CHAPTER 47
"Oh... Not this again..." I rolled onto my back, and wiped my hand down my face. I was in a cobblestone room, laying in a pile of hay... And my only way out is a cell door, which is probably locked. "Great... Just. Fucking. Great."
I pushed down on my knees as I stood up, letting out a small grunt, but froze as I heard hoofsteps coming from a hallway leading into the dungeon I was in.
"Please don't be Fluttershy please don't be Fluttershy please don't be Fluttershy..."
Luckily, it wasn't. The... Whatever you want to call it that entered the room had an orange coat, and a messed up, filthy blonde mane. I knew who she was before she was turned into a monster. It was AJ. Her stetson was gone, and her mane had chunks torn out of it, and stitches running along the length of her torso... And one of her forelegs was white instead of orange. I wanted to throw up, but decided against doing anything that would make me seem scared.
"Well Ah'll be. Fluttershy actually caught ya'. Ain't that somethin'..." She stepped closer to my cell, and I felt my heart racing even faster. "Yer' scared, ain't ya'?"
I spit at her. "No. And you're not Applejack, you're just a figment of my imagination. Just some sick, twisted version of AJ that I created when I was bored one day."
AJ laughed, and shook her head. "Alright, whatever ya' say. Try tellin' yerself that when yer' on Twi's operatin' table." She turned and walked away, and I felt my blood run cold. She was right. Even if I was in my own mind, if I died...
I shook my head, dispelling the thought. "I just need to find a way out of here, and I'll be fine..."
I looked around, and I noticed that one of the bars near the ceiling was bent, and looked ready to break. I just needed something to break it with. I looked back at the pile of hay I was laying on.
"I wonder..."
I started tossing the hay aside, and sure enough, I found a hammer... And a small vial with a blue liquid in it. A Sanity Potion. And a small tuft of rainbow-colored hair. I knew where Rainbow Dash had been held. Maybe she's the one who tried to escape, and bent the bar.
"Thank you Dashie..."
I grabbed the hammer, and slipped the potion into my pocket. I noticed that I still had all of my oil and tinderboxes, and my lantern was sitting on the ground nearby. I picked it up, and hung it around my wrist.
"Wow. Real smart, Shy..."
I slid a box that was in the room up to the bars, and stood on it, beginning to hammer away at the broken part, until it broke off. It was still in pretty good shape. I tried to use it to pry the door open, but that didn't work.
"Dammit. I need a new plan... The walls are made of cobblestone... Maybe there's a weak spot..."
I felt along the walls, and sure enough, I found a spot where a few rocks were loose. I stuck the rod in a small wedge between a few of them, and started yanking them out of the wall. After I made a decently sized hole, I started jabbing away at the rest of the wall, until the hole was big enough for me to crawl through. I pulled myself through to the next cell, and the door was unlocked. Lucky me. At least, I thought I was lucky, until I heard hoofsteps in the hallway again.
"What in tarnation are ya' doin' in here t' make all that noise?!" I huddled into a corner, an peeked out through the bars to see AJ walking into the room, and when she noticed I was gone... She looked pretty angry. "Oh, so ya' think yer' gonna get away, huh? Jus' wait 'till Ah' find ya..."
(Stop the music, listen to this now)
I leaned away from the bars, and looked around for somewhere to hide. I needed to act fast. There was a bed in the room, but it didn't have a mattress, so it wouldn't hide me at all. I heard AJ's hoofsteps coming towards the cell I was in.
"Oh no..."
I pressed myself against the wall as best I could, and hoped the small patch of shadow I was hiding in would be enough. AJ looked through the bars, and didn't even bother to come in, since the door was closed. She must have assumed it was locked. She turned around, and started to search the other cells. I opened the cell door very slowly, trying to make no sound at all. I snuck behind AJ, and went down the hallway she came from, making sure to close the door behind me so she wouldn't see me.
"That was too close... I've gotta start being more careful."
I pulled out a few tinderboxes, and lit some of the torches hanging in the hall, standing in the light, my headache slowly fading. I heard AJ's muffled yells of frustration coming from the other room, and I had to stifle a chuckle. "Can't believe she didn't hear me."
Suddenly, her yells stopped, and her hoofsteps slowly moved somewhere, but because of the door, I couldn't tell where... Until the door to the hall started moving. It had locked itself when I closed it.
"Aha! I've got ya' now!"
I didn't have time to react, when the door was blasted off of it's hinges, and landed almost right in front of me. AJ had bucked the door down, and she was staring at me, and I knew she wasn't going to be as gentle as Fluttershy.
(Stop the music, listen to this now)
I spun on my heels, and ran full sprint down the hallway, and whipped out my lantern when I was out of the light of the torches. AJ's hoofsteps were gradually getting closer to me, since she was in better shape than me, being an athlete and all. I looked behind me, even though that's a big no-no in situations like this, and AJ was almost right on top of me.
"Yer' not gettin' away from me!" She jumped at me to tackle, but I ducked to the right, and slammed through a door, and slammed it shut behind me, hoping to buy a little time. I jumped into a cupboard, and turned off my lantern, staying as quiet as possible. I heard the door smash down, and AJ's hoofsteps entered the room. "Oh, don't think ya' can hide from me! Ah' know all yer' lil' tricks from Shy!"
I almost screamed right there. "Wait, does that mean she knows I'm hiding in here?!"
And, of course, the cupboard doors fly open, and AJ shoves me out, and bucks me down to the floor.
"So, how'dya wanna die...?"
"Old and with my family!" I scrambled to my feet, and ran out of the room, and down the hall again, AJ in tow. My back was hurting really badly, but other than that, I was fine. I rounded a corner, and it was another long corridor, with only one metal door at the end, I looked behind me, and AJ was catching up still, so I made a break for the door... But when I got to it, it was locked. I was trapped. AJ was racing towards me, and I had noway out... But then an idea dawned on me. I turned around to AJ, and started taunting her. "Come on! I dare you! Tackle me as hard as you can!"
She fell for it, and sped up. I dropped to the floor, and I heard the wooden frame of the door smash, plus the sound of AJ hitting the floor. I stood up, and looked at her. She was unconscious, thankfully.
(Stop the music, listen to this now)
"I have no idea what I would have done if she would have stayed awake..."
I stepped into the room and looked around. There was only a desk and a few crates. I checked in the drawer on the desk, and found three vials of green... Stuff. Laudanum.
"Thank Luna..." I swallowed all the contents of one of the vials, and I felt very warm inside, and that warmth spread to all of my injuries. I felt little pinpricks as my cuts an bruises healed. "That feels so much better..."
I felt very safe, for some reason. As if nothing would be able to hurt me in this room. I didn't want to leave. But when AJ started stirring in her sleep, I decided it would probably be within my best interests to leave, as to not be brutally murdered by a being of my own creation, in a way.
"I still can't believe I thought of all of this stuff... I've gotta start controlling myself more when I get bored. And as for Torrie... Oh, he's so dead for this."
I wondered just how I was going to get out. I didn't really know where I was going. I saw a note sticking out from under one of the crates, which I took, and read.
I've managed to escape. I hit her over the head with a crate, and I ran. I can hear them coming, they're going to capture me, and change me. There's a way out just down the hall, a secret passageway, it leads to the laboratory and main library, but there is a staircase there leading to the main hall. It's-
The rest of the note was smeared with blood. The writing was very neat, and obviously done by a unicorn. It was probably Rarity.
"Thanks, Rarity. I won't let your sacrifice go to waste."
I stuffed the note in my pocket, and kept pressing onwards.