Steel hooves echoed through the white halls of the Canterlot castle medical wing. Bon Bon made her way through the winding corridors whilst doing her best to ignore the confused glances of the guards around her.

A turn to the left, then to the right, and she found herself standing before the door where her friend was being repaired. She pushed the door aside, peeking into the operating room and seeing the black carapace of Ocellus hunched over a nearly-rebuilt Lyra.

“How is she doing?” She asked the changeling, walking up to examine her friend better.

“You sliced her main talisman in half, I’m amazed we were able to salvage as much as we did. Everything should be operational when we turn her back on. We also managed to salvage some intelligence-”

“You looked into her memories?!” Bon Bon asked, indignant, “Who gave you the right?”

“We were forced to do so when we tried to reassemble the talisman!”

She huffed at the changeling, but conceded; she didn’t know much about any of this talisman magic doohickey.

“If she isn’t a normal pony, how can she do magic?” Bon Bon intentionally avoided using the word ‘fake’ to describe her friend, but her heart still throbbed painfully at the thought.

“Some kind of artificial telekinesis, we are still trying to decipher the enchantment they used. I can’t imagine what kind of brains are behind such an incredibly complex automaton,”

A flare of anger lit in her chest, but she let it go with a deep exhale.

“What about the intel you found?” She asked, at last, making the changeling groan in frustration and drop her tool onto the table.

“Yona will give you a briefing in the office, can you let me work in peace now?”

Bon Bon left the room and turned left towards the main office. A green guard mare stood next to the door at the end of the hall, staring at her with a stern glare.

“State your business,” The guard ordered.

“Mission briefing,” She replied, bored. The guard took a step to the side and let her pass, but Bon Bon could easily hear the relieved sigh she let out when the door closed. Did she really look that scary?

The office was filled with desks oriented in a circle around a crystal table. Most of the chairs were occupied by unicorns, dressed in the light royal guard armor of the support units. Behind the table stood an elevated podium where the large figure of Yona stood overseeing the room.

Sandbar was sitting next to the yak, looking down at his own crystal desk and deep in thought. Bon Bon cleared her throat, causing both of them to turn their heads and face her.

“Ah, Bon Bon, are you here for briefing?” Yona asked her with a smile.

After a nod, the yak continued with her explanation.

“We couldn’t really decode much from her memories, but we did find a list of cities she visited. At first, we didn’t see anything important, after all, an infiltration unit would obviously visit important cities-”

“But!” Sandbar interjected, “One of the locations stood out from the rest; Burrango”

Bon Bon had heard about the city, it was in the donkey lands if she remembered correctly. It wasn’t a capital and she couldn’t recall a single important detail about it aside from the name… A perfect place to hide a base.

“Have you investigated the place?” She asked the earth pony.

“Yes, and we discovered that the locals are complaining about magical waste being dumped into their sewers. We believe there’s some kind of laboratory hidden there, and we need you to go and investigate,”

She gave the pony a long stare. What could they possibly be doing all the way out there? maybe Lyra could tell her once she got fixed… Lyra… She had to talk to her.

“I’ll do it,” She told the pair, “But only if I can take Lyra with me, as backup,”

“I don’t see why not,” Yona shrugged.

“We’ll just tell the doctor to remove anything that could let Desperado control her, we wouldn’t want our top agent to get backstabbed in a sewer,” Sandbar added.

Bon Bon nodded and turned to leave, she had to check on how Lyra was doing. When she reached the door she heard the yak clear her throat.

“And, Bon Bon, thank you for staying here. I’m certain you know that with how much you have gone through, Celestia wouldn’t object to you retiring,”

“What would I retire to?” She replied with a chuckle, “I look like a freak science project and my best friend ended up being a killing machine. I can’t exactly move back to Ponyville and open up my candy shop again,”

Bon Bon had thought that the desert roads of Saddle Arabia were tough, but she was wrong. The road she was currently on was more akin to driving on the surface of the moon. She looked over her shoulder to the back of the carriage, where Lyra was looking out the window, sitting in her usual strange position. Ocellus had been amazed at her artificial skin’s ability to flip between magical armor and incredibly realistic coat.

“Hey Lyra, you haven’t said much,” Bon Bon said, her friend had been completely silent for the entire trip.

“I am sorry, miss Bon Bon, I have been trying to reorder my memory,” She replied.

It was… surreal, the voice was Lyra’s, but she sounded so… distant.

“What can you remember?” She asked with a calm smile, “Anything to know about this place, for example?”

“I am sorry, miss Bon Bon, it appears that during my repairs the memories of this location were tampered with, I can’t remember,”

“Why do you keep calling me ‘miss Bon Bon’?” She lifted an eyebrow at the green mare.

“I could tell that you were… disturbed at the reveal that our friendship had been simulated,”

The cart entered Burrango, simple buildings rose around them as they made their way down the street. She was too distracted by Lyra to pay much attention to their surroundings anyway.

“Well… was it fake?” She asked.

“In a way, anything I do can be seen as artificial,”

That didn’t answer her question, but Lyra was probably still shaken by her recent unplanned disassembly. Ocellus had said that she should return to normal once the talisman reorganized itself.

Sandbar appeared in her view, bringing her back to the present. The new enchantments on her crystal eye should allow them to see her as well, not to mention the more user-friendly alert system. The earth pony opened his mouth to speak, but his eyes went wide when he looked at her.

“Umm, what are you wearing?” He asked, lifting an eyebrow so much that Bon Bon was convinced it was going to fly off his forehead.

“It’s my disguise,” She replied, adjusting the sombrero on her head.

“Okay…? Just get into the sewer as fast as you can,” The pony said, and facehoofed.

“Your destination is on the right,” Lyra added from the backseat.

The cart stopped on the side of the street, nopony was around aside from the two that were pulling the carriage. Lyra opened the left door and jumped outside, Bon Bon tried to follow her, but she couldn’t get past the door frame. She tried again, growing annoyed.

It seemed the two large basket saddlebags she had bought at the border were a bit more cumbersome than she thought. She ended up having to leave the cart sideways to avoid getting stuck on the door.

“Good luck ma’am!” The guards said before trotting off.

Once the cart passed Bon Bon saw two donkeys standing on the other side of the street, looking at her with concerned expressions. She waved nonchalantly at the pair before turning back to look at Lyra.

The donkeys said something in their language before running away, leaving a small dust cloud in their wake. Now out of sight, she took off her excellent disguise, discarding the tortilla-filled baskets and sombrero to the side of the sewer hatch. She jumped down the hole, followed closely by the green mare.

A spray of water went flying as the two mares landed in the stone tunnel. Bon Bon decided not to think too hard about the greenish liquid that flowed under their hooves, and instead started walking ahead.

“I will go first and scan the area, I’ll send you a message if I encounter anything noteworthy,” Lyra told her.

The green pony’s body seemed to grow larger, sections of her coat moving outwards and spinning to reveal the magically enhanced plates on their flipside. Before her very eyes, her friend transformed from the green unicorn she had always known to an armored pony wielding a chainsaw on her back.

“Oh, one thing I forgot to mention, Bon,” Sandbar said, popping into her view, “The locals have also been reporting ‘Angels of death’ lurking around the sewers,”

“Angels of death? What’s that? Some kind of local superstition?” She replied.

“Most likely, but not like anything short of an alicorn could stop you, am I right?” The earth pony gave her a wink.

She answered with a simple chuckle. Her hoofsteps echoed through the tunnel despite the sounds of water rushing along. A rusty gate separated two sections of the sewer, Lyra appeared to have sliced through the lock, however, since the door was hanging ajar. Bon Bon trotted ahead but stopped in her place when she picked up on the water dripping from the ceiling.

“Lyra, did you find anything here?” She asked her communicator, but she didn’t get to listen for a reply.

She turned to look at the origin of the water, and saw a black pegasus hanging from the gate. It looked almost as large as Big Mac, and judging by its red glowing eyes, it wasn’t a normal pony.

To prove her point, the pegasus’ eyes lit up and fired a beam of magic at her. She dodged out of its way and reached back to grab her sword. The pegasus jumped off the gate, flying towards her and into the light. Her enemy was some sort of automaton, but its body appeared to be constructed in the same manner as her own.

Bon Bon backflipped to avoid the pegasus before launching herself back towards it. Her blade flew through the air, aiming for the pony’s left wing, but it bounced off harmlessly. Of course, it was shielded.

A steel wing slammed into her face, sending her flying into the sewer wall. She shook her head to try and clear her vision, just in time to avoid being squashed by the bulky automaton. The white blade fell into the muck below them, its magical edge bringing the noxious concoction to a boil.

Bon Bon scrambled to the fallen sword but had to jump back to avoid another wing swipe. The pegasus launched itself at her again, slamming her into the cement walkway on the side of the sewer. Her crystal eye barely focused again before a steel hoof slammed into her face, cracking the floor beneath her.

A second hit landed, this time a beeping alarm started to blare in her ears. Her vision grew blurry as the pegasus lifted both forehooves. She thought about lifting her own hooves to try and block the attack, but there was no way for her to survive that much force.

Something metallic crashed into the pegasus, filling the air with the sound of a revving chainsaw.

“Bon Bon, are you alive?” Lyra asked her, standing between the automaton and her fallen friend.

Bon Bon replied with a gurgle. She got back up weakly and carefully walked to her sword, making her best effort to ignore the smell. She grabbed the white blade and turned to see how Lyra was doing.

The armored mare was busy chucking magical daggers at the pegasus. Dodging and rolling out of its way before trying to get a hit in with the chainsaw on her back. But no matter what she tried, the pegasus was still unscathed. That was some impressive magical armor.

“I can’t cut through,” Lyra said after a particularly close dodge.

Bon Bon tried to shake the disorientation away but only made it worse. The hilt in her mouth was slippery and nearly fell out as she trotted towards the pegasus’ metal back. Lyra wrapped her chainsaw in her magic and spun it around, the serrated edge biting into the automaton’s chest and showering the water with sparks.

A steel wing flew at Lyra’s head, but she managed to jump away while keeping the chainsaw firmly pressed against the pegasus. Bon Bon could see how the magic armor was starting to flicker rapidly. That was all she needed to see.

The white blade sparkled next to her as her legs fought to propel her through the water. Lyra dodged away from a hoof stomp just as her chainsaw broke through the pegasus’ armor. But the mare didn’t press the advantage, instead opting for flipping into the air and jumping away, using the automaton’s face as a launchpad.

“All yours,” Lyra said as she landed out of reach.

Bon Bon planted both of her rear hooves on the sewer walkway, standing upright on her hindquarters. The sword fell from her mouth into the catch on her forehoof and then carefully aimed at the pegasus. Her first cut went from over the left shoulder all the way down to the right knee, where the sword glanced off a plate of still-active magical armor.

A flurry of cuts fell onto the pegasus, each one letting Bon Bon get closer and closer to the automaton’s core talisman. Finally, after the twelfth slice, the crystal that controlled the metal abomination was pierced by her sword.

“That’s the stuff,” She said to herself while the substantial magical energy the crystal had been infused with started to repair her dented chest.

Lyra walked up to the metal wreckage and recovered her chainsaw, replacing it on the metal arm on her back. The visor covering her yellow eyes split open when she crouched next to the pegasus’ remains.

“You should continue on your own, I will analyze this automaton for any useful intelligence,” The green mare stated simply.

Bon Bon gave a simple nod and sheathed her sword, looking up at her companion again.

“Any trouble ahead?” She asked.

“Two talisman signatures in the tunnel to our left, I suspect they could be more metal pegasi,”

Stealth it was, then. Even the two of them working together were barely able to take down one, two at once would be suicide. As Bon Bon turned the corner she saw the two large talismans light up in her crystal eye, just beyond another metal gate.

She looked around, trying to find a way around the bars that wouldn’t require destroying them, maybe a rusty lock that she could break? An even better alternative appeared in the form of a catwalk just above the separator.

With a big jump, she landed on the elevated walkway, making sure to hit the wall first and slow down. She wasn’t sure if the platform would hold under her weight, but it didn’t seem to be an issue. Bon Bon crouched down and made her way carefully down the catwalk, keeping her eye firmly planted on the two talisman signatures.

Just as she suspected, two pegasi automatons were patrolling the tunnel below. Bon Bon winced every time she had to take a step forward, apparently, steel hooves on a steel walkway weren’t as stealthy as she thought. On several occasions, one of the pegasi below had looked up, but they hadn’t spotted her yet.

There was a problem. A problem in the shape of a missing platform segment ahead of her. One of the metal ponies was standing watch below the hole, just perfect. Of course, she could’ve just jumped to the next segment, it wasn’t so far, but the noise she would make on landing was sure to alert the pegasus.

“Stabilize volume, mark,” She whispered into her communicator, the magical device hummed slightly before giving a low beep of confirmation.

“Bon, are you there?” Sandbar asked, the volume was just barely enough for her to understand the words.

“I’m here, I have a problem,” she poked her head over the edge of the platform to give her team a better look.

“Wait up, I think the doctor and Lyra have something for you, I’ll patch them through,” Sandbar disappeared, replaced by two windows showing her companion and the changeling.

“Bon Bon, I apologize, the automaton we took down was too damaged to be of any use,” Lyra said.

“Nothing at all?” She insisted, there had to be something.

“Only a theory,” Responded Ocellus, “but I doubt your current situation is the place to test it,”

“Anything works, the alternative is trying to fight both of them at once,” Bon Bon answered, readying herself for combat.

“Very well, the pegasi appear to have high-power magical shielding. That kind of armor draws too much energy to keep it active all the time,” The changeling explained.

“So if they’re not alerted…” Bon Bon followed.

“They should be easy to cut,” Finished Lyra, “If you are going to test it out, try and disable one with as little damage as possible so we can examine it closely,”

“Will do,” Bon Bon said before closing the windows.

She drew her sword slowly and carefully, making sure to avoid making noise. The metal strands in her rear legs tightened as she prepared to launch herself into the air. The platform didn’t make any sound as the heavy pony jumped off, directly above the pegasus. In a single motion, she did a flip and threw the sword into her left rear leg catch, falling blade-first like a pony-shaped dart.

The automaton never suspected a thing. Bon Bon’s sword plunged into its chest, piercing just between the two wing joints. It seemed that Ocellus’ theory had been correct; the armor plate on the pegasus’ back was cut like paper under the white blade.

She ripped the sword out of the disabled automaton and turned to face the other one, weapon at the ready for an attack. But somehow the other pegasus hadn’t as much as turned their head to figure out the source of the noise. Not wanting to tempt fate, Bon Bon carefully dropped off her defeated opponent and started to approach the other pegasus with as much stealth as she could.

The fast-moving water masked her hoofsteps as she lifted the blade to aim at the automaton’s talisman. A single stab through the side was all it took.

“Lyra, I’ve got two more pegasi here, took them down with a single stab each,” Bon Bon said, remembering a little too late that the communicator was still set to whisper volume.

“Ouch…” Complained Sandbar, rubbing his ears.

“Good, I’ll be there soon, you keep going,” Lyra responded, her artificial hearing unaffected by the high volume.

Bon Bon turned to face the sewer tunnel, if there was a secret laboratory here its entrance would be heavily guarded. She walked through the tunnels, her sword drawn and ready for an attack from any direction. Yet as minutes went by she encountered a… suspicious lack of resistance, not even a single scout.

“Bon Bon, are you there?” Ocellus said, popping into a window.

“I am, did you find anything with Lyra?”

“Nothing on the laboratory, but we did find something… strange about the automatons you dispatched,” The changeling’s bug-like eyes were darting over something on the side of her screen.

“Strange how?”

“Well, they had some sort of life support system attached to the talisman chamber. It’s a strange thing to include in an automaton,”

“I see,” Responded Bon Bon, lifting her forehoof to her chin, “Maybe they are meant to be used as some kind of powered armor?”

“The talisman chamber is far too small to hold anypony,”

“That’s strange… Say, doc, I have some questions about Lyra“ She said.

The changeling blinked once before shaking her head and looking back at Bon Bon.

“Sorry, I was looking at the schematic, what do you want to know?”

“She’s not acting right, are you sure your unicorns repaired her correctly?”

The doctor let out a deep sigh, like a teacher who had just been asked the same question one too many times.

“The repair spell takes time to set, especially when cast on such a complex talisman,”

“But what happens when it sets?” Bon Bon asked, trying not to sound so desperate.

“Well, she should return to normal completely. The spell always works, Bon Bon, it will just… click,”

She started to speak again before being interrupted by an emergency transmission from Lyra.

“Bon Bon! There is a filly in the sewers!” The green mare said.

“A filly?! How? Where?” Bon Bon started running back to where Lyra was.

“I’m sending you her location, she ran away when she saw me”

That made sense, her friend was probably covered in robot bits, not to mention the armor and chainsaw. The poor filly must be terrified!

“That’s not all… I think I’ve seen her before”

The mare’s words made her stop in her tracks. Could her friend be regaining her memory?

“I’m not certain, but I believe this filly lives in Ponyville,” Lyra finished.

“Give me a description,” Bon Bon asked as she kept walking towards the point marked on her view.

“Pegasus filly, orange coat, and purple mane. I didn’t get to see her cutie mark,”

That description matched only one pony in Ponyville.

“Scootaloo is here?” Bon Bon was becoming more confused by the moment.

“That is her name? I will remember it,” Lyra said almost absentmindedly, “You must hurry, I believe she has gone deeper into the sewer,”

Indeed, the ‘last location’ indicator led into a tunnel whose only exit was a hole in the floor. It probably led to an even deeper section of the sewer, and judging by the still-swinging door, somepony had gone through here recently.

Her suspicions were confirmed when she heard a scream coming from within the hole. Bon Bon peeked into the opening and saw a small orange filly at the bottom cowering back from one of the metal spikes she had seen before.

“Help me!” Scootaloo cried.

Bon Bon bit hard into her sword hilt and unsheathed it, letting go and throwing the blade at the small automaton. She jumped into the hole just as the sword impaled the dragon into the sewer floor.

She landed on the floor with a great thump, ripping her sword out of the ruined automaton and resheathing it. The sewer appeared empty aside from herself and the filly.

“Whoah! Bon Bon? That was awesome!” Scootaloo chirped happily.

“What are you doing here?”

“I’m escaping!” The filly puffed out her chest with pride.

“Escaping from who?” Bon Bon asked.

“Those big pegasi! And those things that look like Rarity’s assistant!” The filly looked down, pensively, “And if you came from up there I’m sure you at least saw that other metal pony with a chainsaw! I’m not making it up!”

“I believe you,”

“Well of course you don-“ The filly paused, “Wait, you do?”

Bon Bon gave her a nod. The filly launched at her and wrapped her little hooves around her foreleg in a hug.

“Thank you! I’ve been looking for a good adult since I got here!” Scootaloo said, her voice shaking slightly.

“Where exactly is here?”

“I escaped from a weird bunker thing full of crazy ponies. But I just got here with all those pegasus things!” The filly explained.

So there was some kind of base after all. With how lax the security had been, Bon Bon was starting to get convinced that this was nothing more than a minor equipment stash. Scootaloo probably knew some useful intel.

“Can you tell me where the bunker is?” She gave the orange filly a warm smile.

“It’s on this level, should be… a turn and then a long way right? I can’t remember too well, sorry. But I think I-“ The filly was interrupted by a loud screech coming from the other end of the tunnel.

Bon Bon turned to see not one, but three of the metal pegasi making their way towards them.

“Scootaloo, run!” She ordered.

“But-“

“Now!”

The filly turned tail and ran down the other end of the tunnel. Bon Bon drew her sword and turned to face her three opponents, sending a silent prayer up to her queen.

Three pegasi, one earth pony.

The first pegasus flew directly at her, she’d already dodged this attack before. A quick roll to the side with a buck for good measure and the automaton went flying away. The other two attacked her on either side with wing swipes.

The sound of magical steel clashing filled the tunnel as the wings closed over empty space. Bon Bon, having ducked beneath them, ran back in between the two automaton’s legs while giving some passing stabs to the one on her left.

Something became clear to Bon Bon, almost as if a lightning bolt had struck her. These were automatons, they had a limited set of moves. She could use their size and movements against them just like she had been trained to do all those years ago in the agency!

The sudden shift from aggressive to passive netted almost instant results. In the cramped confines of the tunnel, the pegasi wound up hitting each other every time she dodged an attack.

One of the trio lifted off the ground and charged at Bon Bon, but the cyan mare dropped to the floor and slid beneath the steel hooves of the pegasus. The automaton went tumbling down the tunnel in a mess of limbs and wings.

But it recovered fast, too fast. Soon Bon Bon found herself surrounded by two rapidly approaching pegasi. It was the same lunge they had done countless times before, forehooves outstretched and aiming for her chest.

Her legs tensed as she prepared for a big jump, she had to time it right. Just an instant before she was sandwiched between the automatons, she released the pressure in her legs and flew upward. The pegasi slammed into each other like two locomotives.

Their magical armor wasn’t designed for that kind of impact. Bon Bon smiled around her hilt when she saw the blue flickering of a spent magical shield. After a quick kick to the tunnel roof, she descended like a white tornado, slicing along the backs of the pegasi below and chopping them into ribbons.

One pegasus, one earth pony.

She jumped back and away from the last automaton, sword at the ready. The lone pegasus looked at her as if weighing its options. But before Bon Bon could make a move two bolts of magic flew at her, striking her dead-on in the chest.

She tumbled back, her thin magical armor was just barely enough to keep her from being fried. Fortunately, her sword hadn’t gone flying away this time. She kicked back up to her hooves, a low alarm sounding in her head informing the current state of her shielding: not great.

The pegasus’ eyes lit up again as it charged another beam. Bon Bon’s mind went back to when she had first encountered Applejack and how the farm pony had deflected a magic bolt with her blade. Without time to think her actions twice, she turned the hilt in her mouth to make the flat of the sword face ahead. Then she rested the magical steel against her shoulder and braced for impact. If she was right, the pegasus would be aiming for the exact same spot as before.

The twin beams flew at her and struck true, right in the middle of her sword. The magical field of the weapon forced the bolt to a stop before violently bouncing it back at its caster. Two destructive bolts slammed home into the automaton’s eyes and traveled back down into its power source: the talisman.

A jet of magical fire and sparks flew out of the pegasus’ chest before it collapsed onto the floor. Bon Bon waited for a few seconds to ensure no more enemies approached before placing her sword back into her scabbard.

She paid no mind to the wreckages around her as she darted down the tunnel Scootaloo had escaped through. It didn’t take long for her crystal eye to pick up on the small filly hiding in a hole.

“I’m here Scoots, you can come out,” She said with a calm voice.

The orange filly poked her head out and looked at Bon Bon, her eyes wide.

“Did you destroy those pegasi?!” She shouted, jumping out of the hole.

“Well… yes?”

“I didn’t know you were an awesome ninja mare!” The filly jumped in place, “And your armor looks so cool!”

Bon Bon let out a chuckle before hardening her glare.

“Scootaloo, what are you doing here?”

The young pegasus’ head drooped.

“I got tricked by a unicorn with a black suit, he said he had tickets to see Rainbow Dash’s next tour in the back of his carriage. But as soon as he was out of sight he put me to sleep with a spell, when I woke up I was surrounded by other foals in that awful bunker.” She said quickly, making a great job of keeping her composure.

So she had been foalnapped off the street? This wasn’t just any evil group, it seemed. One part of Scootaloo’s story had stood out to her.

“You said other foals?” She asked.

“Yeah, pegasus foals, at least ten of us,”

This wasn’t good.

“How did you get out of there?”

“I snuck out through a really small vent, I was the only one small enough to get through,” The filly looked up at Bon Bon, almost pleading, “You’re going to go save them, right?”

Bon Bon nodded, trying to convey calm.

“But first we need to get you out of here, do you remember that mare with a chainsaw you talked about?”

The filly gave her a nod.

“That’s Lyra, she is here to help you. I’ll call her down here,”

“That was LYRA?! How many other superponies were hiding in Ponyville?” Scootaloo squealed.

“You’d be surprised,” Bon Bon said, calling Lyra on her communicator, “I rescued Scootaloo, get here quickly,”

“I’m on my way,” Came the response.

“And we are sending a team to retrieve the foals, you need to make sure they’re safe until they arrive,” Sandbar interjected.

Not long after, the two ponies heard metallic hoofsteps coming from somewhere down the tunnel. Lyra came into view trotting directly at Bon Bon and Scootaloo, whose jaw remained firmly planted on the floor.

“You look so cool!” The filly said.

Lyra crouched next to the orange pony, her horn projecting a map of the sewer around them.

“Could you please tell us where the facility is?” Lyra asked, her tone was incredibly soothing, probably intended to calm Scootaloo down.

“Oh! Now I remember!” The filly responded, taking a moment to look at the map, “It should be riiiiight… here!”

A dot appeared where the small orange hoof was pointing at, right in the middle of a dead-end tunnel.

“Are you sure?” Bon Bon asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Yes! I’m sure! The wall is a door,”

“That makes sense,” Lyra commented, sending the information to Bon Bon’s crystal eye.

“All right, I’ll go find this place, you stay here with Lyra,” She told the filly.

Bon Bon bolted down the tunnel, headed directly towards the red dot in her view. Lyra could easily defend Scootaloo until the guard team arrived, all she had to do was make sure the other fillies were safe.

Another left turn and she came face to face with a Spike automaton. The small dragon jumped in surprise and started to run away, no doubt headed for an alarm of some sort. Bon Bon launched at the automaton, but a warning flash in her eye made her lift her gaze to the ceiling.

Just in time. The lone Spike was making her follow it into a trap, several more were waiting on the roof just ahead. Her quarrel stopped its escape and turned to wave at her, jumping around in the water.

“Get over here!” Bon Bon shouted while dashing towards the taunting automaton.

The Spikes on the roof dropped onto the floor, but they were too slow to save their comrade who now lay cut cleanly in half. Bon Bon turned to face the trio of metal dragons and gave a mirthless chuckle.

One good horizontal slash was all it took, and right when she was thinking security would increase as she approached the lab.

The end of the tunnel was as unassuming as any other, but when Bon Bon focused her crystal eye on it she detected some strange details. There were no talisman signatures, but those were probably masked, the most suspicious thing about the wall was how some of the bricks seemed much newer than the rest.

“Bullseye!” Bon Bon claimed victoriously after cutting the wall horizontally, causing the destroyed doors to fall apart.

Beyond the entrance was a long metal hallway, flanked by observation windows on the left side. She resheathed her sword, unsure as to whether or not she would have to fight anypony. Scientists weren’t really known for hoof-to-hoof combat, especially not those that placed dangerous automatons in front of their lab entrance.

“Bon Bon, I sent Scootaloo to the surface to wait for the guards. I will stay back to serve as a relay for your team,” Lyra said.

“Great thinking,” Commented Sandbar, popping next to Lyra in her view, “Remember Bon, we need to get as much intel as we can from these ponies. Especially on desperado itself so we can get the guard involved,”

Bon Bon walked up to the observation window and looked out onto the laboratory below. Many ponies draped in lab coats moved around one of the pegasus automatons that she had fought before. Given how they were running several strange-looking artifacts over it, Bon Bon assumed they were doing some sort of diagnostic.

“I doubt you’ll be able to just walk in and read through the records though,” Sandbar commented.

“Maybe if I ask very nicely?” Bon Bon quipped back, drawing a chuckle from the earth pony.

Something caught her attention. One of the scientists, a unicorn mare with her mane tied up above her head, rolled up a pile of scrolls and dropped them onto a Spike automaton that was waiting idly. The mare said something to the dragon, who responded with a mock salute before turning and leaving through a vent.

“Did you guys see that?” She asked her team.

“Yes, we’ll have the doc look for any way to control one of those things. You should try and stay out of sight until then,” The earth pony said.

“Will do, make it quick,” She answered before closing the communications.

The hallway she was standing in ended in a sliding metal door, the only other way to go was cutting the observation glass and jumping into the lab. Bon Bon walked up to the door and was pleasantly surprised when the door slid open on its own.

On the other side of the door, she saw a catwalk overlooking an open room. She looked over the guard rail and took in the floor below. a ramp connected the catwalk with the lower level, next to several hanging racks that held deactivated pegasi automatons.

Two guards were in the room. One of them, a pegasus, was patrolling the room slowly while the other guard stood at attention in front of a door. Bon Bon zoomed-in her crystal eye to try and read the plaque on the door.

The small metal sign hanging from it read ‘Storage room A’. Bon Bon didn’t see what was so important about a storage room that it would demand a designated guard within an already guarded facility.

“Bon Bon, I have found what you need,” Ocellus appeared in her view.

She turned and walked back into the hallway to avoid being heard before responding.

“Did you find a way to control the Spikes?”

“Yes, we have,” The changeling said, puffing out her chitinous chest in pride, “You’ll need to get one of those Spikes and perform a clop procedure,”

“I… WHAT?” Bon Bon nearly fell onto her haunches from the sheer shock.

“A clop procedure?” The changeling lifted an eyebrow, “Cortical Level Omnidirectional Piloting? Take over its mind, so to speak,”

“Oh, I see… How do I do this… procedure?” She asked the changeling.

“We will deactivate the limiter on your sword, that should allow you to pierce its talisman without destroying it. Once your sword connects to it, your eye should link itself to the automaton and allow you to control it,” Ocellus explained.

“I just need to find one of those Spikes,” Bon Bon commented.

“I bet there’s some of them in that storage room you saw, just try not to get spotted,” Sandbar interjected.

“All right, I’ll try,” She said before closing the link.

Bon Bon walked back into the large room and immediately dropped to the floor when she saw the patroling guard coming up the ramp to the catwalk. She unsheathed the white blade and waited for the guard to appear on the end of the ramp.

The guard’s heavy footsteps resonated against the metal floor before the guard’s helmet came into view, and range. A flash crossed the guard’s view before their head tumbled off their shoulders. Bon Bon stretched out and caught the head before the metal helmet could give her position away.

A quick glance over the railing confirmed that the other armored pony hadn’t moved from their post. Bon Bon walked down the catwalk to stand directly above the guard and placed her blade in her hoof catch. Just as she had done with the automaton before, she jumped into the air and dropped onto her opponent like a pony-sized dart.

When she was sure that no alarms had been triggered, she turned to face the rows of hanging metal pegasi. An idea crossed her mind, what if she tried to control one of those instead of a Spike? She doubted anypony in the facility could take one of those things out. Her crystal eye was quick to dispel her thoughts when it scanned the pegasi and revealed that they had no talismans inside.

Bon Bon turned to look at the wall that she couldn’t see from above the catwalk. A large observation window opened into a hallway beyond, where a large rack of deactivated Spikes sat in cubicles. That was odd, if the Spikes were there, then what was in the storage room?

At first, she thought that it was probably just that, storage, but she couldn’t help but feel like something sinister was afoot. Why else would they have posted a guard outside? And besides, she didn’t lose anything by giving a quick look.

The door of the storage room opened into an inky void. In the dim light that came in through the open door, Bon Bon could see several rows of cubicles like the ones that held the Spikes in the other corridor. Detecting her presence, the storage room’s lights flashed on, revealing its contents.

She wanted to scream, she wanted to scream and kick and rip her other eye out.

The storage room was full of brains. Rows upon rows of brains floated within jars full of some cyan liquid, each one connected to a pair of eyeballs that darted around to look at her. Each lid sported a large talisman, hooked into the organs within by tendrils of magic, almost like a monster wrapped around its prey.

“What in tartarus…” She started, but she couldn’t produce any words to describe what her eye was seeing.

“Oh… oh no,” Somepony said, but she was too shocked to make out who it was.

Her hooves started shaking. How could anypony do something like that to somepony else? It was vile!

“What the? Stop right there!” Somepony shouted from behind her, snapping her out of her trance.

A baton swung at her head, snapping her out of the trance she had entered. Another guard had come into the large room and seen her work, a unicorn mare with no helmet. Bon Bon’s eye, ignoring her uneasy state, immediately informed her that this mare had one of the forehooves she had been told to collect. Bon Bon managed to draw her sword and parry the attack in time.

The unicorn mare swing the baton at her again, but once more it was stopped by the white sword. Bon Bon gave the mare a roundhouse kick to push her back before jumping forward with her blade at the ready. The unicorn moved the baton to intercept the attack, but that was her greatest mistake.

Bon Bon turned her head away from the mare, making the blade miss the baton, before stabbing at her neck. A simple move, but an effective one. She turned to chop the hoof off her opponent before resheathing the sword.

“How far are the guards? We need to get those… those brains out of here,” She told her team.

“They’re… still an hour away, I… Don’t know what to say,” Sandbar said.

“At least we found the foals… or what’s left of them,” She answered, trying to will her hooves to stop shaking.

“I don’t think so,” Lyra interrupted, hers was the only voice that didn’t shake.

“What do you mean, Lyra?” Sandbar asked.

“We only found Scootaloo a few minutes ago. I doubt even the best unicorn surgeon could remove all those brains in such a short time,” The mare explained.

“But then that would mean that the foals are still in the facility!” Bon Bon exclaimed, reinvigorated.

“The guards will be able to help you rescue them,” Sandbar lifted his hoof to his chin to think for a moment, “You should use one of those Spikes to gather intel before the guards arrive,”

“Sounds like a plan, maybe I’ll even find out where they’re keeping the foals,” Bon Bon answered before closing the link.

She trotted up to the racks of Spikes, setting her eye on one near the end of the shelf. Working efficiently she unsheathed her sword and disabled the limiter, causing it to vibrate violently in her mouth. The heat coming off the blade almost singed her fur as she positioned the tip just over the automaton’s talisman.

the sword melted straight through the outer metal plates, just barely touching the talisman beneath as Bon Bon’s face started sweating from the heat. As soon as the connection clicked she reactivated the limiter on her sword, causing it to start cooling again.

A black window appeared in her view with multiple arcane symbols spinning around each other. She turned to look for a hiding spot and found a cardboard box on the floor near the wall, perfect. Neatly settled inside her undetectable hiding spot, she focused on the window in her eye.

Her eyes opened inside the cubicle, eyes, plural. The body felt wrong, as in she couldn’t feel it at all. Clearly, these automatons didn’t have any sort of sensory feedback aside from sight. Bon Bon dropped to all fours and jumped out of the cubicle, landing on the floor and turning to look at the box where her body was hidden.

“Most impressive!” Ocellus said, apparently, the Spike’s eyes weren’t complex enough to display the changeling’s face, “The automaton has a built-in map of the facility! I can locate the records for you… do you see the path?”

A series of blue arrows materialized on the floor with a small tag that read ‘unknown transmission’, pointing at a small vent on the wall.

“I see it,” She answered in a magical immitation of the real Spike’s voice.

“Try not to draw much attention, Bon, move like you belong there,” Sandbar added.

The vent opened inwards to let her through, following the arrows in her view. On the other side of the wall, she dropped into a hallway and prepared for the toughest challenge she had faced yet: bipedal movement.

She tried to stand on her new legs, the unnatural yet comfortable position feeling far too awkward to move around in. Yet the automaton she was piloting corrected itself to avoid falling when she took a few tentative steps forward. One step after the other, she made her way down the hallway towards the record room.

“Did you catch the hoofball game last night?” A pony said from an adjacent hallway, almost causing her to try and find a place to hide.

“I’m not buying you a beer, Lens, give it up,” Another pony replied.

The footsteps were coming towards her, they couldn’t be too far away. Her objective was just a little bit further, she could see the vent clearly in her augmented vision.

Using every last bit of self-control, she walked in a straight line towards the vent, trying her best to avoid looking at the two guards that walked into the hallway behind her. Just as she had suspected, neither pony paid her any mind as she made her way to the vent.

The room she came into was divided into two floors by a large metal catwalk hanging from the ceiling. A guard was patroling around but shouldn’t be a problem if she could avoid raising suspicions. Bon Bon did notice, to her dismay, that the final vent she had to go through was on the second level of the room.

“Here I go,” She said to herself before jumping onto a metal pillar that reached all the way up to the catwalk.

The steel claws on her new body were pretty efficient for climbing, letting her make her way up. She got halfway up the pillar before nearly falling off from shock when she heard somepony talk.

“Umm, what are you doing?” The guard that had been patroling asked her, tilting their head to the side.

“I… uh… Was trying to get to the records,” Bon Bon improvised, caught off guard.

“But why are you climbing up the pillar? The stairs are right there,” The pony pointed to the other end of the room. Surely enough, a staircase that led onto the catwalk stood proudly against the wall.

“I got lost, my map was upside down!” She lied.

“The map… inside your head?” The guard didn’t sound convinced, “It was upside down?”

“Yes!” She said.

The armored pony fell silent for a moment before giving a defeated sigh.

“I’m amazed you things can even walk without running into walls,” The pony turned and continued to patrol the room.

Saved by inept design, imagine that. If she could, she would’ve sighed in relief. Bon Bon made her way down the catwalk and reached the vent that led her into the records room. The large room had a beehive pattern on the walls, each hexagonal cell holding a rolled scroll with a bronze tag underneath. Bon Bon made her way to the wall and started to read the tags.

“These are all inventory lists, what am I looking for?” She asked her team.

“Maybe they’re alphabetical? Try… S for subjects?” Sandbar responded.

Bon Bon glanced over the tags looking for the letter S, but she stopped when she read one plaque reading ‘ICG investors’. The acronym didn’t ring any bells, but it probably had information on who was investing in this horrid place.

“Sandbar, check the records for ICG, apparently they’re the ones financing this thing, I’ll try to get the scroll to-” But she fell silent when she heard several heavy hoofsteps coming towards the room.

In a feat that was more luck than skill, she backflipped into the vent she had entered through just moments before the door swung open. Bon Bon turned and looked through the grate at the ponies that had come in.

The one in the front of the group was an agitated orange unicorn with a beard, dressed in a lab coat. Right behind him entered the massive figure of Big Mac, both blades sheathed at his sides. Bon Bon tensed at the sight of the large red earth pony, but she stood completely still to listen.

“We need this batch ready, now,” Macintosh boomed.

“W- we are doing everything we can to fill our q-quotas sir, we just need more time!” The unicorn explained.

“We don’t have more time, our scouts just said that we have a mighty big problem headin’ here!” The earth pony stomped the floor.

“What problem?” Asked the unicorn.

“Royal guards, so ah’ll ask again, when is this batch goin’ tah be done?”

The scientist adjusted their lab coat with a quick horn flash, large beads of sweat falling down the side of his head.

“We will need at the very least two days to get all the brains extracted, we need to get the foals out of here,” He said.

“No time for that!” Another voice boomed from just out of sight, “Just get the brains we have out of here and get rid of the foals!”

“B- but sir we can’t just-” The unicorn tried to respond, but he fell silent when a large figure walked up to him and looked into his eyes, almost touching his muzzle.

The large pony in question was a large white pegasus with a cropped yellow mane. He wore a business suit that was clearly made out of some sort of magically reinforced fabric; there was no way it didn’t rip under the clear strain of the muscles beneath.

“Yes sir,” The unicorn said, looking at the floor, “I’ll order them terminated right away,”

“Good, we will pay you the bits once you get to the new location,” The pegasus answered.

Bon Bon took a few steps back from the vent before opening her communication channel again.

“I need the location of the foals, is it on the map?” She asked, forgetting that the Spike she was piloting didn’t have any way of changing its voice volume.

“Yes, I’ll send it to-” She heard, but a booming voice drowned out the earth pony.

“Gotcha!” Big mac roared before slicing through the wall with one of his swords, cutting her body in half.

Bon Bon returned to herself screaming in agony. The world had distorted into a swarm of colors and shapes as she tried to get her bearings. She kicked the box off herself and got to her hooves, or at least she tried. Apparently being forcefully ripped out of a different body had messed up her own legs.

“Bon Bon, stay still for a moment while your body stabilizes,” Ocellus ordered, the window in her view was too distorted to make out the changeling’s face.

She remained on the floor, twitching slightly as the magic-infused into her body reordered itself. Before long she was back up on her hooves, still feeling a bit disoriented.

“Where are the foals?” She asked groggily.

“Bon, you’re not okay, take a little more time to-” Sandbar started.

“No!” She cut him off, “They’re going to kill them!”

The earth pony nodded and started to look over something on his desk. After a few moments, he looked back up and spoke to her again.

“Go down the hallway you took last time, but go left instead of straight. You should get to the holding cell just through another storage room,”

“Do you think that one is also full of brains?” She asked, shivering.

“I doubt it, it’s far too large,” The earth pony responded.

Bon Bon closed the communication and shuffled towards the door that led to the hallway. As soon as she started to walk through the door an alarm started blaring, adding to her already hurting head.

At last, she reached the door labeled ‘Storage room B’. The loud clanging of several armored hooves coming down the hallway behind her pushed her to open the door and jump through as fast as possible. They were probably being sent to distract the royal guards while they evacuated the facility.

Her head had stopped throbbing now, clearing her view to look at the storage room. Clearly, this was reserved for more heavy-duty equipment, as evidenced by the rows of armored carriages and boxes covered in warning labels. The room was divided in half by a tall tower of metal boxes, the only way through being blocked by a strange barricade. The blockage was made from several black plates that reminded Bon Bon of Ocellus, with a large black spike sticking out of the middle.

“What is that thing?” Sandbar asked in her head.

The spike lit up with an ominous green glow, slowly growing brighter and brighter. Something about the device made Bon Bon uneasy, the magical pulses that started at the base of the spike and culminated at the tip… almost like a unicorn’s horn…

Decades of combat training took over her body, causing her to roll out of the way just as the metal horn released a ray of green energy. The explosion singed the tip of her tail, but the brunt of the attack hit the wall, leaving a large scorch mark. The horn started to charge again.
Bon Bon unsheathed her sword and sprinted toward her enemy, making the most out of her window for action. As she suspected, the blade bounced off a magical armor plate. She backflipped out of the way of the magical beam. Part of the blast washed over the automaton, revealing that its entire front was composed of magically reinforced armor.

“It’s some kind of automaton,” She told her team.

She shouldn’t have any trouble with it, after all, that spike telegraphed its beams for easy dodging. On cue, the green glow returned, but this time it didn’t accumulate. A barrage of smaller beams flew out at her, pelting her steel coat with small scorch marks.

Bon Bon ran, swinging her sword wildly to try and block some of the beams. Despite her efforts, she could feel how many hits had slipped through her armor, damaging the artificial muscle beneath. Her eye caught sight of a metal box pile not too far away, surely that would offer some protection.

With a great leap, Bon Bon rolled behind the boxes and hid. The automaton continued its assault, covering the boxes with scorch marks, but they held.

“Any ideas, guys?” She asked, hopefully.

“We’ve got nothing! Hang in there until the guards arrive!” Sandbar responded.

She was about to say something when her ears picked up a charging sound coming from behind her. Bon Bon jumped out from behind the boxes just moments before a large beam hit them, causing a large fireball.

“Those red boxes appear to be filled with some kind of explosive! Maybe you can use that?” Ocellus said.

It was worth a shot. She took in the room, looking for the closest crate. The second she heard the charging sound again she bolted towards the small red box, sliding on the ground and giving the crate a hard kick.

The box flew through the air before slamming home exactly where she had aimed it, the spike. A fireball enveloped the automaton, causing it to slide backward as the flames died out. Unfortunately, it seemed to have not had any effect aside from pushing the thing back. But a thought occurred to her, if she pushed it back enough she could probably get around the reinforced plates and attack its side.

She turned and ran towards another red box while the spike sprayed bolts of magic towards her. Something seemed off as she approached the box, but she couldn’t quite put her hoof on it… then it hit her, the small beams had stopped.

Alarm flared up in her mind almost as fast as the focused beam the automaton fired in front of her. Her world went into slow motion as she crashed facefirst into the explosion caused by the box. She thanked that her eye was an enchanted crystal sphere, because she was certain the old one would’ve boiled in its socket.

The fireball made Bon Bon fall to the floor, desperately rolling to extinguish her burning mane. But the automaton didn’t let up, charging another beam and forcing her to roll out of the way. Her battered metal coat was pelted with pieces of the floor as she barely dodged the attack.

Bon Bon jumped back to her hooves and desperately tried to make a plan. She stared at her opponent, blinking rapidly to clear the multiple warning windows cluttering her view. An idea sparked, she could use its charge time against it.

She growled through the sword in her mouth and stomped the ground, making a big show of how she was going to stand her ground. Just as expected, the automaton took the bait and fired the charged beam at her.

With a smile, Bon Bon rolled out of the way and towards the last remaining red crate. If she had planned this correctly, the beam shouldn’t be strong enough to fire for a few seconds.

With a roundhouse kick, the box flew at the barricade. A direct hit made it shuffle back until it was no longer lodged in between the stacks. The opportunity she had been waiting for.

More alerts flashed in her sight, as well as a window with somepony trying to contact her. But this wasn’t the time to be distracted, she blinked and the messages disappeared.

She pursued the automaton now that she could hit its unarmored flanks. Sword at the ready, she barreled towards the metal wall. And of course, it didn’t work.

The automaton’s plates spread open as it reorganized itself into the shape of a pony, a very tall pony. The black plates gave her opponent a buglike feature, reinforced by the membrane wings on its back and the green slitted eyes.

“My word! It’s the queen!” Ocellus shouted through the communicator.

Bon Bon would’ve responded if her mouth hadn’t been busy holding the sword. The metal alicorn took to the air, hovering above the floor just out of reach, and started charging its beam again.

It would seem that her plan to make the fight easier had done little aside from escalating it further. She rolled out of the way of the magical blast and turned to see that… the automaton was gone?

Her eye went wide with alarm and darted around the room, could it turn invisible? Where was that thing? She spun around trying to locate her foe, becoming more and more desperate.

“Where did it go?” She shouted at her team.

“I don’t know!” Sandbar shouted back.

Then the automaton decided to make itself known. One of the large metal boxes shifted, opening up to reveal a black spike that buzzed with green energy.

The blast hit Bon Bon like a train, sending her flying into the wall as her armor plating was stripped of her damaged body. More warnings popped up, this time they refused to go away when she blinked.

She tried again to no avail; that’s when she noticed why it wasn’t working, her eyelid was missing. The blow had been monstrous, but still, she stood atop scorched hooves.

The automaton decided to press its advantage once more, charging a second beam. Bon Bon looked up at her impending doom and let out a defiant roar. She wasn’t going to fall here, not while she could still do something.

In a last, desperate attempt, she arched her neck to the side and threw her sword at the alicorn. The white blade spun through the air towards her opponent, making the automaton freeze for a second in confusion.

The sword struck home exactly where she had aimed it: the support pillar that held up one of the box walls. Loud metal clanging filled the room as the steel boxes collapsed onto the automaton, pinning it to the floor.

“Stay still,” She said groggily.

A small explosion came from within the pile of boxes, but the reinforced metal held. Bon Bon dragged herself to where her sword had fallen, picking it up and sheathing it.

“Are you there?” She asked her communicator.

“Bon! Oh, sweet Celestia what happened to you?” Sandbar shouted, apparently one of the hits had damaged her eye given how the window that should’ve held the earth pony was a black square.

“I’m fine, where are the fillies?” She growled.

“You are not fine! Look at yourself! You need to-”

“Bon Bon, Scootaloo is missing” Lyra interrupted.

“What? How?” She demanded.

“The guards couldn’t find her on the surface or in the sewer. I’m sorry, I should’ve taken better care of her,”

“It’s not your fault, we’ll go find her as soon as I free the fillies. Where are they, Sandbar?” She asked.

“They’re through the door on your right… please stay out of trouble I doubt you could take on a parasprite in your condition,”

Bon Bon turned to the door and kicked it open, revealing a simple maintenance hallway. As the battle adrenaline subsided she became increasingly aware of how badly she was hurt. Her face felt like she had been thrown into a vat of acid; her remaining internal organs felt inflamed and battered. And even though her new body was nearly incapable of feeling pain, the sluggishness with which she moved left no doubt as to whether or not it was faring as well as her organic parts.

A trail of blood and small parts of scorched artificial muscle followed her as she finally found the door she was looking for.

“Here goes nothing,” She said to no one in particular, trying to ignore the charred taste in her mouth.

The room beyond had a large observation window on the left side, with multiple consoles facing towards it. She made her way to the window and saw the foals, safe and sound, sitting around the small containment room. She had made it.

Bon Bon approached the window, unsheathing her sword to cut the glass, when one of the fillies spotted her. The purple pegasus’ eyes opened wide as she let out a blood curling scream. The other foals turned to look at her before having similar reactions and huddling up in the opposite corner to where she stood. Did she really look that scary?

“Y- you there!” Somepony said from the other end of the room.

She turned to see the same orange unicorn that had been with Big Mac earlier; and held in his hooves was none other than Scootaloo, with a scalpel aimed at her neck. The unicorn’s eyes went wide when she faced him.

“S- st- stay there!” He spat, clearly distressed.

“Put her down,” She ordered, sheathing her sword to try and negotiate.

“No! I have demands!”

Bon Bon took a step closer, causing the unicorn to fire a magic bolt into the containment room. She stared in horror as a green smoke started filling the room.

“Stay right there! You can save them or you can catch me, your move, hero!” The large bead of sweat gave away that he didn’t know if his plan was going to work.

Bon Bon took another step closer.

“N- no! Stay back you m- monster! I’m getting out of here!”

Bon Bon did not have the patience for this.

“The only way you are getting out of here is in a bag!” She shouted before unsheathing her sword.

It was a simple plan, she would jump at the unicorn with her sword next to her and cut his head off before he could hurt Scootaloo, then she would save the foals by cutting the glass apart. With how fast she could move, there was no way for the scientist to react in time.

But she had ignored one crucial detail, her body was badly damaged. When she reared back on her hind legs to jump, her right leg gave out halfway through the jump. A shower of metal parts and torn muscle rained on the ground as the enhanced mare flew forwards a bit too low, but still too fast for anypony to react… even herself.

Author's Note

Chapter three, cutting it close but still on-time.

I've had a busy week so I couldn't do as many re-reads as I usually do, let me know of any spelling mistakes or other errors in the chapter. As always, I hope my work at least gave you a smile.

Next part will come out next Wednesday and may be even longer than this one.