Black Aether

Applejack gritted her teeth as she yanked hard, and the deadly silver rope burned and ripped through the undead flesh of the parasitic monster like a knife through wet bread, the creature’s disgusting death scream slicing loudly into the dimly lit air like an echo in a cave while the flaming sparks of Black Aether, the supernatural force that was used by the Dark Powers for all their dastardly purposes and that heavily fueled the power of a Preyer, erupted from its body and flowed around her before being absorbed into her body.
The pony skillfully and gently swung her head around a few times, keeping the rope spinning about in the air above her head as she eyed her foes that surrounded her, pouring in from the trees and houses and barn and the road.
It was as if they were crawling up from the very earth itself, and in an increasingly high number of cases right now… they actually were.

She swung her shield arm as another thrall dove at her, and the hard wood with the iron dome at the center of it struck the hissing monster directly in the face.
As an instant result, several dull teeth were knocked out of it’s gaping mouth, along with tiny drops of putrid blood as its body was sent stumbling harshly down and rolling along the ground and crashing against the fence in a limp heap, but the Preyer was not going to delude herself into thinking that this particular one was dead for good, as it was already stirring back to it’s hooves in a second while she had to turn away to face her other foes.

Applejack now swung again, and this time successfully decapitated another undead rotter and then raised her shield high before bringing it crashing forward onto the place where the head had once been, and gruesomely CUT THE BODY IN TWO diagonally, yanking her gore-soaked shield out of the mutilated pony’s corpse as it collapsed to the equally bloody ground, more of the dark Magic energy swirling through the air like a mass of ten thousands burning fireflies.
Spitting off to the side, Applejack quickly maneuvered her front right leg/right arm in a slight twisting gesture twice over and the shield automatically folded in on itself, basically folding around her right arm into a sort of gauntlet that allowed her to run more easily.

Having already coiled her lasso at her side, she took off running down the road, fixing her gaze forward and not letting the gurgled grunts and snarls of the undead ponies from behind to distract her.
She made her way past the old railway and through the train station, but there she found herself confronted with an undead Bat Pony.

“For bucks sake… Come ere’ you,” she muttered, and switched on her shield as the creature lunged at her like a shadow, its tattered wings literally streaming a wave of trailing darkness.

Vampire Bat Ponies were purely creatures of the dark side, and were among the most difficult and dangerous to engage with in combat, due to their nasty habit of being able to move in the shadows and strike from virtually any direction in the midst of it. It was virtually hopeless to try finding real victory when fighting even one when the night had fallen, and suicide to engage several. Only exceptionally strong and skilled Unicorns and maybe Pegasi(and Alicorns, obviously) could do that and hope to emerge victorious, and even then the advantage could be lost at a moments notice.

But fortunately for the cowpony Preyer, the struggling Sun still had some light to give, even if it was only a fraction of what it once was capable of.

The monster suddenly dispersed into pure blackness and zipped all around sad encased her in darkness where she would be vulnerable to the attacks of her would-be killer, but Applejack was not fooled.
Her instincts, already naturally sharp and further honed by numerous battles, didn’t fail her this time, and she ducked her head down and whirled around with all her considerable strength and speed, narrowly avoiding the spectral fangs of her attacker and blowing away enough smoke to run out of the dark cloud that had encased her.

She sped out just as the monster rematerialized partially and slashed at her with one of its wings, the sharp bone-like edge of the appendage slicing into the back left leg of the pony.
Applejack, on her part, barely felt anything and grabbed her whip in her jaws and whipped around while holding her shield up just as the physical jaws and fangs bit into the iron dome and slid off before becoming the deadly black cloud again.

But this was not to the advantage of the undead pony. For by now, Applejack had gotten her whip out and held fast in her jaws by its handle.
She now spun around in a deadly arch, the weapon slicing through the surrounding darkness like a hot knife through melting butter and leaving shining white streaks lingering in the air that mingled their own slicing sounds with the rumbling hiss of the pained monster.

Applejack cleared the space around her as she spun about with a triumphant “Yeehaw!” through gritted teeth.
She then immediately whirled her whip back into a bundle and sped on down the road again while affixing it to her side again, breathing heavily through her nostrils as the horde of pursuing zombies and vampiric thralls had now caught up with her, climbing over the small buildings and houses or literally materializing in trails of red and black flame and ash.

Applejack ran fast and easy and occasionally let her eyes dart to either side to make sure that any new monsters coming in from the side were not close enough to need to be dealt with, as that would slow her down just a bit and thus would allow her pursuers more time to catch up with her.
She could easily hold her in any old fight, but taking on too many foes at once, no matter how weak they individually might be, could overwhelm even the mightiest of ponies or any other creature.

The strong young mare ran and leapt over the various obstacles in her way, including a small crowd of zombies that appeared suddenly in front of her as she was passing the haunted depths of the Everfree Forest. She wouldn’t have minded killing them all under any other circumstance, but right next to those dangerous woods? It would be a death sentence.

But now more than one of her pursuers were Vampire Bat Ponies and they rapidly gaining on her, rushing through the air like black bolts of shadow as the last light of the Sun still lingered just a little bit longer and managed to keep the shadows from consuming the entire land and dooming the fleeing mare.

Applejack herself now outed every ounce of strength into her powerful legs, speeding down the road and in one case making a sharp turn and smashing through a fence line and into somepony’s deserted farmyard in order to take a short cut to her destination.

“Cmon Applejack, yer almost there.”
She grunted to herself.

She was getting closer to the safe haven from these horrors and would soon be able to rest. But they also knew that, and just as she was almost in sight of it, Applejack was tackled at her hind legs by a diving Vampire Bat Pony, as it used all its supernatural speed to try stopping the pony from escaping yet again from their grasp!

Fortunately for her, while she did fall, she managed to roll back onto her hooves while quickly reassembling her shield and reaching back for her silver whip.
Unfortunately for her, the flying pursuers were already upon her, and the running ones were not far behind.

A Vampire Bat Pony slammed into her just as she raised her shield, and Applejack was driven backwards by the force of the attack and nearly fell over.
Still, she managed to shove it back and pull out her whip as she jerked her shield back, but immediately the young mare was knocked to the ground on one side by the swooping attack of another one of these creatures as it sliced into her right shoulder and shield, drawing out a thin stream of the mare’s blood into the air while the others now lunged at her, fangs and claw-like front hooves bared and ready to rip her to pieces.

But reacting on pure muscle memory, Applejack turned her rear to them and shoved herself up by her front legs, her powerful back legs being thrown out with as much force as she could manage and her back hooves collided with the face and chest of the two monsters before they could dodge or transform into smoke or shadow.

Applejack was an Earth Pony, having long ago become one of the strongest ones alive due to her natural talent and life of hard work, and the training she’d endured in more recent times since this darkness had first fallen upon this world… well, let’s just say that she was strong enough to be mistaken for a monster herself, even more so than usual.

The head of one of the Vampire Bat Ponies violently exploded into a cloud of gruesome viscera and fire-colored sparks, and Applejack’s other hoof was impaled into the mangled chest of the other, with this monster now making a loud gurgling and sound in its throat and starting to convulse in agony as the full effect of the physical trauma was quickly starting to overwhelm it’s mind.

Applejack herself didn’t take her time to admire her handiwork. She simply yanked her hoof out of the monster’s chest as fast as she could in order to get into better fighting stance, ignoring the gore still on her hoof and leg as she slammed it into the ground and spun to face the oncoming assault by the horde, as the third undead flying pony was nowhere to be seen and this could be problematic.
But Applejack ignored such worried ideas as she let her survival instinct and harsh training guide her now, managing to take a solid stance with her shield and her whip
And as the horrific unnatural creatures descended upon her with murderous intent, Applejack of Apple Acres tensed her powerful leg muscles and prepared for a mighty lunge and charged fearlessly into battle!

She lashed out with her deadly whip, and the pure silver burnt and lashed through the unholy flesh of her undead foes, cradling a way for her through the many weaker ones.
Meanwhile, the powerful pony swung her shield around her at any that got close, crushing skulls and shattering jaws and snapping outstretched limbs and sending full teeth and sharp fangs, along with little pieces of broken bone and ripped flesh and splashes of black blood into the air.
This violent battlefield between the living and the dead all around was swiftly coated with an ever-increasing covering of gore, and the air all around was filled with Magic that looked tens of thousands of tiny sparks or long swirling beams that sliced across the space like fiery sea serpents.

Even though the undead Unicorns could still use telekinesis and cast bolts of magical energy, they were nowhere as powerful or as focused as Applejack’s trainers had been and they might as well have not been doing so at all, even though some blasts managed to land on her and do some rather minor damage.

“HA! Ah’ve had tougher fahts’ with Rainbow when she’s snorin’ off her sahder’ drunkenness!”

The mare shouted over the din of the grunts and screeches and mashing of bodies from her hideous enemies, the feeling of excitement that Rainbow Dash had once described as “fighting joy” steadily overtaking her as she got more and more into the battle, even if she didn’t particularly like the idea of it.
The ground was starting to become a bit slippery as the sheer amount of blood and innards only increased as the number of dead and destroyed creatures only grew by the moment, but she managed to keep herself balanced enough to keep up her rather one-sides slaughter of the undead.

One thing she’d forgotten though… was that the bodies of the seemingly destroyed Vampire Bat Ponies were not lying there anymore, along with the third one that hadn’t been “killed” yet.

Several teeth flew off and went bouncing and rolling before coming to a stop some sixty feet from the scene of where they’d been knocked out.
A zombies decapitated head flew over the others and landed in a tree, towering over everything else in the vicinity.
A dozen zombies and thralls were killed by Applejack’s shield and front left leg/left arm so fast they practically fell together into a gruesome imitation of a pyramid, dark blood slowly oozing down from their mutilated bodies.

But at one opportune moment, just as she finished crashing the jaws of yet another zombified pony, the dark vampiric beast saw its chance and dove down from above onto Applejack’s back… and sank it’s knife-like fangs into the back of her neck.

“What the darned buck!”
She screamed and thrashed her head wildly she began to leap about and try to dislodge her deadly foe.
But this only resulted in the flesh there being completely ripped off and the beast quickly biting down even deeper, digging it’s claw-hooves into her back and flanks as it began to jab it’s sharp wingtips into her sides, each time leaving a new bloody stab wound that began to drip blood out alarmingly.

In desperation, Applejack swung her head around with more force than she had done so all day and all night so far, and the blood-coated silver strand of her deadliest weapon lashed out behind her.
The monster didn’t see this as soon as she did it, but immediately realized right after as its left wing was suddenly wrapped partially in the horribly burning sensation of pure silver and steel, but held on and savagely tore even deeper into her neck.
In fury born of pain, the Earth Pony now yanked her head forward and cut the wing off in a spray of blood and shadow, and the Vampire Bat Pony finally released it’s prey as it let out a sudden screaming snarl of agony.

Blood pouring from her gashed neck and stabbed sides and legs, the enraged and panting Earth Pony now threw herself to the bloody ground while simultaneously spinning around and managing to strike her foe in the side with her shield, finally and successfully dislodging her fearsome foe from atop her body.

“To Tartarus witchu’ an’ all yer’ kind!”
Operating on adrenaline more than anything else, Applejack spun around on the ground and furiously brought her shield down onto the monster’s head, but it had already transformed into shadow and was gone!

“Are ya kiddin’ me!?”
She shouted at the night before scrambling back up to her hooves. Only now did she see for herself… that the Sun was down completely and she was alone in the dark, the numbers of other unliving enemies already only seconds away from being upon her.
And only now did she remember what she’d read about the Bat Ponies who’d become members of the darkness that now plagued Equestria, and how they were pretty much as immortal as she was when it came to physical combat and wounds.

“Oh, fer’ Celestia’s sake…”

The bloodied, battered pony turned to fully face the other monsters now and spinning her deadly rope all around herself to keep back the three Vampire Bat Ponies undoubtedly circling her right now from the endless shadows all around, silently mocking her and waiting impatiently for an opening in her defense.
Despite the vast reserves of Black Aether that she’s gathered, the Vampire Bat Ponies were all more than capable of quickly draining her down if they’d continue to strike at her from the darkness as she was busy with the fodder, and she was alone right now with no backup.

This was it, wasn’t it? She was going to die here tonight. Right?

…wrong.

Just as the first of the zombified Unicorns blasted their magical beams at their sole source of attention and the infected Earth Ponies were THIS CLOSE to reaching her deadly arch of silver with their hooves and fangs, the skies above suddenly exploded in a mighty burst of colors and light, and the air was torn by the power of the Magic that had just been used.
And at the exact same time this suddenly appeared, the crowd of unnatural things was suddenly reduced to an explosive cloud of gore as a rainbow blur smashed through them at a speed almost no mortal could ever hope to ever see properly with multiple bolts of lightning striking out from the blur and incinerating many others who were still somewhat physically intact from the sheer wind alone of the speeding entity.

The amount of glowing orange and red Magic that was released as those bodies were torn apart or were burned horribly that it almost looked like a second Sun appeared for a moment, such was the massive sudden dispersal of mystical energy!

Applejack knew full well who her savior was and why she was here, and so simply turned and resumed fleeing down the road towards her destination.
She could feel the other Preyer zooming around above and behind her, and knew that the three most dangerous monsters here wouldn’t try taking on two Preyers. It’d be too difficult to do.

“Ah’ll see ya back at base, Dash!”
She shouted over her shoulder.

She knew that Rainbow Dash would hear her just fine.
After all, Applejack herself wasn’t the only pony her who’d been given special training and had been magically strengthened beyond what she’d once thought she was capable of.

-

Upon hearing the massive doors slam shut behind her, Applejack finally took a deep breath and let her shoulders sag. Another day survived, a few less abominations to haunt the lands and stalk those who still retained their minds and their own souls.
But soon enough, she also knew that the more medical and spiritually specialized Unicorns and Earth Ponies would be looking her over carefully, and she honestly couldn’t find it in her to be annoyed with them. After all, she HAD been rather reckless in her decisions tonight, even if she hadn’t had much of a choice to do anything else.
Her numerous injuries across her body were not something that could be survived by many other ponies, after all, especially not the repeated bites of a highly infectious Vampire Bat Pony. Sure, she was still healing even now due to the mystical powers coursing through her blood and from her very soul, but she was still potentially carrying the dangerous taint from the Dark Powers, and this could sneakily spread to the others here and that was a serious threat.

She was currently still alone in this particular area, and that was both a good and understandable thing. She didn’t want any other ponies who weren’t quite as resilient to corruption as she was to be exposed to it, after all.
She could feel how many of her injuries were closed up by dried blood, but the ones in her neck were still bleeding just a bit in a steady trickle.

“Then darnd’ varmints,” she growled to herself.
“Them and ther’ unhealin’ bahts’.

Indeed, wounds inflicted by Vampire Bat Ponies didn’t heal naturally and were guaranteed to kill or forcibly transform whoever was bitten, unless great medicinal treatment was applied ASAP.

Applejack sighed and dropped her head as the door across the room was unlocked and opened, and Doctor Redheart quickly was now coming up to her personally, dressed in her official white uniform with a Red Cross symbol on it. The medical pony looked quite peeved by what she could already see, her skillful eyes being able to quickly make out that Applejack had plenty of injuries of her own and that was simply not good.

“You already know what happens, Miss Applejack. Come along this way.”

“Yes ma’am.”

Both ponies knew that the Preyer would be fine ultimately. She’d be able to heal from anything. But the touch of corruption from the monsters she fought was the real threat, and Redheart knew more than just how to stitch up wounds and other non-magic techniques. She could also cleanse and purge darkness itself from another living being, and her own personal laboratory was precisely for that.

Applejack knew she was in good hooves. Nurse Redheart was the kind of pony who took her job very seriously, and she NEVER let her own frustrations or biases get in the way of doing what she needed to do. This meant that she would soon be finished with the cleansing process, which was very good indeed.

After all, the Preyer also needed to attend to a very important appointment tonight.