//------------------------------//
// Chapter 68: Red Mist 
// Story: Daring Do and the Hand of Doom 
// by Unwhole Hole 
//------------------------------//

The dial flashed, and Daring Do once again felt the world fall away from her. The familiar sickness that came with it arose within her, but she had not eaten in days and managed to keep whatever was left down. Still, she could feel a sensation that had become tragically familiar: as she reemerged into Equestria, she suddenly felt the weight of years. Every bone she had broken in her life, every dislocated joint, every strained tendon that had to be fixed by surgery or elixir, all of it came back to her at once. Her body, like her brain, remembered her many adventures, but thought of them less fondly. 
Rainbow Dash was beside her, and she immediately began to collapse without a pulse. Flock immediately slapped the dial onto her chest, and Rainbow Dash inhaled sharply and painfully. 
“BUCK ME FOR APPLES!” she swore, borrowing a particularly vulgar expression from a particular friend. She looked around. “Where am I?”
The question did not really require a response, as it was already apparent. The gallium coolant pools had hardened into silver, crystalline surfaces, and the air had grown desperately cold in response, but it was still the same place that had once housed the Hand of Doom. Now, though, the whole of it seemed to have gone profoundly and eerily silent. The ancient walls no longer seemed to resonate with magic, but rather with a dead sense of quiet relief. No machines hummed beyond; they had all stopped with their power source removed.
New systems had been constructed, though. Flock had been busy. Parts that he needed had been salvaged from what the Questlords had left behind, as well as the ancient Exmoori artifacts. Yet precious little seemed to have been built. 
“What did you do?” asked Daring Do, catching up to the wizard. 
“I eliminated things that are dangerous,” he responded, curly.
“Meaning you took them back to hide them,” called Rainbow Dash.	
“I did NOT request your presence here!” he spat.
“Where I go, she goes,” replied Daring Do. “At least until this is over.”
Rainbow Dash squealed softly. Flock just glowered. “Why?” he asked, sarcastically. “Don’t you trust me?” 
“No. Not at all.”
“Well that is going to make this all very challenging, then, isn’t it?” Flock looked to Daring Do’s side. “Did you do as I requested?”
Daring Do nodded and held up an article obscured beneath her thick coat. Flock sneered when he saw that it was a whip, albeit one of exquisite quality made of an unusual inky-black leather. 
“Of all the weapons for you to choose.”	
“You know what a sword does to a pony. No. For me, just a whip.”
“‘Just a whip’. Do you have any idea what that even is?”
“I have a pretty good idea.”  
“A whip braided from the living sinews of Moloch.”
“Completely unbreakable. Completely immune to magic.”
“Didn’t know you were into that sort of thing, Flock,” joked Rainbow Dash from the rear.
“I believe you would be quite appalled if not outright traumatized by what I’m ‘in to’. That said, no. I kept that whip because it is still alive. And I do not particularly think that Moloch would appreciate his sinews being used in a toy, especially if he is allowed to regenerate.”
“I’ll keep it in mind,” said Daring Do, putting the whip back- -carefully. “What about you?”
“What about me?” 
“The dial. You couldn’t teleport here before.”
“Yes. Because somepony shut down the security interlocks, letting the Questlords in and the Hand of Doom out in the process. This whole facility is collapsing. First magically, then structurally. And…”
Daring Do raised an eyebrow. “And what?”
“And it’s been working more efficiently than normal. Vastly more efficiency. Several orders of magnitude.”
“Yeah,” said Rainbow Dash, poking the thing in her chest. “Harvestor rebuilt it. I forgot to mention that.”
Flock turned sharply. “Who in the name of Satin is ‘Harvestor’?” 
“Hey!” called a female voice, interrupting them. Daring Do looked down one of the hallways to see Argiopé waving to them. She was still comparatively weak, and her form had not fully stabilized. Instead of existing as a black changeling, she had apparently decided that she liked white, and her current form more closely resembled a unicorn/changeling hybrid than either a complete illusion or a complete lack of one. She was dressed heavily in real coats, specifically several that she had apparently borrowed from the zebra. 
Daring Do approached her, but carefully. Once again, it was a matter of distrust. That, and the fact that it was quite apparent just from the look of sour but oddly civilized contempt on her face that the changeling hated Daring Do deeply. Whether it was just pure jealousy, Daring Do did not know, nor did it matter. She did not intend to work with Argiopé or Caballeron for a minute longer than she had to. 
“You’re late,” she said.
“I’m a wizard,” growled Flock. “And a wizard is never- -”
“I had time to knit myself a new set of lacy undergarments using my own silk. Don’t tell me what I know about time or I will ram my tiny changeling horn in a place that tends to make the vast majority of stallions scream quite loud.”
“Loudly,” corrected Flock. 
Argiopé’s jaw tightened, and her horn ignited with green light. Daring Do stepped between them. “This isn’t the time for flirting.”
“I’m not flirting,” snapped Flock.
“If my mouth is opened and not stuffed with some stallion’s love, I am,” snapped Argiopé. “I take professional pride in that fact. But if you touch me, I will bite your leg off.” 
“Fine,” said Daring Do. “You two can dismember later. Can we get going? It’s really cold here.”
“I’ve noticed,” snapped Argiopé, although she did acquiesce. She turned quickly- -being sure to flick her tail into Daring Do’s face- -and started leading them deeper into the hallway.
Rainbow Dash followed, but turned to Flock. “Was it just me, or did that sound really, really dirty?”
“I’m already nauseous thinking about it,” growled Flock. “Have you ever seen four hundred crows vomit in unison?”
“No. But…I kind of want to now…”
“No you don’t. So don’t even imply what you’re trying to imply. Changelings are almost as grotesque as Pegasi, although at least they have proper chitin.” 
“Besides. A proper mare should be taller than a stallion. That’s only natural.” 
Argiopé turned around and stuck her exceedingly long, forked tongue out at him- -all while reducing her height by at least four inches. 
“Hey,” said Daring Do, looking back. “Wasn’t Clover the Clever taller than you?”
Flock nearly squawked, and feathers immedicably became visible protruding from his coat. He then proceeded to unleash a horrible tirade of swear words cursing Clover the Clever and her entire bloodline- -forward and back- -in his unintelligible native language. 
“See? That shut him up,” said Daring Do to Argiopé.
“Ha.” Argiopé smiled slightly. “I usually have to stick something in their mouths to make them do that.” 

Argiopé led them down the hallway to an offshoot room. It was one of the few places left in the facility that was still lit, although not by any part of the facility itself. Rather, Daring Do recognized the glow of a crystal. Not the ordinary source used for light, though, that generated crisp if cold white light, but one that produced a slowly pulsing orange-red flame. The kind that was meant to substitute for a campfire.
They entered the room, and Caballeron looked up at them. The glow of the reddish crystal cast long shadows and made him look far more threatening than Daring Do supposed he actually was. Although bundled in coats, he seemed cold and annoyed. 
“You’re late,” he snapped.
“We just had a conversation about it,” said Daring Do. “It was nice.” 
Flock entered the room, and Caballeron’s expression only grew more sour. 
“Is it here?” asked Flock.
Caballeron nodded and pointed to the farthest, darkest corner of the room. Atop an ancient stone altar sat a case. It was aluminum, and fashionable in a cold, clinical sense- -but Daring Do know all-too-well that it was lined with thick layers of enchanted lead. She knew, because it was heavy- -and because it had not been disturbed since she had placed it there hours earlier.
“You didn’t try to steal it?” asked Caballeron.
Caballeron turned to her looking aghast. “Of course not. Unlike you, I am actually a sensible, reasonable pony- -and one who recognizes artifacts that are not safe to handle.”
“Like in the Pit of Eight Wings?”
“That was TWENTY years ago! Celestia’s divine flank, will you not let me live that down? I learned my lesson! And I know that THAT- -” he pointed at the case “- -is something that ought NEVER be toyed with.”
“I don’t see why we couldn’t do this in your fancy castle,” whined Argiopé. “It was at least warm there even if your sense of décor is worse than my mother’s.” 
“I would have, but I don’t want it there,” said Flock, approaching the case with unusual caution. “Not around that many artifacts. Depending on how this goes, it could become an unmitigated disaster.”
“So you brought it here?”
“This place is at least designed to handle magical…phenomena. And my inventory could have very negative repercussions in the wrong hooves.” 
Daring Do looked at him, trying to decide what he was feeling. He was difficult to read, but the expression on his face was uncharacteristically distant. That meant he was either terribly afraid or extremely apprehensive for a different but unidentifiable reason. 
Flock unclipped the clasps at the back of the case and flipped it open. He inhaled sharply when he saw it. Beneath all the shielding, wrapped in delicate, perfectly cut foam, was a red mask- -the Masque of Red Death. 
“I never thought I would see this again,” he said. “Not until I saw it in her collection. I thought it had been lost, or even been destroyed…but here she is.” 
“She?” 
Flock turned to face the ponies. The red light of the crystal pulsated ominously in his sickly eyes. “Do you know what this is, Daring Do? Not just its name. What it is. Where it came from.” 
Daring Do stared back at him, not sure why he was asking, and even less sure that the look on his face was fear. “It’s the mask that Scarlet Mist wore. She was one of the Dark Thirteen. Just like you.”
Argiopé gasped, and hugged closely to Caballeron. Caballeron grew pale. Daring Do supposed he may have been suspicious, but had probably not even stopped to consider which dark wizard he might have been working with- -considering such a thing, after all, would not result in increased pay. 
“That is a profound oversimplification,” said Flock, suddenly seeming almost insulted. He turned back to the mask, and it seemed to stare up at him questioningly- -or accusingly. “Scarlet Mist is not a pony. She is a concept.”
“And in case we don’t understand what that means?” said Rainbow Dash. She gestured toward Caballeron. “For, you know…”
Flock turned sharply, but his expression had grown soft. “It was before I was born. At that time, there was a sorceress of immense, almost immeasurable power. What you would call a pureblood, one of the last. She was a gray wizard.” 
“Meaning?” asked Rainbow Dash.
“Meaning neither good nor evil,” explained Daring Do. “Not white, like somepony like Starswirl or Clover the Clever…but not dark, like Flock or Sombra.”
Flock recoiled at the sound of his nemesis’s name, but seemed to be greatly appeased by having his name equated with that of his master. “She was unique. Perfect, elegant, and beautiful beyond compare. A pony neither ruled by petty morality nor the demons of hate and greed. One capable of absolute and true freedom.” He slowly looked back at the mask. “And then she destroyed all that.”
“How?” asked Argiopé, sensing that this might be a familiar type of story.
“She was a fool. A profound fool. She did not want to be gray and balanced, but was tempted by the light. She wanted to be pure and good, to sacrifice what made her perfection possible. So she created this.” He gestured toward the mask. “Using a powerful spell, she bound all the negative parts of her- -hate, anger, jealousy, greed- -into a mask. She left light and pure, and threw this part of herself away. Left it to rot.”
“But it didn’t rot,” said Daring Do. She shivered and felt goosebumps rise on her neck. “It’s still here.”	
“Because you cannot sever part of yourself so easily. A fragment of the soul is still a fragment of the soul, even if torn free of the body. The Masque did not remain a simple vessel. It began to think. To hate. To resent the pony who had robbed her of a body.” He looked at Daring Do, and at Caballeron, Argiopé and Rainbow Dash. “The Masque is not what Scarlet Mist wore. The Masque of Red Death is Scarlet Mist.”   
Caballeron and Argiopé moved back suddenly. They could already sense the evil radiating from the Masque, the strange dark sensation that rose from it the same way that heat rose from the crystal in the center of the room. It was disturbing to look at. Daring Do had sensed this as well, and even Rainbow Dash had some instinctive loathing of the artifact. 
“Touching that mask is fatal,” said Caballeron. “None have ever survived it. It drives them mad.”	
“Only because she has given up. Her body persisted into my lifetime. It was ruined by pointless self-sacrifice- -and then disappeared entirely. She spent centuries searching, but she’s given up. Madness is not the effect of the Masque, it is her will. She does not want to be awakened unless she can be given back her true body.”
“Then why do we even have it?” asked Argiopé. 
“Because I plan to reawaken her.” 
The ponies- -even Daring Do- -stared at him as if he were insane.
“You fool,” said Caballeron, standing suddenly. “You’ve already doomed us with the Hand, and now you want to resurrect one of the foulest sorceresses ever to walk this land?”
“I’m not a soldier,” snapped Flock, stepping toward Caballeron. “Right now, what do we have? An unmutated vedmak girl, two half-blind clones, a zebra who won’t even lift his spear unless I pay him, one earth-pony that can barely walk and one who is barely smart enough to punch things, a changeling, an elderly Pegasus, a girl with no working organs, and YOU. If we are going to take on an ancient order of ultra-knights, I need more power.”
“There are better ways to do that!”
“With what? How would I get them? How long would it take? To raise an army, maybe? I don’t need an army if I have HER!” 
“But we cannot awaken her anyway,” noted Argiopé. “The point is moot. You said it yourself. She refuses anything that is not her real body. Unless you have it.”
A sadistic smile crossed Flocks’ face. “If only, if only. But no. Nor do I intend to seek it out.”
“I’m going to try to wear it,” said Daring Do. She felt herself shaking, realizing that there was no going back. 
“You can’t!” cried both Caballeron and Daring Do at the same time.
“I have to,” said Daring Do. “Flock and I already discussed it. It’s the only way.”
“I also lied,” said Flock. “She would reject you, even if she were desperate. You are too old and too weak. Although at this point she would simply strip your mind away. As pointless as your existence is, I believe that would be a waste.”
Daring Do hissed under her breath. Suddenly everything seemed to make sense, and she saw where this was going. If she had only known, she would never have retrieved the mask for him. She would never have allowed this to happen. “Then what are you trying to do?”
“I intend to trick it.”
“Wait,” said Rainbow Dash. “We’re trying to trick a mask? A…mask? Are you being serious?”
“Deadly serious.”
“How?” asked Caballeron.
“Scarlet Mist’s desire to reunite with her original body is more powerful than any mortal being can comprehend. We only need the wearer of the Masque to LOOK like her, and it should be enough for her to connect.”
“Look?” asked Rainbow Dash. “How are we supposed to- -OH!” She turned toward Argiopé. “You’re a changeling!”
“Last time I had the doktor check, yes,” said Argiopé. She looked at Flock, meeting his eyes. She looked afraid. “But the point is still moot. I can only replicate ponies I have seen, and this pony existed long before I was even an egg.” 
“That’s not entirely true,” said Flock. “You can also draw inspiration from a pony’s mind.”
“I can replicate what they love,” corrected Argiopé. “Yes. I can do that.”
“Then use my mind. Look into it, and you will see her.”
Argiopé gasped, but regained her composure. “You’re not a pony.”
“But I was. Once. Long ago.” 
Argiopé continued to scrutinize him, and then sighed. “Alright, then. Let’s see.”
She tilted her head back and took a deep breath. For a moment, she stood still. Then her body flashed with green light. The metamorphosis only took a fraction of a second, and when it was over, a different pony stood before all those present. 
Caballeron gasped and Rainbow Dash stared in awe. The pony before them was a perfect replica of the purebloods who had once sired the earliest of unicorns. She stood almost twice as high as any of them, with a pale lavender, nearly hairless coat that faded to white on her narrow hooves. Her horn was enormous and sharply curved, and she had long, pointed ears. Behind her horn sat a long green mane that seemed to flow outward like a delicate cloud of mist; her tail matched it perfectly. 
She stared at Flock with a pair of blue eyes. They were not the ones that she normally wore, but a set that represented deep and endless kindness and sensitivity- -something that Argiopé seemingly could at least mock, even if the expression in those eyes could never be sincere. 
“This emotion,” she said. “Desire. Fear. Hatred, sadness, but tinged with respect and infatuation…and disgust for her, and for yourself.” She winced. “Wizard, these are not healthy emotions. This love is wrong and failed.” 
“Only because she chose to give all she was away to others…or to throw the best parts of herself away.” Flock turned back to the mask and tapped near it with his hoof. A translucent spell appeared over it, assembling like a machine. It drew out the Masque and held it up. Through the reflections on the stone walls, the eyes seemed to glitter with blood-red light. 
“What would I need to do?” asked Argiopé. 
“Simple. You would only need to put it on. Scarlet Mist will do the rest.”
“No,” said Daring Do, stepping between the mask and Argiopé. “You can’t do that. Not like that.”
“But, Daring Do,” said Rainbow Dash. “We need her.”
“Tell her the price, Flock. Tell her what the Masque actually does.”
Rage floated through Flock’s eyes. Rage that somepony other than him knew. Daring Do, to her disgust, realized that he intended to resurrect his ally without ever having mentioned the cost that others paid for her immortality. 
Yet he obeyed. He turned to Argiopé, staring at her almost as though she were the pony he had once loved. “Scarlet Mist is a parasitic lifeform. She does not have a physical body. As such, she possesses the body of whoever she is in contact with. Usually female. Usually an especially talented unicorn. If she has a choice.” 
“And then what?” asked Caballeron. He was beginning to sense what Daring Do already knew, and the horror in it ran much deeper in him than it did in her. 
“What do you mean ‘and then what’?”
“How does she remove it?”
Flock froze. He paused for a long moment, appearing to think of a way to lie. Instead, though, he told the truth. 
“It can’t be. The only pony ever to do so was princess Penumbra Heartbreak, and in one thousand years I have still not deciphered how, exactly. Scarlet Mist supersedes the pony she is attached to.”
“And what happens to that pony?” demanded Caballeron. “What happens to her?”
“Scarlet Mist drains her life force until the host invariably collapses into dust. Apart from Sombra’s daughter, no pony has ever survived wearing the Masque of Red Death.” 
Caballeron stared at him, dumbfounded by Flock’s self-assurance and forthrightness. Then he regained some- -but not all- -of his composure. “Well, then, our response is simple. She will not be wearing it. Under ANY circumstances.”
“But she is the only one who can,” protested Flock. “No other pony will be able to become Scarlet Mist except a changeling. And we only have the one.”
“The one. My point exactly. Not ‘a changeling’, wizard. Argiopé. My changeling. A changeling who is very…” He looked up at Argiopé in her unicorn form and faltered. “…important to my work. An invaluable member of my team.”
“We will not be able to win fighting the Questlords. Even know, we’re wasting time. The vandrare is nearing manifestation. And if it does, there are presently no mages in this world who can hope to fight it.”
“We have Princess Twilight,” noted Daring Do. “We can summon her. She’d be glad to help”
“Or Starlight!” added Rainbow Dash. “She’s even more powerful than Twilight!” She paused. “But don’t tell Twilight I said that!” 
“They are not willing to do what would be necessary. If it comes down to a clone with a knife and the least-alicorn with her horn alone, which do you think will walk away?” 
“You’re asking too much!” screamed Caballeron. “Of all the artifacts! Of all the things we could do! You already have the Spear! You already have that cursed book! And now you want Argiopé to- -to- -”
Argiopé put her hoof on Caballeron’s shoulder. He looked up at her, and she shook her head. 
“But…but Argiopé.”
“You can’t shapeshift,” she said. “Only I can. I’m the only one who can do it.”
Caballeron took her hoof between his. “But you don’t have to!”
“Yes. I do.”
“But- -”
“Because if we lose, we lose everything. My queen, my thousands of siblings and cousins…my friends in your organization. And you. I would lose you. As romantic as it would be to meet my end wrapped in your hooves, I cannot allow that.”
“Argiopé, you’re not thinking clearly- -”
“Either we both meet our end, or you survive. I think the choice is obvious.” 
She pushed him aside and held out her hoof. “You. Give me the mask.”
Flock smiled.
“No!” cried Caballeron, leaping forward. “I won’t let you! YOU CAN’T!”
A translucent yellow barrier appeared in front of him, and he slammed against it. His eyes widened in shock, and he began to pound on it, but to no avail. “Daring Do! Daring Do!” he cried. “Stop her! You have to stop her!”
Daring Do looked at her, and then at him. “It’s her choice.”
Caballeron’s expression of terror turned into one of rage. “Hypocrite! YOU HYPOCRITE!”
Argiopé sighed, and Flock moved the Masque of Read Death in front of her, turning it around so that she could see the inside. Argiopé grimaced, realizing that it was not smooth but filled with thousands of rigid hair-like structures. Structures that very closely resembled long, thin needles. 
“Will it hurt?”
“I don’t know,” said Flock. “If it does, you won’t be the one feeling it. You won’t feel anything at all.”
“So my end isn’t when I turn to dust, is it? It’s when I put the mask on.”
“I suppose that is one way to phrase it, yes. You will cease to be you. Only Scarlet Mist will remain.” 
Argiopé looked over her shoulder at Caballeron. A tear dripped from her eye. “So be it.”
“No! NO!” screamed Caballeron. “If you do, you’re fired! FIRED!”
She turned and pressed her face into the Masque. 
At first, for just the briefest of moments, there was no response. It was the last point in time where Argiopé existed, and that time seemed to stretch out for eternity, both for Argiopé, who held her breath, waiting for the end and wondering if the tingling on her face meant that the needles were growing- -and for Flock, who wondered if he had failed. 
Then Argiopé leapt backward, instantly regretting her choice. She had not understood, but as the Masque of Red Death awakened, she did, all at once. There was no time to think logically about the life she had thrown away, as the pain quickly drove away any possibility of thought of any kind. 
Argiopé screamed. Caballeron leapt back, surprised by the sound, and Rainbow Dash jumped, covering her ears. Daring Do closed her eyes, not wanting to watch- -yet Flock watched the process unfold, captivated and smiling. 
It had not been a scream that should have every been heard from a pony, or any sentient form of life. It was too wracked by horror, too high and in too many frequencies. It sounded like an entire legion was screaming from within Argiopé, rising high and being distorted through her changeling vocal organs until it was unrecognizable as any sound apart from one of sheer agony.
She suddenly leaned forward, almost bucking behind her as she did so. The motion had been sudden and forced, as if a great hoof had shoved her head back down. Red, inflamed marks were visible leading from the Masque and down Argiopé’s neck. They were a product of the infection as it quickly spread through her body. 
Then the infection seemed to burst open. Red poured out from her body, her flesh shifting and morphing at the will of something that was not her own. Clothing formed: numerous layers of red leather streamed out from her body, wrapping and forming themselves into a complex arrangement of clothing that was not unlike something Argiopé might have chosen for herself. Straps formed, and were buckled by numerous clasps that had the appearance of being made from faded gold. A cloak spawned around her, or perhaps some kind of robe made in a design that was forgotten long ago. It seemed to float in the air, and it was clear that it was not cloth but a substance summoned and created by magic alone. 
The scream had stopped- -but the relief was only momentarily.  A new scream arose. This one was different; deeper. It was the voice of a mare, and even without looking Daring Do felt her breathing stop at the sound of it. There was no pain in that voice. There was no capacity for pain. Only an unending desire to inflict it. 
“NO!” she boomed, staring down at herself, her eyes barely visible through the slits of the mask. “No no NO NO! This is NOT my body!”  Her attention immediately snapped toward Daring Do. Daring Do was forced to look up, and she saw the pony looming over her. Tall, thin, but no longer beautiful. Any beauty she had possessed was covered in blood-red crimson, and her face was distorted by the hideous mask. Even the eyes beneath it seemed red. Her horn, which in Argiopé’s possession had been long and curved, had partially reverted to that of a changeling. Daring Do supposed her body was, underneath all that fabric, already beginning to shift, ceasing to look like her former self, or even a pony at all. 
“You did this!” she hissed.
“Why are you blaming me?!” Daring Do almost jumped back, surprised that she had been able to summon words at all. 
“You deceived me. You all deceived me!” She lifted her head and stared upward. “So now you will all die.” 
Her body seemed to shift, and the air suddenly became cloudy, the whole room filling up with a red fog. Daring Do held her breath and jumped back, grabbing Rainbow Dash in the process, but it was already too late. She was engulfed with the rest of them.