Boredom.
Three hours had passed since I was thrown in here for reasons unknown to me. And I've had to sit there doing jack shit for the entirety of that time.
A few creatures had stopped by my cell, either to stare at me or mock me. To which I replied with insults and taunts. It worked rather well in my favour, since they seemed to give up on trying to bother me soon after I got started.
I was currently on the floor belly up, messing with my wings, which I had managed to free after the second hour. They were still covered in that gooey crap though. Playing with them managed to quell my boredom for a while, but even that was starting to grow stale quickly.
Using magic was out of the question, whatever they had put on my horn prevented me for doing anything with magic, much to my annoyance. They just have had this all thought out if they went through this much trouble. Of course, the real Princesses were still in Canterlot.
”Hopefully they're a big enough hole in their plan for it to all fall apart soon.” I thought to myself as I waved a small feather I managed to pull out around.
My mind began to wander over to their other prisoner, Carl. I didn't really know if they took the both of us, or just me. Hopefully she was okay either way.
If we ever get to talk again, I have a few choice words for her. Especially the part where she got tucked within the first second of the Ambush.
My train of thought was interrupted when I heard a metal clang coming from the gate. I turned my head and gazed over, finding the same Centaur that had called me a bitch before standing there with the same shit eating grin on his face.
“Get up, beautiful. My CO wants to have a… few words with you. Heh.” He chuckled as he opened the gate and two Minotaurs walked in, who were easily few feet taller than the Centaur, and dwarfed me by five.
They picked me up rather roughly and restrained me with their massive hands, before taking me outside the cell and making me face the Centaur face to face.
Said Centaur licked his lips and got his face closer to mine, to which I responded with trying to move my head backwards to avoid him.
“Damn, when was the last time you brushed your teeth? I think I can see last year's Christmas dinner in there.” I taunted as I smirked at him, to which he responded with a frown.
His two guards seemed to like my joke, because I heard them try to hold in laughter. Snickering as they tried to avoid the Centaurs angry gaze.
“You think you're funny, bitch?” He growled and proceeded to punch me in the gut, making me grimace in pain and hunch over slightly in the grip of the two Minotaurs.
“F-funnier than your ugly ass? Yep.” I hissed as I tried to hold it in. Damn that hurt like a motherfucker.
His left eye twitched as he reared back his fist once more and punched me across the muzzle, making me yelp slightly as blood dripped down my nose and onto the floor.
I shook my head slightly and maintained my smirk, gazing up at him.
“What are those, baby punches? I've met fetuses that hit harder than that.” I said. I could have sworn I saw steam coming out of his ears as I did so.
Instead of punching me again, he seemed to relax as his smirk returned to his face.
“Oh, I'll enjoy what I'm going to do to you later, whore.” He licked his lips once more and waved the guards off.
“Take her to Erdwich. And tell him to not loosen her up too much, heh.” He chuckled darkly as he turned tail and walked in the opposite direction, leaving me with the two Minotaurs.
I definitely didn't like the way he said that. And I definetly did not want to find out. I wasn't about to get fucked, figuratively or literally, within the first week of me being in this crazy ass world.
The two Guards began to take me down a series of dark corridors. As they did so, I began to try and formulate a plan to hopefully escape his place in one piece.
Suddenly, an idea came to my head.
“Hey.” I said as I looked up at the Guard to my left.
“What?” He responded in an annoyed, gruff voice.
“Your shoe's untied.”
“Huh?” He bent down to check his feet, and just as he did so, I slipped my foreleg from his grasp and dropped down, bucking the one on the right in the back of his knees, making him cry out in pain and fall down. I didn't spend enough time there to find out what happened to them next, since as soon as I did that I bolted down the corridor, running as fast as I could away from them.
I kept running for a few more minutes, before I began to hear voices coming from the front of me. I frantically looked around and spotted a heavy wooden door to the left. I quickly pushed it open and closed it behind me, leaning my back on it as I breathed heavily.
“Fuck me that was close.” I uttered as I slid down to my ass and rubbed my face a few times with my hooves.
Thankfully for me, most of the goo on me had finally decided to fall down quicker to the point that I was no longer dripping the stuff as I ran. Hopefully I did so far away from this door, or they would find me rather quickly.
Speaking of finding, I needed to find where they took Carl. God knows what they were doing to her.
Before I could continue that train of thought, I heard something suddenly drop to the floor and shatter, which caused me to snap my head up and look around the room, trying to find what had made that noise.
A weird, Pony-like creature stared back at me with eyes wide in shock. It looked similar to an insect, with a black exoskeleton, insect-like wings, and holes on its fore and hind legs. As well as a misfigured horn on its head.
It currently sat upon a frail looking wooden chair, and seemed to have been working on numerous crystal bottles, similar to the ones that were thrown at me and Carl. They all seemed empty however.
The room itself seemed rather poorly lit as well. Not on the same level as the narrow corridors I had to run through, but still dark enough to have to make you double take on a few smaller things. There were five stone tables lined up in the center, with sometime of furnace on the far left, with a large cauldron which seemed to be leaking a pink liquid from its edges. The only table that had anything on it was the one in front of the bug Pony. And even that one had barely any stuff on it apart from the things it was already using. The ceiling was plain and smooth, with cobwebs littering the corners where it met the walls. Random items such as empty glass tubes and copper wires were strewn across the floor, giving the room a finishing touch.
We both stared at each other for a few seconds, neither of us making a move, before I finally decided to speak up.
“If you value your life, I'd advise you to not call for help.” I growled as I glared daggers at it, hoping that intimidating it would work in my favour.
It gulped and nodded, slowly taking its misfigured hooves away from the table and help them up in a clear ‘I surrender’ pose.
I carefully stood up and took a few steps forward, never taking my eyes off of the Pony sized bug. If this wasn't a perfect opportunity to interrogate someone, nothing was.
“Who are you, and where am I?” I spoke in the best commanding tone I could muster, trying to copy earlier examples from Luna.
It gulped once more and opened its mouth to speak. “M-my name is D-Detrax,” It stuttered.
”Okay, Good so far. Now I just have to keep it up.” I thought to myself as I took another step closer, causing the now named bug horse, Detrax, to lean back slightly in his chair out of fear.
“That's one question. What about the other?” I narrowed my eyes at him.
“Y-You're in a cave system u-under the Fenris Mountain range, i-in the badlands.” He replied, trembling slightly.
Now, I had no fucking idea where the ‘Badlands’ were, but I decided to assume it was a fair distance away from Canterlot, if my captors had half a brain.
“What are you, and what are you doing with those bottles?” I said as I took another step closer to him, causing him to visibly flinch.
He seemed confused at my first question, but decided to answer it anyway. “I-I'm a Changeling. And I-I'm just cleaning the bottles.” He said nervously, glancing at said bottles that now lay unmoving on the table.
”Changeling? Aren't those supposed to be Japanese monsters or something?” Now, I wasn't well versed in the world of mythological creatures and such, but I did remember a horror movie that had something called Changelings. And they did not look like what was infront of me at that moment.
“Alright, ‘Detrex’” I began.
“I-it's Detrax.”
“Whatever. Listen, I want you to tell me what this purple shit is, and how to get rid of it.” I took one final step towards him and leaned my head down to glare at him, making him even more nervous.
I gestured towards my body with my hoof to get the point across.
“It's… Ah… It's a special type of liquid that hardens at command.” He began slowly.
“I… I can get it off if you'd like.” He finished, scratching the back of his head as He tried to avoid my eyes.
I may be stupid, but one thing I wasn't was dumb. He could easily had been planning to fuck me over again once he got the chance, and I kept that well in mind.
“How?” I asked, not exactly believing he would do it.
He stayed silent for a few seconds, before looking me right in the eye.
“Astras Novus, Hornus Polus.” He chanted. As I opened my mouth to question what in God's green Earth he had just said, I felt the substance on my body begin to fall away. Within one to two seconds, it was completely gone. The only thing that remained was whatever they put on my horn.
I blinked and slowly brought one of my hooves to my face and confirmed that he had indeed gotten rid of it. The fur on my hoof looked pristine, as if I had finished taking a bath and used every known shampoo and conditioner known to man.
“Uh… Okay, can you get this thing off too?” I pointed towards my horn with the hoof that was already in the air. The thing they put on it was really starting to bug me.
To my disappointment, he shook his head.
“T-That requires a special… Key of sorts.”
I lowered my hoof, but sustained my glare on him. “You seem rather willing to tell me anything.” I accused, still not trusting his word, even if he did get that stuff off of me.
He seemed hesitant to answer that one as he glanced around, before looking back at me.
“I'm not willing to die because of the Lord. Tartarus, I don't want to be here! I was taken prisoner while on a scouting mission for my hive a year ago and haven't seen the light of day since!” He half yelled, keeping his voice low enough so that no one outside heard him.
He hopped off of the chair and walked over to the cauldron, which made me take a step back, my eyes never leaving him.
“They stuck me in this room and forced me to make this… Stuff, which I don't even know the name of. They gave me a few books and made me learn how to produce and get rid of it, and if I didn't get the hoof of it within a week, they'd starve and torture me.” He said in a low voice, before looking back at me.
“I know you don't trust me, but I think we can both help each other get out of this place.” Not trusting this guy was a very big understatement. Call me paranoid, but this could very well just be him trying to get rid of me and fuck me over.
I stared at him for five full seconds, before nodding slowly.
“And how would we do that?” I asked. I wasn't very confident in his, and my abilities to fight off an entire base full of enemies.
He didn't respond immediately, instead just walked over to the table and picked up one of the empty bottles.
“First, we need to get that magic suppressor off of your horn. I don't know how powerful you Alicorns are, but if we can get it off, we can safely teleport out I this place.” He began as he walked back towards the cauldron and dipped the bottle In, filling it with the link liquid.
Oh, fuck me.
I didn’t know how to teleport.
I bit my lip. I barely knew how to levitate shit, let alone teleport anywhere. Knowing that just going with it was bound to end poorly for the both of us, I decided to activate my bullshiting card.
“I… Uh, had my magic drained too much by some… Centaur to teleport.” I lied, not wanting him to think I actually didn't know Jack shit about magic.
He cursed in some language unknown to me. “Already? They're moving fast. You don't seem so drained, did you escape before they could finish?” He asked.
“Er… Yes.” I answered, trying to sound convincing.
“That's good. But that means that we have to go find where they are storing your magic, we won't be able to escape without it.” He nodded and brought the bottle back to the table.
”God, why have you forsaken me?” I thought bitterly as I stayed silent. I was getting fucked into a web of bullshits of my own making. So instead of coming out clean, I did the next best thing.
“Well… I already have the magic, I got it back before I escaped, but I'm too… Fatigued to use complex spells.” I said as I cleared my throat and tried to hold my head up high, to sell my point.
He put a cap on the top of the bottle and picked up a dirty rug, cleaning the spills from the side of it.
“That's… Good! One less step I guess.” He still seemed nervous around me, which most likely worked in my favour in that situation.
I watched him repeat the same thing with a few more bottles in silence, not knowing what else to say. After the sixth bottle, I decided ask him.
“What are those for?” I asked.
“They're for the guards we encounter on the way. If we can't rely on your magic, then we need something to de-” He was cut short by the entire room rumbling, similar to the one Carl and me had felt in the castle.
I blinked and looked around, spreading my forelegs ever so slightly to maintain myself from falling.
“What was that?” I asked Detrax, who seemed just as confused as me as he held the bottles in place with his magic, if the glowing horn and the green aura around said bottles was anything to go by.
“I… I don't know, an earthquake maybe?” He answered, looking around the room nervously.
Before I could answer, the room shook once more, but this time much more violently, throwing Detrax onto the floor, and me up and over the table. I tumbled a few times on it before landing on the other side, on top of some chairs, breaking them in the process.
“Fuck me…” I muttered in pain as I sat up. I shook my head and slowly got up.
I leaned against the table and held on for around ten seconds, looking around in caution.
“I think it's over. What the hell was that?” I said aloud.
I heard a groan come from the other side of the stone table, and soon after a reply.
“I hope... “ He grunted as he got up, rubbing the side of his head with his hoof.
I let go of the table and walk around it, towards Detrax, who was still recovering from the sudden shaking.
“Maybe it's an attack?” I pondered, last time it happened it had been an attack. I assumed so, anyways.
He replied with a side to side shake of his head. “Impossible, no one could ever hope to fi-” He was cut short as we both heard dozens of footsteps coming from the outside of the door. They passed right in front of it and seemed to continue going, fading away until we stopped hearing it.
As soon as the sound stopped, the Earth shook once more. This time to a lesser extent than before.
“I think that may be a yes.” I said as I looked back at him, having been staring at the door prior.
“I… I don't know. But if we're under attack, then by whom?” He asked, a bit shaken.
”This place must have been sealed tighter than a nun’s ass if he's acting so surprised.” I looked back towards the door and turned to face it.
Suddenly, I remembered something.
“Oh fuck, Carl!” I had completely forgotten about her during my little chat with Detrax. I needed to find her, As Soon As Possible.
I looked back at the Changeling, who seemed even more confused now by my choice of words, and then back at the door, before beginning to trot towards it.
“We need to move now, we can use the chaos to escape.” I said to him as I reached the large wooden door. He opened his mouth to say something, but quickly closed it and nodded.
He grabbed a bag from… Somewhere behind him and stuffed the glass bottles into it. He then walked over to the furnace and did something I could not quite see. Seconds later, the entire thing seem to shut down as the fire beneath the cauldron died.
I waited until he was finally ready to go. He now held the bag above his head with his magic and nodded to me.
“Follow me, I know the way to the prisoners ward.” He stated as he walked to my side.
“Prison ward? Why do you want to go there?” It was definitely the place I would visit first to search for Carl, but I wasn't aware of why he wanted to go there.
“I know a few people there, they'd gladly help us get out of here.” He replied as he carefully pushed the door open, poking his head out and looking both ways before opening the door fully, allowing me and him to step outside.
“Follow me.”
Meanwhile, I had dwelled over the fact that he said people instead of some made up word for a few seconds, before snapping out of it and walking outside, and then following the Changeling down the long, dark corridor.
The walk to the prison ward was short, and relatively uneventful. The entire place had shaken numerous more times as he made our way there, and the corridors were mostly empty. The occasional guard we encountered on the way were quickly disposed of by Detrax’s magic-in-a-bottle shit.
I carefully peeked my head through a heavy metal door, before slowly opening it wide enough to allow me to step into the room, followed closely by Detrax.
“Okay. Now what?” I whispered as I looked back at him. He pointed towards number of cell doors at the end of a tall, wide hallway.
I nodded slowly and looked forward, taking careful steps as we started to pass through the cells.
Inside said cells were numerous creatures unknown to me, as well as Minotaurs, other Ponies, and what looked like Griffins.
Once we reached the last of the cells, what I saw made me stop in shock. And even Detrax had to double take at one of the occupants inside another cell.
Inside the one I was looking at were two, dirty and half naked humans. Yeah, you heard me right. One man, and a woman. The latter barely looked older than twenty, and the former looked like he was approaching his thirties. The both looked beaten to some degree as well.
The man looked the most roughed up of them all, and wore what looked like Camo pants, and a plain, green shirt. He wore a pair of dog tags around his neck, and was sitting on the floor next to the woman, glaring at me through the cell bars.
The girl on the other hand was… Happy to see me? She looked at me as if she was my biggest fan or something. It was a bit creepy, to be truthful.
Without giving much thought to it, I immediately tried to open the door, which was locked by what looked like an old, heavy duty lock. Instead of looking around for another way in, I gripped said lock and pulled back on it.
To my surprise, the lock broke almost instantly. I looked at it in my hoof for a second before discarding it by throwing it behind my back.
I pushed the door inwards, grunting as I struggled for a second. The lock may had been easy to break, but this door felt heavy, and it scraped against the rocky bottom as it opened, giving it some added resistance.
As soon as I finished pushing the door open halfway, I stepped into the cell and looked down at the two. The man had gotten up by that point and was glaring at me with distrust.
“Look, I'm not were to hurt you. I was a prisoner here too, and we're breaking the hell out of this place.” I told him slowly as I took a few steps back, gesturing them to exit the cell.
The woman almost literally jumped at the chance, getting up to her feet quickly, much to her companion’s presumed annoyance, and rushed out of the cell, taking in deep breaths.
“Oh thank god, I swear I couldn't stand another second with that smell.” She panted as she leaned against the wall with one hand.
The guy came out next, eyeing me suspiciously and keeping his distance. I had come to the assumption that he was military, if the attire and the dog tags were anything to go by.
I decided to try and gain his trust by acknowledging it, completely unsure if he was going to relax a bit, or be more suspicious of me.
“You're military, right? United States?” I began, his eyes went wide a bit at that mention. He wasn’t expecting me to know that.
“I'm from Sacramento, California. I can explain later, but right now we have to get out of here.” I finished. He didn't look completely convinced, but sighed and nodded his head.
“Sergeant Romeo Luis, United States Marines, first Division, first tank battalion." He finally said.
”Damn, a Marine here of all places? This is going to be interesting.” I nodded back and looked back, trying to spot where Detrax had gone.
He had managed to get one of this locks open without having to rip it off, and was currently helping Celestia, or rather, Carl out of the cell. She had looked better, but it didn't look like anything major had happened.
She wore the same thing I had around my horn on hers, and still had that purple residue, which Detrax had quickly finished taking off of her.
I walked over to them and smiled at Carl, who spotted me and returned the smile.
“Took you long enough.” She squeezed out. “One of those Centaur looking things kicked me in the stomach when I insulted his mother. What about you?”
I rolled my eyes. “What, you were waiting on me to rescue you? Why not the other way around? And I also insulted one of those cunts, got me bad in the… Muzzle.” I said as I rubbed my muzzle slightly, the blood dripping from my nose was still fresh.
Carl seemed to have stopped the two humans behind me, because she looked over my shoulder with wide eyes.
“Are they-”
“Yes, they are. We can ask questions later. But now, let's go!” I told her, to which she and Detrax responded with a nod.
“Follow me, I know the way!” Detrax announced as he rushed past us all. Me and Carl Looked at each other for a second before nodding and quickly following after him, the two humans also following after us after a two second delay on their part.
Just as we exited the room, a group of ponies crashed into Detrax, me and Carl, sending us all tumbling to the ground. The two humans stopped at the entrance and looked at the mess of limbs and colors.
I groaned as I rubbed my head, slowly getting up to my feet.
“The hell…” I looked down and saw the one who had crashed into me.
“Wait, Twilight?” I asked in surprise.
Twilight stopped and looked up at me with wide eyes.
“Princess?”
Princess Luna stood on the edge of a large airship bristling with cannons and other weapons. Her ship was part of a twelve strong fleet which was headed towards the location of David, Carl, and the Elements.
Her sister was on a separate ship equal to hers. The ships were specially made for them, if the color schemes on the hulls said anything. During her and after her banishment, airships were commonly used for commercial and military purposes. For the past thousand years, the military airship fleet had dwindled in numbers, before dropping to barely a hundred just after her return.
She had pushed the Council to allow the building of more airships, but it was a slow process. Equestria hadn't seen a major conflict in centuries, they thought there was no need for more, and even wanted to downgrade the numbers.
She and Celestia had mustered every available ship in Canterlot and formed the small fleet. And in her opinion, it was far too little. But they could not waste any more time. The lives of her friends, new and old, were in danger.
She was currently looking towards the horizon with a nearly emotionless face. But inside, her mind was in turmoil.
Heaven's know what the brutes the kidnapped them were doing with them. She shuddered to imagine so. Truth be told, she was a lot more worried about their safety than anything else.
She and David had quickly before friends. Or at least she believed so. They had spent a long time talking, and even though it felt weird to technically talk to herself, she felt better and more open talking to her than to any other Pony, apart from Celestia.
Maybe it was because she looked so much like her. But no matter the reason, she was damn sure she wasn't going to let somepony hurt those that she considered friends.
As the fleet continued their course for their location, her mind began to drift to more… Graphic scenarios.
She flinched slightly as those thoughts crossed her mind.
“Please be safe…”