A ringing bell woke Pinkie Pie up. It sounded like a school bell.
Pinkie rubbed her eyes. She noticed that as the bell rang, her door automatically opened. She stuck her head outside, and found that the others were walking outside of their rooms. Their ears flattened and they looked around hurriedly.
"C'mon freak, hurry up!" Barked a guard next to Pinkie. He unexpectedly kicked her in the side of her stomach. Pinkie groaned and held her hoof to her stomach, and she slowly limped to the same room where the others were heading.
Luna still had her wings tied and the metal cage around her horn.
Screw Ball was tied with ropes around her as she tried to fly, guards and nurses trying to keep her down.
Whoever was in the metal door had not come out, for it had not been opened.
Screw Loose was tugging and growling at her leash. Pinkie felt a deep connection with the pony. She wanted to help her escape, so that they could be free to play together. Pinkie felt a strange desire to hug Screw Loose, to scratch her behind the ears.
Great, Pinkie thought to herself, now I’m starting think she’s a dog.
Pinkie shook her head, only Derpy and her seemed unguarded. The pink pony made her way beside the grey pegasus, who looked miserable.
"Psst, Derpy it's me Pinkie Pie." Pinkie whispered to her.
"Is there something with my eyes?" Derpy suddenly asked Pinkie.
"What? No there's nothing wrong with them. Er, where are we going?" Pinkie said nervously trying to change the subject. Too many times Derpy had been told she was different, she didn't need it anymore from Pinkie.
"To our meal. I'm not sure which one anymore. There's no clocks or windows besides the ones on our doors." Derpy answered. "As one of the Insane, that's what they call us, you uh, never....can see the outside.”
Pinkie frowned and nodded, then glanced back at the metal door. It was silent, the red eyes nowhere to be seen.
"Mind Twist is in there," Derpy said to Pinkie, following her gaze. "Don't ever talk to her or anything."
"Why?"
"I don't know the entire story, but Screwball told me that she wandered in here, like you, but trying to find her parents. Her parents were both in an accident when she was a little filly, and she had no one else to take care of her. So she kinda lived at the hospital for a while, waiting for them to get better. The hospital wouldn't let het go home for some reason. So when her parents died, she didn't know where they went, no pony had told her, so she went looking for them. Then she found this place and they took her...here. " Derpy shivered. "So they kept her in that room for her entire life. They gave her some weird shot that made her very strong, who knows why. She...wasn't right the day her parents were in the accident. Something snapped inside that mare...and she hasn't been right since. Always angry and trying to escape. Even Princess Luna stays out of her way. Mind Twist, Screwball, and Screw Loose are the few that were the first ones here. They are the only ones who know what happened to the others."
They entered a small cafeteria. They each grabbed a tray and stood in line to get food. They were given a pile of mish mashed food and sat down at a table. Derpy and Pinkie sat together, Screw Ball and Screw Loose at another table. Princess Luna sat alone at a corner table.
"Others?" Pinkie asked.
"I don't know much about them. Not many were cured, they all either were unfortunate to find this place or have something....off about them." Derpy said. "There was one pony. He was even worse than Mind Twist. He loved...blood." Derpy shivered again. "He was obsessed with it. He wouldn't eat any of the cafeteria food, so the hospital had to give him the donated blood at the blood drive they had once a month.” Derpy explained.
Screwball heard what they were talking about, and came over, Screw Loose following her.
“It wasn't enough for him. So he started killing nurses and guards, soaking his entire body in it. He ate it and sniffed it and would sometimes grab a knife and cut himself so that he could mix his blood with theirs. It was sick! No pony was allowed inside. Not even the guards. Yet somehow he always managed to trap one inside his room. I hated that room, dry blood was covered on the walls and corpses of his kills were in the corner. The staff could do nothing about it, for they were too afraid." Screwball continued the story.
Derpy stared at her food, then raised her head at Pinkie.
"All of us want a taste of freedom, but that was a pony who should never be free." She looked at her food again. "One day, he started cutting himself to shreds, licking his blood. After an hour, he was dead." Derpy finished.