The creature was easily twice the size of a full grown stallion. It stood hunched over the stone, gore-splattered table while managing to retain it’s daunting size nevertheless. Both of its arms were splayed over said stone where a majority of the gore and guts were. These appendages resembled massive rectangular slabs of bone and steel scraps which were capped off in circular, razor sharp hooks.

As if the more preserved muscular canine build wasn’t enough, the thing had half a dozen other nasty appendages jutting out from it’s backside and flank. Some of these tendril-mounted limbs sported a trifold of spikes - similar to the tails on a Hunter - while others were slimmer and resembled a sewing pin or medical needle. One of the limbs jutted out straight from where this thing’s tail should have been, which ended in a large, desaturated blue hand. Most of the flesh of the fingers were missing, but the appendage's past functions were clear with the carved bone in their place.

Then there was the face.

Dear Celestia, that face.

It resembled more of a mutilated cow skull left out in the desert for centuries instead of a dog or cat skull. The only thing keeping Zecora from making that assumption about the skull was the addition of dangling canine teeth close to the stone ones of Timberwolves. As for the eyes, two blue insects had been snuggled into the eye sockets somewhat calmly until they met the zebra’s petrified stare. They had sprung upwards with their tiny limbs to examine her briefly before retreating back into their respective holes to look back down at the mess on the stone table.

Both Hunters had resorted to standing straight and still as statues beside Zecora. It was like they suspected some surge of adrenaline to fuel her escape and were waiting to pounce. The hope of that happening had been snuffed out no later than half a minute from being turned upside down. Zecora’s blood had almost finished rushing to her head, making her limbs feel as weak as her resolve to take a stand against this thing or at the very least high tail it back the way she came.

The beast pulled back it’s strange appendages, creating the sickening scraping sound Zecora had been forced to endure just a few moments earlier. It used the bulk of the rectangular-shaped parts to scrape chunks of flesh off of the stone and down onto the floor. After the ear piercing scraping, only the faint dropping of blood resounded throughout the chamber.

Despite her upside down position, Zecora could now make out that the liquid remains of whatever or whoever had just been on that table were flowing into a purposely cut channel which led somewhere out of her dwindling line of vision. The zebra’s attention didn’t remain on the trail for long before the creature turned to face her.

Or at least she thought it was her.

Whimpering and a few muffled sobs started to play around her as if on cue. Zecora forced her neck to turn from side to side even though her vision started to stutter behind her like a lagging monitor. Once her framed sight caught up with her, the zebra was able to finally make out the horrendous sight in front of her.

Mares.

Well, not just pony mares, but female species of all kinds of creatures. Living creatures. Some weren’t equine-like such as griffon and a changeling. Most of the females were actual ponies of the three races, a few of which Zecora swore she recognized from her time in Ponyville. Through her edging vision, she was vaguely able to identify a white earth pony with a pink mane, Redheart. Then there was a cream colored earth pony, known as Bon Bon. Then a violet pegasus she didn’t recognize, and some more girls which were hard to make out in the darkness. Everyone else shared Zecora’s all dangling upside down position alongside them being bound by blue tendrils to stone hooks carved out of the mostly hollowed out ceiling.

Zecora was second to the edge of the drying rack-style restraints with only a dirty white and pink mare in front. The dizzying headache and horrific nature of the whole situation might have clouded her judgement but the unmistakable red cross on the mare’s cutie mark let the zebra know it was Ponyville’s former nurse from the days gone by. Zecora looked into the mare’s lidded eyes but she seemed to have been hanging there a while too long to really retain anything.

The scraping stopped.

All the conscious and capable females on the rack ceased their unheard pleas momentarily as all eyes went onto the multi-limbed monstrosity. No creature uttered a syllable or sniffle while the butcher craned its rotten neck along the line. It then took a step away from it’s crimson-caked workstation.

As if on cue, the whimpering and cries for fruitless help resumed at once. The only ones not making a scene were Zecora and the few unconscious females. Zecora was too captivated by the whole ordeal to express her fear verbally but the look on her face summed it up nevertheless.

The creature arrived at the line, extended two massive, hand-tipped appendages and wrapped them around Redheart. Once the earth pony was secure tightly, one of the Hunters snapped its tail to cut the tendril-like restraint that kept her suspended. Redheart fell limp in the larger creature’s grasp, which is when the other girls also started to quiet their struggling. Most of them resided into muffled sobbing while others tried eagerly to catch their breaths as if the danger had passed.

Zecora forced her breathing to steady in compliance with her mind’s focus as the other healer was placed on the stone table. The creature’s hands removed themselves from Redheart’s body, opting to spread her limbs eagle. It was at this moment that Zecora noticed Redheart begin to actually regain her senses as the blood must have begun to return throughout her body. The white pony attempted to roll off the table only to get roughly yanked back and forced down onto it face up. Using it’s hands, the beast gripped all of her limbs down except for her right foreleg.

It then placed the hollow, circular tip of one slab-like blade over her shoulder. The creature raised its other main, cleaving arm high into the air. Redheart screamed. Many of the others did too. Zecora couldn’t. All she could do was watch.

Watch as Redheart’s foreleg was cleaved clean off in an instant.

The force of the cut created a sickening grinding sound as the bladed limb passed through bone and scraped on the stone in its fury. Zecora flinched and bit her tongue accidentally with the sudden noise. Her self-inflicted minor injury paled in comparison to the mare on the table who was in agony, staring with teary eyes at her missing limb.

In a flash, the butcher scraped the foreleg aside like it was a useless piece of packaging on a much more interesting product inside. Then it brought a cuffed appendage down onto Redheart’s stump. It placed the weird part over the nub before spinning the cuff at high speeds, making Redheart holler more. When the appendage was removed, Zecora could see that the stump was now charred black. Additionally, the bleeding had stopped.

Luckily for the poor mare, Redheart had passed out due to the shock of watching her discarded limb being tossed aside. Zecora, however, didn’t have the luxury of turning a blind eye. She watched as the hand-tip limb grabbed the foreleg and threw it into a nearby rusted minecart - that was also filled with various limbs and remains.

The creature got to removing the other foreleg, which managed to force Redheart back into consciousness. She pleaded much like the unseen victim before her, but the cleaver-clawed variant continued by applying the cauterizing appendage to the new stump of flesh.

Once that was done, it moved down to the hindlegs. Now that the shock of the situation was setting in, Zecora was forced to endure the visceral display for what it was.

“NO PLEA-” Redheart started before transitioning into a scream of anguish.

The creature displayed no sense of remorse or care for the living being it was mutaliting. It’s usually squirming eyes were perfectly still and focused on the task at hand. It didn’t let Redheart finish a plea or give the mare any down time in between slices except for when the creature had to reposition it’s restraining limbs - a job that became easier with each one lopped off - to cut the next one in line.

The final limb came off.

Zecora’s ears were assaulted by a horrid symphony of blood curdling screaming and bone-on-stone scraping of the creature cleaning up its workstation. It had tossed each discarded limb into one of the cars on the rusted minecart on the platform’s edge right after removing it.

Redheart was thrashing, most likely in agony rather than an attempt to escape now that her only methods of movement had been stripped entirely. The beast no longer held her down as it turned around to dip a needle-tipped appendage into a cauldron on a blue substance - which was fed by a glowing tube of blue liquid that wrapped around the base of the platform from the walls of the chamber - causing the bone spike to emit a faint glow from the multiple holes in the chunk of the appendage.

The creature returned to the table’s side where it raised the needle tendril over Redheart, whose eyes went wide. She tried to roll or shove herself off of the table but her sapped strength and mutilated appearance made escape impossible. Two more sharpened appendages swung around from the carvers back. These were thicker than the needle, but were also double pronged like a set of pliers for precision.

Suddenly, the monstrosity froze in place as the two Plexers wiggled free of their respective eye sockets. The insects scurried their way down to a hollowed out slot on each of the plier-limbs before the creature resumed animation. It plunged the pliers into Redheart’s belly to open a small hole, which the piloted limbs entered.

Zecora felt like expelling the contents of her last meal now. With no scraping sound to distract her, the zebra got a full auditory raping of a squishing noise coming from Redheart’s insides alongside her screaming. When it found whatever it was looking for, the tendrils started to retract themselves from her stomach with some of her body’s insides. One plier pulled while the other would snip and then the hand appendages would drag a dull blue tendril into her stomach before ‘fusing’ it with the mare’s own organs like a pvc pipeline having a leaky pipe replaced with a new one. In an ironic, yet horrific display, crimson splatters erupted from Redheart’s mouth as her insides were effectively molding clay for this thing.

When this was done, the blue needle joined the fray inside the mare’s abodomine. The two plier ones seemed to guide it through the mess of discarded gore and holes. Light began to shine out of the beehive-like nest pattern on Redheart’s belly. Shortly after, the now empty needle and it’s companions returned out from her insides and back to the side of the creature. The Plexers returned to their original position up top. Now back in full control, it scooped up the mutilated mare and carefully set her in one of the empty cars on the cart.

As far as Zecora could tell, Redheart was still unfortunately alive and semi-conscious despite how hard it was to tell from her reduced struggling into liquid-filled whimpering. The zebra had no idea what had just been done to what used to be a whole living creature, but her answer was coming very soon.

The carving creature locked its eyes on her.

It’s illuminating gaze confirmed the next one in line…

Meanwhile, on the ledge of a stone overpass spanning yards over a massive monster highway, a canine-like creature continued pinning pieces of steel and wood to the ceiling. It held a mix of scraps up with its spiked arms while using bone projectiles from its tail to nail the scrap into a crudely constructed support beam. The diamond dog corpse displayed no signs of discontent - or any emotion for that matter - and no signs of fatigue as it continued the task at hand.

Suddenly, the creature’s rotting ears perked up as the sound of rapidly splattering liquid came from behind it. It snapped its neck around to focus the glowing holes within on the adjacent end of the overpass. The Plexers inside squirmed to get a better look at the source of this mystery noise when they froze in place at the sight before them.

A tube had been broken.

Wrapping around the opposite tunnel’s entrance was a now severed fleshy tendril with blue liquid rushing out of a massive split. The canine swiftly disregarded the remaining scrap by its paws and stomped over to the damage. In it’s hurry, the thing failed to notice a set of clothed hooves gripping onto the floor of the overpass’ ledge. Instead, it began attempting to connect the tubes back together and seal them shut with its tail.

Storm’s heart and brain were having a competition of which part wanted to flee his current dangling position from the side of the overpass. He couldn’t stop glancing down at the literal floor of Damned. It was like he was just waiting until one of them just happened to look up but none did. Their distant glows reflected off his suit with each movement far below, making him jump and nearly lose his grip the first time. Nevertheless, the plan was in motion and there was no stopping it now.

Now that the dog-thing above him was occupied, Storm moved his forehooves along the edge of the stone to stealth his way across. Once he was over halfway, the suited pegasus peeked up over the edge to see the creature was having a field day with the gushing liquid and its crude appendages, which made repairing whatever the fuck the tube was a difficult task. It wouldn’t be turning around without a reason for a while.

Or so he hoped.

Storm hoisted himself back onto the overpass as quietly as possible, all the while keeping direct eye contact with the back-facing beast. He then tiptoed along the few remaining steps before arriving at the entrance to the other tunnel that Zecora had been carried through minutes prior. This continued on for another minute or so until he arrived at a large tunnel exit into an even more colossal chamber.

This new area wasn’t bigger by horizontal standards, but vertically, Storm found it impossible to see the bottom of this deep chamber. Besides the island-like cutout in the center, the place resembled a black hole that suddenly formed in the center of the planet. His tense wonder at the architecture quickly became cut short when a feminine wail of agony rang out from the central platform. With his limited lighting, Storm couldn’t make out much beyond a bulky silhouette slamming something downward on this island platform. Thankfully, the scream did not match the vocals of Zecora.

Maybe he still had a chance.

After a limited survey of the chamber, Storm discerned that there were two paths branching off from his current position - which was the highest possible area in this chamber. The first curved hard to the left before spiraling down like the ridges on a drill bit. As far as the stallion could tell, this path stopped at the island but also led all the way down into whatever abyss awaited below. The other path led him straight above the island with whatever-the-hell was causing those cries below.

Rule of hoof, screaming equals correct path… He sarcastically mulled.

Storm crept across the straight path without a moment longer to debate with himself. He made sure to stay dead in the center to not arouse any suspicion from whatever was now directly underneath. He then took in a deep breath and deactivated his helmet. With his proximity to the island, it would be suicide to let even his visor glow on it’s lowest setting be visible at all.

The stallion peeked over the edge just in time to see a white earth pony mare having her last hindleg chopped off by a… dog or cat creature. If either mentioned animal were decayed, had a fucking Royal Guard-grade multi-tool knife on their backs and were twice his size, that is. This thing finished carving the poor mare up before using a needle-like appendage to start messing with her insides.

Storm immediately got to work scribbling notes in his head, which would be the equivalent of an overflowing high school student’s binder at this point held together by spit and tape. He dubbed the thing as a “Carver,” noted the needle limbs, the restricting hand ones, and the others too despite only seeing the purpose of half the appendages as the Carver went to work on the tortured pony. But most importantly, he noted that the creature only had two Plexers that typically resided in its skull, safe for their brief transition into the needle limb for precision.

Then there was Zecora, dangling upside down with a line of others. Storm watched her forced calm demeanor turn to one of pure terror as her eyes widened. She didn’t notice him peeking down from directly above the platform as something else had demanded her attention.

Storm followed the zebra’s stare to the Carver - which was now looking directly at her. He noticed the stiffness of this creature’s Plexers. They weren't the typical angry squirming, surveying everything at once kind but instead were calculated in their glare. Precise even.

The Hunters mobilized from their statue-like stances. They began undoing Zecora’s biological restraints, allowing her to drop to the blood-stained ground. Zecora attempted to scramble upright until a swift stomp on her back forced her back into restrained submission. The demonic duo assisted one another once more in getting the zebra to the stone workbench before tossing her on. The Carver restrained her in a face-up position with two of its hand appendages while raising a cleaving arm and the needle tail as if threatening her. Despite all things, she still continued to thrash violently to no avail.

The Carver showed no sign of pleasure, resentment, or any emotion whatsoever through its rotten skull as it raised the cleaver-arm higher into the air. It stared down on Zecora with the calculated glare of a professional surgeon instead of a butcher.

It’s arm began to come down.

A gunshot overpowered the zebra’s screams right before the bone-cleaver slammed into the stone beside her foreleg. The hollowed portion of the icepick-like tip landed where the blade’s original target was, leaving her foreleg unharmed and only the stone dented.

The Carver snapped its neck upward to reveal a hole of blue gunk and bone fragments where one of the Plexers had been. The creature locked it’s one remaining eye with the purple-visored assailant above for a split second before it too was gone to another piece of lead. It dropped into a slumped position beside the table with it’s stiff grasp around Zecora holding even in death.

That split second look at Storm’s suit was all the Hunters needed to spring into action. Both creatures fired their tails at him immediately, but the stallion had already anticipated their ranged methods and rolled back into the center of his elevated platform right before the projectiles soared past his helmet.

Zecora watched as the two creatures let out growls of frustration before one of them swiftly cloaked to completely vanish from her sight. The other Hunter used its pointed tail to slice its own throat open violently, allowing the three insects inside to scurry out.

Storm had no choice now. He had already stuck a neon sign on his position with that attack and wasn’t going to lose anypony this far. The stallion leapt down onto the platform in time to see the trio of Plexers were now scaling the Carver’s body and heading in Zecora’s direction.

Suddenly, they diverted into the Carver’s limp maw, ignoring the zebra entirely. Inside the still beast’s mouth, a faint glow started to resonate. Storm realized what they were doing and raised his pistol towards the thing’s neck to-

A rough smack to the helmet made the stallion’s telekinetic grip flinch the second he pulled the trigger, causing the bullet to miss by a mile. Before he could react, Storm felt something wrap around his throat multiple times before the Hunter’s multi pronged tail glared at him through his visor. The prongs started to expand, allowing the center bone fragment clearance as it was about to be fired point blank to his face. With all his might, Storm struggled to pry the tangled appendage off of his face, but was only rewarded by feeling weightless momentarily as he was then flung roughly onto the ground, effectively almost knocking the wind out of his lungs. A firm hoof stamped on his bladed arm shortly after, pinning it as well.

As he lay struggling against the thing’s grasp, Storm’s oxygen deprived vision made the world fade in and out. With each clear burst in the blurring, the restraining Hunter reloading it’s bone quill seemed to split into more before reverbering into its original position. The beast finished in a matter of seconds, pulling a piece of it’s ribbed bones into the tail slot to be primed and ready for another shot.

In the light of staring down his potential demise, an idea became clear to the stallion in that instant. He stopped groping at the coils around his neck and instead used his unarmed foreleg to lunge for the midsection of tail in between the coils and the tip - which fired immediately after.

His efforts paid off as the projectile went straight through the tail and clanked against the side of his helmet, mere millimeters from his cracked visor. The constricting, crushing sensation on his throat ceased as his lungs were able to pump back life into his being. With it’s ranged attacks gone, the Hunter reared its bone infested face up and charged the still downed stallion, who was shoving himself up to a standing position.

Storm met the nonexistent facial features of this macabre battering ram of a head with his own fixed stare. He felt his muzzle twitch briefly as his jaw involuntarily clenched. Almost anypony unlucky enough to have lasted this long with one of these fuckers would have had the sense to duck a charge, but not Storm.

No, no. He had other plans.

The armored pegasus raised his left hoof and activated his blade, as if daring the Hunter to finish it’s assault-in-progress. Instead of cloaking like he thought it would, Storm was briefly surprised to see the beast charge him head on without any additional maneuvers.

It didn’t matter.

He had his opening.

Storm fired the blade directly at the spot under the thing’s chin and above it’s neck - the only facial part besides the mouth where the bone growth was absent - effectively lodging the blade inside.

The Hunter didn’t seem to notice the pain or care as if the weapon hadn’t pierced it’s pride and joys. The thing just kept coming like it was incapable of doing anything else. It didn’t seem to have the means to anticipate what was going on before Storm telekinetically retracted the blade back at full force, dragging the carcass with it through the air.

In a flash, the stallion spun around and reared back before releasing an Earth-shattering buck into the Hunter’s face and neck. It wasn’t easy to aim a backwards facing attack, but the sheer force of it made up for the diminished accuracy, that much Storm knew by the bone shattering sound and the pain in his own hindlegs. The Hunter went down in a heap and tried to get to it’s hooves before Storm’s own stomped the softer neck into a pulp. The glow inside its neck disappeared right as a choking gasp filled the chamber.

Storm spun around to discover the reanimated Carver - which had its hollowed out eye holes glaring him down - as it held Zecora suspended in the air by the throat. The zebra’s uneven struggle for breath made it clear this thing was allowing her pockets of time to breath before continuing the vice-like grip. It didn’t want to suffocate her, at least not yet.

It wanted him to waste time...

Echoes of rumbling and ear-splitting scraping began to fill the chamber from multiple sides as the realization came to him. Storm knew he had signed his own suicide certificate the second he fired that shot, as what he guessed to be that entire highway of Damned flooding into the chamber any second.

Storm continued his standoff with the Carver while keeping the upper tunnel entrance in the edges of his vision, and despite the unrelenting noise, nothing ever appeared in it.

The stallion tilted his head and chest to look up at the overpass tunnel, but made sure to keep the Carver in his peripherals instead. Tiny shards of stone began lightly pelting him from above, where the ceiling started to push out as if something was being birthed from the rock formation. But it wasn’t just this one spot. All around the chamber ceiling and sides - on the island platform’s level - rocks were pushed aside before canine creatures appeared in their place.

Those from the ceiling immediately landed all around the platform while those in the walls clung to the stone with their talon-like appendages, emitting low pitched roars. Storm turned back to the Carver and raised his pistol at its neck. He could hear and see a few of the demonic diamond dogs closing in around him.

The Carver didn’t budge. Zecora’s restricted breaths ceased as it clamped down without mercy. Daring him to act without reason or thought. Suddenly, an idea came to the stallion. One he wished hadn’t even entered his mental inbox, otherwise he could have accepted his death without it.

The females. They were his and Zecora’s chance, and in a way, they were their own chance. Storm had been calculating a thousand scenarios involving possibilities to save them as well, but this one might just might damn them even more than they already were.

With his pistol still raised, the pegasus snapped his left foreleg up to fire his blade in the mare's direction. The Carver seemed to freeze as if it was processing what he was doing. The blade sliced through the bounding tendrils with ease, allowing the dozen or so remaining females to land on the crimson-caked floor.

Many of them were up and running in various directions the second they realized what had just happened. Thankfully, to every living creature’s sake, the reanimated were momentarily inactive at the sight of this new development. Once the girls realized that their only path down was the spiraling path along the island, they began to sprint that way.

The Diggers finally sprung into action. All seven of them changed targets from Storm to the female escapees. The variants with strictly sharpened appendages seemed to hold back, only using their size and form to try and shepherd the girls between their bodies and the island’s edge. In tandem with them, the blunt-tailed canines got physical by striking their prey unconscious.

The Carver let out a shrill cry as it clamped down on Zecora’s throat even more. He didn’t heed the flailing multi-tool’s warning and charged from the right side of the creature. After dodging a swiping needle appendage, Storm was close enough to see the tears in Zecora’s eyes as her oxygen was finally leaving her. Leaping into the air, the pegasus activated his telekinetically retrieved blade before slamming down on the hand appendage gripping her. In one sickening display of crimson and blue liquids, the tendril was severed and Zecora dropped to the ground. The zebra was finally able to force air back into her lungs as Storm knocked them both away from a cleaving strike where they had just been standing.

Before the creature could react, Storm flashed it at point blank range. The thing shrieked once more, this time in a pitch of either frustration or pain. Possibly both. Storm pulled Zecora to her hooves just as the Carver’s blindness wore off. It slammed a hand appendage onto his helmet, encasing the whole thing like a dragon grabbing a fistfull of tasty gems.

Storm shoved Zecora away just before he felt his own body get yanked off the ground and slammed on its side. The impact was divided between his protected skull and side, causing the stallion to drop his tethered weapon. There was no grace period before he was pinned on his back with a cleaving appendage pressed against the helmet.

The Carver raked it’s blade along his helmet, progressively breaking through the multilayered plating, while Storm was pinned and powerless to await the connection of bone against his flesh. Zecora tried to get up and help but her blood-rushed head and weak limbs wouldn’t let her get far before falling on her face.

Storm tossed and turned his neck as violently as possible given his restrained position, his efforts rewarded by slowing the blade’s progress against his helmet, but it would only buy him time. Noting the resistance of its prey, the Carver let out a guttural growl, like a dog warning a stranger before resorting to snapping. A small shower of glass erupted in Storm’s vision as it scraped its blade across his visor.

The stallion slammed his eyes shut in time to avoid any of the shards embedding themselves, but he had lost all of his night vision in the left side of the visor. Shaking his head to scatter the shards further down the interior of his helmet, Storm noticed the same bladed arm was coming back for round two - back for his right side of the “x” shaped visor.

It never made contact. The Carver’s neck exploded as a gunshot rang out. Bits of bone and blue goop coated the ground as the creature fell limp beside Storm, who quickly yanked its arm from his helmet and shot up to a standing position to see who had just saved him.

A cream colored earth pony with a swirled mane of blue and pink stood a stone’s throw away with his revolver. Through what little he could see, Storm noticed the distraught glare in her eyes as she continued to point the weapon in his direction. Thankfully, the roar of the canine variants snapped her out of whatever trance she was in, prompting the mare to help a lavender pegasus being chased by one of the creatures.

Storm wasted no more time helping Zecora to her hooves, which was a clear improvement over a second ago. The zebra was able to stand, however shakily, on her own. She let out a series of rough coughs before shouting over the commotion.

“Y-you came for me despite your distrusting attitude…” She croaked. “Thank you… there is no method of properly expressing my gratitude-”

“Now isn’t the best time!” Storm interjected as a Digger departed from the escapee herding to focus on their position. The creature planted it’s arm-blades into the ground before propelling itself forward into a charge. “Flank it! Destroy the Plexers!”

Zecora nodded weakly while straightening herself up. She began subtly moving away from the stallion as the canine closed the gap in mere seconds. Storm looked the thing in it’s hollowed sockets as he activated the blade and braced himself. Once it got close enough, Zecora sprinted to the side expecting to sidestep the creature, but was met with a blunt surprise.

The Digger’s hidden tail club bonked the zebra straight in the chest, forcing the air out of her lungs and sending her to the ground. Storm had no time to register the fault in their plan before the brute slammed into him. He was, however, able to get his blade into the thing’s neck to test one Plexer location theory, but it was to no avail. The initial force of the collison alone, sent the stallion’s firmly planted hooves back a few steps. Closer to the platform’s edge.

Storm grit his teeth and strained his muscles in an attempt to match the Digger, but the creature’s momentum and build outclassed his own. He felt his back leg slip over the edge with the other soon to follow. The canine seemed to have no intention of stopping, even if it meant going down with its prey.

Then it hit him.

Using his free foreleg, Storm slammed his hoof down on top of the Digger’s head, forcing its neck deeper onto the blade. Just as his other hindleg slipped off, Storm swung himself on his buried blade like a gym bar to propel himself past the creature. As he collided with the hard stone platform face-down, the pegasus heard a sickening crunching of bones being broken as the Digger hit a few snags on the way down.

His vision was fighting itself after the impact, but the stallion could faintly see that beige-colored mare and a lavender pegasus carrying Zecora to the trio of minecarts. Another Digger spotted the girls and raised its arm to strike, only to get gunned down by the beige mare. Storm had no idea how she had more bullets for his gun, but he didn’t have time to care. She was dropping the Diggers and was on his side or at least he hoped.

“C’mon! Do you want to get left behind?!” A female voice called out, breaking Storm out of his brief analysis. The voice in question belonged to the violet pegasus waving him over to the carts urgently.

She then helped the beige earth pony lift Zecora into the cart with two other girls. Suddenly, the ceiling began to rain down pebbles as the whole chamber began to shake. Storm didn’t wait to discover the cause, instead he proceeded to sprint towards the carts. The stallion checked over them in record time. Three cars total, each one could fit about three ponies - there was a spot left for him in the rear cart with Zecora and the violet pegasus - and the cart was on a track that seemed to bend around the platform’s island in a spiral fashion into the darkness below.

Storm slammed himself into the back of the rear cart, where he began pushing it with all of his might. The rusted wheels screeched, but the cart slowly transitioned from the flat path to the downward slope. The second it started to move on its own, Storm grabbed the lip of the back car and hoisted himself into it. Above them the rumbling continued but no source or monster had yet to reveal itself.

A particularly rough tremor sent him into the car face first just as it began to really pick up speed. Storm managed to get into a standing position in the cramped car in time to assess the situation. The mares in the front car were gripping onto the sides, their chests heaving violently due to either the near death experience or the current ride. The beige earth pony in the middle car propped herself against the side while holding the revolver in her telekinetic grip. Then there was his car. Zecora was weakly clinging on to the side, still clearly suffering from the blunt force trauma. Lastly there was the violent pegasus. Storm could make out her features clearly now that she was practically pressed against his armored muzzle in the confined space. She had a mane style practically copying Twilight Sparkle’s own with pink stripes to match. Her eyes were a cherry color slightly on the pinker side and her cutie mark resembled a rainbow-colored horseshoe wrapped in a blue flame.

“Where are we going?!” She yelled over the screeching wheels.

“Hell if I know!” Storm replied as another tremor made their heads collide briefly. He shook off the impact and attempted to see past the spiraling abyss to no avail. “But somewhere without a falling ceiling is preferable!”

Suddenly, the girls up front began yelling hysterically. Everypony looked at them, noticing one of them frozen in fear while staring upwards. Storm snapped his head in the direction to see a massive chunk of the ceiling headed straight for the first car. The beige mare didn’t seem phased by any of this, but her car-mate did. She reached over the middle car to the front one, grabbing the paralyzed mare just in time for the chunk to separate her flank from the rest of her body.

Nopony had time to register the sudden death as the ceiling chunk had landed inside the first cart, crushing all three mares and nailing the minecart trio to the track, forcing the remaining cars to flip. Storm, Zecora, the violet pegasus, and the beige earth pony went flying both around and over the embedded chunk.

Storm felt a fury of glass shards assault his face as he tumbled across what felt like another stone surface. The stallion didn’t roll far before he felt his side slam into a jagged wall. As his vision recollected itself, he saw the girls making contact with the apparent ledge he was on as well. Zecora and the beige mare hit the opposite wall as him while the pegasus barely landed past the edge. In fact, her unconscious body was starting to slip off!

Ignoring his stab wound and sore limbs, Storm threw himself up to grab her foreleg as her body slipped over the side. The stallion pulled her up and retreated back to the tunnel entrance which they had crash landed next to. Zecora and the other mare had stood up and were waiting for him already. Storm made it past the entrance directly before another ceiling fragment slammed behind them, effectively blocking the way they came off.

A few seconds later, the warzone of tremors in the previous chamber ceased entirely. There was no shaking of the ground or falling chunks of ceiling to be heard or felt. Storm laid down to slide the pegasus off of his back gently. “For Celestia’s sake! Does the whole fucking planet have to try and kill us too-”

A barrel against his visor cut him off.

He froze. Storm remained completely immobile as his eyes did the work for him. He was now staring down the barrel of his own revolver, held by the beige earth pony standing behind it...

Author's Note

I want to start this note off by apologizing for the delay between chapters. Between starting a job in my personal life and preparing for my future, I haven't had much time to write. Nevertheless, fear not because this story isn't going anywhere but forward anytime soon. I put some juicy plot elements in this and the next chapter regarding the Damned alongside a reveal that has been building for an eternity up until this point.

Another thing, I know I stated that this chapter would be dedicated to Rainbow Dash in Appleloosa, but I have switched gears with a new outline that serves the bigger picture better. Don't fret, Dash will still get her moment in the spotlight in Appleloosa, plus many more to come.

I'm looking forward to continuing this tale hopefully as much as ya'll continue to enjoy it!