Colgate heard the splash a second before she plunged into murky water. Water rushed into her open mouth and in an instant her fear of falling was replaced with an even greater fear of drowning, which was just as quickly replaced with pain as she hit the bottom of the shallow pool with enough force to knock the wind from her lungs. She reflexively gasped for air, inhaling a sizable lungful of water for her trouble.

Colgate’s head had just cleared enough to start panicking properly when she felt a pair of hoofs wrap around her and haul her upwards. Nightmarish images of the creatures that had killed her friends and taken her leg flashed through Colgate’s mind as she tried to jerk free of her assailant’s hold.

As her head broke the surface of the water, and her ears were assaulted with the echoing jeers and catcalls from the ponies above. She also heard the grunting of whatever unspeakable thing had grabbed her. She lurched forward, trying to free herself from its grasp once again, but was foiled by her own body as she violently coughed out a mouthful of foul-tasting water. Her assailant bent forward, allowing Colgate to wretch out what felt like a gallon of water.

“Are thou feeling better?” her surprisingly soft-spoken assailant inquired.

Colgate looked back to see the pale, soaked face of Private Pansy looking back at her, the chain securing them by the neck dripping with water.

“I have been better,” Colgate admitted, rubbing her head with a hoof, feeling for cuts. “I guess I should just feel lucky to have you here to keep me from drowning.”

The Private’s cheeks flushed a rosy red as she ducked behind her wet mane. “Oh my, I hardly did anything another would not have in my situation.”

Colgate gave the pegasus an encouraging smile. “Hey, you’re selling yourself short. You haven’t thrown anypony into a huge pit or thrown rocks at their head or anything today! As far as I am concerned that’s putting you way ahead of the rest of these primitive savages!” The last two words where shouted up at the crowd peering down at them. The crowd responded with a string of insults and profanities, as well as a few bits of rotten fruit. Colgate stuck out her tongue and blew a raspberry back at them. “And your pit is terrible! I have magic, geniuses! All I need to do is free her wings and we are out of your primitive, stupid death trap! What do you think about that?”

“I don’t think that they meant for the fall to kill us,” Pansy replied, slowly backing toward Colgate.

“Why?” Colgate asked, a cold feeling running down her spin as she slowly turned to look at Private Pansy.

“Because of that,” Pansy answered, voice rising to a terrified squeak as she pointed a shaking hoof toward a rotten, pony-shaped monstrosity, slowly wading toward them from some dark and hidden side passage of the well.

“Oh,” Colgate said, feeling her heart sink. Then a thought struck her. “Oh! That thing has been living in here? In the water?” She looked from the rotten thing to the water and blanched. “Ew,ew, ew! That was in my mouth!” Colgate began to dance on the spot as the creature’s head titled in confusion.

Colgate stuck out her tongue and began to wretch as Private Pansy looked at her in confused horror. “What’s wrong?” Pansy asked, looking from Colgate to the monster as if unsure which to be more concerned about.

“I need a toothbrush!” Colgate wailed.

The creature, who had been watching this display with slack-jawed bewilderment, took a moment to recompose itself. The blue unicorn’s reaction seemed to have put it off its game somewhat, but it was rapidly recovering. Taking a breath, it dropped its mouth open, bellowed an indescribable howl of rage and charged the winged pony.

Pansy screamed in terror as the monster lunged forward. She backed up against Colgate and squeezed her eyes shut. As Pansy heard the thing close in, a stray thought passed through her head. At least I will die next to somepony who was nice to me. This thought she found oddly comforting. Then the monster was upon her. She screamed again as the demon tackled her into the water, its hot, rancid breath filling her nose.

Then, suddenly, she felt the weight of the creature fly off of her. She paddled madly to keep her head above water as she opened her eyes to see Colgate wadding out in front of her, horn glowing with magic. Colgate’s horn crackled menacingly as she lowered her head as if to charge. “Get away from her, you brute!”

The demon responded by screaming in rage and charging again. At the last second Colgate’s horn flashed as she dove to the side, while at the same moment Pansy felt a magical force throw her to the other side. Just as the chain was pulled taut, the creature rushed directly into the connecting iron links. Both mares once again found themselves flung bodily through the air as the chain pulled tightly around the monster’s neck. Grunting, the creature tried to spin to attack Pansy, but only succeeded in tightening the chain around itself.

Colgate, seeing the creature’s attention had turned to her new found friend, wrapped her legs around the monster’s body, pinning two of its flailing legs in the process. Unable to hold itself up, the creature was plunged straight down into the shallow water. Colgate had just enough time to take a deep breath before her senses were muffled by the water rushing over her head.

Underneath her, the monster twisted and writhed, trying to free itself from Colgate’s hold. Colgate gritted her teeth and pulled hard, holding the monster’s head below the water as a scream from the demon’s other side conferred that Pansy had at least managed to surface. Colgate however was beginning to feel the burn as her lungs began to cry out for air. As if sensing this need, the creature violently jerked one of its free legs into Colgate’s gut. Colgate wheezed as the remaining wind was knocked out of her in a stream of bubbles.

Colgate’s eyes shot open as her instincts kicked in and she began desperately trying to disentangle herself from the monster, to get back up to the surface. To her horror, the monster’s grinning face turned back to face her as it clutched her own legs into place against its body. Too late, Colgate thought to ask herself if a rotten corpse being ridden by an age old demonic spirit would actually need to breath. As her vision began to darken and the leering face of the monster slowly grew larger as its mouth opened, revealing a double row of jagged teeth, Colgate surmised the answer was probably no.

As the world dimmed to near blackness, Colgate felt a horrible pressure on the sides of her head. With an almost clinically detached disinterest, Colgate’s dying mind registered that her head was being crushed in the abomination’s jaws. Colgate suddenly wished more than anything that she had drowned already as the terrible pressure grew and grew.

Then suddenly the pressure disappeared, leaving only a throbbing pain in its wake as Colgate was once again yanked bodily out of the water. Colgate’s lungs screamed as she desperately sucked in air, water cascading from her in a sheet, dimly aware of screams and shouts from above. She looked to the side to see Pansy desperately trying to hold onto the shaft of a familiar ax, whose head was buried deep in the back of the monster. Confused, Colgate looked up to see a struggling purple mare in brown robes being restrained by a pair of guards.

The mare, seeing Coalgate looking up, tore free from her assailants long enough to dive to the lip of the pit and scream, “Strange one, take up your ax!” before she was grabbed and hauled back by the princess’s guards.

Colgate shook her head as she turned back to the struggling Pansy. She leapt forward, grabbing the ax shaft with her magic as she did so. “Pansy, let go!”

Pansy obliged, releasing her hold on the ax as Colgate’s magic wrenched it free from the monster’s back and swung it around to her side. The demon spun around to glare back at Colgate as the unicorn levitated the weapon in front of her face menacingly.

The demon growled in frustration as it glared at Colgate. “What does it take to kill you?”

“Apparently more than monsters, evil trees, drowning and cannibalism,” Colgate replied tiredly. Watching as Private Pansy quietly snuck around the side of the distracted creature, keeping as much distance as the chain would allow between her and it.

“I have devoured the flesh and souls of a half dozen brave knights who have come down to drive me out,” the creature hissed, slowly advancing on Colgate. “Each one was armed and armored far better than your pathetic, little toy there.” Colgate did not respond, but kept the ax level toward the monster’s body. The creature’s eyes darted toward Pansy and its mouth curved into a sinister, toothy grin. “And not a one of them was tied to another so helpless.”

Private Pansy made a small sound, somewhere between a squeak and a scream as she hurried to circle back around Colgate. Colgate frowned at the monster. “Those are some big words, considering you’re talking about the pony that just put an ax in your back.”

The creature made several dry heaving sounds that Colgate assumed were meant to be laughter. “A blade in the back is no bravery. That irritation saved your life for a time, but will mean nothing, in the end.”

“If you’re so confident,” Colgate shifted her weight, “Why don’t you just come and try and get us, huh?”

The demon made the horrible laughing sound again and pointed a hoof at Private Pansy. “Let’s just say that I have a sense of honor about these things. She is not of your tribe and a liability to boot. Let me have her and I will give you time to release yourself from your chains while I devour her. What do you say?”

Pansy gasped, but Colgate just laughed. “Wow! Just wow! Like that’s not the most obvious trap I have EVER heard! I mean, come on. Give me a little credit here, ok?” From behind, Pansy began to whimper and Colgate looked back at her with a reassuring smile. “Don’t worry, even if it wasn’t a dumb trick, there is no way I would let him have you.”

“Look out!” Pansy screamed as Colgate heard the sound of loud splashing as the monster took advantage of her distraction to attack.

With a loud crunch the ax lashed out through the air with deadly speed, catching the monster by surprise as Colgate sidestepped its now-out-of-control charge. As the monster splashed into the water yet again, Colgate stepped forward, bringing the ax down over her head in a wide, arcing strike.

Pansy and the ponies above watched in slack-jawed silence and disgust as Colgate proceeded to hack apart the body of the possessed pony with one heavy swing after another. Finally, after the body had been reduced to a quivering pile of meat, Colgate sat back in the dark red water and sighed.

“Like I would just look away like that. Idiot.” Colgate shook her head as she beckoned to Pansy. After a moment’s hesitation the mare slowly approached the horrible red mass and the unicorn sitting in the middle of it. The unicorn waited till her companion was only a few feet away before gently tugging on her chain to pull her in close. Bowing her head, Colgate closed her eyes as a ray of blue magic shot from her horn and engulfed the lock keeping Pansy attached to the chain. Then, after several long seconds of awkward, smelly silence, there was a faint click and Private Pansy’s collar popped off and fell into the water with a splash.

Pansy jumped back with a cry of delight as she rubbed her neck where she had been violently pulled around by for the last several hours. “I’m free!” She screamed, dancing a joyful little jig.

“Well, I still need to get your wings and then you can get me out of this pit, but then we will be free, yes,” Colgate stated dryly, lifting up the heavy chain still dangling from her own neck.5

“Oh right,” Pansy amended with a blush

Less than a minute later Private Pansy flew up out of the pit and into the noonday sky. All around her shocked and silent ponies stood and gazed in wide-eyed wonder at the first pony to leave the pit alive in weeks. Even Princess Platinum and Commander Hurricane seemed at a loss for words as Pansy picked up a length of rope and tossed it down to her new friend.

By the time Colgate had pulled herself out of the pit, breathing heavily, at least one pony had gotten over her shock as the purple unicorn who had been pulled off by the guards earlier pushed her way up to the Princess’s side once more.

“I told you.” She whispered, excitedly pointing to Colgate. “I told you she was the one of whom to prophecies spoke!”

Colgate, having recovered her breath, marched to the Princess, a determined look in her eye. As she approached, Princess Platinum rose to her full height, determined to face any accusation or rebuke the pony had with dignity. As Colgate came face to face with Platinum, she stopped and stared directly at her for long moment before quickly looking down to her hoofs and back up again.

“You know you have some monster blood on your hoof?” Colgate stated flatly.

Platinum’s cheeks reddened as she maintained eye contact with the other pony for several seconds before looking down to check her carefully-maintained hoofs. To her surprise, when she looked down she did see a very dirty, blood-stained hoof, but it was much more blue then her own. Before she had time to register exactly what sort of indignity she was about to suffer Colgate’s hoof stuck her squirrely in the snout with enough force to knock her sprawling.

The crowd of ponies gasped as Colgate spun around to face them. Spotting a guard who was hesitantly pulling his sword from its scabbard, Colgate pointed her gore-soaked ax at him. “Do you want to go next?” She demanded.

The pony immediately went white as a sheet and dropped his weapon, shaking his head violently. Several other guards did the same as the townsfolk who had been jeering now backed away in fright. “That’s what I thought.” Colgate growled.

Spinning, she next pointed toward the line of prisoners, whom Private Pansy had already begun to attempt to free. Pansy dropped the lock she had been fiddling with as she noticed Colgate pointing in her direction. Colgate shook her head and shouted, “Somepony free those captives! They’re not responsible for any of this!”

Immediately several armored ponies started as if a fire had been lit under their rears and quickly set to work freeing the Pegasus ponies from their bounds. As she was freed, Commander Hurricane took to the sky with a victorious shout. Looking down at Colgate she flashed a devilish grin. “I was wrong about you unicorns, it seems,” she called. “You’re a credit to your people Time Keeper and I owe you a debit!”

“Thanks.” Colgate waved with her ax. “It’s just Colgate though. The cutie mark is a long story.”

“And one I have no time for, so save it!” Hurricane interrupted quickly, before turning her attention to Princess Platinum, who was only just rising back to her hooves. “Excuse me Princess, but you have been a terrible host. I will have to repay your hospitality some other day though, as I need to fly!” And with that she took off, over the castle walls and into the blue sky, her followers forming into formation behind her.

“NO!” The Princess’s face contorted into an expression of equal parts panic and rage as she watched her captives fly away safely. “Somepony! Anypony! Stop them!”

A few unicorns halfheartedly raised their spears, but it was already too late to hit any of the escaping pegasi and the unicorns knew it, as did the Princess. Platinum’s eyes flashed as she glared at Colgate. “You!”

Colgate sighed and waved back to the Princess, her horn beginning to glow a bright blue as she rested the ax on the ground besides her. “Hi.”

Platinum’s eye twitched as she beckoned to her squire. As the small pink filly carefully brought out her personal blade, the purple mare stepped up beside her.

“Princess, I know you are angry, but this pony is our best hope for stopping-”

Princess Platinum shot a dangerous glare at her adviser. “Clover, my nearest and dearest adviser,” she whispered. “If you don’t shut up about the ‘chosen one’ and get out of my way this instant, I shall personally see to it that you spend the next month cleaning every floor in the castle!” The purple pony looked at the twitching, furious face of her liege and quietly backed away.

Princess Platinum took hold of her sword and drew it with such ferocity that the tiny filly holding it for her was knocked to the ground. “Now, for that arrogance…” She paused as the filly began to snivel.

“Is that filly ok?” Colgate asked.

“She is fine!” Princess Platinum shouted back, indignantly. There was an awkward silence as the filly started to cry. The Princess sighed as she picked up the filly and gave her a hug. Platinum shifted her stance to hold out the sword again while holding the still-sniveling pony away from Colgate. “Now where was I?”

“Something about my arrogance?” Colgate offered.

“Yes, thank you darling,” Princess Platinum said before frowning. “By which I mean that your arrogance shall cost you dearly! You have betrayed your race, attacked your rightful Princess and for all that I shall see you… Hold on.”

Colgate nodded, waving a hoof as a purple earth pony hurried from the crowed to the Princess. Platinum tried to maintain a proud stance, sword raised as she carefully gave her squire back to her mother.

“I am sorry about that milady,” the mare apologized, bowing.

“No, no, I shouldn’t have been so rough with the poor dear.” Princess Platinum shook her head. Finally, as the mother and daughter disappeared back into the crowd, Platinum turned her attention back to Colgate. “Now as I was saying, for that arrogance-”

“You mentioned that part already,” Colgate called, her horn glowing brightly.

“For that arrogance, I will see you dead!” The Princess shouted over Colgate. To her consternation Colgate just rolled her eyes.

With a shout Princess Platinum charged forward, blade held high, gleaming in light of the sun as her cape bellowed out behind her. Colgate slowly pushed herself to her hoofs, bowing her head to meet the charging royal. Then the world exploded with a deafening explosion of sound and light.

The crowd of ponies flinched back as Princess Platinum swayed uneasily, trying to hold her balance. Giving up on the last cause, she sat back heavily and stared in dumbfounded consternation at the bent remains of her sword. Looking back she saw the rest of the blade embedded in a wooden post behind her.

Colgate for her own part was feeling more than a little lightheaded after the massive surge of magical energy, but turned to face the crowd. “Yeah,” she muttered. “You all saw that?” she asked, voice rising in volume. “That was my… Boom… Spell!”

As the crowd gasped and cowered Colgate silently cursed herself for not paying closer attention in her self-defense classes. Still, feeling that she had gotten the crowd’s attention, she continued. “I learned that little trick from the finest self-defense master in all of lower Canterlot! A class that cost me about two hundred bits, but that was worth every one!” She glared fiercely at the ponies, as if daring them to question her investment. None did.

“If there is one thing that my master taught me, it was this: you don’t kill ponies!” She glared at Princess Platinum. “Not even if you think that pony might be a changeling queen who is going to brainwash you and your friends into becoming mindless zombie bridesmaids… again.” The Princess just looked at her confused and Colgate quickly moved on.

“Because killing is wrong!” She looked around at the ponies in the crowd. “I know that you are all scared right now, but you can’t let that turn you into crazy ponies. You almost tossed a bunch of your fellow ponies into a horrible murder pit, just because you didn’t like them. And that’s wrong!” She turned and pointed a hoof at the still-dazed Princess who was now being attended by her advisor. “I am sorry if I hit you Princess, that was wrong of me, but violence is not the answer here.”

Suddenly a pony in the crowd screamed and Colgate spun to face the pit, where the waterlogged corpse of a unicorn knight had just pulled itself over the rim. The corpse snarled at Colgate as it pushed itself to all fours.

“You have not bested me yet, chosen one!” It screeched.

With a yelp Colgate picked up her ax and telekinetically hurled it at the monster. Caught off guard, the beast was struck directly in the head with the ax and toppled backward into the pit. Wasting no time, Colgate grabbed the hilt of Princess Platinum’s sword and cut the rope that Private Pansy had left for her to free herself from the pit with.

Turning back to the crowd she took a moment to compose herself, then sighed and shook her head. “Oh forget it,” she groaned. “Let’s just figure out how I can get back home.”

Author's Note

So how awkward was that bit with the kid? I sorta imagine that most people trying to do big dramatic things on the fly will just end up having the moment ruined by other stupid things happening.

I figure most historical lords would not bother trying to calm down a screaming child while trying to murder someone with a sword, but Princess Platinum is more or less Dark Ages Rarity, so having her awkwardly caring for the kid while still attempting to be dignified and regal felt appropriate. And amusing.