The Final 9

The duo started walking; weaving a path through the sharp pieces of wood, bricks, what's left of the thatched roofing, and whatever else could pull their stitches apart.

"What... Happened here?" Asked Twilight, gawking at the surroundings with a mixture of wonder and horror. "What could have caused damage like this?"

Rarity's expression turned sour; her little leather nose scrunching up. "I don't know, dear, nor do I want to know. I just want things to grow anew. Too bad we don't have the Talisman."

"The what?"

"It's round and has six symbols on it. Pinkamena is constantly drawing it, but it's probably long since lost and destroyed."

The purple doll stopped in her tracks, as gears turned in her mind; both metaphorically and literally, her expression becoming blank as she pictured the peculiar device she had stored within her.

"You alright there, darling?" Asked a concerned Rarity.

"Six symbols..." Twilight began. "They wouldn't happen to have one your diamonds, and my starburst on them, would they?" Rarity's shutter-eyes widened to a ludicrous size, as wide as the lenses would allow.

"You're not saying..." Before Rarity could finish her sentence, Twilight's head ducked to look under her midsection, using her magic to pull the zipper half way down, letting the Talisman drop to the dusty ground with a sharp plink. "NO!" Rarity hoarsely gasped. "You found it!?"

"I found it when I... Woke up? That's one way of putting it."

Rarity took the talisman in her aura and inspected it closely, turning it over and scrutinizing all the little details. Off in the distance there came an ominous clatter, the sound of a tin can or something metallic in origin being knocked against one of the innumerable piles of rubble or stones. Rarity's head snapped sideways in the direction of the noise, and Twilight Just casually followed Rarity's line of sight.

"More of us?" Asked Twilight.

"The rest of us... Are back at the hideout..." She stammered, fear obvious in her tone. Her head darted around, spying an empty spray can of some description with a large hole in the side, the nozzle fallen off and the nipple with it; the label long since rusted away from the oxidation on the surface of the can. "Get in the can!"  Rarity harshly whispered, rapidly ushering Twilight in the direction of the can.

Without a word, Twilight galloped into the can and plastered herself against the inside of it. Peeking out the hole slightly, she observed Rarity whom had pulled out a short spear from her cart that resembled a doctor's scalpel, the blade and handle thoroughly coated with tetanus-laden rust. Luckily for Rarity she can't get tetanus poisoning. She saw Rarity with the scalpel-spear in her aura in a battle-ready stance, her ears perking and twitching every which way, her eyes narrowing on any source of noise her ears picked up. She had the junk-laden roller skate to her back so nothing could creep up on her.

It unfortunately did nothing for what came next.

Rarity must have heard something; her expression and overall demeanour and posture softened. Her head turned around to her left, giving Twilight a look at the abstract horror written all over Rarity's face. Just then, something leapt over the cart.

It looked like a haphazardly thrown-together, half-completed version of either Twilight, or Rarity. Black and green, its legs and hooves hooves were made of stitched together leather that had since become tattered, dirty, and torn over the decades, revealing the metal bones underneath that made up its 'skeleton'. The torso didn't have any covering, so Twilight could see what is consisted of. Bones... Bones off of who-knows what, riveted and screwed to a metal spine that pivoted to allow sufficient movement. A few smaller bones made up the rib cage, but only one of the hip joints has a bone socketed into the metal pelvis. The head... Oh no... The head is the skull of a cat! The skull had a hole in its forehead, which a jagged and twisted metal spike poked through. Loosely hanging around its neck is a cracked leather collar, the purple colour it once had long since faded.

The peculiar thing about the collar draped around the metal spine was that it had four little blue baubles set into the leather, and in the middle of the four baubles was a flower of some description. Twilight couldn't really tell if it's a flower or not, she's just guessing. Sprouting from the creatures back were needle-like bones webbed with a myriad of fabrics, tattered, strewn with holes. Twilight doubted it could even fly.

Rarity turned to face the beast, dropping the makeshift weapon as her aura faltered out of sheer terror. It opened its skeletal maw, roaring in Rarity's face as it picked her up in its mouth, tossing her against the side of the skate/wagon. The force of having Rarity thrown into it shook half its contents all over the ground, including the Talisman. Out of all the things than clattered to the ground, for some reason the beast's attention immediately focused on the Talismasn. The beast's gaze turned from the Talisman, to Rarity. Twilight couldn't tell what is was, but for some reason the creature's demeanour gave off the expression of looking at Rarity with a smug 'You know what's coming next', grin.

Slowly, its head turned away from Rarity as it lifted its hoof, and needle-like fingers extended from inside the leg, picking up the Talisman and popping it into the socket of what could have easily been the owners tag.

Twilight recoiled, leaning back against the inside of the can, inadvertently making it 'clink' against one of the many pebbles or stoned peppering the ground. Breathing heavily, she heard a soft grumbling, presumably coming from the beast. It grew louder and louder, and Twilight's breathing got heavier and heavier.

Almost for a second, the grumbling stopped.

Then, after a split second of pointless relief a sickly green light shining from one of the eye sockets followed by the hoof-turned-needle appendage shot into the opening of the can, and began digging around. The five spindly phalanges wormed their way further towards Twilight, whom had shuffled her way to the back of the can. Twilight pulled her head away from the claws, as far back as the concave end of the can would allow.

DING!, DING!, DING!

'What is that!? Was the only thought that ran through Twilight's mind. That, and the prospect of getting mauled by a robot made out of an amalgam of bone and metal was certainly prevalent. The can rocked to the side, the creature withdrew its appendage as the needle phalanges retracted back into its foreleg.

Then came a voice.

"Over here, you ruffian!"

The beast gave an annoyed growl as the last of its leg pulled from the hole in the can. Twilight heard it take three steps before a loud thunk echoed through Twilight's ears. She noticed a slightly smaller hole she had been too scared to see initially, so she exited through it with all due haste and clambered over a few bricks, crouching down behind and peering over the top of it.

Twilight saw that the beast had Rarity in it mouth, a couple of its teeth puncturing Rarity's white leather. With a final, frail scream that could shatter glass—if there weren't any windows that were already broken—it carried her off into the distance. Twilight raised a hoof and screamed out after her new friend, but her words fell on non-existent ears, ears that would have belonged to and flesh-and-blood creature.

Twilight followed the path of the beast as it galloped off. As her gaze followed it, she saw a huge, twisted and bent, black spire with veins of green radiating out from between the plating covering the building in the background, raising out of the poisoned land.

The hoof that Twilight hadn't raised, slipped on the loose stones that she stood on and the brick she leaned against slipped, trapping her hoof. She pulled and pulled at her leg, using the other to push the brick off with what force she could manage. Finally, with the strongest tug the tiny doll could muster, she managed to pull her leg free, but fell backwards, tearing the stitching in her left joint where it connected to her torso. She tried standing up, but she couldn't put weight on it. If she tried, she would fall down.

Getting up; standing on three legs with her injured leg dragging underneath her, Twilight hobbled along on three legs out from behind the pile of bricks and rubble. She would take two steps forward with her hind legs, push off with her one good front leg, throwing it forward as she dragged the useless leg along under her.

Where she's going, she didn't know. Twilight only knew she had to get to safety. She started back towards the house that she woke up in. It wasn't too far away, she reasoned. Not even half way there, she gave into fatigue and collapsed on the ground, the resulting thump raising a small dust cloud around her form. She rolled onto her back, using her good foreleg to pull the other one up onto her torso, cradling it gingerly.

~~~***~~~

An unknown distance away, a dirty glass lens followed the form of Twilight. Whomever was looking through the lens slid the next lens into place, increasing the magnification on the device. It saw Twilight collapse, and as she did, another lens slid into place, clearly seeing Twilight cradling her leg from the torn joint.

From behind the telescope came a yellow face with pink hair and one eye; the other eye long since lost. A piece of dirty brown leather replaced it. She put a hoof up to her mouth contemplating her next move as her eye darted around. She put her eye back up to the telescope, looking back down at Twilight. Her choice made, she galloped off through the tarpaulin hanging down over the door leading out to the telescope.