It was an otherwise ordinary Saturday when Minuette got sent to Tartarus.
She woke up early that Saturday. Third weekend of the month, every month: she did her volunteer work. Leftover Donut Joe donut, shower, brush her teeth and mane, and then off to the Ministry of Health building for seven a.m. assignments. "Incisor!" she said, hugging an old classmate as they entered the front door. "Haven't seen you in a month."
"Minuette, how ya doing? I hope I don't pull the short straw again," he said.
Tooth Pick joined them as they walked down the marble hallways. "What's 'the short straw?'"
"The Smokey Mountains. The Hooffields and McColts... sweet Luna!"
Minuette nodded. Yeah, she had heard about that. Any dentist would despair. An elegant unicorn mare was already waiting. Minuette asked her, "Anesthesia, how are you?"
"Excellent! Already drew my chit. Off to the Friendship School in Ponyville."
Minuette stomped. "Darn it! I wanted that one. Have fun and tell Twilight 'fluff up those wings!' for me."
"They didn't need a surgeon this month," Anesthesia said, "just a DDS. You always get the toughest jobs."
"That's what I get for stacking the MD on top," Minuette said with a smile.
The Assistant Minister winged over an envelope to Incisor. Incisor opened it and his horn sparked. "The Smokey Mountains again? How is this random?"
Tooth Pick patted Incisor's withers. "Short straw again."
The assistant minister shook his head. "No, we've got a new worst assignment this month."
Tooth Pick opened his envelope. "Cloudanooga? Seriously?"
"Go get a cloud walking spell," the minister told him, "and a voucher for a pegasus taxi."
There was only one envelope labelled Oral Surgery. Minuette opened it. She read the single word and dropped down to her bottom on the cold marble floor. Her tail swished and ears flattened as her vision went dark around the edges.
"Looks like Minuette drew the shortest straw," Anesthesia said. "What is it, dear?"
Minuette gasped, "Tartarus!"
Two Royal Guard pegasi hauled the chariot, Minuette strapped into the back. Every time they crossed a lake or river, she contemplated throwing her saddlebags of supplies and tools overboard so that she wouldn't have to go to freakin' Tartarus, but...
...but, she was a dentist and a surgeon. It was her job to help anypony who needed her. And the photograph of Cozy Glow looked bad.
She levitated it out again. Today was Saturday, and Thursday's date was written on the corner, which meant the little criminal filly was in even worse condition by now. In the photograph, Cozy's black-bagged eyes streamed tears, her ears drooped, and the left side of her face puffed out. Cozy curled up in a miserable ball on the floor of her cell, mane and tail filthy, chin flat on the stone floor, wings dragging in the dirt.
Clearly a massive abscess. If the guard had waited too long, she would be a hospital case, but Minuette wouldn't know until she got in there and drilled out the ruined tooth.
And besides Cozy Glow, Lord Tirek needed his yearly fang grinding. Minuette facehoofed.
But, granting all that, why did she have to get the Tartarus assignment? There were other oral surgeons in Canterlot!
The chariot landed, and four guardsmares waited by the door.
"Doctor?" said the senior guard, a unicorn mare. "Sergeant Silver Sable. Have you been to Tartarus before?"
"Never." Minuette looked at the massive gates, and her ears flattened again. Animal instincts tucked her tail defensively over her privates.
"Stay on the path. You're going to walk past a load of dangerous monsters. Stay on the marked path and they can't reach you."
Minuette nodded. "Got it."
"The sapient prisoners—that is, Tirek and Cozy Glow—are in the far back. Stay with us and we'll lead you up there."
"Can do."
Minuette looked around. Even outside the dismal gate, the ground was bare volcanic rock. No plants, no sound of birdsong or insects buzzing. Everything was dead gray ash. Volcanic soil should have been rich, overgrown with life.
The very magic around here seemed dead, and Minuette shivered despite the hot sunshine.
As the massive door swung open, the smell hit Minuette before her eyes adjusted enough to see into the dim cavern. It smelled like a pet store—but not one of the clean, expensive ones in Canterlot. No, it smelled like one of those vile pet shops just off the train platform in some border town near Griffonstone, where the animals sat in piles of their own poop and pounded their heads against the glass of their enclosures.
It smelled like despair.
Very distantly, the sound of sobs came from the cavern.
"Ready?" asked the sergeant.
Minuette nodded.
"If you leave the marked path," the sergeant said, "your family doesn't get the death benefits. You've been warned, okay? Walk only where we walk."
Minuette nodded again.
"Okay, follow the trooper."
A yellow pegasus mare in gold armor led off, walking down the path.
A massive three-headed dog growled at them, one head watching their progress, but it otherwise ignored them.
Monsters snarled and clawed at them from their cages. Red cockatrice eyes glowed, trying to petrify her.
Minuette looked at her hooves, and at those of the trooper just in front of her, as the entire world narrowed down to just the stone path and the golden boots of the pegasus, and the weight of her own saddlebags.
Shadows flickered. Minuette stopped, and looked up. The trooper stopped, too. "Ma'am? I need you to follow me."
"What's—I keep—what am I seeing? At the edge of my vision? So faint..."
The yellow trooper nodded. "Shadows. When a pony, or any sapient, dies in here, their shade is trapped. They don't move on."
Minuette let her gaze go to the edges of the chamber. A shadow of a griffon flickered in the dim light of the lava.
"How long?"
"The shadows fade," the sergeant said. "Seems to take millennia. We don't know. Ponies only took over Tartarus a thousand years ago."
"Oh. What happens if a visitor—a dentist, say—dies in here?"
"Whatever afterlife she believes in," said the sergeant, "she doesn't see. At least not soon. That's one reason we want you to be careful."
"There," said the trooper, pointing with her wing. "See her?"
"Who?" Minuette aked.
"That unicorn mare."
A shadow flickered against the wall.
The shadow looked about like Minuette's own. "What was her crime?"
"She loved her husband, visited him. Brought him photographs of their children, and a fresh-baked pie. He killed her so that he wouldn't be alone for eternity."
The shadow of a unicorn stallion bounded after the mare's, and the mare ran away.
"They've been chasing each other for six hundred years," the sergeant finished.
Minuette closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
"Doctor? You okay?" the sergeant asked.
Minuette was about to say no when she heard another sob echo down the path. She remembered the photograph of the small pink filly, the entire side of her face swollen, ears tucked in agony.
"I have to," Minuette said. "The filly's life is in danger—"
"Who cares?" muttered the yellow pegasus.
"—and I'm a professional," Minuette finished.
"Damn," said the sergeant. "I was kind of hoping you would chicken out. We don't like spending any more time here than we have to."
They trudged up the path. Minuette peeked over the edge. The drop appeared to be thousands of feet.
She sidled back to the center of the path.
"That's why we always have two pegasi on duty at any time," said the earth pony trooper. "In case we need to make a catch."
"Oh hooo," called Tirek. "A fresh visitor. I do so enjoy traumatizing the innocent."
"Quiet," ordered the sergeant.
"What will you do? Throw me into Tartarus?"
"Do you want your meals this week?"
Tirek flicked his hand dismissively, and then made a zip-the-lips gesture.
Minuette could see Cozy Glow now. The filly was curled in a ball in the corner of her cell, next to a bucket. The stink of sulphur and pet store disappeared, totally overwhelmed by sour urine and feces.
Cozy Glow's wings covered her face, and she sobbed with every exhalation.
Minuette levitated a lab coat, face mask, safety glasses, and surgical cap from her bags and donned them. "Cozy? Honey? Can you hear me?"
Cozy stirred, and pulled her wings from her face. She bleared up at Minuette, her left cheek swollen like she had a ping-pong ball stashed in it. The swelling had even mostly shut her left eye.
Snot crusted her nose, and the whites of her eyes were bloodshot, as red as the cockatrice's eyes.
"Yowza!" Minuette spun and glared at the sergeant. "What is wrong with you ponies? Why wasn't I flown in days ago? Look at her!"
"This isn't some regular prison filled with ordinary, decent prisoners. First we had to be sure she wasn't faking, and then we—"
"Shush!" Minuette shouted, and held up a hoof. "Just, shush. Open the cage."
"No. She's dangerous. Work through the bars."
"Open the cage. Doctor's orders."
"D'cthrrr?" Cozy asked.
Minuette looked at her. "I'm a dentist, honey. An oral surgeon, actually. I'm going to help you."
"Thankthhhh."
"Cozy," said the sergeant. "Crawl to the bars."
The filly sobbed.
"Open the cage," Minuette commanded.
"If you die—we're not taking responsibility. She nearly brained me two weeks back, I had a concussion, and you're not wearing a helmet."
"Open the cage."
The sergeant nodded to the earth pony trooper, who pulled keys from her saddle bag, gripped them in her teeth, and unlocked the cage door.
Minuette levitated the door open and stepped through.
She jumped when the door slammed behind her and the lock clicked.
The echoes of the slam rumbled back and forth across Tartarus for several seconds. Minuette's tail tucked deep under her belly again.
Minuette glared at the sergeant, and then knelt down next to her patient. She levitated a syringe from her bag. "Here, honey, I'll hit you with a painkiller, then an antibiotic potion. Give me your foreleg."
Cozy held out her left hoof. Minuette touched the frog of her hoof to Cozy's head. "She's burning up. She needs to be in a hospital."
"Not an option," the sergeant said. "If you need help, we can bring in supplies or assistance, but she doesn't leave this cage."
"Her life is in danger." Minuette levitated a rubber tube around Cozy's foreleg and tied it, then waited for the vein to pop up.
"She's got a life sentence."
Minuette breathed through her mouth as she waited for the vein to pop up. The smell of urine and feces made her head spin. She side-eyed into the bucket... the empty bucket.
"Bring me towels," Minuette ordered. "And soap and clean water. She's been soiling herself. She's a mess."
"She's a malingerer and a faker," said the yellow pegasus mare.
"Water, soap, and towels."
The sergeant nodded to the second pegasus trooper, a striking brown-coated, black-maned mare with a white blaze, socks, and wings. She spread those white wings and flew down the cavern.
Minuette pushed the syringe of painkiller as soon as the vein popped up. Cozy's jaw slackened, her bloodshot eyes widened, then rolled back and closed as she passed out.
"Poor thing," Minuette said, stroking her withers. "She must not have slept for days. She passed out as soon as the medicine hit."
Blood poisoning for sure, the infection raging far from the jaw and into her whole body. Minuette tied a bag of potion to the top of the cage, and then inserted a line into the vein. The antibiotic potion would probably save the filly's life, if Minuette was able to clear out the worst of the infection from her jaw.
Sweet Luna! Minuette checked the filly's temperature at ear thermometer. Sweet Luna, that fever! She needs to be in ICU!
Sepsis, blood poisoning, was a terrible way to die. Minuette's grandmother had gone that way after the diabetes tore her body apart. Blood poisoning was one of Minuette's most personal and deepest enemies.
The pegasus trooper arrived with soap, water, and clean rags. Minuette cleaned the unconscious filly's bottom of what looked to be at least a day's worth of filth.
"I'm going to file a complaint against you all," Minuette told the troopers. "No matter what crimes she committed, withholding medical treatment and basic sanitation is evil."
She stroked the sleeping filly's blue mane again.
"Seventy-four," said the earth pony guard.
"Seventy-four what?" Minuette asked.
"Seventy-four premature infants died in hospitals around Equestria when she drained the magic from their incubators."
Minuette's hoof drew back from the blue mane.
Tirek burst into laughter and sat down, clutching his belly. "Oh, once the details become concrete, the merciful doctor becomes as judgmental as the other ponies! So typical of your race."
Minuette pushed a syringe of anesthetic into the intravenous line. "That'll take a half-hour to put her deep enough under to start work. Have Cozy's parents been notified?"
Tirek burst out laughing. The guards all looked at their hooves.
Minuette frowned. "I'll work on His Lordship now."
The centaur rubbed his jaw. Then, "I don't want my fangs ground down."
"It's non-discretionary," the sergeant said. "Do we need to make threats or will you behave?"
They let Minuette out of Cozy's cage and relocked it. Tirek stuck his head through his bars, and made a playful snap at Minuette.
The sergeant levitated up her spear and cracked Tirek over the skull with its shaft. "You know better than that," she said.
"I remember, I remember," Tirek muttered. "Apologies."
"What does that mean?" Minuette asked.
"Two years ago, he bit the dentist's nose. We had to airlift her to Canterlot, and we just broke his fangs that year, using slingshots. We thought he had learned his lesson."
"Oh, you ponies have no sense of humor."
"I don't know how much local anesthetic a centaur requires," said Minuette.
"I'm no pansy pastel pony. Just grind."
She adjusted her mask and safety glasses, and then levitated up her drill. She checked its magic charge—full—affixed a diamond bit, and wound it up to full speed.
"Ugggh, hate that sound," said the sergeant.
Minuette ground Tirek's fangs down until they were even with the rest of his teeth. The centaur stomped to the opposite side of his cage, plopped down, crossed his arms, and said, "I behaved. I want my meal."
Minuette lay next to Cozy Glow. The filly was sedated, and Minuette stroked the blue curls again. She put a blood pressure cuff around Cozy's left rear leg and began pumping it up.
Seventy-four.
Seventy-four infants.
The number echoed around her head.
One of the shadows, perhaps the unicorn mare whose only crime had been to love her husband, moved around in the floor, sniffing at Cozy.
Seventy-four.
But even so—how could a filly deserve eternity as a shade?
Minuette pulled out the stethescope's earpieces. "Her blood pressure is stable. Sergeant, come in here."
"Heck no."
"I need hornlight and you're the only unicorn."
She rolled her eyes. "Can't you just push some extra meds? So she doesn't wake up? We'll all swear it was an accident."
"Oh, would it be such a bother?" Tirek asked. "She drives me insane. 'Golly!' 'Let's be friends!' 'Golly!' 'Why are you all red and black? It's so edgy!' 'Golly!' Please do shut her up for good."
"Sergeant!" shouted one of the pegasi, the mare with the white wings and blaze. "That's not even funny!"
"What if you just anesthetized her vocal cords for a few weeks?" Tirek asked. "I could use some 'me' time for plotting my revenge on you ponies."
The sergeant looked at Minuette and rolled her eyes, and pointed a hoof at the pegasus. "Kaydee here is a medic. She takes that sort of thing seriously."
"Damn straight, Sarge," said Kaydee.
Minuette looked at the trooper. "You're in standard armor, not red crosses."
"Yes, Doctor. On Tartarus duty, we're troopers first, medics second."
"I could use trained help."
"Of course, Doctor."
Kaydee entered Cozy's cage—it was getting tight, two adults and a foal—and the others locked the door again behind them. The sergeant poked her horn through the bars.
"Monitor her blood pressure, heart rate, and breathing," Minuette ordered Kaydee.
"Yes, Doc."
"Hornlight. Bright, and hold it still."
The sergeant rolled her eyes, but lit her horn.
It took five hours. Not one but three of Cozy's bottom molars were broken and abscessed. Minuette drilled them out, cut incisions into the soft tissue to drain the infection, and injected potions into the gums and jawbone. She then rubbed magic salves over the open wounds.
As she worked, the stench of the raging infection and sour pus filled the filly's cage, and the sergeant spent most of the five hours puking through the bars into Cozy's toilet bucket. However, the sergeant did hold her horn light bright and steady as she puked, letting Minuette work.
The pus's stench reminded Minuette of the smell in the hospice room where her grandmother died.
Luna-be-damned blood poisoning again!
Not this time. This time, she was an adult, a surgeon trained in the best medical school in the world. Not this filly. Not this time.
After closing the last incision, Minuette gently laid Cozy's head down onto a clean towel, and ripped off her mask and goggles.
"She had three broken teeth, right next to each other. You abuse prisoners."
The sergeant spit a last gob of puke into the bucket. "No, Doctor. She made an escape attempt about ten days ago, and one of my troopers bucked her in the head. It was justified by our rules of engagement. We filed a report."
"Report."
"Report, anytime we touch a prisoner. When Tirek snapped at you, I thwacked him with a spear. That's forty extra minutes of paperwork before I can go to bed tonight."
"Which trooper bucked a foal in the head?" Minuette snarled. "Those were brand-new adult teeth you broke, not milk teeth."
The sergeant stomped, and poked a hoof through the bars at Minuette. "It was somepony in my detachment, so the bit stops with me. You don't need to know."
"Sarge?" said the earth pony trooper. "It's time to go."
"Go?" Minuette said. "Are you joking?"
"It'll be sundown in an hour," the sergeant said. "Maybe less. Nopony stays in Tartarus after dark. We have a bivouac outside the gates. We'll loan you a sleeping bag and a tent."
"This patient will die unattended overnight," Minuette said. "She should be in a hospital."
Tirek clapped. "Oh I do so miss my alone time."
Minuette glared at him.
The sergeant swished her tail. "We're clearing out. Give her a dose of whatever, and you can check on her in the morning."
"I'm staying with my patient."
"The worst mass-murderer in Equestrian history?"
"My patient."
"Do you have any idea what Tartarus is like after dark?"
"Do you have any idea how seriously I take my Healer's Oath?"
"I'm staying, too, Sarge," said Kaydee. "I'm a combat medic instead of a doctor because my folks didn't have money for university—but the medic corps' Oath is word-for-word the same as a doctor's."
Minuette looked at her. "Thank you, Kaydee. I'll need the help. This will be a long night."
"You're being insubordinate, trooper," the sergeant said.
"The laws of war command that a medic doesn't care who her patient is."
The sergeant flicked her tail. "Fine. I respect your dedication, if I question your judgement. We'll lock you both in Cozy's cage."
"No..." Minuette said. "No. Lock Kaydee out, so she can run for fresh towels and clean water for me."
"Doctor?" Kaydee said. "I'll lay in some buckets of clean water now, and then they'll lock us both in. The cages are also to protect the prisoners from the night."
Minuette said, "Oh..."
The other troopers disappeared down the path, and the massive outside door slammed and locked, echoing through the caverns of Tartarus.
"What am I doing?" Minuette said.
Kaydee just nodded her head and swallowed.
They sat in silence.
"I like your coat," Minuette said. "Wings that match your blaze and socks—I've never seen that before. Is it unusual?"
Kaydee blushed, and looked away. "Yeah. Pretty rare. Thanks."
Silence again, except for Cozy's ragged breathing.
"Do the stallions like it?"
"I made a few bits modeling. Decided I would rather help ponies, joined the guard, picked the medical corps."
"Oh."
Silence again.
Minuette leaned down and lapped from one of the buckets of water. "The humidity here is zero. I'm thirsty but forgot to drink while I was working. I haven't eaten since Canterlot."
Kaydee passed her a paper-wrapped biscuit from inside her armor.
"Thanks, Kaydee. You got any food for yourself?"
"That's it."
They split the dry biscuit, then took turns lapping from the same water bucket, so that the other buckets would stay sterile-ish.
"I've been here for centuries," Tirek called. "The low humidity is very bad for the skin and complexion and mane. I used to look like Prince Blueblood! Are you sure you can't just kill the pink little beast so you two can go?"
"Very sure," Minuette said, pulling a bag of saline from her supplies and adding it to Cozy's IV line. "She hasn't urinated since we've been here. I'm concerned about her kidneys."
"Yeah, Doc," said Kaydee. "I was wondering about that myself."
Minuette levitated up her thermometer and stuck it in Cozy's ear. "Luna! She's even worse than earlier."
The two adults wet down towels and wrapped Cozy in them, but her temperature refused to drop. After an hour, Minuette injected another potion into the IV line.
The ambient lights died, until only the red glow of lava far below them lit the cavern. Tirek was simply a shadow, despite how close his cage was.
"So, what happens in Tartarus after dark?" Minuette asked.
Tirek cackled laughter.
"I honestly don't know," Kaydee said. "I just know we never wait for it."
"As much as I hate that little beast," Tirek said, "do move her closer to the center of the cage, to ensure nothing can... reach in, in the dark."
Minuette levitated up the filly, and Kaydee moved the towels to make a bed for her.
Shivers shook Cozy's tiny body. Minuette sat next to her and stroked her mane. "Check her blood pressure, Kaydee."
A gust of wind shook the cage and ruffled Minuette's mane.
"Oh ho!" Tirek said. "The sun is fully down outside."
Flapping wings echoed from the stone walls, and the dry air blew again, the temperature dropping quickly. Cerberus barked and snarled. Minuette shivered.
"Blood pressure is still low," Kaydee said, "but better than it was."
"Cold," Minuette whispered, and pulled her labcoat closer around her barrel.
A guttural howl echoed from up the cavern.
Kaydee sat down next to Minuette. "It's gonna be a long night, huh, Doc?"
"I think so."
Tirek laughed.
Something shook the left side of Cozy's cage, and then silence returned.
It was around two in the morning when Cozy's fever spiked and she went into convulsions.
Minuette lit her horn bright and crammed a rubber bite block into Cozy's mouth, between the front teeth, hoping to protect all the work she had done earlier. Kaydee wrapped her legs around Cozy's barrel and foreleg to protect the IV line.
Shadows shook the cage, enraged by Minuette's hornlight. The dry wind swirled, stinging Minuette's eyes and ears with its cold.
Cozy's tiny wings spasmed. Minuette had never treated a pegasus in grand mal before, Minuette lived in Canterlot and her patients were all unicorns and she couldn't remember what to do with the damn wings! Oral surgeons didn't get practice treating sepsis!
Minuette's magic lit, and held Cozy's leg. "I've got it. Let go, Kaydee. My bag, left saddlebag, green rubber envelope. Tear it open. Glass ampoule. Labelled 'R19X.' Draw thirty mills and push it into her line."
"R19X?" Kaydee said. "That stuff's dangerous."
"Last resort," Minuette said. "If we don't get the fever down, she'll get permanent brain damage. She'll die."
Kaydee said, "But, R19X? They trained us—"
Minuette said, very calmly: "I am the responsible physician. You will follow my order."
"Yes, Doctor," Kaydee replied.
"Her brain was born damaged," said Tirek.
Kaydee snapped, "Shut up, Tirek!"
Wind and shadows shook at the cage again, and darkness flowed through the bars, inky on the stone floor, several inches into the cage.
"You sound so professional!" Tirek called. "You're from Canterlot, yes? I remember the taste of your magic. An hourglass cutie mark but a medical career, because you do things in such a timely fashion! Why aren't you an emergency room doctor or a trauma surgeon?"
"Shut up!" Minuette shouted.
Kaydee pushed the syringe of potion into Cozy's veins. The sharp smell of thick urine punched Minuette in the nose, and a warm puddle wet Minuette's forelegs and chest.
"That smells bad, Doc," Kaydee said.
"The blood infection is hitting her kidneys. Either the potion will clear it, or not. The convulsion is passing. Can you clean her up? I'm going to check her vitals again."
"Yes, Doc."
The fever and seizure subsided, and Cozy began to shiver in the cold wind of Tartarus's night. Kaydee wiped away the urine and threw the rags outside of the cage.
Minuette said, "You can take a nap."
Once the guard was asleep and the urine mostly dry, Minuette took off her lab coat and laid it over Cozy. The filly continued to shiver, and the cold of the stone nagged at Minuette's hooves.
"Mommy..." Cozy muttered.
Minuette put a hoof on the filly's mane, and rubbed her gently.
"So cold..." Cozy said. The words were slurred from the swelling in her mouth, but any dentist or oral surgeon was practiced at understanding patients with full mouths.
Minuette shivered, and she curled up next to Cozy, wrapping around her. The filly was still boiling hot, gripped by the fever, and that warmed Minuette up.
This filly was sick. The heat radiated off her, like Minuette was hugging a space heater.
"Mommy," Cozy slurred.
Minuette stroked her mane, down her withers, and rubbed her wings through the lab coat. Poor thing. She was going to go talk to Twilight. No foal deserved this. Was there no jail or hospital in Equestria they could use instead? Were they so sure there was no hope of redemption, of rehabilitation? This was just a filly—
"I'm sorry, Mommy," Cozy said. "Sorry."
"It's okay," Minuette whispered, rubbing Cozy's wings again. "I'm here."
"I'm sorry I killed you, Mommy."
Minuette's hoof stopped rubbing. Her whole body froze.
"I'm sorry," Cozy said. "The baby, you would have loved it more than me when it was born, had to kill you both..."
"She has that dream a lot," Tirek said. "I think her body count is well into three digits. I'm embarrassed by my paltry score in comparison."
Her fever fell over the next two hours, and Cozy spoke less.
Tirek snored.
Kaydee whimpered and thrashed her wings.
Minuette inched away from Cozy, sat up, and stayed awake the whole night. She took Cozy's temperature and blood pressure every time her eyes seemed to be getting heavy.
The filly shook in her sleep. "Mommy? Lonely."
Minuette ground her teeth, and lay back down next to Cozy, and stroked her mane again.
The filly settled, and slept peacefully.
The urine-soaked rags, tossed outside the cage, disappeared sometime before dawn.
The light in the cavern slowly returned, and a deep boom echoed as the guards opened the door.
Minuette checked Cozy's temperature again. It was still a fever, but much lower than it had been. Her pulse was stronger and blood pressure up, too.
Modern potions were truly amazing. Even just five years ago, the filly would have died.
She rubbed the filthy blue curls again. "You're gonna make it," Minuette whispered. Even quieter: "Fuck you, blood poisoning. I beat you this time."
Sergeant Silver Sable trotted to the cage. "You made it. How was Tartarus at night?"
"She went into febrile seizure a few hours ago. If I had left her unattended, she'd be dead."
"Wouldn't that have been such a shame," Tirek said. "Breakfast?"
The earth pony guard carried stuffed saddlebags over her hips. "I brought plenty for everypony."
"Everycentaur."
"Shush," said Kaydee.
After breakfast, Kaydee monitored the still-unconscious Cozy Glow while Minuette napped.
Sometime later—but not nearly later enough—Kaydee shook Minuette awake.
"Doc? She's come around."
Minuette sat up and blinked. Cozy lay flat on her belly, but her eyes were open.
Lying down next to her, Minuette pressed the frog of her forehoof to Cozy's forehead, and then levitated the thermometer to her ear again. "Your fever's way down. How do you feel?"
Cozy gestured to her left cheek, and a few tears ran down her muzzle.
"Yeah, I bet." Minuette pushed a small dose of painkiller into the IV line.
"Ohhhh, wow..." Cozy said, her eyes widening. Then, "You smell like tinkle."
"You tinkled on me in your sleep. How do you feel?"
Cozy sat up to her haunches. Her voice slurred, but it was understandable: "It hurts, but not like yesterday."
"You were in bad shape," Minuette said. "I had to take three teeth, and drain a lot of fluid."
Cozy nodded, and then gasped and held her hoof to her cheek. "Ow."
"I'm going to give the guards a bottle of pills for your pain," Minuette said.
"The guards hate me."
"Kaydee? One every eight hours until they're gone."
Cozy looked at Kaydee. "Well, she's the guard who made the others call a doctor."
"Lay down and rest. Your body is in bad shape. A train wreck would have left you in better condition."
Cozy curled up on a fresh towel, and Minuette put a new bag of antibiotic potion on Cozy's IV.
"Drink lots of water."
Cozy gave a tiny nod, and lapped from a shallow bowl.
"Get some sleep. I'm going back down, too."
"Why?" Cozy asked.
The sergeant glared at the prisoner. "These two stayed awake all night, saving your life."
"Night?" Cozy squeaked. "In Tartarus? Golly!"
"Oh, you get used to it," Tirek said. "Took me about a century."
Minuette went back to sleep.
Kaydee shook her awake again. "Time to go. Sundown's in an hour, and the boss ordered us out tonight."
Minuette checked Cozy's vital signs, pulled the IV line out, and gave her her first painkiller pill.
"See you in the morning, Cozy."
Cozy slunk over to Minuette and whispered, "Did you hold me in my sleep, Doctor?"
"Yes."
"Thanks. The nights... I could use a friend at night. I haven't got any friends anymore."
Minuette gave the tiny filly a hug, and then went to bivouac with the guards outside the gates.
Around a campfire, Kaydee stripped her armor off, and Minuette looked at her cutie mark.
"That's a caduceus," Minuette said
"Yeah, that's my name, too, Caduceus. I go by Kaydee for short."
Minuette flipped her tail. "I smell like a minotaur. Is there a creek or stream I could bathe in?"
"No," Kaydee said. "We all get ripe by the end of a week shift here."
"How long is left in your guard stint?" Minuette asked.
"Eleven moons."
"Going to re-enlist?"
"Ehhhhhhh..."
Minuette said, "You would need to pass the entrance exams and classes on your own... but if I whisper in the right ears, I can get you a tuition remission at Canterlot School of Medicine."
"What? How?"
"I went to school with Princess Twilight. We were roommates sophomore year. She likes nothing more than connecting talented young ponies with the right school."
"I... yeah, I'd appreciate that. Thank you. But why?"
Minuette flicked her ears. "Being a doctor... it's more than a science. It takes a lot of heart. Nopony else cared enough about that filly to stay the night with me. You'll... you have the right kind of heart."
Kaydee nodded. "I hate her. Cozy Glow. Crazy Glue, we all call her. My cousin died when Cozy drained the magic—she worked at the weather factory, and a safety failed. There wasn't enough left to have a cremation."
"I'm... I'm sorry." Minuette put a hoof on Kaydee's withers.
Kaydee nodded, and looked away.
"I've treated ponies I hated. Kaydee, if you can hack the classes—and Canterlot is the hardest medical school on the planet—you'll be a good doctor someday."
"Thanks."
The next morning, Minuette insisted on seeing Cozy alone. "Doctor-patient privilege," she explained.
The guards locked Minuette into the cage, and then backed off a few hundred feet, outside of earshot and reasonable lip-reading distance.
"What happened to your teeth, Cozy?"
"I hit the sergeant over the head with my poo-bucket—first, I had thrown the poo into her eyes, then hit her with the bucket—and broke for the gate to my cage. The earth pony, I never got her name, bucked me down before I could get airborne. Golly, it hurt."
So, the stories were consistent, at least.
"They didn't call a doctor?"
"Once I got a fever, the pretty pegasus made them call."
"Have they hurt you, otherwise?"
"Golly, no. That was the first time I tried to escape. I haven't been here three weeks."
"I'll come back next weekend and check how you're doing. If your fever comes back before then, I'll commandeer the first pegasus chariot. In about six months, we can put you on the potion to grow those teeth back. Chew on the other side for the next few weeks."
"Yes, Doctor. What's your name?"
"Doctor."
"There's a photograph of you and Twilight in her office. Twilight had her wings really fluffed up."
"No comment."
"When I get out of here..." Cozy tapped her chin a few times.
Minuette cocked an eyebrow. 'When?' When she gets out of here? She was an optimist, this filly.
"When I get out of here... I'm going to get everypony. I'm going to get Twilight in particular. I'll use rusty hooks to pull her ovaries out through her nose..."
Minuette's face went cold and her tail thrashed as the filly's well-rehearsed revenge monologue spilled out, encompassing most of Equestria, and using every vile torture Minuette could imagine, and thousands more that were beyond her ken.
"But you were nice to me," Cozy Glow finished. "I'll just kill you, fwoop!" – Cozy made a slash across the neck with her hoof – "quick and easy. Thanks, Doctor. I appreciate it. You're my friend."
Minuette waved to the guards, and they let her out of the cage, and escorted her out of Tartarus.
Minuette gave her business card to Kaydee. "Write me, if you want to try school."
"Thanks, Doc. I'll keep your patient healthy."
"You did good work," Minuette said. "Thanks. If her fever comes back, summon me."
As the pegasus chariot carried her into the sunset, home toward Canterlot, Minuette thought about Cozy's vow to get out of Tartarus, to kill everypony. Thought about her apologies for killing her mother... and an unborn foal, too...
Crazy Glue.
And for the first time in her life, Minuette wondered if she'd done the right thing by saving a life.
Of course she had. Cozy would never get out of Tartarus. Nocreature ever did.
She remembered from the Oath she swore upon graduation with her MD: Most especially must I tread with care in matters of life and death. If it is given me to save a life, all thanks.
All thanks.
So why did Minuette feel like she'd screwed up?
Author's Note
Comments are always welcome! A certain amount of inspiration was drawn from Latecomer's enjoyable "The Trial of Cozy Glow," although I took it in my own direction.
2020.03.21: Squelched a few typos.
