//------------------------------// // Chapter 24: Step Aside, Let the Mare Go Through // Story: Once Upon a Time, on an Alien Ring World // by Hi World //------------------------------// Fluttershy looked around. All she could see were shadows. All she could hear was her own raspy breath. If she didn't know any better, she'd say she was alone. Nether the less, she took heed as she tip-hoofed off the elevator and across the metal floor. She stopped, debating whether or not to just turn back, hop on the lift, and ride it back up to the swamp where she could communicate with Rainbow Dash. She really needed a friend right now. However, as she contemplated, she heard a hushed shuffling come from somewhere in front of her. It startled her, but she didn't scream. She almost did, but instead, she just bit her bottom lip and froze in place. She may have been a statue on the outside, but inside, her heart was beating a million times a minute. The wall in front of her stood separate to the main wall of the lift chamber, and that's where the noise came from. Close. What was the petrified Mare to do? Turn and flee? Call "hello?" Go in guns blazing? The noise could've been anything. It could've even been Applejack and Rarity. With that in mind, Fluttershy opted not to turn and flee, or go in guns blazing, but she didn't try communicating either. There was still the possibility of there being Covenant behind that wall, so she crept over as silent as a mouse, and peeked around. Immediately, she receded back around the wall, teeth coming down on her lip and sweat beading her head. On the other side of the wall, there was a door, and something was clustered around it... They weren't Ponies. Huddled around the compact door, the Grunts and Jackals shivered, eyes darting all over the place. None of them had caught sight of the pink maned Pony though, which meant Fluttershy still had the element of surprise. A hollow rolling sound made the Grunts flinch. It sounded like a bowling ball rolling slowly along, only on a smaller scale. Looking down, one of the rookie Grunts widened his eyes at the little green "bowling ball," and barely had enough time to squeal before it exploded and sent the whole congregation flying. With the cramped quarters blackened and blood stained, Fluttershy took another peek and surveyed the carnage. Her frag grenade had done the trick, so she paced onto the blast scarred deck and approached the door. Almost tripping over a severed Jackal's arm, she squirmed and stepped tenderly over it. Before she touched the door controls, she got back to contemplating whether or not to go back. She had just successfully wiped out an entire squad of Covies, single hoofed, with no directions from Twilight or Rainbow. Could she keep this up? Should she explore deeper into the facility? Maybe she'd find her friends. Either way, she was scared to the bone, and the more she debated, the more time passed. Time that a trio of Jackals on the other side of the door used to run up and make their surprise appearance. "Aaaah!" she screeched, turning her head away as she raised her shotgun, deafening herself by sending one devastating buckshot on its way. Before the first Jackal could duck behind his orange shield, he was mutilated by the ball bearings, and his gore-streaked body was flung to the floor. Instantly, the two blue shielded rookies rolled out of the way in opposite directions and crouched behind their circular gauntlets, firing their plasma pistols at the frightened Mare. That was it; Fluttershy decided to evacuate the brooding facility. However, before she could run, a plasma grenade sailed up from a lower floor, behind the Jackals, arced through the narrow doorway and landed right underneath her. Shrieking with panic, she dove away and scrambled forwards, unintentionally between the two Jackals. As the grenade detonated with a tremendous BOOM, Fluttershy rolled and blasted the left hand off the Jackal to her right. As he fell and wailed in pain, the Jackal to her left sprinted and smacked Fluttershy over the head with his shield. In terms of strength, Jackals were roughly at the same level as Ponies, and a small portion of Fluttershy's shields was drained. Before the yellow Pegasus could get up, the bird-like biped pinned her to the ground with a boot and squawked angrily into her ear. She winced as the alien's bad breath found her nose and his icky spittle found her cheek. Luminous green light built up around the tip of the rookie Jackal's plasma pistol and bathed their bodies in a vibrant glow. He was overcharging the thing. One overcharged bolt of plasma would be enough to completely drain her shields, so she flailed madly under the evil alien, screaming, desperate to be free. Fortunately, she was able to slip out from under the Covie's boot and flip him like a pancake. Unfortunately, he managed to get a grasp of her tail, and he hung from it over the edge of the balcony they were on. Below, the bottom floor wasn't that far down, but a bunch more Covenant commanded it. The young Mare squealed, feeling the weight of the Covenant soldier pulling her down and stretching her tail. Shining bright and green, the overcharged orb of plasma was still raring to be fired, and as the Jackal lifted his pistol, Fluttershy swivelled her shotgun. It was a race, and it was interrupted by the other rookie Jackal who'd lost his hand. He staggered over and stomped down hard on Fluttershy's hooves. With an abrupt yelp, Fluttershy was plucked from the balcony, and she and her Jackal trailer fell to the floor below. Halving the floor, a built in trench ran from one end of the chamber to the other. It kinda looked like a storm drain. Whatever it was, the Pony and the Jackal landed in it, the latter breaking the former's fall. Under Fluttershy's weight, the biped soldier accidently fired his overcharged plasma pistol, directly into his own face. His features burned off and dropped to the floor in bubbling blobs like a melting polythene bag. It was a gross sight, and one that Fluttershy had to turn away from, gipping. However, there was no time to be squeamish as the Covenant on the floor came hurrying up to line the top of the trench. As plasma and needles came down on her in a rainbow coloured shower, the quivering Mare backed up behind a thin support column and made use of a grenade. She just so happened to pull a plasma grenade out of her bag, and as she ducked around the pillar, she never witnessed it stick to a Grunt's leg and lay waste to the entirety of the squad. The dust settled, and as Fluttershy's shields recharged in a flurry of golden motes, she spied shakily around her cover at the remains of the Covenant hanging over the long pit. The only thing breaking the silence was the wounded Jackal above, who proceeded to moan in anguish and pain. He was miserable, and it was all her fault. She stepped out of the gutter and up onto the level floor, her hooves ringing against the surface. She looked up to see the Jackal getting all teary eyed and clutching his severed wrist. "Oh, I'm sorry," she apologised, knowing Twilight would tell her not to. "I didn't want to hurt you. I just... If you can come down here, I might be able to help you... if you'll let me." Being alone with the Covenant gave her the opportunity to try to communicate with them, instead of just shooting them all the time. Perhaps treating this Jackal's wound and making friends with him would be the start of a peaceful end to the war. Unfortunately, the Jackal didn't feel the same way. "Em pleh uye tel I doo iy?" he cried, pointing a finger. "Em ot sith did uye! Sd'nerf im dellik uye! Fo zub!" And with that, he turned to exit, into the lift chamber, clutching his bleeding wrist. Fluttershy hadn't a clue what he'd just said, but his tone was clear, and she could understand the alien's refusal. Poor guy, she sympathised, feeling very guilty. I'm sorry. Once she'd reloaded the shotgun, scavenged the Covie corpses for grenades and taken a sip of water, the young Pegasus searched around. The door to the elevator that the sad Jackal had just gone through was way up on the balcony, out of reach. Purple Covenant crates were scattered messily on the floor at the far end, like they had just been thrown into position. And two compact doors bracketed the chamber; one open, one locked. Seeing no obvious way to get back up to the balcony, Fluttershy sighed and grudgingly trudged over to the one open door, exploring the complex further. I guess I don't have a choice. Behind the door, Fluttershy had two choices; right or left. Opting to go left, she rounded a square piece of architecture and found that it didn't really matter which direction she chose; they both re-connected at the next door. On the other side of that door, a large chamber lit up by sickly green light waited for her. A sizable holding tank dominated the centre, an inaccessible balcony ran along the perimeter of the chamber, and three nervous looking Jackals stood around the next door. "Oh no," Fluttershy whispered to herself. More killing. The Jackals were easy. It only took a small expenditure of MA5B ammo to put them all down. Fluttershy still hated herself for it though. It was odd for the Covenant to be this unprepared... or scared. I wonder what they're afraid of, she thought, staring at the floor just next to their bullet ridden corpses. Whatever had the Covenant so spooked, it was probably responsible for the mess that greeted her on the other side of the door. Just like before, she was given the choice to go left or right... or backwards, which was where she really wanted to go. Vivid Grunt blood turned the silvery metal blue, and the twisted, sliced up carcass of the methane breather sat atop a mountain of spilt organs. Fluttershy had never seen so much blood in one place, and she put a hoof over her mouth to stop whatever she felt coming up. It was as if the corridor had been painted. It stunk too. Stunk of gore and methane; two foul odours that, when combined, created the worst stench in the universe. Backwards was her preferred direction, but she knew there was no turning back now, so against her will, she forced herself to creep down the left, clean route. She shuddered, grossed out, knowing the mess was still behind her. Traveling through the confining corridor, the fearful Pegasus came to the next door and tapped it open. All was ghostly and quiet in the Forerunner chamber. There were no signs of life, Covenant or otherwise. Nothing but a constant humming and what sounded like breeze in a cave reverberated around the cold quarters. Fluttershy had entered the chamber from a side door. She looked around for trouble, but found no immediate threat. A gutter, identical to the one she'd found two chambers ago, cut across the metal deck before her. Columns stood strong, holding up two separate balconies at both ends of the room. Bracketing the central gutter, were two, unmanned Covenant Shade turrets. They stood on their three legs, facing across the room at a solid metal wall. Behind those Shades was another compact door. It was situated on a platform hovering over the gutter. It was separate yet perfectly level with the main floor, and sandwiched by a couple of struts. A Covenant crate had fallen over below the platform, spilling its cargo of needler ammo all over the metal grating. The ammo cartridges were very peculiar. They just looked like pink balls that glowed from within. A needler weapon had its crystal shards on show on the top of its carapace. The crystals laying in the gutter however were just clumps of shiny pink. The bright pink reminded Fluttershy of Pinkie Pie, and she pondered where the pink one had vanished to, and when she'd see her again. If she'd see her again. It was as if Halo was a living being, and it had a plan to torture Fluttershy by taking her friends away and forcing her to explore its bowels by herself. Fluttershy's hooves clopped solidly on the metal floor as she stepped out into the dead room. She came across more blue Grunt blood leaking from one of the Shades and down into the gutter. There wasn't nearly as much blood as there was in the corridor earlier, but still enough to make the shy bring a hoof to her mouth in fret. Maybe that's what the gutters were for; draining the blood that would inevitably be spilled. Peering down disgustedly at the blood, Fluttershy realised something... there was no body. She wondered if the Grunt that had bled the blood had survived whatever had caused him to bleed, but looking around, she couldn't see any footprints or evidence to back that up. Mysterious. Touring further into the Forerunner complex for Applejack and Rarity, Fluttershy put some distance between herself and the miniature platform over the gutter, and galloped at it. Reaching the edge of the gutter, she sent all her strength to her back legs, and propelled herself through the air to come to a decent landing before the only open door. She slid it open, and found herself in the usual narrow tunnels that split and re-joined each other in a square. She opted to go right, and when she opened the door at the other end, she was most unready for what waited for her on the other side. BANG, went the M6D pistol as it discharged a round into the wall just to the side of Fluttershy. The yellow Mare yelped and receded back into the corridor. "Stay back!" a shrill, female voice cried from the chamber. A second bullet was fired from the magnum, and it chipped a hole into the wall. "Stay back! I'll shoot you if I have to! Don't think I won't, cos I will! I will!" The voice was fragmented and full of terror. Reasoning, Fluttershy begged, "Oh, please stop firing! I need to talk to you! Please let me talk to you!" The crazed Pony wasn't having any of it, and she fired another round into the corridor. "Oh no! No no! I won't let you! You're not turning me into one of those things! Go away!" BANG! "Leave me alone!" BANG! "Find your own hiding place!" Fluttershy couldn't believe it. She was being shot at by her own kind! She couldn't judge the Pony too harshly though; something had driven her mad, and all she needed was to be calmed down. Some reassurance. Fluttershy wouldn't mind a little reassurance herself. Trying to settle the disturbed Mare's nerves, Fluttershy persuaded, "Oh, if you could just let me talk to you. I can help you. And you can help me." "I'm not falling for that!" wailed the unstable Mare. "I'm not letting you in! I'm not letting you anywhere near me!" "But, I'm a Pony just like you," Fluttershy informed, sticking her head out as unthreatening as possible, proving her point. The pale cyan Unicorn with a light two tone mane sat opposite her wasn't taking any chances though. A gunshot rang out with a resonating BANG, and Fluttershy was rocked back as the bullet hit her square in the eye. She would've died were it not for her shields. "Aah!" she screamed with shock as she hid away in the corridor. "Y... y... you shot me!" "Darn right I did!" spat the Unicorn fiercely. "I'll do it again if you show yourself! Leave me alone! You horrid monster!" The mad Mare's words hurt more than the bullet. "But... but... how could you?" whimpered Fluttershy, tearing up. The cyan Unicorn just broke into sobs. "Go awaaay! Leave me alooone! Waa-aha-aha-ahaah! Aaarr!" This Pony's very presence was an indicator that she was on the right track. "I have to proceed," she told herself, waiting for her shields to recharge. "I have to proceed." "Proceed somewhere else!" bellowed the edgy soldier. She then decided to empty her lungs with a piercing scream, as well as fire another bullet into the corridor. She would've fired more, but when she pulled the trigger again, all it did was click. Empty. Fluttershy's ears caught the sound of it; now was her chance. Picking up the sound of another magazine being fed into the M6D, Fluttershy shouted, "No!" and charged out at her fellow equine. Before the cyan whacko could resume fire, Fluttershy snatched the pistol out of her magical grip with her teeth and put away her shotgun so she could keep the small firearm secured to the mechanical arm of her soldier saddle. Desperate for her gun back, the Unicorn Mare squirmed on the blood stained floor and powered up her horn, pulling on the robotic arm. Her magic wasn't powerful enough though, and she was unable to retrieve her weapon. "Stop that right now!" demanded Fluttershy, astonished by her own courage. "I am not your enemy!" The Unicorn on the floor snarled, spittle coming off her lips. "You will be! You'll turn, just like everypony else!" "What do you mean by that?" "Oh, you don't know, do you? You don't know." The cyan Mare leaned forward, her light orange eyes boring deep into Fluttershy's blue ones. "You'll find out soon enough." Perplexed as to what the insane Mare was on about, Fluttershy simply began, "Listen, um... what's your name?" "They call me Lyra," said Lyra, leaning back against the metal pillar, a Covenant crate just next to her. "Nice to meet you, Lyra. I... I'm Fluttershy," the yellow Pegasus introduced herself in a friendly manner. "Listen... Lyra... I... I need your help. I'm looking for Applejack, Rarity, you and the rest of your team. If... if you could come with me... I'd be very grateful, but, if you'd rather not come with me, then, I guess that's ok too," Fluttershy spoke in a soft voice, trying to soothe the fear crazed Lyra. "Do you know where they might be?" "Where they might be? Bwaha - Where they might be - Aahahahahahaha!" Lyra laughed with insanity. "I like how you said that, as if there's still hope." Well that was melodramatic. Loudly, Lyra blathered, "Don't you get it?! There is no escape! We are all trapped down here." "No! There's an elevator! We can ride it to the surface! There's a Pelican waiting for us... probably," Fluttershy assured, wondering if Rainbow was still somewhere above them, trying to contact her. "Probably? Even you know your Pelican is as good as scrap!" Lyra pointed at her accusingly. "You saw the wreckages!" Fluttershy shook her head. "No! Rainbow Dash is - wait," she came up short upon realising what Lyra had just said. "How do you know I saw the wreckages?" The wreckages being referred to were the crashed drop ships that Fluttershy had discovered in the swamp above. One Pelican and one Spirit. "We crashed here!" shouted the Unicorn, throwing her hooves up. "... The Covenant crashed here too... And now all of us are doomed," she moaned despairingly, facing up with her eyes closed. "Oh, we can't be that doomed," Fluttershy surmised, shrugging. "I fought my way down here all by myself. The Covenant were hardly a-" "-The Covenant?" questioned Lyra rhetorically, looking at Fluttershy like she was stupid. "We're trapped down here, and your biggest concern is the Covenant?!" Thinking of her friends, Fluttershy began, "Actually, I'm more concerned that-" "-Ahahahahaha! Who cares about the Covenant?!" Lyra interrupted, laughing manically and holding her sides. "No! No, no, no! The Covenant aint got nothing. The Covenant did not do this!" She gestured around the surrounding chamber. Fluttershy hadn't got a good look around yet, and she was shocked to see such destruction surrounding her. Multiple blast scars had been introduced to the deck and walls, along with massive blood stains from Ponies and Covenant. Bullet holes and plasma burns stitched lines into the ruined Forerunner architecture, and the surrounding balcony had collapsed in the far left corner. In that corner, a fire burned away, singeing the metal and turning the corpses of Ponies and Covies into crispy black skeletons. Like one of the previous chambers, this one had a glass holding tank in its centre, and that glass had smashed, clumps of rotten skin hanging from the shards. It was like a nightmare, and Fluttershy just wanted to wake up. She gawped around at the devastation, perplexed as to what had happened. Gulping, the Pegasus started to ask, "Um... what happen-" "-Or this," Lyra interrupted, lifting her right hind leg with her front hooves. She gritted her teeth with agony as she exposed a horrific bite wound on her leg. She had kept it hidden under her other leg until now, and Fluttershy could see scraps of flesh dangling from the missing chunk. Even more alarmingly, she could see a gap in her bone where it had been bitten away, and the two pieces scraped against each other inside Lyra's ravaged leg. Despite the bite wound, Lyra didn't give into the pain, and she winced as tears cut cracks down her grimy face. As Fluttershy's eyes were fixated to the huge gap in the Unicorn's leg, Lyra plonked the leg down like a heavy log and stated, "Ponies did this!" Shocked, Fluttershy gasped, "Ponies?! But I-" "-You and anypony else in this Celestia forsaken heeeck hooole!" Lyra howled like a wolf at full moon, and blood spat from her parched lips. Wishing to be quiet in the haunted facility, Fluttershy urged, "L-Lyra, please, I-" "-You should have seen them," the twitchy Mare butt in again, pushing one widened, bloodshot eye into Fluttershy's face. "You should have heard them." She slumped back and stared longingly up at the underside of the balcony in a daze. "Their bodies... lying on the floor... oceans of blood... And then... they got up." Listening on in fascination, Fluttershy took out her med-kit and glanced back and forth between it and the mumbling Lyra. "Some of them... they grew hands," she whimpered with a sniff. "... They grew hands!" She'd caught Fluttershy's attention, and the yellow Mare looked bewilderingly at her. "I don't want hands anymore. Oh no! No, no! Not at that price! Not at that price!" You wanted hands? Fluttershy wondered in her head. Not fully understanding, and still not liking her volume, Fluttershy grated, "I don't understand. Please-" "-Oh, you'll understand soon enough, Fluttershy," a creepy grin creased Lyra's scuffed, cyan coated face from ear to ear, and Fluttershy got the shivers when she pronounced her name. Narrowing her orange eyes, Lyra uttered in a deep voice, "Now if you'll excuse me, I refuse to live in the same universe as these monsters!" Catching Fluttershy off guard, she beamed up her horn and yanked the pistol off the yellow one's mechanical arm. She cackled as she pressed the barrel against the side of her head. Fluttershy lunged at her. "Lyra! No! Don't-" -BANG! ... ... Fluttershy was appalled. She took a deep inhale and brought a hoof to her gaping mouth. "... Oh my gosh," she breathed in disbelief. Breaking down, she wailed, "... Oh my go-ho-ho-hosh! " Abandoning her med-kit, she curled up on the ground before the dead Lyra, her weeping echoing around the desolate room of destruction. In fear and sorrow, she cried for just under a minute... then it was time to push on. She brought herself to her trembling hoovesies and wiped the tears from her face. With the med-pack back in her saddle bag and the shotgun wielded once more, she left the defunct Lyra slumped against the wall, and paced out into the battle scarred chamber. "I... have to find Rarity... and Applejack..." she whispered to herself as she traversed the damaged metal deck. "... I... I have to continue..." She was startled to come into contact with something loose at her hoof. Peering down, it turned out to be nothing more than an abandoned plasma rifle laying beside the sea of blue, purple and red blood. She also picked out a plasma pistol and an MA5B assault rifle discarded carelessly on the blood soaked floor. Giving the blood a wide berth, she continued to support herself. "I can do this... There is still hope... There is still hope." It was hard to convince herself, and she squeaked with misery as she came up to the raging fire. What had Lyra seen that had pushed her so far over the edge? What had inflicted that horrible bite wound on her leg? What had happened in this destroyed chamber? The mysteries were piling themselves up high in Fluttershy's mind, and the more she thought about them, the more she started to believe that the whole mission was a farce. She'd gotten a gander around the room, and the way she saw it, there was no other way to proceed on the bottom level, leaving only the top level to be explored. However, the only way to get up there was to climb the burning scrap heap, and as determined as she was to find her friends, she was a little nervous about walking through fire. She knew however, her Spartan armour would offer her protection from the flickering flames. Hastily, she leapt up onto the blackened metal, and the flames immediately wrapped themselves around her and burned away at her shields. She could feel the intense heat, and her shields shimmered gold as the fire began to lower them. Before they could be popped, Fluttershy took another courageous leap and ended up dangling over the swirling inferno. Her front hooves scrambled to lift her up onto the broken balcony and slipped in a thick liquid that had been spilt. Fluttershy caught a glimpse of the liquid on her hoof, and found that it was some sort of slimy, olive green substance that reeked of something that could only be described as indescribable. She wrinkled her muzzle and gagged with the stench, doing her best to keep her sandwich down, and hauled herself up onto the higher deck. Quickly galloping to a spot away from the fire, she pulled out a cloth to wipe the sickly green mucus off her hooves, threw the cloth away, and wondered what on earth that stuff was. With her hooves clean... ish... she wiped the sweat from her forehead, took a sip of water, noting that it was a little warmer, and trotted on her way along the elevation as her shields recharged. And then it hit her... In the chamber, there was blood, there was weapons, but besides the crispy fried skeletons and Lyra, there were no bodies. She came to another small door above the one she'd used to enter the chamber, and she shuddered knowing that Lyra's body was somewhere directly below her. Banishing her discomfort, and failing at it, she tapped the door open and journeyed through the same old split corridor layout, only this time, the floor was glass, and she could see the lower level under her hooves. Exiting the tunnels, the pink maned Pegasus re-emerged in the chamber with the gutter, the Shade turrets, and the Grunt blood, only this time she was on the upper level. On the balcony with her, there was a Forerunner control panel, and Fluttershy spied another one on the opposite balcony. Wondering if Twilight would tell her to activate it, and seeing that the only open door she hadn't been through was on the opposite balcony, Fluttershy placed her front hooves on the shifting lights and puzzled over how to use them. The controls were all alien to her, and there was no obvious indication how to activate whatever she would be activating. Judging from the two separate balconies and the activation panels on each side, she'd take a guess that she was trying to extend a bridge. Trying to recall the bridge of hard light that she had activated with Twilight and Applejack back in the meadows, she unsurely hovered a hoof over an orange button to the lower left, and pushed it. A sudden cling startled her, and she witnessed a narrow footbridge of solid blue light materialize before her, connecting the two balconies. Double checking that it was solid, she stomped a hoof three times on the shimmering girder of light, and once she was fairly satisfied that she would be safe, she set off trotting over it, looking down at the gutter beneath. She soon made it to the other side, and since she was feeling a little paranoid, she touched the controls to make the bridge disappear. Good, she thought, watching the beautiful bridge fade away. Now nothing can follow me. With her back turned to the chamber, the lone Pegasus passed through a mini door and immediately entered a dark room with two ramps forming a V under a central metal canopy. Opting to take the left ramp, she halted abruptly at the gruesome sight of a dead Pony, and a monumental pool of red blood joining it. Fluttershy was truly afraid, and she had to try hard to stop her sandwich from coming back up again. The Pony was a real mess. 'Twas a Unicorn Stallion with a teal coat and black hair. He had been gutted, and his intestines had spilled out into a pile on the bloody floor. Both his eyes were missing, and - no. Fluttershy couldn't look at him. It was too violent for her innocent little heart. Instead, she turned and galloped the other way, taking the right ramp, and even then she could still see a patch of his blood. The grossed out Pegasus remembered Lyra, and how she took her own life. She'd been so afraid to wind up suffering the same fate as that poor Stallion, and Fluttershy couldn't blame her. If she had a choice between suicide and whatever happened to that Stallion, well, let's just say she'd take the less frightening option. Speaking of the Stallion, what in Equestria had happened to him? Lyra said the Covenant weren't responsible, and when Fluttershy was at Halo's control centre, Twilight had mentioned the Covenant having another enemy. Could it be possible that the war was gaining a third faction? Some sort of brutish, cannibalistic tribe? Fluttershy didn't have a clue, but like Lyra said; she'd find out soon enough. Now, as she stood in front of a Forerunner door with a UPSC gadget stuck on it, she got the dreadful feeling that she was about to meet her howling fate. The crashed drop ships, the jittery Covenant, the messed up corpses, the insane Lyra... it all lead to this. The device fitted to the door was a UPSC hack box. It could be used by anypony to hack into any system. It was nowhere near as advanced as Twilight though, and it would've taken Applejack and Rarity some time to crack the door open. Just as Fluttershy reached a hoof out to open the door, she was made jump by the stomach churning sound of slithering. She spun to face behind her, feeling eyes boring into her from every direction at once, but the noise faded away, and Fluttershy saw nothing at all. The Mare's heart raced with suspense, and she panted heavily, eyes flashing this way and that, checking every nook and cranny. Shivering, she rotated to face the door again, swallowed, and quickly tapped it open. The doors parted, and a corpse came falling through. "Aaaahh!" screeched Fluttershy as the limp body came flopping down on top of her. Huffing and puffing with a fragmenting voice, she hoisted the corpse off of her, backed up, and was sad to see it was another Pony. The murdered Mare was a Crystal Pony, and she had a light blue coat and a purple mane and tail. Her eyes were closed peacefully, and she had suffered a shotgun blast to her abdomen. Wait a minute... A shotgun blast?! Could Lyra have been right? Were the Ponies turning against each other? Applejack was almost always armed with a shotgun. Could she have done this? Why would Applejack shoot another Pony? It couldn't have been her. There had to be another explanation. Applejack would never do something so horrible. Leaving the motionless Mare on the floor, Fluttershy entered the chamber, and boy was she in for a shock. Blood. It was everywhere. Deep red Pony blood, painting the silver floor, and a million spent shell casings created a carpet. If there had been a lot of blood surrounding the dead Stallion earlier, there was a great deal more of the stuff wetting the floor in this chamber. Would Fluttershy's sandwich make a return? ... No, she was able to keep it inside of her with a big gulp. Darn, the gore stunk. It stunk out the whole room, but there was another stench as well. The same stench that Fluttershy's nose had been subjected to in the room that Lyra had been in. The sloppy green paste. Fluttershy could even see a few specs of that mysterious green liquid on the floor, mixed in with the red blood. As for the chamber itself, it was quite unique in comparison to the other Forerunner chambers encountered thus far. It was long, and featured two metal, sloping islands topped with glass. Beneath that glass, was a dizzying abyss. There were also support columns stretching up to the ceiling, and six miniature doors arranged like formal dinner goers sat around a long table. The first door on the left had been busted open, and parts of it lay broken on the floor. The trembling Fluttershy got a gander around, her head sweating and heart thumping, terrified that something would jump out at her at any moment. On the ground next to the ocean of blood and shell casings, Fluttershy discovered a camcorder laying unattended. If it had been recording, maybe she could find out exactly what happened in this creepy labyrinth. The yellow Mare sat on her haunches and picked up the camera with both front hooves. She stuck her tongue out as she inspected the device, trying to figure out how to work it. Luckily, the camcorder was in a very good condition, with only a single scratch on its pink casing. A video was already up and ready to play at her command, and the still picture in the tiny screen was that of Lyra the Unicorn. She was in the back of a Pelican and her face was beaming with excitement. Raring to have her mysteries solved, Fluttershy had a sip of water, checked the closed door and deceased Mare behind her, took a deep breath, and pressed play.