As I waited on the bathroom ceiling for closing time, I found my mind wandering to the past. To old jobs that had been so much easier. Jobs that didn’t force me to spend hours upside down on the ceiling of a bathroom. Jobs that had taken me back and forth across Equestria. Las Pegasus crept into my mind. The last time I had been there was the first time I had agreed to take on a partner.
Rainbow Dash had been willing enough. She’d been following me in an attempt to find out exactly what it was that I did. While I had known of her presence the whole time I had allowed her to follow. I never shared much of this life with anypony and it could get lonely. I suppose, in hindsight, it was a moment of weakness. Rainbow had even followed me all the way to Las Pegasus which was where I had confronted her about tailing me.
I had wandered into a crowd and allowed myself to get lost, all the while never losing sight of Rainbow. She had followed what she thought was me for some time before I grabbed her from around a corner, pressing her to a wall with my hoof over her mouth. Not too roughly, but just rough enough that she would take me seriously.
“I’m going to remove my hoof and then you’re going to tell me why you’ve been following me. If you lie to me I’ll know, and I will make sure you never follow me again.” I had said harshly, as I removed my hoof from her mouth, still pinning her to the wall.
“And just how would you do that? I can go wherever I want to and you can’t stop me.” Her arrogance would be her undoing.
“Listen to me. I’ve let you follow me the past few weeks because I’ve been stuck with mundane jobs in Ponyville. This is different. The men who hired me don’t accept mistakes and failure is not an option. If they see you following me, they won’t hesitate to kill both of us.”
Rainbow Dash had stared at me for a long time after that, trying to discern if I was telling her the truth. When she finally spoke, her voice wavered slightly, “Then why would you take it if it’s that dangerous?”
“Because with this job I’ll be able to eat for a year. And I’m not talking eating daisy sandwiches. I could go to a Canterlot buffet every night.” I hated myself for taking this job solely for the money but work had been scarce and I could really use it.
Her eyes widened as the realization of what I did sank in. Big money for finding somepony who didn’t want to be found? Where could she sign up? And that was exactly what she had asked me.
“No. I don’t work with anypony. I haven’t needed a partner in all the years I’ve been doing this and I certainly don’t need one now.” That statement had hurt her.
“Why not? I’m already here. Why not use me for this one job and we can part ways afterward? I won’t even ask for a share of the money.” She did her best to give puppy dog eyes, which she didn’t need to do. She was pretty enough to convince Celestia the sun didn’t need to shine.
I don’t know if it was her looks or her willingness to participate or just my loneliness but something inside me caved. “Alright, fine, you can come along. But if you’re going to do this we have to dye your mane. Those colors are pretty but they’re very noticeable. You need to be as inconspicuous as possible.”
“Dye my mane,” she had said with some hesitation. “But how will it get back to normal once we’ve gone back home?”
“Simple. They have dyes that stay in for about a week and then wash out. You’ll be back to your beautiful self in no time.” I internally kicked myself for calling her beautiful but she hadn’t even seemed to notice.
“Alright, so where do we get started?” Her enthusiasm was uplifting. Maybe this job wouldn’t be so bad.
We headed to a market to get some dye and then checked into my hotel room. Everything had been prearranged by my employer so it was a singe bed room. We’d have to make due. I helped Rainbow with the dye and could help but take in her scent as I helped wash her hair. It was almost too much for me to bear. God, I really was lonely.
As we finished up, Rainbow dried her mane and tail and looked at herself in the mirror. Her bright cyan coat clashed slightly with the black hair but the look suited her. She seemed satisfied and tossed the towel aside.
“So what’s the plan, Shadow? Bust into a club and find someone to question? Snoop around in their hotel room looking for clues? Maybe a high speed chariot chase?” Her innocence of what really went on in my job was cute.
“Not quite, sweetie.” Calling her sweetie had been deliberate. If I was going to convince anypony she belonged with me then marriage was a perfect cover. Though she didn’t quite know my meaning and took a bit of offense.
“’Sweetie?’ Hold your horses, buddy. I’m no pony’s sweetie.”
“Then how else do we explain why you’re here? For this week, and only this week, you will be my wife. It will be the easiest way to get ponies to believe my cover story.”
“What’s your cover story?”
“It changes from pony to pony. Situation to situation. Lie to lie. Just go with it when you hear it. Like I said, no pony around here is too fond of private detectives. But if we look like a couple on our honeymoon then it’ll be easier to play off.”
Rainbow didn’t look pleased with the way I played this. She thought there was more planning. More devious tactics. She thought I was better than I really was. But she held her tongue on the issue and asked instead, “So what’s our first move?”
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I snapped back to reality as the bathroom lights flicked off. I’d been lost in the past for quite some time. I moved to check my watch, becoming visible. It was the same time the bar had closed last night. I slowly walked back down the wall into the stall I had originally walked out of and check my pack one last time. It was time to get to work.
I waited a few minutes to give everypony time to get a healthy distance from the bar before I gingerly cracked the door. The club was just as dark as it had been the night before and I brought up my horn light to see.
I approached the stage, knowing just behind it was the trap door that led to the castle, but was stopped short as a bright light flicked on catching me dead in the center of the club. I was caught.
The other ponies surrounded me quickly. The unicorns had their horns glowing, ready to stop anything I might try. I recognized one of the colts that walked toward me. It was Mr. ‘Bean’ I had seen in the tunnel last night.
“Well, what do we have here? A detective snooping around our club after hours?”
“Snooping? I wasn’t snooping I was in the bathroom when the lights flicked off and was looking for the exit.”
“Oh come now, must you lie to us? We know why you’re here. Octavia must be important to your employer. Why else would he send you into the Wolves’ Den?”
“Listen, I don’t know what you’re talking about. If you could just show me out…”
“Enough! Listen detective, you’ll be leaving this place in one of two ways. Dead or unconscious. Just answer me this one question. Who hired you?”
I swallowed hard and tried to recall anything that might help me get out of this. Save a miracle, I was done for. I sighed heavily. Unconscious was better than dead. “I was hired by…” The lights flickered and the turned off. Tables began to shudder and chairs clattered. A booming voice echoed through the club.
“Not another word! This den of liars and deceivers has existed for too long under my watchful eye! I have long known all was not as it seemed! I will be your undoing! Soon the time will come when those associated will be dragged into the light and their deeds made public! Tread carefully, defilers of this kingdom! Your end is nigh!”
The voice echoed and boomed so loudly that I had to cover my ears. I shriveled in fear as the voice finished and lighting appeared inside the club as everyone ran for cover. I was in the middle of this storm within a building praying to Celestia that I would somehow survive when from my squinting eyes I caught a purple flash. Not too unlike the lighting flashes but different. I felt a hoof on my shoulder and then a feeling of falling as the world fell quiet.
As the feeling of weightlessness subsided, I stood slowly, looking around, recognizing my hotel room. Standing next to me, my savior, it was all I could do to not kiss her, Twilight Sparkle. I settled for a hug and a very sincere thank you.
She smiled and returned my hug. “Ya know, if this is the kind of work you always do, maybe you should get a partner,” she laughed sweetly, at her own joke.
I couldn’t help but chuckle as the adrenaline pumped its way out of my system. “You know I don’t work like that, Twi. So what was that? You just conjure a storm inside a night club and then teleport in, grab me, and teleport back out?”
“Oh no, I could never do all that by myself. The voice and the storm belong to..”
“Me.”
“By the moon.” I stared, awe struck. “Princess Luna?”
“One and the same,” she smiled.
“But how.. You.. And her.. and you..?” I stammered, unable to deal with the fact that I had just been saved by the goddess of the night and a very magical friend of mine.
“Calm down, detective,” Twilight chuckled. “We can explain.”
I sat down on my bed and nodded my head. I was ready to listen.
Twilight paced the floor, explaining the whole story. Octavia had not been kidnapped. She had been asked to serve Luna on an important mission. Luna had needed someone who could infiltrate their society with relative anonymity. Being from Canterlot and having a rich upbringing, Octavia had made an ideal candidate. I was assured her involvement was voluntary. As it turned out, she had infiltrated their society with ease. They accepted her as one of the Canterlot elite and as a talented musician, which was something they could use.
The master plan of this order was to bring Discord back from his stone prison. Their plan to unleash him? Gather all the unicorns they could and perform a reverse petrification spell on the statue. Octavia had been employed as a ‘recruitment’ technique. They had cursed her cello to take over the minds of other ponies. Allowing them ease of movement around the city and more power for when they were to unleash the spell.
“But how did they do all this so quickly? Octavia’s only been gone a week. How could they have recruited enough people to be able to unleash Discord? How did you even know of their plans? And if all of this is so important why hasn’t Celestia gotten involved?”
Princess Luna smiled. “My sister handles the day, I handle the night. This society has been operating only at night so Celestia has given me responsibility over it. And just because I raise and settle the moon does not mean I don’t pay attention to Equestia at night. I’ve kept a close eye on their proceedings for quite some time. Since before Cadence and Shining Armor’s wedding. The problem we’re having isn’t that they’ve recruited enough unicorns to unleash the spell it’s that Octavia stopped feeding us intelligence. They’ve either turned her against us, or know she’s a spy and are keeping her prisoner.”
“My money is on the latter, Princess. I found this torn note when I did some snooping last night. It’s hard to make out but I think it mentions the dungeons. That’s where I was headed tonight.”
“The dungeons? I thought the dungeons had been remodeled into more guard housing.” Twilight said.
“The remodeling was no longer needed once the changelings had been defeated. The dungeons remain unchanged.” Luna spoke with disdain. She was not fond of prisons.
I rose from the bed and with as much conviction as I could muster, “Then let’s not stand on ceremony. We’ve got a secret society to kick in the hind end.”
Luna stepped toward Twilight and I. “Agreed. My showing at the bar will force them to act quickly and finish any loose ends. We must move quickly.” With that, she bowed her head and I felt the weightless feeling return for a moment.
I was in for another long night.