The Healer, The Thief, and the Painter. Act 1 The Healer

(Approximately 10 minutes later…)

Crystal’s eyes snapped open to an environment where she wasn’t before. She was in a metal box and was laying on something warm and sticky. As she rose to all four hooves, she realized two things. One was that her armor and sword were gone, and what she was laying on was some kind of coat of warm black fabric. As she looked at it in the morning light she realized that it was covered in a thick congealed layer of blood. “Was that hers?!” Crystal thought in her head, “or Blades?” “Blade!”she called, but to only the response of her own echo in the metal box she was imprisoned in. Sunlight side streamed in from Crystal’s right side, so she turned to that side and observed the continuation of her prison. It extended about three feet forward where part of the front was crushed around the bark of an old tree. Small trickles of black smoke were curling around the metal and wood like evil fingers. Crystal stepped over a small blue cushion flanked by two curved L seats made of the same glossy blue material. She heard glass crunch underneath her hooves and made the connection to the shards and the wide window in the front of the prison with no protection.

She considered escaping through this large window, but quickly dismissed it. If she had her armor, she could have probably made it through unscathed, but she didn’t and when she had to crouch to pass through the window, the glass would cut through her flesh like tissue paper. She observed her surroundings more and saw two more windows, high up and set on some kind of door like she had never seen. It was fully metal and was a dark blue color with deep purple stripes racing along the sides. They also appeared to have some sort of handle protruding from the side of them. Crystal tried to fidget with the handle on the right, but she could not get her hooves around the cold, hard metal. A creature with claws might of, but not her. So Crystal resorted to turning her flank to the frustrating obstacle in her way and kicking it with all of her strength.

The metal bent slightly and Crystal lined up her legs for another kick aiming for the spot that was already bent inward by her last kick. As Crystal delivered another kick with only the strength that earth ponies possessed, the indent grew again and the door seemed very unstable. “One more kick should do it.” she said in her mind and reared back for one final devastating kick. As she thrust out her back legs with all of her strength, the door flew open with a shriek of tortured metal and crashed into the side of her prison with a bang, which reverberated throughout her now empty prison. She nearly cheered for joy from escaping but Crystal held her tongue in case there were more hostiles waiting to ambush her and throw her into another prison. Crystal readied herself to jump out of her enclosure until a glint of bright silver caught her left eye. As she looked she saw two pieces of bright metal. They were an L shape, slightly bent at the bottom of the L. They were also about three inches thick with a singular black stripe running down their side.

Also there was a small hole at the end of the longest part of the metal L. “What are these?” Crystal asked to herself. She reached down to retrieve them and then realized that there was a trigger system where the two ends of the metal met.“Oh horsefeathers,”she said, “weapons.”She reached down tentatively and picked them up one at a time by the shorter end (and they were HEAVY) making sure to keep her teeth away from the trigger that did Celestia knows what. She wondered where they had come from, until she saw a compartment door that was open. “Must have knocked it open when I kicked the door.” She mumbled to herself. She rummaged around in its depths and within a couple of minutes laid out what she had found. One of these things was a small box containing small brass objects. The writing on the side said that there were 20 of these things in the box. The other was a piece of leather construction like she had never seen before.

It had two large rings of leather that were secured to a main body piece. Also it had two large leather pouches on the rings of leather. It was built for a very large creature, maybe twice her size. Crystal jumped of her gloomy prison with the leather piece, the box, and one of the weapons on her back. The other weapon she kept in her mouth. As soon as all four of Crystal’s hooves hit the ground, she was instantly alert. She panned the clearing’s edges that led into the dark forest. She trotted slowly around the clearing with her cargo still on her back. Crystal heard a hissing sound and whipped around violently awaiting a fight, but realized it was only her previous accommodation giving off another stream of black smoke. She nearly shrugged it off until she saw a familiar flash of sapphire and a mound of leather near the back of the prison. As she approached cautiously Crystal saw that it was indeed her sword and armor. Crystal trotted over slowly to her belongings.

Crystal was expecting a trap, but nothing reared its ugly head, or heads. She shrugged off her current load and re-equipped her armor. As she pulled the big piece of leather over her back she kept watching the dark realm of the forest. She had heard many tales of basilisks, hydras, and even chimeras that live in these woods. Crystal quickly re-did the strap closest to her, and cursed softly when she couldn't reach the back strap. She then tentatively picked up her sword and slid it back into its cozy home. Finally Crystal replaced her found items on her back and walked slowly again into the dark depths of the forest with the back part of her armor hanging sluggishly off her flank and her findings weighing heavily on her spine.