//------------------------------//
// l'interrogatoire 
// Story: Quete 
// by Comrade Bagel Muffin 
//------------------------------//

The air was cool and crisp, there was the sound of water dripping somewhere nearby. Consciousness slowly came back to the unicorn colt. The world around him was pitch black. He tried to look up to see where the moon was. Only to find that he was firmly chained down to the floor. There were only a few links in the chain between the iron collar around his neck, and the metal loop fastened to the floor. He stood up in a panic none of his hooves were cuffed allowing him to stand up so long as he held his head low to the ground.
"Where am I? What's going on? Dusk are you okay? Dusk? Dusk!" He tried to look around in his panicked state. The darkness of the room and the chain however completely nullified his struggles and attempts to find his friend.
"Enough," a gruff stallion's voice said from somewhere in the darkness. "I will be the one asking the questions, little colt. And I will only ask them once before using more physical methods of getting answers. Now then colt what is your name?"
"Escutcheon. My name is Escutcheon. Is Dusk okay, did you get her too? Ahgr!" Escutcheon screamed as the stallion bucked him the chain went taunt snapping his neck and throwing him back to the ground. His side and neck were in a race to see which one could hurt him the most. The cave filled with high pitch screeches, squees, and clicks. 
"I said I would be the one asking the questions. Now do you understand?" There was a moment of silence before Escutcheon felt two hooves fall on his side. He screamed. "I asked you a question."
"Yes!" Escutcheon cried. "I understand."
"Good. Now colt, where are you from?"
"Equestria." Escutcheon spit the answer out quickly not wanting the stallion to stomp him again. He knew he'd lose a few ribs if, it happened again. The stallion stepped on the chain forcing his head down.
"Where is that?"
"The other end of the world." The cave again filled with high pitch squees and clicks. His interrogator grumbled something, and stepped off of the chain, allowing him to lift his head a little bit.
"I'm going to ask you if you're a zebra. You will answer yes do you under stand? Yes or no?"
"Yes."
"Are you a zebra?"
"Yes." The second the word left his mouth the collar around his neck squeezed tight around his throat. His chest hit the ground as his fore hooves went to his throat trying to tear off the collar. The room erupted with squees and clicks, as he panicked trying desperately to get the shackle off of his neck to breath again.
"Tell the truth."
"No, No I'm not a zebra!" The collar loosened back to it's original tightness. Letting him gasp and cough as he was allowed to breath again.
"Next I'm going to ask if you've been using your unicorn magic on the shackle, you will answer yes. Do you understand? Yes or no?" Escutcheon's eyes widened in fear.
"I can't us my magic." He heard the sickening crack of one of his ribs as the stallion stomped on him. He screamed in pain until he felt something being forced into his mouth and a foul tasting liquid ooze down his throat. There was another crack as the fracture undid itself and the rib became whole again.
"Answer the question do you understand?"
"Yes."
"Have you been using magic on the shackle around your neck?" Escutcheon whimpered, his ears folded back. The stallion stomped on him again.
"Yes!" The second the words left his mouth the collar wrung his neck. It was twice as tight as it had been before, cutting off his breathing. He struggled to get the truth out before it collapsed his wind pipe. "No." He lay there in the dark, on the ground whimpering as he caught his breath. His interrogator didn't give him much time before he asked his next question.
"If Equstria is on the other side of the world, then how did you get here?"
"I teleported."
"And you cut off the Eternal Storm?" Escutcheon's eyes widened again the only way this stallion could know that is if Dusk had told him.
"What did you do to Dusk?" His anger temporarily overriding his interrogator's attempts to reprogram him. His body slammed into the floor as his fore hooves were bucked out from underneath him. His blood started to freeze as he felt pressure being applied to his back.
"I ask the questions. Now did you cut off the Eternal Storm?"
"Yes." Escutcheon glared at where the voice was coming from. The entire room was quite save the continuous dripping from the water. He was in a cave. At least he knew that now. The pressure left his back.
"Why aren't you using your magic now little unicorn?"
"I'm burned out I can't." lucky for you. He mentally added.
"Where were you taking Dusk?"
"To the other end of this desert to her father and the rest of her colony." The room erupted in high pitch squees and clicks again. "I'm guessing you never made it to the other end of the desert did you?" The was a sharp ungodly pain as the stallions hooves came down on his horn. The strange bile tasting liquid oozed down his throat before he could pass out.
"You're name's not Escutcheon is it?"
"It is." In an instant he was rolled over and a furious blow came down with a vengeance on his gut. Causing him to lose what little food he had eaten the day before.
"You'll answer no, or I'll snap you're little horn off." Escutcheon's ears flopped against his head as he was reminded of the power dynamic between him and his interrogator. The room filled with angry screeching.
"That is enough." A feminine voice demanded he could hear flapping as another bat pony flew down to were they were. "We will have no more of this." It wasn't Dusk the voice was much to old to be her.
"I was chosen by the colony to do this."
"You were chosen to be an interrogator not a torturer or executioner." The other bat pony countered.
"I can't believe you defending this unicorn filth." Escutcheon cried out in pain as the stallions hooves slammed into his gut. He was trampled a few more times before two other bat ponies flew down and restrained his tormentor. He was left there crying, rolled up in a ball on the verge of passing out as they argued in their own language. A language that he could barely hear let alone understand.
"Take the unicorn back to his cell. And throw him in a cell as well, till he cools off." Escutcheon slipped out of consciousness as the iron collar around his neck was removed. "And give that colt some food and water." Were the last things that he heard before he shifted from one darkness to the next.