You should have known you were going to regret trying to lung with those stupid horseshoes on. Your leg muscles bunched, trying to push you forward, but you didn't really get too far before you found your right leg slipping outward, metal sliding against damp stone. Stupid. Stupid, stupid decision. Even as you feel your leg sliding, you know you should have picked a different room in this hell hole of a cavern to fight in. You manage to catch yourself from falling, but not without pulling at the muscles inside of your leg first. They burn, twitching their displeasure as you try to gather yourself back up. You're used to slipping, but... this is a little different.

And, all the while that you're flailing about, teeth snapping on empty air, your whinnying your displeasure, the vicious sound echoing off the stony walls and reverberating, multiplying your frustration. You'd been praising the gods just a moment ago, thanking them for the gift of your horseshoes, and now? Now you're quite convinced that they hate you, if you didn't think it before. Cashmere does something stupid, rearing up in the face of her opponent, and you get punished for it? They give you metal shoes only to watch you slip and slide like a fool? What did you do? What did you ever do? You can't think of single thing to make you deserve it. Of course, your companion can. But you don't even have time to roll your eyes as she sends you a picture of Ampere.

Cashmere takes advantage of your still recovering form, lunging with her mouth open, her teeth clamping down on the previously damaged portion of your chest, grinding the bruise brutally and making you grit your teeth in response to the sharp sensation. Automatically, you try to step backwards, away from the pain, only to slip again on the stone and feel the muscles you pulled in your leg screaming at you once again. Having not even recovered from their first assault, they are thrashed anew and they're none too pleased about it. Neither are you. You bellow again, a vocal beast in a cave that's too small to contain you. Are you really such an idiot? Are you really so unworthy of the general position that the gods see fit to beat you down at every chance they get? Are you really so terrible that you can't even hit a stupid mare standing right in front of you.

Your mind swirls through various layers of fog and detox, berating yourself and the gods, calling yourself weak and gods callous, spiteful and useless. Her scream as she lets go of your chest brings you back to life, though, and you reach out without thought, teeth aiming for the first thing you think of. You try to clamp them down around the earring she wears, using your height to reach over her and try to avoid her horn, and when you think you might have the metal piece your teeth, you shake your head and pull back, trying to rip the thing from her very ear.

Even as your reaching, even before your teeth close down, however, you can feel the chastising of your companion in your head. She floats about in the room, just the faintest wisp of black hiding in the shadows, watching you, and she does not approve of your cruelty. You can feel it. It drives you on, spurs you forward, drives you into further action, and just as you are done shaking your head like a fool, you pick your front foot up and swing it forward, hoping to drive your massive hoof into the front of Cashmere's left cannon bone, to make her scream the way you have screamed, to make her curse the gods and hate herself the way you are now.

You try to move, to give yourself a better position in the battle, but suddenly you find yourself feeling an emotion you haven't felt in... too long. Is it the lack of drugs, or the darkness above? Is it the thought that you might never achieve the greatness you've spent your whole life striving for? Whatever it is, you feel it deep within your bones. Fear. You're afraid to move, to have the horseshoes slide against the stone again, to slip and do even more damage to your leg muscles, to simply rip them in two instead of just pulling them. You're afraid that if you try anything, the gods will smite you down where you stand and mock you while you crumple to the ground in a heap of drug-wasted flesh and bones. Oh, how the mighty do fall when their mind is a wasteland.

Post: 2/3
WC: 789