The party carried on, but without Daring Do and Rainbow Dash. Daring Do had learned as much as she could from Wun, and had come to the conclusion that Dulcimer was almost certainly mistaken. He had confused Wun’s search for Exmoori experts as an indication that she possessed an artifact; or, perhaps, he might have heard it second-hoof from somepony else who had misinterpreted the situation. Either way, he had been wrong- -and Daring Do was angry that she had actually put hope into anything that the hopeless academic prattled on about.
Rainbow Dash, meanwhile, had no real reason to stay. Her clothing was horribly uncomfortable, and there was no one to talk to. Bon Bon- -or Sweetie Drops, apparently- -had vanished almost as soon as she had arrived, disappearing into the background. The only ponies left that Rainbow Dash knew were Filthy and Spoiled, the latter of whom was not somepony she wanted to get anywhere near. For the others, it was impossible to tell if they were ordinary but profoundly wealthy ponies or if they were actually Caballeron’s henchponies. Rainbow Dash avoided them regardless, although she did at one point have an urge to talk to Caballeron himself. After all, it was not every day that one received a chance to speak to Daring Do’s arch nemesis. Of course, Rainbow Dash had decided that doing so was probably a really bad idea.
The night was still young, but Rainbow Dash had grown exceedingly tired. Sleep, though, was nearly impossible. So, instead, she lay on the bed of small, cheap hotel room, staring at the slightly moldering ceiling. Water was running in the bathroom. Rainbow Dash listened as it stopped. What that implied did not really occur to her until Daring Do stepped out of the washroom nude.
Rainbow Dash shot up suddenly. “Wha- -you’re not wearing clothes!”
Daring Do looked down at herself. “Um. Yeah. I’m a pony.”
“Oh.” Rainbow Dash blushed. “Sorry. It’s just…I’m really used to seeing you in the jacket and hat.”
“I don’t wear them when I sleep. At least not in hotels.” Daring Do stretched, and a pained expression crossed her face. She then approached a small, rickety table where her shirt was placed haphazardly. She began to go through the pockets. “Sorry about the hotel,” she said. “I know you’re usually used to clouds.”
“No, it’s fine. I mean, I’ve slept in worse. I once spent two nights in Applejack’s woodshed.”
“Why?”
“Well, I slept in on the first one and woke up at eight.”
“That’s not that late.”
“PM. So I decided that I might as well just go to bed at that point.”
“Are you sure you’re not a narcoleptic?”
Rainbow Dash grimaced. “Isn’t that that thing necromancers do?”
“No, that’s necro- -no. Never mind.” Daring Do shook her head and removed several small bottles of pills from her shirt’s various pockets. “I would have got us a better one, but I spent most of my money on that amulet.”
“The amulet?” Rainbow Dash turned toward the pitted end-table, where the amulet lay staring back at her, its chain curled around like a long silver tail. “Wait. How much did that actually cost?”
“Don’t worry about it. Like your friend said, I’m in the process of squandering my father’s fortune. I just don’t carry much cash.”
“Friend? You mean Spoiled? Oh no, she is DEFINITLY NOT my friend! I mean, Twilight says we’re supposed to be friendly to everypony, but…come on. You saw her. I don’t even know what Filthy sees in her.”
“Is that the jealously I hear?”
A look of disgust crossed Rainbow Dash’s face. “WHAT? Jealous of HER- -because of FILTHY? I mean, come on! His name is LITERALLY ‘Filthy’! And he’s like a gagillion years old!”
Daring Do chuckled. “Dash, I was joking. You’re too young for marrying for money anyway.”
“I don’t know if anypony is ever old enough. Well, except Spoiled.”
“Spoiled Milk…Filthy Rich…do parents in Ponyville hate their children or something?” Daring Do began opening the pill bottles and pouring out many small pills of various colors.
“I don’t think so. I mean, it’s a pretty loving place…um…what are those pills for?”
Daring Do looked up, and then back down at the pills, and then up again. “Oh. These.”
“Yeah. Those.”
“They’re prescriptions.”
“For what?”
“That’s private.”
“Did you drink the water? Because Twilight says that can give you the trots. And I hate trotting. It’s so slow!”
“No, I’m immune to drinking the water. I’ve drank a lot of it. Drinked? Drunk?”
“Not at the moment, no.”
They both laughed, but Daring Do’s laughter faded first. “These pills are because I’m old, Dash.”
“What?! No way! You’re, like, my age! And I’m what…” Rainbow Dash counted on her hooves. “Nineteen?”
“Then I’m old enough to be your mother. Or grandmother depending on the timeline.”
“That’s impossible! Unless you came in contact with some sort of long-life artifact thing…” Rainbow Dash clapped her hooves to her face and gasped. “You’re not immortal, are you? It all makes SENSE now! When you stopped Wun Hun Dredd from attaining the Lazarus stone- -”
“He never completed the spell. The stone was never activated. And no. I’m not immortal. I just look good.” She stood up and winced, then limped over to the opposite nightstand where her notes were stored. “At least on the outside…”
She sat on the bed. Rainbow Dash could clearly see that one of her wings was drooping and crooked. Only then did she realize that Daring Do was in pain, maybe even a lot of pain.
“Daring? Are you okay? Did you hurt yourself?”
“Only about a thousand times a year since I was your age,” she sighed. She then gave a pained smile. “I’ll be fine, though.”
She lay down in the bed- -next to Rainbow Dash. Rainbow Dash gasped so hard some of the peeling paint under the windowsill dropped off.
“Um…Daring Do…what are you doing?”
“There’s only one bed,” she said.
“Oh. Well- -um- -I can sleep on the floor. It wouldn’t be the first time.”
“Why?”
“Because- -you know- -bed- -together- -”
“We’re both mares.”
“I know that!”
Daring Do lifted an eyebrow and stared at Rainbow Dash confusedly, clearly not understanding why Rainbow Dash was blushing so heavily. “Okay. It’s not like I’m going to force you. But if you’re going to be any use tomorrow you need to sleep well. If you think you can do that on the floor and not wake up stiff, go ahead. Celestia knows I can’t.” Daring Do moved toward the edge of the bed. “I’ll leave space for you if you change your mind.”
Rainbow Dash sputtered incoherently, trying to form a logical protest. Daring Do apparently did not care to listen. She turned onto her side and promptly went to sleep. Rainbow Dash stared at her for what felt like several minutes.
“Well…” she said to herself. “I don’t want to wake up stiff…”
The dream began reasonably normally, or at least as normal as a dream could be. Rainbow Dash was laughing with her friends as she walked through the halls of the Crystal Citadel. For some reason, the hallways did not correspond with the way they were actually designed; they just seemed to curve onward forever, making Rainbow Dash wonder why it was taking so long to get to the kitchen.
Sunburst was there, but he was also Twilight. He- -or she, depending on how the conversation went- -was pushing a baby carriage. Flurry Heart was in it, and Rainbow Dash could also see Pinkie Pie peeking out from beneath the blankets. Which was strange, because Rainbow Dash was sure that Pinkie Pie was supposed to be in Canterlot; in fact, she was somewhat angry because she leant Pinkie her shoes for just that purpose.
Rarity was there too. She was dripping wet. Rainbow Dash did not know why, but as they were walking she kept wanting to rub her side against Rarity’s. Every time she tried, Rarity would laugh. Always the same laugh, repeating over and over again.
Then in an instant the dream changed. The air grew cold, and Rarity was gone. Rainbow Dash blinked and inhaled sharply. The air was frigid, and she was alone.
The Crystal Citadel remained, but it had grown dark. The long hallways that had formerly just been an inexplicable annoyance suddenly became ominous and vast tunnels with no known exits. Rainbow Dash stopped walking. She wanted to run, to fly away, but darkness surrounded her on both ends. Darkness that was not empty.
Something was moving. Crawling. Rainbow Dash could hear the clicking of metal-clad hooves against crystal. They were too irregular and too fast to be a pony; it was as though a recording of the sound of hoofsteps had been accelerated to a manic speed.
Then she saw it. A dark thing skittering across the ceiling. Watching frozen in horror, Rainbow Dash saw it descend silently to the floor, never stopping as it scuttled forward. It was a grotesque, eyeless black thing, like an enormous insect. She saw the glimmer of metal beneath the rags it wore, and heard a dull, low screech like the call of a distant, echoing bird.
She turned. She tried to run, or to fly, but she could not. Her body would not respond. It had betrayed her.
Then it stopped. Rainbow Dash closed her eyes, crying. All she could think about was how if Daring Do had seen her crying like that, she would not tolerate her tagging along in the adventure anymore. But she could not stop herself.
A sound came from the thing beside her: a strange mechanical gurgling. That was how it breathed, though machines. Without looking, Rainbow Dash understood that the thing now sinking its long fangs into her neck was not alive. It had not been for a long, long time.
Rainbow Dash awoke with a gasp. At first she was confused and unsure where she was, or even who she was. Then, slowly, the memories of the world came into focus. She was in a hotel room, lying in bed. It was dark. There was little if any light, save for a thin sliver of moonlight that came through the musty blinds over the small window on the left side of the room.
Then she remembered that Daring Do was also in the bed. In fact, they were not only sharing it, but Daring Do had moved in her sleep and was now snuggling against Rainbow Dash’s midsection, wrapping it in a hug. Her breathing was steady and silent; it was clear that she was completely and totally asleep.
This should have been an overwhelmingly joyful situation for Rainbow Dash, and for a few precious moments it was- -until she realized that she was completely and totally unable to move.
Her breathing accelerated. Rainbow Dash distantly recalled that this happened to ponies sometimes; she understood at least the basics of what sleep paralysis was. It had just never happened to her. She was awake, but unable to move, and it would pass in a few moments if she just waited. Waiting was the hard part, though; for an athlete who prided herself on strength and speed, the inability to move no matter how hard she tried was terrifying.
Just as she was staring to panic, Rainbow Dash suddenly felt a chill run through her. She held her breath and looked across the room. For just a fraction of a second, she thought she had seen something, so she looked again, to confirm that what she had seen was impossible.
From the darkness, a sickly yellow eye stared back at her.
Rainbow Dash screamed- -or would have, had she been able. No sound came out; just a low hiss. Daring Do did not even stir. The owner of the eye, though, appeared to hear it. Rainbow Dash saw the eye move, turning to reveal another eye. There were two. The eyes of a pony- -but a second ago they had been something else, as though the owner of the eyes could not focus both of them on the same spot at the same time.
To her horror, the pony began to move toward her. He- -if he was a he- -was entirely black. In the darkness, it was impossible to see him clearly; all that Rainbow Dash was able to discern was a dark silhouette.
A sound filled the room. Rainbow Dash’s eyes turned involuntarily toward the vedmak amulet sitting on her nightstand. It was humming wildly, to the point where it was in danger of falling entirely off the table. Then, suddenly, the air around it flashed with light. A dim translucent yellow sphere appeared around it, levitating it and containing it. While it was still vibrating- - now with even more force- -it did no sound escaped the magical bubble.
Rainbow Dash turned her eyes back toward the black pony- -only to find a pair of yellow eyes inches from her own. She tried to scream again, but once again nothing came out. In the darkness, it was impossible to see anything other than the eyes. Rainbow Dash could not see their owner- -but she could smell him. He strange and unpleasant, like wings that had not been washed in months, and something else. Something like metal.
The black pony moved. Rainbow Dash did not see him do it, nor did he teleport; it was as though time had just skipped. Perhaps she had fallen back to sleep for a moment, but not for very long. He was still there, in the room. Now he was standing on the other side of the bed, near Daring Do’s nighstand.
“No,” said Rainbow Dash, if only in her mind. “Stay out of there! Daring! DARING! Please wake up! PLEASE!”
Neither Daring Do nor the black pony heard her. She watched as the black pony opened the nightstand silently and withdrew the Manilla folder within. He opened it and removed its contents, then flipped through them silently, his eyes never once blinking. For the most part he seemed disinterested- -until he stopped at a page that was different from the others. A piece of vellum with a black rectangle drawn onto it.
There was a flash of magic. Strange symbols surrounded the page, but only for a fraction of a second. Then the black pony was once again across the room; the folder had been filled and returned to its exact location. Now he was moving near the table on the far side of the room. As he passed it, though, he paused. For a moment he looked at the clothing lying on it. Then, with a surprisingly swift motion, he removed something from one of Daring Do’s pockets.
“Don’t…touch…that…” whispered Rainbow Dash.
Daring Do stirred. She frowned. “No,” she muttered. “Pontrancio…please don’t let me go…”
“Interesting,” said a voice. Rainbow Dash looked up at the dark shape that was now staring at her. His voice was unpleasant. It immediately brought to mind the sort of sleazy pony who could commonly be found hanging out in a dark alley- -although it was hoarser, as though the owner had not spoken in some time. “You. Primitive. You can hear me, can’t you?”
Rainbow Dash tried to reply, but was not able to. In truth, she could not quite hear him. His voice was barely as whisper, and there was a chance he was not even speaking in any way that could be deemed remotely coherent. Rather, Rainbow Dash heard most of his meaning inside her mind rather than in her ears.
“You can. So listen closely. You are going to want to wake up. NOW. Any longer, and it will be too late.”
Rainbow Dash was surrounded by light and she shot up, screaming.
“Dash,” said Daring Do, her face clearly worried in the glow of the electric tubes she had lit. “What is it?”
“The black pony- -did you see him?”
“Black pony? There isn’t a black pony. You were dreaming.”
“But…” Rainbow Dash realized that Daring Do was dressed in her adventurer outfit.
“Get dressed,” she said.
“What time is it?”
“We’ve only been out for three hours. Then I woke up, and I suddenly realized it.”
“Realized what?”
“Caballeron. He’s after something in Wun’s collection. That’s why he was there. It’s not Exmoori, but it doesn’t matter. We have to get there before he does. Now come on!”