Lex closed the distance between himself and the ghouls until they were less than ten feet apart.
“Now,” he intoned darkly, “why was there so much blood on that street?”
The pair of ghouls directly in front of him cocked their heads, as though not sure what he meant, while the third one – still hiding behind the water heater in the corner – simply continued to devour its fallen companion’s body. His lip curling in disgust, Lex telekinetically grabbed the leg of the half-eaten corpse and dragged it away, causing the ghoul to squawk in displeasure. It started to chase after the body, but Lex snarled at it, and the creature faltered. “Answer me!” hissed Lex angrily. “What happened out there?!”
“Which street?” rasped one of the ghouls in front of him, a pegasus mare whose wings were little more than ragged tatters. “A lot of them are bloody now.”
“Bloody and slick and lovely to lick,” sang the other ghoul in front of her, the unicorn stallion. “Especially when it’s still warm.”
“Especially when it’s still warm!” giggled the ghoul in the corner, an earth pony stallion.
“DO NOT PLAY GAMES WITH ME!” roared Lex, his patience running out. He canted his head to the side, grunting with effort as he telekinetically flung the headless body of the ghoul he’d killed into the overturned boxes against the far wall. The resulting crash sounded unnaturally loud in the enclosed space, the body flopping awkwardly amidst the debris. “There are large puddles of blood less than a block from here, surrounded by bags of bits! NOW TELL ME EVERYTHING YOU KNOW ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED THERE!”
But the ghouls’ reaction to his display of rage wasn’t the fear that Lex had expected. Rather than cowering, the undead creatures gave him hateful looks, glaring at him with undisguised loathing. Acting on some unspoken cue, the pair in front of him began to move in opposite directions, circling him until they were on either side of him. Knowing better than to turn his back on either of the creatures, Lex continued facing forward, keeping them both in his peripheral vision. “We had a free meal,” sneered the unicorn ghoul from Lex’s right. “And right now, we’re about to have another!” With that, the creature lunged at him, eyes wide and teeth bared.
Lex didn’t even bother to face the creature as it rushed him, instead simply sweeping his crystal-covered foreleg out to impact the creature’s jaw. The blow knocked it off-course, sending teeth flying as the thing stumbled and almost fell from the force of the strike. At the same time, the pegasus ghoul rushed toward him only to suddenly dive, flinging herself at his legs in an attempt to knock him down. Her reward for her effort was a snort of contempt as Lex reared up onto his hind legs, taking a single step back as the ghoul slid across the ground directly in front of him. Almost casually, he telekinetically grabbed her wing, yanking her upright just long enough for him to sink his crystallized hoof into her midsection, sending her staggering back.
Sensing motion out of his periphery, Lex fell back onto all fours and immediately crouched down, narrowly avoiding the folding chair that the third ghoul – the earth pony one – had thrown at him. Slowly rising back to his full height, Lex slowly turned and regarded the creature coldly, causing it to hiss at him and back away slowly. For a moment Lex didn’t move, wondering what had brought on the sudden display of aggression. Had they found some courage because he’d told them they were going to die? Or had undeath simply warped their minds so much that such threats no longer mattered to them?
I don’t care, he decided. Pushing the matter out of his thoughts, Lex swept his gaze over the other ghouls. “What does that mean?” he demanded. “A ‘free meal’; what does that mean?”
The two ghouls he’d battered slowly recovered their bearings, and the unicorn stallion snickered. “Someone laid out a meal for us.”
“Five delectable dishes, with all the trimmings,” grinned the pegasus mare. “Right there for whoever wanted some.”
“Fur and skin, dig right in,” sang the earth stallion. “Muscles and meat, taste so sweet!”
Lex bared his teeth at the revolting rhyme, fighting to keep his temper under control. “Who were they? Describe them!”
“Aw, were they friends of yours?” cooed the mare. “You have good taste in ponies.” She licked her lips in an exaggerated manner, smiling wider. “That pretty mare with the chocolate-colored fur was delicious!”
Lex went rigid at that. A mare with chocolate-brown fur; that was Thermal Draft! “You…!”
The ghoul, seeing his reaction, laughed again. “I got the yummiest parts of her face,” she taunted. “The lips and nose and ears are dandy, but eyeballs make the sweetest cand-”
Her grotesque rhyme was cut off as Lex let out a wordless scream of rage, his eyes and horn glowing brightly. A stalagmite of black crystal instantly erupted from the ground beneath the pegasus ghoul, shooting upward and piercing her torso, lifting her off the ground. Shrieking in surprise and anger, rather than pain, the creature wriggled uselessly, limbs thrashing as she tried to break free.
Lex didn’t give her a chance, still howling in fury as he threw himself forward, his crystal-covered hoof cocking back. The pegasus ghoul covered her head with her forelegs, trying to ward off the blow, but it was futile. Lex’s first strike crushed the bones in her limbs, driving them back against her head. The second left her forelegs dangling uselessly in front of her, reduced to so much pulp. The third collapsed her muzzle, and she spewed unintelligible curses at him through a shattered jaw. But Lex didn’t slow down, his crystallized hoof rising and falling again and again and again until her head had completely caved in. Even then, he didn’t stop, battering the now-limp corpse until his muscles were aching and his breath was coming in gasps.
When he finally finished pummeling the corpse, his rage had abated only slightly, and he ground his teeth as he stared at the mangled wreck that had once been a pony. It’s not true! he seethed silently. IT’S NOT TRUE! Around him, small black crystals were growing of their own accord, sprouting from the walls and ceiling.
Through the whirl of his emotions, he somehow managed to register the sound of a heavy impact coming from behind him, and he turned his head sharply to see what was happening. Behind him, the two remaining ghouls were hurling themselves at the door he’d entered through, flinging themselves bodily against it in an effort to break it down.
The door was just beginning to crack when Lex made crystals grow over it, the black protrusions covering the wood and filling in the space around the jamb. Snarling in frustration, the ghouls sprang apart and turned to face him, their faces still registering anger rather than fear despite their escape attempt. Growling, the undead ponies lowered their heads and dug at the ground as though threatening to charge.
Lex couldn’t have cared less, still preoccupied with finding a way to disprove what he’d just been told. His eyes locking onto the unicorn ghoul at random, Lex took a threatening step toward him. “What about the scythe?!” He almost shrieked the question, desperately holding onto the last inconsistency with the answer he’d been given. “Where is it now?!”
“What scythe?” spat the ghoul. It started to circle him again, but this time Lex turned to follow it.
“DON’T PLAY DUMB WITH ME!” he shouted. “Severance! The floating scythe that can move on its own! There’s no way it didn’t cut down hordes of your kind!”
“Nope, nope, no big peelers there,” jeered the undead unicorn. “Wish there had been. The neck-scar on that stallion I had was all tough and gamey.”
Lex almost doubled over at that, the words hitting him like a physical blow. “No…” The monster in front of him had just described Sandbar, and in doing so had destroyed the last of Lex’s hope that they weren’t talking about the ponies he was looking for. Because while the brown mare the other ghoul had described might have been somepony else who coincidentally happened to look like Thermal Draft, the odds that there was also another stallion with a distinctive scar on his neck were completely nil.
“It was still better than the bones,” continued the ghoul, leering at the memory. “Once you’ve sucked the marrow out, they’re all crunch withou-”
Not wanting to hear anymore, Lex pointed his crystal-covered hoof at the creature, his eyes glowing as he willed the black mass around his foreleg to grow. Instantly, his makeshift gauntlet rocketed outward into a spear, the point punching through the ghoul’s mouth to burst out of the back of the creature’s head. The creature flailed at the sudden wound, gurgling incoherently for a moment before it shuddered and went still.
Lex stared at the corpse for a long moment before he willed his weapon away, the black crystals crumbling into dust immediately. Putting his now-unclad hoof back on the ground, Lex nevertheless swayed dangerously, trying to process what he’d just been told. How could this have happened? It made no sense. None of the five ponies that had come here had been ignorant of the dangers. On the contrary, they were all well-acquainted with them. Even if something had happened to Severance, for all five of them to have lost their lives…it was unthinkable!
“How…?” Lex’s voice was almost a whisper as he looked at the last ghoul. “How was it that you miserable, disgusting monsters managed to…” He couldn’t continue, couldn’t bring himself to say it out loud. For a moment he struggled with it, but the words stuck in his throat and after a moment he abandoned the attempt, rephrasing what he was trying to say. “All five of them? How?”
“Hair and skin and bones and meat,” crooned the undead earth pony, keeping its distance from him, “every part is good to eat.”
Lex shuddered, the rhyme making bile rise in the back of his throat. “You…”
“Face and hooves and flank and chest, if they’re still moving it’s the best.”
That was all Lex could take, and he began to march toward the creature. The thing snapped at him, its teeth clacking loudly as it growled and hissed, but it retreated as he advanced on it, trying to get as far away from him as it could. But there was nowhere for it to run, and a moment later it was quite literally backed into a corner. And still, Lex advanced on the thing, stopping only when he was within hoof’s reach of the creature. “Now tell me,” he said quietly. “How did those five lose to the likes of you?”
For a moment the ghoul didn’t answer, gnashing its teeth like a trapped animal before the corners of its lips turned upward in a cruel grin. “Mm-mm. Nope. Not like that. No muss, no fuss, just a lip-smacking good time.”
Lex’s eyes narrowed, not sure if the creature was answering him or simply gibbering. “What?”
“Fresh meat is freshest when it’s still moving, but still warm is just as good.”
Lex gave the creature a disgusted look, convinced that this particular ghoul was, for whatever reason, even less sane than its counterparts. He had just decided to simply kill the thing and be done with it when it spoke again. “Those five were only a little warm, but that was fine too.”
His eyes widening at that, Lex reared up onto his hind legs, grabbing the creature and hauling it upright as well. Pressing his hooves against the thing’s shoulders, Lex shoved it further back into the corner, bringing his face within an inch of the creature’s. “What does that mean?! Tell me!”
The ghoul smiled broadly, apparently unfazed by the rough treatment. “We didn’t kill them,” it giggled. “When we got there, they were already dead.”