While committing crimes might have been easy, the act of actually picking a target, planning the hit, and carrying out the job just enough to make it look real so that a superhero would appear in response was a whole ‘nother ball of feathers.
This was the problem Blueblood found himself in. Worse, he was a prince, so he wasn’t really used to thinking about petty crimes. Something mundane and white collar like dipping into the tax revenue would probably only attract angry auditors. Doing something to draw in Bright Defender so she could be unmasked was turning out to be an especially hard task.
He lay on his bed contemplating the problem. Luckily, he had Trudy to help him with the planning. If Blueblood couldn’t think of a crime slummy enough to draw in a superhero, he was fairly confident that the voice in his head could.
And what’s that supposed to mean? Trudy demanded.
“Hey, we’re a team. What I can’t do, I look to you for help.”
By assuming I’m a mare of low class?
“One of us has to be,” Blueblood replied. “And last time I checked, I was royalty.”
Last time I checked, I was inside you, she shot back. And doesn’t royalty run in the blood?
“Can we not talk about the whole sharing a body issue?” Blueblood asked.
That’s the entire issue! I don’t want to be stuck here and I’m pretty sure that alicorn wings or not, you don’t either. You could at least be a little more accommodating.
“Jeeze, get up on the wrong side of my head or something?” muttered Blueblood.
You’re such a jerk sometimes. Worst superhero ever.
“Oh yeah, and what does that make you? You’re related to Chrysalis, who is practically a real life supervillian.”
We can’t be both. There’s two of us here, and becoming archenemies in one body would be really awkward.
Blueblood resisted, but the situation was too ridiculous and he couldn’t help bursting out in laughter. It sounded like Trudy did too, albeit just as reluctantly.
“But seriously,” muttered Blueblood, calming down. “What kind of crime should we do?”
It needs to be something simple to pull off, close to the castle, and offer us deniability. Maybe...that lingerie shop a few blocks away.
“What?! Why that?”
Who’d suspect Prince Blueblood of snooping around intimates when there aren’t mares inside them?
Blueblood sputtered. “Yeah, but...if you can change how I look, then what does it matter picking a place where I wouldn’t be suspected?”
Because it’s funnier this way. Plus, you need to go as your regular costumed self, so Bright Defender will know you. Maybe she’ll let down her guard.
Blueblood sighed and looked out the window. The sun was going down and so was his excuse for not getting started on the pursuit of his goal of learning Bright Defender’s true identity.
“All right, let’s… go break into a lingerie shop.”
Trudy actually sqee’d inside his head as she rapidly dressed him in his Trueblood getup. Blueblood sighed as he went over to the window to go out into the night. He tried to turn his thoughts towards his mission. It helped to think about success instead of embarrassment.
When they had both attained varying degrees of readiness, Blueblood flexed his wings and went out the window. He was getting better at navigating from the air, although he probably could have found his way to the intimates store even without Trudy dredging through his memories to find it.
Landing on the roof, Blueblood found a hatch and lasered the lock off with magic. Folding his wings, he dropped down inside the store. Not surprisingly, it was dark and filled with lingerie, just like he expected an intimates shop at night.
Here, let me put together a composite image from your memories, Trudy offered. Scraping together everything Blueblood had ever seen from just glancing in the window the times he had passed by the shop, she managed to build a reasonable map of the floorplan and project it onto his eyes. It was not perfect, but combined with magically enhanced night vision, it effectively made Blueblood instantly familiar with the inside of the building.
“Nifty,” he muttered. He paused and looked around. “So...I don’t see Bright Defender.”
Well, you haven’t done enough to draw her attention, Trudy suggested.
“I wonder if they have a burglar alarm we could trip or something.”
That would probably only attract the police. Besides, why would a place that only sells skimpy clothing need an alarm?
Blueblood glanced at the tags on some nearby saddles and sputtered. “I think I know. That’s a small fortune. I don’t know how mares afford it.”
You didn’t know how much this stuff costs?
“Hey, you didn’t either, and you only know what I know. I’ve never been inside a place like this. I, uh, never really got into the gift buying thing.”
Your relationships never lasted long enough for you to get to that.
“How do you know?” Blueblood accused.
I only know what you know. It sounded like Trudy was smirking.
“Yeah, whatever. So I have to do something more significant to get Bright’s attention?” Blueblood looked around and then reached out a hoof to push over the nearest rack of clothing.
The array of fancy saddles teetered and fell over, the stand knocking into the next one beside it. That kicked off a chain reaction that quickly spread to everything else in the shop. In seconds, nearly everything was falling over, spreading out in waves and dominoing into more action.
Everything culminated in all the racks near the front of the shop simultaneously bursting through the windows and scattering glass all over the sidewalk.
In the sudden silence that followed, Trudy muttered, That’ll do.
“Yeah, I’ll say,” agreed Blueblood. The wanton destruction gave him a strange thrill, although he knew that it was only for a purpose. Even as careless as a prince could be, Blueblood was not usually into random acts of destruction.
With a whisper of feathers, Bright Defender flew in through the broken windows. She squinted, spotting Blueblood standing in the middle of the mess.
“Trueblood? Did you catch whoever did this?” Bright asked. “I heard you talking a second ago.”
Trudy caught Blueblood’s sudden nervousness and apparently felt the same way. Uh, now that she’s here...what was the plan?
“It all happened so fast,” Blueblood began, counting on his gift of glib to carry the day. “Here, maybe you can help me search for clues.”
Bright picked her way across the room, bumping into a few things. Blueblood waited for her, brain working furiously to figure out what he was going to do next.
Stopping a few feet away, Bright looked around and lit up some light from her horn. Glancing with disgust at the lingerie scattered about, she looked up and spotted the open ceiling hatch. “Hmm, that looks suspicious.”
She spread her wings to fly up and take a closer look. With her back turned to him, Blueblood realized that this might be his best chance to do something. But what?
Bright hovered towards the ceiling, and Blueblood, desperate to do something, anything, threw a pair of panties at her face.
The garment snagged on Bright’s horn, extinguishing her light. She bumped into the ceiling and fell back into the pile of lingerie.
Seizing a pair of stockings, Blueblood hurled them at Bright just as she cleared her face. Grabbing anything else he could reach, he flung it all at her.
Managing to bat away some of the incoming erectile projectiles, but too surprised and dazed to get them all, Bright got buried by saddles, garters, and knickers. She swatted at her face, Blueblood’s target, attempting to scrape off all the intimates that were rapidly covering her.
Frantically peeling back the layers, Bright went one layer too deep. Her entire face came off, revealing the mare beneath.
It was Princess Twilight Sparkle. Or at least, in the dim light of the shop, it was a purple unicorn that sure looked like her.
Pleased to be making progress, but conflictingly disappointed that he hadn’t revealed Shining Armor instead, Blueblood opened his mouth to utter a cry of triumph, but he was cut off by Trudy. Look at her wings!
Blueblood’s mouth dropped open. Emerging from Twilight’s otherwise smooth back were green gossamer wings punched with ragged holes.
And then, just to add to the sensory overload, the front wall of the shop blew out and through the cloud of swirling dust, a voice shouted, “Prepare your anus!”