//------------------------------// // Chapter 8 // Story: The Resurrectionists // by Captain_Hairball //------------------------------// “The Gray Pony must’ve done something to Smooth. He’s a dickhead, but he wasn’t the cult leader type before he went in,” said Skanky. Firmament was rushing around the lab, filling the ice tank and setting up the prep area. “Okay. So. Hypothesis,” said Hearth. “We bring something from the Gray Pony through when we go in and out. Like being possessed,” “Yes. And… dust.” Skanky ran a hoof across the back of a chair, and it came away covered in gray dust, leaving a noticeable divot in the top. The whole lab was covered with a thin patina of gray. The omnipresent decay seemed to be giving Firmament a great deal of trouble with the equipment. “So Firmy hasn’t been under, and Ether didn’t meet the gray pony,” said Hearth. “They’re not compromised.” Skanky frowned. ”But you and I have. And you haven’t been acting any differently.” Hearth thumped the left side of her chest. “Pure of heart, baby. I’ve been having bad dreams, and I’ve had to double up on the dandruff shampoo. But I’m okay.” Skanky’s frown deepened. “I’m not pure of heart.” Hearth patted her on the withers. “Sweetie, you’re the purest. You don’t even hide it well.” “But what about Eternal Enigma?” The lab’s door opened, and Eternal stepped through. Ether was behind him, holding the revolver in his mouth. “It is loaded, this time,” said Eternal. “Please explain why you are here.” “We need to stop the Gray Pony,” said Skanky, turning towards them. Eternal looked angry. Ether looked like he wanted to pee himself and run. “We think if we bring Firmament to Celestia, that will help.” She gulped. “Somehow.” “I knew there were things you didn’t tell me about your last experiment. Firmament, please step away from the equipment.” Firmament raised her forehooves and stepped away on her hind legs. “What are you going to do, kill us?” said Skanky. Eternal shrugged. “If I need to. It would difficult to hide the crime, but I may not need to. Smooth Operator responded to the experiment better than I could have hoped. The situation at the Student Center is escalating. There are things I need to accomplish here, if you’ll allow me. Then this world will be open for feeding.” “You’re working with the Gray Pony,” said Firmament, her voice shaking. “No,” said Eternal Enigma, “I am not working with her. I am a part of her.” He shrugged out of his lab coat and dropped it to the floor. Where his cutie mark should be, there was nothing but cracked, flaking gray hide. “I am a thanatovore — a predator that feeds on the souls of the dead. Your world’s death realm looked especially delectable! Such life! Such energy! “But then your princesses traveled to the death realm to oppose me. The light-colored one sacrificed herself to lead me into a trap. I thought all was lost, and that I would storage there. But then I was able to send a part of my consciousness into the body of the dead foal, Eternal Enigma. I saw an opportunity. An opportunity that took half a pony lifetime to realize, but what is time to me? My experiments have weakened the boundary between life and death. Soon, I will taste a delicacy few of my kind have ever sampled: the energy of a living world!” “What do you need to do to complete the ritual?” said Skanky. “I merely need to enter the tank myself, reconnect with the rest of my consciousness, and tear through the opening Smooth Operator and his followers are even now creating. My victory is almost complete.” Behind Eternal, Ether’s eyes filled with the horror of the gradual realization that he was holding a gun for an extra-dimensional horror. “Mghn?” Skanky concentrated. Her telekinesis wasn’t strong, but a lot was riding on this. She tugged on the sides of the immersion tanks with her magic. They creaked but remained intact. “Let me get that,” said Hearth. With two powerful earth pony kicks, the first tank’s side shattered. Water poured onto the floor. Firmament scrambled to shut off the flow. Eternal clucked and shook his head. “I don’t think you know what you’re doing. If you break the other one, there will be consequences.” Skanky smirked, balled her magic into a sphere of force, and smashed the glass side of the other tank. “Fine. Do your worst. We just saved the world.” Eternal looked over his shoulder to speak to Ether. “Please murder your cheating whore of a marefriend.” Ether apparently hadn’t come prepared for this. He’d backed into the corner by the door, eyes darting around, hooves scrabbling on the floor tiles as though he was trying to crawl inside the laboratory wall. Eternal’s scowl deepened. “Fine. I’ll do it. Give me that gun.” Skanky thought he seemed awfully calm for a pony whose evil schemes had just come to naught. Eternal reached out for the gun with a hoof. Ether bit down on the gun, and it went off. Eternal fell to the floor with a hole in the back of his head. Ether dropped the gun from his mouth. “I killed him. I killed him. Oh, my Faust I killed him! I didn’t mean to!” wailed Ether. Firmament rushed to his side. “It’s all right. It’s all right. You did the right thing,” she said, stroking his head. He buried his face in her chest fluff and sobbed. Firmament turned to Skanky and Hearth. “Cover Eternal up. Please?” Hearth scrambled to drape Eternal’s lab coat over his body. Skanky stared, wondering how they were going to explain this to the police. Suddenly the room was bathed in purple light. A voice Skanky had previously only heard on the TV news rang out, pure and sweet and clear. “I’m sorry I’m so late, my little ponies. I didn’t even see your note on the PEMA web site until I saw the news reports about the ritual at your student center.” Skanky turned around. Twilight stood there, glowy and shimmery, so probably a hologram. Tall and thin, her purple and indigo mane floating around her head. Stars shone in the darkness of her hair. “Y-your highness.” Skanky, dropping to her knees. “We really don’t have time for that, and anyway just ‘Twilight’ is fine. Now, what I’m about to tell you is highly classified, so don’t spread it around. You’re dealing with is something called a Thanatovore, and…” “We know, already, actually,” said Hearth, from behind Skanky. Twilight blinked. “Really?” Hearth and Skanky started to give Twilight a rundown of Eternal Enigma’s research and the things that had happened over the past few weeks, but Twilight cut them off halfway through. “Okay, this Eternal Enigma sounds pretty fishy. I think he might be working with the Thanatovore, or he might be a tulpa or emanation of the creature itself. Whatever you do, don’t let him flatline, and don’t let him die. If he can’t get to the realm of the dead any other way, he may try to trick you into killing him, and… Why are you all looking at me like that?” For the first time, Twilight’s eyes focused on Eternal’s corpse. She stepped back, and turned pale. “Okay, how did I not notice that before?” Skanky’s throat felt tight. “We fucked up,” she said, her voice trembling with guilt and sorrow. “No. I did.” Tears began to well up in Twilight’s eyes. “You’ve done so well. Better than I could have hoped. I’m the one who messed up. I was too late.” Twilight’s image flickered. “There are things coming through into Equestria from the Void. Horrible things. Spike and I have to deal with them before we can take care of the Thanatovore.” Her horn flashed. Skanky heard the bulkhead down the hall slamming shut. With her magic senses, she felt magical fields stronger than steel enclosing the Dungeon. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry,” sobbed Twilight. “We understand,” said Hearth. “Yeah,” said Skanky. “Go.” "I'll come back for you, I promise!" whimper Twilight. “Go!” shouted Skanky, charging at the hologram. Twilight vanished. “What do we do, now?” said Hearth. “Same plan as before,” said Skanky. “We didn’t get a chance to ask Twilight about it, which sucks, but she didn’t say not to send Firmy to the realm of the dead.” Firmament frowned and tossed her head towards the ruined immersion tanks. “Well, that’s going to be pretty difficult, thanks to you guys,” she said, still holding a sobbing  Ether. Skanky smacked her hoof against her forehead. “Oh my fuck, why is nothing ever easy?” Hearth sighed. “Hey, you have duct tape, though, right, Firmy?” Firmament snorted. “It wouldn’t be much of a lab if we didn’t.” “So you can fix it with that.” Heath walked over and nuzzled Ether. “You go help Skanky fix the tanks. Firmy and I will move the body somewhere we don’t have to look at it.” Skanky and Ether spent the next half hour covering the broken side of one of the tanks with trash bags and duct tape like the back window of a hillpony’s pickup truck. It didn’t look like much, but when Ether ran the water, it held. “Great!” said Ether. “We might be able to actually do this!” Skanky looked around. She’d been really absorbed in the repairs, and only now thought to wonder what was taking the other two so long. “Um… Ether?” “Yes,” he said, looking up. His tear-streaked cheeks aside, he was beginning to look cheerful again. But when he saw the way Skanky was looking at the wall clock, his expression changed. He looked around the room with wild surmise. “Where’s Firmy? Where’s Hearth?” Skanky levitated up the gun. “Stay here. I’m going to go check.” “Like buck you’re going alone,” said Ether, crowding in against her rump. “I’m coming with you.” ✭☆✭☆✭☆✭ Hearth and Firmament were standing at the end of the hallway, looking into the open door of an empty lab. Skanky’s heart lifted with relief when she saw them, and then crashed back into the gutters of depression and anxiety when she realized they weren’t moving. “Guys?” she said, her voice weak. “Guys?” They didn’t answer. Behind her, Ether made a strangled noise, and charged forward, shouldering Skanky’s smaller body aside to tear down the hall. He connected with Firmament, and the young mare flew apart into motes of dust. “Ether, no!” screamed Skanky. He turned to face her, backing into Hearth, whose body crumbled like a sandcastle as he blundered into her. “Get away from there,” she wailed, voice choked with grief and fear, but her warning was too late. A gray-green predator that had once been Eternal Enigma stepped from the door, all striated muscles and raggedy hide. Ether met his gaze and froze. Eternal bit him, and the life went out of him. Skanky fired, and missed. She fired again, taking out Ether’s sandcastle husk. Eternal turned to grin at her at her with desiccated lips and cracked teeth. Skanky backed away, gun trembling in her magic. The next shot would have to be closer if she wanted to hit. Really close — it was a miracle she even knew how to shoot one of these things. To really hit him she’d have to be close enough for him to touch her, and she didn’t want that. She ran. She heard his hoof beats on the metal grate flooring behind her. She dived into the lab and slammed the door behind her. “Little pig little pig let me in,” said Eternal, leering at her through the door’s glass window. “You killed them,” said Skanky. She looked at the door. It was holding for now, but the metal was losing its shine, becoming a duller shade of gray. “Not killed them. Devoured them. I ate your friend’s souls, little piggy.” “Bullshit,” said Skanky. “If you could do that, why bother with all this.” She swept her hoof around to gesture at the lab equipment. “I don’t think you’re strong enough yet.” Eternal hissed. “Open the door, bitch!” “You’re just clinging to life, aren’t you? Look at you. You’re a mess. You killed all my friends, and you’re barely holding yourself together.” Skanky backed herself into the corner of the room as cracks started to form in the metal of the door. She looked at the gun. How did you even hit anything with one of these? She’d watched every western, crime drama, and war movie ever made; you’d think she’d know how guns worked. The little bumps on top! Those were sights, right? One bump over the… the place where the bullets came out, and two over the back. You lined those up, right? The metal of the door screamed. Eternal jammed a hoof through it, sending shards of weakened metal scattering across the room.  Skanky fired, forgetting all about aiming. The revolver jerked in her magic.  She’d missed, of course. Eternal tore the door open enough to come through and leaped across the room towards her. Skanky lowered the gun as fast as she could. Eternal’s mouth was hanging open, inches away. She stuck the gun in there and pulled the trigger. The monster pony’s body rippled as the bullet slammed through it, coming apart in a shower of dusk and rags. Skanky pulled her hind legs up against her belly as the dust settled to the floor, afraid to touch it. Something shimmered in the air where Eternal had been and then vanished. Skanky dropped the gun and sobbed. Every time she tried to catch her breath and get her wits together, she thought about Hearth and Firmy crumbling to dust in front of her, and the racking sobs came back harder than before. What was she even supposed to do now? She took a deep, gasping breath, and wiped her eyes and her nose, trying to pull herself together. The flatline tank? No, a shard from the door had broken another plate of glass. It was hopeless. And anyway, how would she put herself under? And who would take her out? The only way to go to the world of the dead was to die. She looked down at the gun on the floor. “Fuck, you bitch. You always wanted to anyway,” she snarled, levitating the gun and turning it towards herself. How many shots had she fired? She could see the… roundy thing in the middle was empty, except for maybe the one behind the barrel. That was what it was called, the barrel. She opened her mouth and took the barrel between her lips like a lover’s cock. She tasted metal and oil. She tried to pull the trigger. She couldn’t do it! For all the times she’d dreamed of it, dreamed of ending her life and ending all her problems, her she was. She HAD to do it, and she was too. Damn. Scared. Because she knew there was no rest. Death wasn’t the end, and something even worse than death was waiting for her on the other side. Her friends were probably fighting it already if they weren’t already devoured and gone for good. “What have you got to live for, now, anyway?” said Skanky. The answers came to easily — her friends. The best of them were dead, but there were others. Her parents. Her brother. Her films. Fuck, she’d met Twilight Sparkle! Life was amazing! No. All of that would be gone, too, if she didn’t act. “Do it, coward!” she shouted at herself. “Do it!” She jammed the barrel in her mouth and pulled the trigger. It hurt. A lot. ✭☆✭☆✭☆✭ Skanky was passing through the tunnel again. Not walking. Flying. She cackled, blood and spittle flying from her lips. Of course she was flying. Rainbow Dash had told her that she could do anything she dreamed here. But there was more to it than that. She being dead felt strange to her. She felt alive. For the first time since she was a little filly, she felt at peace with herself. Brave. Powerful. And… hungry? Fuck it. Shit was up against the wall. The chips were down. It was the third act. She’d be what she needed to be — a lame, goth metal edgelord fucking superhero. That thanatovore or whatever it was didn’t stand a chance. She concentrated, and her horn glowed iridescent purple light, making her light gray fur luminesce. Her speed increased until the glass around her started to crack from the force of her passage. It shattered behind her, fragments spraying everywhere. She burst out into Celestia’s dome. Far away flashed gray and purple light. Closer at hand, things were harder to make out. The crack in the dome had gotten worse, and a gray mist was pouring through. The fake hills and ersatz trees of the terrarium were shrouded in fog. But she could still see movement. There, in the distance, was Eternal. He was running pell-mell, heading for the center of the dome, the source of the light show. If Luna or Celestia was still there, she couldn’t see it from here. But she needed to catch up with Eternal. He had a substantial head start, but he hadn’t thought to try flying. She could catch up. Skanky dove towards him, shooting dark bolts of magic out of her horn. Eternal dodged the shots with alacrity. Damnit. Superhero or not, she was still a terrible shot. Combat magic hadn’t really been in her repertoire when she was alive, so it wasn’t like she could have practiced. “Stupid little piggy!” cackled Eternal. “Where did this piggy thing come from? When did that start?” shouted Skanky. “It was how I always thought of you mortals! Nothing but fat, disgusting pieces of meat! I just couldn’t say it before,” shot back Eternal. “Piggy piggy! Wee wee wee!” Skanky snarled. Oh, it was on. Eternal was headed for a bridge. A bottleneck. A big, easy to hit bottleneck. Skanky slammed on the gas. Her lips pulled back from her teeth as she shot past Eternal. She stopped on a dime over the bridge and started to rain black bolts of death on it. It didn’t dodge. It held onto its shape for a few shots, but then she thought to go for the supports, and soon chunks of it were falling off into the river, tumbling away in the current. By the time Eternal skidded to a stop at the edge of the river, the bridge was just a memory and a few jagged chunks of rock. “Ha! Gotcha!” shouted Skanky. Eternal took off up the river bank, probably towards another bridge. She swung in close to him and fired at the ground in front of him. The earth exploded. So did his forelegs. Oh. She remembered now. From Bridge over the River Canter. Shooting in front of a running pony was called “leading the target” and apparently, it worked pretty well. She should have tried that earlier. Ether’s crippled soul hissed at her as she landed. His torso was a little zombie pony bean. Hind legs kicked, pushing him in a slow circle on the ground. Pathetic. Strange desires filled her as she looked at him. Not sexual desires — food desires. Like 'the waitress had just come with dinner, and she was starving' desires. “So. You eat ponies souls, huh?” said Skanky, stepping up to him. He snapped at her hooves, but she’d stopped just out of range. “How does that work exactly?” “I am only a part of a greater whole! I will tear open your world and feast on its guts! I will gorge myself on your universe! I cannot be stopped! Whore pig!” “Blah blah blah,” said Skanky. She leaned down, opened her mouth, and took a bite of Eternal’s muzzle. The chalky flesh came away easily. It tasted like shellfish. A bit dry, but not bad. She took another bite, depriving Eternal of his speech. What the hell was she doing? This was disgusting! But she couldn’t stop. Something was wrong with her. Something was very, very wrong with her and she loved it. In only a few moments, Eternal’s body was gone and Skanky felt stronger, if a bit bloated. She took a drink from the river, trying to wash his taste from her mouth, and with it the memory of what she’d just done. Light flashed far away. She looked up. The real battle was over there. Resigned, Skanky rose into the air and flew off to help. ✭☆✭☆✭☆✭ She found her friends cowering in the mists in a grove of trees. The sounds of battle were closer, here. Flashes of magical light preceded rending crackles of power by a few seconds, the world of the dead for once giving nodding acknowledgment to the rules of real-world physics. “Skanky! What happened to you?” said Hearth. Her expression was strange — as though she was struggling to be surprised, like a bad actress doing her best with a difficult role. “I didn’t expect to run into you here,” said Ether blandly. His eyes were dull and distant, the eyes of the dead. There would be no surprises for him. Not anymore. Skanky felt her throat tightening. Firmament had her head tucked against his side. Skanky couldn’t see her face. “What. Happened. To. You, “ repeated Hearth. “Come on. Indulge my curiosity. It’s all I have left.” Skanky blinked. “I don’t know? I’m sort of good at magic, now.” “You look… different. I’m not sure, but… I think you look amazing? Like, I’m literally not sure. But I’m pretty sure I should be amazed.” A single, dry little tear made it halfway down her cheek. Skanky hadn’t really noticed how she looked; she’d been a little busy. She hardened the air beside her into a mirror — it was easy for her now — and she turned to look. “Holy fucking shit.” The short, pudgy little unicorn she’d once been was gone. Well, no, actually, she was still short and pudgy. But her and tail mane hovered behind her, streaked green and black. Her green eyes radiated a lambent glow. Best — and worst — of all, her film reel cutie mark was gone. In its place was the cutie mark Eternal Enigma had described but never actually had — a simple, sideways figure eight. “Skanky, I was right about you,” said Hearth. “You are a Chosen One.” “Fuck you I’m not. Anypony dead pony can do this shit if they focus.” She missed her old cutie mark. She’d liked being a filmmaker. There were so many films she wanted to make! But you couldn’t make films when you were dead, she supposed. “If they focus,” said Hearth with a tone that distantly approximated ‘wry’. “Skanky I’m struggling to remember ever being alive. Focus isn’t something most dead ponies have.” “Okay, that's great, but now what?” said Skanky. “I might be suddenly better at magic, and I’d make a hell of an entrance in a goth club, but I still think I’m out of my weight class, here.” “I don’t know,” said Hearth. “I was just waiting for you to get here. I’d hoped you’d known what to do.” Ether poked at the grass with his hoof and bent down to eat some. Yuck. Firmament looked up from Ether’s side. Her eyes were sad but still lucid. “Take me to Celestia. That was the plan, right? We’re under the firmament. Where she is.” “Right.” Skanky took a deep breath. “So we walk towards the lights and explosions. Like crazy ponies.” “Can you fly, and carry us?” asked Hearth. “It seems like this might be a little time sensitive.” “I guess. I don’t have wings, so I must be flying by telekinesis. Let’s see what I can do.” ✭☆✭☆✭☆✭ They whipped over the treetops, leaves nearly tickling their hooves. Skanky held Firmament on her back and carried Ether and Hearth at either side in glowing bubbles of telekinesis. “The trees are always green here,” said Ether calmly. “Because they’re fake,” said Firmament, clinging to Skanky’s back. “Not alive or dead. Probably so the thanatovore can’t feed on them.” Celestia was in view, coming over the horizon as a white and red dot. The gray pony loomed over her, big as a storm cloud, its body insubstantial and blurry from being expanded to such a size. A dark shape flitted around it, firing purple bolts of light at the Gray Pony. Skanky squinted her eyes. Was that Luna? “Cursed is everyone who hangeth on a tree,” mumbled Firmament. “What?” said Skanky. “We made this place as a trap,” said Firmament. “I had to buy Luna more time. So I offered myself as bait. This is my body, broken for you.” “Firmy, stop screwing around, you’re freaking me out,” growled Skanky. A bolt of gray energy split the air between her and Hearth. Skanky swore, and dove and spun. Hearth and Firmament screamed — Ether didn’t seem to care — but the maneuver threw off the gray pony’s aim. Gray bolts smashed into the forest behind them, throwing astroturf and plasticy-looking branches up into the air. The extra maneuvering was weakening Skanky’s telekinetic grip on her friends. She leveled off, flying under branches, losing altitude until her hooves started scraping the dirt. Skanky gritted her teeth as she skidded to a halt in front of Celestia, scraping up her legs. She set Hearth and Ether down, wriggled out from under Firmament, and pushed herself up into the air. She took a place next to Luna, who hung in the air flapping her wings. Purple light glimmered around her body in a sphere before concentrating on her horn, and then shot out in a blindingly bright bolt. The bolt knocked a huge chunk out of the gray pony’s massive body. The bolts Skanky had been using so far had been telekinesis-based; tiny packets of force. Luna was using something else. Skanky didn’t really understand what, but she thought she could copy it. The gray pony’s wound was healing rapidly. Skanky drew a massive amount of magical energy from her body and focused it in a point on her horn. She aimed for a spot near the gray pony’s wound and fired. Her black bolt slammed through the gray pony, tearing out a chunk and making it stagger. Luna fired again, knocking a chunk out of the gray pony’s head. It roared at them, its massive mouth opening to show jagged gray teeth. Skanky pulled together another of those strange magic bolts — it hurt this time, a burning all through her body. She fired into the Gray Pony's mouth. Its head blew apart like something in an old camp horror film. The rest of its body turned and fled. “Did we win, your Highness?” Skanky felt shaky, like she’d she did when been living on sugar and caffeine for days at the end of a semester. She found the telekinetic field holding her up was too hard to keep up. She yelped as she began to plummet, but Luna was on the ball and grabbed her before she hit the ground. She lowered Skanky, flapping down afterward. “Your Highness,” mumbled Hearth, bowing. “You may be at your ease, loyal subjects,” said Luna. Skanky looked around for the other two. Firmament was staring up at Celestia, mouth hanging open in horror. Ether was trying to eat astroturf. He’d take a mouthful, chew for a bit, and spit it out. Then, a few moments later, he’d take another bite and try again. “Did you beat it?” asked Hearth. “No,” said Luna. “Only frightened it away. Your friend’s attack startled it, but it will be back soon. But you brought the soul jar. You have done well.” Skanky bristled, the furs of her coat standing on end. “You mean Firmament.” “Yes.” “She’s not a ‘soul jar’, she’s a living pony,” growled Skanky. Luna frowned. “Celestia lives in unendurable agony. She could not make her sacrifice and hope to maintain her sanity for long. Her resolve would falter, and risk everything. So I took the essence of her being — her free will — and followed the spirit of a foal who had died in utero back to its mother’s womb. That foal became your friend Firmament. Very similar to the technique the gray pony used to escape her prison by creating Eternal Enigma.” Skanky didn’t feel any less angry. “So what happens to her now?” said Skanky. “The universe has sent us a gift, my little pony. You are something I have never seen before — a pony who gained a new cutie mark upon death. A thanatomancer. If we reawaken my sister, the three of us may have a chance at defeating the thanatovore.” “What happens to Firmament, then?” “She would be reabsorbed into my sister,” said Luna, bowing her head. “I’m sorry. There is no other way.” “No.” growled Skanky. “I’ll let the universe end before I give her up.” “She doesn’t belong to you, Skanky,” said Hearth. Luna nodded. “You are correct. Firmament must make the choice.” She looked up towards Firmament. “Child?” Firmament looked away from Celestia. Tears glistened on her cheeks. “Will it hurt?” “I will not lie to you, child. It probably will.” Luna walked over to Firmament, placid but sad, and draped a foreleg over her shoulder. “I cannot make you do this. You must be brave — I’m asking you to give up your life as you know it. But I do remind you that the fate of Equestria depends on this choice.” Firmament gulped. “Will I remember this life?” Luna hung her head. “I do not know.” “Can I say goodbye?” said Firmament. “Yes. But be quick. The prison weakens” Firmament stopped at Ether first. She nudged his head up from the grass with her hoof, and kissed him on the lips. “You’re nice,” said Ether. “I knew you, didn’t I?” “Yes,” said Firmament, fresh tears welling out of her eyes. She hugged Hearth quickly, and came over to Skanky. Skanky bit her hoof, trying not to sob. Tears were rolling down her cheeks en masse, she was finding it hard to talk. “Skanky,” said Firmament, kissing her on the cheek and wrapping her forelegs around her shoulders. “I love you, Firmy,” said Skanky. “Please don’t do this.” “I love you, too. But if I don’t the world will end.” “Then we’ll watch it end together,” sobbed Skanky. “Don’t leave me!” The two kissed until the sound of shattering glass rent the air. Chunks of the dome were falling, landing with resounding crashes that could be heard from kilometers away. “Quickly!” said Luna. Firmament turned and walked back towards Celestia. "I'm ready." Skanky gasped as Firmament lifted up into the air, glowing like a foal getting her cutie mark. Celestia was glowing, too. Firmament rose up, wings spread, and floated up to Celestia’s chest. She slid inside of the larger mare’s barrel, head thrown back, vanishing inside of her. Celestia began to scream. “Pull yourself together, Sister,” shouted Luna. “The trap is failing. It is time to fight!” Celestia, still screaming, flapped her wings, and rose off the spike impaling her. Organs and muscles rose after her, reforming into a pony’s hindquarters in a sickening, if largely metaphoric, display. She landed next to her sister, legs shaking like a newborn foal’s. They embraced. Reunited. Skanky fumed. It must be nice. “What now?” said Skanky. “I can’t sense the thanatovore anymore,” Luna. “It has escaped. It will be heading for Equestria.” Celestia turned from Luna, and smiled a bitter smile. “Then we go hunting.”