Two voices conversed faintly in the distance.
“New recruit, huh?”
“Come on, Scratch, I think she’s got potential!”
“Dash, listen to me. Look, I’m glad you’re enthusiastic about this, but to me she sounds completely inexperienced! For all we know she’s never even boarded in her life. How do you expect somepony who couldn’t make it through the drop without completely passing out to even fathom taking on the harder stuff, let alone Tirek’s Peak?”
“Please, Scratch, can’t we give her a chance?”
“Oh, by all means give her a chance. Just don’t be so cocky as to think she’s going to be able to become one of us right away, OK?”
There was a brief moment of silence, followed by a door opening.
Twilight's eyes opened to see Rainbow sitting on the edge of the bed.
"Mornin’, newbie."
Twilight observed her surroundings. She was in a bedroom-sized, garage-like room, walls coated with graffiti of seemingly random scribbles, initials, profanities, and symbols of cutie marks. She turned around to see Rainbow, the same one she had been rescued by the previous night, sitting there. With the snowsuit removed, Twilight could now see that, along with the bandana which was still obscuring her mouth, her whole body, save for her face, had been tattooed with a glow-in-the-dark neon-green skeleton motif.
It wasn't some random dream or anything like she had thought; something very strange was going on.
"Who was that you were talking to?" she asked.
"Ah, Vinyl Scratch. Don’t worry ‘bout her. She can be a little hostile towards newcomers, but trust me, she's a good pony once you get to know her."
The name instantly rung a bell. "Let me guess: white unicorn, lightning blue hair, music note cutie mark?"
Rainbow was taken aback. "Y... yeah, that's Scratch all right. How did you..."
“Because I know her! And… and I know you too! I mean I don’t know you, personally, but I know… you… like… I...” Twilight stumbled over her words. Even she had no clue what she was saying anymore.
“You’re not making any sense here… Sparkle, you said?”
“Twilight Sparkle. And...” she sighed. “Forget about it. I’ll try to explain later, I’m… I’m still a little messed up is all. I just hope Spike is…”
She stopped mid-sentence. Her eyes widened.
“SPIKE! Oh no, Spike! Where is he? Is he OK?” she frantically questioned Rainbow, clinging onto her.
Rainbow gave a confused glare, pushing Twilight a glare. “Uhh, who’s ‘Spike’?”
“Small dragon, purple and green, raspy voice? Did you see him?”
Rainbow shook her head. “Sorry, Sparkle. I’d scouted pretty much the whole sector before I ran into you. No dragon in sight.”
Twilight lowered her head into her crossed forehooves. “Well, that’s just great. Now I’m stuck in this stupid wasteland with no idea what’s going on, and I’m all by myself.”
Rainbow sighed, patting Twilight on the back. “Come on, you’re not all alone here. You’ve got us.”
“Who is ‘us’?”
“You know what? I’m gonna give you some more time to rest and think stuff over. Looks like you need it. I’m willing to introduce you to the gang whenever you’re ready.”
And with that, Rainbow was off.
Twilight laid back down, sighing as she buried her face into a pillow. Even though it wasn’t as bad as it was outside in the brutal tundra, the room was still measurably cold. She desperately tried to recall any recent memories of her home that she could, but anything recent that could lead to a clue as to what had happened was a big haze. Maybe with time her memories would clear up. She rolled over and stumbled out of bed, and trotted out of the door.
She found herself in a large warehouse-like setting, standing on a steel balcony that ran along all four walls of the room. She leaned up against the rail and observed the setting.
The walls of concrete and steel coated with even more graffiti and lined with snowboarding gear and more posters. A busted-up gray couch and vending machine full of energy drinks also parced her line of vision, and a couple more garage doors like the one she saw the previous night, albeit smaller.
“See you’re awake.”
Twilight let out a small scream and flinched. The voice caught her completely off guard.
“Whoa there, chill out. It’s just me,” Rainbow assured her.
Twilight caught her breath. “Oh. Hey, Rainbow. Umm… cool place you got here.”
“Thanks, and there’s a lot more where this came from. I’ll give you the full tour later. For now, ready to meet some of the crew?”
“Sure.”
“Awesome. Hey guys, in here!” she called out.
One of the doors in the lower story was lifted open by hoof and a few ponies flooded into the room, all bearing the same bandanas and body paint as Rainbow, all ponies Twilight recognized, Vinyl Scratch being one of them.
Rainbow and Twilight descended to the lower floor, Rainbow hoofbumping and making small interactions with the group.
The pony resembling Vinyl Scratch walked towards Twilight. Alongside the bandana and tattoos, she bore a pair of magenta pink snow goggles strapped over her forehead just above her horn in place of the signature glasses Twilight was familiar with, black bracelets and piercings lining her front hooves and ears respectively, and a gray beanie adorned with black buttons, each adorned with a different glow-in-the-dark graphic design. A white snowflake, a hot pink bleeding “X”, a light blue music note, and as Twilight noticed was becoming a common theme, a green skull and crossbones, among others. “So, Twilight Sparkle, huh?” she asked with a somewhat menacing glare, putting a hoof to Twilight’s chest.
“Ease off on her, Scratch,” Rainbow said.
Vinyl backed away. She lined up with the rest of the ponies as Rainbow began her little introductory speech.
“Sparkle, you’re new around here, so I’d like to introduce you to the crew and show you how we do things.”
Twilight listened attentively.
“We call ourselves the Neon Skulls.