I stood to my feet and slowly paced my way into the room, just to make sure there were no hidden surprises. I peeked my head around the corner and gave the room a quick scan. I couldn't find any other ponies; so I entered the room, and made my way over to my clothes.

Once I finally clothed myself; I took a quick stretch. It felt good to have clothes once again, and a hell of a lot warmer. "Oh yeah, that's the stuff." I said to myself.

I gave the room another scan for the rest of my gear. "And of course, they had put it in another room..." I figured that if these two were smart; then they would have had to put them inside a safe, or something.

As I exited the room, down the hall I could hear things smashing against distant stone walls. I knelt down concealing myself, and continued to listen in.

"Where the hell did he go?!" Screamed the older mare.

"I like how you ask me; like I'd know." Voiced Moon Shadow.

I could hear an audible frustrated grunt. "It was a rhetorical question! One that doesn't need answering!"

"If it didn't need answering; then why did you ask it then?"

I could hear the sound of the older mares palm slap against her forehead in agitation,"Sister, I am going to say this one last time. Stop. Being. A. Smart-ass. That's not your job."

I couldn't help but laugh silently to myself; just the way the younger sister kept pestering her older sister was hysterical. I figured it was about time I got out of there; so I made my way through the halls of this empty, cobwebbed abandoned castle.

I was just about to lose hope of ever finding my armor and weapons, until I finally came across the only locked door left inside the constantly expanding halls of the ruin. "Now, if only I had that table..." I figured that I could try to bust the door off it's hinges, if I tried to boot it down; but it was completely made of steel and stone. If my idea was going to work, then I'd either need a hell of a lot of force; or a new peg-legged foot. I continued to plan the impossible doors demise when it hit me,"Let's wing it."

The hallway was slender; so I placed my hands against the wall to use it as leverage, and lifted my right foot off the ground to build stability placing it on the door. After placing both hands and feet on opposite walls and a great feat of force, and strength; the door burst open with a loud crash as it slammed the wall. The noise was sure to call my captors, so I quickly began searching through the once locked room.

After a moment of rummaging around inside the dimly lit room, I finally found the device that housed my armor. "I'd better hurry; they could be here at any moment." I reached down to the sketchy safe box built into the flooring, and took hold of it. "...Come on..." I pulled with the rest of my strength, but to no avail. It stayed closed tightly; then a thought popped into my mind.

'If I can cast a spell without my bracer, then maybe...' I placed my right hand over top the safe and focused. Slowly; my hand started to glow, and I could hear the sound of metal shifting. After a moment of concentrating, I heard the sound of a click. The safe slowly cracked open, and I reached in; pulling out my armor. "Thank you, Twilight. I never would have known this spell, if had I always kept my house key handy."

I strapped my pauldron on, and could hear the sound of hoofsteps coming closer down the hall. My eyes shot open as I realized that I needed to hurry faster. I quickly strapped on the rest of my armor on, and turned to face the door. I readied my right hand with a charged inferno spell; and I took a calming breath as my wings came sliding back out of my back. There was no pain, no blood, just feathers and bone.

I focused hard on the spell, and just as the spell finished charging; the figure of the mint green earth pony burst around the corner of the door. "There you are!" The elder sister cried out but I blasted her with the spell unfocused, and it launched her backwards through the window. She fell a great distance as her smoldering remains crashed to the ground. I didn't want to kill her; there was no need, and I made a mistake.

"Sister!" Screamed the younger pony. The very same one from the Everfree; Moon Shadow. She cried out for her sister in agony panting, and each scream swelled and festered inside my head.

As the cries echoed throughout the halls; I felt every emotion inside my body fade. I couldn't feel anything, but sympathy...for the newly grieving filly. I made my way over to the sobbing filly slowly, and knelt down. "I'm greatly sorry, I didn't want to...I...I just..." I lowered my head; in shame. It wasn't a part of my job. I'm supposed to protect; not this. Then something happened to me. The aching headaches; began to happen again.

The filly saw that I was in pain as she backed away from me,"Why? Why would you...oh goddess..." She watched me as I fell to the floor grabbing a hold of my head with both my hands, to comfort myself away from the pain.

"Please, stay back..." I said through grunts of pain angerly. Pounding nerves and strikes of pain pierced my back; then began to overcome my entire torso. I could feel the sensations of pain strength overtake my mind, and I could only let out tears.

"Darkmoon, is that...blood?" The filly exclaimed slowly. I tried to look down to the floor boards, and all I could see through blurred vision; that what I thought were tears, were actually tears of blood. Each teardrop staining the ground.

I tried wiping my eyes free from this curse. I cried out,"No, not now...Not now!"

(Version 1.3(2023))
Misspelling errors, timeline corrections, story clarifying. Etc.
I hope you enjoyed my company, and do enjoy entertain others. Keep them walrus's sexy.
Keep it cool, xXCondemnedSoulXx.