//------------------------------//
// Chapter Three  
// Story: The Asylum 
// by MrMoonBird 
//------------------------------//

Following the streaks of blood, I rounded a corner and saw a deformed mare that was missing the lower half of her hind legs. The wounds were still fresh seeing as there was still blood slowly dripping from the gaping holes.

“Um… he-hello?” I had to call out to her, even if she were to be there in order to kill me. She paused and slowly turned her head towards me. She didn’t look at all like somepony that belonged at the asylum. That was, until she shifted her body to where she was crawling towards me.

On her hooves were these appendages that looked like carrots, except they matched her coat color. 

She crawled along the floor towards me, the appendages groping at the ground for leverage. It was a sickening sight to be honest. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing at all. 

She continued to move in my direction before stopping a few feet from me. A small whisper came from her mouth; I couldn’t make out what she had said, and upon noticing that, she spoke up more to where I could hear her clearly.

“Why… Do… You not… Run?” 

I stared at her, awestruck by her will to live even though she was bleeding to death, awestruck by the appendages that grasped on to her very existence itself, awestruck as to how she was… different.

“I… said… why do… you… not run?” 

Shaking my head in frustration, I slowly responded with, “You can’t hurt me… I’d outrun you before you move a hoof or… appendage thing.” 

She glanced down towards the tentacle-like things that were clasping onto the ground and muttered, “They’re called fingers.”

Confused, I asked, “Fingers? What in the world are fingers?”

“Fingers… are… the things… you call appendages… There are… these creatures called humans… that have them attached… to things called hands… Don’t… you know anything?”

“Um, apparently not I assume. And you seem to be the only one who believes in this ‘human’ mumbo-jumbo.” 

She groaned; a sign that she was severely injured.

“Look um…”

“Lyra… the name’s… Lyra.”

That was when it hit me. 





Lyra Heartstrings: Do not open this door under ANY circumstances!





But, if she was Lyra, then what made her so bad to where they had a sign NOT to open her door? 

Seeing my curiosity peaking, she laughed slightly before saying something that sent shivers down my spine. The worst part was how she wasn’t pausing to catch her breath or cringe.

“You know, you’re quite the stallion. Makes me remember one I used to know long ago. Yeah, before I was sent here, he offered me an opportunity that I would never get again. He told me that he had been working on something that could change the fate of Equestria forever. And that I could be his very first test subject. Turns out that he had found a way to send us ponies to a world full of humans and knowing how much I loved humans, he sent me into their world. I found one that looked exactly like me, same coat color, same mane color, same eye color. She even wore a skirt that had my cutie mark on it. And out of curiosity, I went up to her and just like that, her fingers were gone. I had wanted fingers for so long!! It felt so wonderful to have those blood covered, boney fingers in my mouth as long as I possibly could. I fell asleep soon later only to wake up back at my stallion friend’s home, but with fingers on my hooves. He was freaking out to be honest. He began scolding me about how that was not why he had sent me there. ‘The reason I sent you there,’ he said, ‘was so you could be up close and personal with humans, not so you could go and chomp off their fingers!!’ And you know what I did after he said that? I snapped his neck, kind of like what I’m going to do to you. Because, you see, these fingers were made for killing, they just never felt the love of slitting a throat or snapping a neck, so the human version of me would’ve never known that. But, I’ll spare you for the next time you venture down these halls. It’s time for you to go back to the reality you know Mr. Cloud Chaser.”

With that, she heaved out what seemed to be a final breath and collapsed to the floor. Just as she did, the world around me began to dissipate, a burning sensation beginning to flood over my body.





I awoke in my lobby chair, drool hanging from the corner of my lip. I looked at the clock on the wall that read 7:00 AM. 

Had I been asleep the whole time? No, that couldn’t have been true because Lyra said, “It’s time for you to go back to the reality you know Mr. Cloud Chaser.”