Omen
Once upon a time in the magical land of Equestria, the Blood Moon rose into the sky and when the last rays of the sun vanished, the Nightmare began.
Nowhere was it more apparent than in Canterlot, the oldest of all Equestrian cities, perched high on the side of the great Canterhorn mountain.
Canterlot was once a living, breathing city, filled with energy that had since been drained out of it. Its streets, once teeming with life and light, sat naked and dark, from the lowest residential quarters where doors still hung ajar and windows were broken by those trying to force their ways both in and out, to the oligemic markets and crafts halls. The sole illumination cast over Canterlot’s corpse was the weak glow of lamps and lanterns from the highest streets that had not yet fallen to the madness gripping the rest of the city, and the angry light cast by the Blood Moon that refused to leave the sky. But naked and dark as they were, the streets of Canterlot were not wholly devoid of movement, or what yet passed for life.
A lone group of six figures shambled across the pavement of what had once been a shopping district. The smallest of them was a dog, although calling it such was generous as its skin was pulled tightly across its bones, its eyes never focused, its tongue constantly lolled out of its disease-ridden and bloodied mouth, and its fur had grown uncontrollably long and matted, yet was still falling out in mangy clumps. The other five scarcely fared better, even if their condition was all the more insidious.
As did the dog, they carried themselves of four legs, although they walked upon hooves instead of paws. They likewise had fur and manes and tails that had grown uncontrollably long and matted, but in a spectrum of colors from yellow to brown to blue, even to pink. Once, they’d had pictures emblazoned on their hindquarters announcing for all the world to see what activity they had excelled in, but through their matted and overgrown coats, those pictures were little more than blobs of color without meaning. They carried tools with them as makeshift weapons, clutching between their teeth the handles of shovels, axes and large hammers, even if it was not clear what they might need them for; sense and reason were wholly and forevermore beyond them.
These pitiable creatures were ponies, or at least were mostly still ponies, their forms changed and degenerated once their blood had gone bad. Even the sickly hound with them had been a dog before its blood had, in turn, gone bad along with the blood of its masters. Such was the fate of everything that lived within the occluded jewel that had once been Canterlot; the slow, living death that was beasthood.
When their blood had gone bad, their eyes had followed suit, and this was the reason why these former ponies — these beasts — did not see the second dog — lying on the ground and very much dead — being dragged deeper into an alleyway as they ambled past. Unlike the beasts on the street, the creature that was pulling was the very opposite of pitiable and was still very much a pony. Little could be said about this pony — this mare — as only the tips of her pink hooves and mauve tail were visible. The rest of her form was concealed by long, dark leather coat that covered her from crest to croup, including a high collar that reached up over her muzzle to protect her from the blood that had spattered across her chest. Sturdy saddlebags hung on either side of her flank, belts and bandoliers held rune-covered phials of potions and powders, and her head was covered by a tricorn cap that had worn down to feathers at the edges.
Affixed to her left arm was a metal tube that was flared at the front and connected to a slim box of mechanisms at the rear, but it was her right arm that was at that moment the source of her troubles, for heavy belts and steel rods affixed to it an enormous, curved saw blade that had seen fit to bite too deeply into the dog the hunter was dragging out of sight. Once inside the alley, she tried again to pull the saw free, and finally had to push forward to open the wound wide enough to finally succeed.
She had not, however, even a moment to compose herself before a howl split the night. The hunter tarried a moment, and then galloped to the mouth of the alleyway, crossing her right arm across her chest and swinging upward just as she arrived. The dog from the street rounded the corner at the same moment and the hunter’s saw caught it in the throat, cutting through flesh and bone with frightening ease. Blood arced high into the air as the dog crashed onto the pavement, its head barely held on by a few threads of muscle and skin. Turning, the hunter’s eyes fell on the five beasts galumphing towards her, metal grinding against stone as they dragged their makeshift weapons with them. Grabbing a phial in her fetlock, she yanked it from from its bandolier, activating the primer in its cap and making it spits sparks into the air like a firecracker. The phial was hurled at the street in front of the beasts, exploding into a pool of flames. They recoiled from the light and heat in surprise, and regained their wits in time to see the dark shape of the hunter vault over the flames to hit the ground at a full gallop right into them.
Rising up rapidly onto her hind legs, she threw an uppercut, thrusting the serrated blade affixed to her arm up and through the first stallion’s chest to the grinding of bone and outrushing of blood. With grace more befitting of a ballerina than a warrior, she walked and spun on her hind hooves and brought her weapon down through the head of the next beast as the first one fell dead, cutting its jaw and tongue free. Pirouetting past this second corpse, she twisted her arm and brought it down to her side, force and spring mechanisms swinging the blade forward, transforming the saw into an oversized, vicious cleaver. She charged forward and brought her weapon up and then down in an overhead chop, sinking the blade deep into the chest of a third beast, where it immediately stuck in the ribs and resisted the hunter’s attempt to pull it free.
Not wasting a moment, the hunter swung her left arm to bare on the closest of the two beasts still remaining and flexed and twisted her hoof, activating the mechanism connected to the clockwork at the back of the flared tube and making it flash with the discharge of gunpowder. Shot slammed into its chest and it fell to the street unceremoniously even as the second disregarded it and charged, shovel clutched firmly between its teeth.
Turning her attention to the dead beast in front of her, the hunter planted a hind hoof on it and pulled, wrenching her weapon free in an eruption of gore and with an elegant spin and violent swing of the blade as the final beast reached her and cocked its shovel back to strike. It was knocked aside by the weight of the hunter’s strike, the saw teeth lining the outside edge of her cleaver tearing through flesh and muscle alike and dropping it to the cobblestones in a spreading pool of blood.
The hunter, covered in blood and standing tense and tall on her hind hooves, drew in a deep breath that stank of metal, twisted her arm and swung her saw-toothed cleaver back into its ready position, and then dropped back to all four of her hooves. She was alive and in command of herself and her prey was slaughtered, and she could have hoped for nothing more than that. Weak choking drew her attention, and she looked to see one beast still alive — the one that she had shot — trying to crawl away while its labored breathing was rattled by the bullet holes in its chest.
The beast’s pitiful struggles carried it barely anywhere before the hunter’s weight bared down on its back and pinned it to the ground. The steel of a firearm’s muzzle was pressed into its temple and forced its head down when it tried to look back at the hunter through milky, unseeing eyes.
The night air outside of an abandoned shop rattled with the discharge of a blunderbuss, and scarcely one minute later, the knob of the front door turned, and the door swung open to permit entry to the hunter dressed in leather and gore. Stepping inside, she reached back to one of her belts and opened the shutter of the lantern hanging there, the light from magically-enhanced fireflies filling the room.
The tables she expected to find were still there, of course, even if they were overturned and pushed about. The glass counter near the back, although covered with a thick layer of dust, surely showed rows of moldering treats and pastries. Once upon a time, before the blood-filled nights, before the hunt, this shop had been a bakery, and been a bakery that the hunter knew all too well, for she had grown-up inside those walls and behind that counter.
The bakery had, once long ago, been Sunridge Sweets, and Velvet Step had finally come home.
Velvet Step the dancer. Velvet Step the sister and the daughter. The baker and matchmaker. The friend and confidant, the lover of ponies and hunter of beasts.
How had it all gone so wrong?
With heavy hooves, she made her way to the door along the back wall, slightly ajar, and pushed it opened to look up the flight of stairs behind it. With equally heavy hooves, she made her way up the stairs and into the hallway at the top, the fireflies hanging from her belt providing the only illumination as she walked with solemn, slow purpose towards one of the doors and pushed it opened.
The room was exactly the way she remembered it, walls papered in blue patterned with small cupcakes. A simple crib with a mobile occupied one corner, a small chest filled the corner across from it, and several toys were scattered around. What held Velvet’s attention as she entered the room, however, was a small pile of cloth under a moonbeam by the lone window. She came to a stop just within reaching distance of it; a blue foal’s blanket.
Hesitantly, she lifted one hoof and reached out for the blanket cautiously, as if it might startle and fly away from her at any moment.
The floorboards behind her creaked.
She whirled about and came face-to-face with something that had once been a pony. It still vaguely resembled a pony, but its fur was too shaggy and too black, its face was too wolfish, its body was too large, its limbs were too long, its teeth were too sharp, and its eyes were too dead.
With a feral, snarling growl, it raised one paw and swung it at her, long claws flashing in the moonlight.
