Equestrylvania

by Brony_Fife

The Wolf Revealed, Part II

Their plan to head down Bodeley gone from their minds (as well as Shatterstorm’s warning about not flying), the two pegasi bolt from the wolf, pumping their wings with all their might to get above Lost Canterlot’s streets, away where it can’t reach them.

As he follows Rainbow Dash’s lead, Shatterstorm’s heart shakes his chest with every beat of his wings. His teeth clench of their own accord. Tears of terror mass around his eyes.

Then he sees it.

It’s still too foggy to see, and the dying light distorts everything further. But Shatterstorm swears up and down that he sees it. There’s something sitting on a nearby spire—a spire from the nearby church—something black and scrawny, with a creamy-white face and dark, wet eyes. The sounds of crow-cackles echo as little black things gather around this creature.

Its creamy-white face is turned in Shatterstorm’s and Rainbow Dash’s direction.

Don’t look.

The dark, wet eyes narrow.

Don’t look!

It watches them. Has been since they arrived.

---

She feels a hoof wrap around her back—then forced descent onto a building—then landing—then being rushed behind a rising roof—then being thrust ahead—then being pulled down—then Shatterstorm harshly whispering in her ear, “Siddown and shuddup!”

Even from up here, Rainbow Dash can hear its growling, feel its heavy footsteps. How in Tartarus a beast like this could have been quiet enough to sneak up on them is beyond her.

The beast grows quiet.

Then they hear—no, feel—the entire building shake.

Shatterstorm lets go of Rainbow Dash and whispers, “RUN.”

The wolf shoots up over the side of the building, its huge mouth open and hungry. Rainbow Dash unfurls her wings to fly away again, only for Shatterstorm to bite her tail and take off running, yanking her along with him. “I said run, not fly!” he yelled.

Rainbow Dash thinks to yell a retort, but her voice and thoughts are swallowed by the wolf’s piercing howl behind them. Her legs find the rooftop beneath her and immediately pound it, propelling her forward, the wind whipping her mane and tail with every step.

The giant wolf closes in on its prey, foaming drool and knife-like tongue spinning wildly in its cavernous mouth. It emits a hungry hiss, almost able to taste the oceanic-colored one in front of it. With a sound like two pieces of metal clamping shut, its mouth bites down on Shatterstorm’s tail, yanking him off his hooves.

With a slight hook of its neck, the wolf pulls Shatterstorm into the air, then slams him hard enough to leave an indention on the roof. It repeats a few times, jiggling Shatterstorm’s insides, using enough force to have broken the neck of most ponies, but the most it gets out of Shatterstorm is a few bruises.

Rainbow Dash leaps to the next building, but stops as she hears Shatterstorm cry out in pain. She turns her head, and through the fog sees the faded outline of the wolf, jerking its head to and fro with something pony-shaped in its mouth jerking about spastically.

Without so much as a blink’s hesitation, Rainbow Dash turns back and, with a flap of her wings, shoots straight for the wolf, speeding back over to the previous building. “Get your filthy paws OFF him!” she barks as she turns around. Her hind legs may be no Bucky McGillicuddy or Kicks McGee like Applejack’s, but they leave impressions on the wolf’s face either way.

Stunned, the wolf staggers back a few steps as Shatterstorm is dropped onto the rooftop. Rainbow Dash thrusts a hoof out to help him back up, only for Shatterstorm to smack it away and stand up himself. Shatterstorm only realizes he’d smacked her hoof away after she sneers at him.

“You’re welcome,” Rainbow Dash shoots snidely.

There’s not much time for Shatterstorm to work up a counter or apology; the wolf regains its bearings and growls, the rooftop shuddering from the sound.

“Get ready!” Shatterstorm says. “Here it comes!”

The wolf bounds for them, its mighty stride shaking the entire building, the rooftop beneath Rainbow Dash’s hooves rumbling perilously. She and Shatterstorm get ready to jump it as it lunges, ready to shoot down as it flies beneath them, ready to…

The two pegasi raise eyebrows as the giant wolf suddenly flops down on its side with a yelp and a thunderous crash, sliding to a stop just in front of them.

Rainbow Dash, unsure of what the heck just happened, finally gets a good look at the wolf’s face. Its terrifying, predatory grimace morphs into a vulnerable, weak look of shock, a small, puppylike whine escaping its lips. Its wide, frightened eyes slowly lose focus… roll upwards slowly… then close.

“What in…?” she asks. Then she notices the small, white dart in the wolf’s side.

“We got it!” cries a voice from some distance away. The accent sounds Trottish.

“Great shot!” says another.

“Well,” replies the first voice as they grow closer, “they don’t call me ‘Eagle Eye’ fer nothin’!”

“…Eagle Eye?” asks Shatterstorm, snapping to attention suddenly.

Just as Rainbow Dash is about to ask Shatterstorm who that is, two gray shapes form in the fog. Shatterstorm cranes his neck forward. “Eagle Eye!” he calls.

The two figures stop. “…Shatterstorm?”

Shatterstorm breathes a sigh of relief. “Eagle Eye, yes, it’s me! Good grief—I thought you guys were dead!”

The two shapes come further from the fog until Rainbow Dash can make out details. One has a dirty purple mane, off-white pelt, a horn; the other guy has a dark curly mane and tail, grey pelt, wings. Of course, the fog’s still wrecking her view, but at least she can tell they’re ponies.

“Shatterstorm!” cries the unicorn (Eagle Eye, by the sounds of his Trottish accent). He gallops over, wrapping a foreleg over Shatterstorm, who flinches at first, but returns the hug anyway. “Great to see you again, you ole’ tosser! We thought’cha bit it back when all this came down!”

The other guy pokes the giant wolf cautiously. It twitches. Then lies still. He turns his head. “Hey, Professor!” he calls. “It looks like your paralysis medicine worked!”

“Paralysis?” comes another voice, resonating like thunder rumbling ominously in the distance. Rainbow Dash hears hooves hitting hard rooftop, gradually becoming louder until a large shape begins to form in the fog. “You’re cleary mistaken. What’s in that dart was a strong sedative. It’s meant to put her to sleep.”

The grey guy kicks the wolf. “I don’t see why we can’t just kill this thing,” he says. “It’s already eaten Night Flight and Dead Air.”

Finally, the deep voice has a form to be attached to. The blue pelt, the gold mane, the long horn, the smart clothes, classic handsome features, piercing green eyes behind a set of spectacles. The size of this guy. Rainbow Dash recognizes him right away from the magazine Twilight had.

“To kill her would be wasteful,” opines Roaring Yawn, stopping just in front of the Royal Guard. “We need her alive if I am to conduct any further research on lycanthropy and how it affects ponies.”

The grey Royal Guard looks at Roaring Yawn disbelievingly. Then he kicks the wolf. “She’s giant, hairy, and extremely violent. I’d say it affects ponies the same way it affects those weird apelike creatures from the Castle. Case closed.”

Roaring Yawn waves a hoof. “I’m not here to argue, Lieutenant Shakey. I’m here to bring in this specimen for study.”

“Yeah, yeah, study, study, study,” grumbles Shakey. “It’s always books and potions with you, Yawn.

“So. She must weigh, like, four times any of us. Not to mention she already destroyed our cage-carrier we were gonna put her in. How we gonna lug this bitch around?”

Almost at his words, the wolf begins to shrink. Her hair segues back into a normal, slate grey pelt, the deep black stripe that crowns her back becoming a wave of long, black mane, her even-longer, silkier tail spilling like ink all around her. Her body trades its lupine shape for an equine one, the paws closing into hooves, the snout shortening into a muzzle, the fangs curling into blunt teeth. The dark hair on her flanks reveals a treble clef for a cutie mark.

“...Does that answer your question?” asks Roaring Yawn.

Rainbow Dash gets a closer look at the thing that had been chasing them for the past twenty minutes. Her chest rises and falls slowly, rhythmically. A soft snore escapes her nostrils. She smacks her full lips in her sleep. It’s surreal that so pretty a mare could become so terrifying a monster.

“Here, let me carry her,” Shatterstorm volunteers.

“Whoa there, loverboy,” jokes Eagle Eye, “now’s no time to go crushin’ on dark beauties with terrible curses.”

Shatterstorm shoots Eagle Eye a smirk. “No, I mean, it’s been forever since I saw you guys. It’s great that the Royal Guard at least still exists.”

A pause. Eagle Eye smiles. Laughs. “What’s that got to do with her?” he asks, cocking his head to the once-was-a-wolf.

“I… just… wanna be useful,” Shatterstorm says with a shrug. He looks to Rainbow Dash. “Hey Dash, gimme a hoof here.”

Rainbow Dash is broken from her stupor; she nervously rubs a hoof against her temple while releasing a shaky sigh. Too much is happening at once, too much to take in. “Y-Yeah, just gimme a second.”

“Oh, what? Going too fast for you?” Shatterstorm snarks.

“Any slower and you’d be going backwards, Shatterdork,” Rainbow Dash shoots back as she gets on the other side of the unconscious mare. “You want my help or not?”

Shakey laughs, his eyes twinkling. “Ooh, she’s a fireball, this one! Where’d you get a catch like her, Shatterstorm?”

Rainbow Dash blushes as she sets the once-was-a-wolf on Shatterstorm’s back, his wings cupping the mystery mare’s body carefully. Shakey and Eagle Eye look at her with wide smiles, their eyes twinkling with expectation… and maybe something else.

“Catch?!” she snorts angrily. “H-He’s—”

“We met shortly after arriving in Ponyville,” Shatterstorm interrupts with a charming smile.

Rainbow Dash’s eyes widen, recoiling as Shatterstorm continues. “She and I ended up having a lot in common, so I asked her, y’know—”

Roaring Yawn groans and waves a hoof impatiently. “I’m sure your love story is quite compelling, but we must get going before the sun sets.”

Roaring Yawn and Eagle Eye ready their ropes to descend the building and head for the nearest edge. When she’s sure they’re far enough away, Rainbow Dash turns and gives Shatterstorm the mother of all death glares. “What. Was. That?” she growls.

“I’m just trying to protect you,” Shatterstorm whispers harshly.

“Protect me? By pretending to be my boyfriend?!”

“Not so loud, stupid!” he says, leaning in. “Didn’t you see the looks on their faces when they saw you?”

Rainbow Dash shrugs. “So they think I’m awesome. I have that effect on everypony.”

Cue facehoof. “That wasn’t awe!”

“Really? What else did you see?” Rainbow Dash asks earnestly.

Shatterstorm grinds his teeth, his blood boiling at Rainbow Dash’s complete genre blindness. “Awe!” he grumbles. “Not ‘all’, awe! A-W-E, awe! That was not awe in their eyes! I gotta spell this out on a chalkboard for ya?!”

“Hey, quit making out back there!” Shakey shouts with a laugh. “This is a G-rated mission! Let’s go!”

Rainbow Dash starts toward the group, then stops. She turns her head aside to Shatterstorm and whispers, “Just so you know, you’ll never be my boyfriend.”

“Lucky me,” Shatterstorm retorts as Rainbow Dash walks away. She stops when she doesn’t hear his hoofsteps behind her. Slowly, she cranes her neck behind her, catching Shatterstorm looking about the fog cautiously.

“What’s the holdup?” Rainbow Dash asks.

With a startled breath, Shatterstorm snaps to attention. In a way somehow both sheepish and arrogant, he trots along to catch up with everypony, not so much as offering any explanation as he walks by Rainbow Dash.

Rainbow Dash shrugs. “Fine,” she snorts as she trots along. “Be all mysterious.”

---

The fog grows thicker, the fast-fading sunlight coloring everything in dark dust. The visibility vanishes, and a milky darkness takes its place. Their trek back to base takes them through murky streets and past colorless, formless buildings.

“First things first,” Shatterstorm opens. “We need to know where Princess Cadance is.”

“Don’t worry,” Eagle Eye says. “She’s okay.”

Rainbow Dash pops an eyebrow. “Then what were those freaks doing with her crown?”

“It was a close one, for sure,” Eagle Eye replies, turning his head to look at Rainbow Dash. “We almost didn’t get away in time when they attacked the hospital! She lost her crown on our way out, and I guess those clowns must’ve found it.”

Rainbow Dash facehoofs. “Are you kidding me?! They punked us?!”

“Sounds like something they’d do,” Shatterstorm grumbles. “This was a trap, after all.”

“A trap?” Roaring Yawn asks. His sharp green eyes dart about as he puts two and two together. “For Twilight Sparkle, I take it?”

“You guessed it,” Rainbow Dash says as she carefully hovers over the street, her wings beating silently. “She went and pissed off one of Dracula’s minions—Actress, I think—”

“Actrise,” Shatterstorm corrects.

“Yeah, whatever,” Rainbow Dash says, rolling her eyes. “But anyway, Actrise’s henchponies… hench-apes…?”

Shatterstorm stifles a groan. “Try ‘lackeys’.”

Rainbow Dash shoots him a glare. “Her lackeys gave Fluttershy—she’s a friend of ours—Princess Cadance’s crown to try luring Twilight here.”

Roaring Yawn nods. “I see. It’s good to hear Twilight is doing all right.” He walks around a fallen chariot. “I certainly hope whatever she’s doing in sending you two here in her stead will work. Actrise is one of Dracula’s most dangerous minions, if not the most.”

“She been giving you guys trouble too?” Rainbow Dash asks.

Eagle Eye shakes his head. “Like ya wouldn’t believe! We managed to get ’er off our backs, but I still get nightmares about her. If I were you, I’d steer clear of her as much as possible.”

“Too late for that,” Shatterstorm grumbles, shuffling his wings, readjusting the once-was-a-wolf on his back.

Eagle Eye raises an eyebrow. “What do you mean? You two ran into her already?”

Rainbow Dash nods. “Pretty much. She possessed some mare, and…”

Silence. Everyone looks aside to find Rainbow Dash sullen and hesitant. There’s this look of discomfort on her face that Shatterstorm can see even through the thick fog and dimming light. “What she did,” he says, breaking the silence, “she’ll pay for. She’s on our list, don’t worry about it. Right now, we’re just here to retrieve the Princess.”

Shakey snorts. “Retrieve? Hate to break it to you like this, but there’s this little problem we’ve been having.”

“W-What do you mean?” Rainbow Dash asks.

“Getting into Canterlot’s the easy part,” Eagle Eye explains. “Getting out is another issue entirely. Dracula’s lieutenants have eyes everywhere—in the sky, in buildings, on the streets. They’ll welcome you in, but don’t expect a goin’-away party that doesn’t involve a casket your size.”

“Especially since your aim is to rescue the Princess,” Roaring Yawn says. “I doubt very much Dracula’s minions would simply let you slip past them.”

“It’s worked out for us so far,” Rainbow Dash says with a smile.

Eagle Eye snickers. “Don’t git cocky, aye? ’Fore y’know it, you’ll find yerself surrounded by shamblers ’n willy-beasts.”

“Aw, I’d like to see ’em just try it!” Rainbow Dash says, mock-punching the air before her. “They’re the ones that don’t know what they’re getting into!”

Eagle Eye’s snicker breaks into an outright laugh. “I like this chick. She’s got spunk. You’re a very lucky stallion, Shatters.”

Shatterstorm chuckles nervously as Rainbow Dash gives him an uneasy aside glance. “Darn straight he’s lucky!” she crows, hoping she sounds convincing.

Shakey laughs. “You shoulda seen ’im before you met him, Dashie. Every time we caught him makin’ eyes at mares—’specially this one cutie of a barista—he’d just, y’know, deny, deny, deny.”

“Yeah,” Eagle Eye agrees, putting one foreleg around Shatterstorm’s neck facetiously. “Made us kinda wonder about you.”

Shatterstorm rolls his eyes and blows a huff of air. “Not this again…”

“Hey, it’s all right to like guys, too,” Shakey says. “We’re not, y’know, judging you or anything.”

Rainbow Dash presses a hoof to her turned-up lips as a snort chuckles its way out of her nostrils. Shatterstorm frowns. “I-It’s not that,” he says flatly, “I just… don’t like using my military status to—”

Eagle Eye shoulders Shatterstorm. “Oy! Enough with the fake modesty. We know how much time you spend with Tiger Cross.” He shrugs. “Though honestly I never thought he’d be the type. You’re not just datin’ this fine mare here to make ’im jealous or anything, are ya?”

Rainbow Dash can barely hold her laughter at Shatterstorm’s flat frown and furrowed brow. The death glare he shoots at Eagle Eye could probably count as a laser beam.

“How is that old blighter, anyway?” Eagle Eye asks. “He was with you last, right?”

Silence. The group stops and looks behind them, to where Shatterstorm stands, struck silent. He’s frozen in place, his hilarious frown now much more somber, the hard look in his eyes answering Eagle Eye’s question. A heavy sigh billows from Shatterstorm’s nostrils as he trots ahead to rejoin the group, his gaze fixed on nothing in particular.

“…Oh,” says Eagle Eye silently. “I-I’m sorry.”

The group walks along in a damp and uncomfortable silence, the news of Tiger Cross’s death crushing the Royal Guards’ good humor. From the grief on their faces and the loss in their eyes, Rainbow Dash can hazard a guess as to how precious and admired Tiger Cross was to the Royal Guards.

“How’s the Captain?” Shatterstorm asks suddenly, apparently wanting to change the subject. “You were studying him, right?”

Roaring Yawn looks to Shatterstorm as Eagle Eye and Shakey glance away morosely. For the first time since they’ve met him, Roaring Yawn struggles for what to say. “Captain Rose Blade is fine,” he says.

Shatterstorm shakes his head. “No, not—not Captain Rose Blade,” he says, “The Captain. Shining Armor.”

“Shining Armor,” Roaring Yawn says, his voice struggling, “is… beyond my help. There was… an incident.” He sighs as they turn another corner. “He has succumbed fully to the madness of his infection.”

Roaring Yawn stops, as well as the rest of the group. Without turning to look at them, he rolls up one of his sleeves. Rainbow Dash takes in a sharp breath as she sees the bandages wrapped all around his foreleg. “…After only a few days’ study, he suddenly attacked my team, and I… was the only survivor.”

Ice strokes Rainbow Dash’s spine at the sight of Roaring Yawn’s leg. A taste of cold that courses through her suddenly, grabbing her, squeezing her, its claws digging deeper and deeper. She swallows a lump in her throat. Shit. What is she going to tell Twilight?

“D-Does,” Rainbow Dash stutters, “uh… Does Princess Cadance know?”

Roaring Yawn sighs uncomfortably, looking straight ahead, avoiding Rainbow Dash’s eyes. “Not yet. She has no idea her husband has…”

He is interrupted by a hideous silence.

“I did my best,” Roaring Yawn concludes in a quiet and small voice. “…But I have failed.”

Shakey pats Roaring Yawn’s back. “Hey,” he says. “Hey. Stop. We know you did your best, it’s not your fault. It’s okay.”

Silence. Shatterstorm shifts his weight from one side to other uncomfortably as he looks aside at Rainbow Dash. She clears her throat. “Hey, guys, I hate to be the one to say this—”

“No,” Roaring Yawn says suddenly. “No, no, you’re absolutely right. There is no time for this.” He sighs, recollecting his previous rigidity, and leads the group ahead once again. “Absolutely no time. We must reach the base. The daylight is waning.”

---

It relieves Shatterstorm that the base looks about the same as when he’d left. The Academy where he’d been chiseled into a Royal Guard sits as a sentinel at one end, a squat and square creature, while the two other buildings—the Headquarters—stand erect at the other. The remaining sunlight has drained away, leaving only the black shapes of the base standing in a dark and milky fog, lights in their windows like yellow eyes twinkling in the night. The tall stone and iron wall separates the base from the rest of Canterlot, the last bastion of resistance against Dracula’s near-complete dominance.

But Shatterstorm doesn’t remember the barbed wire. He also doesn’t remember the bodies hanging just outside, or the bodies on pikes around the main gate, or the piked bodies lining the road here.

“Don’t like the new decorations?” Shakey asks. “Good, neither do we.”

Shatterstorm can see Shakey’s bright purple eyes even in the fog. Closer to Shatterstorm is Rainbow Dash, her cyan face fallen and pale and beaded with uncomfortable sweat. “What’s with the…?” she asks, her voice trembling, her words dissolving.

“We got some traitors,” Eagle Eye responds, his voice uncharacteristically glum. “When we found out they weren’t with us, drastic measures were taken.”

“Ya think?!” Rainbow Dash glowers.

“Considering who we’re up against,” Roaring Yawn interrupts, his voice even and strong, “it’s absolutely the most necessary precaution to take. Hanging the bodies of Dracula’s inside-ponies sends a message that needs to be said. Impaling the bodies of his fallen minions sends a message that needs to be said. So far, no further attacks have been made on our base.” He pauses. Blinks. “It seems the message is understood.”

Suddenly, a shaft of light falls on the group. The moment their searchlights pierce the dark fog, the Royal Guards recognize Eagle Eye, Shakey, Roaring Yawn—and cheer when they see Shatterstorm, followed by giving him the usual good-natured shit.

Shyly, Shatterstorm readjusts the once-was-a-wolf on his back just as he feels her weight begin to slip. He doesn’t take his eyes off Rainbow Dash’s face as they draw nearer to the base’s gates.

The color in her face is nearly gone.

---

As Shatterstorm and his squadmates converse a bit, their words fail to reach Rainbow Dash’s ears, instead settling into barely-audible white noise. As she stares at eyes that stare back.

Don’t look.

Their blank eyes watch her, their gray gazes settling on every detail. Their slack, open mouths scream soundlessly. Their legs… all broken. Twisted. The pegasi all lack wings. The unicorns have no horns. A crow descends, lands on one of the impaled. It cackles as it reaches its beak into the eyesocket and pulls out a meal. As more crows descend, the first crow turns its head, eyeball in its beak, as if giving the dead Guard a good view of Rainbow Dash.

Don’t look!

Was… any of this worth it? Considering how Shakey and Eagle Eye reacted to hearing of the loss of their comrade, it makes Rainbow Dash wonder how hard it must have been for them, and the other Royal Guards, to fight, much less kill, their own. And what would cause these Royal Guards to turn on their own kind...?

The gate’s main doors squeal maliciously as they open, the sound loud enough to jerk Rainbow Dash back into the present. As the gate opens, a sharp wind rockets by the group, surprising Rainbow Dash enough that she finds herself up off the ground, her wings keeping her aloft.

She expects Shatterstorm to snicker at her, crack a joke about her tension. But one look at his discomforted eyes, their wide whites, their shrunken pupils, and she can see it in him as well.

As they are ushered through the base’s gates, the Royal Guards’ eyes press against her. She’s the center of attention again, but this time it’s different.

“Hey, who let this pretty little thing in?” said one with an Appaloosian drawl.

“Think she wandered in by mistake?” asks another. “She’s too pretty a mare to be around lugs like us!” He laughs.

She smiles weakly at the Guards as they become increasingly close. There’s an uncomfortable feeling inside Rainbow Dash, growing with every compliment given to her. Finally, Shatterstorm steps in.

“Hey guys, come on, leave my girlfriend alone,” he says in a way that sounds authoritative. “She’s got enough on her plate.”

“I bet she does!” grumbles a deep-voiced Guard. “She’s dating you after all!”

Everypony laughs, and suddenly everything feels okay. Shatterstorm had taken a pin and deflated the situation before it could balloon out of control. Rainbow Dash finds it immensely relieving, but at the same time surreal.

A set of Royal Guards approach, pulling behind them a large cage on wheels—like the kind the circus would use to house tigers and elephants. They take from Shatterstorm the once-was-a-wolf, delicately loading her unconscious body inside the cage. A thin frown and pitying eyes from Rainbow Dash accompany the poor mare on her way in.

Shackles are applied to the mare, snapping around her fetlocks with loud chomps. A muzzle hides her mouth, leather straps attaching it to her head like some monstrous parasite. After fastening everything, the Guards then exit the cage, closing the door behind them, and locking it tightly with several locks. Their animal is caged.

Roaring Yawn looks in at the mare with a look that’s half-curiosity, half-sympathy. He scratches at the foreleg with the bandages. Rainbow Dash wonders if he’s trying, deep down, to make up for his failure to cure Shining Armor. Trying to avoid repeating his mistakes. Trying to help somepony.

As the Royal Guards pull the cage-wagon towards the holding cells under Roaring Yawn’s direction, more Royal Guards appear. Shatterstorm and Rainbow Dash are showered with praise and attention—two of Rainbow Dash’s favorite food groups. As Rainbow soaks up the adoration, Shatterstorm rolls his eyes in exasperation. Afterward, Shakey and Eagle Eye lead them into the base.

The gates are closed behind them with the same ominous squeal as when they opened.

---

“Captain Rose Blade, sir?”

Rose Blade sniffs dispassionately, the scent of his namesake flowers wafting into his nostrils and piano music from his record player tickling his ear drums. He sweeps his icy turquoise hoof through his long, firetruck-red mane, admiring the way it drifts as it falls, admiring how well it matches the stains on his hoof. Even fast-approaching forty, he looks not a day past twenty. He turns a deep green eye to his subordinate.

“Yes, my Vice Captain,” he says, a snakelike baritone slithering from his mouth. “Report.”

Vice Captain Whisper White has always been the demure type—how in Equestria he became Vice-Captain under Rose Blade is a topic of frequent debate amongst the troops—but at the sound of Rose Blade’s voice, he suddenly stands rigid, his wavy electric yellow mane bobbing cutely while his equally yellow eyes stare ahead, his clown-white crystal pony body but an image in Rose Blade’s ornate round mirror. “The collection team has returned, their mission successful,” he says in his soft tenor. “The escaped Wharg is in our possession again.”

Rose Blade’s horn—long and sharp as a spearhead—glows the same deep green as his eyes as he turns on the faucet. He washes his hooves in the sink before him, scrubbing vicariously under clear water turning reddish pink under his hooves, not taking his eyes off his own reflection in the mirror. The hot water sparkles as steam rises to his face. “Good,” he mumbles, not terribly interested in the outcome of that little mission that rambling fool Roaring Yawn begged him for.

“They returned with a pair of survivors,” Whisper White adds suddenly.

Rose Blade turns his head slightly, his long tail flicking irritably. “Survivors?”

“Corporal Shatterstorm was recovered along with the Wharg… as well as one of the Bearers of the Elements of Harmony.”

At this news, Rose Blade cocks an eyebrow. For the first time this conversation, he turns around to face Whisper White. “A Bearer? Intriguing.” His thin lips crook into a grin. “It wouldn’t happen to be the former Captain’s equally-irritating sister, would it?”

“No, sir,” Whisper White replies. “It would appear the Bearer in question is a pegasus. Her name Rainbow Dash.”

Rose Blade takes a deep breath, as if inhaling the memory behind the name. “Ah, yes. The winner of the Best Young Flyer Competition some two years ago. The one responsible for that colorful sonic boom.” His smile broadens. “I must meet with our Corporal… and our new prize.”

He steps down from his mirror, descending a small dais, the piano music filling the silence in their conversation. He stops in front of his subordinate. “Whisper White, I may have checked myself over in the mirror, but do me a favor and tell me if my cutie mark remains unmarred?”

Whisper White smiles boyishly as his attractive eyes, the same electric yellow as his mane and tail, analyze the sword surrounded by roses on his Captain’s flanks. There’s a look of admonishment in his eyes that Rose Blade quite enjoys seeing. “I see not one scar, not one smear, not one smudge, my Captain,” he coos.

Rose Blade’s smile becomes more pleasant. He nods approvingly, and leads Whisper White out of the room, leaving the record to finish its song as the traitor he’d spent the last half-hour bludgeoning lies broken and shackled on the floor, surrounded by the heads of plucked red roses soaking in his spilled blood.

Comments

[Dusty the Royal Janitor]

Her body trades its lupine shape for an equine one, the paws closing into hooves, the snout shortening into a muzzle, the fangs curling into blunt teeth. The dark hair on her flanks reveals a treble clef for a cutie mark.

Ohhhhhh noooooooo...

...wait... then that means... the letter in the previous chapter...

OHHHHHH NOOOOOOOO...

You, author, are a freaking monster, you know that? You're a monster.