Bungee felt his heart sink into the pits of his stomach as he stalked a few feet ahead of Luna and Celestia. Being aware of the surroundings had been easy enough, even with the lack of odours hanging in the air and the way sounds seemed to mute over long distances. At one point Bungee had wandered a little too far ahead of the alicorn and hadn’t realised Luna had been calling him to slow down until they had galloped a short spell to catch up.
Bungee could still use his eyes to scan the vast, flat landscape… but even that only lasted until a grim mist rose from the Styx.
Thick banks of the stuff swirled all around, parting and shifting around the trio as they crunched over the scorched, lifeless earth of purgatory. It hung around them like a light grey smokescreen, obscuring everything beyond a few metres. They had to stick tight to the ruler bank of the Styx just so they wouldn’t get turned around.
Bungee didn’t like it one bit. And as such, he became much more wary of his surroundings.
Especially when a dark silhouette materialised through the mist.
At first Bungee thought it was a man. Pitch black and solid in the banks of mist, tall with defined arms and legs. The Military Working Dog braced himself, ready to charge and pounce, half-expecting it to be Rourke. Half expecting the light of gunfire to flash at any given moment.
But when the curtains of mist slowly parted, Bungee felt confusion replace some of his unease. But that didn’t mean he stood down.
It wasn’t quite a man, nor a pony. The approaching figure was something in between. Black iron hooves, the centaur’s pony-half was covered in matted, unkempt dark steel grey fur, matching the armour covering his chest and forearms. The brimstone red skin covered his bulging arms and his face, his long black hair and beard covering his neck and chest. A pair of horns stuck out of the sides of his head, angling upwards and ending in vicious bull-horns.
His yellow eyes glowed with the malice he was well known for.
Materialising from the mist came Tirek, identified by Luna and Celestia’s joint gasps.
“Tirek,” the princess of the sun hissed venomously, a tone that didn’t suit her usual radiant appearance. But of course down in purgatory – with everything that happened – she wasn’t as radiant as she usually was.
Celestia’s hiss along with Luna’s slight balk from the approaching creature was enough to tell Bungee that the newcomer would not be friendly. Though he needed little telling, he was more comfortable with confirmation of such before he started biting.
But it was while Bungee watched silently; Tirek completely ignored the dog with his malicious smile revealing sharpened teeth to the alicorn princesses. Celestia lowered her head like a reflexive action, horn sputtering out golden light.
But that’s all it did. Sputter. There was no glow. There was no manifestation of her will. She conjured little more than a few sparks, and nothing more.
Eyes widening with a little shock, Luna did her best not to falter, taking a step forward to put herself between the lord of evil and her older sister. For whatever good it would have done.
“Stay back, Tirek!” Celestia warned as she tried to conjure another spell. Again, just a splutter of magic and then nothing.
Tirek gave a rumbling chuckle, his heavy, hoarse voice carrying enough bass to wind both ponies. “Tut-tut, Celestia,” He chided playfully. “Have you forgotten that magic doesn’t work in purgatory?”
“How are you out of Tartarus!?” Luna growled loudly, secretly fearing Lieutenant Rourke had already thrown open the gates separating hordes of pure evil from Equestria.
“I have Grogar to thank for undoing my bonds to that place.” Tirek grinned. “And I have him to thank for subduing that pooch – Cerberus – that loved to keep an eye on me so. Getting out of the gates was easy without help.”
At least that answered the fact Tirek hadn’t been released by Rourke. Perhaps there was still time. But they still had a problem.
A lord of darkness standing in their path.
Moving closer to the alicorn standing their ground together, Tirek’s smile widened further, his eyes filling with something other than malice at the sight of Luna. She could almost feel his eyes over every sleek curve of her body, caking her already grimy coat with filth in their wake.
“You’ve grown up nicely since we last met, Luna. I’ll make sure that when I return to Equestria we will become intimately reacquainted.” Reaching out slowly, the centaur moved to brush Luna’s cheek with his callous fingers.
And the alicorn didn’t flinch out of her stubborn glare.
At that very moment where his skin came in contact with a few strands of Luna’s fur; that was when Tirek was truck. The furious hammer of a guardian angel smote him, smashing him in the chest and swatting him clean away from the two alicorn like he was nothing more than a bothersome insect.
The dark lord of the shadows – overlord of the Rainbow of Darkness – had been tackled and was being held down by his beard, clutched in the maw of a very angry German Shepherd. Bungee had straight up sicced him.
Anything remotely sinister – least of all a centaur of darkness – didn’t get to touch Luna. Not without Bungee’s permission.
Tirek cried out with pain, his hands clawing at Bungee’s face as he tried to find something to grab. But every time he cried; every time he clawed, Bungee would pull harder.
Glancing to her side with a small smile, Princess Luna saw her sister’s jaw was almost on the ground. With Celestia gaping with surprise, Luna quickly walked up to where a teary-eyed Tirek was being brutalized by her canine companion.
Lowering her head to Tirek as he fell still, Luna lowered her voice menacingly as well. “As you can see; Bungee here is worse than Cerberus. One word from me and he will break you in ways you didn’t even know you could be broken. So if you ever enter my line of sight again; I so much as sense you are thinking of me in any context whatsoever, I will have you begging for your life before I end it. Are we clear?”
Blinking away tears of shock and pain, the centaur quickly nodded. Though thinking it was an attempt to struggle again, Bungee gave a warning tug at Tirek’s beard, drawing a yelp from the dark lord.
“Bungee, heel!” Luna commanded, and Bungee immediately let go of Tirek.
Slipping free of the German Shepherd’s grasp, the centaur quickly scrambled away and managed to climb unevenly to his hooves.
“Now get your flank back to Tartarus,” Luna ordered.
Tirek didn’t waste any time to see what would happen if he pushed his luck. With his arms swinging for balance, the centaur turned about face and ran off the way he had come, vanishing into the mist while tripping over his own hooves.
As he vanished, so did the mist that heralded his presence. It began to lift, slowly revealing more and more of the area around them. It didn’t lift completely, but at least it was enough for them to navigate safely downstream without getting turned around or wandering into an ambush.
“That was quite scary,” Celestia admitted, puffing up her cheeks as she blew out a relieved breath.
Luna chuckled with a shake of her head as she moved off ahead with Bungee striding eagerly at her side. “Tirek is nothing more than a bully. He is nothing to be afraid of.”
Following with a smile, Celestia added; “I wasn’t talking about Tirek.”
At the very gates of Tartarus, the source of the mist was revealed. And the so called ‘gates;’ they weren’t exactly gates.
At the edge of purgatory, the world dropped into a steep cliff. It wasn’t a ravine or a chasm, as there was no opposite side. It was just a sudden drop off into which the Styx fell, striking the rock face just over the lip and misting the air with water particles. The earth just dropped away beyond.
Dropping away into a vast infinity below. A dark pit. The dark pit. Tartarus.
And standing at the edge was Lieutenant Rourke, gazing down; considering the prison of the damned.
He only looked up and over his shoulder when he heard the hooves crunching on the brittle dirt. His eyes narrowed angrily when he realised a set of paws joined them.
“I really should have shot the dog,” the man mused darkly as he turned to face the princesses and their stalwart canine guardian.
The princesses of Equestria didn’t look the least impressed. With human-like expressions, that much was easy enough to tell. It was Bungee that surprised the human. He’d seen dogs snarl, snap and growl before. But never glare.
And the German Shepherd was glaring at him. It almost forced a bemused smirk on Rourke’s face; looking as though it was carved out of stone.
Rourke knew he was done. Outnumbered and outgunned, he simply threw down his rifle and held out his arm.
“I surrender,” he announced almost smugly. “Take me to your dungeon. Isn’t that what you pansy ponies do with unarmed men who surrender, right?”
“It’s too late for that,” Celestia huffed angrily with a shot of mist from her nostrils. Luna mimicked the action in agreement while pounding the earth with a forehoof.
Rourke frowned wondering what the folks in Geneva would’ve said to that. Then he shrugged, remembering he too didn’t give any amount of fucks about any of the Geneva Convention. “Fair enough.”
Lieutenant Rourke’s hands were a blur of motion. Neither Luna or Celestia saw the motion coming, as he snatched up an object holstered on the front of his tac-vest. There was a flash of black polymer, and Bungee was already rearing back to leap forward. He knew exactly what was coming next.
Bungee jumped as Rourke’s trigger finger jerked back and a deafening crack rang out, the dog leaping to put his own body between the gun and the princesses. But the dog was too slow. Far too slow for a speeding bullet.
He landed neatly on his forepaws before lowering himself to the ground to absorb the rest of his weight hitting the deck. As he stood there, low and poised, he quickly realised he was unscathed. He hadn’t caught the bullet. But who had?
That was when he heard a cough, and Bungee’s memory flashed. A memory of a desert compound before meeting ponies; before coming to Equestria, and Bungee’s blood turned to ice realising where Rourke’s first shot had landed.
“LUNA!” Celestia screamed hysterically, her voice nearly reaching royal Canterlot levels had it not broken with the tears erupting from her eyes.
She darted to one side, trying to catch her little sister, but Princess Luna was already on the ground. Her whole body was convulsing, dark globules erupting from her mouth as her eyes stared off blankly into space. Crimson seeped into her coat from a ragged hole in her chest. The exit wound blew out her right side, right between the ribs, spitting more crimson that pooled under her like a black carpet.
Celestia was draped over her sister, forehooves trying to plug the ragged wounds torn into her body. All the while Luna was trapped in a seizure of pain and fright.
All he heard was a voice.
No, it whispered, not in a pleading whisper; but a furious growl. No. Not again.
It was a demand that history wouldn’t repeat itself. A demand that no more friends would fall such ill fate again. And it was followed by fierce action to prevent exactly that.
Bungee threw himself angrily at Rourke, barking and snapping as he sprinted. He really didn’t care about living or dying anymore. All that mattered was drawing fire away from Celestia and Luna. All that mattered was putting Rourke down.
He had to finish the mission.
More shots filled the air as Rourke saw the dog coming. But as he tried to adjust his aim the rounds merely cratered into the purgatory dirt around Bungee.
One ripped close by though, tearing a hole in one of the pouches on his vest. The German Shepherd didn’t seem to notice. Valour wasn’t the word to use to describe Bungee’s emotional state, but he wasn’t entirely blinded by rage either. The training was still there. The training to recognise it was Rourke’s pistol that posed the greatest threat. So that was his primary target.
Lunging forward like a guided rocket, Bungee snapped his jaws shut on the wrist of the hand holding the gun, throwing the human and the dog sideways. Bungee’s paws stretched out for landing, his jaws still locked shut as Rourke fell sideways with him.
But then his heart skipped a beat. It was like missing the last tread when descending a set of stairs. That sudden sinking feeling mixed with a jolt of fright. Bungee had expected to land, but didn’t hit any dirt as the two of them went tumbling over the edge of purgatory and into Tartarus.
Bungee let go of Rourke’s arm as they spiralled around each other, bouncing on some outcroppings as they tumbled head over heels. In the confusion the human had let go of his gun sending it clattering off in a random direction, out of sight and out of mind.
And then they hit. A dusty ridge somewhere off to the side of the waterfall crashing down into the darkness of Tartarus. They bounced and slammed to a halt on that little platform just above the threshold of darkness that threatened to swallow them both whole.
They both lay still for a moment as the clouds of dust and grit settled around them.
Their hard landings were both absorbed by the kevlar panelling in their tac-vests. But the unarmoured parts of their bodies were left sore and bruised. Not to mention the fact the impact had still driven the wind right out of them.
Rourke was the first to make a sound, coughing into a fist as he slowly sat up, groaning and rubbing the back of his head. Looking over he saw Bungee wasn’t far away, shaking off the landing and climbing to his paws. With a sigh he looked between the dog and purgatory’s ledge a good dozen metres above. It didn’t look like a tough climb, even the dog could make it…
And therein lay the problem. He wasn’t going to be able to fight Bungee and climb at the same time. So he’d have to do it one at a time.
With a shake of his head the man rose to his feet, brushing some of the dirt and dust off his fatigues. Bungee did the same, only with a vigorous side to side shake that rippled down his body and ended with a fluttering of his tail.
“So this is what it’s come to, eh?” Rourke sighed tiredly with another glance between the dog staring venomously at him and his route to escape. “Literally on the border of life and death, trapped in a final fight with my adversary… only to shake up the usual cliché, my adversary is a fucking dog!” the human chuckled reaching to the back of his belt, a chime of metal sliding over metal ringing out. “Well come on then, mutt. Come and get me.”
As he challenged Bungee, the human revealed he was holding a long bayonet in one hand. The blade’s straight edge curled slightly at the end into a right angled point, with serration running down along the spine of the weapon. With a deft glint the weapon slipped into a reverse grip as he raised his arms to defend himself.
Snarling, Bungee swiftly darted forward, meeting the knife with teeth.
As the dog came into range, Rourke reeled back and rotated his arm forward, aiming a standard stab at the dog’s neck. Seeing the motions, Bungee leapt to one side, hearing a light hiss as the blade cut only into air. But even then the dog was too slow to follow up with an attack, his paws hitting the loose dirt causing him to skid and lose balance.
As he fought to restore his balance, Rourke’s blade angled ninety degrees to one side and jabbed outward. With a thud, the point slammed into Bungee’s side with enough force that would have normally broken skin.
Bungee huffed for air as the blow threw him to one side. But the knife stopped against his armoured vest protecting his lungs and heart. Using the momentum of the blow Bungee managed to turn the attack into an opportunity. Digging his paws into the ground as best as he could, the German Shepherd twisted his head right around and managed to catch hold of Rourke’s forearm, flexing his jaw muscles in preparation to sink in his teeth as hard as possible.
But as he did, Rourke was already retaliating as swiftly as possible. His knife was immobilised, but his free hand was not. Grabbing Bungee by the collar, he lifted the dog clean off the ground. And as he did so, he drove one knee forward, straight and true.
The hard joint slammed into Bungee’s gut, right where the armoured panelling of his Storm Intruder vest ended. The blow drove all the air right out of the dog, forcing him to reflexively let go of Rourke’s arm out of sheer pain. The blow even knocked the dog back – that’s how much force was thrown into it – tumbling Bungee upright in the air and letting him land on all fours.
Before Bungee could even suck in a fresh breath, Rourke lifted his off-foot and swung it around in a low roundhouse kick.
“Kai!” the dog screamed as the blow made contact.
The rugged cordura crook of his boot slammed into the side of Bungee’s face, knocking all sense out of the dog. He span away with the blow yelping, nearly tripping over his own paws as he was whipped a near three-sixty degrees on the spot. It took all sorts of willpower to not just collapse on the spot.
Blinking away stars and the double vision, Bungee did his best to shake it off as he kept his gaze locked on Rourke. In the dog’s daze, the human wasn’t about to sit and let Bungee come to his senses. As predicted, he took full opportunity of the situation and charged, swinging his knife’s serrated edge in a wide arc aimed for the dog’s throat.
Bungee made do with the blurry vision and ignored the stars exploding before his eyes. Angling his muzzle downward, the dog ducked low, shuffling his paws in a short, quick step so he kept low and darted to one side at the same time.
The blade slashed high over Bungee’s head, nipping a few hairs off the top of his rigid ears. As it did, Bungee darted up again, maw open wide and aiming for the exposed side of Rourke’s neck.
But the human saw the attack coming. In fact, he’d tempted the dog into it, impressed how the mutt had gone for the bait. In an instant, the knife slashed back along the same curve.
Bungee caught sight of the glinting steel in the corner of his eye and dug his paws into the dirt. He skidded as he reeled back, abandoning the attack just as it was launched. His jaw snapped shut and he squeezed his eyes shut as he tried desperately to go into reverse to avoid the bite of the knife.
He was lucky it missed… for the most part. Bungee wasn’t that lucky.
A stinging pain seared diagonally across the top of Bungee’s muzzle causing his eyes to water; but he suppressed his yelp. The knife had only nipped his skin, leaving a hook shaped cut, but it had shed blood that trickled down into the fur across the side of his face.
Jumping back a couple of paces, Bungee shook off the pain and blinked away the tears. Rourke’s knife was becoming a problem. Unlike the human, Bungee didn’t have arms or legs to defend himself with. He only had one method of offence. His bite. He needed to get rid of that knife. But the lieutenant was fast to react. Simply biting wasn’t going to do the trick; he still had a sick feeling where he’d been kicked in the gut to testify to that.
That was when the dog saw something. It was the way Rourke was standing in a bladed stance, his knife held out in front and free hand cocked as if ready to throw a punch – it gave Bungee a crazy idea.
Lowering his head like a sheepdog glowering at livestock, Bungee gingerly stepped forward. Rourke lowered his stance slightly, smirking at the dog’s cut. Bungee gritted his teeth. He didn’t bark, he didn’t snarl, he didn’t growl… all focus was placed on what he was about to do.
Darting forward with a sudden burst of speed, he kept his eyes on Rourke. The human did the same, gaze only shifting as Bungee weaved and bobbed from side to side with his approach.
And then suddenly – at the last possible second – Bungee veered off course. Rourke was surprised. It was like they had been playing ‘chicken,’ and the human had won. But in his brief lapse of concentration, Bungee gained the higher ground.
Leaping up to one side, the dog planted his paws on the rough stone of the cliff face beside their arena. His other paws followed as he ran a single gait along the cliff-wall and leapt onto Rourke. Only his target wasn’t the man’s throat. That would give him the opportunity to stab, bypassing the vest and eviscerating the German Shepherd.
Instead, Bungee bore down on Rourke’s knife arm, teeth interlocking over the forearm just above the wrist once more.
But it wasn’t the usual offensive bite, where he’d lock his jaws as tight as he could to inflict pain and hopefully cause the man to drop the weapon. This was a whole new bite.
It was his first dog-fu bite.
He’d seen Samantha do it all the time; not by biting mind you. He’d seen her grab a man’s arm a certain way, and flex it another way. A way it wasn’t meant to be flexed, rolling her own limbs – sometimes even her whole body – and twisting in with a series of lever actions to immobilise a foe. Of course, Bungee didn’t have the same kind of limbs so he couldn’t do it like Samantha had.
But he had just figured out how to emulate the action.
Rolling forward with his momentum, Bungee curled up as best as he could and somersaulted forward over Rourke’s arm; the ‘radius’ and ‘ulna’ bones in the forearm locked in his jaw. As he fell, tumbling forward, Rourke’s body turned against the human’s accord. The limb twisted as Bungee rolled, the man’s shoulder rolling it its socket at the same time, drawing a cry of pain and surprise from the lieutenant.
Bungee’s rotation only ended when his rear paws hit the ground, and flexing his body forward, lowering his chin to his chest forced the man’s face down into the dirt by the time Bungee was back down on all fours. At the same time there was a sickening pop from Rourke’s shoulder, drawing another cry of pain from the man. His fingers extended automatically and the blade fell free, the weighted handle thudding audibly as it hit the ground.
In that moment, as Bungee let go, Rourke rolled over onto his back in an attempt to scramble away. But he was too slow.
Bungee was already on top of him, front paws pinning him by his chest and his jaw wrapped around the man’s throat. Everything up to that point seemed suddenly forgotten to Bungee. He froze, and wasn’t entirely sure why. Everything he had worked for. This whole ordeal. It had been for this very moment.
Was he savouring it? Was he hesitating?
He squeezed, but didn’t exert as much pressure as he should have. His teeth dug into Rourke’s skin, the force crushing his wind-pipe and causing him to gag for air. There was a pop that sounded suspiciously like an Adam’s-apple breaking. Bungee didn’t loosen his grip. But at the same time, Rourke didn’t seem to be struggling.
Opening his eyes, Bungee looked down at the human’s wide eyes. Wide with surprise. There was no fear to be had. But Bungee on the other hand couldn’t seem to calm his heart beating in overdrive.
It felt like his heart might break one of his ribs when he saw one of the human’s hands move down to his tac-vest. Bungee was frozen, unsure what to do. His training told him the lieutenant was going for a backup weapon, and at this range Bungee wouldn’t have time to avoid or retaliate. He was locked in position.
It was do or die… but he couldn’t for some reason. He stayed frozen and uncommitted like that; half-choking the life out of the human.
But Rourke didn’t reach for a backup blade. Instead he grabbed the flag pinned to his chest and tore it free. The flag of blue with a circle of stars. The flag he had served. Penned to it the names of the family and friends he’d lost in a pointless war. Stained on it, the lieutenant’s own blood, sweat and tears.
He pinned it to a velcro strip on Bungee’s vest, then the human closed his eyes in calm anticipation of what would happen next. The German Shepherd indulged him.
All it took was a flex of his jaw muscles and a pull of his head. And with a sickening crack, it was all over.
Bungee’s eyes were squeezed shut. His mouth was dominated by the warm, thick taste of metal. It drooled from the corners of his mouth with the wet globs he’d torn free. He refused to swallow.
His ears picked up the wet gagging noise of Rourke’s final breath… and then nothing. Not even the faint thump of his heart anymore. The man was gone. The mission was almost over. All he had to do was verify his kill.
But when Bungee opened his eyes, he didn’t look at Rouke. He didn’t dare.
Bungee felt empty. He had no idea what to expect vengeance to feel like; but he hadn’t expected this. He had expected a little bit of succour. But he couldn’t help but wonder if this was what Samantha really wanted for him. To devote a portion of his life chasing a dark cause.
It certainly didn’t bring her back. Nothing would.
The dog gagged and coughed. The blood tasted foul on his tongue. It matched the feeling taking over his heart.
It was wrong. Killing out of necessity was one thing. Killing to survive was another. Killing to protect the weak or innocent, it was what Bungee was trained to do. To protect and serve.
Protect and serve.
Killing for vengeance felt unnecessary. And unnecessary death – waste of life – felt a whole new category of erroneous.
Walking to where the Styx cascaded down the rocks nearby, he dipped his muzzle into the frigid water, washing the taste of pennies from his mouth. Satisfied the blood was gone he looked up again.
It struck him hard; the realisation it was over. The mission was over. He had completed his objective. But he didn’t feel like celebrating. Instead he remembered what Samantha used to tell him post-missions.
“Mission complete, Bungee. You can wander off now.”
So he did exactly that – with no one or nopony to stop him, he started walking. Beginning the climb back up to the world of the living.
Standing in Grogar’s basement, Bungee watched the portal into purgatory collapse in on itself as if sensing that its own usefulness had passed. Bricks slid into existence from the blocky frame of the portal, crunching and grinding noisily over each other as they rebuilt a wall in place of the hole from the outside in. The hole shrank and shrank before Bungee’s eyes; before with a dull thrum the hole vanished completely, the pinpricks of purgatory’s light filtering through the cracks flickering out as the grouting magically replaced itself.
Bungee had found his way back to the basement not only following the river Styx upstream; but also following a crimson breadcrumb trail. Little flecks of crimson dotting the earth, making a winding trail all the way back to the portal that led back to Equestria and across the basement.
Following it over the cold earth of the basement floor, Bungee reached the steps and started to climb to the compound’s ground floor. At the top of the steps, he felt his heart sink when the little drips of blood suddenly changed to a large splatter, forming into a dragging smear across the compound floor.
Bungee didn’t get to see much of Grogar’s old home; standing in the dog’s path was a tall greyish figure. Celestia’s coat didn’t have any of its old brilliance left, smeared with dirt and crimson across her back. Her head was hung low, eyes shut with tear stains on her cheeks.
Her eyelids opened, revealing her eyes were bloodshot from crying. Slowly her pupils angled upwards to look at the dog. She looked worse than she had been before. Her expression was a whole new level of dreary. So dreary, that Bungee felt as if his chances of ever being happy about anything in any given future were being sapped away.
Celestia’s expression shifted a little with a flex of her facial muscles as she opened her mouth and asked in a broken voice; “Is he dead?”
A simple enough question. A simple enough answer.
But Bungee didn’t answer. Not only for his lack of ability to do so; but if he could actually speak could he bury shame to actually mutter an answer?
He would never know. But the look in Bungee’s eyes betrayed the answer regardless. The dog expected Celestia to be angry. But to his surprise, she was not.
She simply nodded with a sigh. “Very well.” What had to happen had been done. It wasn’t pretty, but in the end it was for a greater good.
Even Bungee knew that. Rourke wouldn’t have stopped. He never would have stopped. Not until Equestria was in ashes and he had what he wanted. His motivations on the one hand noble – on the other hand atrocious. In a way, a grim reflection on Bungee’s own actions.
His motivations had been to bring a murderer to justice. To protect his new friends – Equestria and its ponies. Noble.
But also to avenge someone. To kill, just for the satisfaction of it? Atrocious.
And still the alicorn princess managed a smile. A tiny little dismal smile of virtual relief. Equestria was safe. They had that at least.
Stepping to her side, Celestia revealed the rest of Grogar’s wrecked compound to the dog. It was a mess. Tables and benches were upturned. Blast damage from the grenade Rourke had dropped was evident, and there was still shrapnel all over the place. Specimen jars were shattered, cracked or leaking. Grogar’s corpse still lay unmoving to one side.
And then of course there was the smear of blood leading from Bungee’s paws to a still, night-blue form.
Luna lay on her side in a small pool of light-absorbing liquid. Crimson stained the corner of her mouth with hard black scabs matting her coat and hair. Her eyes were shut, dark eyelids standing out against the rest of her coat. Standing over was a semi-familiar figure.
Were it not for the smell and the shredded remnants of the costume, Bungee never would have recognised Mare Do Well... or whoever the hell he really was. Where the costume was even more battle-damaged from the more recent fights with zombie ponies as Bungee and the princesses had assaulted purgatory, more of the vigilante’s buff physique was revealed.
Most of the mask was missing, revealing a square, sharp muzzle of a stallion. Only one half of his face was still hidden by the remnants of his mask, along with a cracked lens over one eye. Much of the purple sleeves and body suit were missing, revealing a chestnut coat with a short chocolate mane and tail, dark brown forming a five-o-clock shadow on the end of his muzzle. His hat was still missing, and the cape had been shorn away completely, revealing his alicorn nature.
The horn glowing with amber light extinguished as Bungee approached where the vigilante seemed to be trying to heal the princess of the night. Though all progress halted when he looked up to lock gazes with the dog.
The stallion’s expression didn’t change. Staring for a brief moment, the alicorn considered Bungee, then gave a nod. If he was impressed it didn’t show. Without a sound he turned away from the princesses and their canine friend, and left. Not a word. Not a sigh. Not even a moment’s hesitation. Just his hooves thudding on the floor as he walked out through the compound door and disappeared. If they would ever see him again; only time could tell.
But Bungee wasn’t thinking about the next time he’d see the vigilante. His eyes remained fixed on Luna’s still form. Celestia didn’t follow his gaze. She still had her back turned, probably afraid of what she might do if she laid eyes on Luna in her current state again.
Gingerly moving closer to where Luna lay, Bungee noted the gaping bullet holes in her body were gone. Clearly the vigilante’s magic had done something. But had it been enough?
Slowly he nudged her face with his wet cold nose the same way he had nudged Samantha in her final moments; expecting his handler and best friend to wake up…