Sunrise

Pinkamena Diane twirled a particularly sharp knife in her hoof as she waited for her current charge to regain consciousness. As his eyes blinked back to awareness thanks to the smelling salts she had sewn into his nasal cavity, a piercing scream flew from his lips when he noticed one of his legs was no longer attached to his body. In its place stood a cauterized stump of infected tissue.

Humming to herself, she approached across the basement and drew the tip of the knife along his stomach just hard enough to draw blood, "Well, do we feel like talking yet? You still have three legs and your horn after all. You can still walk out of here."

He glared at her and spat, "I will tell you nothing, beast."

Her eye twitched as her long, straight pink mane whipped through the air at the snap of her head towards his, "A beast!? We'll see who's the beast after you lose your horn!" she shouted and plunged the knife into a non-vital part of his chest. He hollered through the pain as his captor reached for a particularly vicious looking hacksaw.

Placing it carefully at the base of his horn, Pinkamena began to saw slowly through the sensitive appendage. Now, a unicorn's horn is not only extremely sensitive, but it is a vital part of unicorn anatomy. It provides a release for the magical energy built up by an organ deep within the brain. Should this release not occur for a long period of time, the brain of the pony in question begins to slowly degrade. The first symptoms of magical overload are delirium, dizziness, and an inability to process short-term memories. This rapidly escalates into dementia, psychosis, or schizophrenia. If the situation is not treated, full brain death quickly follows, leaving a hollow vegetable where once stood a proud unicorn. Horns can be regrown magically and naturally if not completely severed, but a horn severed at the base, close to the skull, is extremely difficult to regrow.

The earth pony giggled as her victim snapped a vocal chord, turning his screams and curses into blood-filled gurgles as his voice box destroyed itself. Continuing her leisurely sawing motion, her mind wandered off to other things that needed to be done. If this pony didn't survive, he'd be worth quite a bit to one of her higher class customers. She figured 6 bits a pound, more if she sliced him up right.

Eventually, the unicorn lost consciousness again. She waited a few moments to see if her smelling salts would work again, but the idiot remained out. With a shrug, the pink pony began to tidy up, placing all of her instruments in a neat row for later. As she finished up, a scroll appeared in front of her in a puff of green flame. Catching it in her hoof she bounced over to the stairs leading up from her little basement singing a song, "Spikey-wikey sent me a letter~ I wonder what could be better~"

Tossing the leg of the pony into the meat grinder to prepare it for sausage, she unfurled the scroll and read. The smile on her face grew and grew, "Lady Twilight needs me! Oh, this will be so much fun. I'll definitely need to hurry on this sausage for Spike though. I only have three nights to prepare and that idiot downstairs is going to take at least another to really have fun with," she explained, looking down at a crocodile lazing in the corner of the kitchen. It blinked at her and yawned, revealing a maw full of sharp teeth. Pinkamena giggled and twirled, heading up another set of stairs to her small apartment.

She flopped down on her bed and looked at the half-finished quilt next to her. Thinking about it, the colt downstairs had a very nice cutie mark that would go perfectly in the pattern of others.

Elusive lay back on the bed, pretending to be exhausted and satisfied. The colt on the other side of the bed smiled at her and fell asleep almost immediately. Rolling her eyes, the unicorn rose from the bed and moved to the mirrored dresser. Fixing her purple mane back into its usual perfect style, she picked up the bag of bits next to her comb and retrieved the scroll that had been recording everything said in the room for the last three hours. It had taken far too much effort to relieve this particular stallion of his bits and his information, but, it had been worth it. The pegasus she left in bed would never wake up from his little post-coital nap.

With a soft hmph, she left the room and shortly after, the hotel. The cleaning crew would find the pegasus in bed, dead from an overdose of one of the popular drugs circulating the Lunapolis underground. At least the poor dear had provided Elusive with some valuable information. With the right maneuvering, she could double her take from the night and perhaps even afford a few new dresses after her bills were paid. Living in high class was expensive after all. As she sauntered down the streets, the eyes of passing colts and stallions and even some mares would stare at her, taking in her perfect body. The attention thrilled her.

Passing a particular alley as she did every night, she peeked in on the ponies who had taken up residence among the garbage and other filth. Long ago she had crawled her way up from these very same gutters, so she tossed a few dozen bits down the alley for anypony who could use them. It was one of her quirks to be generous to those less fortunate despite her snobby attitude and near-celebrity status.

As she reached her penthouse apartment with a wonderful view of the royal castle, a scroll popped up in front of her. Catching it in her magic, white coat glistening in the moonlight, she unfurled and read. It appeared that Lady Shadow required her skills for a special mission. It had been quite some time since she last left the city and getting out into the country would do her some good. Writing a few notes of her own, postponing parties and appointments with her clientele, Elusive smiled to herself. It would be an interesting trip.