouching for this plan, Twilight thought morosely, but it seems like our only choice at the moment, and after what Rainbow told me, I really need to make sure the rest of my friends are okay.

Twilight forced some confidence into her steps and gave Rainbow Dash a nod of approval.

"I don't like it, but if that's what we have to do to find our friends and escape this horrible place... then I'm with you Rainbow Dash. But... wait..." she stopped and gave Rainbow Dash a worried look, "if you do this, Rainbow, you might risk-"

"I know the risks, Twi," Rainbow interjected, giving Twilight a determined look, "I'll... I can deal with it if it means finding everypony else... especially Fluttershy," she added quietly.

"Well... if you're sure you can handle it, Rainbow..." Twilight conceded hesitantly.

Rainbow answered Twilight with a melancholy smile before turning her gaze back to the many doors along the wall. She began trotting forward again, but Twilight held back for another minute observing her with a frown.

Dash... don't believe for a second that I couldn't see you shaking at the thought of going through that again.

She furrowed her brow and followed after Rainbow.

No, Rainbow... I won't let you go through that again. I Pinkie Pie swear it.

As they trotted down the unending corridor, the two of them kept their eyes and ears open for any sign of change in the scenery. Twilight was beginning to get uneasy.

"Rainbow, don't you thinks it's little too..."

"Quiet?"

Twilight nodded, "And empty."

Rainbow looked towards the ceiling, humming in thought.

"Well... you're definitely right about that. When I broke out of my room the place was swarming with security ponies. Now though..." she swept her gaze around the hall again, "it's like they just up and abandoned the place."

They eventually came across an intersection with two paths going left and right. Looking left, they saw a large door at the end of another pathway. Unlike the other large nondescript metal doors they had passed thus far, this one was regular sized and black with the words 'SKY TALON LABORATORIES ANNEX BUILDING 3' stamped in blocky white letters.

Well it seems my hunch about this being some sort of large scale research facility wasn't too far off the mark, Twilight thought.

She looked to the right and saw that the hallway continued further down with another intersection at the end. She turned back to Rainbow Dash.

"What do you think, Rainbow?" she asked, but Rainbow wasn't paying attention. She was focused on the black door, her eyes squinted and head slightly tilted in thought.

"Rainbow Dash?" Twilight asked in concern, "what's wrong?"

"This name..." Rainbow responded slowly, "'Sky Talon...'" she looked back to Twilight with a bemused expression, "that's a griffon surname."

Twilight returned Rainbow's bemused expression with one of her own.

"That's odd. Did you see any griffons when you were making your way to the room I was in?"

"No," Rainbow replied, shaking her head, "just ponies. There were no griffons in that memory either."

For a time, the two stood there, pondering what that could mean, when Twilight suddenly spoke up.

"Rainbow, what's the last thing you remember before waking up?"

"Huh? Oh, well... um," Rainbow frowned thoughtfully, "the last thing I can remember is you telling us about some kind of empire popping up somewhere in the frozen north after coming back to Ponyville from your meeting with the Princesses. We all left Ponyville on the Friendship Express to go investigate... and that's it," she shrugged, "I got nothing after that."

Twilight slowly nodded, as though she expected the answer, "that sounds about right. I remember Princess Celestia telling me about the return of the Crystal Empire and some kind of test..." her eyes widened, "wait, that might've been what I was talking about before!"

"What were you talking about before?" Rainbow asked in confusion.

"In the memory you saw," Twilight clarified, "when I mentioned how I wasn't going to fail the Princess again. This test must've been what I was talking about," the excitement of her discovery quickly vanished, "and I failed it somehow..."

Seeing her lavender friend's dejected face, Rainbow pulled her into a one legged hug.

"Hey, come on, egghead, cheer up," she said with what she hoped was a winning smile, "it ain't the end of the world... as far as we know."

Twilight whimpered, her head sinking lower.

"A-and even if it was," Rainbow added quickly, "you still got me and the rest of the girls... once we find them."

When Twilight didn't respond, Rainbow gave an exasperated sigh.

"Twi, look at me."

Twilight didn't move and Rainbow pulled her around to face her.

"Look, I know things suck right now, but we need to keep going," Rainbow said sternly, "we can worry about what happened in the past later. Our friends need rescuing now. I know I'm the last one that should be saying this, but at least keep it together until everypony is safe and accounted for, alright?"

Twilight finally looked up at Rainbow with a small, sad smile, "Thanks, Dash, really... and you're right," she wiped her eyes and looked at Rainbow with newfound resolve, "I can't just wallow in self-pity when our friends are still out there somewhere - possibly in a worse situation than we are."

"That's the spirit!" Rainbow Dash exclaimed with a genuine smile, "now then" - she turned to the intersection before them - "I don't know about you, but I am sick of these hallways. I vote we go with the black door."

Twilight nodded in agreement, "And we might find some more answers," she tapped the metal band around the base of her horn, "as well as a way to get this thing off of me."

"Um, Twilight," Rainbow asked with a raised eyebrow, "why don't you just... you know... use those tendrils to break it off or something?"

Twilight blinked and looked at her horn.

Can I do that?

With no specific thought in mind other than removing the band, she tried pulling from that strange power source at her core and the tendrils responded. Rather than removing the metal band, the tendrils wrapped around her horn and receded back into her head, leaving her horn ringless.

It only lasted for a few seconds, but to Twilight, the sudden and excruciating agony that coursed throughout her entire body might as well have lasted an eternity. As soon as it had started though, the pain stopped abruptly - leaving Twilight no worse for wear aside from the disorientation caused by the near instantaneous change in sensation.

Coming back to her senses, Twilight found that she had collapsed to the floor at some point. To her confusion, she could also make out the sounds of heavy panting interspersed with low muttering somewhere nearby. Looking towards the source of the noise, she saw Rainbow Dash back up against a wall.

To Twilight's shock, the entire area immediately surrounding her and Rainbow Dash was pockmarked with all manner of gashes and holes that were carved out by... something.

What happened? Twilight thought, slowly shaking her head in disbelief, What did I do?

She was snapped out of her shock by the soft muttering coming from Rainbow Dash. She moved closer to get a better look at her friend and gasped in horror.

She was a mess.

She was shaking violently, wings fully extended in agitation. Her eyes were wide, pupils reduced to pinpricks and tears falling freely down her face. She seemed to be staring at something Twilight couldn't see.

Her fur was matted with sweat and her mouth was constantly moving, muttering something Twilight couldn't quite hear. Worried for her friend, Twilight trotted right next to Rainbow Dash, putting a hoof on her withers.

"Rainbow?"

"No... no... nonono... no... please don't die... come on, Twi... don't do this to me..."

Twilight's heart skipped a beat.

She grabbed Rainbows face and turned it to towards her own.

"Rainbow?" Twilight spoke in a loud, clear voice, "Rainbow Dash, listen to me. I'm not dying. I'm fine. Do you hear me? I'm okay, Rainbow."

It took Twilight several minutes of reassurances but she eventually managed to calm Rainbow Dash down enough to speak.

"Are you alright now, Dash?" Twilight asked in a soft voice.

"Y-yeah, I'll be fine," Rainbow croaked in reply, "just... just gimme a minute."

After a few deep breaths, Rainbow turned to Twilight and nodded, "Alright, I think I'm good now... sorry about that, Twilight," she turned away with a grimace, "I guess that memory is affecting me way more than I thought."

"No kidding," Twilight agreed looking thoughtful, "I can't help but wonder why though."

"What do you mean why?" Rainbow asked, frowning at Twilight, "it was one of the most bucked up things I've ever seen, Twilight."

"I don't doubt that for a second, Rainbow Dash," Twilight responded seriously, "but from what you told me, and what I've experienced firsthoof, this shouldn't be affecting you at all given the change in our state of mind regarding... things of a gruesome nature."

"Sorry, Twilight," Rainbow Dash said shrugging helplessly, "I don't know what to tell you."

Twilight lowered head and quietly grunted in frustration.

There's way too many questions and not enough answers! But wait... Twilight's scowl turned thoughtful, If this is some sort of research facility, there might be some documents hidden away somewhere detailing what this project is and what the virus does specifically. If I could just find those, we might finally be able to answer at least some of these-

"Whoa... hey, Twilight, come check this out."

Twilight looked over to see Rainbow Dash examining a section of one of the walls near the black door. Curious, she made her way over to where Rainbow was and raised her eyebrows at what she saw. Embedded deep into the tile of the wall was the silver horn ring.

"How did that happen?" Twilight asked in confusion.

"I dunno," Rainbow said with a shrug, "guess it just didn't agree with the new you."

Twilight opened her mouth to retort, but stopped short.

"Wait, how did I get the ring off my horn?"

Rainbow Dash shift uncomfortably before answering, "When you tried to remove with the tendrils, you kind of ended up... absorbing it instead. After that, your tentacle things started freaking out. That's all I'm saying about that."

"That's all I needed, Rainbow," Twilight replied with a thankful smile, "now I think I can finally start piecing a few things together about how this virus works."

She began pacing the narrow hallway and seeing this, Rainbow let out an exasperated groan.

"C'mon, Twi, you're not seriously gonna start-"

"Apparently this virus allows us to absorb - or rather consume - both organic and inorganic material."

"Oh, buck me there she goes..." Rainbow muttered, burying her face in a hoof.

"When we consume other ponies we can see their memories and possibly learn their skills - though I'm not sure how that works exactly in regards to what's shown."

Rainbow perked up at the mention of learning skills.

"Wait seriously? We can steal skills? That's actually pretty awesome!"

"Calm down, Rainbow," Twilight responded shaking her head, "A lot of what I'm saying is mere conjecture at this point. I'm almost certain there's a lot more we don't know."

Rainbow just huffed and looked away.

"Where was I?" Twilight continued, "oh, right-" Twilight raised a hoof and, in a blur of tendrils, a silver blade had once again replaced most of her foreleg "-our bodies seems to be completely malleable - at least when it comes to tentacles and sharp objects," she added sardonically.

"Twilight, this is super informative and everything, but we really need to-"

"On the matter of what happened when I consumed the ring, I have a hypothesis," Twilight continued, reforming the blade back into a hoof and resuming her pacing.

Rainbow gave a weary sigh and rubbed her temples.

"That horn ring was designed to block the flow of my magic and force it back into my wellspring causing a sort of magical feedback to occur - a very painful magical feedback, I might add. Naturally, that ring would've caused an adverse reaction when my body tried to consume it. I deduce that this in turn led to a" - Twilight stopped her pacing and looked around the partially destroyed hallway with a grimace - "very violent rejection."

"Twiiiiliiiiight," Rainbow groaned in annoyance.

"Yes, Rainbow? Did you have a question?" Twilight asked with an eager smile.

"Twilight, we've been sitting in this Celestia forsaken hallway, next to this Celestia forsaken door for ages! We need. To find. The others." Rainbow Dash emphasized each sentence with a hoof stomp, "can we please go now?"

The smile fell from Twilight's face.

"Oh... right," she rubbed the back of her neck, chuckling sheepishly, "sorry, Rainbow, I got kind of... caught up in the moment... again."

"Yeah, sure that's great. So we good to go?" Rainbow asked impatiently.

Twilight nodded, "go ahead, Rainbow Dash."

"Ugh, finally!" Rainbow cried, pulling open the door, "I seriously thought we were gonna be in there forev-"

"STOP RIGHT THERE, FREAKS!"

Rainbow and Twilight froze in the doorway. Eyes wide, they slowly turned in the direction of the voice. Upon opening the door, they found themselves facing a large white cylindrical building several yards away. The building they had exited and the building before them were connected by a wide, open air skyway.

They couldn't see just how high up they were from where they were standing, but that wasn't what the two friends were worried about. What had caught their attention were the dozens of griffons in dark red armor and several security ponies in black and blue barding on the opposite end of the large bridge - effectively blocking the entrance to the annex building.

Each griffon carried either some kind of long stick of metal and wood or a larger tube made completely of metal. Both contraptions were aimed in their direction. Neither Rainbow nor Twilight had ever seen these things, but it was obvious they were a weapon of some sort.

The ponies for their part, carried an assortment of hoof blades, wing blades, and arcane staves capable of highly amplified and very deadly magic.

For a few moments nopony moved. Twilight and Rainbow Dash just stood there gawking at the blatant display of force. After a minute or two, a gray feathered, black furred giant of a griffon stepped out of the gathering and towards the two girls, stopping a few yards away.

He glared at the two with cold ice blue eyes. He remained that way for several seconds before he suddenly turned and spat to the side, much to Twilight's disgust. He turned back to face them, a vicious sneer crossing his beak.

"Disgusting abominations."

Author's Notes:

I feel like this chapter drags a bit, but I also feel it's necessary. The good stuff is coming up in the next chapter so hold on to your butts.