Angel of Justice: Blood Moon

A few clicks and magical hums quickly rang out as vest mounted flashlights flicked on and horns cast light spells. The immediate area around the group was lit up once more, with several beams of further illumination traveling a good distance ahead of them.

“Where are we going first?” Rainbow Dash asked in a hushed tone as she gazed down the vast entry corridor. They couldn’t even see the end. “This place is huge.”

“You found the girls downstairs last time… that’s probably where he’s keeping them now,” Shining noted.

“Makes sense. That place looked like a dungeon.” Glimmer Shine added.

Glitterball scrunched up her nose in disgust as she anticipated going back into the dank corridors. “It definitely smelled like one.”

“Downstairs it is. Shining, you lead the way.” Celestia suggested.

Shining nodded and shifted his attention ahead. If he recalled correctly, the route to the stairs wasn't far or particularly complex. What he was worried about was what they could run into on the way there.

Everyone kept their heads on a swivel as they traveled. Being wise to some of the tactics the pale ponies used last time, they made sure to inspect the rooms they passed and keep an eye on the rafters up in the ceiling. Any corner or shadow was a potential ambush location.

Twilight eyed around at the long hallway with an uneasy feeling nagging at the back of her mind. The last time she had been through here, the torches were lit, seemingly as a welcome to her friends as they came to rescue her. Now, however, it was dark as night save for their various light sources.

“I don’t like this… Something doesn’t feel right.” The unicorn noted.

“Nah… really?” Raincloud deadpanned. “What gave it away?”

“Save the sarcasm for later, Raincloud.” Sunspot sighed.

Meanwhile, Shining Armor took a paranoid glance around before looking to his sister. “I agree… It's way too quiet. Dusk’s cronies already tried to ambush us by now last time.”

A sharp hiss drew their attention back to Blue Bolt, who just got done using his senses again. “I still can’t feel anything around us.”

“That isn’t exactly comforting.” Rarity said.

“We already know Dusk is capable of masking his presence from you. Perhaps he has lent his cloaking charms to his children as well?” Luna ventured.

Glitterball held out her detector again and pointed it around. Much to her surprise, she actually got a reading, however imprecise it might have been. Half of the vial was glowing slightly brighter than the other half, but it didn’t narrow down a direction as she moved it, instead shifting broadly within the vial like the bubble in a level.

“Looks like our detectors are working… at least a little. Hopefully, they’ll buzz if one of the vampires gets close.” Glitter said.

Twilight and the others who had received vests briefly looked down to their own charms. They wished that they could rely on them as an early warning, but they weren’t about to take that risk and drop their guard.

“Let’s keep moving,” Celestia said. “Just keep in touch with those around you and keep your wits about you. We don’t know what Dusk has planned for u-”

Just then, as the alicorn stepped on a particular spot of the tattered red carpet stretching through the hall, a magical buzz and a slight red light came from underneath. By the time she lifted her hoof to see the concerning reaction, another noise drew everyone’s attention down the hall.

A low whooshing sound, like a concentrated draft of air, came barreling down the hallway toward them, along with a wave of orange-tinted light. Like the flipping of a switch, all of the areas touched by the surging wave seemed to change.

Twilight and the others froze. Some of them flinched or readied themselves in a fighting stance as the wave passed them in a flash. As they darted their eyes around, they realized that all of the torches around them were now alight. And that wasn't all.

Where before there were cracked stones and splintered wood and fabric, there was now pristine stonework and carpets. Paintings and tapestries lined the walls at odd intervals, along with a few suits of armor with beaked helms.

“Whobuthe wh… whaa…” Rainbow Dash muttered incoherently as she panned her head around before doing a few double takes and spinning around to fully take in her seemingly changed surroundings. “What just happened?” She asked, more than a touch of alarm in her voice.

“That’s… new. That is definitely a new one for me.” Shining was at a loss for words as he slowly eyed around. The orange flickering torchlight was bright enough in most places to render their lights inefficient, so he let his horn dim.

Meanwhile, Celestia looked down to the newly restored rug and pushed it aside with a hoof. As she suspected from the earlier light and sound, a faintly glowing symbol was painted on the stone underneath in what could only be blood.

“Of course… I thought it was unlike Dusk to just leave the entrance unguarded.” Celestia sighed uneasily.

“Well, if he didn’t know we were here before, he definitely does now.” Glimmer Shine said. He flicked his light off for the time being and took a few steps ahead so he could keep an eye on the rest of the hallway.

While some of the others shifted their focus to watching their perimeter, Twilight walked forward to the small group examining the symbol on the ground. She knelt down, tracing a hoof over the air above some of the smaller runes and lines.

It was mostly circular in design, with asymmetrical patterns of lines nested within, and various smaller symbols painstakingly painted within those. And while she couldn’t fathom what the inner workings of it were meant to do, the purple mare did vaguely recognize it.

“These look similar to the type of symbols that Raven Feather used to make.” Twilight reasoned.

“Raincloud, can you make out what it does?” Glitterball asked. As much work as they had put into trying to decipher magical symbols of this sort, Raincloud actually worked on and drew them.

The gray pegasus ambled forward and examined the bloody circle. She muttered to herself as her eyes traced along every grouping of glyphs before her face wrinkled. “It’s not in a language that I know. Some of the glyphs look familiar… and the overall structure looks like something used to trigger a larger spell on command, but I’m not familiar enough with blood magic to tell you exactly what it’s for.”

“Can it be broken?” Celestia asked.

As if in response to this, Raincloud smudged some of the blood on the now dim symbol. It had no discernible effect other than ruining the craftsmanship.

“Unfortunately for us, it looks like this thing was a one and done kind of deal. It triggered whatever it was meant to, and now it has no tie to the actual spell.” The pegasus said, her brow still furrowed in thought. “If I had to wager a guess, I’d say this links to a bigger symbol that maintains… whatever the hay all this is.” She gestured to the surrounding area.

“So, we find that symbol, and we can undo all this cool mood lighting.” Sunspot reasoned. “Sounds just like old times… a little too much like old times.”

Sparkplug blinked at that. “Old times…? You mean, like back when the hooded ponies summoned all those monsters you told me about? Those old times?”

Glimmer Shine nodded in place of Sunspot. “Yeah… Keep your eyes open, guys. Anything is on the table now.”

Fluttershy shrank down a bit, trying and failing to hide her jittery limbs. “I don’t l-like the sound of anything.”

Twilight offered her nervous friend a sympathetic look before settling her eyes ahead and sighing. “There’s nothing we can do about it now. Let’s keep moving.”

With that, the group hesitantly pressed forward, this time at an even slower pace.

A couple of minutes of walking later, the group came out into a relatively open intersection. There was a wider hallway to their right and ahead of them. Strangely, however, Shining Armor and those that had been here before didn’t remember seeing this last time.

“That’s… weird,” Shining said as he looked around. By this time, he expected to find the intersection near the courtyard. He had never even seen an area like this before.

“What is it?” Luna asked, growing a bit concerned by just how many confused and unsettled faces were around her.

Twilight walked forward a bit and looked down the center hallway. It seemed to go on even further. “This isn’t right. This isn’t how the layout was last time.”

“Indeed,” Celestia said. “It would appear that Dusk has created a spell similar to the ones you all encountered during Raven Feather’s attacks on Ponyville. If I recall your letters correctly, you said that the rooms and layout of the school and the hospital shifted and changed.”

“Ugh… don’t remind us.” Rainbow Dash groaned at the thought of traversing another magically created maze. At least this one wouldn’t be full of shadow-hopping monsters waiting to pull her and her friends into the dark and drain their life force, or so she hoped.

Sparkplug backed closer to the rear of the group where Fluttershy and Applejack were. Her movements were starting to get a bit jumpy as her nerves started to get the best of her. She exhaled tensely, “Ok… what’s the game plan now?”

“I don’t suppose it’s too late to head back?” Raincloud ventured with an awkward smile. Half the group turned to her with unimpressed stares.

However, before anyone could voice their annoyance, another sound made their ears prick.

What seemed to be a rapid series of metallic clicks, like the sound of chains releasing tension, came alarmingly closer toward them from above. Raincloud looked up, only to widen her eyes as she saw a set of iron spikes heading straight for her.

“AH!” The pegasus yelped, jumping back and falling onto her tail end just in time for a large gate to come crashing down where she just was. Sparkplug, Applejack, and Fluttershy barely made it clear as well, however, they were on the wrong side of the large obstacle.

Before anyone could react further, more metallic sounds came from the darkened ceiling as two more gates appeared out of seemingly nowhere.

“Twilight, look out!” Shining Armor dove forward, catching his sister and pulling her to the floor and out of the way of one of the gates. The purple mare yelped and covered her head with her hooves.

Soon, the hall was filled with terrified squeals and yells as everyone was scrambling to either help their friends or to get free of one of the descending gates. By the time the dust settled and silence claimed the room again, four gates had come down. Three were blocking each exit to the hallways, and one was in the middle between them, slicing the area in two halves lengthwise.

As everyone gathered themselves and looked up, they realized one thing above all others. They were separated.

Twilight cringed softly as Shining helped to pick her up. Glitterball and Rarity were to her sides, looking similarly confused and shaken after their brief adrenaline rush. Looking ahead, she widened her eyes as she found a barred portcullis stretching the entire width of the hallway.

“Oh no…” She rushed over to the gate and frowned with concern as she saw her scattered friends slowly recovering on the floor.

Her group was toward the front of the hallway, while Blue Bolt and the two princesses were trapped behind a gate toward the adjoining hallway. Sparkplug, Applejack, and Fluttershy were behind everyone and everything on the other side of all the gates toward where they originally came from. Everyone else was in one of the two sections created in the middle, with Sunspot and Glimmer Shine in one half, and Rainbow, Pinkie, and Raincloud in the other.

“Is everyone ok?” Fluttershy asked as she and the other two mares approached the bars on their gate.

Sunspot grunted as she worked her way back to all fours, letting out a puff of air as she did. “Still in one piece… surprisingly.” She cringed as she examined the spikes on the bottom of the gates. Any one of them could have easily been impaled if they didn’t move quick enough.

Off to the side, Celestia lit up her horn and cast her influence to the center of the gate separating her from Rainbow’s group. She tilted her head upwards and heaved with all her might, but the iron obstacle wasn't budging. “Sister, help me with this.”

Luna quickly joined in, wrapping her own aura around a cross-section next to her sister’s colorful glow. After some coordination, they both pulled upwards. The others watched the pair straining and struggling for a few moments before they finally relented.

“Blast it all…” Luna panted briefly and gave an agitated kick to the bars. Shifting her thoughts to another approach, she looked up to the yellow stallion and suited pegasus across from them. “Glimmer Shine, use your-”

A sound like a blow torch cut the alicorn off as the stallion produced a vial from his vest and pressed the button on the bottom, producing a sparking light at its conical tip. “Way ahead of you, princess.” He said before applying his cutter to one of the bars. However, much to his annoyance, it didn’t seem to have an effect, even after several seconds of exposure. “Crud…”

Seeing the failed attempts from the alicorns and the monster hunters, Raincloud walked over to the gate at the front where Twilight and the others were, shifting her focus to Glitterball. “Hey sprinkles, why don’t you let me have a crack at these bars?” She tapped her collar.

Glitter sighed as she pulled the remote out of a pocket and clicked the button. “It’s worth a shot.”

With that, Rainbow Dash and Pinkie backed up hesitantly as the gray mare’s collar disengaged. Raincloud jostled it a bit and smirked as she popped her neck a couple times.

“Woah… let’s not get any big ideas,” Rainbow said.

Raincloud stared at the pair for a moment flatly before suddenly jolting. “Boo!”

“Ah!” Pinkie yelped, falling over. Rainbow Dash had no reaction other than a slight flinch, which she immediately got annoyed and embarrassed for as the gray pegasus started laughing.

“Ha! Classic…” Raincloud smiled, uncaring of the unimpressed looks she was receiving. Finally, she held a hoof up and produced a spout of dark flames, casting a faint purple light on her surroundings as she turned back to the gate in front of her. “Alright, back up. I’ll show you how it's done.” She said, thinning the beam to a single point like a makeshift blowtorch.

Glitterball and her fellow unicorns all backed up a step and gave the pegasus some room to work. As the flames around Raincloud’s hoof sputtered and produced a high-pitched whine on contact with the iron bars, not unlike the sound a saw might make, they took another step back.

Raincloud poured more energy into her foreleg and pushed harder. However, after a few moments of getting stiff resistance, she pulled her hoof away and let it dim, only to lift her brows in surprise. There was no damage visible on the bar. There wasn't even a mark from where she had been cutting. “Holy crap these things are sturdy.” She remarked.

“Well, that’s just great.” Rainbow Dash groaned. “What do we do now?”

“Unless we can find a way through these bars, a whole lot of nothin’.” Applejack stated flatly. At least she and her two companions could head back to the entrance. The two groups in the middle were literally trapped with nowhere to go.

“I knew I should have brought some emergency cupcakes! Now we’re gonna starve!” Pinkie fretted.

“Stay calm, everyone. We can find a way through this as long as we keep our heads.” Celestia said, hoping to ease some of the tensions in the air.

“Yes, do be sure to keep your heads. I have a bit of a collection going, so I want them intact.” A familiar voice echoed through the halls.

Twilight and the others spun around to face their hallway, while Celestia, Luna, and Blue Bolt faced theirs. It was hard to tell where the seemingly sourceless voice was coming from.

“Dusk.” Celestia narrowed her eyes.

A cold chuckle came, setting everyone on edge. Those who had weapons readied them, while everyone on the outside of a gate backed closer together.

“Do forgive me for not greeting you in person. As you can see, I’ve been a touch busy with restoring this, my new home, to some of its former glory… with some special new additions, of course.”

Twilight took a step forward and stared headlong into the darkness at the end of their hallway. “Where are Cadence and the girls?!” She demanded.

“You better not have hurt them, you monster!” Rarity added.

After a moment, a disembodied tsk-ing could be heard.

“Now, now, let’s be patient. I’m certain you’ll find dear Cadence and the young ones soon enough… or, at least what’s left of them.” Dusk said. The group could practically see the sadistic grin on his face. And even if he was making a sick joke, it was enough to send a wave of dread through many of them.

Rainbow Dash stomped over to the gate near Twilight and the others. She grabbed the bars and glared into the distant shadows alongside her friends. “Don’t even think about touching them! If you hurt them I swear I will make you wish that dagger killed you!”

Nothing but silence responded.

“Dusk?” Celestia called to no avail. “Dusk?!”

Then, there was a slight rumble. Everyone felt it in their hooves first, but then it happened again stronger than before.

Fluttershy got light on her hooves and stared down at the floor nervously as the shaking continued. “Wh… w-what’s going on?”

However, the ground wasn't the only thing that was shaking. Applejack looked up to see Pinkie Pie’s tail vibrating, seemingly separate from the tremors in the floor. “Pinkie, your tail!”

The pink mare turned to her friend before looking at her own tail. She noted the bizarre vibration and had a look of alarm come over her. “Uh oh…”

“Don’t tell me that’s your Pinkie sense…” Rainbow Dash said, watching the pink mare uneasily.

“W-what’s that one for?” Rarity asked, not sure if she even wanted to hear the result.

“Uh… let’s see… Vibrating tail, upset tummy…” Pinkie muttered to herself as she tried to determine what her sixth sense was trying to tell her. Suddenly, her eyes widened and a gasp escaped her. “EVERYONE GRAB ONTO SOMETHING!”

No sooner did Pinkie get her message out did the rumbling intensify abruptly. There was a dull crack, and part of the stone floor behind Sparkplug split open.

The gray mare yelped as her back leg suddenly broke through to thin air. She tried to scramble forward, but she found herself falling as the ground beneath her crumbled away. Applejack grabbed onto her hoof and tried to pull her up, but soon the fissure opening up reached her and Fluttershy as well.

“AHH!” The three mares screamed in unison as they fell, the sound growing more distant by the second.

Rainbow Dash gasped as she watched three of her friends vanish into a dark abyss. “Girls!” She yelled, rushing to the bars and staring down with a worried frown. However, she couldn’t dwell on her concern for long, as a few panicked yelps came from behind her.

As the rumbling and shaking continued, more fissures opened up on both sections of the intersection.

Glimmer Shine yelled as he nearly fell through the floor, only to be caught by a now-hovering Sunspot.

“Gotcha!” The suited mare assured as she flew up a bit. The pair watched the floor crumbling away for a moment before shifting their attention to their friends.

“AHHH!” Pinkie Pie squealed as she tried and failed to cling onto the bars ahead of her. Twilight rushed forward and tried to grab onto her friend’s hoof through the bars, but the pink mare plummeted before she could do anything.

“Pinkie!” Twilight cried before a crack beneath her forced her to back up. However, before she or one of the other unicorns beside her could light their horns to try and rescue the pink mare, a cyan blur swooped down into the darkness and came back up carrying a very relieved party pony.

Soon, the rumbling stopped, along with the slight shaking of what remained of the floor. Twilight’s group was shocked to see practically nothing standing in the middle of the intersection.

Only a small sliver of stone was left underneath each of the gates, seemingly preventing anyone from leaving their section even beyond the pits in the floor. Everywhere else was just a deep chasm that led into darkness. Thankfully, the pits stopped before they reached Twilight or Celestia’s groups, though there was a slight hole directly in front of their respective gates.

“Phew…” Pinkie deflated with relief, letting her head fall back into Rainbow Dash’s form. She blinked up at her cyan savior and smiled. “Thanks for catching me.”

“Yeah… don’t mention it,” Rainbow replied.

“Jeez…” Raincloud chimed in, causing the pair to turn and see her hovering next to them. She was staring down into the abyss below. “I’ve heard of open concepts, but this is ridiculous.”

“Is everyone ok?” Blue Bolt asked as he and the two alicorns looked ahead with concerned expressions. With the newfound hole opened up in front of their gate, it was hard for them to see anyone but the two groups in the middle.

“We’re fine over here.” Shining Armor stated.

Twilight frowned as she looked past the intersection to where her three friends were once standing. “But what about Fluttershy and the others?”

As everyone got as close to that side as they could, Luna lifted a hoof to her ear and focused. “Sparkplug, can you hear me? Are you ok?”

A few moments went by, but no response came.

Glitterball lifted a hoof as well. “Sparkplug?” She asked, somewhat desperately.

“This isn’t good.” Glimmer Shine groaned uneasily as he looked down into the hole Sunspot just saved him from. “We’ll have to move on and hope we find them… but it looks like our only option is to go down.”

“Yeah, that seems like a good idea. Purposefully fall into the death trap we just escaped from.” Sunspot remarked.

“I’m afraid that we don’t have much of a choice with these gates here,” Celestia said. She glanced back to the hallway behind her, eyes swimming along with her thoughts before she turned and looked to Twilight’s group as best she could. “Everyone stick together and stay safe. Try to find a way to meet up somewhere.”

Twilight drew her mouth into a tense line, but nodded anyway. “Ok… Remember to stay in touch.” She tapped her ear.

Sunspot sighed tensely as she trailed her eyes down. “Alrighty… Good luck, guys. We’re going in.” She said before slowly hovering down and out of sight.

Raincloud growled under her breath and rolled her eyes as she looked at Rainbow Dash. “Great, I’m stuck with you and the sugar addict.”

“Hey! I can stop whenever I want!” Pinkie jabbed a hoof toward the gray mare awkwardly. She struggled for a moment to try and move with Rainbow Dash holding her under the shoulders before giving up. “Rainbow, fly me over there so I can pout at her!”

“Oh! That reminds me!” Glitterball said. She dug around her vest for a bit before pulling out the remote and clicking the button.

Raincloud looked down as her collar clicked and spun, suppressing her shadow magic once more. “Aww, come on!”

Ignoring the death glares she was getting from the gray pegasus, Glitter walked as close as she could to the bars before taking the remote in her aura and sticking it through to the other side. “Here, take this. You might need it.”

Seeing how Rainbow Dash had her hooves full, Pinkie took the device from the unicorn and examined it. “Neat.” She said before tucking it into a pocket on her snazzy new vest and patting it for assurance.

“Thanks.” Rainbow Dash said. She looked to Twilight, Rarity, and Shining, and although she hid it well, there was a hint of concern in her face. “You guys watch each other’s backs, alright?”

“You too, darling.” Rarity said, her eyes brimming with worry as she glanced up to where Applejack’s group had fallen through the floor. They had only just arrived, and already they were in danger. “Please, stay safe.”

Soon, after offering a few concerned looks to their scattered group of friends, each group eventually made their way down the only path available to them. For some, down was as literal as it could be.

None of them knew what to expect anymore, and that was terrifying. Before, they at least had strength in numbers, but now they had done the one thing they never wanted to do. Split up. However, they were still determined to find Cadence and the crusaders, even if they had to work around a slight detour.

At least, they hoped it was going to be just a slight detour.