“No no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no…no!” Rainbow backs away from Twilight. “I am not Slayerizing any more. I moved from Cloudsdale to get away from vamponies, not so I could slay more!”

Twilight taps the desk impatiently with her hoof.

“You’re the Slayer, the one with the powers to kill the vamponies.”

Rainbow rolls her eyes. This is all déjà vu to her, but not the good kind of déjà vu. The kind of déjà vu she had hoped would never happen again. Rainbow rears up on her hind hooves and folds her front hooves across her chest.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Supernatural strength, speed and a predisposition to attracting four-legged fangies. That’s not news to me. I’ve heard it all and done it all before in Cloudsdale. Not anymore.”

“You can’t run away from your destiny, Rainbow,” Twilight reminds her.

Rainbow’s last Watcher had told her the exact same thing when she decided to leave Cloudsdale. She knew full well that she could’ve transferred to a different school in Cloudsdale, but she wanted it to be over: the vampony slaying, the lying to her parents, and the constant life threatening situations. Rainbow shakes her head.

“Don’t say the “D” word. I do not like the “D” word. The “D” word tends to bring me nothing but trouble,” Rainbow adds. “The “D” word is not my friend.”

“Well, whether you like it or not, from now on the “D” word is your life.” Twilight walks around the desk towards Rainbow Dash.

Rainbow notices Twilight’s cutie mark: a darkish pink six-point star surrounded by a few other smaller white stars. She points at it.

“I’d expect your cutie mark to have something to do with books. You are a librarian after all,” Rainbow observes.

Twilight shakes her head.

“It’s the cutie mark of a Watcher,” Twilight explains.

“I don’t get it. What do stars have to do with being a Watcher?” Rainbow wonders.

Twilight hesitates, deciding whether or not to tell Rainbow the story behind the Watcher cutie mark.

“I’m not sure your ready for that story quite yet,” She decides. “Anyways, you’re a Slayer whether you like it or not. It’s your duty to keep the forces of evil at bay.”

Rainbow stamps her hoof on the ground in defiance.

“I don’t want to be a Slayer. I just want to be a normal pony, with a normal life and normal friends and normal un-vampony slayey nights!” Rainbow declares.

Twilight muses for a moment, almost as if thinking of a joke.

“It’s funny. For a pony so intent on not slaying, you chose an unfortunate place to run to.”

Rainbow is confused by this sentiment.

“What do you mean?” Rainbow asks.

Twilight paces back and forth, smirking slightly.

“Do you know what a Hellfoal is?” She questions.

Rainbow shakes her head.

“No, but I have a feeling you’re going to tell me.”

“A Hellfoal,” Twilight begins, “is a place of magic, dark magic to be precise. A Hellfoal is a place where masses of dark magic come together to form a breeding ground for evil. It's a beacon of evil that attracts monsters and demons of all sorts. Would you like to know where the nearest Hellfoal is, Rainbow?”

Rainbow has a terrible feeling about where this conversation is going, but she speaks anyway.

“Where?”

Twilight points her hoof at a ground-level bookcase underneath the platform where the two parts of the spiral steps meet. The bookcase is only a few feet away from the small round table.

“Right there.”

Twilight lets the thought sink in for a moment before she continues.

“However, at the moment it is a dormant Hellfoal, but I fear, if we do not act soon, it could become much less dormant.”

Rainbow is silent for a moment. An annoyed look suddenly flashes across her face.

“Well isn’t that just my luck.”

“Not luck, Rainbow,” Twilight corrects. “Destiny.”

The “D” word again. Great.

“Forever my prison,” The LordPony muses. He trots over to the edge of his prison and places his hoof on the invisible wall that is keeping him trapped in the candle-lit cave, “Not for much longer.”

He turns to a blue vampony.

“Tell me Wild Scotch, what does three days from now mean to you?” the LordPony continues.

Wild Scotch is put in the spotlight. He hesitates, not wanting to answer wrong and face the wrath of his new master.

“I-I-don’t know, my Lord Pony,” Wild Scotch admits.

The LordPony grins at the vampony’s ignorance. The LordPony turns towards the strange symbol on the wall.

“Three days from now is the Autumnal Equinox,” The LordPony begins. “Not a very significant meteorological event? Doesn’t give off too much mystical power, right?”

Wild Scotch nods in agreement, despite knowing nothing of such matters.

“What if you combined it with a total lunar eclipse and the arrival of a Slayer?” The LordPony goes on, “How much mystical energy do you think those three events combined would give off?”

Wild Scotch hesitates, fumbling around in his brain for a safe answer.

“A lot.” He answers timidly.

The LordPony laughs.

“An apt, if somewhat blunt description,” The LordPony says. “It will create enough mystical energy to destroy my prison, with the right spell, obviously. That’s where you all come in.”

He turns to the rest of the vamponies, who are staring at him expectantly.

“On that night, the night of the lunar eclipse, I will need you all to participate in gathering resources.”