//------------------------------// // Split Pony-nality Disorder // Story: Tales of the Battle Foals // by Sirdubya //------------------------------// As soon as the foals found a suitable hiding place in a small forest near the train station, Shadow Shroud made her move. She crept and slithered through the moonlit corners of the train station to view the schedule. She couldn’t disguise herself and risk looking like a little lost filly that needed help. She needed to stick to the dark. Eventually, she found a good view of the schedule from just beside the stairs that led up to the platform containing the building itself. She would have to peek from below the platform to avoid being in the light, but the coast was clear, and the ticket office mare was too half-asleep to even be able to perceive her. She read the schedule carefully, and learned that a Ponyville-bound train was set to depart at 8:45pm the next day. It was almost too perfect. With this new information, she returned to her comrades. “8:45? Ok, that gives Air Slash plenty of time to scour around. Are we going to sneak onto this train like we did in Ponyville?” Fire Fight asked. “It won’t be nearly as simple seeing as we’re now a party of six, but it’ll be dark well by the time we’re to board, so we should be fine. Just stay quiet and follow my lead.” Shadow Shroud explained. “And if I were to find a foal that I can’t convince to come with by the time our train is to leave?” Air Slash inquired. “Then we’ll simply wait for another opportunity……or, you know what? I wouldn’t be opposed to walking at that point.” Shroud answered. “Really would just be easier, just sayin’.” Turf War said. “Look, if something goes awry again, it’ll be our last train ride. Sound good?” Shroud said. “Well, after we get back to the castle, we’d really just need to let a few of us go while the rest of settle on the homestead. Reckon that’d make things a little bit easier.” Kickback said. “Yeah. We really are kinda taking a risk here. It’s not like we’re in any rush.” Spiral galaxy said. “Maybe not, but we need to rescue every other foal that we can as soon as possible. And for them, that couldn’t come sooner, so….this is kinda necessary.” Fire Fight said. Spiral sighed. “Well….alright. But like Kickback just said, we really shouldn’t ride altogether like this if we can help it.” “I know……I’m a little nervous myself, but we should be okay.” Fire Fight said. They all bid each other goodnight, and went to bed. Earlier in Baltimare… News crews and police swarmed around a mass of corpses of strange animals that had been salvaged from the old subways beneath their city. The police tried to keep everypony back, but a few sneaky journalists managed to photograph the ‘reptilian gophers’, as they were called. More and more other ponies who wanted to see what all the commotion was about caught little glimpses of the monstrosities that had surfaced from the depths were understandably spooked, but none were nearly as shaken as the mare that happened upon them. Film Noir was still in shock at her unexpected, and quite frankly terrifying discovery. She had just been acting out her role for a movie when she tripped over one of the grotesque corpses in the dark tunnel. As she was getting up, she found herself looking another one right in the eye. She screamed loud enough for her voice to echo across the entire abyss. When the rest of the filming crew came to see what was wrong, they were in no small part as rattled as she was at the sight of the massacred monsters. They immediately stopped filming, and reported their find to the authorities. “Script……Wha…..What are those things!?” Film noir asked her producer. “Really wish I could tell ya, Noir. There’re lots of things we’ve never seen before or studied before. Scientists are gonna have a field day and a half with these fellers.” Script answered. “And……so will my sanity…..probably.” “What’s going on here!?” Trotting over quickly to the scene was Mary Land, Baltimare’s mayor. The crowd of authorities clearly alarmed her. An officer walked up to here. “Mrs. Mayor, I’ll have to ask you stand clear from here. These…..things might not be totally dead.” He said. “What ‘things’?” the mayor asked. The officer explained what Film Noir and her colleagues had discovered and reported to them. When he let her get a peek of one the creatures, she had to hold back a scream. “OH MY GOODNESS!! WHAT WERE THESE ABOMINATIONS DOING BELOW OUR CITY!?” she exclaimed. Some local veterinarians, and scientists from the local biology museum passed by her. “That’s what we hope to find out, and furthermore, just what they are.” One of them said. “Nothing like this in Equestria has been documented. I suggest we move them to the lab immediately.” “Just some of them. There’s too many corpses to monitor at once, and some of them are pretty mangled.” One of them had pointed out that all of the creatures had sustained various kinds of wounds. “What could have killed them off like this, and so quickly? There’s burn marks, lacerations, blunt trauma in multiple places, and……a bunch of really tiny puncture wounds that are pretty deep; they’ve got this….residue in them.” one of the veterinarian examiners observed. “They were apparently living in the old subways underneath the sewers. There’s all kinds debris and stuff in there that could damage them like this if they weren’t careful. Maybe there’s even still some flammable oil? That would explain the burns.” A detective hypothesized. Another examiner shook her head. “Not likely. They all sustained this damage recently, and at about the same time. Plus, the trauma is too severe to have been inflicted by merely tripping and falling. Something was clearly fighting them.” “Even stranger is the fact that some of the blunt trauma is centered in burn marks…..as if whatever hit them burned them on impact.” The other examiner said. “We’ll have to explore the subways. Burrowers like this typically have underground nests. Perhaps they have something to do with the recent wheat famine.” One of the biologists said. “If only Professor Gene Splice in Fillydelphia hadn’t disappeared all those years ago. He was a brilliant stallion!” another biologist said. “I don’t know….. I heard rumors that he was kinda nutty.” Another biologist commented. Film Noir overheard that last comment about the burns, and perked up a little. It almost immediately made her think of Fire Fight. Surely it wasn’t him that fell all of those odd creatures…..right? Not all of them had burns marks, so……unless he wasn’t alone……….something told her that she should visit Ponyville sometime soon…. Back in Fillydelphia….. Morning had broken over Fillydelphia. The salty breeze of the sea and the sounds of nature gently awoke the foals. Fire Fight made everypony some breakfast before they decided to move further back into the woods before sending Air Slash into the city; he removed his swords before departing. Shadow Shroud remained ready to sneak them onto the train should they find nothing. “Stay frosty, mah boy!” Turf War said to Air Slash. “As always, my comrade.” Air Slash replied before departing. The others bid him good luck as he disappeared into the forest beyond towards the city. “I hope he has better luck than I did.” Shroud said. “Yeah, if it turns out we missed a foal after we left, I’d be pretty sad.” Spiral Galaxy said. “Well, no reason why we couldn’t make another round when we got a chance.” Kickback said. “Yeah, I guess that’s true.” Spiral said. “Let’s go harvest some more stuff for the trip. I know we got a lot, but you never know when we’ll into another situation where we can’t get any in a good amount of time.” Fire Fight said. Kickback tipped his hat. “Ah reckon that’s a mighty fine idea, but Ah think somepony should stay here and wait fer Air Slash in case he gets back soon.” “Yeah, dat’s a good idea. I’ll do dat.” Turf War said. “Ok, cool. Now we’ll have to make sure we don’t accidently take anything from the farm-” before Fire Fight could finish his sentence, they heard a bunch of rustling coming from the bushes nearby. They all looked in the direction of where it was coming from, and saw that something was moving in the bushes towards them! They braced themselves for a potential fight. What suddenly appeared was something none of them expected…. “BASKETBAAAAAAALLLLLLLLL!!!!!!!!” A mass of pink that turned out to be a filly pounced into Fire Fight, knocking them to the ground. The pink filly got up almost immediately, and began jumping around like a maniac while loudly cackling as though she was high. Fire Fight got up not too much later than she did, but the crazed filly kept jumping all around him. “WHAT THE!?” Fire Fight exclaimed just before the filly began jumping on him again. “TOUCHDOOOWWWN!!” the crazy filly screamed as she knocked Fire Fight over again. She cackled again. “H-Hey! What are you-” Spiral tried to speak, but the filly just popped up in front fast enough to make you think she might have just teleported. The filly was right in Spiral’s face, and eyed her with a manic smile on her face with her eyes wider than anypony knew possible. Spiral curled down in fear as the filly fixed her manic gaze onto her. The filly began slowly inhaling, which made Spiral pretty nervous. What the filly eventually said confused her. “Sign my yearbook!” she whispered. Any fear the Spiral had was replaced with utter confusion. With the filly standing still, the foals could finally get a good look at her. She was a rouge-pink Earth Pony with a blonde mane that was braided into long pigtails hanging to either of her knees. Her eyes were a butterscotch-yellow, and her Cutie Mark was…..a strand of DNA? Her behavior alone was odd enough already. Kickback kept his cool as he tried to speak to her. “Somethin’ the matter, ma’am?” he asked. She jumped up to him, and glared at him. “HEY! DON’T INTERRUPT ME WHILE I’M INTERRUPTING MYSELF! IT’S BAD ENOUGH THAT THOSE SQUIRRELS SAID I WASN’T GOOD AT CHECKERS!!” she angrily shouted. Kickback just stared blankly at her while stammering for something to say. “Well, uh….Ah s-sure am sorry-” the filly went back to jumping all over Fire Fight before he could say anything. Shadow Shroud tried to keep up with her, but even she couldn’t catch the erratic filly. The filly cackled with no trace of sanity as she jumped around and on the fiery colt as he tried to push her away. Eventually, he panicked and ended up punching her in the face, sending her tumbling away. The filly held her face and quietly sobbed on the ground, and Fire Fight began to very much regret his rash action as he felt the disapproving looks from his friends. “Wow! Way to go, Fire Fight. You freaking hurt her!” Spiral said. “That just ain’t how ya treat a filly, sheriff.” Kickback reprimanded. “S-Sorry! I-I was freaking out.” Fire Fight said. “Tell that to her!” Spiral said as she pointed to the filly. Fire Fight walked up to her as she continued to cry on the ground. He must’ve hit her pretty hard. “H-Hey…. I’m really sorry….. I-I didn’t mean to hurt you. Are you okay?” he softly said to her. The filly seemed to lighten her sobbing a little bit, but shot up and grabbed Fire Fight’s hoof…..as if she was thankful. “My first punch in the face! Oh, you shouldn’t have!!” she sobbed. Her tone was….legitimately grateful! Needless to say, the foals were caught way off guard. “I’ve been waiting my whole life for somepony to just…..to just show me such painful, brutal love, and…….and you made my wish come true! Oh, thank you! THANK YOU!!” she declared. The foals just didn’t know what to think. Even the ever calm and cool Kickback was at a loss. His mouth hung open in utter confusion. “Here! This is for you! And this, AND THIS, AND THIS TOO!!” The filly grabbed various objects from the forest such as a pile of leaves, sticks, and even a portion of a big log, much to their amazement, and slammed them onto Fire Fight. He managed to dodge the log however. “THEY’RE FOR YOU!! TAKE THEM AS TOKENS OF our friendship!” she sobbed in a joyful tone. Fire Fight was shaking in his gauntlets at just what a loose cannon this filly was. She made Pinkie Pie look sane! Where did she come from, and more importantly, what was she doing running loose without any supervision!? “Dis b**** is crazy!” Turf War said. The filly quickly glanced at Turf War with a furious glare, and popped up in front of him. “HEY! IT’S NOT JUST ‘CRAZY’! IT’S CRAZYLOCKS!! L-O-C-K-S, LOCKS!!! Jeez, get it right.” She exclaimed. Her last statement turned from angry, to just sassy. So her name was apparently ‘Crazylocks’. Turf War quivered in fear. “Uhh….my bad.” He muttered. Shadow Shroud cleared her throat. “Crazylocks, is it?” she asked. Crazylocks whipped around, and looked at her with her manic smile, crossed eyes, and her head cocked. “Yes?” she replied. “I…..see……..Well then. Umm……What are you doing out here?” Shroud asked. Crazylocks maintained her stare onto Shadow Shroud for a couple moments before answering. “Well, I was going to dive to the bottom of the ocean again today to have coffee with the sea wolves, but the trees wanted me to help them find their missing ties, so I came out here, ‘cause this is where they lose them most often, and I suddenly ran into you guys!” she answered. This filly was clearly completely delusional, and somewhat dangerous. “Ehh…….Y-Yes…….That sounds…….lovely. Do your parents know this?” Shroud asked. Crazylocks suddenly pondered as though she actually had to think about that. “Hmm……What are parents again?” she asked. All the foals just facehooved. She was clearly beyond any kind of help. “We…….should probably help her get home.” Fire Fight said. “We prolly should!? Homie, she crazier than dat damn scientist we just busted! She need to be anywhere but out in the open!” Turf War said. They looked at her as she could be seen pivoting her body around one point in the ground where she stuck her nose, and made small, animal-like noises. “Yeah. Let’s put our stuff up, and take her back into the city. Turf War, stay here and wait for Air Slash in case he comes back.” Fire Fight said. Turf War nodded. Before they could, Crazylocks moved the log she had nearly slammed into Fire Fight back behind the bushes. Her horn was about as normal as any……..wait, when did she have a horn!? She suddenly had a unicorn horn protruding from her head! And she was using it as though she’d had it her whole life to magically move a big log behind a bush. “There! Much cleaner!” she sang. Her horn suddenly sank back into her forehead, and……presumably, she was an Earth Pony again. “What in tarnation!?” Kickback exclaimed. Air Slash suddenly appeared, and flew back towards them. “Forgive me, friends, but today seems to be a school day, so I can’t make a search without-” He suddenly noticed Crazylocks. “Who might this be?” Crazylocks, much to their shock, sprouted wings this time! She ascended as expertly as though she’d had them her whole life, and came face to face with Air Slash. “Hi, pegasus! I’m also a pegasus! I’m Crazylocks!” she introduced. Air Slash fumbled over his words out of shock at what he had just witnessed. That…..and he could feel her manic disposition. “But…….B-B-But you were an Earth Pony mere seconds ago!” he said. “You mean like this?” Crazylocks asked. She descended, and landed softly on the ground. Her wings disappeared about quickly as her horn did, and sunk back into her shoulders. “W-W-Wha…..What are you!?” Air Slash exclaimed. It was a question that all of the foals collectively shared about this paradoxical pony.