Blue

Rainbow woke early next morning. Well, early to her standards. When she slept in her own house, she usually stayed in bed until noon. Counting in her naps, it was a small miracle she had time for her aerial practice. She glanced around. The bedsheet from the cell door was gone, as was Trixie. The pegasus yawned, and got up. Stretching her muscles, she began to wonder about the current time. Fortunately, she only had to step out of the cell, and found a rather large clock, the time being around ten o' clock. Vinyl was still snoring loudly. Wanting company, Rainbow trotted back to her, and poked the unicorn.

"Mmmm... no, Mom, I don't need more asparagus..." she grunted.

"Vinyl, wake up!" Rainbow prodded her with more force.

"A'ight, a'ight, I'm up." Vinyl said, yawning. "What's the big deal?"

"I can't sleep. Do you think they'll let us out today?"

The unicorn walked to the sink, and turned on the tap. First she sprinkled a few drops of water on her muzzle, then, with a sudden movement, she held her head under the stream. She straightened up, stopping the water. Strangely enough, her mane did not seem to flatten despite being wet. She finally answered the eager pegasus.

"The hay knows, but since Trixie's not here, I reckon' going out would easily result in a lynch mob. What do you say for a word-chain game?"

"Sure!" replied Rainbow anxiously. She hated boredom, even more than not being able to fly.

They started playing, minutes, then an hour passing by. Deciding to take a break, they went to the cafeteria, grabbing their lunch quickly, and shoveling it in. They could feel the glances of everypony else, but ignored it, and hurried back to their cell. They got bored with playing the same thing over and over again, so they switched to the guessing game. Another hour has passed. Rainbow was about to suggest they go and find Trixie, when the speakers came to life, booming with a familiar, dreaded voice.

"Attention, prisoners! Get yer sorry arses out of our way, we've got another high-security sonnuvabitch coming through!"

Rainbow gulped. "High security? Sounds serious."

Vinyl shifted around nervously. "Maybe just a political refugee. Yeah, that's—" She stopped talking, because they could hear echoes of hoofsteps, gradually becoming louder.

"A'ight, here's the cell. Shove 'im in!" The voice was undoubtedly Strong Walls'. "Sturdy and Hoof, you stand guard here, and let no outsider come into this cell."

"Sir, I'm not sure—" one of them started, his voice identifying him to Rainbow as the one who led her around when she first arrived.

"Yer not paid ta think, but ta follow orders, numbskull. Now shut up, and guard."

"Yes, Sir," the third voice grumbled.

Rainbow gasped, as she saw a beaten white stallion, with soot and blood on his coat and mane was thrown in. She wanted to run to him, to make sure he's all right, but then she saw Strong Walls. The director was carrying a bat with him. She froze.

"Well, well, well." the head warden intoned mockingly. "The oh-so-mighty protector of peace. The stallion, who is better than anypony! Who could feel for those poor criminals—because he is one!" He spat. "Where's yer superiority now, captain?"

Captain? No, no, no, no... The laying stallion looked up. He did not look at anything or anypony in particular; there was no life in his eyes, as if the worst has already happened, and he didn't care anymore. Rainbow tried to scream when she recognised Shining Armor, she wanted to see if she could help him, but for once in her life, fear has paralyzed her.

"Let's see how ya like THIS!" Strong Walls shouted, and swung his bat. It hit Shining straight in the muzzle, causing him to fall over, blood flowing from his mouth. "WHERE'S. YER. CELESTIA-DAMNED.PRIDE.NOW?!" the furious director shouted. The ex-captain didn't react, even though he was hit again and again, with full force. The sight finally broke Rainbow's stupor.

"Stop!" she screamed, leaping between them, the shackles of fear replaced by the urge to protect the stallion. "Don't you—"

She couldn't continue, because the brown earth pony batted her in the stomach, depriving her of air. Before she could recover, another blow landed on her skull from the side, sending her across the cell, in front of the horrified Vinyl. The director paused for a moment, then smiled manically.

"Why don't I get rid of ya? Yer juss' trash anyway."

He raised the bat. Rainbow tried to dash out of the way, but her battered, still recovering body could take no more. As a last thought, she saw the bat swing downwards, it's tip getting bigger and bigger...

... and then spiralling out of control, and landing harmlessly on the floor, when a blue blur busted through the open cell door. The still dazed pegasus watched dumbstruck as the living unicorn bullet pierced the head warden's mouth with her horn. The stallion screamed in pain, and turned to his assailant. Trixie didn't waste a second, mercilessly pounding, kicking, and bucking the warden in a short succession. He started to look a bit like Shining, bleeding and battered. Rainbow finally understood why the other inmates were afraid of the showmare. Her eyes glinted with undiluted rage and hate, and her fighting style was without any style or mercy. The mare quickly degraded the earth pony from an executioner with a weapon, to a bloody pulp, barely standing on his hooves. He tried to save face, and subdue Trixie, but somehow, the showmare managed to overpower him at every possible turn. Finally, when she bit him on the haunch, he gave up, and shouted for the wardens. They immediately rushed in, one being the familiar grey pegasus that Rainbow met earlier; the other a white earth pony, who did not waste any time, and pounced the still biting showmare. She flew in a wide trajectory, slamming into the DJ, finally stopped by the wall.

"Idiots!" the head warden screamed, "Why did ya let her in?!"

"You told us not to let in outsiders, Sir." the white one said with a poker face.

"And she's no outsider, she lives in this cell, Sir!" pointed out the pegasus, poorly concealing his satisfaction felt upon seeing Strong Walls beaten. He switched to a more serious tone, formality disappearing from his voice.

"I think this is enough. If you can't even beat unarmed opponents who are seriously hurt, don't even dream about intimidating us again. I won't tolerate your games any longer."

Strong Walls gave him a broad smile, despite his injuries. "Go on. Disobey me. Run away. Do it, and I'll have that published before ya can say 'horseapples.'"

The grey stallion gave him a cold look. "That is the only thing why we haven't reported on you yet. But this brutality will end here."

The director narrowed his eyes. "We'll see. C'mon Hoof, treat this wound, will ya?"

Every warden left the room, except the grey pegasus. He looked at the mares with a pained expression, and whispered "Sorry." before heading out. The door was sealed shut.

Trixie spat out a tuft of hair, and turned to Rainbow.

"Spectrum, did you call him names again? Bad girl!"

The cyan pegasus took deep breaths. Her stomach churned up, both from the assault, and the chief warden's dripping malice. Her head hurt like hell, blood was dripping from her temple, and her brain threatened to explode, if she didn't get any answers. But where would she get any? Shining Armor is not exactly what you would call 'cooperative' right now. Actually, he wasn't exactly in what you'd call 'thinking condition.' She glanced at Vinyl, who was the least injured from all of them, and saw her rip up a sheet. The DJ moved to the sink, washed the rag in water, and created a makeshift bandage on Rainbow's now barely dripping wound.

"Thank you."

"No probs." Vinyl smiled meekly. "Y'know, I thought I left the beat in the outside world. Apparently, I was wrong."

Rainbow couldn't help, but give a half-hearted grin to the unicorn. The DJ sure knew how to make life look less dark.

Her head throbbing less and less, she turned her attention to the injured stallion—who was getting felt up thoroughly by Trixie, by the look of it. The pegasus felt anger boil inside her.

"What the hay are you doing?" she shouted.

"Why, Gobbles is just checking her potential harem candidate!" Trixie replied, "So far he only seems a bit out of it for Gobbles, and these bruises only add to his stallionly charm."

Rainbow nearly retorted with an acid-coated reply, but then she just shrugged. There's no arguing with a lunatic, and her shenanigans aside, if the pegasus understood Trixie's insane ramblings right, Shining is fine, at least in the sense that he had no deep wounds, or broken bones. However, something took away his way to live, and Rainbow dreaded to know what it was. Sure, his rapid devolving from captain of the Royal Guard, to a high-security prisoner must have had a reason. But the same reason has made him a catatonic wreck, shocked to the end, who wouldn't even react to intense pain. No, they will not get answers now, if ever.

Meanwhile, Trixie finished with her check-up, and somehow managed to slip the unconscious stallion on her back, then on a bed. She took a blanket, and wriggled her way to his backside, drawing the blanket over them. Rainbow looked at her, bemused.

"What are you doing?" she pressed.

"Gobbles is tired, Gobbles will sleep." the unicorn stated matter-of-factly.

"But he... and we... and—"

"Dudette, chill." Vinyl interrupted, " He needs rest, does he not?"

"Well, yeah, but—" started the pegasus.

"No buts, Rainbow. Go to sleep, too. What else could we do? Beside me, you all gotten beaten up badly, and even if you'd rather stay awake, you can't ask him a single question. Believe me, I'm just as confused as you are."

"B-but a mare sleeping next to a stallion—a married stallion...!" Rainbow objected.

Vinyl chuckled. "Relax, I don't think he will go down on her like a puppy on a bone."

"It's not him I'm worried about." Rainbow said darkly.

Both of them looked at Trixie, and somehow, the image of her raping him was quite... easy to imagine. Not to mention vivid. The subject of their stare looked up.

"Do you mind? Gobbles is no neighrophilly... Neighropilley... She does not have sex with the dead!"

"Um, he's alive." pointed out Vinyl.

"Not long if Gobbles would give him the awesome prize that is Gobbles."

"Well, you heard the mare. Nothing to be worried about here. So sleep." Vinyl chirped.

"...Fine." the pegasus grumbled.

She climbed on her bed, the thought of sleeping a good fourteen hours suddenly becoming more appealing. Used to having naps all the time, now she was tired. The pegasus glanced at her cellmates; Vinyl immediately fell asleep as soon as she pulled a blanket over her shoulders; Trixie cuddled tight to the now closed-eyed Shining.

She shrugged mentally, and sank onto her pillow, falling to a dark, restless sleep.