Between Life and Death

Later the same day as the team roamed the abandoned town. As they walked the streets they could hear faint moans coming from the undead that were still standing along with the sound of a few collapsing buildings and cracking fires. A while later they arrived at an intersection leading in four different ways, two lead to other streets while the third lead to a giant castle sitting on a cliff side. While deciding which street to take Dance Party pulled out a two-way radio, he extended the antenna on it and held it to his head.

“Attention, this is General Orange Hoof requesting extract at following location, X-9354, Y-293, arrive when contacted, over and out.”  As he began to put away the radio Monochrome started walking down the street leading to the castle. “Hey, blonde where do you think you’re going-?”

“First off, go to hell I’m not blonde, second, I need to go to the castle, I need to make sure that the people that live there are still alive-“

“Why do they matter to you? It’s not like you live there.” Dance Party replied, he started heading down the north street. Monochrome pulled out his scythe and teleported in front of him, he took his scythe and started forcing him back to the intersection.

“Listen, my wife and children live in that castle, and considering the condition of it, I doubt that they’re all still alive, but right now, I can tell that at least one of them survived, also, due to the large amount of infected, I need back up for escorting them out of there.” When he finished talking he put his scythe away and continued head towards the castle, the others hesitated then eventually followed him. Along the way they reached another intersection, when Monochrome attempted to keep moving Dance Party shoved him out of the way and moved in front of him. “What the hell are you doing now soldier boy?”

“Give me a second, I know this territory, and something’s wrong.” Dance Party stood there motionless for a moment, then out of nowhere, 3 infected charged out from behind the buildings and charged at him, he waited for a second then pulled the triggers on his guns; he got one with the first bullet then the other two with the other. “I sensed that there were a few extra things then their used to be.” He put his guns back into the pockets on his vest. Half an hour later they arrived the main gate.

“Ok, A.J., Dance, you two re up-“ Monochrome announced as he stood at the back of the group.

“Why do we have to do everything?” Dance Party complained as he moved away from the gate.

“Because, this gate has a magic seal on it, it can only be broken be two non-special people.” Dance party sighed with annoyance.

“What do we need to do?”

“See those two chains on the sides of the gate? You two need to take hold of them and pull them back with all your might.” Dance Party looked back and saw them, he sighed again and started heading towards the one on the left.

“This ota be good.” He grabbed the chain, and as soon as Applejack grabbed hers the two started pulling them back and the gate started sinking into the ground, after a few minutes, it was completely buried within the stone walk way.

“Ok, let’s go.” Monochrome announced, he started leading them down the path until they arrived at a colossal chasm. “Ok, Red, I’m going to need your help with this part.” Monochrome expanded his wings and jumped into the abyss, a moment later he flew back up holding a rope. “Come on Red, get the other one.” Monochrome demanded, he flew forward and took hold of the other rope then flew back alongside Monochrome. Once the ropes were held out a bridge rose from the green fog beneath them, Monochrome and Red held it steady as the others moved across it to the other gate, when they were all across, the two dropped the bridge and followed them. When they arrived at the next area, they noticed a mirror reflecting a green light off of it and four stone heads on the castle walls a normal one, one with wings, one with a horn, and one with horns and wings. “Ok, how do we do this part?” Monochrome whispered to himself.

“How do you know how to do all these other challenges, but not this one?” Dance Party asked with irritation.

“Bitch I built this place! Anyway, the problem isn’t that I don’t know how to solve it, the problem is how we do it.”

“…What?” Dance party replied with confusion, Monochrome sighed.

“Listen, I built the castle walls for this place-“

“What about the castle?”

“That was already there, I just improved it, but like I was saying, I built the castle walls. There are about 5 lairs to it, the first one was the Earth lock, second was the sky, third, aka this one, is the illusion lock, next will be youth lock, final is…wait no,there is no lock after that one, there was supposed to be one before the earth lock and it was…torn down so…huh…anyway, we need a unicorn to solve this-“

“What about an alicorn?” Nyx interrupted.

“As long as it has magic, but if we do use an alicorn for this part, we’ll need another one for the next part.”

“Why?”

“Youth lock, alicorn has to reduce their age to fit within small areas, it would be children but since we don’t have them with us we’ll-how long have they been here?” Monochrome asked, he pointed behind everyone and standing behind them all was Scootaloo and Applebloom.

“What!? What in tarnation are yall doing here, you were told to wait back in Ponyvile!”

“We wanted to help-“

“I told you little brats to wait with Brimstone-!”

“Clockwork shut up.”

“Can’t you pleases just let us help, we’ll behave, promise!” Applebloom negotiated with them, they gather together and thought of an answer, after a minute they thought of a decision and turned around to tell them.

“You two can stay, for now, after we get past the youth gate you two are to go back to Ponyvile-“

“How are we supposed to get there? The boat left.” Scootaloo interrupted.

“I’ll teleport you two back there. Now, since we got everything sorted out, Twilight, I need you to use your magic and turn the mirror and have the light shine on the statues in this order; normal, horned, winged then horn and winged, can you do that?”

“Yeah, give me a sec.” She used her magic and started moving the mirror, he tilted it towards one of the heads and it’s eyes  started glowing green, she did the same to the rest of them, and once all their eyes were glowing green, they began to fade to blue and the gate on the other side opened.

“Ok, let’s go-“

“Hold on, I need to make a call before we go any further.” Dance party interrupted as he pulled out his two-way radio again. He extended the antenna and held down the button on the side. “This is General Orange Hoof, connect me to the bas leader, over”

“Roger sir, this is Bombing Run, what do you need? Over.”

“I need a carpet bombing on my immediate area, over.”

“Roger that General, I’ll send out the convoy now, they’ll be there in about 2 hours, over.”

“Roger, over and out.” He began putting away the radio, and when he looked over to Monochrome he punched him.

“You bastard!” Monochrome yelled as the other held him back. “We save your ass and now you’re trying to kill all of us and my family-!?”

“That’s not what I’m planning-“ he replied as he got up and wiped the blood off his lip.

“Oh, it isn’t?! Ten explain what you just did!”

“Listen, that castle is the source of this outbreak. I was sent here to find it and destroy it, people in it or not-“

“If you kill my family I’ll beat the holy hell out of you!”

“Forget about your family, there are millions of other lives that need to be saved and it’s my job to protect them-“

“It’s your job to kiss my-“

“Scootaloo, Applebloom over your ears now!” Applejack shouted, she covered Applebloom’s ears and Fluttershy covered Scootaloos’. Monochrome and Dance Party continued yelling at each other, the two couldn’t hear them but the others could.

“If you’d just listen to me for one bucking second I could explain-“

“The only thing you’ll be explaining is how your face became a tangled mess to your superior!”

“You know what, forget it, you can go save your half assed family, I’m out of here.” Monochrome roared as he broke free from the others and raced towards him. He tackled him to the ground and started beating him, before he could do too much, Clockwork tackled Monochrome. He picked him up and threw him too far and he fell into the pit in the previous gate. Clockwork walked over to Dance Party and helped him up.

“You should know better than insulting his wife and kids pall.”

“Sacrifices have to be made to save others.” He replied as he swatted his hand away and stood up. “And why should I care about His family, what makes them so important? I bet their just another bunch of civilians.”

“His wife is royalty and so is he. His daughter is the carrier of an ancient spirit and his son is as strong as him.”

“Congrats to him, but I honestly still don’t give a shit-“

“I’ll burn your soul you mother bucker!” a voice yelled. Clockwork and Dance Party turned around and the pit from the previous gate started glowing with a blue light.

“Shit, start running!” Clockwork panicked as he started running away from the pit. Dance Party was paralyzed with fear, and by the time he started running a blue ball of fire shot out of the pit and into the air. He looked up at it for a moment, he was about to run again, but it shout out smaller balls of flame and revealed itself to be a white skeleton with a horn of bone, and wings and a tale made of blue flames.

“You’ll burn in hell for all the things you have said about the ones I love!” he opened his wings and flew towards him, but he jumped out of the way and Monochrome bounced off the ground and back into the sky, Dance Party looked down at where he landed and all the grass was burnt and dying. “Take back what you said!”

“Make me!” Monochrome roared again and dived towards him again thinking he could get him this time, he jumped out of the way again and pulled out his dual pistols and began shooting him. But when the bullets got close, they turned to dust due to the heat radiating off of him.

“I shall damn your soul till the end of existence!” Monochrome yelled at him. He held out his hands in front of him and a small orb of red fire appeared. The orb began to grow and smaller sparks of flame began rising from the ground and burning all the grass as they flew up towards him and into the orb.

“Monochrome, stop, please!’ Twilight yelled.

“Your soul shall burn!” Monochrome yelled. He raised the orb above his head. Its size was now 10 times of when it started.

“You think you can scare me!? Huh!? Do your worst you bucked up son of a bitch!”

“Yes…do it…” A dark and sinister voice whispered to Monochrome, everything went quiet, all the noises died down until they were eventually gone. Everything went still, colors started to fade away, and lights when dark. “Use your hatred…fuel the flames…kill them all…” the voice continued. Monochrome turned his head and he could see someone else leaning over his shoulder whispering into his ear.

“…Stop talking to me, I only want one of them to die-“

“No…you want all of them to die…you know it…just drop the flames…and watch them burn-“

“Be silent fiend-!”

“Burn them all…burn them…watch them suffer…make them beg-“

“Shut up!” Monochrome yelled. He let go of the orb and turned around, the man was gone.

“They must suffer…they all must suffer-“

“Silence!” Monochrome yelled as he turned his arm into a sword and turned around. He slashed it through the air attempting to use is magic, but when he did, his attack just floated in front of him, unable to move. His anger began to die down, he turned back into his normal self.

“Admit it…they must die…all of them…they all…must…die-“

“You must die you shaded bastard!”  Monochrome screeched. His arms and legs turned to bone, his skin turned yellow, and his hair tail and wings turned blue.

“They have sinned…you must cleanse them…”

“Never!” Monochrome turned his arms into sword again and started swinging them around uncontrollable, sending a wave of magic out every time he swung them.

“You hate them all…you know you do-“

“I hate no one but you!”

“You and I are alike…you cannot hate me-“

“I can hate any damn person I want-“

“Then hate them! They are your enemies! They are the ones who want you dead-!”

“You are the only one who wants me dead!”

“Kill them now-!”

“Never!” Monochrome shouted one last time before time went back to normal. The magic waves he sent out started flying everywhere, the other dodged them as they crashed near them, and the ball of fire Monochrome was holding exploded sending hi flying downwards. He crashed into the ground right on the ledge of the chasm.

“Monochrome!” Twilight rushed over to him. “Monochrome, are you ok?”

“…Kill me.” Monochrome replied with a blank expression and no emotion. Twilight helped him up.

“What happened to you? Why are your arms and legs like this?”

“It’s a mix of three of my emotions. It’s complicated.” Twilight chuckled as he got up.

“Are you still angry?” he looked at his arms, he took a deep breath and he went back to normal.

“Not any more. Hey, Dance boy-“

“If you still want to fight then at least give me some more ammo.” Monochrome walked over to him and picked him up by the collar of his shirt.

“If you ever, say anything negative about my family again, I swear to Celestia, I will bucking, kill you.”

“…Understood.” He replied. Monochrome put him down and walked over to the next gate.

“Let’s go! After that event I’m pretty sure we only have an hour left before that idiots bombing raid begins!” the others caught up with him. The next gate looked menacing, there were three small pipes made of steel pipes leading to three different locations, the large gate was broken and they could see the next gate through it, and the path was falling apart. “Well, let’s just skip this one, were going to need all of us for the last one-“

“I thought you said there wasn’t one after this!?” Dance Party started yelling at him.

“Yeah well I forgot ok!? Come on let’s go.” Monochrome started leading them through the current gate their at, he climbed through the hole on it and landed roughly on the stone path which looked like it was in near perfect condition. He looked up at the gate as he waited for the others to join him.

“Monochrome, didn’t this gate take four unicorns?”

“It did, but since I couldn’t get in without four other people, I made a few modifications.”

“Modifications like?”

“Modifications like this.” Monochrome walked to the gate and kicked it over, when it fell the ground began to shake. “I had the guards make the gate door weaker, that way, if I ever get locked out, all I have to do is kick down the doors.”

“That’s…good, I guess.” Twilight replied. “But, why didn’t you just do that to the other doors-“

“Hey, would the rest if you please hurry up before I die of aging!” Monochrome interrupted.

“We would be move’n faster if Someone would get out of the way!”  Applejack replied.

“Hey, I’m trying, the hole is too small for me!” Clockwork yelled back at her.

“That’s what you get for being a fat ass-“

“People! We don’t have bucking time for this! The bombing is going to start any time now, we have to hurry up!” Dance Party shouted. He rammed Clockwork and shoved him through the hole, he jumped through it then told the others to hurry.

“Who made you the leader?” Monochrome asked.

“Don’t start this damn it!”  Dance Party replied as he walked past him. He stepped onto the gate and headed towards the castle. Once they got to the colossal door separating them from the inside, Monochrome walked up to it and kicked it off its hinges. “Ok, until we get out of the interior, we need to use stealth-“

“Since when should we have to listen to you-?” Monochrome interrupted.

“Damn it, would you shut the bucking hell up and let me do my bucking job!” Dance Party yelled at Monochrome with every bit of anger he had in him, after that, Monochrome didn’t say anything, he just stood there in fear nodding his head. “Good, like I said, stealth, reason; so we don’t get caught, sound like a good enough reason?” the others nodded their heads. “Good, let’s go.”

“Hold on a sec.” Monochrome stopped everyone, he turned around and faced Applebloom and Scootaloo. “It’s time for you two to go.”

“What? But can’t we stay long enough to see Amber-?” Scootaloo whined.

“No.” Monochrome interrupted her, he lifted his hand and snapped his fingers causing a bright light to flash, when it faded the two of them were gone. “Ok, let’s go.” Him and the others entered the castle, and as soon as they took their first steps in the ground started shaking. “What the hell is going on?” Monochrome whispered to himself. He took a step forward and somehow something in front of him exploded and sent him flying.

“Monochrome, are you ok!?” Twilight yelled as she and the others ran over to him.

“Yeah. I’m fine, just startled is all.” Monochrome got up and went back to the main door, he looked down at where he was standing and examined the floor. “Well, this isn’t good.”

“What is it?” Dance Party asked as he approached him.

“Someone got the idea of turning my home into a fun house; there are arcane trap circles everywhere.”

“Is that a bad thing?”

“Well, yeah, if we step in one of them, something’s going to happen.”

“Like?”

“How should I know, the effects are random with each one, we could wind up in space, we could be frozen or burnt, hell we could even up as kids again-“

“So, watch our steps?” Twilight interrupted.

“Basically.” He pulled out his scythe and tap the ground in front of him to make sure their wasn’t another one waiting. “We need to be careful, one wrong move and we could wind up in a situation much worse. Ok, here’s what we do, Twilight, you and the girls head that way, me and these bone heads will head the other way, got it?”

“What if we run into one of those…things?” Fluttershy asked.

“Simple, check the ground and see if there’s a trap in front of you, if there is let it run in to it, if not, kill it.” Monochrome walked off heading towards the left side of the castle, once he and the others were out of sight Twilight led the others down the right side. After a while the two groups got to a different set of doors, as Monochrome went through the one he was at, he was lead outside to a massive garden, when Twilight went through hers, she ended up in the kitchen.

“Ahh the garden, I remember this place as if it was just yesterday…I don’t remember it being so dead.” Monochrome looked around, all the plants were either dead or dying.

“You can replant everything later, right now we need to hurry, the bombing will begin soon.”

“How can you tell?”

“I just got a call, the convoy is 10 clicks and closing.” Dance Party took a step into the dead grass of the garden, and as soon as he did a black vine with black leaves wrapped around his leg. “What the hell?” Dance Party started shaking his leg attempting to get the vine off of him. “Get this damn thing off me!” Monochrome turned his arm into a sword and slashed the vine off his leg and pulled him back into the interior of the building. “What the hell is that crap?”

“That’s Ivy Weed…Who the hell planted Ivy Weed in my garden!?” Monochrome yelled out with anger.

“Calm down. Listen, since you know so much about all this stuff, tell us, how do we get past it?” Red interrupted him in the middle of his rant.

“All we have to do is expose it to a source of light, but since the sun is in hiding, we’re going to need to something else-“

“You have magic dumbass-“ Dance Party interrupted him.

“Won’t work jack ass, these things absorb almost all types of energy. Life energy, electrical energy, Magic energy.” Monochrome held out his hand and pointed two of his fingers towards the door on the other side of the garden, after a second a light started glowing from his finger tips, the light caused the plants to grow, but it also faded away. “See, the stuff is stronger since there’s so much of it, because of that, it can suck magic energy out of the air.”

“So now what?” Red asked.

“I don’t have time for this, let’s just hurry up-“

“What the hell are you doing you dumbass!?” Monochrome yelled as Dance Party started walking through the Ivy Weed, with each step he took the color of his skin started fading. “You idiot!” Monochrome yelled, he flew over to him and picked him up. “I told you, this stuff absorbs life energy, what do you think that is!?”

“I don’t have time for this shit.” He replied in a fainted voice. Monochrome sighed, he looked down and saw the plants were beginning to grow.

“Great, you just fed all of them-“

“The hell are you talking about?”

“This stuff feed’s off of energy, the more you feed it, the more it grows, and thanks to you, you managed to feed it enough for it to cause it take energy from the air. Alright you two come on, we need to fly over all this-“

“I thought you said it could take energy out of the air.” Red complain as he flew up to him.

“I did, but it takes a while, if we hurry up we can fly to the other side before this stuff can kill us, now come on.” Monochrome flew off and the other two followed him. When they got to the other side of the garden, it revealed that their problems have only gotten worse. The door was covered in fully grown Ivy Weed. “Well this is just great, stupid plant-“

“What’s wrong?” Red asked.

“The door is covered with this shit.”

“Can’t you just cut it down?”

“I wish. If my magic gets close to it, it get’s absorbed, if I get close to it, my life force gets sucked out of my body-“

“I thought you said that if your flying it takes a while for you energy to be drained-“

“This stuff is fully grown, if I get within range, I get sucked dry of life in less than a minute-“

“Can’t you tell us all this shit earlier!?” Clockwork yelled at him.

“Buck off I never thought it would be a problem! Here, hold this.” Monochrome tossed Dance Party over to Clockwork, he held his hands in front of his mouth and inhaled deeply, when he exhaled he shot out fire which he used to burn the plant, but on contact with the flames the plant began to scream as if it was in pain. “Let’s hurry up before it re-grows.” Monochrome flew downwards and rammed into the door, when it opened he landed softly and the carpeted floor. He waved to the others signaling them to land, and a second later they landed next to him and laid Dance Party on the floor against the wall.

“Am I going to die?”

“No, not yet...unless you want to.” Monochrome placed his hands on Dace Party’s chest, a light began to shine and he turned back to normal. “There, good as new, now don’t do anything that assigning again, got it?”

“Yes your highness.” Dance Party replied with sarcasm as Monochrome helped him up.

“General, come in!” a man shouted out. Dance Party took his radio out of his vest and extended the antenna. “General, sir, come in!”

“This is general Orange Hoof.”

“Sir, this is Lt. Barker calling from the convoy, we’re dealing with some massive resistance!”

“What’s going on?”

“We have just entered Eagleland air space. The pegasi are everywhere, they keep ramming into the planes, the hauls can’t take much more!”

“Keep calm Lt. state your area!”

“6 klicks and closing! Sir, the planes can’t take much more, and if we lose the bomber, we’ll have to turn back!”

“Calm down Barker. Continue with the convoy, when you get to the castle release everything you got, understand!?”

“But sir-!”

“Listen! Continue the convoy, get to the castle and bomb the hell out of it! Once done turn around and retreat!”

“…What!?”

“When done, retreat, I just realized that a few warheads aren’t going to be enough, I’m going to call in heavier artillery.”

“Sir, a carpet bombing is already powerful enough, what could you possibly call in to do more damage-“

“I’m going to nuke this place.”

“…You…you’re serious!?”

“I don’t joke; you should know that, now continue as planned.”

“Sir yes sir!” he folded the antenna back up and put the radios away, he turned around and face Monochrome who was glaring at him angrily.

“…What-?”

“You know what!”

“I have no choice, if someone get’s in here, they’re going to get them self killed!”

“That doesn’t give you the right to nuke my house-!”

“This place is to big for a common bombing run, how else to you expect me to get rid of it-?”

“How about you don’t get rid of it-!”

“Both of you, shush!” Red interrupted. Everyone went silent, Red held his hand to his ear. “Can you hear that?”

“…Hear what?” Dance Party asked.

“Some one’s here, I can hear them crying.”

“Which way?!” Monochrome asked in panic.

“Over there-“

“Hold on I’m coming!” Monochrome yelled as he ran off.

“Look at this place, It’s in complete ruins.” Twilight said as she and the others entered the kitchen.

“This looks like something right out of a horror movie.” Nyx added. As they walked deeper in to the blood soaked room faint screams could be heard as if someone was trapped somewhere within the same room.

“Do we have to go this way? Can’t we go the other way?” Fluttershy asked in fear, the others ignored her and she sighed with sadness, after she took a step forward the door slammed shut behind her with a loud gunshot like noise. She started screaming.

“Fluttershy!” Twilight yelled out. She and the others ran over to her. “Fluttershy, are you ok?”

“Yeah…” Fluttershy mumbled as she stood up.

“Come on, the sooner we get through here the better.” Twilight took her hand and started guiding her and the others through the kitchen. As the navigated past everything, it seemed that it was getting worse somehow, they passed a table with a man laying on it, his head had been cut off using one of the many butcher knives, there was an open oven with someone in it, their skin was sired and they had a horrifying expression on their face, their mouth was wide open and so were their eyes, it looked as if they died screaming, the petroleum floors were covered in thick sticky lair of blood, and the walls were decorated blood covered knives and hooks with people hanging off them by their head. “You know, now that I think about it, we really should have followed the others.” Twilight stated, the others agreed with her. As they kept moving, Applejack bumped into a cart, causing all the plates and dinning utensils to fall off, the plates shattered and the silverware made other loud noises. They all turned around and looked at her, she stood their frozen with fear. They kept moving. When they made it to the other side of the kitchen they realized the door was locked, Applejack attempted to ram it down. Nyx turned around and noticed a rack that had several pots and pans hanging off of it, and the strangest thing, one of the pots was clean while the others were covered with blood. She walked over to it and looked into it, she saw her reflection and smiled,  but her smile faded as a black figure rush past her behind her, she twisted around, nothing was there, when she turned back around she let out a blood curdling scream as she saw her reflection but it wasn’t her own, it was a black face with tusks and glowing red eyes, and it was smiling at her with its blood stained teeth. She fell backwards as she continued screaming, the others turned around and ran over to her.

“Nyx, what is it!?” Twilight asked in panic as she kneeled down next to her.

“I saw something, I. I don’t know what it was.” She replied as she started crying, she turned over to Twilight and hugged her tightly as she continued crying. Twilight helped her up and as they stood up there was an intense screaming coming from somewhere in the room, all the ovens turned on and all the stone furnaces lit up.

“What’s going on!?” Agony yelled out as she pulled out her bow.

“We have to get out of here now!” Twilight yelled.

“You cannot leave…” a faint voice told them, they looked around trying to find out who was talking.

“Fluttershy?” Appljack asked, everyone looked over at her and were shocked by what they saw, Fluttershy’s eyes were completely black and she had blooding dripping out of her mouth.

“This room…it shall become your tomb-“

“Fluttershy, what’s wrong with you?” Twilight asked, she attempted to approach her, but she opened her wings and a gust of wind sent her backwards, when she got up she noticed her wings were ruined and covered with bloody.

“You shall not survive...you have escaped death for your last time…even the immortal will fall…on this day-“

“Who are you and what did you do to our friend!?” Applejack yelled.

“Your friend is mine…I control her soul now…and it shall be damned…” she lifted her hands up and the room caught on fire and the others started screaming.

“Hold on I’m coming!” Monochrome yelled, he ran around the corner and saw a single girl kneeling in front of two bodies. “…Amber?” Monochrome called out, the girl looked up at him.

“Daddy?” She stood up and the two of them ran towards each other and hugged each other. “Daddy, I missed you!” she cried, as she was crying she started digging her sharp claws into Monochromes back.

“Amber-ow-what’s wrong, you never-ow-dig your claws into me like this unless something bad happened-“

“I killed them.” She interrupted. “Corruption got infected, and mom made me kill him along with her self-“ Monochrome looked over at the two corpses. “When he was screaming, mom held him back and told me to use the bow on him, but, I had to shoot him in the head, and to do that, I had to do the same to her…I’m sorry.”

“I’s ok. But, how did all the spell circles appear?”

“I had to place them, I had to defend everyone somehow…but I failed.” As the two of them hugged, someone started screaming. “What is that?”

“No…the girls! Come on we have to move!” Monochrome yelled, he let go of his daughter and ran towards the kitchen. They entered the dining room and across room where they entered they saw the kitchen door, it was blocked off by a tipped over book shelf and it had smoke rising for the top of the door. “Shit, Clockwork, Dance boy let’s go-“

“What about me?” Red asked.

“Stay here and look after my daughter!” Monochrome and the other two rushed and jumped over the table in the center of the room and headed towards the door. Monochrome and Clockwork lifted up and threw the book shelf and Dance Party attempted to open the door.

“I’s locked from the inside!”

“Ok, I got an idea! Dane, against the door, on the count of three we ram it down and Clockwork you use your hammer and cause a blizzard!”

“Got it!” Clockwork replied, he pulled out his hammer and readied himself. Monochrome held up his hand and three fingers.

“Ready, 1…2…3!” and right then Monochrome and Dance Party rammed their bodies into the door, it flew open and Clockwork slammed his hammer on the ground causing a blizzard to either extinguish or completely freeze the flames. “Are you all ok?” Monochrome asked, as he entered the kitchen Fluttershy fell to the ground. “What happened?”

“We don’t know, something happened to her and…she…-“

“Never mind, doesn’t matter, we need to go before the bombing starts.” Monochrome picked up Fluttsershy and walked out the opposite side of the kitchen. Once they got outside they looked over the horizon and saw a massive plane and several small planes surrounding it.

“General Orange Hoof, come in!” Dance Party pulled out his radio again and extended the antenna.

“Go ahead.”

“Sir, you need to get out of the castle now! The bombing is going to start in less then a minute-“

“Roger, I’m out front, continue as planned and forget about us-“

“But sir-“

“That’s an order, over and out.” He looked at the top of the radio next to the antenna; he turned a switch on it and put it back up to his ear. “This is General Orange Hoof, I request and emergency extract.”

“Roger that general, Vulture Convoy is on its way hang tight, over and out.” He put away the radio and threw it back into the castle.

“Now the only problem is getting out of here alive.”

“Leave that to me.” Monochrome snapped his fingers and teleported all of them back to the front gate.

“…Not bad-“

“Yeah, well you guys are on your own now, I’m out of magic.”

“What?” Dance Party replied in confusion.

“I haven’t been in my healing circle for weeks, which means, I can no longer use magic, sucked dry because of this stupid parasite.” As they started walking the planes reached the castle, as they flew above it the dropped bombs on it and one chunk at a time, the castle collapsed. When all the dust cleared there was a loud screeching noise, they looked around and notice that they were no longer alone.

“This is why I wanted to nuke the area-“

“What?” everyone interrupted.

“My mission; infiltrate the area, evacuate all survivors, bring down the horde, get back in time for dinner, but since there were more than I thought, I had to use more force-“

“Do you change your goal every time we do some  important thing in this stupid story?” Monochrome interrupted with irritation.

“Apparently.” Dance Party smiled. Monochrome sighed with annoyance, he pulled out his scythe and placed Flutterhsy over one of his shoulders.

“Well, you called for evac, so I guess were going to have to fight our way to it.” Everyone smiled and pulled out their weapon. They waited for the first zombie to appear then started rushing towards the cliff face, slashing at every infected they saw along the way.

“Are you sure this is where we get picked up?” Twilight asked as she swung her staff at an infected.

“Affirmative, this is where the Osprey appeared to get the others-“

“Did you say…Osprey?” Clockwork asked with interest. Dance Party took one of his guns and shot an infected that was sneaking up behind clockwork.

“Yes, I did.” He replied as he continued shooting all the other infected. They continued running through the streets until they made it back to the cliff.

“So, where’s our ride?” Monochrome asked as he swung his scythe and decapitated another zombie.

“It should be here, we have an evac station in the area, this doesn’t make sense.” Dance Party said to himself, he pulled a grenade off his bandolier and threw it into the horde. As it exploded the sound of a propeller started growing louder in the distance. “Their late.” He looked up and saw it flying over head and it went to the edge off the cliff and hovered there. The door of it opened up and someone started yelling at them telling them to get in. One-by-one they jumped over the crack separating land from the Osprey, Dance Party was the second to last one in leaving Monochrome. “Come on we need to go!”

“Give me a minute!” Monochrome yelled. He held a zombie back, after a second he pushed it away and cut off its legs and head.

“Monochrome, we need to go!” Twilight yelled as she leaned out the side of the Osprey as it started flying away.

“I said hold on-!” he started screaming as an infected went up behind him and pulled off one of his wings, he quickly turned around and punched it with the force that sent his hand straight through its head. He looked back to the others, noticing that they were flying away he rushed to the edge of the cliff and jumped, he just barley caught the edge of the chopper, he pulled himself up. When he got inside the others held him up as he started swaying from blood loss.

“Where’s the med-kit?” one of the pilots asked as he rushed to the cockpit. The pilot driving pointed under the seat next to him, he took it out from under the seat and rushed back to Monochrome. “Don’t worry, I promise you’ll be fine.” He told him as he opened up the kit and started wrapping bandages around him.

“That was the most dumb ass thing I’ve ever seen any one do.” Dance party told him with annoyance as he kneeled down in front of him. “Do you have anything to say for yourself?”

“Immortality…only works…if you have magic…and blood.” Monochrome replied with a faint voice.

“Your wing had an artery in it.” The man told him as he finished wrapping the bandage around him.

“Will he be ok?” Amber asked with worry.

“Yeah, he’ll be fine, he just needs to rest.” He replied. Dance Party lifted his arm; he looked at his wrist watch and started counting down.

“3…2…1.” Then at that exact moment, an explosion and a mushroom shaped cloud appeared over the Eagleland castle. Everyone became shocked as they stared out the circular window.

“Damn.” Amber said to herself, she walked over to Dance Party and stood next to him as he stared out the window, as they were about to go back to their seats the Osprey started shaking and tilting, causing everyone to lose balance and fall.

“Sorry about that, shock wave caused a bit of turbulence.” The pilot told them all. They all got up in a hurry and strapped themselves in to their seats, except for Monochrome who lied on the floor groaning in pain.

“Get over it you big cry baby.” Clockwork taunted him, Monochrome got up and sat down in the seat next to Fluttershy, he buckled her seatbelt then his.

“We’ll be arriving in Iron Air in about two hours, so get comfortable.” The pilot said to them all. Monochrome stretched and yawned as he fall into a deep sleep, and the others did the same, except for Dance Party, he looked at them all with anger , hoping that they’d all just vanish, he sat down across from Monochrome, he lied down on the row of seats and closed his eyes.