//------------------------------// // Chapter 3: The Royal Executioner // Story: The Unseen // by Shadow Beast //------------------------------// The castle appeared on the horizon, jutting out of the mountain just as it did those two months ago when the invasion took place. The team smiled as they flew toward it. Verdugo scanned the land below them, seeing the next checkpoint getting closer and closer. She frowned at the absence of activity. “Not so fast, guys,” she said, stopping in midair. Everyone hovered over the empty shack town. “It’s too quiet around here...” She signaled to her team before diving down into the center of the checkpoint. Starchy could feel instinct take over his movements as he joined the others in their charge to her side. They landed like comets, impacting into the dirt and getting up without a scratch. The team looked around. Verdugo sniffed the air. “No sign of ponies.” She turned to her team and pointed to the different shacks around them. “Check around and look for anything pointing to foul play. Whether they’re all lazy or in trouble, someone’s gonna pay.” They nodded and split into different directions, leaving Starchy in the middle of town with Verdugo. She noticed. “I know you’re new, but your body is a toned soldier.” She shook her head. “No need to be nervous to follow orders.” She forced a smile before turning from him. Hooves smacked the ground behind Starchy. Before he knew it, the hooves had wrapped around his neck and pulled him up on his hind legs. There was something cold being pressed up against his neck. Verdugo turned around and took a defensive stance with a glowing horn. “What the he--” “Don’t move or somebody dies!” a male, pony voice yelled into Starchy’s ear. “That’s a knife, pegasus...” Verdugo noted aloud. “Those are illegal, you know.” The cold began to hurt Starchy’s neck. “Moving your mouth still counts. Now take off your armor and get down on the ground with your hooves at your side.” It became difficult for the recruit to breathe. “Now!” Verdugo growled at Starchy’s captor. She aggressively pulled off her helmet and saddle and tossed them aside. She slowly lay on her side as he had requested. “Good,” said the voice. The cold withdrew a little, allowing Starchy to take a breath. “Good.” He could feel the body behind him shuffle a little, then a hoof threw a rope at the general. “Now use your magic to tie yourself up.” Verdugo looked at the rope then back up to the pegasus. “You’re kidding?” The cold closed in and pain coursed through Starchy’s neck. “Do I look like I’m kidding?! Tie. Yourself. Up!” She grumbled to herself as she complied. The glowing rope looped through the holes in her legs like the vine once had, then tied itself into knot. Starchy could breathe again. “Good,” the pony commended. “Now, order your team to do the same.” The cold came right back. “Don’t mess this up for your little recruit. I want to see you four changelings tied up together at the hoof now!” Verdugo sighed. “Dreary! Bruce! Squealer!” she called out. “Come to me slowly and without any sudden movements. Lay here on the ground with me.” They heard her. Dreary kept his head to the dirt, not even looking at Starchy or his captor as he approached Verdugo. He fell onto his side to match her. Squee popped his head out reluctantly then with an almost unnatural stride, calmly trotted to her side and laid down with her. Brucie was the last one, slowly going to their side and joining them. “Now tie yourselves up!” the voice commanded. Verdugo quickly undid the knot and pulled the rope off of her front hooves for enough slack for it to go around all four sets of hind legs. She tied the knot around her own hind leg and stared back at the pony holding the recruit. “Good!” he yelled into Starchy’s ear. “Well, that was... Easy,” another stallion’s voice called out from the darkness. A pale yellow unicorn trotted into view. “What do you expect from a hivemind?” The unicorn noticed the armor on the ground. “Ooh! These had armor? That’s super rare!” He trotted up to them. “Hooves off the merchandise, Sin! You gotta hold this little guy for me until we’re ready to act, alright?” The unicorn smirked. “You mean kill them all, right?” “Wow!” Verdugo chuckled. “Really?!” She turned to the captor. “Let him go right now and I promise not to snap your neck in half and shove that knife through your idiot friend’s eye.” The unicorn laughed. “Now we’re talking!” “Sin is definitely an idiot,” the voice growled. “But I can assure you that I had no intention on killing this changeling if you all just complied.” “But that’s so boring!” The unicorn pulled a spear from one of the shacks with his magic. Its tip dripped with changeling blood. “Why have all this bogus trust when we can just skip to the fun part!” “Because that’s not how we do things!” the voice was becoming more irritated. Starchy could feel himself being shaken around. But then he realized that he was doing the shaking. The captor tried to hold on. “No!” Just as the recruit escaped the pony’s embrace, it turned only to see the knife embedded in its own chest. Green leaked from his carapace. The white pegasus shook his head. “You... you made me do that! I told you not to move!” Starchy looked back down to his chest one last time before collapsing. The pegasus quickly grabbed the knife from his body and prepared for the worst. Sin simply laughed and charged toward the ensnared changelings, spear first. Verdugo’s magic shot the spear out of the unicorn’s aura before lifting the entire pony off of the ground by his neck. Dreary did his best to untie the knot around her leg. Brucie was still in shock and Squee was trying to chew his way through the rope. The pegasus charged from her flank, unseen before it was too late. The knife cut through Verdugo’s front hoof. The pain forced her to lose her balance and the grip on the unicorn. The others on her team doubled their efforts. Verdugo simply looked up at the knife-bearing pegasus. And he looked down at her. Sin crawled over to the armor. “Dude, this stuff is super high quality. Like... Royal guard stuff!” He turned to his friend with a smile. “You want to get back at the Queen for taking your wife, why not just kill her bitch?” He laughed. Verdugo looked up at him with her one eye before turning back to the pegasus. His lips trembled, shaking the blade. Verdugo’s horn began to glow. “Thunder! She’s up to someth--” Verdugo blasted the pegasus with her horn. She quickly turned her horn to the unicorn as the pegasus collapsed. Sin’s horn glowed in an attempt to pull the spear back to his side in time. The momentum caused the weapon to land harmlessly on his unconscious body. Dreary finally got the knot undone. Everyone pulled away from each other. Verdugo galloped to her armor, Dreary to the knife and then the spear, Squee meeting him at the fallen unicorn, and Brucie galloped to the fallen changeling. “Do you think they have any idea how lucky they are?” Verdugo asked Dreary. She scoffed at the sight of the unicorn. “Trying to kill the Royal Executioner! Ha!” She sighed. “I almost wish Chrysalis hadn't given me the explicit order not to kill ponies.” “So what do we do?” Dreary asked in an almost deadpan voice. “Leave them here? Take them with us?” Verdugo put her armor back on. She smiled at the pegasus. “That one, we bring with us. We find out his name. We find his wife. We get fed.” She turned to the unicorn. “That one stays here.” She took one last moment to look him over. “Sure was a freak, huh?” chittered Squee. He shrugged. “Might be fun to mess with at the castle...” “Chrysalis grew bored with the criminally insane the moment we started in-the-womb training regimens,” Verdugo explained. She shrugged. “He's completely devoid of love. He only likes killing.” A smirk creased her snout. “Those emotions really threw off my nose.” She stared at the pony almost wistfully, as if the unicorn were an old friend. She shrugged again and smiled at Squee. “Wrap him up. I want to see if Chrysalis will allow an execution.” Verdugo turned to see Brucie carrying Starchy's body on his back. “He's barely holding on, Verdugo. We need to rest here for the night.” She shook her head. “It's too unsafe. The recruit stays behind.” Brucie shook his head. “He trusted us! And... Dammit, we need a cocoonist!” “He stays behind. I'm sure Chrysalis will love to deal with the two ponies that killed our breeder.” Brucie reluctantly nodded and shook the changeling's body off of his back. “Listen, lieutenant, if that recruit weighed you down enough that some pony with a bow gets you right through your eye, we lose up to two changelings today.” Verdugo sighed. “Don't we just want to cut it at one? You know as well as I do that his complete lack of true experience puts him far too low on the waitlist for treatment anyways.” “But he'll die alone...” “Good. I hope he wakes up for a fleeting moment. What's happened here is a tragedy and I absolutely hate unexpected death.” She looked around before finally smiling. “But... If you want, we can fire off a flare for him. A changeling beacon. Maybe someone who lived here will see it and help him out for you?” Brucie smiled and nodded. “Then it's decided.” Verdugo fired a flaming bolt of magic that exploded into a puff of green flame. “Now let's go. You take the pegasus. The others have the unicorn. We've got a report to make.”