Twilight awoke with a cry of surprise as she felt something jab her in the barrel sharply.
Her cry was immediately muffled by a hoof and her widened panicked eyes follow that light pink hoof to the light pink pony it was attached to. An equally panicked looking Starlight stared back into Twilight's eyes as she put her free hoof to her own mouth in a shushing gesture.
It took a few seconds, but Twilight's heartbeat slowly began to drop back to normal levels and after another few seconds, she slowly nodded. At that, Starlight removed her hoof and allowed Twilight to rise to her own hooves.
The lavender filly took a moment to look around herself. It seemed she and Starlight were in some kind of small empty room made of shiny black stone and lit by a few sconces high above.
Off to one side of the room was a small pile of hay and two buckets that Twilight hoped were filled with water. Another corner held what looked like two very dirty brown mats that looked less like mats and more like large strips of dirty cloth.
Twilight wouldn't have been surprised if that's what they actually were.
Looking directly ahead of her revealed another room outside separated by a row of iron bars.
We're... in a prison cell?
She looked back over to where Starlight was to see her lying on one of the mats and staring out at the room beyond the bars with an intense expression. It was only then that Twilight noticed the horn ring placed on her horn.
Eyes widening, she reached a hoof up to her own horn to see that she did indeed also have an anti-magic horn ring on her own horn. She lowered her hoof and sighed morosely before trotting over to where Starlight was and planting herself down beside her.
Starlight gave no sign that she had noticed Twilight and instead continued to stare ahead of her. Twilight furrowed her brow and followed Starlight's gaze, spotting what the light pink filly was probably looking at a moment later.
Sitting at a large wooden desk in the middle of the darkened room outside was one of the largest unicorns Twilight had ever seen. Solid corded muscle flexed and rippled under his dark brown coat as he leaned back in his chair.
He had a short cropped orange mane and a rather long and thickly braided tail that Twilight couldn't help but raise an eyebrow at, despite her current predicament.
Maybe it's a local custom?
She couldn't see the unicorn stallion's eyes due to them being closed, and just when Twilight began to wonder if the stallion was asleep, he suddenly let out a loud snort that made the filly jump slightly.
He smacked his lips a few times and adjusted his position slightly in his seat, but made no other movements. Twilight waited and listened a moment and sure enough, she could hear soft snoring coming from the burly pony.
The lavender filly frowned and leaned down to Starlight's level.
"What's going on?" she whispered, not taking her eyes off the unicorn, "who is that pony, and where are we?"
"I don't know," Starlight whispered back, "but shut up for a minute, I'm trying to think."
Twilight rose her head and grimaced at the light pink filly, she wanted to say something about her attitude, but decided now wasn't the time. Instead she opted to get a better look at the dark room where the stallion was sleeping.
She couldn't see much beyond the dim light some torches on the walls offered, but from what little she could glean, there actually wasn't too much more going on than inside their own dingy little cell.
A few racks and shelves lined the walls, the racks mostly empty save for a few rusty looking weapons and the shelves made of some kind of slightly rotted wood. Moving slightly so that she could see more of the room, Twilight spotted a small window on the far right side wall.
To her shock, she could see that night had already fallen, the sky outside completely black and full of stars.
Just how long were we out?
"Twilight."
The lavender filly turned to find that Starlight was facing her, though her eyes remained on the slumbering stallion as she spoke.
"I think I can get us out of here, but I need something to write with," she whispered, "I also need you to get this horn ring off of me."
"What? How?" Twilight whispered back with a bemused frown, "If you haven't noticed, I have my own horn ring to worry about. Even without it, I'm still suffering from magical burnout, remember?"
"Just... I don't know," Starlight hissed, "use your teeth to pry it off or something!"
"My teeth," Twilight deadpanned, "you want me to grab the horn ring with my teeth."
The situation certainly demanded more solemnity than either filly was showing, but Twilight couldn't help her reaction to Starlight's ridiculous suggestion.
"I don't see you coming up with anything to get this thing off," Starlight shot back with a glare, "if you haven't noticed, we don't have a lot of options right now."
Twilight went to argue, but gave a grimace of resignation instead and trotted over to the light pink filly. She really didn't want to do this. Even setting aside the extreme awkwardness of the act, unicorn horns were sensitive and she didn't want to accidentally hurt Starlight.
There was also no guarantee it would even work. Nevertheless, Starlight had a point, they really didn't have much of a choice right now. Putting on a horn ring with your hooves was one thing, but taking one off with hooves was something else entirely.
That's why they were more or less exclusively handled by unicorns.
"Alright, I'll do it," Twilight grumbled, "just... hold still so I can get this over with."
Starlight nodded and lowered her head so that her horn was level with Twilight's muzzle. Twilight herself stood there for a moment, eyeing the horn nervously.
"Are you sure there's no other way to do this?" she asked, "maybe we could--"
"Just hurry up, and do it!" Starlight growled in annoyance, "this isn't exactly fun for me either you know!"
Twilight sighed and opened her mouth, moving forward over Starlight's horn until she felt the cool metal of the ring above her tongue. Making sure not to rush it, she gently bit down on the ring and began pulling back. She heard Starlight inhale sharply and stopped.
"I'm fine," Starlight grunted, "just keep going, and hurry."
Twilight reluctantly started to pull once more with a bit more force, ignoring Starlight's whimpers and grunts. At first, the ring didn't budge and Twilight was afraid they had gone through all this for nothing, but then she felt it start to give.
Starlight must've felt it too because she began pulling in the opposite direction. After a few more tense seconds of pulling the horn ring popped free and Starlight stumbled back with a small surprised yelp. Twilight scrambled back a few steps before turning and spitting out the ring.
She turned to see if Starlight's outburst had awoken the burly unicorn. The stallion gave another loud snort, but remained fast asleep. Both fillies breathed a quiet sigh of relief before Starlight suddenly lit up her horn.
A quill and a piece of parchment that Twilight had failed to noticed previously floated over to the cell from the table in a bright blue aura. They slipped through the bars and landed in front of Starlight. The light pink filly wasted no time in tearing the parchment to shreds with her magic, leaving Twilight completely baffled.
"What are you gonna do?" Twilight asked curiously.
"Just watch," Starlight muttered as she focused her attention on the quill and torn pieces of parchment, "this shouldn't be too difficult..."
Twilight stepped closer to Starlight and peered down at what she was scribbling. Her face scrunched up in confusion as she observed Starlight's work. The filly was hornwriting several strange and complex looking symbols on each piece of parchment.
In all her studies, Twilight had never seen such a thing before. She did get the feeling that whatever the light pink filly was doing, it had something to do with magic.
"Starlight, what--"
She was cut off by a sharp hushing noise from Starlight who hadn't looked up or stopped writing for even a moment. Twilight huffed and took a step back before lowering herself down onto her haunches.
Her tail twitched in irritation at being denied, but she could more than understand the need for concentration in this instance. She decided that whatever the filly was doing had to be magical in nature.
As Starlight continued her work, Twilight's gaze idly drifted back over to the single desk. She blinked and squinted a bit before trotting closer to the bars of her and Starlight's prison. Her eyes widened and she smiled before turning back to Starlight.
"Hey Starlight, it looks like there's some keys on the--"
"Finished!"
Twilight stepped back in surprise as Starlight quickly trotted over to the bars, each torn piece of parchment held in her magic and a determined frown on her face. Before Twilight could ask just what she had finished exactly, Starlight closed her eyes and the glow of her horn intensified.
She floated each of the pieces of parchment over to a separate iron bar and used her magic to make them stick. Twilight watched in awe as the symbols on each piece began to glow a bright yellow. Starlight's eye's snapped open and she focused a steely gaze on the iron bars before her.
"Dissolve."
At Starlight's command. every iron bar that had a piece of parchment stuck to it melted into a liquid state before Twilight's wide disbelieving eyes. In a matter of seconds, several of the bars were nothing more than a rapidly hardening pool of metal on the ground, leaving the two fillies free to exit the prison cell.
Twilight slowly turned from the newly made opening to Starlight herself -- her eyes practically sparkling with amazement, curiosity, and a bit of envy. Starlight noticed Twilight's stare and looked back with a smug grin that quickly faltered and fell into a pained grimace a moment later.
"Come on, let's get out of here," the light pink filly said quietly as she stepped out of the cell, "I don't know what happened, but I don't think it's safe here."
"Wait hang on," Twilight cried trotting ahead of Starlight and cutting her off, "what was that? The symbols, the glowing, and then you just said 'dissolve' and... and... they did! The bars just... melted into a liquid! You just changed a solid to a liquid and it didn't look like it took any effort at--"
"Twilight!" Starlight hissed, "Shut. Up. We're trying to escape, remember?"
"But... but the magic! How did you--"
"You probably should've listened to your friend there, Purple. You're really loud."
Both fillies froze.
They're eyes widened and they slowly turned to see the muscular brown unicorn gazing down at them in annoyance as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes. The girls scrambled back several steps as the stallion rose from the chair and yawned.
He took one step towards the fillies and stopped, looking from them, to the empty cell, and back to them again with a bemused frown. Twilight and Starlight stared back with matching looks of fear and trepidation. They had to crane their necks all the way up just to see the stallion's face.
"Now how the buck did you two get out of there?"