"She's been in there for too long," Twilight said.
"You think I don't know that?" Ace replied. "We need to go after her."
"I agree, but we don't know what we'll find," Twilight said.
"I do, she's either dead or she's not."
Twilight looked at the lime green stallion uneasily. He caught her gaze and looked back to the door.
"Okay, not helping," he said dully. "Sorry."
"It's fine, we were both thinking it," Twilight said.
"Wanna go find out what happened to her?"
"Might as well, no use sitting out here," Twilight answered, her tone becoming determined.
The door handle glowed magenta as Twilight gripped it with her magic. She slowly turned it and pushed the door open. The red stallion and black mate were still lying on the floor, one dead and the other clinging to life by a thread. Twilight cautiously crept into the room and saw Flutterbat pinning Rarity to the wall, her head lowered to the white mare's neck. She could see the blood dripping down Rarity's body from where Flutterbat was biting her.
"We..." She choked out, trying not to cry a the sight of her friend being drained of her life force. "We're too late." She let a few tears roll down her cheeks before sniffling and backing into the hallway. She collapsed against the wall and started sobbing, tears now pouring down her face as she cried over the loss of another of her friends.
Ace looked at her sympathetically, and placed a hoof on her shoulder for support. "It's okay," he said, "there's nothing we could have done or can do."
Twilight looked at him with reddened eyes, still dripping with tears, and nodded knowingly. For he was right and she knew it.
"Let's get out of here before it's too late," Ace said, offering Twilight a hoof to help her up. She took it and stood up shakily. The pair then headed down the stairs as quickly and quietly as they could and made a beeline for the library.
"You sure this is gonna work, AJ?" Rainbow Dash asked her lover.
"No, but we gotta try," was Applejack's response.
Rainbow Dash nodded uneasily, hoping that Applejack was right about this. Their plan was to write a letter explaining what had happened and to give it to Applejack's family directly, seeing as they couldn't understand what they said. Hopefully their writing wouldn't be affected. Of course, there were many ways in which this could go wrong. For starters, they could be too terrified of their appearance to even read the letter and just shove them out, or worse, shoot them. Applejack looked to Rainbow Dash affectionately before giving her a quick kiss on the cheek.
"Hey," she started. "If'n they don't understand, we'll make 'em. I won't let my family tear us apart because ya love me."
"Yeah," Rainbow agreed dully.
The pair then read the letter over before folding it in half and inserting it into the small envelope they had managed to find. Rainbow sealed it and put it under her wing, folding the appendage up and keeping the envelope in place. The pair then exited the barn together, moving towards the farmhouse and with it, the Apple family. Rainbow Dash tried to keep her cool, but the nervous blush on her cheeks gave away what she was thinking. Applejack caught her love's distraught expression and patted her shoulder with a wing, only just getting the hang of having them, and shot Rainbow a confident smile as she responded to it. Rainbow smiled back, but went back to worrying that something would go wrong.
"It's all right, sugar," Applejack said. "We'll be fine."
Rainbow only nodded in response as they approached the farmhouse's front door. Rainbow stopped in her tracks, still a bit nervous as far as Applejack could tell but she had something else on her mind as well.
"Are you alright, sug?" Applejack asked her.
"I... I have something to tell you, AJ. Before we go and see your family." Rainbow Dash said.
"What is it?"
"You know when you came into the barn and saw me hanging there, right?"
"Yeah."
"Well, you may have known who I was, but I lost all my memories before that. I guess it was the vampire blood taking over or something, and I was fighting it so hard... But, I failed and every memory I had was gone, including those we shared together," Rainbow explained with a pained expression. "After that, I kept fighting, I didn't remember what I was fighting for, but I kept on. I wasn't going to let it take control of me. Then you walked in. As soon as I saw you I remembered what I was fighting for, why I wouldn't give up. Because I had to see you again." She looked at Applejack and smiled. "If it weren't for you, we wouldn't be having this conversation, and I'd probably be out sucking ponies' blood like Fluttershy is."
"Rainbow, I... I don't know what to say," Applejack said, a few tears making their way down her face.
"Come on, AJ. Don't cry yet," Rainbow said, wrapping a wing around her lover. "We still have to give this letter to your family."
"Hehehe, yeah," Applejack chuckled, wiping the tears away. "Alright then, let's do this."
With that, they pushed the door open and stepped inside.
Rarity woke up leaning against a wall in a room lit by afternoon light. She could see two puddles of blood on the ground, one empty, the other had the same red and blond stallion lying in it, the midnight black mare holding his body. Rarity could see that her wings were bat like and her ears were longer than normal. She also seemed to be biting his neck, and Rarity cringed at the thought of what she was doing.
It was then that Rarity realized that her sides, horn and teeth were in pain, and when she looked herself over she saw two leathery wings sprouting from her sides. She put a hoof to her horn and felt that it was longer and sharper. She swished her tongue around her mouth and felt the many sharp teeth inside. She scanned the room for any sign of Fluttershy but found nothing. Letting her head fall against the wall, she drew in a long breath and slowly let it out. She felt her lips where Fluttershy had kissed her, and revelled in the memory of it. For all she knew, though, it could simply have been a means to get her guard down. She hoped that that wasn't the case.