Like always, I just couldn’t help but star-gaze.

It was the one and only hobby that has entertained me throughout my life in this new world. I’ve tried other things like crafts like pottery, sewing, and woodworks, but all of them have either failed miserably or failed miserably. In short, I only found comfort in the simple, unchangeable hobbies that I could figuratively get my hands on, such as looking up to the stars. If there was to be a point where I stopped my nightly visits to the art gallery of the night, then… that would probably mean I died or something.

It was a different type of feeling, though, when you’re star-gazing on top of a moving object. I had no idea how to explain it, but just the feeling of star-gazing on top of a train was surreal. Hell, the idea I was even on a train in the first place was surreal. Makes me wonder what other modern things I’ve been missing out in this world.

Either because of the train’s relatively slow speed or because of some other logic I couldn’t find, I wasn’t finding any trouble holding myself on the roof of the train cabin—it helped that it wasn’t super curved, too. Without the risk of falling in mind, I let myself idly enjoy the nightly ambience, embracing the white noise of the train’s wheels.

It was… another acceptable distraction from all the shit that’s been going on. So much shit… so many necessary fuck-ups…

“ You ape, get down from there!” From the door of the cabin below, under the light of a hoof-held lantern, yelled the conductor of the train. I idly gazed down at the aged stallion, his dark gray horseshoe mustache failing to hide the scowl on his patchy face.

The hell was his problem? From the way these ponies have been behaving—besides from certain individuals like the enclosed Fluttershy and that pink sugar addict—I would’ve expected at least some sort of contentment that I was out of sight. And honestly, the same goes for me; I’d rather not bother myself with these creatures anymore than I already have. “ I ain’t bothering no one, chief. Calm down.”

“ I said get down, no questions!” the conductor barked out with growing annoyance, stomping his hoof against the metal floor. “ I don’t need yet another casualty on my train…”

…Woah, what? Casualties on a train ride? That’s a curveball. “ You ponies die on this train?”

“ Tch… you aren’t the first idiot to think they’re all tough and fool around on top of a moving train,” the conductor growled, “ so clean your clogged ears and get down here!”

… Honestly, I didn’t have any reason to listen to this guy at all. Hell, I don’t think there will be a point where I’ll ever listen to an order from these ponies. For fuck sake, the majority of them were a pain in the ass, and I’m not just talking about Ms. Raintard and the Asshat Brothers. That stupid mayor nearly got me on this country’s blacklist… and I'd argue that the receptionist also made things slightly more unbearable with the unnecessary reactions too.

Well… with how persistent this old horse was being, there’s no doubt that he’d be bothering me for a hot minute if I ignored him. I guess I’ll humor his request… and besides, he already fucked up the vibe up here.

“ Alright, geez,” I huffed, hopping down to the door of the cabin and landing on the small platform. I then gave the scowling conductor an exasperated look. “ How the fuck is this train still operating with a death toll?”

I found it to be a reasonable question. Normally—at least, from what I’ve read back home—a train would be out of commission for some time while they figure out the cause of death. And even if it doesn't go out of commision, then there’s at least an extensive check on the employees during the death of that person. But I dunno… I could be just spouting nonsense there…

“ What is it for you to know, ape?” the conductor responded blandly.

“ Just curious. I mean, who wouldn’t want to know why they're riding a deadly train?”

“... Tch… fine,” the conductor huffed in annoyance, “ there are some… special sources that clear up any, ahem… misunderstandings…”

… I guess corruption finds its place in any form of society… though, I should’ve already figured that out from Flim and Flam. “ Damn… shit’s crazy.”

“ Just, get back into the cabin, ape,” the conductor grumbled.

Gladly, I did. In retrospect, I’d rather not press anymore than I already have about other’s personal business… that sort of behavior has already been a big contribution to my current fuckery of a mess, anyways.

Entering the cabin, I leisurely made my way back to my designated seat. I found the majority of the passengers around us—which numbered up to four—were either sleeping deeply or failing miserably not to sleep deeply. Fluttershy in question was still in the same spot, having easily succumbed to the former. The way she curled herself reminded me of a cat.

Out of courtesy, I silently sat myself down across from her, leaning myself against the stiffness of the seat with a discomfortable sigh. I may not be able to get a good sleep from this, but it was better than the likes of a dusty old cavern… or cold sandy dunes…

Yeah… no complaining here.

I could, at the very least, attempt to kill time by counting the dust floating past the lantern.

I stared up with a neutral expression at the four-story Italian styled red-brick building in front us. The building painfully stuck out amongst the other older and more run-down buildings; it was spotless without a single trace of dirt in sight, had glass windows that reflected the sky with the shininess of a gem, and it even had its section of the pavement completely repaved with new concrete… or, what I’d assume was concrete.

…Do these ponies know how to make concrete mix? I heard it was difficult to make primitively…

A large yellow and green striped awning stretched out from the decorative wooden front doors, with the overly-extravagant words ‘Exotic Kingdom’ written in neon and forest-themed colors on top. Small caricatures of a parrot and bunny hugged either side of the text, their small eyes and mouths flashing through a gradience of warm colors. In comparison to the backdrop of the mute-colored factory appearance of the street—and arguably the rest of the city—this building felt way too out of place.

… Wait wait wait, did I just read that sign clearly? Holy shit, I did. It's in English…!

… Well… uh, good to know I guess? I guess it means I'm not going to look all that lost in literacy…

In regards to this place’s appearance, I was beginning to doubt whether what this kid had said was true. This looked more like a place where they sold animals than other non-living items… and I should’ve already guessed that from the name alone.

…Tch, the fuck was my dumbass doing listening to some random kid on the street. Have I really fallen that desperate?

“ Hey,” I glanced up to the colt on my head, who—after completely finishing the rest of the ice cream at an overbearingly cautious pace—was slumped on my head while groaning at a low tone, “ fucking lying can get yourself hurt, kid…”

“ Hrnnn… brainfreeeze…” the colt simply whined in response, my words flying over his head.

“... Tch,” I clicked my tongue, glancing down the street. In comparison to the other places we've been to, this was like an abandoned area. I guess it would make sense for scam artists to be living in these types of places. “... hold your tongue on the roof of your mouth, kid. It’ll make it better.”

“ Hrnn…” I'm not sure whether he did it or not, but whatever. It's not like me to be kind or anything… and I'm starting to see the impact it has when I do be kind… or something… but… yeah, I'll… just… nevermind.

Well, look where your unorganized dumbassery led you this time, Robert… I guess there’s no point in turning around. I’ll just make use of any lead I get, even if it turns out to be a lie… dammit…

“ U-Um,” Fluttershy started. I glanced down at her, having completely forgotten about her in fact. Her ice cream cone was completely gone, and I guess she had left the magazine back at that plaza. Her reclusive silence would really make her a good assassin or ninja. “ Y-You can, um, p-put me down now, Robert… please…”

Right, should probably do that. I had been in such a rush for nothing, anyways. Crazy, though, how light her body was. Felt like holding a featherless bird, if that made any sense. Either that or my body has really bulked up over the years…

With a slimmer of cautiousness, I knelt down and let Fluttershy hop down to the ground, where she gratefully wobbled onto her hooves with a quiet thank you. The kid, on the other hand, remained locked tightly on my head in his brain-freeze state, his groans having been replaced with muffled hums. For a moment, I had the fleeting thought of tossing him off and onto the street—frankly because he fucking smelled, as much as I tried to ignore it—but… that would be mean. There’s a fine line between asshatery and just being a flat out jerk, so I decided on letting the kid stick on as much as he needed.

After collecting her bearings with a small sigh, Fluttershy blinked up at the auction house with a look of uncertainty. “... Um, I guess we go in..?”

“ Yep,” I nodded. Whether it was the actual place where my shit was at or not, that would be up to what we find inside. We entered the auction house without hesitation. Initially, I had the idea that an auction house was something similar to a pawn shop with how they advertised and sold their products, with the only exception being an extra room where they held their auctions. But, as the past three auction houses have shown, it was a lot more… sophisticated in terms of design. Not sure if that was the right word, but this fourth auction house sure as hell made it feel like it.

The first thing to greet us was an enormous chandelier of crystal pipes giving the illusive shape of a diamond, which sparkled with a soft white-yellow hue. Of course, this chandelier was hung right above a grand foyer, one made of both polished and unpolished white marble. The walls, floor, and the few doors I also saw were also white in color. A wide mahogany receptionist desk was situated right in the center, currently unoccupied. And going back to the ceiling, there was a large mural of a golden cloudy sky, with a few silhouettes of pegasi flying. In short, this was nothing like the past places we had been to; it felt like I walked myself right into a luxurious and wealthy Greek museum or something.

“...pretty,” Fluttershy said quietly to herself, though with the deafening silence in this place, we could all clearly hear it.

“ Hm,” I hummed, though my eyes were focused on the vacancy at the receptionist desk. Man, it would suck if they were closed… no, if that were the case, then why leave their doors open? This place looked too expensive to do something as careless as that…

Are they just understaffed, then? That would mean yet another place where these ponies don't have enough of a workforce… which is weird, because I’ve absentmindedly noted that these guys are quite numbered in terms of population…

… well, whatever, it’s their problem I guess.

“ …Ah, one second, please!” I suddenly heard a flamboyant voice echo from the staircase. Alarmingly, I looked up, immediately feeling a sense of suspicion the moment I saw the pony in question coming down. They were a relatively tall and lanky red-purple stallion, one who wore a deep green tailcoat with a golden trim and bright yellow feather collar.

That was as much as I was willing to look at before I had to look elsewhere to save my poor eyes. The colors of his clothes clashed with his darker natural color palette so badly that it made him look like the masterpiece of a kindergartner on three packs of pure, unfiltered sugar. The colors just didn't mix at all, and it was a sight I had no doubt anyone with a right mind would be annoyed at seeing. And because of that, I dutifully and forcefully distracted myself instead with the droopy red-iris eyes of the stallion.

The stallion quickly reached the end of the stairs and stopped a few feet right before us, giving an over exaggerated bow. “ My apologies, honorable guests. Welcome to Exotic Kingdom! I am Sham Rock, and I shall be your guide during your visit.”

“...” I silently stared at his introduction. I wasn’t even sure how to respond to this guy. He was giving off Flim-Flam vibes and I was not liking it one bit. This could probably be why they even bother to sell all my shit here... fucking weird thieves…

The now-named Sham Rock stood back up in a confident pose, running a hoof over his slicked-back dirty brown hair as he gave Fluttershy the smile of a salesman. “ Now then, madam, to what may I do the honors of assisting you with?”

“ O-Oh,” Fluttershy looked startled, unprepared for the sudden attention. She gave me a quick and pleading look of help. “ I-um, actually, I am n—”

“ Why, excuse me, I did not mean to pressure you. I believe I see what you are here for now,” Sham Rock quickly interrupted, eyeing me up and down with a calculative and rather disturbingly gleeful look, “ It appears that you wish to sell this creature of yours, no?”

“ S-Sell?!” Fluttershy squeaked.

I narrowed my eyes. “ The fuck was that, shithead?”

“ Oh~! He even has a level of intellect… how marvelous!”

…Yeah, no, I hate this little fucker now. He’s just like those damn brothers. He even got that type of grin too… and man, do I just want to beat the shit out of those brothers. I might as well toss this guy in, too, since he's got the same insufferable energy.

“ N-No, I’m, um, not here to s-sell Robert,” Fluttershy interjected quickly, “ h-he’s … he's actually the one buying…”

“ Collecting,” I corrected, crossing my arms as I glared at Sham Rock, “ I'm not buying shit from this place and I don't plan to. I have things here that belong to me.

Sham Rock stared at me for a moment before nodding, his smile never leaving. “ …I see. Another affirmative claim of property… I must say, it's been a trending reason for our customers’ visits.”

Trending… right, I'm likely not the first one those assholes stole stuff from. “ You know the Flim Flam Brothers, right?”

Sham Rock’s eyes widened with unadulterated elation. “ Oh yes! Flim and Flam! They're quite the respectable gentlemen, I must say.”

My face scrunched in disgust, but I continued on regardless. “ They traded in a carriage around three days ago. Where is it? My shit is in there.”

“ A carriage, you say?” Sham Rock rubbed a hoof on his chin before nodding slowly. “ … I do believe they made a recent donation. They're arguably our best patrons! That reminds me, not too long ago they had—”

Oh, fuck no. I don't have time for this nonsense. “ I don’t care. Answer the fucking question. Where'd you put my shit?”

“ … Now, I would much appreciate it if you eased your tone, Mr. Robert,” Sham Rock calmly admonished with a momentary neutral smile, all before clearing his throat, “ As for the supposed carriage you speak of, I'm afraid we have not retrieved anything of such in the past three days… much less the past month.”

Bullshit. Absolute bullshit. “ I'm not falling for your stupid lies. Tell me where the hell you put my shit right fucking now or—”

“ I am not obligated to further satisfy your curiosity, Mr. Robert,” Sham Rock cut me off with a shift in his demeanor so sudden that it made me momentarily pause. Within an instant, he went from the unbearable salesperson persona into a much more monotonous and lifeless zombie. “ As I've said, we have not received anything in your description, not before or since the Flim Flam Brothers donations.”

I stood there silently, working my jaw as I gritted my teeth hard. It was so easy, so damn easy to just send this good-for-nothing flying into that desk… and then some more. The hell was he to boss me around for? It’s so obvious right now. My shit is definitely in this place, and it doesn’t matter if he tried to cover it up. If I have to resort to ransacking this place, then I will. It’s not the first time I’ve looted a place.

But… then what? This shithouse is large. Had it been smaller, I could’ve smashed my way through until I found what I needed. But this? I’d need a hot minute to clear this place out, and I’m sure these fuckers won’t go down without hindering me along the way.

My attention then went over to Fluttershy, who was nervously digging a hoof on the floor with a discomfortable expression.

… fucking hell, Robert, where’s your head at? What good does a plan like that do? A plan made on emotions? Hell, I’m only in this mess because I’ve been blinding myself with all these irrationalities. Now I would only cause trouble to not only myself, but my benefactors as well if I kept this up. I can’t even lie, Fluttershy is a good person, and I’d be shitty to get her in trouble because I broke some law out of pettiness…

… fuck, this is so annoying.

“ Now, unless you have other business with Exotic Kingdom, I must ask you to leave,” Sham Rock concluded. His seriousness then completely vanished in an instance, returning to his original giddy smile as he glanced over at Fluttershy. “ However, you are welcome to stay and have a look at our public catalog, madame.”

Fluttershy gave a weak smile before shaking her head. “ Um… no thank you.”

“... Fucking hell,” I exhaled, running a hand through my face. Try to keep calm, Robert. That’s the one thing I have to maintain, less I only make this worse. “... Just… ok, just tell me what those two idiots gave you then. Carriage or not, they still brought something.”

“... Assuming your derogatory epithet is referring to Flim and Flam, I again cannot give you anything more than I've said,” Sham Rock’s eyes narrowed, “ Exotic Kingdom’s business information is strictly encrypted for the protection of our customers and patrons.”

Fucking of course it is. “ Nothing? No blankets, jars, ties? Not even the fancy wardrobe?”

My eyes widened slightly as I instantly saw Sham Rock flinch briefly from the word wardrobe. Ah, see? He knows. Little fucker can’t hide it once I start naming my shit…

I narrowed my glare when his gaze faltered towards the wall. He then coughed into her hoof. “ … I must ask you to leave now, Mr. Robert.”

“ No, the fuck I'm not,” I took a step further, cracking my fingers in the process… before stopping and then wisely putting them to my side. “ You sly piece of shit, I can see through your lies. Tell me where you put my shit.”

“ Again, I cannot give you anymore information, Mr. Robert. Please leave the vicinity before I have to contact local law enforcement.”

“...” Did that even matter? The fuck could these ponies—no, no no no. Stop that shit, Robert. Can’t lose my temper that easily. It doesn't matter how easy it is. If I get the police on my tail, then I can kiss a peaceful life goodbye.

I sighed deeply in frustration, closing my eyes before making a sharp turn towards the door. “ Fine… I'm out of this shit hole.”

Unlike the other auction houses, I was not given a courteous goodbye as I left the building. In just the span of less than three minutes, just like the past places we’ve been to, I found myself back in square one. However, this time, I’ve actually made some progress.

With purpose, I then sharply made a turn on the street, quickly making distance from the auction house. Fluttershy caught up to me, giving me a surprised and confused look. “ R-Robert, where are you going?”

“ Taking the back route,” I said plainly, not stopping my stride even once.

“ The… why?”

I gave her a wide grin. “ It’s obvious, right? My stuff is definitely in that auction house, and that asshole knows it as well.”

Fluttershy pressed her lips, averting her gaze to the moving concrete. “ Um, W-Well… Mr. Sham Rock did say that Flim and Flam had been here…”

“ But he ain’t gonna give it to me. Best option I have left is to break in.”

“ B-B-Break in?!” Fluttershy gawked alarmingly, giving me a scared look. “ Y-Y-You can’t do that, Robert! That’s illegal!”

“ So what? What Flim and Flam did was illegal, and I never saw their asses getting arrested,” I scoffed with indignation. Sometimes, there were things in life that you just had to do in order to achieve what you need, no matter how unethical it was. And as much as I hate to say it… those two brother’s also share that principle with me. It's a good principle to have in the first place.

And even then… I think this is a much better “forceful” approach than my initial “fuck it all and punch them in the face” approach. At least I can explain breaking in rather than harming a citizen.

With that in mind, I made a sharp turn into the next alleyway I saw, quickly sinking into the darkened tunnel. Right behind me, Fluttershy began to fly to catch up. Whether she wanted to join in or not… I leave that to her decision. This should be something I do alone, anyways.

“... aaaugh,” yawning loudly, the colt craned his back and stretched his hooves over his head. Patting his lips together, he blinked lazily, taking in his surroundings as he returned from the dream realm. Very quickly, however, did his eyes instantly shoot wide open, noticing the substantial distance between him and the ground. “ W-W-Woah!?”

Feeling the sudden and erratic movement on my head, I glanced up with both an exasperated and annoyed frown. “ Finally woke up, huh?”

Given the frightened expression he had, I thought for a second he didn't hear me. But as his grip on my head grew tighter by the second, he became a stuttering mess. “ W-W-Where am I? W-W-Why are we so u-u-up here?! G-Get me down!”

“ Calm down,” I huffed deeply, grabbing the back of the colt’s neck and prying him off my head, “ we’re only two stories up. You won’t die from this height.”

Almost automatically, the colt diverted his death grip onto my forearm, his body visibly shaken. I sighed once again, plopping him down onto my lap instead of heading to my intrusive thought of tossing him aside. In all honesty, if I were a kid being manhandled by a giant stranger while being several feet above ground, I maybe would've also felt the same agitation. Still, it's annoying as fuck.

Fluttershy, in response, moved slightly closer and put a gentle hoof on the colt’s shoulder with a gentle smile. “ It’s okay, sweetie… there’s no need to be worried. We’re only staying here for just a little bit.”

Her soothing words seemed to do the trick, for the colt visibly relaxed. I felt his shaking stop as he stared down meekly, most likely out of embarrassment. Curiosity quickly took hold of him, though. “ But… why? What are we even doing up here?”

“ Waiting,” I answered plainly.

The colt glanced up at me with a suspicious tone. “ For what?”

“ The Rapture.”

“... huh?”

I exhaled slowly, leaning back against the dry and smog-covered brick wall… which was a subtle reminder that I'd need another shower after all of this. “ You’ll find out soon enough.”

“ uh… ok…”

A silence soon followed, falling amongst the three of us as we allowed the ambience of the distant business of the city fill the void. Honestly, there wasn’t really much to talk about, especially in a situation like this. Here we were—two ponies and one guy—seated on the somewhat-rusted fire escape of one random building covered in boarded windows and cracked bricks. Oh, and don’t forget the ever present film of pollution in the air… like damn, that had to be some next level health risk. Fortunately, we seemed fine for now, but I’m definitely sure a doctor’s visit is needed soon…

… could these ponies even tend to me? Shit, they probably can’t…

…eh, no problem. I’ve lived long enough without a doctor’s visit ever since coming into this world, and there’s been many times where a doctor was definitely needed…

In any case, I took this time to be a quick reflection of what the actual hell I'll be doing from now. Sure, I'll be breaking into that shithouse, but what then? I'm not gonna act like I'm sneaky enough to make my way through the entire place without being caught… but I can’t see any other way I’d go about this. I guess anything would be a much better alternative than outright storming in, now that I’m clearly thinking about it. And above all else it probably would be convenient to have a map of the place too, despite the irrationality of that ever happening…

… yeah, this sucks—and frankly it’s infuriating—but I have to do the best I can here. There’s no going back on this. I’d be more at ease with some of my stuff instead of none.

But with that aside, I really don’t have a plan beyond breaking in and wandering the place. This is technically going to be my first robbery… if I were to look at this shallowly. I don’t even know how to lockpick, for fuck’s sake… and of course the latch behind the building—which is the only backdoor entrance to the place, mind you—oh-so-surprisingly has a lock.

Maybe I could wander around and find a crowbar or something… maybe even a bolt cutter… and for that, my best bet is probably a junkyard or something… did we even pass by a junkyard?

Agh, fuck this shit. I can’t even collect myself right now. Damn it all…

“ … Hey, Ms. Fluttershy,” the colt suddenly spoke up, gaining the yellow pegasus’s attention.

“ Yes?” Fluttershy replied, tilting her head.

“ You look familiar. Are you famous?”

“ Oh, um,” Fluttershy’s ears lowered slightly as she took on a shy look, “ I-I don’t want to brag or anything, but… um, I am one of the Elements of Harmony.”

“ Woah,” the colt’s eyes widened in awe—actually no, admiration, “ so you’re one of the nation’s heroes!”

“ Um, well… oh dear…” Fluttershy pressed her lips, seemingly overwhelmed from the attention.

Heroes? This is the second time hearing about the supposed Elements of Harmony, and now with the notion they’re war heroes. Or just heroes, cause they got magic here and everything. I… I guess this could serve as a short distraction. “ What’s up with all this element stuff? Sounds important”

“ You don’t know, mister?” The colt shot me a surprise and an almost appalled look. “ They’re the heroes of Equestria! They stopped Nightmare Moon and saved us from eternal night!”

Eternal night. Ha… well, not gonna lie, that’s not the most obscure thing I’ve heard… much less seen, but it still kinda feels overexaggerated. I glanced over to Fluttershy instead for a more rational response.

“... Uhm, y-yes. The colt…” Fluttershy started, though only for her eyes to widen, “ oh my, we haven’t even gotten your name, have we?”

The colt blinked, realizing as much as the two of us that we really didn’t even bother to ask his name, even after everything that had happened. Which is sort of… sad, now that I think about it. “ I’m Toothpick.”

“ Well, Toothpick, sorry for carrying you along without asking your name,” Fluttershy giggled, “ but yes, he’s speaking the truth Robert.”

“ Nah, it’s fine,” the now-named Toothpick shrugged dismissively, waving a hoof, “ I’m used to it… happens a lot more than I favor.”

“ …Who the hell names their kid Toothpick,” I decidedly pushed that topic aside and voiced my opinion. And frankly I think it was a reasonable question; I wouldn’t be caught naming my kid over some common house item… Well, in this kid’s case, it’s even less than that.

“ … That’s a rude thing to say, Robert,” Fluttershy frowned slightly.

“ Just wondering.”

“ The headmaster said my mum named me that before passing away,” Toothpick explained, not seeming visibly bothered by the question, “ I dunno why, but I think it has something to do with my Cutie Mark.”

So he pretty much confirmed he was an orphan, huh? Cool, I guess… err, not like that is a good thing, or something. Fuck no. And again, another strange terminology from these ponies. I don’t even wanna bother trying to know what a fucking Cutie Mark is, but… my curiosity got the best of me.

I was going to ask what it was, but the Toothpick suddenly stood up from my lap and turned around, showing the side of his hind leg. There, a clear image of a shiny metal needle could be seen.

Fluttershy’s fleeting look of sympathy turned into curiosity as she saw the Cutie Mark. For my part, I was questioning the ethics of giving a child a permanent tattoo. “ Oh, congratulations! What does your Cutie Mark mean?”

“ I’m good at picking locks,” Toothpick grinned with pride, “ I’ve picked over a hundred locks in all of Fillydelphia! There’s nopony better at picking locks than me!”

…

… That is… oddly convenient.

“ Well, that’s very good to hear, Toothpick, and I think it’s very good that you're confident,” Fluttershy said in a reassuring yet almost coding tone. It kinda reminded me of a mother speaking to a child. “ But remember to not let that get into your head, ok?”

“ Pshh, don’t worry, I know my limits,” Toothpick huffed dismissively, though his cheeky smile never left, “ because I don’t have any—woah!”

Hearing more than enough, I stood up while grabbing Toothpick in the manner of grabbing a cat. I walked towards the edge of the platform while he flailed his stubby limbs helplessly. “ Alright, I think enough time has passed. Let’s get our asses moving.”

“ Which donk—”

“ I said we’re going.”

“... Um, ok…” Fluttershy stood up and readied herself, although her hesitation was very obvious.

“ Wait wait wait, where are we going?” Toothpick exclaimed in agitation. “ A-And put me doooOOOOOWN!?!”

Deaf to his words, I made no hesitation as I leapt over the edge of the platform, descending two stories worth of air before crashing down hard onto the stone ground. Knees bent, I stood still for a moment as my body absorbed the shock of the impact. As crazy as my actions were, I have found myself in many similar situations prior to this, all of which confirmed my rather obscure resistance to fall damage. It was a feature of mine that I’ve made use of greatly.

That aside, Fluttershy—in a more graceful manner—descended down by gliding with her wings. For a split moment after seeing that, I stopped to realize that I had, in fact, befriended a mythical creature. Well… was it really befriended? I thought I already addressed this. Benefactor, right? Or, well, more than that, since she’s tagging along a lot longer than a benefactor would normally. And… she seems to think we're friends, I guess?

The hell am I spouting… I shouldn't be overthinking this.

With that said, I gave a firm nod to Fluttershy, to which she smiled back, and we began our short trip back to the Exotic Kingdom Auction House.

“... I thought you said you were good at lock picking.”

“ I am!” Toothpick shot back sharply with a frown, his hooves messing around with the bronze lock binding the large latch. His actions, although starting off calmly, gradually became erratic and almost desperate. “ It's just that this…. dumb lock isn't working with me!”

“ Well, yeah, that's the whole purpose of a lock,” I said dismissively, pocketing my hands. I scanned the area for the hundredth time and kept my ears focused for any approaching footsteps. Fortunately that has yet to happen, but with the noise we were making I wouldn't doubt we'd eventually hear someone coming. “ Try to keep it down, at least? I don't need you fucking this all up.”

“ Yeah, just gimme a sec… hrn!!” Toothpick grunted, somehow appearing to have found a knot or something. Whatever it was, I'm not sure if lock picking requires you to start yanking away at the lock to remove your pick. Well, with my lacking knowledge on picking in the first place, I can't really judge.

“... Ahah!” With an exclamation, the lock that Toothpick was messing with broke free, ceremoniously falling down onto the ground. “ Phew… that was probably the hardest lock I've ever picked!”

“ Well, good job,” I passively praised as I instantly went for the latch. Had this little runt not been around, I probably would’ve given up on this lock minutes ago… hell, I probably wouldn’t have even noticed this auction house in the first place until much later. This kid really has been helpful, huh?

Grabbing hold of the metal handles, I threw the wooden doors open, revealing a wooden staircase that went down into the dark. With the current time of the day making our general surroundings dimmer, this staircase into the void sort of gave an eerie feeling… not that I’m scared, of course.

“... I still think this is a bad idea, Robert,” Fluttershy said in a hushed tone. She took her eyes away from the abyss and looked down at the broken lock apologetically. “ … we should go back to Mr. Sham Rock and ask nicely… a-and, um, also replace his lock… maybe…?”

I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose. For a second I thought she had stopped with the righteous lecturing… but I guess a supposed ‘heroine of the nation’ would have her own take on all of this. “Look, Fluttershy, I get that this is maybe wrong in the general sense, but it's clear that guy isn't giving my shit back.”

“ …Maybe we just didn't approach him right.”

“ Doesn't matter, with that sort of attitude I doubt that fucking liar would’ve been honest in the first place,” I snorted, putting a foot on the first step, “ sometimes you gotta push to the extreme measures to get the things you hold dear to you, Fluttershy.”

Fluttershy hummed in partial agreement. “ But… for the safety of both you and your belongings, you should also try to find the most peaceful way to get what you want back, no?”

“… point taken.” I gave no other response as I began my descent down the stairs. With a short yelp, Toothpick caught up to me, though clearly not going anywhere ahead of me. For a second, I thought Fluttershy wouldn’t be coming—and I had nothing against her doing that—but a second later I could hear her light footsteps following.

It took a moment for our eyes to adjust, but at the end of the short stairs we were faced with a door surrounded by a concrete wall. This one, however, was metal and had no lock, and so I freely opened it to reveal a long corridor, which gave me the vibes of an oil rig. And with the numerous pipes and wires decorating the ceilings and walls—and for some reason the subtle scent of fish that I could catch in the air—I could’ve been fooled that I was in an oil rig… if I were to ever suddenly and randomly wake up here, of course.

“... Why—” I spoke out loud, though cut myself off instantly as I heard my voice echoing in the corridor. Standing stiffly, I waited for a moment before speaking in a much lower tone. “ … why would an auction house need all this piping.”

“ Um, I don’t know,” Fluttershy admitted sheepishly, although I really wasn’t expecting an answer from anyone in the first place.

“ Maybe, this used to be an old factory,” Toothpick whispered back, squinting his eyes towards the faint text on one of the pipes. I, of course, couldn’t read shit, so I soundly ignored it. “ Fillydelphia has a lot of factories.”

“ But an underground one?” I asked openly, leaving the question hanging in the air. I think there was a mutual agreement to the oddity of the situation.

In any case, it was rather fortunate that this corridor was somewhat lit from the small lights dotting the corners of the ceiling. It’s a much better alternative than walking through literal darkness, which was what I had in mind beforehand. I carefully closed the door behind us—much to Fluttershy’s poorly-hidden dismay—and continued onwards. Coming to about three quarters of the length of the corridor, we quickly met a split in the path. Both our left and right led to equally long corridors, which gave off the sense that this place was going to be a maze… well, it definitely is a maze, no doubt there, but just pointing it out.

Since we really didn’t know where to be going specifically, I decided to just wing it and choose the left path. That, of course, led to another split, and from there I chose the right path. Then left, then right. Quickly we were in this rhythm of interchanging paths whenever we saw a split, and quickly I was beginning to question just how large this place was. And it all looked the same too, in an uncanny sort of way. Each hallway was literally the same, and I confirmed that even the pipe patterns or whatever were the fucking same. The only thing that slightly changed was when we suddenly heard the large fans start to pick up. I got a good chuckle from when the two flinched, but otherwise we continued this repetitive pattern.

“ … The hell?” Squinting my eyes, I voiced out my thoughts as we stumbled across a path that—finally—was not the same damn copy-paste corridors we were wandering through. This new route had another flight of stairs, though instead of going up it was going even further down. Going down to where, however, was the question.

“ Should we go down?” Toothpick asked mindlessly, also looking down the staircase with partial interest.

“ …I don’t see why not,” I shrugged, beginning my flight down the metal stairs. Any second of hesitation was a waste of time, and as I’ve come to learn, that wasted time is invaluable in all situations.

“ W-Wait,” Fluttershy exclaimed, causing me to pause. I looked back and saw her distressed look, though I wasn’t sure if it was because of the stairs. “ D-Do we, um, know our way back?”

I blinked for a moment before nodding slowly. “ Yeah, we went left, right… right, right… left, left… uh…”

“ Wait, wasn’t it left, right, right, left, right, left, left?” Toothpick corrected.

“ No… fuck, um…” I scratched the back of my head, trying to recollect our turns, “... I don’t think so…?”

“ Oh dear…” Fluttershy’s shoulders sank lightly in defeat. “ we’re lost, are we?”

I mean… ok, maybe we are. But that shouldn’t be a problem in the grand scheme of things, right? I’m more so worried about finding my stuff than getting out… for now, at least.

I sighed lightly while waving a hand at her. “ Don’t worry ‘bout it, we’ll find our way out once I get my stuff back.”

“ Um… a-alright,” Fluttershy nodded. Whether her trust in me was waning or not, I wasn’t sure. I wasn’t even sure she even had trust in me in the first place, but whatever.

I didn’t leave room for any more conversation as I continued down the stairs. At the bottom, we were met with more corridors—hurray!—but the condition of the new level was slightly worse. Some of the pipes were showing signs of rust, and I could see a few drops of water(?) leaking from the corners. The scent of fish was also getting much stronger. It sort of reminds me of the fish section of a farmer’s market, or like an aquarium.

Toothpick scrunched his nose as we made way down the path, carefully avoiding the puddles of liquid littering the floor. “ Smells fishy in here…”

“ …metaphorically or literally?” I asked blandly.

Toothpick didn’t answer immediately, but he did snicker once he caught on to his double statement. “ Haha, both! I didn’t even notice that!”

“ Well, then yeah, there’s probably an underground water tank here,” I guessed. My on-the-spot theory came to a quick halt, however, as I noticed the first door we’ve seen other than the entrance. I went quiet for a moment, leaning into the glass window to see what was on the other side, but I couldn’t see anything but darkness. “... Toothpick, open this door for a sec.”

“ Sir, yes sir,” scurrying up to the mystery door, Toothpick got up to his hind legs with his pick in his mouth. Before he could go on any further, however, he stopped when he was faced with no lock. In fact, there wasn’t even a door handle. “ Uh, there’s no lock.”

Ah, I should’ve noticed the obvious there. I tried pushing against the door but it didn’t budge either. Perhaps it was a one-way door, or maybe it was a fake event. In any case, I ignored it, and continued on the path. It was a sign we were getting close to something.

“ … what was I saying again?” I started, rubbing my chin for a moment before snapping my fingers. “ Ah, right, this place most likely has a large tank around here. And based on the smell it’s probably a fish tank.”

“ But why though?” Toothpick asked, tilting his head.

“ Good question.”

“...?”

“ …Well, um, this auction house is called Exotic Kingdom,” Fluttershy added, “ maybe they sell… oh dear…”

Toothpick looked at Fluttershy in concern. I, on my part, simply curled a brow. “ What’s wrong, Ms. Fluttershy? What do they sell?”

“ I just thought of something terrible,” Fluttershy frowned slightly with a look of displeasure, “ I really hope not, but m-maybe this auction house s-sells… um…”

“ …Animals. They could be selling animals,” I finished for her, catching on to what she was implying, “ and judging by the name Exotic, it’s probably not domesticated animals like cats or dogs.”

“ Oh…” Toothpick nodded slowly, seemingly catching on. Or maybe not… actually, no. No point double guessing the colt. He hasn’t shown himself to be a dumbass yet. “ So like a Cragadile?”

… Nevermind. “... it’s Crocodile, Toothpick.”

“ No, Cragadile.”

I huffed, deciding not to waste my energy on that road. “ Ok ok, whatever. Maybe they do have some of those in here. I don’t know, and I frankly don’t fucking care. I just want my shit back and then I’m outta here.”

We fell into a silence once again, although fleeting. The splits on this corridor, as we eventually came to meet once again, was like a fork this time. I mindlessly took the middle route.

After some time, Toothpick gave me a curious look. “ Hey, Mr. Robert, what’s the stuff you’re looking for anyways?”

“ Hm? Uh… well, just some of my travel goods,” I said dismissively, passively realizing I haven’t actually told these two what my stuff even was, “ blankets, pots, tableware, furniture… yeah, all that good stuff.”

After listing off my belongings, I felt a content smile on my face. Weird, really, that recalling the things you own could elevate your mood like this so suddenly. Unfortunately, I also remembered that I didn’t own them anymore, and it just as suddenly vanished and I returned to my neutral scowl.

That aside, my explanation was met with silence. Curiously, I glanced at the two ponies with me, only to slightly flinch when I saw their rather judgemental looks. Like, even Fluttershy was giving me one. The fuck?

“ …Mr. Robert,” Toothpick began.

“ What?” I responded suspiciously.

“ You know you can… just buy all that back, right?”

I blinked before frowning. “ The hell are you trying to say, kid?”

“ Well, it’s just blankets and pots right?” Toothpick explained, not looking all that intimidated from my deep glare. “ You can probably get new ones, even better ones, from the store.”

Just blankets and pots? Just??? The hell?? “ The fuck would you know about that? Stop spouting nonsense.”

“ A-As brash as Toothpick said it, h-he does have a point, Robert,” Fluttershy added on, “ I, um, thought you were doing this for a… family heirloom of sorts… not…”

…

… I exhaled deeply, though I struggled to release the tight grip in my fists.

Just… ok. Ok, remain calm Robert. These two don’t know shit—none of them do. Don’t get mad at their ignorance… yes, don’t. I shouldn’t expect them to know any better…

“ …Let’s keep moving,” I managed to grumble, picking up my walking pace.

Slightly startled from the sudden speed, the two struggled to keep up with me, Toothpick more than Fluttershy. “ H-Hey, wai—”

“ Shut the fuck up.”

“...O-Ok…”

It felt like hours wandering this “auction house”, though in reality it was roughly ten minutes since we entered this maze. Even then, it was absurd just how fucking large this place was. It almost felt like there was a lot more going on behind the whole auction house thing, and I’m really starting to feel like that’s the case.

In fact, our most recent discovery can account to that. We’ve now found ourselves within a room—courtesy to a door that was actually not fake. Like I had predicted early, the room was the source of the fish smell. It was actually an observatory, with a large glass wall showing the deep blue expanse of a massive water tank. And when I say massive, I mean like baffling massive. It’s actually fucking insane how large this tank is, and rightfully we all just stood there gobsmacked.

“... Now this is definitely fishy,” Toothpick exclaimed.

I snapped out of my momentary awe and deadpanned. “... jokes aren’t funny the second time, kid.”

“ Still, I didn’t know something like this was under Fillydelphia!”

… He does have a point there. Given the whole industrial and depressively gray vibes the city had, the least of things a person would think this city had was an underground aquarium. And what’s even stranger is that I’m sure we're nowhere near a large body of water, like a lake or ocean. Maybe a few rivers, sure, but still. How they manage to get this amount of water all the way down here is just… absurd.

In any case, that wasn’t the only thing in this room. Near the far end on the other side was a desk, once you get past the rows of seats in the middle of the room. Perhaps this was like an observatory for rich folks or something, which I wouldn’t be surprised about. But that didn’t fucking matter; what really mattered was the piles of papers on that desk. In our situation, this was like hitting gold.

Walking up towards the desk, I picked up some papers and brought it close to the orange wall light. Of course, I wasn’t trying to read, but instead trying to see if there were any pictures I could deduce from. Unfortunately, it all looked to be just some documentation, with the only image being a logo on the top corner. And that logo… it didn’t match the logo of the Exotic Kingdom Auction House. Yep, some suspicious shit if I knew anything.

“... Oh my…” Fluttershy breathed, having also approached the desk and curiously looked at the papers.

I walked up to her and leaned down to look at the paper she was reading, placing whatever I was looking at aside. “ What’d you find?”

“ Well, uhm, these are shipment reports from a few months ago,” Fluttershy explained, gently turning to the next page, “ and… they talk about shipping a lot of creatures. Giant guppies, tropical fish, albino cragadiles, and… !!!”

Fluttershy suddenly gasped, putting a hoof to her mouth as her eyes gave off a look of pure horror. What? The shift in demeanor was so sudden it literally threw me off. I was quickly getting a bad feeling. “ What? What’d you read?”

“ …. I-I…”

“ Calm down, Fluttershy. What the hell did you just read?”

Fluttershy took a deep breath before exhaling shakingly. I could see the wetness of tears forming in the corner of her eyes…

… holy shit, this must be something serious.

“ T-They…” Fluttershy began, taking one more breath before continuing, “ they’ve a-also shipped in s-sea ponies…”

“...?” I tilted my head, trying to make sense of her words. Sea ponies? Like seahorses? But why… wait, no, if that were the case then she would’ve had the same reaction to ‘Giant guppies’ or whatever. Then… that means she was saying this in a literal sense… right? That this auction house brought in a bunch of literal sea ponies…

…an auction house, run by ponies, selling… ok, what the fuck? This… that would just be flat out slave trade, no??? I… wow…

I ran a hand through my hair. Ok, even if I really am more worried about getting my shit back, I couldn’t just ignore flat out signs of supposed slavery going on in the background. That’s… fuck man, and I thought that the majority of these ponies looked to be all sunshines and rainbows. I guess that was all just a facade, then.

“ …Where the fuck did they put them? These sea ponies,” I quickly asked.

“ U-Um… s-section forty-five?” Fluttershy struggled to read as the tears began to fall. This must be something that really messes her up… and I can understand why. I myself can’t really joke about trafficking other living creatures… especially from the same damn species. Humanity has an ugly record of that. “ I-It doesn’t say anything else but that…”

I exhaled, standing back up with a serious look. “ Alright, section forty-five. That’s good enough… maybe if we pass by section forty-five, we can probably do something about it.”

“ N-No, Robert…” Fluttershy quickly interjected, sniffing as she stepped back from the desk, “ we have to report this… i-if these ponies can do s-something so c-cruel, t-then they… they m-might do a-a-anything to keep it hidden.”

… fuck, the hell was I spouting? She’s right, something like this can’t just be solved so forwardly. If we’re talking about human… pony trafficking, then we’re talking about ponies that are resolved to kill. And not even that… in the case we do start freeing them so brashly, where would we even take the captives? We don’t even know our way out of here anymore, for fuck’s sake. This… why the hell am I acting so emotionally again? I thought I already dealt with this behavior…

“... I understand, Fluttershy,” I huffed, crouching down beside her. I took the cleanest part of my shirt and gently offered to wipe her tears away, to which she allowed without resistance. I didn’t really care if I got make-up on my clothing, though surprisingly I didn’t even get a smear. I guess she just had naturally heavy eyelashes, or just the ponies in general. “ Sorry, didn’t mean to say something brash, but try to calm down, alright? We can… we can still probably take a few of these documents with us as proof… or something.”

Although she didn’t verbally respond, Fluttershy meekly nodded. The best thing we could do right now is not settle on the topic for so long; we came here for different purposes, anyways. With that somewhat settled—though obviously not leaving our minds for a while—I stood back up and flipped through the other papers we didn’t look through. Eventually, Fluttershy got her bearings and also helped. While not saying anything outwardly, we sort of had an instinctive cooperation, and we stacked up papers we did and didn’t look through. I guess it was because of this that we eventually found the elixir of immortality, and by that I mean a map.

“ Fucking finally,” I exhaled, spreading out the blue-tinted paper to reveal a diagram of the entire area. My eyes momentarily widened at the size of the map before slowly giving a side-eyes towards Fluttershy. “...uh…”

Thankfully, Fluttershy gave me a knowing smile, although a weak one. I lowered the map down to her eye level and allowed her to read. Eventually, she pointed at a spot with the tip of her hoof. “ We’re right here… and here was the exit we came from… I think.”

“... damn,” My breath escaped me. She was currently pointing near the corner of the map. The fucking corner of the map. That was implying that the rest of the map was the whole damn facility. And I mean facility because there’s no way in hell this entire place was an auction house. That illusion is already gone; there’s a lot more dark stuff at play around here.

The question now, however, is where my shit was… and of more recent importance, where this supposed section forty-five is.

“ … this place is quite large,” Fluttershy commented, sharing an equal amount of surprise, “ there’s another exit here that enters into Fetlock Avenue… and that’s about, um, a few streets from the auction house.”

“ So this place runs all under this city, huh?” I guessed. Really, it wasn’t a guess but more of an observation. The sheer size of this map would attest to that. Like, damn, what’re they doing with all of this space?

“ Yes…” Fluttershy fell silent for a moment before speaking a bit lower, “ and… the, um, s-section forty-five is on Railway Street… a-across the city…”

Not surprised that she was also looking for that. Doesn’t help knowing it’s that far away from us, though. At least we got its location, I guess. “ Is this place like the sewers of the city or something? I doubt the city mayor or whoever would even allow some company to purchase all this underground space.”

“ Um, no, this is the Scorn Facility Map,” Fluttershy said, pointing towards some bold text on the top.

Facility. Ha, I knew it. And Scorn? That’s the name of the company, presumably. A negative word for a company of negative activities. In any case, this just means that all my shit was entered the black market. Oh, how I love that…

I sighed, running my eyes around the map. “ Ok, then is there—”

“ Woah!” Toothpick suddenly exclaimed out loud. Throughout our entire document search, the colt had been sitting near the glass window, staring blankly into the water void as if consciousness itself was a foreign concept to him. And really, I much rather preferred that than him messing around while we did our search.

That aside, the room suddenly got much dimmer, and I looked back just in time to see the shadow of a colossal tail leave the view of the window. We all just stood there in silence before I decidedly shuffled through the papers we looked through. “ … we should leave now.”

“ W-What was that…?” Toothpick stuttered with a gasped breath.

“ No clue,” I shrugged, rolling up the map, “ but if shark movies have taught me anything, you shouldn’t be standing near the window of a fish tank.”

“ R-Right…”

With that said, I made my way towards the door. “ Alright, let’s keep going. The longer we stay, the more at risk everything becomes.”

I didn’t get any verbal responses, but we were all pretty much on the same page. No second later, we returned the room to its vacancy.

“ …You telling me this place goes deeper?”

Fluttershy nodded meekly. “ Y-Yes, there’s about four levels in total… a-and they get smaller the further we go.”

Well, isn’t that fucking convenient. “ And what floor are we on?”

“ Um, floor three.”

Shit, so we haven’t even gone that far in terms of exploring this place… I mean, I guess that was already confirmed back in the observatory, but still. What the fuck man. I’m worried whether my shit is all the way down at floor one or something, because if that’s the case, then this little tour of ours will be needing an extension date.

“ Where’s the closest information center… or where do they keep all their logs of things coming in?” I asked. It would be smarter to just find out where they keep their log history, to not only reduce our search time but also probably give us more intel on this company’s dirty work. Sure, I’m not a detective or anything, but given the shit we’ve stumbled across… I don’t think we can just so simply ignore a responsibility like this.

Responsibility. Sounds very heroic of me to say, yeah… also doesn’t benefit me in any way by doing it… but it doesn’t hurt to be a good human sometimes, eh?

“... actually, there are two nearby,” Fluttershy pointed out two green dots near the corridor we were on. One was about three corners away while the other was two corners. “ They’re called ‘server hubs’, and... um, I don’t know if that’s what you’re looking for…”

“ No, this is good,” I nodded. It was a start, and we weren’t on a time restraint at the moment. I stood up from where we rested, glancing towards Toothpick. The little guy was having a blast dodging the gusts water vapor which occasionally shot out from a busted pipe. I’m not sure if that was safe, but he seemed to handle himself well. “ Toothpick, stop fooling around. We’re going.”

“ Alright!” Rather eagerly, Toothpick ran up to us with his tail wagging. Like, literally wagging. I thought only dogs and shit did that, but low and behold this kid. “ Where’re we going next?”

I simply snorted, rolling my eyes. Not sure where all the energy was coming from, but I guess it wasn’t bad. “ Just keep quiet. You’ll find out.”

“ Ok!”

The closest of the two “server hubs” unsurprisingly failed to stay true to its convenience of being the closest of the two. And by that, I mean the door was knob-less. That meant going to the second location. However, on the trip towards the second spot, the further we went the more the damage got even crazier. Rust became the new color of the pipes, and the fans sounded damaged. In fact, there were some corridors we couldn’t even go through since there was huge flooding from completely torn pipes blocking the way. And while it was just a small inconvenience—this place did have plenty of alternative routes—what really set me off was the claw-shaped marks on those damaged pipes.

“... the fuck?” I muttered to myself, closely examining the claw marks. I wasn’t all that worried about looking so close. They must’ve closed the valves for these specific pipes, because otherwise water should be spraying out right now. And judging from the shape of the marks as well as the crooked length, I could safely deduce that I had no fucking idea which animal these came from. But even without being an animal track expert, I could calmly conclude that we don’t want to meet whoever made these marks.

“ Hey, isn’t this kinda creepy?” Toothpick asked out, though the jolliness in his tone contradicted his words. “ Don’t all these claws mean one of the animals got out?”

“ Probably,” I hummed dismissively.

“… these are stress marks,” Fluttershy said, pressing her lips nervously as she also examined them. “ … the poor thing must’ve been hurting, and they didn’t know.”

… ah, didn’t she say she took care of animals? Right, so she’d know something about this. “ I doubt this company really cares about something like that.”

“ They should… all of this damage should be a perfect example why,” Fluttershy huffed with a hint of indignation. Ha, image; Fluttershy talking about you with indignation. Could never be me.

“ Well, let’s keep moving,” I stepped back from the pipes and began heading backwards, “ I’d rather we avoid any bad omens like this.”

“ Pshh, omen shmormen,” Toothpick snorted, quickly catching up to me, “ the water isn’t coming from the pipes anymore, so they probably fixed it.”

“ That’s no reason to not be cautious, kid.”

“ You’re just being a big ol’ worry wart, Mr. Robert. What’s the worst that could happen?”

The moment those words came out of his mouth, I instantly stopped walking and went rigid. Confused, both Fluttershy and Toothpick looked up at me, only to see me glaring back at the colt like he was the incarnation of the devil himself. “ … you…you little shit!”

“ …W-Wha…?” Toothpick winced back from my shout, confusion present on his face.

“ The fuck are you doing saying shit like that, huh?!”

“ I don—”

I cut him off as I slammed my fist into the wall, causing him to jump. “ NO! Don’t you realize what the hell you just done—”

“ R-Robert?!” Fluttershy interjected, concern and confusion filling her voice, “ d-don’t yell at Toothpick, he’s just a colt—”

“ Fuck no, Fluttershy! He just—”

I never got to finish my sentence, nor were we ever given time to prepare. No second later—as if on cue, in fact—the lights in the corridor began to suddenly flicker on and off wildly. The background noise of the fan propellers began to accelerate to seemingly dangerous speeds, causing the air to thrash around erratically. And to add to the sudden and arguably frightening scene, the ground and air began to shake violently with the sound of powerful stomps. The stomp quickly began to grow louder and more violent, and just when we thought something was coming…!!!

…

… everything went still.

The fans stopped altogether, the stomping all but disappearing as well. The lights returned back to their stable glows… but the one difference that stood out the most was the deep red hue that they now filled the area.

… Eventually, from the thickness of the silence, Toothpick mustered the bravery to speak out. “... w-what just happened…?”

For Fluttershy, she was simply too shell-shocked to even respond. For my part, I remained just how I was just moments before this jumpscare of an event. I was mad, cautious, and—above all else—serious. There was no room for me to afford anything other than those three, because what stood before us right now was no mere pony or whatever-the-fuck would be down in this metal maze. No, instead, what stood before us was the embodiment of nightmares themselves. The ghoul that perverts in fear, the envoy of terror.

However one were to call it, one thing that never changes is the suffrage that this creature brought…

… and it’s something I’ve grown acquainted with for a long time…

(Trigger Warning: brief gore)

Unknown, many years ago…

The flickers of flame from the small campfire was the sole beacon of light within the expansiveness of this sandy plane of existence. I sat right at the foot of the flame, barely reacting from the sparks that burnt the hairs of my legs. It was the source of warmth that fought against the fridgedness of the night, and I gladly embraced all the good and bad of it.

My eyes were locked on the flames, though my consciousness was everywhere and nowhere. I found that simply being there—both thoughtless and deluding myself in formlessness—was what kept me together… or kept as much of me together as I could. I’ve long cried out my anguish and questions to the dunes, and like always I was answered by the uneventfulness of nature. I figured that there was no point lingering in the why… but instead, I had to linger on the what. What to eat tomorrow. What path I must take for water. What cave should I rest in, or what incline of the sandy dunes should I camp at. From my confusion and hurt, I had come to realize that this was now a game of survival.

My wallet was the only remaining and intact proof that I once had life. The faded print on my driver’s license may be gone, but the image of my trimmed and cleaned self was still there. I managed to memorize the information of my credit card by heart before it faded away and turned into my pocket cutter… so did I do for the other cards that I had. I have yet to fall into insanity, but if the time were to come where I would go so far as to name these plastic cards, I…

… haha, what the hell am I saying? I’m already insane.

I was on night watch this night…. Or rather, every night. I couldn’t afford sleeping, not at least in the open. Many things have tried and succeeded in getting me in my sleep… and I’m disappointed that it took long before I got the message. Maybe if I can get to those distant plateaus, I could get some good shut eye, far above the ground where these starved animals roamed. But I couldn’t believe in that; I couldn’t, even if I wanted to. There’s no rest out here.

The sound of shuffling appeared to my side. I glanced over to see a small lizard crawling out from the sand. It must’ve been drawn from the heat of the fire. I felt nothing of it, nor did I feel anything when my pickaxe missed and caused it to scurry away. That same emptiness that filled my stomach also filled my mind. I just couldn’t… not anymore… I was at the brink of the finish line…

Perhaps it was because of that brief encounter that my vision was aligned at just the right angle, and at just the right time did the clouds part ways from the large move above, giving way to its pale light. My lazy eyes noticed it, and when I raised my head up just enough, I could fully confront its slender form.

Not far away from where I sat stood a black form, tall and nye-purely skeletal. The moon's light reflected from the onyx skin that hugged tightly to bone, giving it a plastic texture. The head, long and cyclical, had skin that drooped like that of an elder, but to such an extreme degree it almost looked like it was melting off. And those eyes—those pinprick white sunken pupils—did not blink even once. They stared right back at me, equally as lifeless… though, that quickly began to change.

I instinctively tightened my grip on my pickaxe, the sole weapon that has guarded me from these accursed words despite coming from it as well. My skin felt moist from my sweat, and I began being conscious of my hastened breaths. I slowly felt life return to me, despite it being a flicker. Even now, as my chest trumped with my beating heart, I still want to survive. I wanted to see another day despite everything I had to go through. That… was just the human in me, and I refuse to deny that part of me.

The movement was too fast. Meters covered in distance, the creature went on fours and ran at me with wild abandon, its spinely limps thrashing out in desperate need of flesh. The once silent night came to life with the scratch roars of a phantom, one not born of flesh but born as the amalgamation of horrors. I was frozen in fear. I didn’t know how to react to this, how to react to a demon of the night chasing after me. But I had to resist, to fight back despite the odds I was unsure of. At the moment of collision, I raised my arms up in defense, but it was futile; the force of impact sent my flying back, tumbling into the sand.

“ Agh!” We tumbled around like the very tumbleweed that danced in this world, gradually leaving the warmth of the fire. I roared in pain louder than the screams of thrill from this demon. My left arm fell into the grip of thousands of long needles, sinking so deep that I could feel them grinding within. The searing and immeasurable pain of pierced flesh clouded my mind, and it weakened my fight as I wacked my weapon helplessly against the creature. Thrashing against my skin, I felt its long nails hook and peel, freeing the warmth within me as it trailed down my body.

We continued to fight for a while, and each passing moment I felt my strength diminish. From behind the palm of the vice grip that the demon had on my head, my tear-stung eyes stared back at white pupils, which remained emotionless. The pain overwhelmed me, and for a moment I questioned whether this was really how it would end. Surely, if that were the case, I wanted to at the very least leave behind a lasting impact. A sign of my struggle, that I had not succumbed to my failed mind without resistance.

These thoughts clouded my mind alongside the prolonged pain. At that moment, as numbness took over me and everything muffled out, I felt solace staring above at the looming moon.

… That same demon stood before us. The same one that taught me what pain was all those moons ago, and the same one I continued to be plagued by since then.

Instinctively, my right arm moved to my back, but I realized once again that I was unarmed. I didn’t have my things, thus I was barehanded.

“... shit,” I muttered under my breath. Panic most definitely and rightfully should be on my mind, but it wasn’t there. I was level headed, and I felt calm. This level of calmness could only be found from years of tortuous agony that accumulated into unwanted experience, and I was unfortunate enough to have that. In other words, unlike these two confused and frightened ponies next to me, I was not afraid.

“ … Mr. Robert?” Toothpick asked out as I began walking away from the two, towards the spinely demon.

I gave no immediate response as I rolled up my sleeves and rolled my shoulders. I came to a stop a few feet away from the demon, my eyes never leaving its still and immobile form. “... You two stay exactly where you are now.”

There was a brief moment of silence before Toothpick spoke. “ Bu—”

“ No questions!” I snapped out loud, not caring of the volume of my voice. “ Stay where the fuck you two are until I say not to! Is that fucking clear?!”

“ …. Y-Yes sir…”

Good. That’s all I needed from them. With that said, I relaxed my body and narrowed my eyes. With my left arm trained forward and my right snuffed in between it and my torso, I lowered my center and widened my stance. I let everything else drown out, my thoughts only focused on the black towering demon before me and only it alone. Readied, I waited patiently, waiting to see the decision behind those white lifeless pupils.

Author's Note

... well, it's been a minute. Sorry for the lack of chapters this past few weeks... uh, month. Almost two months now, wow.

Yeah, I know, I believe that all of us as readers kinda get some sort of disappointment whenever a story has a hiatus. I hate to be like that for my own stories, but life has its demands (i.e. work and college), but I personally don't like to cling on to excuses so much.

With that in mind, I made this chapter roughly double the word counts from the others. I plan on doing that for ever five chapters going forward, just so I can train myself in writing out long chapters without losing quality.

Thank you for reading this far. I can't guarantee when I'll put out the next chapter, but it'll be regular size. If there's any part that doesn't make sense, please do point it out. I want all criticism when granted. See you then!