Rainbow Dash felt like she had been struck by lightning. Her limbs ached, her fur had a slight tingling sensation to it as if the current was somehow still sizzling on her body, and her head hurt - really fucking hurt.

The mare tried to rub her head but couldn’t lift her hoof. Upon trying again, she realized that something rough and tight was restraining her appendage from moving more than a couple centimeters off of the-

Wait! Where was she?

Rainbow whipped her head frantically side to side, trying to get a grasp on her surroundings. She was in somepony’s very dirty living room judging by the coffee table in the center and two recliners in the corner. A busted television sat opposite the recliners, its cracked abyss of a screen reflected her own vague shape and colors.

She also spotted a front door that was facing her but shut. A large window that was boarded up with metallic sheets allowed only the smallest cracks of sunlight to shine through the room. Even the smallest light forced her to instinctively raise a wing - which was bound - to her eyes as she winced. The mare also found that she couldn’t turn her head directly behind her as she was bound back-down.

The uneasy feeling like a knot being forcefully tied in her stomach was beginning to turn into a full on panic. The taunt ropes binding her limbs to the couch also didn’t help - in fact, glancing at them only made her start to sweat or was she hyperventilating?

She didn’t know or care. Rainbow just wanted out.

This was all too much. It reminded her of…

No! No! No! Don’t go there! Rainbow mental batted herself as she pushed back memories that had been long since repressed.

But she couldn’t as the images came back to her - in waves at first - almost like cracks in a dam about to burst. More cracks, more holes, more leaks, and she couldn’t stop it.

The words - those nasty words that tore down her ego and confidence. Those scars - both literal and mental which stained her and took ages to bury. Now they were starting to resurface all because of a couple of ropes? No, it wasn’t just that. It was everything. It was all too similar.

Had she ever escaped or was she just now seeing for real?

She might have screamed. Dash didn’t know anymore. Her vision was clouded by vague images playing like some cheesy horror reel that she used to watch, only this time the fear was real. Very much so.

In her panic, Rainbow started to thrash in an attempt to break free from her makeshift prison. The ropes left faint burns and impressions on her hooves but she didn’t care.

She had to get out of there. Now!

Suddenly, the front door burst open and slammed into the wall. What or rather who she was meant with both relieved and terrified her.

Standing in the doorway before her was one pissed off looking pegasus stallion. He had an unkempt, medium length black and dull blue mane with a decently thick beard to match. It almost hid his near permanent scowl on his lips. Almost.

His piercing blue eyes were locked on hers and suddenly Dash could barely breathe. She had seen that look before despite it being on a different pony. It made her think she had beaten up his little sister, killed his dog, and burned his house down all at once. This look let her know she fucked up. Real bad.

“Are you trying to bring every fucking one of those things down on us?!” He asked, his tone demanding and a little bit cautious at the same time.

Rainbow couldn’t respond. She was still recovering from her… episode. Luckily or unluckily, the stallion answered for her.

“Silence is better than ringing the dinner bell, I guess.” He said to no pony in particular before stepping inside and shutting the door behind him.

Rainbow winced as the door - her only foreseeable escape route was just metaphorically slammed in her face. But she had other things to worry about now.

Without the glare of the setting sun in the background, she could make out the stallion in more detail. She had already identified most of his features, not that there was much. His coat was a lighter grey and was set apart by the multiple bruises and scars that were scattered here and there. One of the bruises directly on his jaw and leading onto his chin was fresh as if it had happened no more than a day ago.

Then she saw a strange object on his ear. This object looked like a slab of metal with a glowing purple circle in the middle. That faint glow was also present on the handle of what looked like the most lethal gun she had ever seen. The weapon was about the size of a rifle she had seen at Canterlot once, but with the major difference of it’s wide horizontal barrel that had five ends.

Wait! Five ends that were glowing blue…

Now that she focused, Rainbow also heard the faint crackling of electricity coming from the weapon. She had assumed it was emanating from the earpiece, but no - it was coming from a weapon that almost looked familiar to her.

The stallion seemed to notice her gaze at his weapon and spoke up. “Don’t make me use this again. Waste of a charge.”

Rainbow wanted to do so many things. On one hoof, she had a million questions that deserved answers but on the other hoof, she wanted to just break these restraints, pummel her captor’s face in, and escape out the front door and back into the embrace of her closest friends.

“W-what?” Was all that came out instead of her mentally planned ideas.

The stallion’s indifferent expression changed to one of slight confusion. “You don’t remember? Waking up here earlier?” He asked.

“I don’t even know where here is!” Rainbow replied, finally finding her voice. “I think I would remember some lumbering lunatic tying me up!”

“Lumbering lunatic, huh?” He muttered barely out of her earshot, “That’s a new one.”

“What was that?”

“Nothing. Forget it. Do you at least remember this?” With that question, the stallion pointed a hoof at the recent bruise on his muzzle.

Rainbow’s expression was all he needed for an answer. “Okay, well then what do you remember?”

“Like I’d tell you anything! Now untie me before I beat the snot out of you!”

“Yeah, you already tried that. Can we move on now?” The stallion replied, clearly not believing her empty threats. “I’ve got questions and need them answered - now.”

The way he emphasized the word ‘now’ made her uneasiness return. Rainbow didn’t like to admit it, but she was clearly out of her league here. This stranger was armed to the teeth in both defense and offensive with things she had never even seen before. She decided her best bet was to cooperate until she had an opening and then - he was history.

“Fine. Let's get this over with.” She replied and would have crossed her forelegs in irritation if she could.

“Who are you with?”

“Excuse me?”

“I mean - what group are you with?”

“Group? You mean my friends?”

“I mean the ones you stay and survive with.”

“Survive? You’ve lost your mind, buddy. I don’t stay with anypony. I live alone in my house and-”

“Bullshit.”

Rainbow didn’t look too pleased with his interruption.

“Nopony makes it long alone out here.”

“Here? You are on the same planet as me, right?”

“I’m wondering the same thing about you.” He replied, clearly growing tired of this. “Ya know what - forget the group part. How many of you are there?”

“Six, why?”

“Counting you?”

“Yes,” Rainbow replied, rolling her eyes as dramatically as possible. “Want to untie me now, asshole?”

“That depends. How do I know you won’t find these five others - if that's even the real amount - and wipe us out?”

“What?! Wipe you out? You really are sick in the head! Why would my friends want to kill anypony?

“Nopony wants to… You just have to.” He replied, looking down slightly.

Rainbow knew she had to get out of there. This guy was delusional, armed, and very likely to be dangerous.

“L-look, I swear there are only six of us. We aren’t killers and I promise you will never see me again.” She tried to convince him. “Untie me and I’ll be on my way back to Ponyville in no-”

“Ponyville? That's a two day walk from here. How did you get here without any filters or suit?”

“I don’t know! That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. All I know is that my friends and I found this cave with a weird thing inside. I touched it and woke up here.”

He looked at her like she was the crazy one.

“Okay… we’ll table that for now.” He said while putting a hoof to the ear-piece.

A holographic box appeared in front of him that displayed the time to be 4:57 PM. After checking the clock, the stallion shut off the display and returned to her gaze.

“Another thing - how are you so… clean.”

“Are you kidding me?” Rainbow replied, not entirely understanding the question or rather - creepy flirting in her eyes. “It's not my fault that only one of us knows how to use a brush and a razor.”

“Alright. I’ve heard enough. I’ve got to be somewhere else right now…” He said while looking towards the boarded up window. The stallion then turned towards her and grabbed a knife out of a hip stealth with his ear-piece.

Rainbow’s eyes widened as he levitated it towards her.

“W-wait!” She struggled, seeing the instrument getting closer by the second, so she closed her eyes.

This made it all the more surprising when she felt one of the ropes loosen. Rainbow opened her eyes to see him cutting her binds off with relative ease. When all the ropes were cut, she sat up and rubbed the spots where they used to be.

Out of the corner of her vision, she saw the stallion eyeing her closely with his tethered grip on the weapon tightly.

Paranoid freak! She thought while flexing her wings and stretching slightly.

“Okay, uh - this has been an… experience.” She said, breaking the silence. “I’ll just be going now. “

“Now? You don’t even have a suit or weapon. How do you expect to make it to Ponyville like this?”

“Like this? What the hell is that supposed to mean? I can handle myself against anything the Everfree throws at me.”

“The Everfree is what you’re worried about? That's it?”

“No, smartass - I’m worried about missing my dinner reservations. Now get out of my way!” Rainbow replied as she tried to head for the exit but was blocked by a hoof.

“I can’t let you go out there. Not now. Wait until morning and I’ll lend you a spare suit and some supplies.”

“No offense dude, but I’d rather sleep on the street than spend one more moment with you.”

“Yeah, Likewise. And coming from somepony who has actually done that multiple times, it isn’t fun.”

Rainbow looked him over carefully. He was big, almost Big Macintosh sized. It also didn’t help that he was a pegasus too, meaning he would catch up to her given his strength and probably honed flight muscles. Going through him? Not an option. Outsmarting him?

Maybe…

The mare let out a fake sigh before meeting his gaze. “Okay, fine. I’ll stay. But just this one night!” She added to make her distaste known.

“I’ll go get bedding from the back. Stay here and don’t touch anything!” He replied as he passed her and headed for a hallway.

Before he was out of sight, he turned his head back to her and added “I mean it.”

Rainbow rolled her eyes at being talked to like some disobedient school filly.

The stallion opened a door, entered a room, and closed it behind him.

That was when she fled.

As quietly as possible, Rainbow opened the front door, not even bothering to shut it as she took off into the night sky.

“Ha! Sucker!” She called out while looking back, knowing he couldn’t hear her.

Looking down, she saw that she had been in some sort of lighthouse. A walled off lighthouse.

Of course he had to be one of those survival freaks. She thought before turning away from the fortified building.

First things first. Rainbow thought. Need to get my bearings and find out where I am.

Luckily, she saw a huge city right in front of her. She guessed it was either Manehatten or Los Pegasus, but had to be sure. It shouldn’t be hard. She would just swoop down and ask somepony where she was. Sure, she’d get some weird and annoyed looks but it's not like she’d ever come back here - especially with that creep - ever again.

Rainbow Dash spent the next five minutes flying through the outskirts of the city. She couldn’t really see much in the dark but saw that every single building was dark. No street lights, window lights, or anything. That was when she noticed something else.

There was nopony out. No late night partiers, night shift employees or anything. It was completely sil-

Then she heard it.

She heard the screams...

Storm Surge returned with a small pile of blankets and pillows from Nourish’s spare stash on his back to find the front door wide open.

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.” He groaned before throwing the bedding down, rushing outside and looking around. He couldn’t see her anywhere.

“Fucking perfect!” He yelled, frustrated with himself more than her.

Storm had an idea and acted on it so fast he didn’t even register that he was doing it at first. In no time, Maverick’s number was being called on his Tethertech.

“Sup?” The voice of his bored friend said.

“Did you see her?!” Storm asked frantically.

“Who?” Maverick asked with a yawn.

“Forget it.” Storm irritatedly replied and hung up as Maverick was about to speak.

The stallion doubled timed it as he ran down to the docks, nearly tripping down into the waters below in the process. He practically knocked Ivory over, who was returning from the workshed with the cans and silverware, in his haste.

“Storm, what’s-”

“No time, just don’t wait up for me.” He replied while quickly slipping into his suit and powering it on.

The back compartment slid open and the plates of his helmet assembled around his head, returning the purple segmented vision he had gotten so used to over the years. Pulling his Sweeper off of his back and switching the mode from ‘stun’ to ‘lethal,’ he dodged a confused Ivory again as he sprinted out the door.

While running back up to the yard, Storm called Talos.

“Open the gate!”

“What, why?”

“Just do it!”

And with that he hung up just in time to arrive at the top of the dock’s path. Looking over to his left, he saw that Talos was in the process of pushing the gate open. He made it up to the griffon in record time and stopped only for a moment.

“Give me your sidearm.”

“Hell no, man get you-”

“Talos! I don’t have time for your bullshit right now!”

Storm’s tone seemed to work as his feathered companion handed over a small machine pistol, that the stallion stored on a magnetic holster on the suit’s hip. Continuing his mad dash into the unknown, Storm yelled back one last time.

“Seal the gate!”

He heard the rusty creaks grow fainter and fainter as Talos did as he was commanded, but Storm wasn’t focused on that. He was focused on-

Then he heard it.

He heard the screams...

Rainbow Dash’s heart stopped for a moment. She couldn’t wrap her head around the sounds she was hearing. It sounded like a choir was screaming, growling, moaning, and roaring all at once. The only way to discern anything out of the garbled sounds of terror were the different pitches and frequencies of each scream.

I gotta get out of here! She thought, not wanting to meet whatever made those noises.

With that thought in mind, the rainbow haired pegasus speeds through the city at a low altitude, hoping to find anypony to tell her where she was and what was going on.

Maybe I should have listened to that guy… She thought, before shaking her head. No, no, get it together, Rainbow! He’s just some lunatic and is probably getting to you! You still aren’t thinking straight - remembering ‘it’ does that to you, remember?

No matter the explanation, Rainbow still felt uneasy at the whole situation. She just wanted to find her friends so they could laugh this whole thing off and in a couple weeks, forget it would ever happen.

If only it were that easy.

If only.

Suddenly, Rainbow heard it.

“Is anypony there?” A female voice asked from below her.

Finally! Somepony who can tell me what's going on! Rainbow thought as she started to descend closer to the ground.

But something was off. The voice got more wrong the closer Rainbow moved to the ground. She didn’t hear it clearly until she was almost touching the street below her.

“iS aN-nyponY Th- eRe?” The distorted voice asked again.

The distorted voice sounded like the owner of it was struggling to get the words out as they botched the pitch and stuttered frequently, but it wasn’t the nervous stuttering of a colt or filly during a school presentation. It was like the voice’s owner was trying to figure out how to speak as if they were presumably mute their whole life.

Rainbow spread her wings and prepared to take off just in case as she scanned her surroundings. The area she was in looked to be some sort of meeting of alleyway where multiple buildings - presumably businesses - would store their trash, have ladder access points, and teens would come to smoke. In the alley were four buildings that surrounded her in a square fashion, almost boxing her in.

Rainbow Dash hated being trapped.

But she had no choice. It was this pony or that wackjob in the lighthouse to help her. Besides what did she have to fear? If anypony came out to mug or attack her she could just fly away - right?

Rainbow continued to scan her surroundings, looking from backdoor to backdoor and finding them all shut. Then she found one that was open.

A large opening in the back of the building to her left. It was one of those openings that would be closed with a large metal shutter and was used to back a delivery chariot so a store could restock, but this one was wide open.

She then heard the voice call out again.

“iS aN-nyponY Th- eRe?” The sound seemed to echo from the darkened shutter entrance.

“Yeah, I am.” Rainbow replied. “This is going to sound crazy, but I think I was drugged cuz I woke up somewhere that I’m not even familiar with. Can you tell me where I am?”

Silence.

The scuttling of something sharp rang out from inside of the pitch black entrance. A chittering, more demonic noise that one of Fluttershy’s birds would make resounded from within the building, causing Rainbow to subconsciously take a step back.

Then she saw it.

A filly.

Crawling out of the dark entrance was a brown and yellow pegasus filly that seemed to stumble and trip over itself with every step.

“Uh… kid? You okay?” She asked, weirded out by this newcomer.

“iS aN-nyponY Th- eRe?” The filly ask-

Wait! Her lips weren’t moving! And the sound didn’t come from the filly, but still came from inside the building. It was definitely closer than last time though.

As the filly came into full view, Rainbow’s voice caught in her throat. She couldn’t scream. She couldn’t run. She couldn’t fly. What she saw made her freeze.

From the waist up, the filly was perfectly normal albeit in need of a couple showers, but from the waist down - and where her hindlegs and tail should have been - was a conjumbled mess of flesh-like matter that led further into the darkness.

“iS aN-nyponY Th- eRe?” It repeated again.

Rainbow Dash wasn’t paying attention to the ‘filly’ at this point. She was too focused on the darkness that which the fleshy tube disappeared into.

Suddenly, two blue points of light appeared in the darkness. The lights looked almost like changeling eyes if they were held up to a light source, but these had two major differences. The first was that they were ‘wiggling’ sporadically as if they were a pair of upset foals squirming in a parent’s embrace.

The second was that they were three times her height off of the ground. The pair nearly touched the top of the shutter’s frame.

Then they locked on her. The two blue pinpricks stopped squirming and focused on her solely.

“iS aN-nyponY Th- eRe?”

Rainbow had enough.

She leapt into the air and flapped her wings only to feel a horrible stinging sensation in her right one. Letting out a cry of pair, Dash looked down quickly to see another fleshy appendage - with a spiked tip on the end - hooked inside of her feathered pride.

On instinct, Rainbow flapped harder to escape danger as her kind had always done. They used their Celestia-given gifts of wings to flee - or fight - danger as all pegasi had for centuries. This only amplified the pain tenfold as Dash screamed this time before she was yanked down forcefully.

The mare hit the concrete in a daze with her head making contact first. Her vision was beginning to swim slightly but she could still make out the ‘filly’ approaching her. It then locked eyes with her.

Not the terrifying blue ones, but the filly’s cold and dead ones, and to Dash it was somehow worse than the latter.

Rainbow still didn’t get a chance to see whatever had plunged itself into her wing, which made her both relieved and terrified at the same time. The blue eyes continued to seize her up for a few moments more. Dash refused to move, scream, or even breath during those moments.

Quick as a flash, the ‘filly’ was dragged into the darkness and out of sight. The blue eyes turned away from her and for a moment Rainbow thought that she had convinced the thing she was dead.

If only it were that easy.

If only…

Rainbow felt a sharp tug on her impaled wing and her eyes widened to the size of grapefruits when she realized what it was doing.

It was dragging her away into whatever dark crevice it crawled out of.

“No! Celestia-dammit no!” She screamed while trying to pry the meaty hook from her feathered appendage to no avail. The more she struggled the more the pain amplified, causing fresh tears to be squeezed from her eyes and run down her cheeks. She wasn’t sure if her injuries or the tears were clouding her vision.

Another tug. Another wave of pain. Another scream.

Another inch closer to her demise.

Rainbow had so much she wanted to do in life! She wanted to finally fulfill her dream of joining the Wonderbolts, see the world, find a special somepony - all of which she would never be able to with whatever plans this thing had-

The sound of something whirring nearby broke her presumably last thoughts but she didn’t turn her head away from the dark entrance that she now lay defeated at the foot of. This gave her the perfect view of a volley of tiny projectiles flooding into the darkness.

The thing dragging her away screeched in either pain or anger as it roughly retracted it’s spiked limb from Rainbow Dash and disappeared completely out of sight.

But she heard it.

Screeches, scuttling of sharp talons, and the breaking of glass inside the building were heard, but thankfully the sounds were getting further gradually. Rainbow used her forehooves to backpedal away from the abyss that was the shutter entrance until she bumped into something.

Something living.

She shrieked and spun around to have something firm pressed against her muzzle, clamping it shut.

It was a hoof. A clothed hoof.

“Keep quiet! That thing isn’t alone!” A familiar male voice - modified by a slight metallic filter - commanded in a hushed tone.

Rainbow didn’t argue and instead nodded frantically as she looked up to see a dark blue helmet with a purple visor glaring down at her.

The suited stallion removed his hoof and fixed his gaze at the entrance.

“Are you hurt?” He whispered, switching on the flashlight to his weapon and revealing nothing but a blue and crimson blood trail inside the jewelry store before them.

Rainbow didn’t want to look, but knew she had to. Slowly, she brought her right wing up to her face and almost fainted at the sight.

There was a gaping hole in the middle of it where her primary feathers should have been. Blood leaked out of it and onto her lap.

The stallion took his eyes off of the entrance and took notice of her injuries.

“Here.” He said before reaching into a side compartment on the suit and grabbing some bandages that he wrapped the wing in. “That’ll stop the bleeding but we have to get out of here now!”

Almost as if on cue, more shrieks filled the alley from seemingly all sides. The stallion frantically whipped his weapon from side to side, the flashlight beam scanning over everything. Quick as can be, he reached into his suit and pulled out another ear-piece object.

“Put this on. It’s easier to handle weapons with.” He ordered.

Rainbow did as she was instructed, the device clipped into place easily and started glowing a light blue. After a few seconds of figuring it out, she created a blue appendage and flexed it as a test.

“Can you run?” He asked, handing over the machine pistol taken from Talos to the shaken up mare.

“Y-yeah. I think.” Rainbow replied, getting to her hooves and gripping the weapon.

“Then start running.”

As soon as those words left his mouth, the screams stopped.

Rainbow looked to him for answers but the stallion’s gaze ignored her as he looked to every possible alley entrance. He pressed something on the suit’s chestplate and a compartment with a large hole on it rose from his left shoulder plating.

“Why the fuck aren’t we running?!” She asked, still whispering.

“Cover your eyes when I say, got it?”

“What? We need to be getting out of here!”

“Not gonna happen. Took me a moment but I figured out what attacked you - and it doesn’t let anyone get away. So we kill it or it kills us.”

“And how do we do that?”

“Aim for the eyes. The things inside keep them animated and functional.”

“That makes no sense, but whatever. As long as it dies I don’t care!”

Faintly as a whisper, the two could hear pained breathing. Rainbow whipped her head about while the stallion stood still, rooted to the spot and poised for the kill.

“Shit…” Was all she heard him mutter under his breath before she was grabbed and knocked to the ground on her back.

“Now!” He yelled, and Rainbow put her hooves up to shield her eyes.

Even with her vision defended, she still saw something white and extremely bright being discharged from his suit. Directly above, which was now in front of her, she heard screeches of pain and the scrapping of sharp limbs as something thrashed in pain.

Rainbow then felt something firm, but not too rough get her to her hooves. It might have been him or it might have been herself. She wasn’t sure because her focus wasn’t on that.

Dash’s focus was on the monster before her.

It was huge - three maybe four ponies tall in total - but barely resembled anything she recognized. The head was clearly equine-like even with the torn open muzzle, dried lips, and hungry blue eyes, but that was about where the similarities ended. The creature’s body was a mess of flesh-like tubes, appendages, and sharpened material which resembled bone. She couldn’t count them as it was thrashing like an overturned spider. Rainbow couldn’t even tell where the bone ended and the flesh began in some spots - not that she wanted to look at the struggling thing for much longer.

The stallion on the other hoof wasn’t taking this time to sight see. He charged the thing and jumped at it, pinning it’s head and snapping jaws to the concrete while putting his body - and suit - weight on its writhing body. The creature continued to blindly thrash as the flash hadn’t completely worn off yet. It aimlessly flung its few free limbs and tried to find it’s attacker, who barely dodged each swing. His strength was clear but the creature could overpower him given time.

Something they were running out of.

“You gonna take a fucking picture or help?!” He yelled, sounding slightly out of breath.

Rainbow snapped out of it and rushed around the thing as she didn’t dare to get closer than necessary.

“What are you waiting for?! Take out the eyes! I’ll hold it!” He continued, barley dodging another swipe.

Rainbow raised the pistol and after a few moments of adjusting to aiming with a ‘makeshift horn’ she huffed in frustration.

“I can’t get a good shot. You’re in the way!” She replied.

“Oh for fucks sa-” Was all he got out before the thing batted him off with a tendril.

The suited stallion went flying back into the wall and managed to barely catch himself.

“Get back!” He commanded. “It’ll tear you to shreds without armor!”

The creature found its footing as it began to rise up while using its squirming appendages to balance itself. It rose to full height and looked down at its attacker with hatred and hunger burning in its eyes.

Rainbow swore she saw him return the same - if not a greater - look of hatred towards the beast. The two were sizing each other up and waiting for the opposer to make a move. She still couldn’t get over the size of the thing. It towered over the stallion despite him being a head taller than herself. The creature was clearly trying to use its size to intimidate the two and it was working.

On one of them.

“The opening!” The stallion called to her from the other side of the creature. “Get inside and find the shutter’s control box!”

Rainbow did as she was told and sprinted to the darkened store. After dodging a stray tendril, she made it and was a little weary of the darkness coating the place due to her recent - and ongoing - encounter but was relieved when her ear-piece activated a flashlight beam automatically.

Huh, neat. She thought while frantically looking around the nearby walls.

“I don’t see anything!” She called out.

By this point, the creature had attempted to strike her armored companion but he was able to thrust out of the way before returning fire. Almost as if it had anticipated the attack, the creature used its limbs to make its main body and head nearly impossible to hit. The creature raised two more spiked appendages and was in the process of striking when another white flash filled it’s vision.

The thing started screeching and shrieking as it raised some of its limbs to its face while the remaining ones lashed out in a blind attempt to strike its assailant. The stallion used this time to dash past the creature, barely dodging to prevent his head from getting sliced off by sliding underneath a stray spike. He barged into the store and joined Rainbow in her search for the box.

“Ah ha!” Rainbow exclaimed in triumph. “Found it!”

He practically shoved her out of the way as he tore the box’s door off the hinges. His ear-piece’s flashlight came to life and illuminated the box’s contents revealing components that Rainbow was clueless to their purpose.

“You actually think a door will stop that fucking thing?!” She asked while keeping her gaze fixed on the recovering beast.

“I’m not trying to stop it - I’m trying to kill it, remember?” He replied sarcastically while fiddling with the internals of the box.

The creature was definitely pissed off now as it whipped its head around and locked eyes with Rainbow instantly. If the glare wasn’t enough of a sign, the violently snapping tendrils started to carry the thing towards the duo.

“It’s coming!” She yelled.

The stallion’s pace quickened and in a second, he turned his head from the box while his hooves were still inside of it. The creature had to take a moment to duck down and fit into the entrance and when it did, he connected two wires and the metal shutter from above slammed down faster than Rainbow thought possible as it took the creature to the floor with it.

The creature let out a wheeze of surprise and pain as it was suddenly struck and then pinned to the cold hard floor. Three of it’s tendrils had made it inside, but were sliced off in the downward assault of the shutter. The thing thrashed so violently that Rainbow thought it was going to force the shutter off of it right then and there.

But it didn’t.

Instead, the stallion lined up his slab-barreled weapon with the creature’s eyes - made easier by it’s pinned down head. Without another word, he pulled the trigger and five holes were torn through its face, two of which in each eye socket.

The creature let out a few more pitiful sounds and struggled before it dropped dead. A blue glow started to drain as some strange substance leaked onto the floor and dried out into a dull grey-blue hue.

Rainbow just kept her eyes on the dead thing, not even noticing as the stallion disengaged the shutter override and lifted the metal doors up. He walked over to the corpse and grabbed a tendril in his tethered grip before laying it out straight like a rope without slack.

Then he raised a hoof and stomped down as hard as possible.

In one swift strike, the fleshy appendage was cut clean in two.

Rainbow half expected the thing to get mad and rise up to finish them off before remembering the creature’s recent demise. Instead, the body slightly rocked as the impact from the attack moved it.

The stallion continued to do this to the two dozen limbs, and was getting a considerable amount of blood and bits on his suited hooves, but it didn’t phase him.

“Those eyes are also alive too.” He stated, answering a question she hadn’t verbally asked but was thinking. “If more of them find its corpse and dig in, this thing would just rise up again.”

“Do you do that to all of them?” Rainbow asked, not sure of what else to say besides try to continue the conversation. Anything but thinking about her brush with death.

“No,” He answered after another stomp. “Just the ones that are a pain in the ass.”

“W-what is it?”

“A Mimic.” He replied while holding up the tendril-bound ‘filly.’

“Yeah, I get it.” Rainbow said, trying to look away from the sight.

A moment later and the Mimic was dismembered to the stallion’s satisfaction. Part of her wanted to run right then and there, but Rainbow would rather never see that thing again.

“Let’s get you back and Ivory will look at your wing.” He said, while rubbing his clothed hooves off with a nearby rag.

“Hold on - how are you so calm about all of this?! And how do you know what that is?!” She asked, raising her voice.

“Keep your fucking voice down - unless you want it’s friends to find us too.” He scolded, checking his weapon’s ammo count. “And how do you not know what that is? Does your group never leave your house or something?”

“Well, yeah, but we never saw some abomination out of all Haywood’s horror movies all mashed together!”

“You’ve never seen a Damned before? I find that hard to believe.”

“Damned? You called that thing a Mimic. Which one is it?”

He gave her a look like she just told him putting a gun to his head and pulling the trigger would have zero consequences.

“You’re kidding, right?”

“No - I’m not, genius!” She replied with a mixture of post-stress fear and irritation in her tone.

“Okay, you know what - let’s table this till we get back to the lighthouse. I don’t feel like getting jumped by anything else because you can’t learn how to put a sock in it.”

Rainbow wanted to retort, but he was already leaving the building.

“You coming? I really don’t feel like having to kill another newly turned Damned tomorrow.”

She growled softly and muttered a string of curses under her breath, but still caught up to him.

A couple minutes of what felt like hours to Rainbow later, the two had snuck past shadowy shapes and moans of terrible things she couldn’t help but picture in her mind, and were at the gate of the fenced off lighthouse.

“Talos! We’re back - open the gate!” He called to the other side of the wall.

No response.

“You’re friend fall asleep on the job?” Rainbow asked, chuckling slightly at her own joke.

“No, probably has headphones in again. I’m gonna kick his ass if that's the case.” The stallion replied, with Rainbow only hearing the first sentence as the second one was muttered under his breath.

“Talos!”

Again, nothing.

“Fuck it, I’ll do it myself.” He stated, holstering his weapon on his back and messing with the nearby control box.

Rainbow waited impatiently, fidgeting and tapping a hoof on the ground absently. She was trying to distract herself from whatever nightmare she was in right now, but joking and avoiding the subject wasn’t working quite so well.

Finally, the gate started to creak open, allowing the two to step inside. He sealed the gate shut behind them and the duo continued up to the residential cabin of the lighthouse.

Along the way, Rainbow looked for any signs of this ‘Talos’ or ‘Ivory’ he had mentioned but the place seemed baron. Like they were the only ones in it.

“They probably went to sleep or some shit.” Came her companion’s answer to an unasked, but thought question.

Damn, he is good at that. She thought with a mixture of impressed and a little unnerved feelings about his ability to read others.

The two entered the house and the stallion shut the door behind them. Rainbow’s wing had mostly gone numb by now and that worried her greatly. Her bandage was also practically red rather than the white it had once been.

“Go sit down on the couch. I’ll get more bandages and meet you back here.” He said before heading for the hallway.

What does he want? Rainbow thought. She had been asking herself that a lot recently, but now had to know.

“Wait, why are you doing this?” She finally asked, causing him to halt for a moment.

“You want honest?” He asked, turning to face her.

She nodded.

“I have to make sure you aren’t bullshitting me about this group of yours. If you are stronger than you said - and try to put my group in danger - then I can put a stop to it.”

“You mean shoot me?” She asked, unamused.

His look was enough of an answer.

“Okay, great to know.” She said with a hint of sarcasm.

“Hey, you asked.” Was all he said before turning back and heading into another room.

Rainbow returned to the couch to find that the pieces of rope hadn’t been cleaned up. She couldn’t help but look at the items before roughly shoving them aside and trying to keep tears of repressed memories from her eyes. Then she sat down and had time to look at the room better.

She noticed multiple makeshift cots on the floor with old and stained bedding on top.

Where are his friends? She thought, but before she could think any further, he returned.

The stallion had a couple of medication bottles and more bandages in a pile tethered close to him that he dumped on the coffee table next to her.

“Alright, I’ll wake her up and she will have you patched up in no time.” He said before turning and heading towards the door.

But he didn’t go to the door. Instead he went to one of the empty cots and put his hoof next to the bed’s surface but just above it.

Then he began to shake his hoof back and forth against the air.

Rainbow was confused and was about to say something until he spoke.

“Ivory - wake up. I need help with something.” He said to the empty cot.

Then it dawned on Rainbow.

Once the stallion seemed satisfied that ‘Ivory’ was awake, he stood up and gestured to Rainbow.

“She went outside and got clipped up pretty bad. Can you take a look at her?”

“Uh… Are you okay there?” Rainbow asked.

The stallion turned to his left for a moment before realizing who she was addressing. “Me? Yeah, why?”

“I don’t know how else to say this, buddy - but there is nopony there.”

“What?” He asked and nearly let out something resembling a chuckle. “Are you blind or something? She is right here.”

“No, I mean there is not anything there. You’re seeing things!” She tried again, more serious this time.

“Yeah, can we cut the bulls-” He replied but was cut off once he turned back to his left side.

She assumed he saw for real this time judging by his reaction.

Rainbow didn’t know exactly what he was thinking but his expression wasn’t a good one - that’s for sure. He looked stunned, confused, even a little horrified. To put it simply...

He looked broken.

Author's Notes:

So here it is - the big one. Had a lot of fun writing this chapter and I hope you all had an experience reading it.

For anyone wondering about Rainbow's behavior at the beginning, lets just say that it is justified as her backstory is slightly altered from the show's canon. There will be explanations but I'd rather not throw character development away just to satisfy a few people's curiosity.

Stay tuned!