• Published 6th Oct 2012
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Becoming Rainbow Dash: A Tale of Two Worlds - Freescript the Bard



Markus wakes up in Rainbow Dash's body in his bed on Earth

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Servant of the Night

<> Day 9 <>

“Who the heck was that?” Anna’s voice asked as the door slammed shut, shrouding us once more in darkness.

“Dunno,” I answered quietly, staring into the dark at where the door was. “Whoever... or whatever... that was, there is no chance in Tartarus that I’d like to meet him again.”

A silence hung in the room. “...Tartarus? Like Hades’ Pit of Despair?” my sister inquired.

I rolled my eyes. “It’s like Hell for ponies, only Tartarus physically exists in Equestria.”

“You would know that, pony-loving weirdo.”

“Look who’s talking, orange-butt.”

“At least I’m the same gender!”

“HEY!” Deedee shouted, banging on her cage for emphasis. Anna and I immediately clamped out jaws shut, ceasing our sibling altercation altogether. In a large contrast to the kind and collected person I initially thought her to be, Deedee could be heard seething in her cage, taking angry breaths. “Do you two have any idea what just happened!?”

Neither of us answered for a few seconds, stunned by this sudden mood shift. “...we were scared stiff by an albino-dude?” I guessed.

“They took Dazzle, you idiot!” the irritated mare yelled at us. “Didn’t you hear what he said!? That man means to hurt Daz, and he’s coming for Zach after that! If we don’t get out of here, he might come for all of us!”

“Here in the shadows she commands... our exodus from the dark... listening... a servant of the night.”

“Shut up, Zach!” Deedee continued, substituting Dazzle. “I’m sick and tired of your mumbling! Your friend just got carried off to some torture chamber god-knows-where, and you’re too fucking crazy to care! I don’t even know who you are anymore, Zachariah! Ever since this whole pony thing started you’ve been acting weird, and now you can’t even talk without sounding like a psychopath!”

“Whoa, okay...” I tried, speaking as calmly as I could. My headache was amplified by her yelling, and it certainly wasn’t helping the situation anyway. “Lay off the kook, lady. He’s probably just scared and in shock... or something.”

“Well he isn’t the only one! But we’re not spouting freaky gibberish, now are we!?” retorted Deedee. “I can’t stand him anymore! I can’t stand being a god damned pony! I can’t stand being kept here by lord-knows-who and waiting to starve to death!” There was a loud slam from the room that shook the entire stack of carriers as the mare rammed herself against her cage door. “And I can’t!” Wham! “Stand!” Wham! “This!” Wham! “Fucking!” Wham! “CAGE!”

WHAM!

With one last impact, Deedee fell immediately silent. Straining my ears, I could hear the mare shift around in her cage, probably peeling herself away from the carrier door. It was an unsettling change for me, to hear the pony that I had thought to be the most collected of the three burst into a rage, much like Dazzle did, then to drop into such harsh silence. Probably broke her spirit, watching her friend get taken away... I thought to myself. A memory of my sister surfaced in my head, her image floating in my mind’s eye. Wouldn’t I feel the same if they did that to her?

“My-oh-my... quite a temper on that one, eh? Always the quiet ones.”

I nearly jumped out of my skin, hitting my head on the roof of the carrier. Ow! Schist! Somewhere in the dark room, away from the cages, a grim female voice was chuckling in amusement. It wasn’t a voice of anypony that had spoken before, and their laugh came from a point that wasn’t close enough to be in a carrier.

“You should have seen your face!” the voice continued to laugh. “Oh Jesus almighty, that was just priceless! Need some aspirin there, Rainbow-Butt? I’ll pick some up with Angry-Face’s sedatives.”

See my face? I can’t even see my own nose in this room!

“What the heck!?” Anna exclaimed. “Who’s out there? Where are you?”

More cackling laughter came from the new voice. “Right... sorry, I always forget you sunlovers don’t have my eyes. Here...” A sharp crack split the dark, then suddenly the room was washed in the bright green light of a glowstick, laying in the center of the room. In the light, I made out an equine figure by the door.

But it was no normal pony. This pony regarded us curiously with slitted yellow eyes set in a gray face, flicking along the cages. Folded neatly at her sides were two leathery bat-like wings, a single claw folded at the joint. White fangs seemed to glow in her grin, extending a few inches below her upper lip.

“Consort of shadows,” Zach giggled in his usual maniacal voice. “The silent guardians in the night.”

“What’s up with Stripey over there?” the mare asked curiously, eyeing Zach’s carrier.

Holy schist, you have got to be kidding me... “You’re a batpony!” I exclaimed.

“Wait, that’s actually a thing?” Anna asked me, incredulously. “How is that even a thing?”

I am a thestral, thank you very much,” the pony growled, sounding offended. The thestral flapped her wings a few times, hovering over to my. She made no sound in flight, which made me feel uneasy. “At least, I have been for a week now. Name’s Ariel, and the sexy pony you see here is Aeres. It’s an honor to meet you, Lady Loyalty.”

“...Lady- what now?” Anna and Deedee asked simultaneously.

“Rainbow Dash isn’t in, presently,” I replied with a little bit of a sarcastic tone. “Markus; Markus Knight. Now, maybe you haven’t noticed, but I’m IN A BUCKING DOG CAGE!”

“Ow!” Ariel winced, covering her ears. “Not so loud! I have sensitive ears!” I did observe her ears at that moment, to find them almost adorably fluffy. “That, and the guards will hear us and investigate. It wasn’t easy getting in here, and rescuing you without getting caught is going to be even harder.”

Almost as if fate had heard, there was an abrupt slam from outside the room, along with muffled voices. Ariel jumped in surprise, glancing back at the door. “Oh, shit.” Suddenly, the thestral hovering in front of my face was gone. Not simply fled, mind you, but vanished into thin air, as if she hadn’t been there at all! Part of me started to believe just that.

Seconds after Ariel had disappeared, the door to the room slammed open. Two humans rushed in, one of them I recognized as the oaf from earlier. “Quick, grab a cage!” the oaf ordered, moving toward us. “Jefferson is already waiting with the truck. If we hurry, we can get them southward bound in a few minutes’ time.”

“Shit, got it!” the other guy responded simply, following the oaf’s lead. I finched back as they moved toward the carriers, picking up the two cages to my left.

One of them- the oaf, I think -hit my carrier, knocking it to the floor with me inside. I tumbled down, slamming hard into the ground. Nothing too bad, but I’d have a faint bruise on the joint of my wing. The two men, not bothering to pick the cage back up, made a hurried rush for the door, each carrying a dog carrier. I almost could have cared less about who was in it, until...

“MARKUS!” Anna’s scream pierced the air. “MARKUS HELP ME!”

My dog carrier had landed in just the right position, so that the cage was facing toward the open door. As the oaf lumbered out of the room, I caught a glimpse of the pony within the carrier in his grasp. An orange pegasus filly pressed her hooves against the metal of the cage, looking out at me with pleading fuschia eyes. Instantly, I recognized who my sister had become.

But before I could react, something stirred within me; within my head. It burned up inside my subconscious, boiling over into my eyes. Crimson red filled my vision, an energy pulsing through my body. Suddenly, I felt my consciousness yanked out from under me, as I lost my physical functions to something else. Something that was inundated with rage and passion.

~+~+~+~

Jack Preacher liked his metal detector a lot. Since he got it for his eleventh birthday three years ago, Jack had developed a healthy hobby of looking through the nearby Spears Woods for bits of metal some misguided soul may have left behind. Not the he found much of anything most of the time, but he enjoyed the activity nonetheless.

This particular day, Jack had been making his regular rounds in the trees, sweeping his detector along the ground for any trace of metals for him to collect, when he noticed something rather odd on the ground. A small, dirty crater, perhaps eight feet at its widest, made a significant dip in the land. Cautiously, Jack stepped over to it. There seemed to be nothing out of the ordinary that he could tell about the mysterious divet. Perhaps someone had been digging up an animal den.

BEEPBEEPBEEP! BEEP! BEEPBEEPBEEP! BEEP!

Jack jumped in surprised as his metal detector, the sensor hovering over the rim of the crater, abruptly began to sound off wildly. Crater forgotten, Jack smiled and crouched down, shifting through the overturned dirt. Maybe he would find another cast iron Monopoly piece and complete the set. Or maybe it was another collar button or safety pin. Whatever it was, he was going to find out!

“What in the world...?” Blinking, Jack couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Embedded in the dirt was a small, golden necklace with a ruby in the center. Blinking in disbelief, Jack stared at the gem. It was cut perfectly in the shape of a lightning bolt, and somehow, seemed to glow with an inner light, suggesting a mystical quality about it.

Jack reached down for it, wanting to hold it. “What are y--?”

ZZABAM!

Suddenly, an intense scarlet light blasted from the gem. Jack Preacher stumbled backward crying out as the flash blinded him. A few moments later, when he was able to recover, the hobbyist would discover no trace of the mysterious necklace.