Speed was her nature, and this would be the determining factor for her whether she would fail or succeed. However, it was no test for herself or any challenge, this was to save a filly’s life. A filly she had grown to love yet had failed during her most desperate of times. Rainbow Dash swore she was flying at a speed where a double Sonic-Rainboom could be seen, but not fast enough for her. Worse was her friend Fluttershy, who was not an experienced flier like her cyan friend.
“Come on, Fluttershy! You can’t slack off now!” she yelled to her friend, who was flapping her wings rather slowly as sweat was seeping through her pores.
Fluttershy wiped the sweat off as she panted for air, “I know Rainbow, it’s just-”
“Just nothing! Those ponies are gonna hurt Scootaloo even more if we don’t hurry it up! You want them to hurt Scootaloo any more!?”
Something inside Fluttershy snapped, as her eyes became blank before showing outrage beyond any measure. She bit her lips as she started to growl, releasing a scream, “Those. Big. Dumb. Meanies!” she flew past Rainbow, who was stunned to see her friend fly as fast as she could on a tournament day. She shook her head as she watched her friend set a course for Canterlot and decided to do a Sonic-Rainboom to catch up with her buttercream friend.
Waiting was by far the most agonizing torture known to ponykind when somepony’s life was in danger. So it was for Twilight and the others, as they waited for their carriage to arrive from Canterlot. They waited at the building’s entrance, not daring to venture off into the forest for fear of their lives. As Twilight sat on her haunches, Spike was sitting next to his mother as he was fiddling with his claws in silence. She looked at him and became worried for her son.
“What’s wrong, Spike?”
Spike jerked his head up as he heard his mother’s voice vibrating through the air. He looked up and saw her eyes filled with concern, knowing that lying would not make the situation any better. “Well, I’m just worried for what they’re gonna do to Scootaloo,” he told her, though she knew that this was only part of his worries as he looked away from his mother’s gaze.
Twilight draped a leg over his neck and brought him in closer. “That’s not all, is it?” she asked him as he let out a sigh of defeat.
“What was he doing with my scales and why was he comparing your magic, Mom? I know you are a powerful unicorn, but what was it that he meant by ‘genetic material’? I dunno what he wanted with me or you, but whatever he's doing now, it scares me... it’s like I’m a part of this somehow and-”
Twilight decided to nuzzle him as she saw the tears forming in Spike’s eyes.
“No matter what it is, we’ll stop them,” she assured him. “I won’t let them get to you.”
“...I guess you want me to go back home when the guards get here, huh?”
Twilight sadly shook her head. “That’s not such a good idea. Those ponies tried to get you. If I left you alone, they might be able to catch you. You’ll come to Canterlot, and you’ll stay in the castle. In. the. Castle. Understand?”
Spike smiled at his mother’s warning. “Yeah,” he answered. He remained silent for a moment before he spoke. “What did you think Red meant when he called me ‘the doll’?”
Twilight shrugged. “Maybe he was just talking about all the other eggs that had dolls in them.”
“...I don’t like this,” he moaned, clutching his stomach.
Twilight kissed his forehead. “It’ll be over soon, Spike, I promise.”
Scootaloo awoke with a heavy metal collar around her neck. She was back in a cage, chained up again. A seal was on her horn, and an additional shackle was around her sides, pinning her wings down.
“You’re more trouble than you’re worth, brat,” Black snarled. “And consider yourself lucky I wasn’t the one who caught you, because if I was...”
“Enough,” Bloodwing said, nearing to the cage. “Well, Subject 10, you caused me quite a bit of trouble. I didn’t expect you to need this so quickly. Hold her down.”
Black obeyed, holding the filly down. The collar came off. She didn’t cry, she had no more tears left. The needle pierced her neck.
Instantly, she screamed again, nearly deafening the two ponies working on her. This felt worse than the treatment, worse than anything she had ever felt. It was like her insides were being ripped apart and rearranged. All she could feel or think about was pain! She begged for it to stop, though her pleas went unheeded.
How long it lasted, she didn’t know, but when it did, it just... stopped. That was it. It was over.
“That should eliminate any further problems. Now, time for your next treatment.”
“No,” she moaned, but didn’t do much else. Struggle was pointless, escape impossible. She just whimpered as the needle came closer. She could feel the steel needle pierce through her skin and felt the pain of her usual treatment. She hardly said a word, even through the pain.
By the time she had regained her bearings, the collar had been placed back around her neck. Black brought up a bowl with gruel and dropped it on the floor, kicking it toward her. “Eat,” he said bluntly.
Scootaloo backed away.
“Listen, you little bitch, you’re lucky you’re getting food at all. Now eat!”
“...I’d rather starve,” she said weakly.
Black growled as he looked up to Bloodwing, who handed him an apparatus that he took hold of. Blue held Scootaloo down while her partner pinched her nose. After a few seconds, she couldn’t hold her breath any longer and gasped for air. This allowed Black to shove the device in her, with Blue bolting it from behind her skull.
Scootaloo’s eyes widened in horror as she realized what was going to happen. She started thrashing against her chains as best as she could, but Yellow joined Blue in holding her still. Yellow forced her head upwards, with her eyes facing the roof. Black then stood over her and poured all of the gruel into the opening. Blue pinched her muzzle to force her swallow the food.
She wished desperately she could cry right then, she wished she still had tears to shed. It was such a violation, how it was forced into her, how disgusting the taste was, how she no longer had any control over anything. She felt water being forced in next, her hydration, not as disgusting but equally as horrible to experience.
“Hey! Will you cut it out!”
Scootaloo eyes darted to where the voice was coming from and saw a mildly disgusted Red looking at Black with hostile eyes. “She’s just a kid!” he told him as he marched forward and shoved Blue and Yellow off of her. He then did something she thought she never would have guessed anypony here would do, he took the apparatus from her mouth. She coughed as she took her first uninterrupted breaths of air. This did not rid her of the foul taste she had experienced, and she splattered her tongue for further results. Red did something else that surprised her, Black, and Bloodwing; he took a tissue and wiped the residue of gruel from her face.
“What the buck are you up to, Red?!” Black yelled out to Red as he stomped forward, with Scootaloo’s eyes displaying fear. Red however matched his anger with a menacing glare that petrified Black, if only for a little.
“This filly is the trump card to the project, and traumatizing her further will just make things more complicated,” he told Black. He spread his wings which started to sizzle, but stopped when he felt a hoof on his shoulder.
“That’s enough, Red! You are out of line here! It’s true, we must not harm our dear Subject,” Bloodwing told Red as he lifted his hoof from his shoulder and looked at Scootaloo with lustful eyes, before giving Red a piercing stare. ”But your actions are treading between madness and treason. You do not want to step out of line again, do you? We don’t want ‘him’ to be harmed in anyway now, do we?” he asked him rhetorically, with Red shuffling in his place and nodding only once. “Good, now both of you, back to your stations!” he ordered the two ponies to leave. Black was the first to leave, growling at Scootaloo before exiting the room.
Red walked past Scootaloo and turned to her as he looked at her with sorrow in his eyes, mouthing: “I’m sorry.”
Rainbow Dash was angry beyond belief.
After following it all the way to Canterlot, Twilight’s tracking spell had bounced off a wall in an alleyway and had simply disappeared.
“What was that!?” the cyan mare threw up her forelegs in rage. “We came all the way here only to have it lead us to a wall!”
“Um, Rainbow Dash...”
“I mean, we flew for nearly an hour, and we’re no closer to finding her!”
“Um, excuse me...”
“I mean, I thought Twi knew what she was doi...”
“Rainbow Dash!”
The pegasus jumped and looked at her friend, a bit surprised. “Uh, what?”
“Oh, sorry,” Fluttershy said, back to her usual self. “It’s just that, um, there was a secret entrance back at the lab. There might be one here.”
Rainbow Dash blinked. “Uh... right. I knew that,” she said sheepishly, rubbing the back of her head. “Well, let’s look for an opening.”
“Shouldn’t we wait for the others?”
Rainbow sighed as she closed her eyes and opened them to reveal her eyes becoming moist, “The longer we wait, Fluttershy, the more Scootaloo is gonna get hurt,” she explained to her, before turning to the wall and tapping it for any button that may open it.
Fluttershy was shocked to see her friend so emotionally distraught. Even with Equestria being on the line, she had never seen Rainbow Dash shed any tears. She wondered when she last saw Rainbow Dash cry? For as long as they were friends, she had never seen her shed tears of this magnitude before. Not when she was bullied by the other pegasi at the academy, not when she was kicked out of the academy, not when she had her spirit broken on multiple occasions, not even when she broke her limbs in accidents... she never cried. Fluttershy’s worried expression turned to one of pure determination, as she walked up to the wall and started investigating it with her lifelong friend.
After what seemed like a half an hour, Fluttershy noticed a glowing lamp attached the wall and wondered. She reached her hoof up and pulled on the lamp, revealing it to be lever of some sorts. Just as before at the lab, the wall started emitting sounds of mechanics working and gears turning before finally opening up to the two mares. When the dust settled in, Dash turned to Fluttershy and hugged her with all gratitude she could muster.
“You’re the best, Shy!” she said to her shy friend as she let go of her, failing to notice the blush forming on Fluttershy’s face.
Fluttershy quickly turned to face the wall, “Um, it’s not a problem...” she whispered to her cyan friend, before slowly trotting to the entrance of the opening. “I just hope we’re not too late.”, she said to Dash, who walked up beside her.
Dash stomped her chest and ruffled her feathers, “All I know is, we gonna get her back...” she said to her friend, before her tone became threatening. “And if we see those four ponies or even Bloodwing, they’ll wish they were never born!” she said with a murderous tone before walking off into the unknown.
Fluttershy was now slightly disturbed and frightened by her friend’s behaviour. Even with her assertion training thanks to Iron Will, she could not muster anything as frightening as what her friend just pulled off. The Stare could be even in terms of the fright it gave off, but the aftereffect of despair in the victims mind she could and would never pull off. She turned around to see the sun setting and looked around the area they were in, spotting a piece of paper and a ruined pencil in a garbage can. She took them both and drew a giant arrow and plastered it to the side of the lamp, should the opening close after she went in.
“Fluttershy! Hurry it up!”
Fluttershy jumped and yelled out an ‘eep’ before rushing into the darkness, with the opening closing and leaving no trace of entry, save for an arrow next to the lamp. An arrow that would hopefully be seen by their friends...
By the time Shining Armor arrived with his platoon, everypony was getting antsy. Relief swept through Twilight as she nuzzled the captain of the guards.
“I didn’t know you were coming, Shining,” she said happily.
“Uncle Shiny!” Spike cheered, hugging his leg.
“Hey, kiddo,” he smiled, rubbing his nephew’s head. “And of course I came down! I’m not letting my little sister go after some nutjob alone.”
“So, I take it you read up on Bloodwing?”
He nodded. “I remembered seeing him a few times when I was in basic training. He creeped me out. And after you went to live in the castle... he cornered me one day. He seemed friendly enough at first, but he started asking about your schedule, all about how powerful you were and... if I had access to Spike.”
Twilight shivered. “Let’s get going to Canterlot, I’m sensing Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy there. I need to tell you something.”
The ride was a quick one, but long enough for Twilight to explain what she saw in the lab. Shining Armor looked disturbed. “The way he talked about you... he was obsessed with you. I can’t imagine what he’s doing to that filly.”
“Then we better hurry. I’m still sensing the two in town.”
“Why the hay would Bloodwing have a lab right in the capital city?” Applejack asked. “It’s so near the Princess.”
“Who knows? Maybe he figured hiding in plain sight would work, maybe there’s some resource he needs,” Shining Armor shrugged. Then he sighed. “First the Changelings slipped by me, now this. My record is not looking too good.”
“Well, I just hope Rainbow Dash hasn’t done anything impulsive,” Rarity sighed.
There was a beat.
“...We better speed up,” Twilight said.
Scootaloo’s vision was blurry and her breathing had become hoarse from all the screaming she could muster. Now she was lying on a hay bed with her hooves bound together by shackles and her newly formed horn had a metallic seal on it. She could not generate any more tears, as much as she wanted to express how hopeless the situation was for her. She thought time would fly faster if she tried to close her eyes to sleep, but that was also not an option as the cell’s door opened and closed with Red standing before her with a popsicle in one hoof and a water bottle in the other. He hovered towards her, and helped her upright from her awkward sleeping position.
“Here you go, kid,” he whispered to her as he opened the water bottle and placed it gently to her mouth, which she hesitantly accepted. Feeling the ice-cold liquid enter her mouth and traveling down her throat, she bit on the bottle’s top and jerked her head upwards with the bottle still latched in her mouth. She gulped as many times as she could, but water overflowed from her mouth when the bottle emptied. When she was done, she released the bottle from her mouth as it fell to the ground with a thud and she sighed in relief. Scootaloo looked back at Red, who was smiling at her. Though the peculiar thing was that his smile was sincere, and had no sense of malice. Red took the popsicle and unwrapped it, revealing it to be pure white.
“Eat it, before it melts.” he instructed her, which she did as she leaned in and took a lick of it. It was sweet like any ice cream was, but the aftertaste had a salty flavour to it. It was delicious. Scootaloo took a bite of it, with her teeth freezing from the sudden frost, but she didn’t care... she needed something sweet after that gruel experience. After she was done, Red took another tissue and wiped what had remained from the ice cream from Scootaloo’s mouth.
“Why?” she asked him as he removed the tissue from her face. “I don’t get it... tell me, why are you doing this?” she asked Red, who just sighed as his ears drooped slightly.
Red looked up to meet Scootaloo’s eyes, “Just because I do this job, doesn’t mean I like it. Besides, you been through enough for one day,” he said dismissively as he stood up and turned to face the door.
“That’s not all there is, is it?”
Red just stood there before turning back to Scootaloo, frowning slightly at the filly’s insight. “That easy to read, huh?” he asked her coyly.
“What does Bloodwing have on you?” she asked him as he looked down on the floor, not making any sound.
“If you escape and I come out of this alive, I’ll tell you,” he explained to her as he turned around again to walk away.
Scootaloo, however, was still curious about one thing, “Is Red even your real name?” she asked him. The silence in the room was so intense, a pin could be heard falling.
“No,” he finally said as his hoof rested on the cell’s door.
“What is your real name?”
Red stood there for a very long time before turning around and looking at the filly with an unamused face, which slowly turned into a smile.
“My name is... Blaze... got it memorized?” he asked her as he tapped a hoof against his head.
Scootaloo nodded before he finally left the cell. Just as he got away from the cell door, Blaze stood still in deep thought as he continued to frown in thought of what he just told the filly. Just a few hours ago, he did not even consider her a pony, merely just a test subject for his superior’s schemes. But hearing her cry, and seeing the look of despair on her face reminded him of something. Something he hoped to never see again.
Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy carefully flew through the dark hallways. Every slight creak or sound sent them flying up toward the ceiling. They couldn’t get caught now.
They carefully kept moving until they saw him. Red was walking out of the room, closing the door behind him. He seemed... upset, actually. It was confusing, to say the least.
As soon as he was gone, Rainbow Dash flew up to the door and tried to open it. It was locked, she realized too late, and it was steel, nothing that could be broken through.
Still, there was a small hatch in the door, allowing Rainbow Dash to open the door and look inside.
She brightened. “Scootaloo!”
Shining Armour led his sister and her friends through the gates of Canterlot. “Don’t worry, we have the entire Royal Guard on standby. Do you still sense where Rainbow and Fluttershy are?”
“...Vaguely,” Twilight admitted. “It seems it’s being blocked.”
Rarity hit her head with a hoof. “Rainbow Dash probably did something to disrupt it. She’s always so reckless.”
Shining Armor sighed, looking through the crowd. He frowned. “There should be guards here. What’s going...” he trailed off when he noticed a single guard running up to him. “Soldier, what’s going on?”
“Sir, the posts needed to chase after a thief that ran by this entrance, nothing wrong.”
Shining nodded. “What’s the status on finding Bloodwing?”
“Still ongoing, Sir, we have our soldiers looking through the whole of Canterlot for the description of Bloodwing and his accomplices. So far nothing has been reported in, Sir!” the guard answered his captain, but Shining had an odd feeling something was wrong.
Twilight decided to march up to her brother’s side, “Have you seen a little orange filly around here?” she asked the guard, who was looking at her in confusion.
“I have not, ma’am,” the guard said dismissively, though Shining could have sworn he say a slight smirk on his face.
“Private...” Shining began to speak in a rather hoarse tone.
“Sir?”
Shining looked down on the guard, “What is the code of the Private’s Vaults?” he asked the guard, who gulped slightly.
“That Sir would be... 1025471,” he said as he closed his eyes and opened them again only to see Shining’s face up close to his.
“Wrong answer.”
The guard suddenly found himself a navy aura and he was lifted in the air, and another shockwave entered the aura causing the guard’s coat to simply melt off and revealing a shocked White in the aura.
“How did you know I was a fake!?” White asked Shining, who just gave him a wry smile.
“I didn’t, I just saw signs that were not guard-like at all... and I know my men quite well. They do not act that way,” Shining told him as Twilight was charging her own horn.
“Where is your base?!” she asked him threatenly but White just chuckled at the mare before him.
“You seem pretty lively,” he answered her casually, but a beam of magic flew to his gut and the aura around him disappeared, causing him to fall on his haunches and coughing slightly. “You pack a punch, lady.”
“Tell us where Scootaloo is or you will be a cactus for life,” Twilight told him as her horn charged again.
At that, White frowned. In a flash, he was back on his hooves. “Silence, tramp!”
And then he shimmered. Water erupted in large streams around him as he grinned evilly. “You better pray you can swim!”