Chapter 26 - It's a Trap!

Thank god for decent beds, I slept all through the night this time. God I needed that. So tomorrow's going to be the 'Wedding of the century', as I like to call it. Hopefully nothing goes wrong, but knowing that Shadow and I both have the luck of the devil, that's probably not going to happen. I got up, finding Spitfire making breakfast. She turned to see me getting up and smiled.

"Morning, sleep well?" She asked.

"Like a log. So what's for breakfast?" I replied.

"Oh, the usual. You can help yourself if you want to, but that look on your face says you've got something else on your mind. Care to tell me what?"

"Hmm? Oh, I got a letter last night from someone, said they wanted to meet me today."

"Did it say who it was?"

"Sadly no, so there's only really one way to find out. I'll take my knife just in case, but hopefully I won't need it. I'll see you later, be sure to stay alive till I get back okay?" I joked.

She smiled. "Same to you." I gave her a 'quick' kiss, and then left, grabbing my knife on the way out. Before I left, I noticed Soarin with a black eye, being laughed at by Ni.

"Okay, I'll bite. What happened? Did he insult your dreaming again Ni?" I asked jokingly.

"It's worse than that I'm afraid, and before you ask no I didn't do this." Ni replied.Soarin then mumbled something quietly.

"Sorry, what was that?" He mumbled again. "Speak differently Soarin, you know I can't understand idiot."

He laughed. "Alright, I give up. It was Spitfire, she did it."

"And just why would she do that?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.

"I...I asked her out. I know, I know, it was dumb."

"I'll say. But I do admire your guts for asking, even though what you did was beyond dumb. You know, even though Spitfire's out of the picture, there are still availabilities out there, and they're closer than you think."

He snapped backwards. "Woah woah woah, there is NO way I am going out wih Ni. And even if I wanted to, does he?"

I did a facehoof. "Dumbass. I didn't mean him, I meant Blaze. I mean really, when would I ever give you advice on being gay?" He slumped his face downward in stupidity. "Anyway, I'll be going now. I've got something to do outta town, I'll be back later." And with that, I flew off. It had been a while since I had been there, but I'm pretty sure nothing changed. I arrived and flew down to the front door, to my surprise it was unlocked. I walked in and looked at a note left in front of me. It read:

Ah, nice to see you've finally arrived. I'm waiting downstairs, in the workshop. I've got somepony special of yours, so don't keep me waiting.

Wait, he doesn't mean... I drew my knife and rushed downstairs, only to find nothing there. Suddenly a distorted voice echoed throughout the room. "Wow, you ACTUALLY thought she was going to be here. You are as foolhardy as you are courageous, and I respect that." The voice became more clear, turns out it was Sorrow Curse (What a big surprise).

"What have you done with her?!" I yelled.

"Now now, temper temper. She's fine, completely unharmed...for now. I don't intend for you to leave with nothing however, so here's a little something from me." I looked around as gas was slowly seeping into the room. "Don't worry, it's not lethal. You may feel a slight tingling sensation, but that's probably just a side effect. Enjoy!" He said before his maniacal laugh drifted away. Trying not to inhale any of the gas, I looked around for escape options. Unfortunately, I had designed it so noone would be able to get in, I also forgot to put in any ways to get out, other than the main door, which was now magically locked. As the seconds passed, I could feel the gas starting to enter my system. After about a minute, I couldn't hold out any longer, and collapsed.

I woke up, tied to a chair still in the workshop. There was a light brown pony with a red shirt and a Mohawk standing in front of me, playing around with my knife. "Well look who's awake, morning sleeping beauty." He said. He walked over to me and smiled, before continuing to study my knife. "You know,, I really like this knife, it's a fucking good knife, it looks very expensive, and that's good, because you know I like expensive things. Hey, did I ever tell you the definition of, insanity? It's when you do something over and over and over again, expecting it to change. You know when the first pony said that to me, I thought the HE was crazy, so I killed him. Turns out he was right, I started to see everypony doing the exact same thing over and over and over again." I tried to shake myself free, which quickly caught his attention.

"ARE YOU EVEN LISTENING TO ME? HEY! LOOK ME IN THE EYE WHEN I AM TALKING TO YOU! look at me, look at me. I SAID FUCKING LOOK AT ME! You're my bitch. I'm in charge here now. What, you think you're so high and mighty, flying high in the sky, without a care i the world? Maybe there, but not here. Down here hermano, you crash. Now, you're probably wondering if I work for Sorrow Curse, and the answer to that is yes." he started to pace around the room. "You know, I'm going to enjoy making your marefriend suffer. And it's too bad, cause you won't be there to see it. Don't worry though, I'll tell her all about how I listened to every scream of agony and pain you let out as you slowly died." I tried to lash out at him, causing myself to fall over.

"I'm gonna kill you you son of a bitch!" I yelled out.

He laughed and stabbed my knife down on a nearby table. "I'm going to leave now, and I'm gonna go chill. But you..." He then grabbed my knfe and stabbed into my arm, before leaning down to my face. "Hey, did I ever tell you the definition of, insanity?" He laughed as he left, flicking a match onto the ground, which apparently during my naptime, had been covered in oil. (they usually use it for torches or lamps. Usually). I tried to break myself free, rather unsuccessfully. This seems really pathetic, doesn't it? I mean, I'm a captain of a secret group charged with the protection of Equestria, and yet I can't even get out of a fucking chair. Really starting to wish I took that strength enchantment for my armor. As a minute passed, the fire was spreading all over the place, inching towards me. Feeling the heat rising, my heart rate started to increase. I started to black out, and remembered a familiar situation that I had been in, years ago.

4 Years ago, before entering Equestria
Al Hanad, Yemen, Middle East
Operation Treasure Hunt
Confirmed Tier 1 Terrorist Personnel hiding in city, 75th Ranger regiment and 64th Aggressors squadron sent to secure tier 1 personnel. All other targets are secondaries and are expendable.

I did a flyover of what had previously been a hijacked Russian style APC, which was now nothing but smouldering ruins. "...Tombstone Actual this is Mojo 1, confirm target has been destroyed, over." I said.

"Copy Mojo 1, enemy armor has been neutralized. Advancing through to next sector, over." Tombstone said back.

"Roger that, heading back to base to re-fuel and re-arm. Will be back on station in 10, over." I turned my jet around to head back to base, but before I could get up to speed, a hidden terrorist fired an RPG at me. It hit my rear left wing, and less than two seconds after he had fired the rocket, Tombstone had already gunned him down. "I'm hit, I'm hit! Mojo 1 is going down, ejecting!" I ejected out of my jet and softly landed on the ground, only to be greeted by a dozen or so angry looking terrorists with AK's. They knocked me out and put me on the pack of a pickup truck, before driving away. I woke up later tied to a chair, with half a dozen or so standing around me. One of them walked up to me and said something, possibly in arabic before punching in the face. he then spoke again, this time in a harsher tone. I simply smiled and spat in his face, to be responded with another hit in the face. Another punch followed, followed by another, and another. All the while I just simply tried my best to keep a smile, and keep the rest of my mouth shut. After about twenty punches he gave up, pulled out a knife before shoving it into my shoulder. They continued to torture me for what seemed like hours, until I was assured that they just wanted to just use me as a punching bag, rather than try to get any information that I might have had on me. Eventually I was rescued by 'the frogmen' (Navy SEALs), who told me I had been held captive for days, not hours. Had the operation not been under wraps I would have made national news, but sadly that was not to be.

Present Day, Equestria

Suddenly I woke up, and realizing my situation I also got a massive rush of adrenaline, which also kicked my fading vital systems into gear. Thank god! Now I can try to get out of here and kick that motherfucker's ass.

I ripped out of the chair, grabbed my knife from the nearby table and went for the door. I went for a solid punch. It landed with a decent impact, unfortunately all I ended up doing was hurting my hoof. (FFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUU) I tried again, this time using my shoulder. The door easily gave way, and I burst through. I ran up the stairs and outside, looked around and found out that he had disappeared. After about a minute of hopeless searching I gave up and took off, looking behind to see the place burn and crumble. I kept going and flew non-stop back to the HQ, and by the time I arrived it was nightfall. I went down into the sanctuary to find that everyone except Spitfire had gone to bed, and Spitfire herself was calmly reading a book. She heard me storming into the room and looked up.

"Spitfire, They've taken Crystal!" I exclaimed.

"Who, who's taken Crystal?" She asked.

I stopped for a second to catch my breath. "It was, it was Sorrow Curse. He's taken her, and I don't know where. Fuck I feel so useless right now!" I said, kicking a chair.

She came over to me and tried to calm me down. "Look, you didn't know that he was going to take her. There was nothing you could do about that, so don't feel sorry for something that wasn't your fault. We'll try and get her back, and we'll make Sorrow Curse pay for what he's done, but I need you to be calm and level headed to do it. Can you do that?" I nodded. "Good. Now it looks like you've been through hell and back, so go take a shower. You've got a job to do tomorrow, and I want you looking your best. It is a wedding after all." She smiled, and I walked off.

As I had my shower, I kept thinking of what might have happened to Crystal. Trying to get it out of my head, I punched a wall in frustration. Fuck, how could I let this happen? I am gonna gut those motherfuckers until you can't tell the difference between them and a squirrel in a wood-chipper. I punched the wall again. Fuck, what am I thinking? I'm not a crazed murderer, I can't do something like that, even if they are heartless necromancers. I sighed. I guess I having two marefriends was more trouble than I imagined. Maybe after all this Crystal can move back here, and then I won't have to worry so much. I finished my shower and climbed into bed, hoping that tomorrow will bring some answers.

I hope you enjoyed the story so far, as I wait eagerly for the finale. I will be writing my version of it (although it will probably be only a fraction of the other one in size) once I've read the other one. And can you guess who that mystery pony was a reference to? If not, I'll put the picture in the comments.