//------------------------------//
// Some Time Out 
// Story: Innavedr 
// by Imploding Colon 
//------------------------------//

	Nightshade's eyes fluttered open.  Calmly, she sat up on her cot inside the pale-white infirmary.  As the blood rushed back to her ears, she heard the struggled of multiple pony bodies through the nearest wall.

Swiftly, she kicked off the table—stumbling only slightly—and trotted a brisk path into the hallway outside.  Once there, all she had to do was raise her voice once, and two dozen workers parted ways, allowing her unimpeded access to the operations room.

Inside, the room resonated with moans and grunts of pain.  A pile of angry stallions had formed on a writhing figure, and were kicking the poor unicorn's body to a bruised pile of meat.

"Enough..."  Nightshade calmly said.

There were two more lingering hoof-bucks, and the combination of guards and engineers stood up from Phoenix's agonized body.  The stallion rolled over, sputtering and coughing up blood as his entire frame quivered.

Nightshade gazed down at him, then over at a pair of stallions squatting beside the far door.  "The sequencing room.  How long until you can make it through?"

"Just a few seconds, madame!" one engineer said over the blaring of a manatorch.  "That intruder gave us quite the show when we first stomped in here—"

"I don't need a play by play.  Just open the door to the foals, thank you."

"Madame..."  Sir Ordo stumbled over, wincing as he covered a fresh whelt on his shoulder.  "Whoever this stallion is, he's well-trained.  Heck, he could even have military experience!  I haven't seen moves like that since the last time the company made a trip to the weapons testing facility south of the capitol—"

"What matters is that he has been subdued," the mare said calmly.  "Unless you have something pertinent to update me with, Ordo, I would prefer you leave the situation to the engineers."

"Right, madame.  Of course, madame."  The stallion nevertheless flung a nervous glance towards the tip of her horn.  "Who... who was it, madame?  Who or what did you see in there?"

Nightshade didn't reply.  With steely eyes, she spoke towards the pair of engineers.  "How's the progress..."

"Aaaaaaand... done!"  The stallions stepped back.  After a final flash from the torch, the door slid open.

Madame Nightshade glanced aside at her guards.  She nodded.

Those who were well enough after the recent fight to stand nodded back.  With managuns trained, they slithered into the dark chamber, one after another.  A few seconds passed by, and yet there were no sounds from the far end, save for the sniffling of foals.

"They... they're still there...?"  Ordo thought aloud.

Madame Nightshade marched into the room.

"Madame!  Please!  It m-might not be safe—"

She entered nonetheless.  With squinting eyes, she swept her gaze across the room.  She saw dangling wires along the wall, including a cot that had been stretched out.

The mare's brow furrowed in thought.  Swiftly, Ordo brushed past her and attended to the foals.  The children stood up from their chairs, one by one, overcome with tears.

"They're all here..."  Ordo exclaimed with a gasp of relief.  "Everyone of them is accounted for!"

"I don't think they're what the intruders wanted," Nightshade said.

"So there was more than the stallion?"

"One more."  She jolted in place.  "No... two more.  She was protecting somepony..."

"Huh?  Who?"

Nightshade's nostrils flared.  "I need answers..."  She pivoted to face a guard by her side.  "Take him into the infirmary," she said, pointing into the operations room.  "Make sure he stays conscious.  Keep four guards on him at all times."

"Yes, madame."

"Madame!"  One of the front guards exclaimed from the stairwell.  "It's a mess upstairs!  Somepony must have made access!"

She nodded and said, "Explore every inch of the upper floor.  There's only one way out."

The guards shouted commands to one another and scurried up in a series of armored blurs.  In the opposite direction, a living wave of fumbling life crawled.  One by one, the foals gathered around Madame Nightshade's legs, bowing and nuzzling her in foalish ritual.

"We're s-so sorry, Madame..." They sobbed.

"We d-didn't mean to make you angry!"

"Please... Please forgive us..."

"We're so sorry for what we did..."

"Do not worry, my foals," she said in a neutral tone, brushing their tattooed faces, one at a time as they huddled beside her.  She rested her forelimbs protectively on a shoulder or two as she gazed towards the stairwell.  "It was not your fault.  And even if it was, you have the madame's forgiveness..."