“What’s going on? What’s wrong with her?” Shiho Sunfast kicked at the comatose Alicorn Fantasy again.
“Stop, stop it, Shiho.” Sunset waved her off.
Their enemy Stand user was now standing straight as a stick. Its eyes had rolled up and its mouth hung open as though it was in some kind of trance. It had been like that ever since they attempted to question it. Without warning, the false Alicorn Fantasy collapsed like a marionette dropping their puppet. Its limbs were splayed out across the floor before its disguise melted away, leaving behind a skinny woman with short hair, whose eyes were still rolled back in her head.
“She’s… She’s dead.” Cajole got up after examining her body.
By now, the rest of the restaurant had crowded over and some of them were already in the process of calling an ambulance.
“We better go before they come asking questions.” Daring Do tapped their shoulders.
The group left and headed back out into the street, standing over the manhole cover, making sure that there were no cars around before doing so.
“So, down we go, then?” Spike placed his fingers under the cover as he yanked it up. “We need to find Die Die Riches before the president’s ride through the streets.”
“And that we will, but Sunset did give us a sensible thought.” Cajole looked at the elderly woman. “If we split up, even if one group fails, at least the other one can still get the job done. We can’t let more innocent people die.”
Joshi sighed. “I guess we’re splitting up after all. If that’s how it is, I should stay up here.” Blitzkrieg appeared behind him, floating through the air as it curled its legs up under itself. “I can take control of the street cameras and other electronics. That way, I would be able to keep an eye on the French president and his surroundings. You see the lengths I go through for another country’s president?”
“We appreciate the effort, Joshi.” Josher clapped him on the shoulder. “I should go down to the sewers. Down Under will be stronger there.”
“I’m going.” Shiho pounded her fists together. “Die Die Riches still needs to pay for interfering with my life and for killing my friend.”
“It’s my duty to protect your world, and that means I’ll have to go down there too. I think the faster we stop Die Die Riches, the better.” Twilight put a hand on her chest. “It’s dangerous, but I will help you stop this Duckie Deluxe.”
“Then you can count me in too.” Spike put his hands on his hips. “Where Twilight goes, so do I.”
“I’m going too.” Daring Do spun around and held out her Stand. “Yesterday and I could prove useful down below.”
“Don’t you mean… down under?” Josher snickered.
“There’s already five of you going to the sewers.” Cajole held up all the fingers of one hand. “Looks like you’ll be stuck with me longer, Joshi.”
“Spend more time with the great hero that helped stop the Nugget People?” Joshi beamed. “That does not sound so bad.”
“Most Stands gain power the closer they are to the Stand user,” Daring Do swung Yesterday around her fingers like a yo-yo. “We’ll be heading into enemy territory, and who knows how many Stand users are down there. If we run into some trouble that we can’t get out of, it’s up to you guys to stop Die Die Riches from killing the president.”
“Looks like I’ll be here above ground as well…” Sunset dusted at one knee. “Don’t worry. I can keep the president alive. As long as he doesn’t die, I can reset him if he gets injured.”
“Looks like we’re as evenly split as we can be.” Cajole nodded. “We know what we have to do.”
“Dad, you stay safe, you got it?” Josher gave him a friendly punch on the shoulder. “Oh, and don’t forget to get Skyburn once he’s out of the restroom.”
“You too, Josher,” Cajole said. “I’m leaving you in capable hands. Watch out for our friends. Die Die Riches may be backed into a corner, but it’s the cornered ones who you need to look out for. They’re even more dangerous that way. And yes, I won’t forget your cousin. I’ll fill him in once he’s back with us.”
Shiho pointed at him, then furled one brow. “Look after my granny.”
Cajole looked between them and smiled. “Will do, Sushi. You can count on me. I owe it to your mother.”
“Don’t have too much fun without us.” Daring Do waved.
After a quick slew of goodbyes, the two teams moved to their respective positions, with Shiho Sunfast tossing aside the manhole cover with Curtain Call, before peering down. From the amount of light piercing the darkness below, she could make out a small stream of running water, traveling further down the tunnels. The smell instantly filled her nose and she crinkled it and groaned. She was no stranger to strange smells, but even she had standards.
“Looks like it’s time to head down under.” Josher looked past the space between Shiho’s head and the edge of the hole.
The sewer hole led to an old rusty ladder and it began to flake as they grabbed each rung as they made their way down. Shiho was the first to reach the bottom and her frown deepened as she looked down the waterway. The smell down here was even stronger and it smelled horrible. It wasn’t just the waste flowing down the tunnel, but the walls were green and slimy, coated in some kind of disgusting sludge that smelled like dead horses that were dead for hundreds of years.
“So these are the sewers, huh?” Daring Do dropped down after her, wiping her rust coated fingers against her vest. “They’re old. They definitely don’t have thermoregulators down here to keep the bacteria down. Don’t touch the walls. We don’t know what could be living in them.”
“Wasn’t planning to, anyway.” Josher eyed the green sludge and stuck his tongue out. “Nasty stuff.”
“Which way do you reckon we go?” Daring Do pulled out her lightphone and activated its light orb feature, pointing it down both the left and right paths. A holographic ball of light appeared out of the screen and shone brightly in the dark tunnel.
“The stench of weakness comes from the left.” Shiho pointed there. “I say left.”
“The right does seem to flow downwards.” Spike pointed at the water. “If your sewers are the same as ours back in Equestria, that should bring us to one of those converging chamber things that’ll lead out to the sea, right?”
“Yes, you should be right about that.” Daring Do clutched her phone tighter as she gritted her teeth. “You’ve got to blame the creator of sewage systems for that. Years of polluting the sea with our wastes hasn’t done the oceans any good. Especially now as life in the ocean is starting to run dry.”
Josher shrugged. “Well, at least efforts are going out to preserve ocean life, right?”
The adventurer shook her head. “I think it’s much too late for that. Who knows how long our oceans will remain habitable? Maybe I should’ve hosted a fish convention back in Tokyo.”
“The state of your world is… really sad.” Twilight tapped one foot against the last rung of the ladder. “Our worlds may mirror in some sense, but things are far bleaker here than in Equestria.”
“Good grief. Can we stop talking and start finding Die Die Riches?” Shiho interrupted them. “We’ve come down here to locate them. Let’s find them and get out of here.”
“Shiho’s right about that.” Twilight sighed and took a few steps towards the left tunnel. “All this talk is making me depressed. Let’s go on. We’ll worry about the state of the world later once this is over and done.”
The rest of the group had no qualms about that and they decided to head through the left tunnel that led straight through the darkness, away from the sea. Die Die Riches would surely not put themselves so close to another opening, further through town seemed like the better option.
“Do you think people even still clean the sewers these days?” Josher snorted as he watched a rat struggle around in a glob of sludge. It must’ve accidentally fallen on it. “My bet is no.”
“This isn’t Paris,” Daring Do said as she stepped over a hole in the ground. “There’s no dedicated clean up crew or robots here.”
“Yeah, these are the boonies,” Shiho hopped over the hole. “The hell is Die Die Riches doing in a place like this? I know they’re dead broke, but do they have to revel in it like this?”
“I suppose they have nowhere else to go…” Twilight shook her head at the state of this world once more. “No matter how poor, there’s always a place for everypony back home.”
“The number of homeless people has been on the rise for years now.” Daring Do stuffed her hands in her vest pockets. “With inflation getting worse each year, its been getting harder and harder for the less fortunate ones to keep living in proper homes. Community apartments have been the more popular choice of housing in the last seven or so years, but even so, some people can’t even afford to live in those.”
“I see why they would pick the likes of this.” Shiho carried on. “They should’ve just stayed down here like the filth they are. Instead, they decided to surface and interfere with our lives. They killed my friend, just because she was rich.”
“That’s all they do with their warped ideology.” Twilight folded a fist. “Things don’t need to be like this.”
“And yet they are.” Shiho exhaled. “Die Die Riches deserves to be stopped, before they can do more harm to the planet.”
“It surely won’t end here.” Twilight caught up with her to walk alongside her. “Who knows when another rogue group like that might show up? Your world isn’t doing too well. That needs to be taken care of, or more like Die Die Riches would show up again.”
“Easy.” Shiho cracked her knuckles. “We’ll just pummel them so far into the dirt, no one else will try anything stupid like this again.”
“Surely you know it won’t end here, even with your threat,” Spike said. “They’ll keep coming if the world continues to decline.”
“You think I want this planet to get worse?” Shiho shot back at him. “Good grief.”
“Don’t you worry, Twilight.” Daring Do flexed an arm. “I’ll do all I can to help the world. And I know I’m not the only one. Weather Alternate and the Crusaders Foundation are also hard at work to help the world.”
“If Die Die Riches was right about one thing, it’s that we need new people in charge.” Josher thought about taking his cards out, but then he saw the sludge on the walls and decided against it. “We need leaders who will work towards the betterment of our world, not just to fill their greedy pockets.”
“Well, if you think so, why are we bothering to save the French president, then?” Shiho looked at him and raised an eyebrow.
“Because… we can’t just kill off everyone we don’t like?” Josher waved both hands. “That’ll make us no better than Die Die Riches. We have to work for it.”
There was a twist at the end of the tunnel and unfortunately, it led them right into a huge pile of sludge in the middle of the walkway they were on. It reeked and Josher immediately had a hand flying up to his mouth.
Daring Do lifted her light up to the other side of the path and they could see a pile of debris beside an opening in the sewer walls, leading down into a different tunnel where a faint orange light was coming from.
“What do we have here?” she said in a low voice.
“I think we might be onto something.” Twilight pointed ahead. “We should check it out.”
They had to carefully walk around it, but to do so, they had to hop across the waterway to the opposite walkway. Everyone got across easy enough, but Spike almost slipped and fell, but with a quick burst of ice from Winter Wrap Up, he created a trio of ice steps, getting him back to the other side unscathed.
“Imagine falling into that.” Josher nudged him. “I can’t imagine the smell. It’s already bad enough as it is.”
“Uh huh.” Spike dusted the sleeves of his hoodie. “Not a big fan of sewer water myself.”
He dusted his hands, then looked up at his fingers and narrowed his eyes. The others saw him looking and stopped.
“What? What is it?” Josher leaned closer and shone his lightphone orb at it. Then he took a step back into the greywater. “W-What the?”
With the light cast over Spike’s form, they could now see that the tips of his fingers were flaking away, dissolving into the air as they left his skin. Josher pulled his foot out of the water and groaned, but then as he looked at his own hands, his eyes widened. It was happening to him too.
“Hey, what’s going on?” He pointed to the others. “It’s happening to all of you too!”
Shiho looked at her hands and clicked her tongue in disgust as she saw her skin flaking away into the air in the light of their lightphone orbs. Even the bones of her fingertips were flaking away into nothing, and that meant they were slowly breaking down into particles and if this kept up, there would be nothing left of any of them.
“Good grief. These enemy Stands can’t just leave us alone…” she grumbled.
“We need to get out of this area!” Spike motioned to the broken wall. “I’ll bet the Stand master’s in there somewhere. We’ve got to find them fast!”
“Wait, Spike, we don’t know what to expect!” Josher tried to grab him, but his fingers scraped the end of Spike’s hood and he leapt over a pile of sludge and through the darkness.
Spike reached an arm out towards the hole with the orange glow, but all of a sudden, his dissolving sped up and spun through his fingers as they cracked and fell apart, traveling down his arm as they faded away into nothing.
“Aaah-Aaaagh!” Spike stopped and fell back into the sludge, coating his purple hoodie in gunk as the others ran over to help him back up. When they had reached him, the speed had slowed again and now the end of his elbow flaked off slowly like before. “M-My arm’s gone!”
“Something determines how fast we fade away!” Daring Do equipped her right hand with her Stand. “I’m sorry, Spike. I should’ve set Yesterday’s starting point earlier!”
“At least it’s not bleeding. You won’t die from blood loss.” Shiho raised a hand and Curtain Call emerged from behind her, flinging its purple cloth over a pencil she held out in her other hand. Once it pulled off its cloth, she now held a brown wooly glove, which she quickly slipped on her dissolving hand. To her dismay, the glove began to flake away too. “It doesn’t work. Anything on you will disappear with you.”
“Then we need to move.” Twilight lifted and inspected Spike’s arm. Everything past his elbow was gone, bone, flesh, everything. Reduced to atoms. Maybe even the atoms were gone. “When Spike left the group, his arm completely disappeared. Maybe the key is to stick together! Maybe it’s our body mass!”
Josher lifted his lightphone to see the flattened pile of sludge Spike had fallen on and grimaced. They carefully made their way past it, not wanting to end up like Spike as they headed for the tunnel through the broken sewer wall.
Eventually they came into view and they spotted a row of crates, messily arranged against a wall of-
“Coffins!” Daring Do ran through the hole to inspect them. “I didn’t know there were catacombs under Angers as well!”
In here, there were orange fluorescent tubes tossed about on the floor. Temporary light sources that lit up their surroundings, but Shiho frowned at their placements. These lights didn’t last long, maybe about an hour or two, but there were two lying almost side by side in front of all the coffins in the stone walls.
“Someone was here recently.” She kept her ears open, hoping to hear something that could point them towards the enemy Stand master. “They’re still here. They must be the ones responsible for our predicament.”
There was no way she could’ve known how right she was as a mechanical device swirled on a stand just outside the entrance to the catacombs, positioned between two wads of sludge in the sewers. Its mechanical eye watched silently in the dark as Shiho and her friends stumbled around in the dark. It had been bought off the market at an incredibly low price of four hundred dollars, but for someone in Die Die Riches, it was as good as spending a year’s worth of money, but it was entirely worth it.
“Hee hee…” A mischievous voice said deep inside the maze of catacombs. “Thought you rich people could just come into the stronghold of Die Die Riches? Too bad for you, you’ll all be dust before you ever find Duckie! All the rich must die, die, die! Ha ha! Die, die, rich scum!”
A grey figure shimmered in a white glow beside him, raising one of its arms to its domed forehead before placing it on the ground between them. The air pulsed around them and as a rat scurried into the crevice beside a coffin, it squeaked and evaporated into particles.
“I have to kill all the rich…” He twirled a black crystal in his fingers. It was a family heirloom he had, passed down through the ages. It was worthless, but it always reminded him that anything could be perceived as useless. And that was how he saw the rich. They only existed now to die. “Soon they will come. And I will face them. Come, rich. Come and die by my hand.”