Outcry: Dead Horse

Outcry:
Chapter two

My legs wobbled as I got back on my hooves, either from the shock of placing my country in danger, or from the blast that I swear nearly broke my spine. Syringe and Target were running back and forth in a panic. Obsidian, Fuse, and Javva were oddly calm about the situation, like they expected something to go wrong. Was screwing up this common of an occurrence? Was I going to be like this someday?

Before I could even take a step, my team had been teleported elsewhere. We were now in some kind of forest. It was misty, and hard to see. Syringe was clinging on to my neck until Obsidian could pry him off of me His whole body was still shaking as Obsidian held him up in the air.

The team formed a circle around Javva, and waited for her orders. She sat there, observing her surroundings, trying to get an idea of where we were. After five minutes, she officially declared that we were lost.

Fuse and Javva took off to the sky to try and get a better idea of where we were, leaving us to fend for ourselves. At least if anybody came along, we had Target. I had some spells that I could use, but most of them involved my speed.

“Did you hear that?” Obsidian asked, reaching for the spear on his back.

“Hear what?”

“Something is coming.” Syringe hid behind Obsidian, his shaking getting worse.

“Are you su-” Something grabbed me from behind, and placed a blade near my throat. Other ponies wearing purple armor emerged from behind trees and bushes. They were gray, and had golden eyes.

“The infamous Dead Horse unit. I was hoping for better prey. Something that could put up a fight.” said the pony behind me.

“Oh we can put up a fight.” said Syringe, coming out from hiding behind his friend. “That guy you’re holding isn’t a Dead Horse. He’s a member of the elite Alive Pony unit sent here to train us.” Some of the armored ponies backed up. Either from Obsidian’s growling or from Syringe’s lie. I hoped it was the former, as I didn’t want to be held hostage by ponies this incompetent.

“I never heard of the Alive Pony unit.” one of the soldiers said nervously.

“Theres no such thing.” said another soldier.

Syringe grinned. “Thats because they’re black ops. Officially, they don’t exist.” He was sounding oddly convincing, like he believed this himself.

“Even if that were true,” said the pony using me as a shield. “We have him right where we want him.”

“Is that so?” Syringe moved closer to the soldiers, his grin getting wider and wider. “I wouldn’t be so sure about that. You’ve fallen right into our trap.”

Two of the soldiers looked at each other, confused about what he meant. “What are you talking about, zebra?”

“Like I said, he trained us all. So even if you do kill him, taking you out would be a piece of cake. The only way for you grunts to get out alive is you let him go, then we’ll do the same to you.”

And like that, I was let go. The soldiers started backing up, but before they could leave, the team decided to give them their blessing. “Attack!” shouted Syringe. I bucked the pony behind me into a nearby tree, and obsidian took two out with his spear.

Target reached into her bag and started throwing rocks at their heads. Not what I had in mind when she said she was the ‘sniper’ but it surprisingly seemed to work. The thing that caught my eye most, however, was that she wasn’t physically throwing the rocks. She was levitating and propelling them at the attackers. I couldn’t see a horn on her, the hat was covering her head, but it wouldn’t be enough to hide a horn.

“Uugh.” the pony behind me moaned. I looked behind me to see him stirring, trying to get back on his hooves. I grinned at the chance to take my revenge

I used my magic to propel me towards the pony, slamming him through the tree and knocking it down. The soldier was dead, and I emerged victorious. At least the assignment wasn’t completely going down the shitter.

My team had already killed the remaining soldiers. Obsidian appeared to be looting their bodies, cheering “Woohoo! Free crap!” Disgusting, we already killed them, did we really have to steal their stuff?

Five seconds later, I became a hypocrite.

I noticed that the blade the pony was using was part of some sort of gauntlet, where the blade could withdraw and be sheathed. Without thinking, I wiggled it off of his hoof and slipped it over mine. It was a perfect fit.

“Wow kid, I heard about the rumors, but seeing it in person is-” I punched Syringe before he could finish talking.

“You’re an idiot. The ‘Alive pony unit’? Are you serious?” I said harshly.

“What?” Syringe said innocently, like he did nothing wrong, while rubbing his cheek. “It worked. Is that good enough for you?”

I couldn’t argue with him, it did work, and I still had all my blood. Considering the situation, I should really be counting my blessings. Obsidian had finished gathering everything he looted into one big pile and smiled at me.

“Hey, Celibacy. Can you help me with this?”

“Its Velocity,” I corrected him. “and help you with what?”

“You’re a Unicorn, can’t you make this stuff smaller, or lighter?” I looked at the pile of Weapons and armor and shook my head.

“No, I don’t know how.”

“Then what good are you?” The diamond dog went back to trying to fit what he could into his pack.

“Its not going to fit.” I informed him as he tried to stuff every helmet into his pack.

“I’ll make it fit. I’m not going to leave this stuff behind. Think of the money we could make!” I decided to leave him alone after this. Dealing with a crazy Diamond Dog wasn’t my idea of fun. Target was levitating the rocks she had used and was putting them back into her bag. Curious about how she was doing this, I went over to ask her.

“Oh, hey Big V!” she greeted warmly. I was rather taken back by the nickname, and remembered that she called Fuse something similar. She noticed the way I was looking at her and explained herself. “Oh, its uh, kind of my thing. I was the smallest in the family so I called everypony ‘Big something’. Its just my thing, ya know?”

“Uh huh...” I nodded. “Say, how are you using magic?”

“With my horn, silly.” she giggled.

“But, you don’t have a horn.”

“Oh, you noticed that, did you?” She stopped giggling and started to blush from embarrassment. “You see, I have a broken horn...” She took off her hat to show what looked like a horn that had been crudely snapped in half. It was painful just looking at it. “I had an ‘accident’ a while back, and before I could do all sorts of spells. But now, I can only use levitation, and even then, it hurts just to do that.”

“Oh,” I said sympathetically. I wasn’t sure of what to say, and felt bad for even bringing it up. “I’m Sorry.”

Target smiled warmly and waved her hoof. “Oh no, Its no trouble. I can’t blame you for being curious. Besides, the hat keeps most ponies from noticing.” She looked behind me, her eyes getting wide with excitement. “Hey, Big Red is back!”

She ran past me and went to where Javva and Fuse were hovering. They looked worn and tired. I guess we weren’t the only ones who had a rough time.

“So? Where are we?” asked Obsidian.

“I don’t know.” Javva said with a defeated tone in her voice. “We didn’t get far before we spotted an army of soldiers flying west of here.” The old gryphon looked around and saw the bodies of the soldiers we encountered. “I guess they’re groundside as well.”

“So whats the plan?” asked our silver tongued medic.

“We saw a cave not far from here, we saw some of the soldiers go inside of it. I think we should go there next.” Fuse said, looking towards Javva for approval. She nodded in agreement and before waiting for the others, he walked off towards the cave. Target was right behind him.

“Do we really need to go where all the bad guys are gathering?” Syringe complained. “Can’t we go somewhere nice instead?”

“We can leave you here, if you prefer.” Javva said as she walked off. I chuckled at the terrified look on the zebra’s face as he ran behind Javva.

Obsidian looked down at me with anticipation. “Ready to knock some skulls, kid?”

“Its my job to, isn’t it?”

The diamond dog laughed and slapped me on the back. “Thats the spirit.”

_________________

It felt like we had been walking through the forest for hours. Syringe had convinced Obsidian to carry him, squealing from happiness when he agreed to it and Javva had resorted to flying to give her old bones some rest.

Up ahead, was a large bridge built over a river. On it, was an old earth pony wearing a straw hat, taking a nap until we approached him. He didn’t look like one of the soldiers, but Javva woke him up just to be sure.

“Hey, get up.” Our leader nudged the old pony. Yawning, he looked up at us standing over him and smiled greedily.

“Ah, so you want to use my bridge do you? The toll is five bits.”

Javva turned to Syringe. “Pay the man.”

“What? Why me?” Syringe asked as though Javva insulted him.

“Because I said so.”

“Well, if you remember, we all spent our bits at the bar. All except the new guy...” The group then turned to me to fix their problem. Remembering that I had used my spare bits to pay for some armor to cover my flank, I was as broke as the rest of them.

“Don’t look at me, I can’t pay.”

“Oh forget this.” said Fuse, who was losing patience with the old pony. He flew up and grabbed the pony, throwing him off the bridge and into the river. Everyone but Fuse and I carried on.

“Was that really necessary? He could die out there!”

“We get to cross the bridge don’t we?”

“Yeah, its a good thing you got that old man out of the picture. We couldn’t possibly have just walked off or anything.” I said sarcastically.

“If I go back and fish him out, will you quit complaining.”

“For now, yeah.” A grin grew on my face as Fuse flew over the river and scooped the old man out, bringing him back to the bride. getting an old pony killed was not something I wanted on my conscious. I already have enough restless nights to last me a lifetime.

The old pony’s teeth were chattering, he was cold and scared from what just happened. Fuse stared at him with disgust before reaching into his bag and pulling out a small blanket and draping it over him, and tried placing something under the blanket without me knowing. I didn’t get a good look at it, but whatever it was, it was small and yellow.
I smiled knowing at my co-worker wasn’t a complete sociopath. We began walking across the bridge, neither one of us saying anything. Trying to break the awkward silence, I attempted to start a friendly conversation with him. I might as well get to know who I’m working with.

“So, Fuse is it? Your cutie mark is a stick of dynamite. I guess you’re good at what you do.”

“Did you doubt me before?” growled the red pegasus.

“N-no!”

“Good.” he said sharply. He was intimidating, more so then Javva. “Whats your cutie mark?” I suppose he was trying to be friendly.

I froze up and started to sweat. Fuse stopped and looked at me. “Well?”

“Uh, its super awesome! Its a uh...”

“Eh, I don’t really care anyways.” Fuse kept walking. we were pretty far behind the others at this point.

I started to relax and wiped the sweat off my head.. I caught back up to Fuse and was walking side by side with him again. The rest of team had stopped up ahead, and we were able to see them in the distance.

Me, being the idiot that I am, had to speak before I could think. “Were you really just going to let him drown?”

“And If I was?” Fuse snarled. “What were you going to do about it?”

Again, I’m an idiot.

I decided that Fuse seemed to be the kind of pony that respected action, and strength. So me, being the stupid pony I was, tried to out macho him. “I’d have kicked your plot.”

Fuse scoffed. “With what?”

I brandished my blade and grinned, thinking I had won. Fuse saw the knife and tackled me, pinning me up against a tree. He struck me in the face and yelled at me.

“If you’re going to pull out a weapon, be prepared to use it.” Something in me snapped and I socked him in the stomach. He let go and and backed up. Once again, I thought I had won. Fuse laughed, and while I was still up against the tree got a low blow off me. I fell to the ground and watched him walk off.

Wanting my revenge, I used my magic to knock him to the ground as I got back up. Before I knew it, Fuse had gotten back up as well and was charging at me. I swore there was fire in his eyes. I moved out of the way and he slammed his head hard against tree.

Fuse rubbed his head while growling at me. “Damn Unicorns...” he charged at me again and again, each time dodging him, and each time just making him more enraged. “Stay still!” he shouted.

We must have gotten the attention of the others, because out of the corner of my eye, I saw Obsidian running towards us. He lifted us up both by the collar of our armor, his eyes telling us how disappointed he was.

“Would you two stop acting like children? We got a job to do.” Obsidian pleaded. Fuse wiggled his legs trying to get to me then let his body go limp. Maybe he was finally calming down? The diamond dog gently put him back on the ground, then me a few seconds later.

The pegasus was still glaring at me, but he at least kept his hooves to himself. When we joined the others, Target joined Fuse in giving me dirty looks. Great, the only one that wasn’t annoying, greedy, or unlikable thought I was a brute who started fights with his teammates.

______________

Soldiers were starting to become a frequent sight, and we we nearly caught a few times before Obsidian suggested he dig a tunnel and we pass by undetected in the safety of the earth. It was a good idea, there was no need to risk attracting unwanted attention to ourselves.

Watching a Diamond Dog dig was a fascinating sight. He worked at amazing an amazing speed, and thats coming from the fastest Unicorn alive. Obsidian never slowed down, never took a break, he just kept working, I hoped I get that kind of stamina one day. The tunnel was dark, and I used my magic to light up the passage. It was silent, peaceful even, until Syringe couldn’t take another second of not hearing his own voice.

“You know what this is like?” Syringe started. “A field trip.” Target and I looked at each other and shrugged.

“A field trip?” I asked quizzically. I thought Field trips were supposed to be fun.

“Yeah, Javva is the grumpy old teacher that likes to give us extra homework, Target is the teacher’s pet, you’re the new kid nobody likes, Fuse is the one that sits in the corner looking pissed off all the time,” Fuse glared at him when he mentioned his name.

“I am not pissed off.” he claimed, hitting the ground with his hoof. Yeah, right, and I’m the prince of equestria.

“Obsidian is the fat kid.” the zebra continued. Our tunnler’s ears perked up and frowned.

“I’m not fat, am I?” he asked anyone who was listening, not taking his eyes off his work.

“Well, you’re the heaviest one here. That makes you the fat one.” Syringe pointed out.

“And what does that make you?” Target asked. I guess she didn’t mind being the Teacher’s pet. I certainly didn’t care for being the ‘one that nobody liked’ but I kept my mouth shut.

“I’m the popular, funny one.” Syringe stated with way too much pride, grinning like an idiot.

Javva looked back at him with a surprised look on her face. “Wow, Syringe. I’m impressed.”

“With my dead on comparisons?”

“No, that you went to school.” We snickered at Syringe’s expense. He blushed and fell back slightly from the rest of the group.

It was nice to laugh. About the first time I actually relaxed since I joined the Dead Horses. A shame really, from what I’ve read, the Dead Horses used to be a respectable force a thousand years ago. Most of us died in some battle, and the survivors were said to be cursed with unbelievably bad luck. Those who died were said to have joined the stars and the survivors
wore bronze stars on their armor in remembrance ever since.

My stars, were stickers I found that were dropped by a rather strange pink pony who was visiting Canterlot, however. I used up most of my money for the flank armor and this was the best I could do. Nobody really seemed to notice, or if they did, they didn’t care.

Thankfully, nobody mention why I bothered to mention why I got my flank armor, but I knew it was only a matter of time before Syringe found out and decided to tell everypony he knows. There was no point thinking about it now, however. I might as well enjoy the privacy while it lasted.

Eventually, Obsidian’s tunnel crossed path with another tunnel. We weren’t alone. Cries of someone yelling for mercy could be heard. There were three branching tunnels, one on the left, middle, and right.

Obsidian instinctually ran down the left. Javva ordered us to follow him, and off we ran. We started finding torches on the ‘walls’ that appeared to have been put out recently. Several Hoofprints were left in the ground along with Obsidian’s tracks.

We could hear our friend shouting something unintelligible. When we reached our destination, I thought I was going to be sick. The bodies of Diamond dogs were scattered everywhere, with deep lacerations covering their bodies.

Our teammate was cornered by the same soldiers that were topside. I guess nowhere was safe from them. We jumped after them, joining the fray.

These soldiers were more experienced then the last ones we encountered. They were faster, and better equipped. All of them wore the gauntlet I nabbed off the one who nearly slit my throat.

Javva slammed the head of one who was charging at Obsidian into a wall and drove her talons into her skull, piercing the helmet. She did this without any reaction on her face. She remained cold and emotionless as she fought the next pony in her line of sight over and over again.

Target stayed in the back and threw her rocks. These soldiers were more heavily armored and were simply annoyed by this, but it work as a decoy so I could stab them without much resistance. Using the blade was surprisingly easy, and felt natural.

The last of the soldiers fell to the floor as one entered the room. He had a brown coat, and cold, silver eyes, and didn’t seem to be phased by us killing the others. “These tests are going better than expected.” he remarked as the body of a diamond dog laid in front of him. He didn’t seem to notice us. “Hmm. Tranquility will be pleased, at least.”

“Who are you” Fuse ordered. The stallion’s eyes shot up at us. They looked dead.

“I am the Nurse, and you are Burning Fuse of the Dead Horses. You were put in this unit for assaulting Prince Blueblood and while growing up, you were a member of a Pegasus supremacist group. Shall I continue?”

Fuse was taken back by this and looked to Javva to an explanation.

“Why did you kill them?!” Obsidian shot out at him. The Nurse’s face remained neutral to the Diamond Dog’s judgement.

“Experimental gain, its the same reason why we attacked you in the forest. You see, these aren’t ordinary soldiers. We can change how intelligent, strong, and fast they are as we please, however, they risk insanity and will go beserk, ignoring our orders, unless we ease them in.”

“And why are you telling us?”

“Because I want you to. I want you to know about this, about these soldiers, and what they’re capable of. I’m a sporting man, I like to give my a small chance. After all, what's the fun of cat and mouse if I catch you as soon as the game begins?”

“What are you talking about? Whats going on?” asked Target, levitating a rock just in case this Nurse character tried something.

“Nothing, yet. All we’re doing now is population control for the wild life.”

This snapped something in Obsidian. Having his fallen kinsmen being called animals made him lunge at this Nurse. Baring his teeth and spear, he almost got a hit in on him. Despite being an Earth pony, the Nurse used something that resembled my kinetic magic, and kept this up until Obsidian was trying to catch his breath. Then he appeared in front of me, mouthing the words “Surprised?” quietly. His face changed emotions for the first time since he entered the room and smirked when he saw the startled look on my face. Fuse put himself between me and the nurse and squinted his eyes at him. I don’t know what confused me more, that an Earth Pony was using my magic, or that Fuse of all ponies, was the one to be protective.

“Look,” Syringe tried pushing Fuse and me away from the Nurse. “We don’t want any trouble.”

“I do.” Fuse growled.

“I agree with Fuse!” Obsidian pointed out while leaning on his spear, resting. He was seriously out of shape. How could someone that was just digging for miles without breaking a sweat, unable to swing a spear around a couple of times?

“Come now, theres no need for such barbarism.”

“I disagree.” Javva pushed herself in front of Syringe, pushing me back even further. I was confused and annoyed at this train we formed. “You killed these Diamond Dogs. They were citizens of Equestria, its our job to deal with ponies like you. Now, we aren’t exactly good guards, so we might forget that taking you in is an option.” I wonder how silly that sounded to the Nurse with half of us sitting in a line behind our leader.

“Don’t be so quick to through your men’s lives away, I expected this from Velocity in the back, but I suppose you aren’t a stranger to sacrifice, are you, captain?” Javva swatted at him, and the Earth pony seemingly teleported on the ledge. He smiled down at us and went through the way we came in.

“Come on!” Javva ordered us to follow her as she flew up to the ledge.

“Uh, sir?” Target interupted. Javva looked back and saw Target pointing to Obsidian looking over the corpses. All of Javva’s lust for battle faded away as she saw her friend standing there. She flew down next to him and silently sat next to him with her head bowed, mourning the dead.

“Aren’t we going to catch this guy?” I asked, not understanding why were worrying about dead Diamond Dogs who we never met before instead of doing our job.

“The dead come first.” she said without looking back at me. An odd thing for someone who about a minute ago completely forgot about the dead to go chase him, but I bit my tongue. When the two were done, Obsidian started digging graves, and it was up to me to fill them.

We all sat by the graves as Javva went by each grave and drew a marking in the soil with her talons.

________________

After the funeral, Obsidian was able to make an exit, and as luck would have it, the cave was in eyesight. It wasn’t guarded, atleast, from what we could tell. Who knew how many of them were in there. I wasn’t worried though, if this Nurse fellow was being serious about wanting us alive, then whatever was in there would be easy to take down.

We crept towards the cave, with still no sight of any guards. Our backs hugged the rough exterior of the cave. It was dark, and we couldn’t see anything. Javva smiled maliciously and looked at me.

“Velocity, you’re fast right?” I didn’t like the way she asked that.

“He actually seems kinda slow, ma’am.” said Syringe. I sneered at him.

“Yeah, I’m fast...” I said warily,

“Then go in there and scout out the area, if you see anything, come back and tell us. Then we can think of a plan.”

“One problem with this,” Besides me being the guinea pig. “How am I supposed to see with no light.”

“You’re eyes will adjust.” the captain said while pushing me into the cave as I resisted. She ran back to the others when I was far enough in. I gulped and looked back at the bastards who were sending me into a place that was dark, and I couldn’t see. It wasn’t ‘Basement with the lights turned off’ dark, it was ‘I couldn’t see my hoof in front of me’ dark. Anything waiting in there could jump out at me anytime it wanted. Breathing got harder just thinking about it.

My eyes were slowly getting adjusted to the darkness, and I could see a little better, but not much. I started walking until my eyesight got better, then I was confident enough to run. The cave spanned longer then I thought, but after about thirty seconds of running, I ran straight into something hard, knocking me to the ground. I rubbed my head and got back up on my hooves. I placed my hoof on whatever I ran into. The texture felt....odd.

I created a light so I could see what I was touching. I was touching scales. Moving scales.

I looked up and saw a large, black dragon looking down at me like it was hungry.

Oh, fuck my life with a soldering iron.

Without hesitating, I ran away screaming like a little filly. My eyes were closed and I unconsciously started cursing out my team. “Fuck you, Javva, for sending me in here. Fuck you, Fuse, and your overly high testosterone levels. Fuck you, Syringe and your stupid jokes. Fuck you Target, for using dumb rocks to fight, and fuck you Obsidian for using that damn spear, you’re the heavy weapons guy, and thats your weapon?!” Shortly after this little outburst, I realized that even though my legs were still moving, I wasn’t on the ground anymore. I opened my eyes to see the angry faces of my team. I looked up to see Obsidian who must have picked me up when he saw. “Oh, fuck.” He dropped me hard on the ground. Sometimes I hated how fast I was.

“Permission to kill him, ma’am?” asked Fuse, as the entire team circled me while I was on the ground. I forced a smile to try and make them think I was joking. Besides, they wouldn’t really kill me for something like this...

“Granted.”

Fuck.

Before the subject matter could continue, we could hear the large thuds the dragon was making as it was coming after us.

“I know that sound...” Javva said with a hint of fear in her voice.

The dragon emerged from the darkness of the cave and looked at us with curiosity. We stared back at it. Javva’s legs were trembling worse then Syringe’s. I wanted to know what was wrong with her, but I figured asking why they were scared while they were being stared down by a thousand pound lizard would be a stupid question.

Cocking its head at us, the dragon didn’t look all that intimidating anymore. Perhaps it was friendly. That was, until it looked at me. “What is your name?”

“V-v-v-v-v-velocity.” I stammered.

I really wish I knew how to shut up, as when I answered, it breathed fire at us. We scattered and circled him. Obsidian charged at the dragon and gored him with his spear. Target threw rocks at its head to try and distract it. Fuse reached into his bag and started throwing bottles that exploded at his feet. Syringe ran over to Fuse and started chucking those bottles as well. I used my speed and blade to lacerate the creature on the opposite side of where Obsidian was stabbing. Javva took to the air and started clawing at his eyes. There was a certain synergy among us.

Seeing Javva fly around gave me an idea, I ran over to Fuse and tried to get him to help me. “Fuse! I need you to fly me over the dragon.”

“What? Why?”

“Just trust me.”

“You better be on to something.” He scooped me up and flew me above the dragon. “This good?”

“Higher! High as you can get me!”

“You’re not using me to get out of this fight are you?”

“Just do it!” I shouted at him. He complied, and flew miles above the dragon. I looked up at him and smiled. “Now drop me!” I exclaimed. He did so without a second thought. I was hoping for a ‘What? are you crazy?’ or ‘No, you have too much to live for!’ but I should have known better then to expect that from Fuse.

I used my magic to propel towards the dragon. This was the fastest I had ever gone, and if this didn’t work, nothing would. I brought out my blade and used my magic to make me go even faster. I was inches away from the Dragon’s spine.

My blade pierced his hide, and the next thing I knew, I was surrounded in blood and guts. I was inside the dragon. I could feel the fat bastard wobble around and fall over on its side. The overflow of blood carried me out of the wound I had made. I was covered in..well, I really didn’t want to know.

The entire team was standing in front of me, still not believing what they just saw. Syringe was laughing uncontrollably. I looked over at him and realized he was at my side, and the armor that was covering my flank had been destroyed.

“Blank flank!” He said pointing to where my cutie mark would have been if I had one. I blushed as he fell to the ground, rolling back and forth, trying to gasp for air. The cat was out of bag now. I didn’t have a special talent, and soon, the entire guard would know.

“You...killed a dragon.” Target said, still in shock of what just happened. Obsidian’s jaw was on the floor and even Fuse looked impressed. Javva smiled warmly at me and helped me up.

“Could have used you during the Dragon War.” Her smile, though nice, seemed kind of forced. Like she was trying to hide some other emotion. From the pain in her eyes, It had to be sadness.

“Augh.” The dragon behind me moaned. My ears perked up in fright. It still wasn’t dead? That didn’t kill it?!

The dragon didn’t move as we approached his head. He followed us with his eyes. “This...changes...nothing. Tranquility will...avenge me.”

Tranquility. First the Nurse mentioned this name, and now this dragon? “We have planned for thousands of years. We will purge you mutants, and ascend the worthy. Your equestria will burn, and from the ashes, an empire, built on all of your strengths and none of your weaknesses, will rise.” the dragon said, using his last amount of strength before gasping for air. He was in unimaginable pain because of me. I felt it right that he be put out of that pain by me. With Javva’s permission, I slit the dragon’s throat.

___________

“You’re saying there were soldiers in this cave?” asked Celestia. We learned that while we were trapped in this forest, Twilight Sparkle and five mares from Ponyville used the Elements of Harmony to defeat Nightmare Moon, and turn her back into Princess Luna. About the only time since Manehatton that I’ve felt glad to hear Twilight Sparkle’s name.

Javva nodded. “We saw soldiers enter this cave, but this ‘Nurse’ must have warned them and left the dragon for us.”

“And they both worked for this ‘Tranquility’, Is that correct?”

“Yes, your Highness.”

“I will have this looked into. If they were speaking the truth, then this is a threat I cannot ignore.”

“Do you want us to help in the investigation? We do have the most experience with them, maybe we could help.”

Celestia smiled. “No, but I do have another assignment for you and your team. My apprentice, Twilight Sparkle, has decided to live in Ponyville to be with her new friends. I’d like your team to be her bodyguards.”

“Her bodyguards?”

“Yes, I’m afraid that over the years, Twilight has been the target of many who would use her to get to me.”

“Are you sure you want us to protect her and her friends?” Celestia looked over to the dragon and laughed.

“I’m sure you’ll do just fine.”

Javva bowed at the princess. “Then its decided.”

“One more thing,” Celestia said like she had almost forgotten. “You have to be discrete. Twilight cannot know she has bodyguards. She doesn’t know that some ponies would want to harm her, and I don’t want her worried.” Unbelievable, she wanted to make our job harder just so that spoiled brat Twilight wouldn’t be scared? I don’t know why I was surprised, I was aware of how Twilight’s guards worked, I just hoped that Celestia had learned something since last time.

“It won’t be a problem.” Celestia smiled at us and teleported away.

“Ponyville huh? Fluttershy lives there.” remarked Fuse.

“Whose Fluttershy?” asked Syringe.

“His sister.” Target said matter-of-factly.

Oh great, another ticking time bomb of pure rage to deal with.

Javva joined us and showed us a map. “Celestia gave this to me, it should lead us out of here, then we can make our way to Ponyville.”

Great, after a night of near death experiences, my reward was guarding the pony I hated most in this world. At least ponyville was supposed to be peaceful. We followed Javva out of the forest, leading us to our new home until we either died, failed, or got reassigned. I prayed for the latter.