Rainbow Dash carefully placed her cheek against the corner of the hallway and tilted her head forward. With just the tiniest bit of her face visible down the corridor, she quickly sighted the four ponies arranging themselves in front of the split door at the end of the hall. They had all stopped moving, simply staring at the obstacle in front of them with blank expressions. As far as she could tell, they weren’t doing anything. They simply seemed to be… waiting for something.
Of course, that didn’t stop her companions from wandering down the hall after her. They both glided to a stop in the water around Rainbow and peered around the corner with her. “What are they doing?” Stargazer whispered in a voice barely audible above the water dripping around them.
“I don’t know,” Rainbow hissed back. “They seem like they’re… they’re waiting for something.”
“What could they be waiting for?” Bearings asked. “They came down here with a reason. Something’s not right about them, and I doubt they all would’ve come down together if there wasn’t foul play going on.”
“Maybe we’ll find out if we wait,” Stargazer said. “Let’s just be patient.”
For once, Rainbow was inclined to agree with the patient approach. Until she knew what these four enthralled ponies were capable of, she didn’t want to try anything. She needed more information to figure out how to dispatch the threat, and at the moment, the only thing she knew was that they weren’t acting under their own volitions.
And then the tomb abruptly began to shake. It startled Rainbow and her companions, and a squeal of surprise died a strangled death in Rainbow’s throat as she covered her muzzle with her hooves. The darkness of the catacombs intensified and lessened almost as soon as it began. Inky black shadows momentarily reached out from their recesses in the stone before falling once more in line. And on top of that, a sensation of anger and rage touched Rainbow’s mind, but it too vanished before she could truly understand what she was experiencing. Dust and dirt fell from cracks in the stone ceiling, and then everything was still once more.
“What was that?!” Stargazer hissed. “The whole ground shook!”
“These islands were part of a volcano once, right?” Bearings asked. “What if—!”
“It’s not the friggin’ volcano, idiots,” Rainbow growled at them. “If it was, we’d already be melting in lava. It’s… i-it’s something else.”
“Then what is it?”
“I don’t friggin’ know! Chill out!”
When the earth had finally settled once more, the four enthralled ponies at the end of the hall began to move again. They split into pairs, two and two, and took positions by the far ends of the door. Raising their hooves, they pressed them against the stone, and Rainbow saw numerous runes and carvings in the doors begin to glow with a white energy. It continued to intensify until it was almost painful to look at, and then the four ponies swiftly retreated once more, their hoofsteps and motions strangely synchronized. After retreating to the hallway, each pony raised their right foreleg, and with a shout, all four drove it into the water, sending a splash rippling out from their bodies. The runes on the door briefly glowed brighter, and with a deafening hiss and crack of thunder, the stone erupted into hundreds of tiny pieces, filling the hallway with debris and shrapnel. Rainbow thought she saw the four ponies be struck with numerous pieces of lethal shrapnel, some even ripping holes through their bodies, but other than staggering back, the four seemed unfazed.
After seeing that, Rainbow had to wonder if Soft Step, Blow Off, and the others were even still alive anymore. She also wasn’t sure if she hoped that Soft Step was dead or alive within her possessed body at this point. What was worse: to be dead and your body reanimated by some evil magic to work towards its nefarious ends, or to be alive and trapped within your body while magic possessed it and forced it to labor towards its goals, sustaining horrible injuries in the process but being unable to react to pain and wounding?
That was a question she didn’t really want answered.
But now there was a whole new problem. The door leading deeper into the tomb had been blown wide open. There was nothing stopping the four ponies from simply marching deeper into the tomb and surprising Rarity from behind. And Rainbow had the distinct feeling and worry that if those ponies mangaged to sneak up on Rarity, she’d end up joining them, someway and somehow. She couldn’t possibly stand for that. After all, she didn’t know if this enchantment or whatever it was was permanent. What would she do if Rarity ended up as one of those strange zombie ponies?
Another question she’d rather avoid thinking about.
But instead of thinking, she had to do something. But what could she do? These four ponies were obviously imbued with some kind of magic that let them manipulate the interior of the tomb much better than Rainbow and her friends could handle. And not only that, but they outnumbered Rainbow and her two companions. A three against four fight where the four ponies didn’t seem to be bothered by wounds in even the slightest bit was not something Rainbow wanted to pit her and her companions against. There was nothing they could do to turn that. They needed numbers for that, and even then, Rainbow didn’t know if that would be enough.
But as luck would have it, she heard noise and commotion coming from the staircase leading down into the catacombs as she started thinking about her plan of attack. A mass of ponies descended the stairs, six in all, by Rainbow’s count, and immediately began fanning out, grabbing the blue torches and shedding light everywhere. Though Rainbow couldn’t see who they were from this far away, she had a distinct feeling that it could only mean good things for her and her friends. The ponies quickly oriented themselves by the direction the torches had been lit, and after a moment to communicate each other, they all began galloping down the tunnel as fast as they could. Rainbow was merely relieved to see their presence; Champagne must’ve gone and summoned reinforcements after whatever had happened to Soft Step and Blow Off, and now they had the numbers she wanted if they were going to force a fight with possessed ponies of unknown capability.
But she wasn’t the only one who heard the commotion further down the cavern. The four ponies abruptly turned in that direction and started marching forward, but they stopped after a few steps. Then, two of the ponies turned back towards the interior, Soft Step and one of the pirates, leaving Blow Off and the other pirate to stand in the water-filled cavern, awaiting the assaulting ponies’ advance. With six to two odds, Rainbow hoped that the survivors would be able to subdue the two left behind in one way or another. Even if it proved challenging, Rainbow knew she could add herself, Stargazer, and Bearings to the fight, turning it into a nine against two struggle. One way or another, the survivors would win the fight that was about to come.
But what about the other two ponies advancing further into the cavern? Rainbow didn’t see any way to stop them without getting forced into a fight with the four possessed ponies before her reinforcements could arrive and help. And they didn’t hesitate, either. Without any delay, the two ponies advanced through the broken door and into the room beyond. There wasn’t anything Rainbow could do except watch. What exactly they were trying to achieve, she could only guess.
Unable to find a means to help Rarity, however, Rainbow could only hope that the unicorn would find some way to hide and stay safe from whatever it was that was coming her way.