What We Become

Dawn Star stood at attention, observing his search party methodically scanning the surrounding underbrush. He was incredibly proud of how much more organized and effective his search party was compared to the other ones. Unlike the other guards he wouldn't let his group get unnerved by one easily overpowered monster. The monster was outnumbered twenty to one, even if he got the drop on them he would have no chance at defeating the entire search party. He was sure his group would be the ones to hunt down the beast first. With him in charge there was no way that anypony would beat him to his prize. I can see it now Dawn Star, promoted to captain of the guard.

Dawn Star felt a sudden stabbing pain in his left flank and let out a cry of agony. His flank suddenly felt as if it were on fire. He could feel his own blood seeping through his fur and dripping down his leg onto the ground. His rear left leg suddenly gave out and he crashed to the ground wallowing in agony. The last thing he heard before he slipped out of consciousness was his fellow guard, Stonehoof running towards him and yelling something he couldn't process. He attempted to reply, but his vision was quickly consumed by darkness as he fell into the calming grasp of the unconscious world.

* * *

“Dawn Star, no!”

One of the pony guards was barreling towards his fallen comrade at a breakneck speed.  Obviously paying no heed to Gaige who was now fully exposed. Shit, that shot wasn't lethal, Gaige thought to himself as he quickly planned his exit strategy. I have a feeling things are about to go from bad to worse, suddenly Gaige noticed that he was now completely illuminated. In front of him, were three unicorns, each with their horns glowing an unbearably bright pastel colour. Well shit.

“I found him!”, shouted one of the unicorns. The guard who had been running towards his fallen guardsman stopped immediately and locked eyes with Gaige. His face contorted into a terrible scowl as a huff of steam could be seen emanating from his nostrils. He let out a mighty war cry and began charging towards Gaige.

Time to disappear, Gaige whipped out one of his smoke pellets and flung it at his feet. The pellet exploded with a satisfying pop and he was almost instantaneously surrounded by a smoke barrier. It wasn't much but it would give him a bit of a head start on his pursuers. Suddenly an enraged pony guard burst through the smoke and skidded to a halt mere feet away from Gaige. Wonderful.

“You!”, hissed the rather imposing guard in between laboured breaths. He locked eyes with Gaige momentarily as the two stood facing each other, readying to leap into action at any second. The whole scene resembled an old western standoff. Whoever was the quickest would win. Gaige prayed that the guard was as slow as he looked. Suddenly and without warning the guard lowered his head and charged straight towards Gaige. Gaige instinctively rolled to the side, avoided the guard's charge and drew his crowbar as he landed on his feet once again. The infuriated guard let out another battle cry and whipped around to face his elusive opponent. Only Gaige had already prepared to strike first. As the guard turned towards Gaige a terrible crack could be heard as Gaige's crowbar collided forcefully with the guards jawbone. The guard stumbled back, dazed by the impact. Gaige struck him again in the same place. The guard fell to the ground with a satisfying thud.

Gaige could hear the flapping of wings that were quickly growing louder. Gaige looked to the heavens just in time to see the same rainbow maned mare he had tussled with not two weeks ago hurtling towards him. Gaige did not have any time to react as the mare collided with him and sent him flying onto the ground. As Gaige landed he could feel the mare stomping on his torso with her forehooves repeatedly, which elicited a few cries of pain from Gaige and did not help his already bruised ribcage. The mare then reared up on her hind hooves, giving Gaige an opening to counter her. Gaige proceeded to flip onto his back and stick the bottom of his crowbar towards her ribcage as she brought her hooves down. Midway through her frenzied assault, the crowbar jabbed into her exposed gut and winded her with the impact. She could be heard gasping for air as Gaige pried her off of him with the crowbar. The mare landed on her side and proceeded to go into an uncontrolled fit of coughing and sputtering.

Gaige stood over the incapacitated mare momentarily, planning his next moves carefully. You know what...I think I'm going to have to send these ponies a little message. Gaige strode closer to the mare who was now making meagre attempts to stand herself up and get away from Gaige. He saw that her wings began flapping furiously as she attempted to take off into the air. This was quickly interrupted by Gaige firmly grasping one her her wings and throwing her to the  ground. He then grabbed on to both of her wings and began slowly twisting them. The pegasus wailed and struggled in protest as he continued to twist the wings until her heard a satisfying crunch. The pegasus squealed in agony and began wildly thrashing about.

“Let me go!”, she screamed.

“Oh you don't get to leave yet,” Gaige whispered, “You get to be my messenger.”

* * *

Twilight Sparkle stood nervously at the head of her search party. The group were all in a tense defensive position a few feet away from the cloud of smoke that the monster had suddenly conjured up. Rainbow Dash and one of the Canterlot royal guardsmen had charged headlong into the plume and neither had returned. All that could be heard from inside the grey mist was some sporadic thumps and screaming. The screams sounded like Rainbow Dash's. As badly as she wanted to rush in and help her friend, she couldn't risk endangering the group. Why did it have to be my group that ran into the monster?

“Alright I've had enough, I'm leaving!”, Bon Bon bluntly stated, as she whipped around to make a brisk exit.

“No! Everyone needs to just stay here in a group and stay calm. This could be a trap!”, Twilight protested. Another frantic cry could be heard from the other side of the smoke cloud. Twilight shifted nervously, desperately trying to maintain her composure despite her building anxiety. Suddenly, all went quiet. The only thing Twilight could hear was her heart pounding. The silence was deafening, time seemed to stand still momentarily as the ponies all waited for the monster to make his next move. Maybe it left?

Just as Twilight's adrenaline rush began to fade and she, once again, considered herself “safe”, the unexpected happened. A laboured grunt could be heard from the smoke cloud and not one second afterwards did Rainbow Dash's limp body get tossed out of the smoke like a rag doll. She hit the ground with a whimper and she looked as if she was trying to move and get back onto her feet, but she barely possessed the strength to lift her hooves from where they lay. The ponies all looked on in horror as the pegasus lay broken and whimpering on the ground. Her wings were bent at an odd angle and her feathers were all ruffled and bloody. Her torso was badly bruised and bloodied, it looked as if something had broken most of her ribs and some small gouges pockmarked her body. What could do this to her?, Twilight thought to herself as she looked on in dismay.

Twilight's question was promptly answered as the monster emerged from now dissipating smoke, holding cracked royal guard helmet in one hand and a small  metal device in the other. The monster was about half as tall as a bear and bore over the ponies menacingly. He wore a long black duster and had dirty and tattered boots on. The most horrifying part of him was his head. It was unlike anything Twilight had ever seen before. It was a dark grey, very metallic looking, and lacked a mouth, ears and a muzzle. The only feature that could be made out on its' “face” was one horrible orange tinted eye that extended across the front of its' head. It was a truly terrifying sight. The monster proceed to casually toss the guard helmet at the ponies.

“Alright, anyone else want to try something?”, it bellowed in it's deep and gruff voice. The ponies all remained silent, “No takers? Anyone?”, the ponies were still frozen in fear. “Good, at least you know how to take a hint. Now I'm going to leave, and none of you better even think of following me, or you'll end up like this bitch.”, the monster raised its' massive boot and stomped hard down on Rainbow Dash's side. She barely had the strength to let out a quiet whimper of pain. Twilight cringed at the sight of this. This monster was turning out to be more volatile and brutal than anything else she had ever seen. The monster took its' boot to Rainbow once again. This time, Twilight didn't react with fear, she reacted with rage. How dare this monster come into her town and terrorize her friends. Not only that but now it was hurting innocents. That was the last straw for Twilight. Her vision became tinted red, she could hear that the monster was saying something else, but it was barely audible to her now. All she could hear was her heartbeat and her own furious snorting.  It was then that she snapped. She had unwittingly been charging on of her spells in her rage and she could see that her horn now giving off a bright purple glow. She didn't remember focusing on a spell to charge, all she knew was that she had charged something up to its' full capacity. The monster quickly noticed her readied spell and levelled its' small metal device at her and yelled something inaudible to her.  In a sudden panic she cast her spell, hoping that it was something that would stop the monster for good.

Twilight heard a loud crackle as a ball of bright purple lighting streaked from her horn towards the monster. Twilight realized that she had cast a lightning ball spell, that was one of her few harmful spells that she knew and it was very destructive. The last time she had used it it had blown up part of Applejack's barn door, she relished in what it could do to the monster. The bolt hit the monster dead in the chest and sent purple bolts of electricity jumping across his body as he seized up from the shock and was blown down onto the ground. Its' body lay on the motionless on the ground, smoke could be seen rising off of its' body. I did it! I defeated the monster! Its' all over now!

“Fuck!”, groaned the monster as it slowly began to sit up, still smoking.

Oh no...

“You...You probably thought that was a brave thing to do right?”, the monster asked as it slowly rose to its' feet. “You thought you'd be the big hero of this adventure?”, Twilight gulped as she slowly began to back away from the monster. “Well where I'm from, heroes don't last too long,” The monster levelled its' metal device at Twilight once again as it staggered towards her. “I hope you enjoyed that little stunt of yours, consider it your last.”, growled the monster. The monster let out a cry of surprise as it was suddenly lifted off the ground and encased in a bright yellow aura. He was slowly raised skyward as he thrashed about in a vain attempt to escape the aura. Then, in a brilliant flash of yellow, it was gone. Twilight's search party looked around for the bold unicorn that had been able to perform such a great feat, but they were nowhere to be found.

I only know one pony in all of Equestria who could create that aura, Twilight thought to herself.

* * *

Gaige's vision flashed yellow briefly as he was consumed by the strange aura that had plucked him straight off the ground. The flash hurt his eyes and he had to close them momentarily as he blindly felt around, attempting to defend himself against his assailant, wherever it may be. He felt as if his stomach had been turned upside down and was overcome with strong nausea. He knelt down and clutched his stomach in an attempt to keep himself from vomiting up his last meal. He gagged multiple times and then, much to his chagrin, his lunch made an sudden reappearance on the floor directly below him. After that bout of nausea he began to feel slightly better as he rose to his feet and slowly opened his eyes. His surroundings were initially very blurry and it was is if Gaige was looking at them through a haze, but after a few blinks his eyes adjusted he found himself in what looked like the throne room of a lavish medieval palace. He quickly noticed the two very regal looking horses atop a short set of stairs, they appeared to be staring him down. One of them was a tall white alicorn with long slender legs and a flowing green and magenta mane, the other was a noticeably smaller navy alicorn with a flowing blue mane sprinkled with what looked to be stars and what looked like a small black semicircle on her chest bearing a white crescent moon. Both the horses looked to be standing in some sort of breeze, based on their flowing manes, but Gaige couldn't feel a breeze coming from anywhere. How strange, he was awe struck by the sudden appearance of these two very imposing, regal equines.

Gaige's stupor was quickly broken by the realization that he was also surrounded by armed guards. There were four of them, all wearing golden armour, just like the ones from the search party. Only these ones were much larger, looked older and brandished spears that were pointed at Gaige's throat. He decided it would be best if he did not attempt anything he might regret, so he slowly laid his revolver on the ground and raised his hands behind his head. “Look, I don't want any trouble with you.”, he stated plainly to surrounding guards. He was about to continue speaking when he was interrupted by the navy alicorn.

“You have been accused of crimes of violence and cruelty against Equestria and its' people! What say you in your defence!”, hollered the navy alicorn. Gaige knew now that it was a mare based on its' loud, but feminine voice. Gaige remained silent, carefully pondering his next moves. It was life or death at this point.

“The princess asked you a question, scum!”, growled one of the guards as he brought his spear closer to Gaige's throat. Gaige pondered to himself momentarily before responding.

“Always.”, he replied.

“What did you say! Speak up worm!”, the guard hissed.

“I said, always.”, Gaige repeated.

“What do you mean 'always'? Always what?”, asked the guard.

“Always strip your enemy of his weapons before you interrogate him.”, Gaige whipped out the flash bang grenade he had been cooking behind his back and dove away from the guards, making sure to cover his ears and shut his eyes. He heard the guard hollering at him as he dove away and felt a spear tip stick into his ribcage. It didn't go in much further than the tip though, Gaige figured he could patch the wound up later. As Gaige hit the floor he could hear the grenade detonating and the guards screaming in pain. Gaige's ears were now ringing from the grenade, but luckily he was not completely disoriented. He quickly brought himself back up to his feet and whipped around to face the guards who were now stumbling around blindly, making half hearted attempts to swing their spears around in hopes of hitting Gaige. Gaige slowly pulled out his crowbar and got straight to business.

He struck the guard closest to him directly on the left side of his jaw, the guard dropped in head, unconscious. Not a bad start. Gaige proceeded to work his way to the next guard who was wildly thrashing about, locked in battle with an invisible assailant. Gaige grabbed his spear as he was swinging it and drove it into the guard's exposed thigh. The stallion screamed in pain and fell on his side. Gaige moved on to the final two guards who were back to back, stumbling in circles with their spears at the ready. Gaige hit the first one in the small of his back, which sent him screaming to the floor in pain. Gaige then stomped on the stallion's exposed underbelly until he felt that the guard was sufficiently incapacitated. And then there was one. The final guard was the scrawniest of all of them and stood shakily swinging his spear from side to side as in an attempt to defend himself. Gaige simply walked up behind the guard and whispered in his ear.

“You better run.”, he hissed, and run the guard did. The stallion took off at full speed away from Gaige and ran face first into one of the large marble pillars in the room, knocking himself out cold. Not bad Gaige, Gaige thought to himself as he admired his work, Now time to deal with these to royal pricks.

The tall white alicorn was obviously beginning to regain her senses as she squinted her eyes in an attempt to focus on Gaige and attempt to piece together what happened in her thirty seconds of disorientation. Gaige calmly strode over to where he had dropped his revolver and picked up his reliable magnum. The white alicorn was now fully aware of her surroundings and her horn began to glow at the sight of Gaige. “I wouldn't do that if I were you.”, Gaige said as he pressed his revolver to the white alicorn's head, “Now...me and my friend here have some questions to ask you.”