One Last Mission

Day 21

Shorelock Prison, San Palomino Desert

“For fuck sake, can we go anywhere without somepony threatening to kill us?”

It was a shared sentiment, but currently my anger was less pointed at the guns and more at the changeling I knew was responsible for this. I should have known, I really should have known that Amaryllis’ blatant disregard for the Shattered Moon’s rules were going to get us in trouble. Not that they seemed to realize that, looking at the weapons with the barest hint of confusion visible. That sense of blindness was really irritating.

“Lady Hash, I’m afraid I don’t understand,” Amaryllis said with total sincerity. “I’m not here to cause any trouble. This visit was in hopes of–”

“I know why you are here, I received your message,” Hash replied, the cold delivery more than enough to silence the changeling. “You really think I’d cooperate with you after how much of a fool you’ve made of my Numbers?”

“Again, Lady Hash, I fail to see what I did that could cause this,” Amaryllis replied, her attempt to take a step forward being halted with a gun moving closer to her skull. “Whatever happened, I’m sure we can talk through this and work out whatever misunderstanding has occurred.”

“There is nothing to discuss. You know the identity of my Numbers, and now you know my face,” Hash explained, leaning even further over her table. That look in her eyes was one I had worn a thousand times during my service in the Enclave. It was uncaring, unloving, and deaf. Nothing Amaryllis said mattered to her. “Did you really think I’d reveal myself if I planned to let you leave this room alive?”

“Danse, it’s going to hurt but–”

“I got it,” I said, more than loud enough to grab everycreature’s attention. I charged my horn, ignoring how badly it ached. “Hash, cover your eyes!”

Hash, while having no reason to believe me, did as instructed and averted her eyes. Hearty and Falke did the same, the former problem more than familiar with exactly where this was going. Amaryllis looked straight to me as I gritted my teeth, and every gun once pointed at her was now pointed at me.

“Sugar, what are you doing?”

Instead of answering, I closed my eyes and let loose the charged spell at the same time Hash let out a command to her guards.

“Fire!”

The pulse of magic swept through the room ‘i’ in ‘fire’ was said, leaving none of them able to pull their triggers. When the word finished and the spell ended, I fell to the ground. The headache gained from the mere act of casting a spell nearly blocked out all of my body’s senses, with touch being the only exception. It was how I was able to feel both Hearty and Falke on either side, pushing me back up onto my hooves, the latter allowing me to momentarily lean against their side.

It took a moment for my vision to focus, but when I did I was more than able to notice that the spell had worked. Amaryllis, not to mention the Shattered Moon that had just been ready to kill us, all now held the same black look in their eyes. With the exception of breathing and standing, all their higher functions had momentarily stopped. I already knew Hearty and Falke had dodged it, as had Hash, but a special note of relief passed through me when I heard the heavy breathing of Gemini on the other side of Falke.

“It’s okay, Gemmy. They will be fine,” I said, voice strained from the throbbing in my horn. “Fuck that hurt.”

“Not sure whether to be angry at you or relieved that I’m currently alive,” Hearty said. He seemed ready to smack me in the back of the head, but held his hoof back. “Never thought I’d be thanking you for fucking with ponies minds.”

“Didn’t want to, but didn’t see another option,” I replied.

An odd, crackling sound drew my attention to the front of the room, to the only other pony currently still functioning. Hash didn’t look happy, for obvious reasons, broken horn eliciting sparks, likely ready to fry all of us. She barely held herself back, and I was instantly aware that I was one wrong move from getting electrocuted.

“What did you do?” Hash asked, glowering at me like an Enclave officer would to a halfbreed recruit for simply standing wrong.

“I temporarily turned off all but the most necessary functions needed to survive,” I explained. “They’ll awaken when I tell them to. Everything between the moment I cast the spell to the moment I canceled it will be a haze, like waking up from a dream.”

“How?!” she demanded, standing up. Her horn crackled even more violently than before, something I didn’t think was possible. “You’re a pegasi. There is no way you should be able to cast magic.”

“A pegasi?” Falke and I asked around the same time. The griff had a little more to add on afterwards. “Danse Macabre is no pegasus, Lady Hash.”

I looked up, realizing that my horn was small enough, and my mane had grown long enough that the latter covered up the former. I brushed my mane out of the way, allowing Hash to view my growing horn. Her brow rose, the electricity in her horn lessening in ferocity. She sat back down and leered at me out of caution and intrigue,

“You aren’t one of the Goddess’s drones, are you?”

I allowed my bangs to fall once more, and shook my head. “No. My ascension was unnatural, but IMP was not involved.”

“If you need confirmation, I have a Stable doctor’s license on my PipBuck and can verify what she’s saying,” Hearty explained, stepping forward. “I’ll hoof it over if you want to see it.”

After a brief pause, Hash nodded. Stepping towards the desk, Hearty took his PipBuck off and hooved it over to her as he said. She took a look at it, sighed, and then motioned that he could have this back. As Hearty reattached the Pipbuck to his foreleg, Hash let out a sigh.

“I understand your reason for wanting Amaryllis dead, Lady Hash,” I said as Hearty came back over to us. “The four of us were made aware of their actions before we signed up. However, I must insist that you give them, if not the benefit of the doubt, the chance to prove themselves better.”

Hash stared at me for a moment, a scowl fixed onto her face not too dissimilar to the one I constantly forgot during my first week on the surface. Still, she was no longer ready to kill us, so that was an improvement.

“Alicorn or not, I’m not sure what ground you stand on to make such demands,” she said. “Besides, she has still broken regulations and rules meant to protect my Numbers. You can’t expect me to let them go free.”

“We’re not asking you too,” Falke replied. “Amaryllis does need to be punished, but I’m certain there is a better way of going about it.”

“As for what grounds I stand on,” I said, walking right up to the front of Hash’s desk. “I believe you were told about me by Three. Former member of the High Council, his higher up, a good friend.”

Her anger seemed to die down just a little bit more, but in it’s place came doubt. “Your friends called you Danse. Three called you Singing Rhapsody.”

“I lost the name,” I explained, “just a few days before the horn started growing.”

“Danse Macabre is two souls in the same body, conjoined to make one singular entity,” Hearty explained further. “Not sure what part of that caused the loss of name, but I’ve stopped making sense of it.”

“If you need to fact check, I’m sure me, my daughter, and my companions are more than willing to wait in a cell while you make whatever radio calls you need to,” I said. “Obviously, that will also come with releasing your soldiers from my spell.”

Hash stayed silent, eyes refusing to leave my own for even a split second. She crossed her hooves, let out an aggravated sigh, and shrugged. I had no idea if any of what I had just said would actually save us, but I had to try. Even if it offered the five of us a chance to plan some manner of escape. Anything to cover Amaryllis’ idiotic ass.

“We got a deal,” Hash said. “Release them.”

With a nod, and bracing myself for pain I knew would be coming, I lit my horn and canceled the memory spell. Hash’s guards stumbled slightly, but quickly reorientated themselves, looking at each other wondering what had just happened to them. Amaryllis trotted back into me subconsciously, their hooves placed in just the right way to nearly knock us both over. When they did recover, they looked back to me.

“What in the Messenger’s name just happened?” they muttered.

“Will, we just saved your life, at least for the moment,” I explained. Amaryllis tilted her head and lowered her mandibles in confusion. I chose to not give them the answer they wanted and instead turned back to Hash. “Done my part, now you have to do yours.”

Hash nodded. “The four of you, put them in five of the unoccupied cells, separately. I have a radio call to make.”

“Wh-what?” Amaryllis asked.

Hash’s guards saluted and moved to restrain everyone, all of us save for the changeling playing along. When one of the Shattered Moon’s approached with cuffs and blindfolds, they backed up. When they did finally catch them, they wiggled and squirmed to the point it was near impossible for them to get the cuffs on her hooves or the blindfold around her eyes. I already had both on, plus something around my horn, when the sound of magic hit my ears and her struggles suddenly lessened.

“Unhoof me. You can not restrain the Voice of the–”

“Amaryllis, shut up,” I barked at them.

“S-Suga–”

“I said shut up!” I yelled. A hoof was around my neck, holding me back from the changeling just in case I wanted to try and fight them. “You put us into this, and I’m doing everything in my power to keep us alive. So keep quiet, let them restrain you, and show some damn respect.”

“But… but…,” it was easy to hear the defeat in their voice growing greater until, finally, a sigh of resignation hit our ears. “Fine, Sugar. Just for you.”

I’m not entirely sure where they ended up putting the five of us, except for the fact we were all in different cells. The blindfolds and cuffs stayed on, the walls were thick enough where if any of them were nearby they couldn’t hear me, and the amount of room I had to pace was minimal. All I had to occupy myself were my own thoughts, Dead Hooves, and Rhapsody.

Not that there was a huge distinction between the latter two and the former most anymore.

“Well, so much for planning out some other means of escape,” they said. “You think Amaryllis is currently screaming their lungs out right now?”

“Wouldn’t be surprised,” I said, snorting. I was sitting against the wall of my cell, using the chains linking both cuffs to rub at whatever they had put on my horn. “I’m certain that, the moment they were in their own cell, they started shouting to be let out.”

Two minutes of silence passed before I got a response from them.

“Yeah, that does sound like them. Like, seriously, for somecreature so hot they really know how to make themself as unattractive as possible.”

I rolled my eyes under the blindfold. “You really still hung up on my attractiveness to them.”

Another long pause from them. “Just teasing you about your bad taste.”

“Oh, ha ha, shut up,” I replied, sticking my tongue out. Another pause, this one deliberate on my part, passed before I spoke again. “DH, Rhaps, are you two okay?”

Nothing. A full minute of silence followed the question with zero answer from either of them. With the lack of vision, the discomfort from my horn, and now the lack of response, something about it made me start to panic a little. My head swerved left and right, as if expecting to somehow see through the cloth over my eyes.

“DH? Rhapsody?” I called out. Still nothing from either of them. “Dead Hoo–”

“Yeah, we’re fine,” they finally said. Then out of nowhere, they got annoyed. “I said we are fine! Jeez, you took so long back in the office to do anything and now this. You got wax in your ears?”

I didn’t say anything, simply because I wasn’t entirely sure how to process how they were responding. To be silent for as long as they had, and then suddenly reply to not just my first question, but my calls to them immediately after as if they had just happened. That wasn’t even acknowledging the fact that I had cast the memory spell immediately after they said to. All of it, together, caused my panic to rise even higher than it already was.

“Why did you take so long to respond?” I asked them.

I knew even before they answered that it was going to take at least a minute to actually get something out of them. I had actually timed it in my head; it took fifty-nine seconds for them to say exactly what I thought they would.

“What are you talking about? You are the one taking forever to do things.”

There is only so many times my stomach could drop in a week before I actually got ill from it. Something was wrong, more wrong than nearly dying from Lady Hash not even half an hour ago. What they said both made no sense and made perfect sense at the same time. Their perception of time was off, that much was abundantly clear. How it had gotten de-synced in the first place was impossible to figure out.

Was this just another part of their individuality they were losing to me? The possibility should have felt terrifying, but then I remembered how they made me freeze up during my first night as Danse against my own will. The more they fused together, the more complete I became, the less I had to worry about that ever happening again. Something about that didn’t feel too bad, since it meant I could forever keep this body.

Something about that thought made me pause. This body was always mine, why was I so concerned about losing it?

The cell door opened not long after that, and somepony walked in. I stood up, looking in the direction I believed the door to be. It was hard to tell, with how sound echoed off every single wall. What was clear is that the door did not close; whoever was in here was hoping it’d be quick.

That pony, as I soon learned, was Lady Hash.

“Three verified what you told me,” Hash said. “He also was more than willing to reconfirm Amaryllis’ crimes.”

“I never said they were innocent.”

“Yet you ask me to not kill her despite breaking a law of my ponies. Why is that?”

“Three reasons, one more selfish than the other. One of those, obviously, is that I’ve been hired as their bodyguard,” I answered. “The selfish one is that there is somepony I have a vendetta against in Our Haven. I want them dead, and she is my way in.”

“And the last one?” Hash asked coldly.

“Amaryllis has a way into Paradise,” I said. Hash did not respond, making it clear even with blindfolds she wanted details. “My vendetta would allow me to enter as a prisoner. With Amaryllis and the others disguised as guards, we can sneak in and take Paradise from the inside.”

“Take Paradise?” Another voice, a Shattered Moon that had accompanied her, asked. “Lady Hash, if that is true…”

They didn’t finish, or rather didn’t need to. Hash knew what that meant as much as anypony else in Southern San Palomino knew, that seizing Paradise was the key to Shattered Moon’s victory. It was the only defense Amaryllis had, the one thing keeping her from being killed by this mare. All I needed to hear was a sigh from one of the ponies in front of me to know that, at the very least, it got them contemplating.

“You’ve put me in a moral dilemma, Danse Macabre,” Hash said. “You can’t expect me to let the changeling off free. Regardless of what information they hold, they have endangered the identity of my Numbers.”

“I’m not saying that she goes unpunished, Lady Hash,” I replied. “I’m merely saying that their death would only elongate a conflict that both the living and dead would wish finished.”

There was a small pause, and then a few steps forward. Much like before, it was impossible to tell exactly where they were, but something in my gut told me Hash was coming closer. A guess that proved correct when I felt the faintest feeling of breath against my nose.

“It sounds to me like the wrong pony is in charge of your group,” Hash said. Some of that eternal cold in her voice had faded away, enough to just barely give the impression that her words were a compliment.

“We rarely choose who leads us, Hash,” I replied. “Even when somepony says we have two choices, we really only have one.”

“A lesson you’ve learned first hoof, I take it.”

“Rhapsody wouldn’t have been thrown down here if that wasn’t the case.”

Another series of hoofsteps, and Hash’s breath was no longer on my nose. A click ran out, and the pressure of the cuffs on my forelegs suddenly disappeared. It was followed by the clank of metal against metal, the sound leading me to wince. Once the sound had died away, I turned my attention to my front limbs, immediately lifting one of them to find my full range of motion had been restored.

Then, somepony placed their hoof on my withers.

“Missus Macabre, if you could please follow us,” Hash requested. By that point, the cold had completely dissolved.

“First thing first, while Amaryllis deserves no apology, you and the rest of your friends do.”

Those were the first words out of Hash’s muzzle as she sat me down in her office, the same exact one we had been in earlier. No one but the two of us, blindfold off, mare to mare. Seems she had even grabbed some beer she had stored somewhere in her desk for us, as a way to further drive in the apology. It nearly made her seem desperate, but Hash kept her expression, tone, and body language neutral. Practiced control, no different from Amaryllis in appearance but far more in terms of display. It was formed not with the purpose of charisma and confidence, but rather that of a soldier focused on the next battle.

We were one and the same in that regard, save for the fact Hearty and Vigil had broken my own soldier mask for some time now.

“When you arrived, I had believed all of you were responsible for what had occurred back in Underside. It seems the report given to me was not clear enough,” Hash explained, as she handed me a can. “I had hoped to meet you, in fact. The way Three told it, you are quite the incredible mare.”

“I guess that description works,” I said, taking the can and quickly inspecting it. No logo, brand, not even nutrition labels on it anywhere. “Your ponies make their own cans?”

“San Palomino may not be the easiest place to grow food, but it was home to miners a long, long time ago,” she said. “That allows us to make many things. What you have before you was home-made. No pre-war factory.”

“Every day, I grow more and more shocked at how wrong the pegasi are about you all,” I responded, snorting in half-hearted amusement. “Most everything the Enclave has is old and worn down. This? This is new!”

Hash allowed me to glimpse a smile before she returned to a neutral expression. She brought her can up in her hoof, as did I, and we clinked them against each other as if they were wine glasses. From there we opened it, took a sip, and then placed it down on her desk. My eyes strayed back to that picture of Hash and Lightning Dust.

“That’s my wife there, as I’m sure you’ve realized,” Hash said, having noticed where my attention drifted. She sighed, and took a longer sip of her drink. “Die not long before the bombs fell. Ministry of Morals doing, you can be damn sure.”

“Lightning Dust, correct?” I asked, more than aware of the fire I was playing with. Hash’s head snapped to me, the slightest amount of cold returning to her ears. “Found a recording from you all back in a theater on Alibi Street in Trotson. She was talking about the end of the world, how inevitable it seemed.”

The cold faded, a voiceless ‘fuck’ leaving her mouth. That was all the proof she needed to know I was telling the truth. Didn’t matter what she did to try her emotions after that; her teeth were grinding against each other, no doubt able to pick out the exact moment I was talking about.

“She just wanted the war to end,” Hash said. “All of us did. Instead she gets a bullet through the head and the rest of us dealt with, well, I think you know.”

I nodded. “You try to do the right thing, and the world spits on you.”

“And now we see ourselves in that same situation, albeit on a smaller scale. We need to end this war with the Equalists. We need Embraxia dead.”

“Embraxia?”

“The current Voice of the Messenger,” Hash explained. She stood up as I took a sip of my beer. “She’s the reason this war started in the first place. Believe it or not, there was a point in time where we and the Equalists used to be allies. Then, one changeling queen died, and the new one decided to greet me with the same thing that took my wife from me.”

”That’s… kind of surprising to hear,” I said, moving to get up myself. “Everything I’ve heard made it sound like you’ve always been at each other’s throats.”

“Our relationship with the north has certainly been strenuous,” Hash said.

She shook her head as she turned around and looked out the window behind her. I joined her, getting a top-down view of Shorelock from Southern San Palomino’s seat of power. It was easy to see where post-war and pre-war architecture started and ended, but my eyes turned to the distance. It was there that the ocean laid, with its salt-infused water and air. What stuck out, however, was the giant ship sticking out of the horizon like an artificial mountain.

No need to ask what it was, that was without a doubt the Hurricane in all its glory. What needs to be said about a hunk of steel that looked, from the outside, like a fully functioning fortress. Maybe it wasn’t the biggest or most impressive battleship Equestria had, but it was the first to greet my eyes. Before me was a symbol of wartime greatness, and if it wasn’t for the knowledge it had been sitting in the ocean for two centuries, I’d have believed it to still be fully functional.

Yet, what I saw was what had not been destroyed by age. If that was the case, how bad was everything else.

“Impressive piece of ponywork, isn’t it?” Hash asked.

“Impressive? It’s magnificent!” I said, Rhapsody’s inner filly coming out of its cage and infecting me. “I’ve been in cloudships, both civilian and military, but that? That looks awesome!”

She may have been a soldier, even Hash couldn’t withhold her amusement at me. The faintest sound of a chuckle left her throat, and I got another glimpse of a grin from the Shattered Moon’s leader. It made me realize what had happened instantly. I had acted like… myself, for lack of a better word, instead of who I was trying to be. For a moment, I nearly locked that filly away out of pure instinct.

Then I remembered my emotional outburst in front of Hearty days earlier. An outburst that nearly killed him and me due to my magic. I hesitated to close the door on that filly now, knowing what I had asked Hearty to do.

The filly was all too willing to be locked away again, because of course she was. It was all they knew, all I had taught them. Locking her up and letting things simmer wouldn’t help us, would it? Not to mention, I had asked for help in changing. Was anything anypony did to help me worth it, though, if I refused to acknowledge it?

For me, deciding on whether to lock her away felt like a small eternity. In truth, it was only a second before, with no small degree of fear, I opened the cage’s door. That little filly at the back of my mind stared at me before walking out. No more locking them up, no matter how much I wanted to. As long as she understood the risks she was taking, everything was fine.

She had seen enough from my two lives to understand that risk.

“What I’d give to be on a ship like that in its prime,” I said, the foalish joy in my voice having only increased in that short amount of time.

“Then consider yourself lucky, Danse Macabre,” Hash said. She had once more returned to her neutral expression; back to serious time. “You will be stepping hoof on the Hurricane, though not for the purpose of a tour. This journey on board will be far more dangerous.”

I looked to Hash, chest out, stance strong, allowing my own brand of intensity to shine. “This is part of getting Amaryllis released, I assume.”

“Partly,” Hash answered. “You and the rest of her entourage will be doing the work to get her released. That’s all you need to worry yourself with, as far as Amaryllis is concerned.”

She motioned with her muzzle towards the Hurricane.

“As you are no doubt aware from the radio, we have been working to salvage anything within the Hurricane for our own use. It was going well for a time, but we’ve had trouble finding one specific part of the ship. A part that the ministries wanted to keep hidden, and therefore is not listed on any of the ship’s maps.”

“Something they didn’t want the rank in file then,” I said, rubbing the underside of my muzzle. “I’m guessing you know what it is.”

“Yes. It’s a megaspell bay.”

My eyes went wide, jaw dropping in terror and fascination. The Hurricane, that glorious ship I saw outside, was holding mega spells in it? So many questions formed in my head from that alone, but only one was necessary. Only one question could explain exactly why the Shattered Moon saw this as important.

“Were they fired?” I asked.

“No,” Hash answered. I swallowed nervously, unable to imagine what kind of firepower was packed in its hull now. “The Hurricane has been off the coast of Shorelock since before the Last Day, and nopony saw anything get launched out of it. In fact, the ship seemed to do nothing, just sit there before, suddenly sinking into the water. It stayed there, half submerged, for nearly two centuries.”

“Until you all pulled it out, hoping to disassemble what was usable for yourself,” I replied, getting a nod from the mare next to me. “You want us to go in and find it.”

“Correct, but I wouldn’t be turning this over to you if it was that simple,” Hash said, turning away from the window and returning to her desk. I joined her back in my own seat as Hash took a large gulp of beer, properly emptying the can. “The teams we sent in, they didn’t return. At least, not alive.”

“Something killed them.”

“Not just them. The past few days, at night, creatures have heard singing near the harbor. Nocreature thought anything about it but…,” Hash shivered, openly grimacing. “A young colt went missing two days ago. They popped up on the shore a day later, dead, cut open in a way where it was impossible for anypony but their mother to recognize them. It was the exact same fate as the team we sent in.”

“Cut up?” I asked, just to make sure I heard correctly.

Hash hesitantly nodded, and that same shiver that had gone through her passed through my bones. I knew the surface was home to some horrifying creatures – the balefire fossil still stood in my mind as some of its more monstrous creations – but there was something about how Hash talked about this one that gave me pause. ‘Cut open’, not ripped apart like an animal. Whatever it was, it had some form of intelligence, not too different from a ghoul on the verge of going feral.

“Any idea what the perpetrator is?” I asked.

“We aren’t quite sure, but stories are being tossed around,” Hash said. “Old folks tale from old Equestria specifically. It talks about the hippocampi, sapient creatures that are both fish and pony, their voice powered by magic. They don’t eat ponies though; their magic brings out the worst in a pony, because they subsist on negative emotions.”

I scrunched and scratched at my muzzle some more, thinking of what had been told to me. “Only other idea that comes to mind is that this is some form of altered sealife, though I know jackshit about that.”

“Whatever it is, it needs to be dead,” Hash replied, pulling my attention away from the perpetrator’s identity for a moment. “It’s a danger to Shorelock’s population, and as long as it remains nocreature is safe.”

That much was beyond clear. Truth be told, it didn’t matter that dealing with this was the price for Amaryllis’ release. My memory returned to the filly that had died on my eighth birthday, or how my choices had left Bone Breaker’s own child from ever seeing their mother again. Now a colt was dead, not by my hooves, but some horrible creature without the morals to even consider what they were doing. Imagining Clear, Rainy, or Gemmy in their place, I felt an animalistic rage build up inside me, almost as if they had suddenly become real.

If this creature was killing foals, then killing them was justified. There mother would want to see them lynched anyways.

“You have a deal Hash,” I said. The Shattered Moon’s leader smiled gratefully, more than aware that this had become significantly more personal. She was a mare, it only made sense she understood. “I have one request I would like to make though.”

“If it gets the threat neutralized, name it,” Hash said.

The grin on my face that formed as she said those words, there was nothing kind about it. “Let Amaryllis search with us. If what you say is true, then whatever we are going to deal with there is a suitable punishment all its own.”

With decisions made, I was brought to a yet another cell along with the rest of my friends and companions. Gemmy had instantly pressed herself against me once her blindfold was removed, clinging to the young mare she is, getting more than a few chuckles out of us all. Hearty and Falke just seemed happy to no longer be blinded and, in Hearty’s case, magically suppressed. The only one of us five who still had their blindfold, cuffs, and horn ring on was Amaryllis.

“Clearly the Shattered Moon is showing some form of racial bias,” they immediately said. They meant to turn their head in disgust, but with their sense of direction fucked up they ended up slamming themselves in a wall. “Gah! Will one of you please just get this off of me.”

“Nah,” Hearty said, barely holding in his laughter. “I think this is plenty deserved.”

“Deserved! I am the true Voice of the Messenger! To keep me captive and disoriented is nothing but here–” Amaryllis then proceed to slam into the wall in the opposite direction. “Fucking… how many of these are there?!”

“Four, like most rooms typically have,” I replied, rolling my eyes, unable to hide the giant smile on my face.

“Not sure how much I believe you right now, sugar,” Amaryllis said as she aimlessly stumbled around, her mandibles twitching all around in panic. “As far as I know there could be some divider none of you are telling me about. Wouldn’t be the first time I’ve had my vision taken advantage of.”

“Your vision?” Hearty said, momentarily raising an eyebrow. Then, in a split second, both of them shot up as high as possible. “Amaryllis, do you have bad eyesight?”

“I do not!” Amaryllis spat back, looking in the entirely opposite direction of Hearty. “It’s that we changelings… rely on magic for our vision.”

“Magic?” Gemmy asked.

“I hardly know the specifics, but yes,” the changeling replied. “I’m not a biologist, I’m a devotee. Faith comes to me greater than science.”

“So cut off your connection to magic, and you have the grace of a bird with no wings,” Hearty replied, looking at me with a smug grin. “Can we keep her like this forever?”

Falke forced a cough, bringing the attention to him. “As funny as that would no doubt be, I believe we have deviated from whatever we've gathered here for. Am I correct, Danse?”

“Yep,” I answered. I gave the ghoul a side glance, “and no on keeping Amaryllis blind.”

Hearty just shrugged. “Was worth a shot.”

“So I got good news and instructions from Lady Hash,” I said. “The good news is that the majority have permission to leave, with the exception of our charge.”

Amaryllis’ jaw momentarily dropped at nearly the same time Gemmy let out a sigh of relief. They attempted to rush forward, wanting to demand answers, but instead missed me and collided with another wall. Groaning and rubbing their chitin, Amaryllis finally managed to look where I was by pure chance. They also sat down, having firmly given up on figuring our where anycreature was with her magic temporarily cut off.

“I-I’m glad we’re getting out,” Gemmy said, pressing herself against my left side. “This place hasn’t been fun.”

The snort of amusement through my nostrils went unnoticed. That was mainly due to Amaryllis’ own voice filling the walls around us.

“Hold on. What do you mean I’m the only one not allowed to leave?” they asked, their shock having quickly turned into anger. “In case I need to remind you, sugar, your job is to protect me. How exactly is offering me up to Her believer’s greatest enemies protection?!”

“Mister Amaryllis, need I remind you why we are in this predicament to begin with?” Falke asked the changeling. They didn’t respond, instead turning their heads away, which ironically ended up with them looking straight at Falke. “You compromised the identity of several creatures in the Shattered Moon. You can’t expect them to not have some form of demands for your release.”

Amaryllis continued their streak of silence, acting less like the leader they claimed to be and more like a foal. I held in the urge to groan at the changeling, unable to believe the immaturity they were showing. They were really that delusional? Really made me question my own attraction to them.

With Amaryllis refusing to admit their faults, I decided to explain what Lady Hash was asking us to do. It was a basic run down, nothing too specific but more than enough to give everycreature an idea of what we were getting ourselves into. That included mentioning the mystery killer responsible for the death of some of Hash’s subordinates and the colt. Just mentioning the latter got my blood boiling again.

“Killing an unknown entity on an old warship,” Falke said, mulling over everything I had just relayed, “and uncovering a hidden megaspell bay.”

“Is it normal for these mega spells to be hidden?” Gemmy asked. “I don’t really know much about them, other than that they destroyed Equestria and are really, really dangerous.”

“Considering the destruction they are able to cause, yes,” Hearty answered. “Everycreature knew they existed, and what they could do, but outside top military brass, the ministries, and the crown? Their exact locations were unknown, in order to keep the enemy from hopefully finding them.”

“Makes you wonder what Hash wants them for,” Falke replied, scratching his beak.

All I could do is shrug. “If we want the Shattered Moon on our side and Amaryllis free, the why is less important than the how. They are trying to strip the ship of everything useful or usable. I’m hoping that, in this case, it means dismantling the spells and not using them.”

“But you do not know that for a fact,” he said.

“Nocreature would pass up on acquiring such a deterrent,” Hearty replied. “I’d bet at least a hundred caps they want it for its intended purpose.”

“But the Shattered Moon and Hash was around before the Last Day,” Gemmy replied, eyes wide with terror. “They know how bad they are. They wouldn’t do that!”

“No bigger liar and hypocrite than a leader, Gemini,” the ghoul said, giving my daughter a pat on the head. He turned his head to me. “Your own leader was one of those liars until we found her.”

“More like the pony fed the lies,” I retorted. “Either way, what choice do we have? We refuse, Amaryllis is killed. We were hired to be bodyguards, and in this case that means helping the Shattered Moon, simple as that.”

Hearty lowered his head, gritting his teeth and stomping a hoof against the floor. He took a few steps away from us, took some calming breaths, and then came back into the group. The sneer on his muzzle made it clear he wasn’t happy, but his folded ears showed reluctant acceptance.

“So, when do we go in?” he asked.

“Tomorrow, midday,” I explained. “Hash said she’s contacting a former Shattered Moon about giving us a place to sleep tonight. All of us save Amaryllis at least.”

“Yes, because the changeling can’t have any comfort,” Amaryllis spat. “Well, all of you have fun. I’ll just be sitting here, waiting for you to be done.”

“Oh, you're not getting out of this that easily Amaryllis,” I told her. The changeling froze, their mandibles up as high as could possibly be. “You’re staying in here tonight, but you’ll be with us on the Hurricane tomorrow.”

“W-w-wait, you’re making me investigate some old hunk of metal?!” they asked, practically jumping to their hooves in fear. “With some foal murdering monster and who knows what else inside?”

“You showed us you can turn into a hellhound,” Gemini said. Amaryllis’ jaw dropped open, maybe having meant to talk, but my daughter continued on. “I don’t think there is anything to worry about then.”

“Unless you are afraid that is,” Hearty said, grinning madly. “But I’m certain some mysterious killer is no match for the Voice of the Messenger.”

Amaryllis closed her mouth, going quite as her muzzle tried to form into a prideful smile. Emphasis on ‘tried’, because no matter how hard they tried they could not get rid of the terror on their face. Every single one of us smiled at the sight. I snorted, remembering how Amaryllis had acted after saving me from Ink Spot, and comparing it to now. All control had been ripped away from them, their pride had been toyed with, and the only thing a creature as prideful as her could do was lie.

“O-of course they aren’t. I just merely wish to not get my chitin dirty,” Amaryllis replied in a desperate attempt to save face. “I-i-if I must be there, then I will be there. This monster foal-murdering monster will soon wish it had never been born!”

“Perfect. I look forward to seeing you work then,” I responded cheerily.

The smile on the changeling’s face was as uneasy as it was fake. There was the tiniest bit of guilt at the back of my mind, knowing I was the one behind this decision. It didn’t stop me from going through with it, especially after they had nearly gotten us all killed. At the time I had justified my thoughts about what had happened to me back at ArcanaTech’s research outpost, and my reaction to learning I was not a pure pegasus. It had seemed obvious that the thing Amaryllis needed was a hard shock, as terrible as it was eye-opening, no matter how traumatic it really was.

Now, I feel disgusted.

It felt as good getting out in the sun as it did ditching Amaryllis. Could have done without getting blinded by the sun, but Shorelock Prison isn’t exactly the most well lit place. Even then, of all the places I actually saw inside, only one had an actual window. Being blindfolded and left in the dark doesn’t leave a pony easily well adjusted for light.

Not that I was in a position to file complaints. Unlike a certain changeling, I was willing to follow rules and regulations.

“You four wait here. Lady Hash’s contact will be here soon to take you to their place,” Three Eleven said as he took the last of our blindfolds off. “Afterwards you are free to roam Shorelock.”

“We’ll get in trouble if we walk off right now?” Gemmy asked, leaning past us all to get a look at the masked pony.

“No, but it wouldn’t exactly be nice,” he responded, a slight strain in his voice. It seems Gemmy’s silly little question had hit some nerve for him. “It’s basic etiquette.”

“Eti… quette?” Gemmy asked, looking back to me.

“It’s… the art of treating somepony well,” I said, not entirely sure of my explanation. Correct or not, Gemmy latched onto what I said like it was fact.

“Oh, I don't like how Amaryllis treats creatures,” she said, her face quickly lighting up. “Then I’ll make sure to etiquette really well!”

“Well, you have fun with that,” Hearty said, sitting down with Falke and leaning against the fence. If it wasn’t for the shade given by the prison, it probably would have burned it back horribly. “Have to say, though, kind of surprised the Shattered Moon is something you can leave.”

“It wasn’t always this way,” Three-Eleven replied, gaining the ghoul’s attention. “When the bombs fell, most of those inside the orginization were on the younger side, or war veterans. Barely anypony was over forty, apparently. Yet as they got older, they were unable to do as much…”

“Then Hash was forced to put some form of retirement option into practice, though with a host of red tape of what can and can’t be revealed,” Falke said, laying down next to Hearty. “Youth doesn’t stay forever. There comes a time when we all must put down a sword and shield.”

“That’s why you are doing this, right?” I asked. “Amaryllis is your last contract before retirement. You hint as much when I first approached you about it back in Underside.”

Falke nodded. “My mind is sharp, but my body? Well, it’s held up better than some my age would, but that isn’t saying much.”

“Tartarus of a contract you’ve given yourself,” Three Eleven said. The griffon chuckled, knowing how great of an understatement the number was making. “Still you got it right. Some of us, like the pegasus coming to meet you all, was an exception.”

My ears twitched as I turned my gaze towards the number. A piece of me couldn’t help but believe Hash had chosen a pegasus on purpose. She no doubt knew enough about the Enclave to know how years of propaganda had brainwashed us into false beliefs, and I had only been on the surface for three weeks. It was likely she was not fully convinced I was free of that, given the short time frame. Nocreature changed that fast, at least not under normal circumstances. Still, something about Enclave brainwashing being the reason behind her choice in pony left me sick, as if I was getting treated like some princess.

I think it is agreeable that I am not princess material, despite the horn growing out of my head.

“Surface born or dashite?” I asked for the number.

“Dashite. That’s all you are getting about Musical Harmony out of me.”

Every single hair on my body stood up the instant I heard the name, pupils constricting. I’m pretty certain I stopped breathing for a full five seconds, having to practically force the next breath out my throat. Once it was out I loudly sucked more air down, closed my eyes, and exhaled again. It wasn’t just me going into panic, the filly Rhapsody was doing the exact same. She went back into her cage.

It was already gone. We had thrown it into the mental equivalent of a lake, letting it sink too deep for either of us to find.

Instead, I tried to convince both her and myself that it wasn’t possible. Harmony was in jail, back up in the Enclave, where she could not find us or hurt anypony else. Those were facts after all, at least as told by my dad and the Enclave itself. As much as I hated the former, and as much as I knew the latter was not trustworthy, I wanted to hold onto the hope that maybe that was still true. It helped a little, though having no idea what Musical Harmony looked like, ‘a little’ was all I was going to get.

“Mom, you okay?” Gemmy asked. “You’re breathing really hard.”

Hearty’s attention snapped to me, immediately getting up. He placed his PipBuck on my head, likely to allow whatever medical magic it had to scan me for heatstroke. One look at my MentaBuck and knowing exactly what was going through my mind was all I needed to tell me that was false, my hoof pushing him away.

“I’m… I’m fine,” I lied. “Some of the past week just resurfaced and… it wasn’t fun.”

Gemini instantly leaned against me in an attempt to comfort me. Hearty did the same after taking a few seconds to question whether he wanted to believe me. It wasn’t completely false, the events that led to us leaving Underside were still far too fresh in my mind, but the actual cause behind my panic came from much further back. Before I became a dashite, or became a member of the high council, or joined the military.

My mind continued to tell myself there was nothing to worry about, that I was safe. The sound of hooves approaching should have alerted me to the fact that wasn’t true. Open Heart blocked whoever it was at first, having placed himself in front of them. Falke had gotten back up, meaning that this was clearly Musical Harmony. Standing back up, I once again told myself any fears I had were unwarranted.

All I needed was a single look at the mare in question to realize that was wrong.

“Hello,” said a pegasus in her mid fifties. A magenta coat identical to my own, pure white mane, blue eyes. Couldn’t see her cutie mark but I didn’t need to; it was no doubt a dashite brand. “I assume you are the ponies who will be helping us with dismantling the Hurricane?”

“Yep, that’s us!” Gemmy said, jumping up.

“I assume you are the mare Lady Hash sent then,” Falke said, continuing off of my daughter.

“That’s right!” Harmony said, her smile like searing daggers in my throat. “I’m Musical Harmony. It’s nice to meet all of….”

The chance she may not recognize me as a full grown mare died in that moment. Her gaze, innocent though it may have looked, made it feel like my heart had stood completely. Their silence didn’t go unnoticed, and with those terrifying orbs stuck on me everyponies attention soon turned to the same place.

I don’t have stage fright, but it wasn’t too hard to assume that this is what it felt like. More eyes on you than you ever wanted, waiting, seeming to anticipate the moment you fuck up, and laugh. Except here there was no laugh, no fucking up, just the waiting. I backpedaled slightly, lips making small movements but nothing substantial enough to truly bring about a sound.

Then, she said those words that I had feared. The ones that confirmed everything laid out before me.

“Rhaps… Rhapsody?”

If the pins and needles from Rhapsody’s name wasn’t enough, hearing that skyrocketed my panic to levels unimaginable. Barely thinking, I dashed off into Shorelock. Away from the prison, away from my friends…

Away from my mom.