//------------------------------// // Part 9 // Story: Silent Ponyville: Reunion // by Chapter 17 //------------------------------// Silent Ponyville: Reunion What a nightmare. Part 9 ------ For a length of time spanning mere minutes it sure felt like the longest wait of their lives as they stood next to one another in their bedroom watching a timer on the nightstand tick down. "..." "..." "...how did this happen?" "I don't know!" She cried out in reply as though a dam had burst, "It's just like you said, I wasn't supposed to be in season last time, but here I am now, when I should be, and I'm not! How am I supposed to know anyway?! You're the doctor here! You tell me!" "What? How am I supposed to know either?" He replied as she began pacing, "I only just this morning found out about any of this. Why didn't you tell me sooner if this was happening all week anyway?" "I didn't think it was important, you didn't either at first, remember?! And just what are you implying by asking that anyway?!" She stopped pacing to look right at him. "You don't need to yell. I'm not implying anything." It was something of a lie of course. He had the same bits of paranoia that sometimes plagued any young stallion still piecing together the life they aspired to, but he wasn't going to give any of them a foothold in his mind, and he most certainly wasn't going to voice them. "The hay you're not! What is it?! Do you think I'm some sort of crazy mare obsessed over getting a foal?! Do you think I lied to you to get one?! Is that it?!" She advanced upon him, forcing him to take step after step backward until his hind legs hit the bed. "No! That's ridiculous! I've never thought any of that and I don't think that now!" He said, his voice also gaining an edge as she so aggressively put him on the defensive. "So what I'm just ridiculous to you now?!" She said, pushing their snouts together as she glared at him. He wasn't going to back away this time. "Oh stop it! I haven't said one word to imply anything at all and you know it! You're the one standing here making oddly specific denials out of nowhere, did you think about that?! Where is all this coming from all of a sudden?!" He retorted, finally matching the volume of her voice. "Maybe I'm just scared out of my bucking mind!" She shouted back at him. ... He'd never seen a pony wilt so devastatingly as she did just then. All the anger in her melted to nothingness and she took a few steps back, letting her head droop to just above the floor as she blinked back more tears. He could swear he physically felt the sudden whiplash in her temperament, but he soon adjusted and placed a gentle hoof on her shoulder, "What are you scared of? I...I've heard you talk about having a foal fondly...I can understand being upset and worried but...scared? It just doesn't seem like you." She leaned the side of her head against his foreleg and sniffed, a few tears gliding down her cheeks, "I'm scared...I'm scared because- Ding! They both looked at the timer on the nightstand, then at each other before they hurried out to look at the test lying on the bathroom counter. She went in first, leaving Lance to once more stand in the hallway looking in. She looked at the test. ... She looked at the box. ... She looked at the test again in hopes that reality had somehow changed in the seconds she'd been looking away. It had not. She backed away from the counter and sat down with her back to the wall, face contorting into a sorrowful grimace. Her eyes shut tight in a futile attempt to restrain her tears and a few strained sobs forced their way out of her. Lance darted into the room to comfort her but found himself with her forelegs around his neck hugging him tightly after she threw herself into him. "Please, please don't leave, please don't leave pleasedon'tleavepleasedon'tleave!" She begged him adamantly as she cried into the side of his neck. He was momentarily stunned before he placed a foreleg around her neck in return, "Is that why you're acting like this? Why would I ever leave you? I love you." She sniffed and let him go, wiping some tears from her eyes before replying, "I...I never told you why my mother is so hyper critical of you." "I just assumed it was because she was your mother." He interjected. "Heh...well, I guess that is part of it." She admitted while actually managing to smile briefly, "But that's not all of it. You remember how distant my parents are with each other?" He nodded. "That's because my father isn't actually my father..." She averted her eyes while revisiting the painful memory, "My actual father was somepony my mother met just after she'd moved into her own place...they...hit it off really well. She always told me that, aside from the time she spent with me while I was growing up, the couple of years she spent with him were the best years of her life. Then they...made a mistake in timing...and then she was pregnant with me...and he just left while she slept after making all sorts of promises. She never saw him again after that and I've never met him. Mother didn't think she could raise me on her own so she started making eyes at one of her more well off stallion friends that she knew fancied her." "So, she...didn't really love him?" "She...liked him enough I guess. I grew up loving him just like anypony would love their father and I didn't think anything was the matter. But then when I was old enough and mother caught me paying a bit more attention to colts she took me aside and told me the truth. Ever since then it's been 'look for a rich colt' this and 'make sure he can take care of you' that and 'get some dirt to use if he tries to leave' this." She couldn't help but give a short, subdued chuckle, "You're lucky I wanted to tick her off enough at the time or I never would've learned that was a bunch of horse apples." Lance nodded with a smile, sensing she wasn't done yet and letting her continue. "And now here we are...in the same situation that broke her heart and made her so bitter. That's why I'm scared Lance. All those things she told me are just suddenly grabbing me by the neck and I never thought they'd be able to." She raised her eyes to look at him again as fresh tears streamed down her cheeks once more, "I can't make them shut up in there either...and it's not fair to you because you've never done anything to make me think they're right...and even when I knew that, I still yelled at you just because I thought if I could make myself hate you it wouldn't hurt as much when you left." She broke down into another sobbing fit, this one much quieter and all the more heart rending for it. He found it impossible not to pull her into another hug and hold her as she let out the anxiety that had been hiding for years unseen waiting to pounce at such a vulnerable moment in her life. Lance knew he had to do something about this. Something that would quash the fears her mother had planted in her once and for all. He wouldn't have her going to sleep every night plagued by doubts that he would be gone in the morning. When she had cried herself out and was quietly nuzzled against him he spoke up, "I need to go do something." She moved back out of his embrace, "What? What do you need to do?" "I can't tell you yet." "..." She looked away biting her lip at the thoughts that suddenly welled up in her head. "What can I do to make you know I'll be right back?" Lance asked. "...I don't think there is anything." "Then...you're just going to have to trust me." "...Okay Lance. I'll try." ------ He was snapped out of it by the sharp bite of the bars against his side as he stumbled sideways away from the slats with that same post impact headache that had afflicted him twice before. He didn't bother looking back at door 303 again, it would be gone. Knowing he would soon recover he pushed ahead to the conspicuously clean door and reached for the knob knowing full well it would probably be locked with some key three floors down hidden behind Celestia knows what that would only let him get to it after he'd solved some riddle or another. It opened. Lance stood there and blinked at the rusted over elevator interior for a moment. He looked over at the door in disbelief, but its apparent ease of use hid no secrets, it really had been as easy as opening it. The only odd thing was the message carved into the inner side of the door: "The way out is useless." "How encouraging." He muttered before limping into the elevator and turning. There was no button panel in the expected spot right next to the door. He began looking around for it but his search was interrupted by the cable snapping two floors above. The fall was too quick for him to even react but the sudden drop and equally sudden impact sent him right to the floor. Lance struggled back to his hooves coughing at all the dust that had been kicked into the air. The way out of the elevator and into the ground floor was no plain door. It was like a bloody, rusted, bank vault door. The suspiciously clean locking mechanism in the center was a keypad bearing an intimidating array of twenty six buttons that covered the entire alphabet without so much as even a hint about the length of the needed code. He looked up to see if there was an emergency hatch in the top of the elevator but there was only another grid of bars keeping him inside. Lance was trapped, and the only way out was a code he couldn't even backtrack to look for. Also there was a chorus of bending, groaning, snapping metal parts above him. His mouth went dry. She had gone back to the elevator shaft and waited. Now that she had him contained in a nice little rusty sardine can she was burrowing down through each of the barriers to peel it open and do to him what she had done to that scavenger. He looked around frantically for any way that he might possibly escape but found nothing. His panic reached new heights as his elevator car prison shuddered with the weight of the beastess that had just landed upon it and his watch buzzed in alarm. "Thinkthinkthinkthink!" He chanted in order to keep his mind from spiraling into uncontrollable, useless terror. WAIT! The way out was useless. The keypad was for entering letters. He knew then that the door worked fine, he only needed some useless letters to open it, and the saint's sequence that had undone one of Door 303's padlocks just so happened to have four of them. Lance scrambled over to the keypad and held up a shaky hoof as he tried to remember the letters through the screeching sound of impending death above him. ...C! The first letter had been C! What was the second what was the second- H! He felt the hot kiss of vented steam on his flank shortly before one of the bars above snapped. Third letter third letter third letter what was the third letter. His hoof trembled in front of the keypad, just as useless as his memory was proving at that very instant. Another bar snapped. Then another. And another. He heard the bars screech in protest as she started applying force and bending them inward. He didn't dare look up. Seeing her straight on would only guarantee he'd never remember in time. "Nonononononono-" ... N, O! The vault door gave a loud clank as the inner mechanism unlocked. Lance completely disregarded the pain as he threw himself against the door and pushed with all his might until the open crack was big enough for him to squeeze through. The ground floor's floor wasn't the same poorly welded together metal as above. It was just like the bottom of the stairwell: a grate over a bottomless pit of darkness. Whatever hid behind the barred in skins that served as walls were also more active than ever, Lance could clearly see that the objects pushing out from behind the stretched skins were hooves and faces. He flew. It was a single hallway once more but this one turned into the central hallway rather than go straight across. He rounded the corner just as she got through the top of the elevator car and galloped after him. Lance was overjoyed to see another iron door sitting there open for him ready to save his life just as the last one had. The instant he had passed through it he was rewarded with the loud metallic clang of its closing behind him. His watch buzzed louder as she approached on the other side but another angry strike against the outside assured him this door too would hold up against anything she could dish out. Lance took the opportunity to catch his breath, letting his head hang low as his entire body trembled. The buzzing of his watch quickly quieted down as she galloped away from the door to hopefully leave him be. Looking back up after a few moments revealed the welcome sight of an 'EXIT' sign glowing red in the darkness ahead. Just a bit more and he would be free of this nightmare. As he limped toward the sign he saw the bars on his left give way to another chain link fence window. It showed the bottom of the hollowed out space in which the now absent hanging pony had resided. It was a floor of dirt that made it look like Lance was gazing outside as the beam of his light searched back and forth to if anything was out there. He only found one thing. It was a trash bag wrapped in chain. Something suspiciously pony shaped was inside and deathly still. Lance didn't so much lose interest as had his interest suddenly repelled by the sight. He turned back to limp closer to the sign but stopped as he noticed that his watch had grown quieter but hadn't stopped buzzing entirely. His light moved up and down the hallway until he found the source of the noise, a drowning mare lying right in front of his door to salvation. This discovery was coupled with another disturbing revelation signaled by the sound of the slats from the floor above snapping from a certain monster mare's advance. The welded together metal slabs above him that served as the floor of every story above were rusted so badly this far down that a weak spot had formed just above the exit. She was going to break through it. Drowning mare or not he needed to be out of there before that happened. The creature in question quickly twitched to life and got to its stumps as he approached. Lance backed away as she started to shamble toward him making the choking noise that sickened him so much. He watched how she moved, swinging the mask blades back and forth as she limped toward him. The option of jumping or flying over her was briefly considered before the mental image of his own guts spilling out of the belly he had so enthusiastically presented to her ejected it straight out of his head. He only had one more idea and he needed to act on it fast. The beastess above hammered her hooves against the weak spot of the floor once. Lance had been forced back to the chain link window by now, trying to grasp the timing of the back and forth motion the drowning mare was continually making. He got the rhythm at last and when next he saw his chance he leaped forward with his good leg, grabbed the side of her head as she began swinging, and used her own momentum to slam her head into one of the bars opposite the chain link window. It proved less hardy than he had hoped and broke, hurting the drowning mare but not knocking her out like he had hoped. He gave a cry of pain as her swing back the other direction caught his unwounded foreleg. Rust colored dust dropped from the ceiling in front of the door as a crack suddenly appeared from another blow from above. Lance acted as quickly as his wounded legs would let him. He turned as she was winding up for another swing and bucked with his good hind leg, resulting in her bashing her own head against the already considerable force of his hoof. Her skull audibly cracked and she dropped to the floor, twitching and convulsing in pain but unable to move as blood flowed copiously from the gash in the side of her head and dripped down into the abyss below. Another strike widened the crack a considerable amount, just one more and the once shrouded mare would be through. He stood and bucked his good back hoof into the drowning mare's head again. She was still shaking, crying out in agony between choking convulsions. Lance couldn't just leave her there like that. He couldn't possibly explain why but he just couldn't. Another buck produced another sickening crack of bone and she finally lay still. He quickly shook some of the blood off of his fetlock and then flew toward the door. Too late. The ceiling collapsed in front of him in a flurry of rust, falling metal, and four metal shod hooves that landed with a clang against the floor grating. He angled his wings to counter his forward momentum and in the few moments it took him to bleed off enough speed to turn around he got his first look at her without a sheet covering. The reason for the irregular length of her snout wasn't due to her snout at all, but rather the angled rectangular metal muzzle that covered it. Steam was released from the ventilation slits running along each side of it, and the two circular joints at the back turned as the metal bar of her jaw dropped. Her eyes along with the rest of the upper half of her head was hidden by a visor made of the same metal, her horn looking less like a unicorn's horn and more like a long angular spike. Her body was striped by cuts worn in by cruel chains that had once confined her, and in place of a cutie mark on her flanks there were bloody red hexagons where the skin had been cut off entirely. Her tail was a deep sanguine color and drifted unnaturally as though it were submerged in water. The pair of tan wings spread wide also made it apparent that this was no unicorn he was dealing with. Lance let out a cry of terror and fled from the this horrid mockery of Equestria's sovereign race but was stopped midair and slammed into the grated floor by the black tendril around his back leg, just as before. The sovereign let out a distorted but clearly pleased hum from behind him as she started dragging him backward. As he looked up to frantically claw at the floor in whatever way hooves could possibly claw he saw that the heavy iron door that had moments ago halted her had transformed into the door 303 from the top floor, complete with the two yet to be undone padlocks and chains. ------ When he opened the door to enter their apartment he found her lying there in the living room. She'd been waiting there the whole time, a tissue box sitting next to her, tear stained tissues crumpled up and dotting the floor around her. The sound of the door opening had drawn her attention and now she looked up at him, both happy to see his return and worried from not knowing exactly what was going on. Lance just smiled back at her and neglected to set down his saddlebags as he motioned her over. "Follow me." "Okay." She said as he stood up. He lead her down the hall to the stairwell and then up to the roof access. There were clouds dotting the early afternoon sky but it was by no means a particularly cloudy day, the bits of concentrated vapor only serving to provide some pleasant scenery and give the weather ponies napping spots. Otherwise they were the only ones on the lonely rooftop. Perfect. Lance lead her over to just the right spot and motioned for her to sit down. She complied, looking around and then back to him, confused about what was going on as he stood before her and started to speak. "I came here to Manehatten to get my medical degree, and just that. I never thought of making any friends. I never thought of meeting a mare. I certainly never thought of meeting the love of my life, but that happened when I met you. I never planned on having an adventure either, but when I met you, that happened too. My world's changed from a lonely, unforgiving trial to be endured to a warm, welcoming place where I see potential on every horizon. Thanks to you I've seen some of the most wonderful parts of life that I had long ago given up on ever seeing, but that was before I almost crashed right into your garden those years ago. I want to see more of life with you..." Lance paused to pull a dark blue box out of his saddlebag. He opened it, set it on the ground, and turned it to face her before nudging it towards her with his snout. She gasped and brought a hoof to her mouth. Inside the box was a plain golden hoof bracelet adorned with three modestly sized diamonds. Her already reddened eyes welled up with yet more tears as she looked up from the box to him, realizing just what was happening. This time she was crying for a much happier reason. "In fact, I want to see all of it with you...Posey...will you marry me?" He was knocked off his hooves as she tackled him to the ground in a hug yelling yes for all the world to hear. ------ Well...he was going to die. At least the last memory that had been ripped to the forefront of his mind had been a very dear one. Curiously enough the door to 303 was still there, for the first time. One could hardly blame Lance for not noticing as his headache raged and the sovereign was pulling him closer. He felt the tendril withdraw and for a split second the hope of getting up and running rose in his heart only to be squashed by the two metal covered hooves that were suddenly holding his forelegs down as she stood over him. Lance tried pulling out of her grip with his two hind legs to no avail. She had him pinned again. His breath started coming faster as the sheer gut wrenching realization of his own utter helplessness sank in while she did...nothing. WHAT IS SHE WAITING FOR?! Her head lowered and he felt the side of her metal muzzle travel slowly down his mane as she took in another long breath just like she had at the elevator shaft. Lance's skin crawled and he felt a renewed need to struggle, "No no let me go get away from me!" She replied with a grunt of amusement overlaid by some strange beast's growl and let one of his forelegs go so she could backhoof him across the face. The motion came across as a mere tap but the force of the blow made his head swim so that he was able to do little as the tendril wrapped around his neck, lifted him into the air, and slammed him into the ceiling. His back popped and the impact from the ensuing fall forced the air out of his lungs, leaving him writhing in pain and disoriented with blood streaming down the side of his face as she re-assumed her position with her hooves pinning his forelegs. A soft hiss and the heat of released steam on the back of his neck brought him out of it. Something tugged at his mane and it suddenly fell free, making him realize with a start that she had just taken the pink hairband that had been holding it back. "Don't take that! Give it-hrmfffff!" Lance began to protest but was cut off as the black tendril wrapped once around his neck before moving up to ensnare his snout and hold his mouth shut. There was another hiss above him, this one much more severe. Her jaw reached down, gripping down hard on his wing, forcibly extending it despite all of his efforts to shut it. He let out a muffled cry as pain shot through his back. But it was too late, she wasn't going to stop. CRACK! Lance screamed louder than he ever had before as the sovereign snapped his wing. The tendril had let go of his snout seemingly only to let her listen. He tried to start struggling again but all it accomplished was to make him realize she still had his wing gripped in her jaw. She still wasn't going to stop. His agonized wail filled the hallway with renewed vigor as she planted a hoof in his back and started to pull, slowly, savoring every subtle snap as the internal tissues that kept his wing attached to the rest of his body broke from the strain one by one. With one final crunch Lance lost all feeling in his wing, moments before she let the severed extremity drop to the ground right in front of his wild, terrified eyes. She was tearing him apart. Her jaw clamped down on his other wing, and she quivered with delight at the resultant cry as she started to apply pressure again... Lance was unexpectedly yanked off the ground as something caught her attention and she neglected to release his wing before standing back to her full height. Despite the distraction his wing snapped all the same from the sudden jerking movement that put the entirety of his weight on the already partially cracked wing bone all at once. Through the haze of pain, fatigue, and horror that had practically rendered him catatonic he saw what was fascinating her so much that she couldn't even enjoy the pain she was inflicting upon him. An inky black substance was seeping out from beneath Door 303 and traveling up to the locks in thin trails resembling a swarm of ants more than the liquid it was. When the black trails touched the iron of the chains and padlocks they spread much more rapidly across their surface, now adopting a look more reminiscent of veins. The two padlocks clicked open and fell to the grated floor, soon to be joined by the chains that held the door shut. Door 303 opened. Lance became aware of a soft ringing in his ears as something emerged from the darkness behind the door. It stood just slightly shorter than the sovereign, and was decidedly less armored. The shape of its head was suggestive of a colt, but it was otherwise devoid of distinguishing characteristics. The front of the snout was smooth while the sides were visibly strained, like some kind of skin mask had been pulled tightly over its mouth and sewn in place. Lance could even see the scar going around its face where the stitch had been made and then poorly removed, and another such seam scar traveling up the head from the top of the first scar ring. This colt's ears were also missing, and not just in the sense that the ear flaps had been severed. There were two deep depressions in the side of his head there the ears should have been, indicating that the internal hearing mechanisms had actually been carved out to render him deaf, trails of dried black blood left running down each side of his head. He was wearing a white smock that was cut in half from the bottom of the chest down, the two halves held against his forelegs by several bandages on each leg similar to the bandages that covered several other spots of his body. Every piece of cloth he wore was stained in various places with the same black substance that had seeped from beneath the door, apparently the creature's own blood, and the same stitch seam scars from his head could be seen over his entire body. The sovereign was not happy to see him and let it be known with an angered growl. She slammed Lance to the ground again, planted a hoof in his back, and tore off his last broken wing in one quick agonizing yank before kicking him aside into the bars. He was a cut, bruised, dismembered, bleeding, terrified mess, and it was all he could do to just tuck his hooves beneath himself and lie there beside the bars trying not to pass out while pretending he didn't exist. She charged the deformed interloper, who didn't seem the least bit fazed by the attack. Even when her horn pierced through his chest and he was lifted off the ground his only response was to quietly stare directly at her from his spot hanging there impaled. The ringing in Lance's ears grew louder. The sovereign seemed fine at first but then her legs began to slowly give out like her strength was being sapped away. Her body began to tremble and she let the deaf colt's hooves back to the floor despite her best efforts. The mysterious malaise pulled her down to the floor, retracting her horn from his chest, and with a final resentful groan she fell over onto her side and was still. The deaf colt stood there gazing down at her as the black blood oozing from his chest wound suddenly vaporized into what resembled a black flame that covered the injury then quickly died out, leaving the spot on his chest where the grievous damage had been inflicted free of any deformation that had not been there when he walked in. Then he looked straight at Lance. He was still there cowering against the bars. There wouldn't be any running now. The leg that the scavenger had attempted to feast on would always slow him to a limp, and with his wings gone it was no longer something he could bypass. More immediately he had lost an alarming amount of blood, and still more was dripping down into the abyss below. Lance would be surprised if he could make it ten more steps in this condition. If this deaf colt wanted him dead he supposed it might be the preferable way to go rather than the slow death the sovereign had seemed intent on. Another rush of fear washed over him as the deaf colt stepped over her still form and walked toward him. Lance weakly shrank back against the bars as he grew closer and closer. The deaf colt stopped in hoof's reach of him and inspected him from head to tail, giving Lance a tilt of the head when they finally locked gazes with one another. The staring contest was promptly ended when the deaf colt's hoof struck the bruised and bloodied side of his face. ------ He awoke in an unfamiliar, very bright place. No...this place wasn't bright. It was a single bright light source right above him. It was so bright it was hurting his eyes but for some reason he couldn't move his head to look away. There other ponies moving all around him. Who were they? Did they know where this was? Had they brought him there? And then the pain started. It had always been there. His waking mind was just taking its time comprehending it. It was bearable at first but it grew, and grew, and grew, and never stopped growing. It hurt so much. It was the worst pain he'd ever felt and everything in his mind was wishing with all his might that it would stop. He tried to move but the rest of his body was just as paralyzed as his neck. He tried to scream but nothing came out. His eye flitted about in panic as the pain grew impossibly worse with every passing second. Why didn't the ponies moving around him notice him? They just kept doing what they were doing instead of helping him. He wanted to scream for them. Help me. Help me! HELP ME! HELP ME HELP ME HELP ME HELP ME HELP ME HELP ME HELP M- ------ He was still there in the nightmarish hallway with the deaf colt standing over him. What the hay had that been?! ... No...he knew. That was one of the nightmares that had been keeping him from sleep for all those weeks leading up to his 'vacation' from the hospital. Why had he only remembered it now? He looked back up at the deaf colt. Had that thing just punched it right into him somehow? "What...are you...?" Lance struggled to say. He didn't have enough strength left to even wait for an answer though. No sooner had he asked the question than the same siren that had heralded the nightmare's coming began blaring in the distance once more. He found himself unable to hold his head up and his eyes open any longer. As he lingered in the black space between the waking world and unconsciousness he felt the deaf colt nudge the side of his saddlebag. Before he fully succumbed he heard the sovereign groan indignantly as she was dragged away, and the rattling of chains as Door 303 was resealed. ------ He was, amazingly, still alive. His mouth was dry, he was desperately thirsty, his entire body hurt, and even just thinking about moving made the pain even worse, but he was still alive. Lance ignored the protests of his body and looked around. It was still pitch black save for the beam of his surgical light but everything was back to the pristine apartment complex he had walked into. Not a speck of dust anywhere, and the exit door stood there just waiting for him to leave the wretched place. Lance braced himself for a few moments knowing that getting back to his hooves would be a miniature ordeal in his condition, and then he got to it. He didn't know how long it took him groaning in pain with his teeth grit there in the dark, but he eventually managed it. The sound of a slip of paper gliding down to the ground caught his attention, and he reached down for it thinking one of the notes in his saddlebag had fallen out. He was incorrect. This was a new note that had been resting on the side of his saddlebag...right where the deaf colt had nudged him. "Dear Esteemed guest, What did we learn?" He didn't think he would be taking that one with him. The cobblestone wall was finally behind him, so that was one good thing that had come from that nightmarish clusterbuck at least. The spot where the drowning mare had been killed was a bit more interesting. In her place was a stuffed, bloody body bag, with a single white flower resting on top. The space around her was cordoned off by yellow crime scene tape, and the words 'FIRST DO NO HARM' were carved over and over into the wall behind her. As though he'd had a choice. Finally there was the door marked G-4 to his left. He looked at it blearily before sitting down and sifting through his bag to find the key marked G-4. Why not? He needed to rest and patch himself up, if the room was clear and safe it would probably be wise to make the stop before he went anywhere else. He held the key up to the knob and found himself unable to keep his hoof from trembling so badly that getting the key in the keyhole was impossible. He let out a weak growl of frustration and brought a hoof to his face, closing his eyes and trying to relax before trying again. It still took a few tries but eventually he hit home and unlocked the door. Glad to be over that mountainous molehill he pushed the door open at last. ... After all of that...after the ascent to the top...and the descent to the bottom...and every brush with death he'd just miraculously squeezed through...after all the pain he'd just endured...only then was he truly struck dumb and unable to say or do anything. .... "...Lance?" He fell to the ground unconscious again.