Garbage Day! [Open][Dated]

Nov. 31, Year 4

Storm slowly sat down by a small creek in the only park, tired from her many days of searching on the surface, only to no avail. Her blade was still with her, as was her compromised armor. The high noon sun caused the creek to shimmer, as trees around her shielded her from the rest of the world, making her seclusion.... peaceful. It was one of the things that made her truly happy for once- something she had not felt in quite some time. Thus, her guard was down. She was not paying attention at all.

Snow slowly made her usual daily flight over the ruined city, putting anything that was different from the day before into her memory so she had the most up-to-date mental map of her hunting grounds. As she silently made her way over the park, her eyes locked onto a pony who was all alone.

The mare's heart began to pick up its pace as a slightly dark grin slowly formed across her muzzle. I think I'm feeling ready for another little 'game'... She thought to herself as she slowly made her way downward.

Landing in a nearby tree, she wiped the grin off her face to replace it with her cheery and slightly 'special' facade that seemed to work. She said nothing for the moment, simply eying the other pegasus.

Storm jolted to attention as the sudden rustling of leaves occurred behind herself. As she stood, she drew her blade, allowing it to lock in her bracer for better usage. As she looked around the trees, she found something out of place: a pegasus, pure white, sitting in one, staring at her. Finding it odd, Storm merely quirked a brow, her paranoia still refusing to go away. Why was she so... cheery?

"Who are you and what do you want?!" Storm demanded in a hostile manner, gesturing toward the other pony with her blade-leg extended, ready for a fight.

Snow leaned back a bit in surprise when she saw the sword, expression changing to match, even if she really didn't care about the weapon at all. She tilted her head lightly when the question was asked, as if it had somehow confused her in some way.

"My name is Snowie, and I just saw you out here all alone. You looked so lonely, so I came to see if you wanted a friend." She replied, doing her best to make herself sound as sincere as she could while offering the other pony a smile.

Stormcloud paused, a bit of thought going on within her head. The white pony before seemed innocent enough, and pretty defenseless. So, probably against her better judgement, Storm sheathed her blade, thus letting some manner of her defense down. She gestured for the pony to come down, with still little trust in her. She supposed that, if she looked so sweet and defenseless, she'd probably have poisonous claws or something. Still, Storm let her come.

"Well... Alright... I suppose," she said with a frown, simply trying to be kind at this point.

Snow gave a nod before flaring her wings slightly to float herself down to the ground, the axe hanging from her side on her belt swaying ever so slightly from her movements. Despite wearing a bandage on her right foreleg, she didn't seem all too uncomfortable standing up on it.

"So, what's your name? I'm sure it's something nice." She replied in the same sweet, yet slightly oblivious, tone of voice. "Have you been in the city long? I don't think I've seen you around either."

Instinctively, Stormcloud backed up as the pegasus floated to the ground on her white wings. She seemed odd, her cheerfulness setting Storm off in an odd way. The way she spoke seemed off, how uncannily sweet and kind it was. Despite all of this, Stormcloud remained where she stood, answering her question.

"I'm Stormcloud; 'been here almost four years now, but I rarely came out of my house 'till now," she said, sitting in the soft grass of the small clearing in the park.

Snow nodded lightly as she sat down in the grass as well, offering storm another smile afterwords. "It is dangerous to come out here sometimes." She replied, holding up her right foreleg to show that bandage that easily blended in with her white fur.

"Some meanie griffon tried to push me around, but I managed to get away!" She said, sounding more like a pouting filly while saying the statement. "I just want them to go away... We were happy before those bullies came."

Storm shrugged as the pegasus spoke, sounding like a child as she did. Storm noticed that her voice's tonal patterns shifted between those of a three-year-old child, almost making Storm feel as if she was talking to an insane pony, which, as she knew, sounded very close to her. Storm, against her better judgement, shrugged her voice off, letting it sit about. She hardly glanced toward Snow as she spoke.

"Well... I'm armed. And I can fight. I don't really think safety matters, anymore. Really. Nobody but the griffons are safe anymore," she said, reluctance and hatred strong in her voice.

Snow inched just a touch closer to Storm while the continued to converse, keeping her smile as she looked down at the water of the creek. "I want them to go back home and leave us alone..." She replied, muzzle gaining a frown while trying her best to lower her mark's expectations of her.

"It's mean to just take something that isn't yours if they still need it."

Storm hardly noticed the movement of Snow; she was fully turned away, and she hardly cared where she was, anyway. How much could such a sweet, childish mare, be harmful? Her voice was so sweet, so soft, so how could Storm not have some trust of her? Storm still was on edge, however, waiting for her to strike, if she ever did.

"Can't really do anything about it. They conquered us, and they really needed the land too," she said with a sigh.

Snow slowly moved her hoof down to undo the strap holding her axe onto her side, slowly taking the weapon into her hooves once Storm was looking away from her. "I still don't see why they couldn't have asked nicely for some help..." She replied, voice staying the same as her expression slowly shifted into a grin that would show a mixture of excitement and hatred.

"But, it looks like things will stay the same for now... So let me put you out of your misery!" She suddenly stated in a serious tone of voice that had been drained of all of its filly-like qualities. As she spoke the words, she swung her axe towards Storm, aiming for her upper back.

Storm quirked a brow as the pegasus's voice changed so suddenly. She looked behind herself; she was too late. The axe slammed into her back, between some plates of her armor, through the leather, and into her flesh, though not quite into her spinal cord; it struck vertebrae, causing Storm severe pain but not the crippling severance that the other pegasus was going for. Storm shakily stood up, trying to get up quickly and draw her blade; if she did at least manage to stand, it would be easy to draw the blade, as her foreleg's bracer would latch onto the hilt. Heck, if she drew the blade, she'd be making a swipe for Snow, wherever she was. In any case, her next move would be to turn about, to face her foe whilst blood stained her back, the cloak and armor now frayed from the axe strike.

As Snow looked back to Storm, her expression was one of an almost evil glee. She mare's breathing had increased slightly as her excitement began to rise from the feeling of making her first successful strike on her target. "It's so nice of you to play with me. It's a game that's to die for." She said with a mild laugh.

Taking a step closer, she swung her weapon towards her victim once again. This time aiming for the right leg she had remembered seeing the sword on when they first met. "I'm just having so much fun! Aren't you?"

Too slow to block, the axe entered Storm's flesh, going right down to the bone as the leg went limp, blood spewing from the wound. Now, the sword became a severe hindrance, and Storm regretted not keeping her guard up. As the mare spoke, Storm's fear swelled over. She was going to die, and the mare was going to have fun with it. Storm took this as leading to an incredibly painful death.

"Of course I am!" Storm yelled reluctantly, her voice full of a mixture of fear and rage at the same time as she backed into a tree out of panic.

Snow's grin only widened and became that much less sane after the second blow landed. Approaching the other pegasus, she dropped her axe to the ground in order to retrieve her favorite switchblade from her vest. She held the handle up to Storm's face, flipping the blade into place as if to taunt her.

"Say...you're number one hundred!" She said with a slight chuckling undertone. "Now I should make this a special occasion...don't you think?"

After the words left her mouth, she slowly moved the blade up to Storm's cheek and ever so lightly pushed just the very end of it into her flesh. After a short moment, Snow gently guided the blade towards the other pegasus' mouth to seemingly create half of an overly large smile.

"Bitch.." Storm murmured as the pegasus slowly sliced away her flesh, easily seeing where her switchblade was being guided to. It was a simple tactic, one all too common (and a bit cliche for torture, as it was also common among griffons). Storm grimaced as she sent her left forehoof toward Snow's lower jaw, to get her to disengage a bit.

"I think you're an idiot. Only a hundred? Try six-hundred, bitch," she said as she would try to slam into Snow, hoping to take her down.

Snow's hoof slipped away from Storm's cheek as the hoof contacted her jaw, the surprise enough to allow the other pegasus' take-down work successfully. Down on the grass on her back, she simply looked up at Storm without any hints of pain in her expression despite the hard hits she had just taken.

"I wasn't in the war, like you very much seem to have been." She replied calmly while locking her glaring eyes onto Storm's.

"You're a hypocrite, though," Storm said with a sigh. "You say you hate how the griffons are here, yet you try to kill someone who wants to get rid of them too," she said as she sent another punch toward her face again, before standing off of Snow, not really caring what happened to her, hoping her hits were enough to incapacitate her, as she turned about, walking away, not really paying attention to her.

"I only said that to make you lower your guard. I don't care about anything, really." Snow replied, preparing to state something else, but stopping as her head jerked back after the punch. Playing unconscious for just a moment, she felt Storm's weight slowly lift off of her.

After a moment, she slowly rolled over and stood back up to her hooves. Stowing her switchblade away, the gathered up her axe before preparing herself. The albino mare quickly rushed back for Storm with her weapon at the ready, aiming for another strike at her back, this time aiming for her center.

Storm, locked into a walking pace, wasn't prepared for the attack that met her. As she turned around, hearing a commotion, she saw a flash of white, and steel... And suddenly felt nothing in her lower half. She fell to the ground, her spinal cord severed by the strike of the axe, once again lucky to have struck through the plates, but now through her spine, destroying any chance of Storm's escape. She had noting more to say, merely grunting as she struggled to escape, now truly fearful for her survival.

Snow smirked as she placed her axe down once again, using a foreleg to roll Storm over onto her back before using her weight in an attempt at holding her down. Raising her left leg back to her vest, she prepared her switchblade again.

"Didn't your training teach you not to turn your back on your enemy?" She asked in a slightly taunting tone. "You're not fun anymore though, so I'll have to finish our game now."

Storm did something uncharacteristic for herself: she began to quake, quake out of fear. She knew, through the pegasus's words, that she was going to die. Even while on her back, with her forelegs ready to punch back, she could not fight back; she was being pinned to the ground. "Fine, well, if I'm so un-fun, at least make it quick," she said with a fearful yet angry tone in her voice, a failure to cover up such fear.

Snow gained an almost giddy expression as she slowly ran the blade along Storm's throat once to make a shallow, bleeding cut. Her wings flared out behind her as she placed the tip of the blade on the center of the cut.

"Say goodnight...Stormie." She said in a low tone before slowly pushing the blade into the other pegasus' neck. The albino mare made sure to keep the movement as excruciatingly slow as possible to savor the moment she seemed to enjoy so much.

"Goddesses.... you get off to th-" Storm's statement was cut short by the blade, plunged into her throat slowly. She tried to struggle against her captor, failing as she was unable to breathe, her trachea severed and unable to ever get air to her lungs again. She gasped, trying and failing to get air; she would never get that air to her lungs, always failing as she fell unconscious after a few moments, dead after a minute or so. The cause? Asphyxiation.

Snow smirked slightly at the statement that was cut off, getting up off of the newly deceased pony. "Perhaps I do, perhaps I don't." She replied simply as she looked down at the unmoving Stormcloud.

Looming over her, she slowly took her knife and carefully cut her snowflake mark into her victim's belly, deep enough to be clearly visible. After a moment of inspection, she cleaned her knife and axe off in the creek before washing her bloody hooves to return her coat to its perfect white.

Snow placed her things back into their right spots before flaring her wings and taking off for a place to rest.