Author's Notes:

So this is where I really earn those dark tags.

The toll of the bell is deafening and mournful, like the tolling for a funeral procession. I’m almost annoyed that it takes a second to realise that’s exactly the point. The Killer is ringing the bell and the funeral is probably for us.

Subtle.

My feet hit solid earth as the darkness bleeds away from me. The forest and campfire are gone, replaced with the cool air of night and stink of rust and engine oil. All around me are piles of old, beat-up cars; trucks, sedans, even public transport like buses. I can taste the filth in the air, but where the Fields where I landed first tastes like rotten vegetable matter, this place tastes like the slow decay of civilization.

I duck to a low crouch and press my back against one of the more sturdy walls of cars and take stock. I’ve still got that medical kit that apparently came out of my Bloodweb, not well stocked but definitely better than nothing. Being careful not to shift the weight of the stack, I start moving, I can’t be certain how sturdy wall is and I doubt a tower of vehicles suddenly toppling over would go unnoticed by whatever is hunting us. I wish I had asked Tempest, or really any of the girls, about the Killers. Which one hunts where and how they hunt. What they do.

But I was so tired.

No excuses, Shimmer. I just have to be extra careful. If I hear a heartbeat, hide. If I hear a chainsaw, hide. Run up the genny’s, avoid the hooks and the basement. I haven’t gotten many lessons yet but I have a feeling this one's going be rough. I slide around the corner and scan the area. We’ve ended up in some kind of junkyard; where there aren’t stacks of cars there are the remains of wrecked ones; cubes of compacted junk, piles of tires, even a massive set of treads. In the distance I can see the towering silhouette of a crane, still sporting its dull, construction-yellow paint job.

I hear the wind pick up and a dull whoosh, that stirs the crows that are squatting in the trees and around the cars. The bell tolls in the distance.

“What the hell is with that bell?” I mutter to myself as I scoot slowly across the oily dirt of the wrecking yard. “You’d think it wouldn’t want to give its position away either, right?”

I keep my head on a swivel as I move towards one of the towering spires topped with lights that signify a generator. I come around a wall of broken metal and rotting wooden pallets. Sure enough there’s a generator, still and silent meaning that none of my… that none of the others have worked on it yet. I’m not sure if that’s good or bad.

Not wanting to waste any more time I dive in, pulling aside one of the side plates and getting elbow deep into the cold machine and start feeling around for out of place parts. It’s not hard, this thing is a mess and I’m making decent progress. Every so often I have to slow down to make sure I don’t trip a loose connection or displace a grounding wire but overall it’s not hard, just slow. I’m about what I reckon to be a third of the way done when the wind picks up again and then dies.

“What the hell is with the wind in this…” The words die in my throat as the bell tolls thunderously.

From directly behind me.

I shriek as I pull my arms free of the generator and roll to the side just in time to avoid something heavy and stinking of blood swinging down through the space my head had been occupying a second earlier. There’s a dull clang as whatever it is impacts the generator, I turn, swiveling on my heels in a low crouch, ready to spring away as I face…

Nothing?

No, not ‘nothing’... the Killer appears slowly, languorously, and my mouth hangs open as it bleeds into existence. There’s a slight distortion in the air at first and then it resolves into something horrifying. The thing is standing on thin, almost birdlike legs and wrapped in a filthy black shroud and stained bandages. Its face is like petrified wood with two deep-set and baleful eyes, pinpricks of cold white light that are fixed squarely on me. The thing is so horrifying I almost miss what’s in its hand.

“Is that a fucking spine?!” I shriek as I scrabble to my feet.

Whatever, not my circus not my monkeys, Sunset Shimmer out. I take off running as it hefts the weapon, a spinal cord layered onto what looks like a short-hafted, triple-bladed scythe topped with a skull. The organic bits are definitely the real deal too.

I vault over a compacted cube of car parts as the Killer picks up the pursuit. I can hear the heartbeat thudding away thunderously in my ears, telling me in no uncertain terms that it is on my ass. I rip past a leaning wooden pallet and kick it loose, earning a satisfying impact and a roar of frustration as I light off into one of the junk pile mazes. Vaulting a shorter pile of junk to get onto the other side of the wall, catching my foot on some of the loose scraps and cause a racket.

“Shit,” I hiss as I take off again. "It definitely heard that."

The heartbeat isn’t as loud but it’s still there, vacillating between tolerable and deafening. It knows where I am and it knows I’m running from it. It’s trying to keep pace which means I have to keep running. My only solace is knowing that, so long as it’s chasing me, Tempest and the others are free to do their work.

A sudden clap of machine noise rings out and a spill of light from the distance tells me I’m right. A genny is already up and running. Good girls. That weird wind picks up again, rushing past my ears followed by the dolorous tolling of a bell. Time to test a theory. I reach another low rise of junk and vault over it, more slowly and carefully this time and drop to a crouch. I move as quietly as possible, slinking around the walls and through the twisting partitions of ruined chassis’, radiators, and engine blocks until I reach a tall storage cabinet. Taking a risk, I peek inside. Mostly empty, good. I glance around, knowing it’s probably futile but doing it out of habit anyway, before slipping into the closet and pulling the door closed tight. It’s a risk, sure. A huge one. If that thing catches me in here then I’ve got nowhere to run, but if I don’t shake it now then I’ll get caught for sure.

The heartbeat is gone, but there wasn’t a one while that monster was properly crawling up my rear end either. Whatever that thing is I figure that so long as it’s invisible not even the heartbeat will tell me it’s close by. Cheater. So I wait, a few minutes pass and I figure if it hasn’t checked here by now it probably lost my track. I can… wait…

I narrow my eyes at the ground not far from me. I swear I saw something there… There! The grass wavers one patch at a time and there’s a faint distortion as it does so, I smirk from my hidden vantage point.

“Not bad,” I whisper as I watch the slight haze shift around in a searching pattern. “Total aural and visual concealment… near perfect bending of light. If it stands still it would be totally undetectable.”

But it’s definitely not incorporeal… not matter what it looks like. It had to come out of its concealment to strike me. No other explanation for it. That thing is a hunter, no way it would doff it’s invisibility unless it had to. So… not incorporeal but not visible, but it can’t strike me, at least not with enough force to matter.

It’s out of phase. It phases partially out of this dimension and into another. The wind is it peeling back into this reality or vice versa. It’s why photons bend around it. It’s probably much lighter and faster in that state too. It’s literally not quite real until the moment before it kills you.

Except for the bell. The Bell must be how it goes in and out. Somehow it allows it to transfer between realities. If I can hear the tolling when it’s visible and invisible equally… then that bell must have a presence in both phases of reality. It was a tool of Artifact-grade power easily. That kind of thing should be sealed in the Vault at Canterlot, not in the hands of a murderous specter.

Another clap of machine noise distorts the air and lights go on not too far from my position. Immediately, the distortion and little shifting trail of grass moves away at speed. Fair enough, I suppose. It can’t just hang around forever while the others are running around getting shit done. I slip out of the cabinet the moment I think it's safe and start to move around the edge of junk towards a distant tower of unlit lamps. I don’t get far before I hear a scream.

“Starlight,” I mutter quietly, her voice sounds different from when she was taking Billy’s attention. It must’ve found her. I didn’t hear the bell though which means she spotted its phased-out movement. She is good.

Still, something’s wrong. Why didn’t it come back into phase? I stand up uneasily and scan the area. I see movement not far from me, heading towards my position. Getting a sick feeling in my stomach, I swivel my around and look towards the junk maze. “Shit, a hook. It’s herding her.”

I turn a corner and press myself against the wall, close my eyes, and sharpen my ears. Seeing won’t do shit for me against this thing, but it still makes a little noise when it disturbs the grass. The wind is my major hint though. It reenters coherent enough to land a strike before I can fully see it. Star screams again. She doesn’t need to at this point but she’s probably egging it on now. She knows she can’t shake it.

So now what?

I clench my teeth, knowing what’s about to happen. The bell tolls. The wind blows, and there’s a sharp, wicked crunch as the Killer buries its scythe in Star, she screams again, this time it’s real and filled with pain. She’s not down though. It was a glancing blow. Her footsteps have changed now. Starlight is staggering. It’s taking it’s time, enjoying the hunt. A moment later I hear another heavy crunch and the sound of a body hitting the floor. They’re close, and if it’s anything like last time… I peek around the corner and sure enough, I see it bending over and hefting Starlight onto its shoulder. I pull back around the corner and cover my mouth, trying to keep my breathing under control as it approaches the hook.

I could go. Easily. Hide out and hunker down, wait for it to lope off towards another side of the area in search of others then make a run for the nearest generator. Starlight Glimmer doesn’t trust me and after what happened at the campfire I have no doubt that she would leave me to rot on the hook.

That decides it. She would abandon me to die with almost a hundred percent certainty. At least she’s straight with me though, not like the Rainbooms. She never pretended to be anything but what she was and the moment she suspected me she got in my face. I can respect that.

Shunk. I flinch as I hear the meaty sound of Starlight being hung from the butchers hook, quickly eclipsed by her teary scream of pain.

The bell tolls and the wind blows and I hear him drift away in the opposite direction. If I’m gonna go I need to go now. He has his back to me. C’mon Shimmer, beat feet. Go… go, go, go, go.

“Fuck,” I hiss under my breath as I turn, breaking cover and sprinting for the hook. I see Starlight Glimmer struggling on the hook, her eyes go wide as I get under her feet and lift hard, levering her off of the impaling spike. She claps a hand over her mouth to muffle the shriek of pain but nothing helps the creaking groan of the rusty hook.

She hits the ground hard but I can’t afford to give her any breathing room. It’s even odds as to whether or not that thing will come back after us or go harass whichever one of our little group has been running up generators and I don’t want to be here to find out. I grab Starlight’s hand and pull her down one of the aisles, and around the corner. I can’t trust the heartbeat because of the thing’s invisibility but at least we’ll have a second or two of warning if I keep listening for the wind. Staying at a dead sprint, we manage to get far from the hook and make it to the wall of a dilapidated shack, unfortunately, there's another damn hook posted against one of its corners. I’m really starting to hate how those things are friggin everywhere.

I cough and drag in a few laboured gulps of air, catching my breath as the two of us slump against the wall, ever-wary and listening for the tell-tale tolling of that creature’s bell. “C’mere,” I say, pulling out my med kit, “let me see those cuts.”

Starlight backs away from me like I just threatened her with a knife. “Not a chance, after what happened at the campsite you think I’d trust you?” she hisses. “Why would you even help me at all?”

I open my mouth to answer but… what do I say? It’s what we’re supposed to do? That sounds hollow, we’re really just supposed to survive. And I don’t owe her anything. Why did I risk my life, or whatever it is I have here, to save hers? Even she doesn’t think I should have. For Princess Twilight? For the girls back home? Why did I help her? By all rights, I should abandon her. After all, that’s what everyone did… to me.

I close my eyes and let out a breath, realising I was overthinking things. In the end, I want to be a better person right? It’s all I want.

“I don’t know, Star,” I answer with a wan smile. “Not… not that I don’t know why I would help you. I just… how do you explain to someone that you’re supposed to want to help other people? How can I explain that I just want to help you?”

“Because nobody just wants to help me!” Starlight practically chokes as she stops herself from screaming and giving away our position. “And you’re just like everyone else,” she nearly growls at me, “except worse, because you’re trying to trick us. You’re working for that thing. You’re just a Killer in a cute skin. I will never, ever,-

I hear only two quick strides from behind us before Aria is at my side and swinging a hard slap across Starlight’s face. Looking like a deer in the headlights, Starlight shakes her head, trying to work out what hit her.

“So, here you girls are,” Aria says quietly before turning to me, “I was trying to find you, Shimmer. No one deserves to run around the Wrecking Yard with the Wraith and not have the lowdown.”

I nod, a little stunned at Aria’s reaction. “I, uh, I think I pretty much worked out what he does. Rings a bell, goes invisible, hunts you. Doesn’t make that heartbeat sound while it’s phased out. That about it?”

The ex-Siren smirks at me. “Yeah, pretty much. I always knew you were sharp, Shimmer,” Aria says before turning to Starlight and bringing a finger straight up to her face. “And you… listen and listen close, I know Sunset,” her voice is low and even. “So if you want to draw a line in the sand then you’ll find me next to her, capisce? I like you Star, I do, but I would trust Sunset with my life.”

Starlight opens and closes her mouth for a moment before finding her voice. “But… why? Even after the Trials… and fighting together… why?”

Aria glances at me, and gives me a small but genuine smile before turning back to Starlight, Aria just shakes her head. “Because I saw Sunset stand with her friends as they fell to my sisters and I; standing in front of them to protect them and singing her heart out to throw us down. Anyone who can call up that kind of fire is someone I’d follow anywhere.”

“Girls, I get it, and Starlight doesn’t have to trust me right away,” I say, holding up my hands as I get between Aria and Starlight. “But I’m pretty sure there’s a better place to air this out than in the middle of a wrecking yard that’s being haunted by at least one murderghost, which is approximately infinity percent more murderghost than I’m comfortable with.”

They both scowl at each but Aria nods, thankfully. “You’re right, we’ll deal with this at the campfire. C’mon, let’s get to work, the Wraith is fast but only while it’s patrolling so we have to divide and conquer, move your asses ladies.”

Under Aria’s sharp direction we all get going. Starlight still refuses to look me square in the eyes or work with me but I guess that’s a step up from a shanking, so I’m already in a better position than the first homeless shelter I stayed in. Starlight scans the distance and I see her eyes fix on an unlit tower. Without another word she lights off in that direction, sticking to the edges of the walls and keeping low to let the fog cover her movement as much as possible.

I stick with Aria, and we turn in the other direction. Divide and conquer. That thing might move fast but so long as we kept working on generators it couldn’t do more than chase us. I follow the former Siren’s lead, keeping low and weaving around the little mazes of ruined vehicles.

“Never go through them unless you’re being chased,” Aria whispers back towards me as we go around. “They’ll slow you down and if the Wraith catches you inside it’ll be harder to weave around its swings.”

I nod. “Are we meeting up with Tempest and Sour?”

Aria gives me a strange look and then buries her face in her palm. “Right, I guess that never got covered. There’s only ever four of us at a time in a Trial, meaning someone always gets left behind, I just left Sour so…”

I feel a cold weight in my stomach. That means Tempest isn’t here with us, she said she’d find me but… I grit my teeth in annoyance. The Entity wasn’t going to let her. I must have pissed it off by breaking it’s little ‘bloodweb’ rules. Well good. Let’s see how many more rules I can break.

“Last time it was Tempest, Starlight, Spruce, and myself,” Aria continues at a whisper. “This time it’s Tempest who was left behind; bet she’s probably having kittens over you right now, I’ve never seen her get so worked up over a new arrival.”

I’m suddenly glad of the thicker mist and dim lighting. “R-really? Why.”

Aria just shoots to me with a smug grin as we weave around another jungle of twisted engine blocks and stop near a quietly thudding generator that was labouring just to fire two cylinders. “Goddess only knows, Shimmer,” she answers in a voice drenched in sarcasm. “Let’s get to work.”

Aria is good, maybe better than Tempest. Her hands move with fluid surety, clicking each piece into place. Crossing wires where they needed to be cross. Setting each pipe in place. I probably learn more about how the generators go together just watching her for a minute than I did the whole time I was trying to get that spiteful piece of pig iron in Canterlot Station to work.

After a couple minutes of slow work, I speak up. “So where’d you learn to repair stuff like that?”

“Before we got taken I did all the grunt work,” Aria replies quietly without looking up. “Electric, plumbing, wiring, auto-repair, whatever; I like working with my hands.” She wrenched a bit into place and we both winch at the grinding noise as another pair of cylinders fire up and we wait a moment, both us listening in around us. There’s no wind or bell, though, so we continue. “Anyway, ‘Dagi always did the talking; haggling and stuff. I’m awful at that. Sona managed our money and did the cooking. We were a good team.”

“Really? Sonata handled your money?” I couldn’t keep the incredulous look off my face. Aria just gave nod and a small smile.

“Heh, yeah, she doesn’t seem the type,” Aria chuckles, but I get the sense of something… sad behind it. “Crazy math whiz though, seriously. ‘Dagi and I weren’t bad but Sona was the reason we always had money.”

I try to figure out how to broach my next question gracefully. After a few seconds of dithering I decide that since it’s Aria, the direct approach is best. “So… you said ‘we were taken’, what… what happened to-”

Aria wrenches a cylinder into place, there’s a sudden pop and the generator roars to life. Aria looks up at me with grim, haunted eyes. “I don’t want to talk about that, Shimmer. It’ll come up eventually, I guarantee it, but until then… don’t ask, savvy?”

“Y-yeah, savvy,” I reply, put slightly off-kilter by her sudden change in mood and tone.

We take off towards the edge of the region, only moving quickly between cover and keeping low to the ground. A few moments later two more gens go active almost simultaneously, and Aria grins.

“That’ll confuse him,” she mutters. “The Wraith is dangerous if you don’t know what you’re doing but if you keep running up generators and breaking shit, it distracts him. He gets frustrated easily so if we time our intervals out right we can all get away from-”

The wind blows and the bell tolls from directly behind us. Dammit! We both take off as the Wraith resolves into existence, but as it reenters this reality the air around it seems to blur. One moment we’ve got a good couple of meters on it then suddenly it’s nearly on top of us.

Fast! Too goddamn fast! I leap to the side and drive my shoulder into Aria, pushing her away as the Wraith’s scythe comes down. I can’t keep my scream in as the cruel, cold blade bites savagely into my arm. The adrenaline sends me bolting away from both the Wraith and Aria who looks confused and shaken, but she’s still running in the same direction we had both been going. For a terrifying second it looks like the Wraith is going to pursue her, but then it seems to fixate on my blood dripping onto the ground and takes off towards me. It takes Aria a good couple of seconds to notice the change in the heartbeat but she turns back I see the horror on her face when she realises what I’ve done.

Sorry Aria, but you’re more useful than me.

I sprint away, gripping the deep cut in my arm. It’s basically useless, sagging loose and bloody from my shoulder. I can barely think straight with the searing pain coming from my side. That thing hits like a truck and it's all I can do to just keep moving. I duck and weave and bob, vaulting low edges without a care for what I knock over or how much noise I’m making. It knows where I am, so subtlety is out the window at this point anyway.

In the distance, I hear the last generator go live and the thundering, electric growl of the doors going active. Good, now they all need to get going. At least I know Starlight won’t have an issue with leaving me behind. If I can just keep moving I might make it to one of the exits. Just. Keep. Moving.

My only warning that I’m not moving fast enough is the stain of red, brutal light that spills over me before the Wraith buries his scythe between my shoulder blades. My mouth opens as I’m driven to the ground but I can’t scream. My lungs are burning and my whole body is shaking. Those blades definitely punctured something… necessary. I have a strong feeling that if it weren’t for the fucked up rules of this place I’d almost certainly be dead by now.

I have the vague sensation of being lifted up from the ground and hefted onto the Wraith’s shoulder. I wiggle feebly, desperately trying to defy it. To try and free myself. In my stupor, though, I’d managed to run almost directly next to a hook. The monster turns unerringly to one of the little junk mazes and enters, stepping past several cabinets and stopping in front of one their sacrificial poles.

I can’t help it, I start crying. I know exactly what’s about to happen.

With one arm, the demonic Wraith lifts me up and slams me down on the hook. A raw scream rips its way out of my throat as the hook punctures through my shoulder and hangs me from the meat of my chest. I try to bring up to grip the hook, to try and pull myself off of it, even though I know it’s pointless. The Wraith is standing there, it’s almost featureless face bobbing up and down as if examining its handiwork.

I can’t give up though, I have to keep struggling, right? That’s what Tempest said. Keep trying to stay alive. I get a solid grip on the blood-slick hook and start to lift, groaning at the searing shots of pain firing through my arm. I barely manage a couple inches before the Wraith dives in like lightning. I feel a cold pressure on my gut and my gorge rises. My arm is shaking as it tries to keep the pressure off. I look down and nearly throw up.

Blood is spilling down my pants and there’s a brutal gouge in my gut. I catch of glimpse of glistening, ropy… Oh no…

I swallow down the growing desire to vomit. Don’t think about it, don’t think about it, don’t think about it, don’t think about it, don’t think about it, oh fuck.

The Wraith lifts its scythe and drags a thumb along the slick, stained blade, flicking off a smear of red blood. It lets out a raspy, grating noise that makes it shake in place a little. It takes me a second before I realise it’s laughing at me. I try to pull myself up again. Gotta stay alive… gotta… stay-

OH SHIT.

The black, spidery legs of the Entity erupt from the back of the hook. I barely manage the let go of the hook in time to stop the large, central claw from spearing me, gripping it in my hand. But the jarring does something else. I feel something… fall out of me. I feel light, empty, cold, and sick.

Don’t think about it. Don’t think about it.

I can’t stop it. I can’t get myself off of this hook. I can’t… I can’t…

I see a flash of purple and black. Aria. She came back for me. No… no no no no no. The Wraith is still here. She’s gotta know that. I flash back to Spruce. It just like it was with Billy, except there aren’t any generators to turn on to distract the Killer. The door is already open. The only thing that makes sense is for it to treat me like bait. To draw in my… my friends. To draw in someone who wants to save me. To give them a reason not to go through the Exit.

The Wraith lopes away, the grating, growling noise of its sadistic laughter following it. But it’s a trick. Aria has to know it’s a trick.

I open my mouth to tell her to go, to leave me, but all that comes out is a dry crackle. I can’t stop her, I can’t warn her as she peeks around the corner and up towards me. I see her go pale and grimace at what she sees. I look down at her, silently pleading for her to leave. It’s too late, the Wraith has nothing but time to hunt us until we’re all gone.

Stop, Aria. Stop. Please. Just… go.

Except she won’t. I saw the look on her face when I mentioned her sisters. I don’t need to ask to get the gist of what must have happened. She won’t leave me. I can’t help but smile at that. All of my friends up and abandoned me on practically no evidence, but the siren that I beat and stripped of her magic is raring to risk her life for me. With enemies like this, who needs friends?

Sorry Aria, but I won’t let you die on a hook trying to save a gutted fish.

Before she has a chance to move I let go of the claw. Aria’s eyes go wide and she starts to cry out to me, but thankfully her good sense keeps that in her throat. I see tears in her eyes. Then I feel the spike drive through my torso as the sound of thunder fills the air around me. It doesn’t even hurt, really. It feels like I’m being pinned to the wall. I guess all the pain is just… white noise now.

Oh look, I’m being picked up. I’m being lifted up and… and…

Goddess… it’s so dark. It’s so cold. And empty.

Tempest? Aria? Sour? Starlight? Where is everybody? Rainbow Dash? I’m sorry… I didn’t mean to make you mad. I promise. I’m not her. I’m not Anon-A-Miss. Please believe me. Applejack? Pinkie? Fluttershy? Rarity? ...Twilight?

Anybody?