Act 3 Chapter 29: The Chains of Leadership
Most ponies give too much credence to the notion that a leadership position is a good thing. Leadership means additional options, but it also means picking the right option when all's said and done. If you don’t, you won’t be a leader for very long and the next guy to take up the scepter might get everyone killed, or decide his first order of business is impaling the last guy to hold office on a pike just to watch him wriggle.
-Heavy Hoof, leader of the Manehattan mob on the day before his arrest for racketeering and tax evasion.
I’m sure Telly thought carving me a nice, shiny new badge in the third of an hour since she left me with Lily was a great piece of comedy, but it almost earned her a broken everything.
----
Lily pounced on me a second before I dropped the badge and went for Telly’s throat. Her hooves wrapped around my neck and she used her body-weight to yank me onto my side, throwing her back legs in front of my knees. For a unicorn, she’s pretty strong. Must be all that farm work.
“No, Hardy! Stop!”
“I just want to feel her organs! Make sure they’re fresh and screamy! Lemme at her!”
----
I did calm down. It took about ten minutes with a determined, stubborn mare clinging to my back and hobbling my rear legs, but I did calm down. My ears were covered in Lily’s tooth-marks from when I’d tried to get my legs under me and Telly was cowering behind Gypsy, who had a sort of ghostly smirk on her face, but...calm.
“Alright...fine. I will not kill the radio idiot today,” I grumbled.
“Promise! No killing her ever!” Lily demanded, tightening her grip on my neck a little.
“I promise I will not kill the radio idiot...ugh...ever...”
Lily cautiously released the leg that was across my throat and eased back to her hooves. My hat was resting against the railing where it’d rolled when it fell off her head. She levitated it over and pushed it down over my ears, then reached back and pulled my coat out of the saddle-bag hanging from her side.
“There. Now, get out of those scrubs, pick up that badge, and pony up! Whether you like it or not, you’re the Chief of Police now.” Before I could open my mouth to rebut, she pushed it shut with her toe on my lower jaw. “You’re the Chief, Hard Boiled! Act like it!”
“If I were acting like the last Chief, I’d be pitching Telly off this platform,” I grunted, stepping away from her leg and scooping up the fallen wallet. I looked at the badge for a second, then shook my head and shoved it into my pocket.
Gypsy flowed over to my side and threw one leg across my shoulders. It had only a slight weight, but it was cold and damp.
“Well—” she began, but I cut her off.
“Do not call me ‘Chief’,” I growled. “I know you were about to. Detective or Hardy, or I swear I will piss off the edge of this platform every day for as long as I’m still alive.”
Gypsy carefully took her leg away. “Right. Sorry. Your plan?”
I straightened my collar and stood a little straighter. “I have a contact with a group of Diamond Dogs who have a tunnel network that runs underneath the city.”
“You...you mean the Underdogs?” Gypsy sputtered.
“You’ve heard of them?” I asked.
She nodded. “I hear them sometimes, on the police radios when they’re moving around the streets. There’s a file in here about them, though it’s only a few pieces of paper stuck together with a bit of sticky-tack. The Underdogs are paranoid and reclusive and nopony knows where they actually live. At least, I didn’t think anyone did. How’d you meet them?”
“Doesn’t matter,” I replied, waving the question away. “What does matter is that they’re waiting on my signal to burrow their way inside the Castle and evacuate all the non-essential personnel.”
Telly put a hoof over her face. “Diamond Dogs? Really, Hardy? I knew you were all about making friends in low places—”
I glared at her. “I promised Lily I wouldn’t kill you. I will wire your jaw shut if I have to.”
“Okay, okay! Celestia save me, you weren’t this much of a grump even when you were drinking...”
“I haven’t stopped drinking! I am taking a brief hiatus to fix the planet, then I plan to slink right back into my bottle. Since you’re saddling me with this, I’m going to use it until somebody picks the badge off my corpse. That may happen sooner, rather than later. In the meantime, Gypsy, what can you do to help?”
The avatar tucked her floating tail beneath her rear legs and sighed. “Not much. Most of my attention is going to keeping several ‘someones’ out of the Castle’s protection grid.”
“Several? I’ve got a friend who has probably been probing the grid a few times lately, but I doubt she could qualify as ‘several’.”
“You’re talking about the Supermax construct, right?” Gypsy asked.
“You’re going to be as irritating as Tourniquet with her big ears, aren’t you?”
“Tourniquet is the...construct? Yeah, I suppose a few of the intrusions match magical signatures that I’d call ‘Crusades era’. Most seem to be much older than that.”
Lily nudged my leg with her shoulder. “I’m feeling kind of left out. Who is she talking about?”
“A nosey, hormonal teenager who just so happens to be in control of most of the city’s power grid,” I replied. “She’s the reason the lights have stayed on in much of the town. Gypsy, could I convince you to let Tourniquet in? I could use her.”
“Errr...no can do, boss. I can’t read the magical signatures until after I’ve repulsed them. We let your friend in, we’ll probably be letting in whoever else is banging at the gates. You want to risk those ‘Biter’ freaks getting ahold of the security system inside the Castle?”
I considered for a moment, then shook my head. “Tourniquet is pretty useful, but I don’t want to take that risk until after the innocents are out of the line of fire. Right. That means...sneaking back into the garage.”
Gypsy’s glowing eyes dimmed slightly and she seemed to be gathering her courage. .“I...err...Hardy? I have to tell you something that I discovered. I was going to a minute ago, but...well, it’s kinda problematic and has to be dealt with soon. You’re going to hate it, but it’s the right thing to do, both for your health and for...hers.”
“Hers? Lily’s?” I asked, and the mist creature shook its head.
“Not her. Iris Jade. You need to get her out of here.”
“I thought you said you didn’t have any more stupid surprises for me!” I shouted, throwing my hooves in the air. “Sweet mercy, are you out of your gourd?! I need her like I need a bomb strapped to my backside! She can rot in that office for all I care!”
My cutie-mark tingled a little; a none-too-quiet reminder I was being a prig. That or I’d need her to fulfill some greater act of justice. Probably the latter. Crap.
“Hardy, if Jade stays in the Castle without a leadership position to protect her, I’m pretty sure she’ll be dead inside of six hours,” Telly murmured. “There are more than a few ponies who want to kill her on principle. With those wards in her office, she’s safe enough from somepony trying to throw fireballs at her, but she hasn’t made any friends with her particular leadership style over the last few weeks. Too many of these ponies have lost loved ones and she’s a great target for some blame, either because they feel like she didn’t act fast enough or because they feel like she’s sitting on her tail.“
“In case you missed it, I just deposed her! I’m headed into the Wilds on a lead! You realize she’s the most dangerous thing in this building, right?!”
“And...for that reason, you probably ought to take her along. She doesn’t drive, but she can fight and she can port. Do you really trust the guns you and your partner are going to be carrying out in the Wilds with no P.A.C.T. patrols controlling the wildlife? Even with one of the tanks?”
I gulped as the sad reality began to set in. Gypsy had a point. An irritating, tragic point, but a point I couldn’t really dispute. Much as I detested her, the ex-Chief was still a magical powerhouse.
Still, that left Iris Jade, queen of the Castle, riding shotgun on a dangerous mission with Swift, Lily, Mags, and myself. Of course, all of this assumed she wasn’t sitting up there cutting her own arteries or drunk off her eyes.
“You know this is a bad idea, right?” Lily murmured. “I can tell, you’re considering it, though. If anything all these ponies have said about Iris Jade is true, she’s not above murder.”
“Yes. Yes, I am completely aware,” I replied, adjusting my hat. “It’s also completely typical. Swift has some very specialized weapons, and I have an ace in the hole, but Iris Jade is in another league. A full grown dragon might roll against her, one on one, and I wouldn’t lay my money on the dragon walking away with all its bits.”
“Hardy, she’s going to try to kill you the second she lays eyes on you.”
“Probably.”
“And...that...isn’t deterring you at all, is it?”
“No.”
“I’m suddenly questioning my decision to drive you around.”
“Smart girl,” I replied, then turned back to where Gypsy floated. “Gypsy, can you monitor transmissions leaving the building? Say, from anything that might punch through the jamming?”
Gypsy hesitated, then quickly asked, “I might be able to. In theory. It’d depend on what sort of transmitter is sending it. I might not be able to tell you what’s being said, but I could probably tell you somepony was saying something. What would I be listening for?”
“Anything. If a signal leaves, you tell me. Got it?”
“Will do!”
“Meanwhile, send a message down to Taxi. Tell her to meet me at Jade’s office.”
“What about your griffin and partner?” Gypsy asked.
“Tell them to meet me in the commissary if I’m still alive in forty minutes.”
“And...me?” Lily asked.
“You’re with me. You might buy us time to run away if Jade decides to draw and quarter me. Here’s what we’re going to do…”
----
No hiding. No slinking along in the dark. No cowering behind statuary.
I marched down the hall, my head held high.
From the moment when the first young colt caught sight of me coming around the corner into the main hallway ringing the Castle there were shouted questions, cheers, laughter, and the first real smiles I’d seen since I’d arrived. I forced myself to mirror their expressions with as much confidence as I could, though I worried it might have just made me look constipated.
Precious might enjoy the spotlight, but I found myself having to struggle with the urge to sprint away from the interested crowd with my tail between my legs. Unfortunately, for what I intended, I needed an audience.
I made sure to keep my gun covered as Lily crowded in close to my body.
Smile. Walk, don’t run. Keep the new badge visible.
At the stairwell, I trotted down with what I hoped looked like extra spring in my step and stopped at the entrance to the throne room half-way down, but in full sight of the herd of ponies filling the vast space. Most of the crowd had given me a respectful distance.
Ponies looked up to see what the commotion was and I waited patiently for a full twenty seconds as the clamor built to a thunderous crescendo. The hundreds of people gathered in the grand hall were stomping their hooves, screaming, and whinnying with a mixture of excitement and alarm. A part of me thought we might be moments from a stampede.
“Gypsy, gonna need some ‘effect’ here,” I whispered out of the corner of my muzzle.
“You got it, boss,” my juju bag replied at a volume only I could hear over the shouting crowd. “Five, four, three…”
Shoving my hat back off of my tousled mane, I thrust one foreleg into the air.
A spine-rattling peal of thunder split the air, shaking the fillings in my head. Even though I’d been expecting it, my ancient, animal instincts almost sent me scrambling for the nearest cover. I heard a couple of foals crying and a mare let out a squeaky shriek of fear, but otherwise it was a very effective means of getting some silence. Their eyes were fearful, but I kept that confident smile in place and most quieted.
“Public address system,” I whispered, under my breath.
“Ready,” came the reply.
I inhaled and raised my chin to address everypony.
“This is Dead Heart!”
The volume was enough to make my ears ring, but I kept going even as the crowd drew subconsciously closer to one another, taking a couple of steps forward as though to better hear what I had to say. Not that it particularly mattered. They probably heard that introduction in Manehattan.
I continued, a little more quietly.
“You all know me or have heard of me! You’ve seen my face on the wanted posters. I have been tracking those responsible for the Darkening! It began, right here in our city!”
Hushed whispers spread across the room. There were some questions called out, but I went on before they could start to process what I’d said.
“I have been tracking those who are responsible! I can’t tell you everything, but I have information that leads me to believe the Princesses and the population of Canterlot itself are still alive! We may even be able to save them!”
That got a response. Ponies began shouting over one another and it took another grumble from the File Cloud to quieten them again. All those frightened eyes were full of a nervous hope, but it was a fragile thing and needed to be carefully managed.
“I am evacuating the Castle! Get the sick, the unconscious unicorns, and the young ready to go! Don’t ask how, because I can’t tell you! The creatures outside have ears everywhere, but they can’t come where we will be going! Your safety is assured if you listen to the Prince of Detrot and my lieutenants, Sweet Shine and Radiophonic Telegraphica!”
Ha! Take that! Want to hand out promotions without asking for permission? How about them apples? I could almost hear Taxi’s teeth grinding from halfway across the building. She would not be pleased.
The gathering was listening now, with rapt attention. That tiny hope was becoming something firmer. I saw grim determination in the expressions of those down front.
“I have a plan which requires me to leave the city, but I will not abandon you and I will not leave you without protection! Not now, not ever! This is my home as much as it is yours! Today, Iris Jade has stepped down and I am the new Chief of Police! I will be taking her with me when I leave and no-one will face her tyranny again! I swear, on my badge, on my gun, and on my talent that I will not stop fighting until the sun shines again!”
A slowly building tremor started to shake the floor under me and I thought for a moment, that Gypsy was doing something to the building superstructure. It spread, and I realized that it was the stomping hooves of hundreds upon hundreds of ponies. I became aware of Lily standing beside me, stomping right along with them as she gazed at me with something akin to rank lust in her face. Eh, maybe that was just my imagination, but she was grinning, and that’s what mattered.
Somepony whistled and I found my smile was now much less forced as I reared back and shouted at the top of my lungs.
“We are going to get our city back!”
----
As speeches go, it wasn’t a bad one. Short, to the point, and with a lot of heart. I didn’t have time to write it, but Gypsy dropped a bottle of very fine scotch in my lap and that helped considerably.
I strode through the crowd, who backed off just far enough for me to make progress, with Lily Blue at my side. The spotlight might not be someplace I’d like to live, but I think I’d be happy to visit from time to time if it meant so many ponies doing something besides shooting at me.
“Good work, boss,” Gypsy murmured from the radio around my neck.
“Don’t congratulate me,” I replied softly as I marched towards the stairs. “We’re not in the clear. Not until Jade surrenders and walks out of here with me. If she doesn’t, we leave her, but I need her on my side. I have to sell that she’s beaten, to the crowd, and that she still has my respect, to her.”
“You think she’ll go along?”
“I think she wants to see her daughter again.”
“That’s a low thing to hold over somepony…”
“It’s either a little guilt now, or a whole heap of guilt when I have to tell Cerise I let her mother die because I was too scared to take responsibility for this situation.”
Jade’s office—I refused to think of it as mine just yet—was still ahead. Up above, I could still see her shadow behind the glass. On either side, the rows of ponies jumped and leaned side to side, trying to get a glimpse of their would-be savior. Of course, I’d bluffed my way through to this point. The next step was a million times more dangerous.
I marched forward, subtly shaking my trigger free. As we stepped into the hallway, I held up my leg and the crowd all stopped.
“Wait here. This is between Jade and I,” I growled. Everypony besides Lily stopped short at the edge of the carpet, as though there were an invisible line there. There might as well have been. On one side of the line, everyone with a sense of self preservation. On the other, an idiot, and a girl too innocent and trusting to know better.
Spooky quiet had fallen over the crowd as they waited to see what might happen.
I trotted forward, my ears twitching, listening for any signs of movement. My armor felt tight and heavy, but it’d kept her from casually snatching a knot in me before. I only hoped it might achieve a similar trick when she was genuinely mad.
When I was three quarters of the way to the door, it opened slightly. I paused, then kept walking.
“S-should we knock or something?” Lily asked, low enough that I didn’t imagine the crowd could hear her.
I put a hoof on the door and whispered, “Gypsy, is Jade doing anything?”
“I hear somepony moving around in there,” my juju bag replied. “There aren’t any cameras. Might be Jade, but I wasn’t watching up here until a couple minutes ago. It’s hard to split my attention and I'm already trying to watch the exterior.”
“Alright. I’m going in.”
I slipped inside and a pair of hooves yanked me in. Instinctively, I raised my legs to fight, but a scared yellow face confronted me inches away and I dropped my guard.
Taxi.
My driver’s eyes were wide with fright and her braid was undone, flying around her head.
“Hardy! Jade’s unconscious! I think somepony poisoned her! You need her if you’re going to get back to the city!” she gasped.
“Your talent?”
She nodded quickly.
I pushed her to one side and surveyed the room. Bits of Jade’s desk were still embedded in the ceiling and the former Chief herself was slumped against the stained glass wall. Her eyes were closed.
All that remained of her clothing was a few shredded rags spread around the room like confetti. Some part of me thought her cutie-mark might be an axe buried in a skull or something like that. It was the first time I’d ever seen her without her pants-suit in all the time I’d known her.
Strange thing, really.
Her mark was just a hummingbird, buzzing along in mid-flight, looking pleased to be a hummingbird. How could the towering monster who haunted the Castle have something like that for a talent? Not that it mattered.
Her belly drew my attention almost immediately. It was badly distended, like she’d eaten a few dozen gallons of something instead of a single can. A thin, white foam was trailing from the side of her muzzle. Her breathing was shallow and seemed labored, but she was alive.
Lily was suddenly there, her horn glowing brightly as she waved it over Jade’s body.
“Hardy, they only taught me this spell a couple days ago, but I think I’m casting it right,” Lily murmured. “It says she’s got a stomach full of...something. It’s not baked beans, though.”
I noticed an empty can with a spoon sticking out of it lying beside Jade’s leg. I lifted it to look inside; a thin, blue tablet covered in the slimey remains of her meal was at the bottom. Fishing it out, I shook it off. It was a smooth rock that reminded me of the dragon control stones from Supermax, but the runes carved into it were ugly and rough.
“We’ve got a talisman here,” I told my companions, holding it up.
Lily plucked the stone out of my hooves and peered at it. Taxi leaned in against her side and the two of them studied it together.
“I...I think this is a zebra magic,” Lily murmured.
“It is,” Taxi agreed. “Somepony has fouled a simple indigestion charm. It’s filling her stomach with something,” Turning her head, she began rooting through her saddlebags. Her expression slowly morphed into one of panic. “I...I don’t have my ipecac!”
“Wait, I’ve got a spell that might work! I used to use it on the dogs back home when they’d eat frogs from the pond.”
‘Options,’ I thought, ‘One. Let Iris Jade expire. Solves a number of problems, probably creates several others. Your conscience will bug you until the end of time and your cutie-mark will probably feel like you’ve been doused in acid. Might almost be worth it. Two. Save Iris Jade. Potentially die when she recovers. May have to take her into the Wilds with you. Three. Cry softly into Lily’s mane some more. Good option, but essentially no different from option one. Four...Oh! That could work…”
“Taxi, go find a restrictor ring!” I said. “We’re going to need one! Quick!”
“Uh...there’s a box of them over there somewhere!” she replied, quickly casting around on the pile of discarded surplus stuffed against the wall. Trotting over to the pile, she began moving heaps of junk to one side.
“How did she know that?” Lily asked.
“Her talent. It ranges from ‘unusual’ to ‘disturbing’, but it’s always useful,” I replied as my driver pulled out a little black box and held it up, victorious. “Alright! Stick one of those on her horn. Actually, better make it two. Lily, cast your spell. Sweets, be ready to crack her on the horn if she tries to get violent. I’d rather not find out she can break those rings.”
My driver obeyed, then Lily’s horn lit up and she traced a figure eight above the ex-Chief’s prone form. Jade’s stomach let out a worrying gurgle and I took two steps back. It turned out to be a good call.
A sludgy liquid the color of tar blasted out of Iris’s nose and muzzle at a speed to rival a firehose, spattering the wall, the carpet, and my driver’s front legs It stank like freshly poured asphalt mixed with sweaty pits and rotten fruit. The smell set me gagging within seconds, stumbling away as quickly as possible from the source of the unholy wretchedness. Jade’s body was wracked with another round of vomiting, then another, each one expelling more of the vile effluvient.
Finally, I couldn’t keep my gorge down any longer. I galloped to the nearest corner and began emptying my stomach onto the carpet. Nothing for it. It was worse than the dip in the sewers. It was worse than Taxi’s father. It was somewhere on the same spectrum as a ride in the Bull. Not quite there, but somewhere in the postal code.
A moment later I looked up and found my driver and Lily there, unloading right beside me. Lovely. It wasn’t the kind of experience I wanted the share with Lily on her first day on the job. What is it with me and making the rookies suffer?
Wiping my muzzle on the wall, I sat back and tried to only breathe through my mouth. It helped a little, but the stink had a definite flavor that wasn’t much better. Filling my lungs, I moved back to Jade’s side, grabbed her by one rear leg, and hauled her a few meters away from the the black pool that was slowly sinking into the carpet. She was still unconscious and showed no signs of waking.
“Yuck, yuck, yuck,” Lily muttered, wiping her mouth on a towel that’d been lying across one of the supply boxes.
I took the proffered towel when she was done and used it to mop my face off. “Wish I could say that’s the worst thing that’s happened to me today. How is she?”
Lily raised her horn and twitched it across Jade’s stomach a few times. “I think we got all the baked beans out of her stomach. I think those were...making whatever this...smelly stuff is. It’s got some strange anti-magic thing going on. Almost like my magic is sliding right off of it. I don’t think it’s poisonous by itself, but...if you couldn’t get it out, it...ewww...”
“It would pop you up like an overinflated balloon,” Taxi murmured.
“Considering her recent diet included every chemical in the book, I wouldn’t trust ordinary poisons and if she could force her own magic to purge it, she’d probably have done it,” I murmured. “What spell did you use?”
“Um...I don’t think it has a name. I learned it from my grandmare. It stimulates the gag reflex until somepony throws up harder than they have in their whole life,” Lily replied.
“I’d keep that spell handy,” I said. “If we get cornered, somepony suddenly tossing their cookies might make a decent distraction.”
“Somepony got in here, somehow slipped that rock into Jade’s rations, and then got out without being noticed,” Taxi mused, making a quick circuit of the room and inspecting the walls. “How? Teleportation? Invisibility?”
“The room is warded against teleportation,” I added.
“Actually, it’s not,” Gypsy put in from the juju bag. I’d forgotten she might be listening in and it was enough to make me jump.
Taxi blinked at my bag, then shook her head. “Hardy, you’re going to tell me what you saw upstairs, right?”
“Yes, but later. Gypsy, explain that. The Chief had wards against every kind of magical interference in the world. It was enough to keep the Darkening from hitting her and Telly. Why isn’t the room port-warded?”
“When she jumped into the dungeon earlier, she had to drop the wards around her office. She didn't put them back up. I think she was a bit distracted.”
“That’s a little worrying. Eh, I hate to do this, but we need to get her downstairs to the med bay and make sure there’s nothing else wrong with her,” I said. “Sweets, there’s another teleporter in the building who taught the Chief. It’s their talent. I’m pretty sure we’ll need them if what I’ve got in mind is going to work.”
----
All hail the conquering moron.
Yeah, I didn’t actually think through what it might look like for me to be toting Iris Jade’s unconscious body, hoof-cuffed and with a restriction ring on her horn, through the middle of a building full of ponies.
That is because I am stupid.
I’ll own that. I am a blithering numpty. A simp. A gormless nitwit.
I should not be allowed to own sharp objects and I most definitely should never be allowed in politics.
To be fair, neither Taxi nor Lily thought that far ahead, either. Chalk it up to stress or exhaustion, the end result was the same; I inadvertently marched my dumb tail through the Castle with the Chief sprawled across me like the world’s most dangerous trophy.
----
My companions and I appeared in the hallway outside Jade’s office to a sea of eyes all wanting to watch the fall of the terror of the Castle. They got their wish. Jade was helpless as a sleeping kitten.
All the implications of what I’d just done hit me a second before the cheering started back up. Mother of skies, it was bad enough when they just thought I’d sent her to bed without dinner. Thumping her, trussing her up, and carrying her around like some griffin’s feted hunt sent them wild.
I shut my eyes and did my best to ignore it. Implications be damned, she needed a doctor.
“Gypsy, find me a route that’ll avoid the rest of the ponies in here,” I snarled.
“Like where? You want to go to the med-bay. That’s currently in the garage. There’s exactly one path there that doesn’t take you outside the walls. Are you saying you didn’t do this on purpose?”
“Yes, that is exactly what I am saying!” I snapped.
“Oh...well, could be worse, then. You want these ponies to follow some diamond dogs into their holes, right? I’m pretty sure that, after that show, they’d follow a hungry dragon into its cave if you told them to.”
My jaw ached for a moment as I forced my teeth to unclench. Yes, the reins of power were a means to an end, but that didn’t mean I had to like it.
I think a part of it was that I was still mentally waiting for someone to take a shot at me. Somepony had taken a shot at Jade the second she was vulnerable. That or they’d set up the shot awhile ago and it was just coincidence, but I don’t trust my luck quite that much. That meant somepony in the building had almost successfully assassinated the most magically gifted unicorn in the building.
What chance did one relatively unprotected earth pony have in those circumstances?
Come to it, why would somepony have attacked Iris Jade in the first place if she was already contained? That was, unless…
My mouth went suddenly dry as I started to put the pieces together.
“Taxi, go find whoever in this mad-house can teleport. Take Jade with you and find her a doctor, then meet us in the commissary as quick as you can,” I ordered, shifting my burden onto my driver’s back, “We’ll need the building ready to move as soon as possible, because I’m pretty sure we’re about to be attacked.”
“Attacked?!” Lily gasped, loud enough that I winced. Thankfully nopony seemed to have heard her.
“Keep your voice down!” I hissed. “Lily, you find Precious and tell him he’s in charge if I vanish for any reason. At best, we have an hour and I won’t count on that long!”
Lily gave me a frightened look, but followed as Taxi peeled off into the crowd who made some room for them. I lifted my juju bag as I headed for the elevator down to the garage on one side of the throne room and said, “Gypsy, I need to ditch the company. Options?”
“Do you really think an attack is coming?” she asked.
“Jade’s down. Power has changed hooves. Everything’s disorganized. Now they know we’re about to try a move and they’ve probably planned for that since our food and water is contaminated. When would you attack?”
“Oog...alright, lemme think, lemme think... Telly can organize getting fighters in place. Get all the remaining officers together and make a quick statement to everypony there. Try not to panic them, but give them something to do! The department needs a hierarchy in case you don't come back and it might help us track down the spy! Start with the non-duty officers with a rank higher than Detective. Use dee-twelve.”
Talk to the department. Don’t make a fool of yourself. Save everypony from violent death.
“Give me some volume. I need the whole building to hear me,” I murmured, stopping at the top of the stairs leading down into the throne room, then carefully setting Iris Jade down at my hooves. Thankfully she didn’t weigh much.
Breathe. Panic later. You can do this.
“This is Hard Boiled!” I shouted and the P.A. system picked up every word. It was heady stuff, having all those ponies focused on on me. “All civilians will be leaving the Castle within the hour for a haven! There will be food, water, and security! I want to see every sergeant and lieutenant still in the Castle in five minutes time in the conference room dee-twelve for a briefing! You ponies get your flanks in gear and maybe we’ll save a few lives! All other officers, listen to Telly. I want to move out in one hour!”
----
As I stepped into the elevator just off the throne room, leaving behind the stunned crowd, I wondered if I’d just humiliated myself.
What if I reached conference room D12 and nopony was there?
I mean, what business did a bunch of cops have taking orders from a criminal who’d waltzed into the Castle, apparently cold-cocked the previous Chief, and started making demands?
By that same token, it did look like I’d managed to somehow put down Iris Jade. That engendered a certain amount of ‘sit-up-and-take-notice’ in anypony with an ounce of survival instinct. Any cop who’d survived the Darkening surely had a fair bit of that.
I pressed the button on the elevator that’d take me to the conference floor and leaned against the wall, finally able to get a breath.
“Gypsy?”
My juju bag was silent for long enough that I was worried I’d lost her somehow, then Gypsy’s slightly harried voice came down the line.
“Yes? What?! Oh, Hardy. Right. Sorry. I’m helping Telly coordinate the evacuation plans. I swear, I just wanted to annoy the city government! I never intended to become the city government! This is like juggling chainsaws and kittens!”
“You’re organizing all of this on the fly?”
“Huh? Oh, no, no! There are plans dating back to the Crusades for every situation you can imagine. There’s even one for evacuating via subterranean tunnels! The civilians are an extra wrinkle, but we’re making it work. An hour isn’t much time, but a bunch of officers and fire-ponies are helping get everypony together to move. We’ve been ready to evacuate since the food and water went bad. We were holding out hope somepony would come from outside...”
“Holding out hope that the guard might still be out there somewhere,” I murmured as the elevator came to a halt.
“Exactly. Right now, we’re mostly focused on shifting bodies and getting fighters on the walls. The duty officers aren’t going to be at this meeting, but most everypony else should be. Where should we have the civilians gathered?”
“Best place is probably the garage. If this works, that’s where the diamond dogs are going to come through. I’m pretty sure we’re going to have to make a fighting retreat."
Gypsy paused for a second, then asked, “You think this is going to be a complete disaster, don’t you?”
“Has anything else gone to plan today?”
“Fair point.”
The doors opened and I braced myself. Ponies were rushing to and fro in the hall, carrying bags, hauling ammo containers, and generally getting in one another’s way as they scrambled to get things in order. Pulling my hat low, I did my best not to draw eyes, but there wasn’t much for it; fame and I are going to be enemies until the end of my days.
By moving with purpose and scowling like I was headed to my own execution I managed to deflect anything besides some staring, and Telly’s commands came over the P.A., getting everypony moving again.
Thankfully, the conference room was down one hall and just around a corner. Even more ponies were in that hall, but a single officer was standing outside of D12, holding the door with his hip. He was a younger officer wearing the remains of a sergeant’s dress uniform that looked like it’d been slept in. He wore a bandage across his forehead, but when he saw me, his eyes brightened. My memory isn’t so good, but I seemed to remember his name was ‘Seed’ something-or-other.
“Down here, Sir!” he called, nodding his head toward the door. “I think this is everypony who can come!”
‘Sir?’ I thought, then shook it off. Necessary evils and all that.
I trotted to the door, giving Seed a quick glance, then peering into the conference room.
I found myself facing almost thirty of my fellow cops. Few were in uniform or anything resembling it, but I recognized most of the faces. There was Dog Whistle, a sleepy eyed earth pony who’d busted up a gang of car thieves by convincing them he was a Los Pegasus mover-and-shaker looking for rare vehicles. Sand Bag—a quivering ball of nerves and feathers who’d out-flown a griffin while carrying a wounded officer to safety—was hovering near the front of the room. Across from me I picked out Sang Froid and his partner, Watchword; who’d have thought a stuffy unicorn and a temperamental yak would make good partners?
Silence fell over the room as everyone looked up with an expectant gaze.
Even having mentally rehearsed what I was about to do in the last few minutes, I wasn’t sure if it would work. It wasn’t as though the world might be riding on all of those cops accepting my leadership on the shortest possible notice, right? I’d taken a couple of officer training courses back when I still gave a damn about things like ‘advancement’ and ‘career’, but that was ever so long ago.
At a measured pace and without hurrying, I walked into the room and took off my hat, then reached into my pocket for the badge Telly had crafted for me. Staring at the pristine shield for a moment, I chucked it onto the table between the shoulders of a lieutenant hugging what I suspected was a loaded shotgun and a sergeant whose eyes were vacant and fearful. Everypony leaned forward to get a look, while I tried to gauge their reactions. Most looked confused, while one or two seemed angry.
Turning to Seed, I nodded and he stepped inside, shutting the door behind him.
I cleared my throat and said, “I’ll assume, for the moment, you all know who I am?”
Sang Froid took a step forward and swept a hoof through his perfectly combed mane. His lips peeled back in a cheerless smile. “Hard Boiled, if there’s a pony in this building who isn’t aware of you by now, they’re deaf, blind, and dumb. I don’t know how you eliminated Iris Jade, but we’ve heard everything from you turning traitor and killing the Princesses to you being on some secret mission for them. You want to tell us why I shouldn’t hold your ass down and cast a few mind control spells just to find out? It’s not like anyone in here would stop me.”
“Feel free to try. You want to waste time and lives, it’s on you,” I said, marching forward until I was right in front of the scowling stallion, pressing my nose against his. Slowly, his gaze dropped from mine and, as it did, I turned back to the assembled officers.
“Ask yourselves this. If Hard Boiled is a traitor, why would he come back here? Why this song and dance with the Chief? Why not just kill her, then wait on the lot of you to starve? For that matter...why not just kill all of you? If he could kill Jade, then slaughtering a bunch of helpless cops should be small potatoes. He could leave your cooling corpses down here and then go upstairs and start butchering those civies...and none of you could stop him.”
I let that sink in for them. One or two clutched their weapons a little more tightly, or shifting their weight so as to get at their triggers. A few murmurs went around the room as they studied me, then whispered to each other.
Sang Froid, who’d apparently been elected the unofficial speaker for the group, sat himself down at the conference table and tapped the surface. Everything quieted and he lifted his chin to speak. “Fine. Say we believe you’re here to help. Somehow, you’re still alive even with all the crap coming out of Uptown about how you’re responsible for this mess, and somehow, you’ve incapacitated Iris Jade. Why worry about us? Why not save your own tail?”
I swung my hip around and flipped my coat off of it, revealing the golden scales on my flank. “You see this? If I left you swinging in the wind, I’d get to live the rest of my very short life in searing agony because my butt-stamp doesn’t like it when I let innocents die.” I let my coat fall back in place. “Now, we are very short of time. I am the only one in this room who knows what is going on in this city, and you can either listen or leave while the adults handle the situation.”
Sang Froid looked around at his fellow cops, then sank back into his chair.
“I suppose it beats starving to death or being eaten by crazed magical monsters,” he replied. “Let’s hear what he has to say.”
----
I can only liken what came next to editing an especially raunchy Germane porno for public television. There was just too much that’d gone on over the last month that wasn’t suitable for anypony of a sober mind. Still, in the fifteen minutes I had, I broke down as much of what I knew for them as I could.
----
“So, you’re saying these ponies are trying to power up a wish machine that’s running off all the misery in the city?” asked one of the older officers whose name I remembered as Sergeant Snow Dime.
“That’s what we know so far,” I replied, pacing back and forth in front of the room. “These people plan long term and I do mean long. We’ve got some evidence to suggest they directly were involved in the construction of the Shield and their machinations might go back even farther.”
Watchword, the yak, let out a loud snort and adjusted his comically small police cap.
Sang Froid tilted his head in his partner’s direction and said, “My partner's right. If you were not standing there with that socket in your chest and Chief Jade’s unconscious body wherever you stashed her, I don’t think we’d believe this story. I’m still not sure I do, but it fits the facts. The sun is gone. No-one will dispute that. Where does that leave us? We’re just cops.”
I grabbed the badge off the table and whipped the chain around my neck. “I’m just a cop. I didn’t wake up this morning trying to be some kind of superhero. This Dead Heart garbage was not my idea, but if it can save lives, I’ll use it. Right now, I need to rely on you lot to organize everything. We’ll be leaving soon, but I expect an attack before then.”
That got everypony’s attention.
“An attack?!” Watchword grunted, drawing every eye in the room. For the stolid yak, that constituted a speech.
I nodded. “I’m reasonably certain there’s at least one spy in the building. We’re going to try to evacuate all the non-combatants from the Castle in four hour's time. If there were ever a time for somepony to hit us, it’s now.”
Sang Froid shoved himself back from the table. “Are you serious?!”
“Damn right, I am. Telly has plans for the defense of this place and she’s already getting the fighters in position. We’re going to let them have the walls, then back up into the keep itself, bar the doors, and...well, I’ll keep the last bit to myself for now.”
“Then why in Tartarus are we sitting here?!” a baby-faced lieutenant by the name of Lemon Cooler demanded.
“Because this is more important!” I snapped. “The duty officers are organizing the evacuation. Once this is over, I’m leaving again and I’ll be taking Iris Jade with me. You lot are going to be the closest thing this department has to leadership while I’m out there.”
“That’s crazy. I mean, you can’t leave us like this! We’ve got hundreds of civilians here and you’re the only pony who knows what’s going on!” squeaked a tiny mare with a pair of revolvers strapped to her sides.
“If I’m dead, it’ll be down to you to make sure the police department survives,” I said, shaking my head. “If I don’t leave, these civilians will die anyway when the cold comes. Unless Princess Celestia is back in control of the sun, we all die. I can make sure you’re safe, for now. Telly and the Prince of Detrot are in charge if I’m not here, because they can manage the herd upstairs, but when it comes to matters of safety then Sang Froid, you’re head of the class. If anypony has a better idea, the floor is open.”
----
The floor was closed shortly thereafter with nopony having presented anything for consideration.
----
I cleared the conference room, sending the officers off to accomplish whatever tasks Telly might have set for them. I checked the clock on the wall. I was supposed to meet Mags and Swift in the commissary in five minutes.
Plucking my juju bag from around my neck, I held it in my hooves alongside my shiny, new badge. It represented a weight of lives. How many lives? Who knows? I suppose it doesn’t matter. They were lives I was expected to protect.
“Telly? Where’s that secret door again?” I asked, aloud.
“She’s busy,” Gypsy replied. “For that matter, so am I. About two minutes ago, I caught an outgoing transmission. Real stealthy. I wouldn’t have noticed it on any other day of the week.”
“Source?” I asked.
“Right there in the room with you.”
“Damn. That’s what I was afraid off. Well, at least that narrows it down a little. Still, if I was going to pick a spy, I’d want somepony with some authority. I wonder if they bought that crap about 'evacuating in four hours'. You happen to figure out what they sent?”
“I couldn’t pin it down, but the bandwidth wasn’t wide enough to transmit actual voice or images. I’d say it was probably a pre-programmed signal of some sort. A panic button. We’ve got movement outside the Castle, too.”
I stiffened and quickly trotted to the door. “What sort of movement?”
Gypsy was silent long enough that I started to worry.
“Lots of. It’s coming from all directions. I’m detecting weapons signatures congruent with P.A.C.T. heavy weaponry. The Castle itself will survive everything up to sustained dragonfire, but nopony has ever tested lightning cannons against it. I’d say you’ve got maybe a half hour before they’re in position. Then...well, however long it takes them to decide to attack us.”
“That would seem to indicate they either didn't buy that ruse or don't care. So we know our spy was one of the officers in here. Can you try to narrow it any further?”
“I’ll give it a go. I’m passing out orders that’ll move them to strategically insignificant places or areas that are well guarded.”
“Whoever disobeys is our spy. Good call. Alright, where’s that secret door?”
“Third panel from the left near the front of the room. Press in the upper right corner, then shove the whole thing open. The last door on your left is the commissary. You’ll have to lean on it pretty hard. There’s a table in front of it.”
I tapped the indicated panel and found it loose, then shoved with my shoulder until the wall slid back, revealing a dusty, darkened passage. Fitting a hoof-light over my foreleg, I flicked it on and started the short journey.
----
I wish I’d had Taxi teach me about those secret entrances and exits years ago. It made traversing the Castle much, much quicker. Granted, they’d probably have found my drunken corpse stuck in a wall somewhere, having gotten lost in the darkness, but it might have been worth it to avoid Iris Jade.
Speaking of that particular gremlin in my back seat, a merciful pony might have put a bullet in her head and left her in a closet, but that was more than either of us deserved. Even dead, she’d be making my life difficult. Not that murdering her was ever really an option. Fantasy is free, but reality is expensive.
----
I tried not to sneeze as I wedged my forehead against the last panel in the passage and braced one back leg against the wall. I shoved as hard as I could and felt something give on the other side, followed by a screech of metal across linoleum. Inhaling, I stuck my muzzle into the crack. I could just see the rows of chairs and tables stacked against the walls. Most of the empty space was packed with sleeping bags. Nopony seemed to be in there, but considering we were evacuating, that made sense.
Tilting my head, I tried to get a better look at what was holding the door shut. Something cold pressed against the end of my nose that smelled distinctly of gunpowder and oil.
“Back up. Nice and easy,” a soft, feminine voice murmured, from just out of my field of view.
“Kid, it’s me! Get the stupid table out of the way!”
“Sir? Oh! I’m sorry! Telly didn’t say you’d be coming through the wall.”
There was a pause, then some grunting and more screeching as the table was wrenched out of the way. I nudged the panel open, only to be caught in the face by a flying, fuzzy belly.
“Egg pony! I be thinking you dead again when lightning hit big room! Stop doing that!” Mags crowed, clutching at my ears with her sharp little talons. Trotting into the commissary, I snapped my head up, slinging her onto my back so I could breathe again.
“I said ‘hide’, Mags. Not ‘get caught and eat cookies’,” I grunted, pulling my hat up so I could see. Turning my neck, I lifted her off of my back with a mouthful of her scruff and set her on her paws. She looked a little bashful, kicking a claw at the floor. Somepony had confiscated her gun, but left her holster.
“I try! But...there was this nice mare and she was fast with her horn...” she mumbled.
“Never mind that. Mags, where is your gun?” I asked.
“I’ve got it here, Sir,” Swift replied, patting her chest pouch. “I also stocked up on ammo for everything and got it stowed inside the working A.M.V. Taxi got a group together to haul the one we took apart. What’s going on out there? I heard some ponies talking about you...you knocking out the Chief?”
“Somepony poisoned her, and no, it wasn’t me. Right now, I’m riding a wave of confusion to get things done. Where’s Taxi? I told her to meet us here.”
There was a quick double knock on the door of the commissar, then my driver nosed her way in with Lily and a young unicorn mare who I didn’t recognize in tow. She was a slight thing, with a straw colored mane and patchy, orange fur. Her grass green eyes were hollow and sunken, with a slight yellow tinge around the edges that suggested recent Ace addiction. A slight tremble was running up her back and down to her knees that could have been fear, but was more likely withdrawal symptoms. I glanced at her horn, which was capped with a restrictor ring.
“Jade is being cared for in one of the back offices by Precious and one of the nurses. Nopony knows where she is besides the three of us, so I figure she’s safe enough,” Taxi said, setting herself down on one of the sleeping bags. “Is there a reason I saw half the officers in the building scattering in all directions? You know something I don’t?”
“We’ve got an emergency situation, yeah. Is this the teleporter?” I asked, nodding at the unicorn whose eyes had gotten very, very big. “Did you not tell her she’d be working with me?”
Taxi shrugged and dragged the shaking mare forward by one leg. “Hay Frost here was injecting herself with something I think was made out of drain cleaner and kerosene in one of the stairwells. I don't know how Jade got her to teach her to teleport.
I approached her slowly, like one might approach a frightened animal. She cowered lower to the floor. Lily closed the door and stood in front of it, cutting off the young mare’s only route of escape.
“What’s with the ring?” I asked, nodding at her horn.
Lily sighed and moved up to stand beside Hay Frost, giving the girl a pitying look. “She tried to teleport herself through a wall when we approached. She moved about a meter to the left. Hardy, I’ve cast every anti-intoxication spell in my medical hoof-book on her and I think she’s still stoned...”
Hay Frost lowered her ears and mumbled something I didn’t quite catch.
Easing down to her level, I reached out and gently put a hoof on the girl’s chin, lifting it to inspect her a little more closely. She didn’t smell very good, but there was still some fat on her. If she’d been living on the streets, it hadn’t been for long.
“You know who I am?” I asked her, softly.
She hesitated, then the quivering in her shoulders stilled.
“Yer...yer D-dead Heart...” she muttered. “Mmm...mmmnot...m’not high…”
I leaned a bit closer and watched as a tear gathered in her eye and began trickling down her filthy cheek. “Miss Frost...did my friends tell you what I need?”
It took a minute, but she finally shook her head.
“She be burnt brain pony,” Mags commented, spreading out one of her tiny wings and casually preening them.
“Hardy, she’s right. We don’t have time for—” Taxi started to say, but I held up my hoof to silence her.
“I’m making the time, Sweets,” I said, then turned back to the mare. “Swift, get down to the garage and wait for me there. Mags, you watch her back. Lily, go with her and get Iris Jade secured in the A.M.V. these two didn’t take apart. We’ll be joining you in five minutes time.”
Lily’s bit her lip. “But...but aren’t we about to be—”
“Yes, and if this doesn’t work, we’re going to need to roll out, quick. Now move!”
My driver looked like there was about to be a fight, but Swift gently put a hoof around her shoulders. Mags sniffed and leaped onto Lily’s shoulders, startling her momentarily.
“Egg Pony is smart pony. Crazy sometimes, but he smart,” my ward said, then lifted her head, clacking her beak for attention. “Hey! Egg Pony! When you done with brain burnt pony, you going to tell me what going on?”
“I’ll consider it,” I replied, resting a hoof over top of Hay Frost’s. I could feel her pulse right through the thin flesh on her knee and it was racing. She stared at my leg like it was attached to an alien. “Now, go.”
Reluctantly, my friends began to file out of the room, leaving me alone with the shivering filly. I was painfully aware of how short my time-frame was and a more pragmatic pony might have left the junkie in a closet for the Biters. I am not that pony.
Easing a bit closer, I looked at her closely.
“Miss Hay Frost? Do you know where you are?” I asked, softly.
“M’not dumb. M’in the Castle,” she mumbled, flicking her eyes at me. Her horn flickered and spit out a couple of sparks. “W-why can’t I port? Wanna port. Wanna go away…”
“You’re here because it’s the only safe place for you, but very soon, it won’t be. You know who I am. Do you trust me?”
Her ears rose a little and, for the first time, she met my gaze. There was a flash of real intelligence behind those empty eyes. “Y-yes. You’re Dead Heart. You save...you saved everypony. You b-brought back the s-sun...”
“I am going to bring back the sun,” I said, quietly.
“The sun is still gone?” she asked, a little plaintively.
“It is. But you can help me bring it back. You, Miss Hay Frost, can help save the world...and all I need you to do is what you do best. I won’t threaten you, and if you don’t want to...you can leave right now.” Lifting a hoof, I reached out. She flinched as I gently pressed the release on the restrictor ring. It dropped off her horn and landed between her forelegs. She stared at it, uncomprehendingly, then she backed a couple of steps from me.
“You’ll lemme go?” she squeaked.
“Yes. If you leave, I’ll find somepony else to help me and nopony will make you do anything. Nopony will know you chose to go. I’ll make sure you get out safely with the rest of the civilians..”
Without another word, Hay Frost’s horn lit up and she vanished in a burst of light, leaving nothing but the scent of ozone and unwashed pony in her wake.
“Huh. Well, I guess it was too much to hope that’d work,” Gypsy’s said from my juju bag. “Now what?”
“Wait for it...” I replied, cooly, shrugging out of my coat and unbuckling my anti-magic armor. Folding it up, squirmed out up the vest, then tugged my coat back on. “Could you have somepony come get my armor? I doubt Miss Frost can teleport both of us with me wearing it. How are things outside?”
“I'll send somepony right up. Things aren't good out there. All movement stopped about two minutes ago.”
“Damn. They’ve got our defenses sussed. Quick as you can, pull the defenders off the walls. Get them inside the keep and get a few unicorns to throw some shields on as many doors as they can. Is Telly up there with you?”
“Yep. She’s holding about twelve pairs of headphones and her horn is smoking like a bonfire, but she’ll live. We’re still moving ponies into the garage.”
“Have her ready to pull out if things get bad. Any sign of our spy?”
“None yet.”
“Keep your ears open.”
“Roger that, boss.”
I sat, watching the clock for about two minutes, counting my remaining seconds before the attack was likely to come. I moved back a step or two and ran a hoof around the brim of my hat.
‘Right about...now.’
Hay Frost burst into being where I’d been standing a moment before, her eyes leaking streams of tears as she stared at me with a porcelain hope in her expression. I smiled and offered her my forelegs. With a ragged sob, she threw herself at me, hard enough that if I hadn’t been an earth pony, she might have done some real damage.
Holding her to my breast, I patted her stringy mane as what I’m sure was at least a month or two’s worth of other ponies’ contempt was wept out onto my shoulder. Sure, it was a risk. Sure, there might have been better uses of my time, but my talent knows its business.
“I’m s-sorry, I’m sorry, I’m s-sorry!” she cried, again and again. I’d no idea who she was begging forgiveness from, but it didn’t really matter. In the end, Justice demanded that one pony in the whole world not judge her for what she’d become. The attack would be starting soon, but there were plenty of ponies with bigger guns, more powerful magic, and fewer lives riding on them who could handle it.
Gradually, Hay Frost quieted until her cries were hardly more than a soft whimpering from time to time. Wiping her nose on the back of her foreleg, she leaned back so she could see my face.
Her voice was choked and weak, but that nervous hope was still there.
“Y-you need to b-bring back the sun, Dead Heart? I can g-go places. Wh-where do you wanna be?”
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magic colic
Wow, hardy just manages to know ponies so well. And this chapter hits below the belt something awful. And I love it for doing so. So many little wheels, and everything just keeps revving up into overdrive. But a marvelous chapter, and huzzah for when the biters come.
So much going on, and all I can think of is 'I don't remember Cerise's cutie mark'. An excellent chapter as always - I look forward to seeing what the plan with the teleporter is.
That last scene put a big ol' dumb smile on my face.
7884180 Gypsy's perceptions aren't real clearly defined. She's got a bizarre sort of awareness that lets her tap into all manner of systems.
-Chessie
I get the feeling that Hay Frost might just be a pony with eight degrees of freedom.
Once again I await the next chapter with both dread and exhilaration.
AAAWW YEAAAAH.
Nice chapter and this fight i's gonna be gud
A good chapter, I thought! Seems to have turned out well, even with the struggle it took to get it there. :)
I did notice this, though:
"through the wall[.”"
Never change, My Little Pony fanfiction
and I mean that with all the earnestness a person can have.
Any art form that can combine that much adorablemess (typo, but DAYUM does that sum it up!), that much relateableness, and that kind of glimpse into the darkness of the soul, is one hell of an art form as far as I'm concerned. Other media have to do horrible things and douse you in gore and go all-dark all the time in order to tap into these subjects. We do it with PONIES (and relentlessly adorable, hopeful ones at that) and the sheer incongruity gives us carte blanche to tackle any subject, as long as our chutzpah and nerve hold out.
Hurrah, and I'm delighted to be a passenger on this ride.
Also, I like Iris Jade. If she's another petite hellion like Swift Cuddles, and if she has the capacity to trust, that's my #1 waifu. Damn, what a fiery personality she is. Kind of like Taxi, if she's not secure there is hell to pay. Maybe I'm just a tigress-tamer at heart
That part at the end with Hay Frost was my favorite part of this chapter. I'm not sure why, it was nice. Was a great chapter, sorry for all the problems it has to see the light of day.
Very interestig developments. I wonder who the spy is.
And I somehow have the mental image of the enchanted beans still producing black tar, flooding the office until it runs out from under the door. With our luck it's flammable.
7884606
Translation:
7888861 Shit's magic, yo. Don't gotta explain shit.
-Chessie
7891636 Sadly, Kasen dropped out about two years ago. He was largely in it as an editor and as the writer for the Scholar's Notes. I've been doing most of the work since then, or rather, the volunteer editing team have while I sort of chug along pounding out words and hoping they go in the right order. Which they usually don't. If this story works at all, it's because the editors are amazing.
-Chessie
7892001 It WAS a short story. You remember in the episode where Spike succumbs to his greed, he destroyed Sugar Cube Corner?
-Chessie
7894052 Thaaanks. Fixed.
-Chessie
7894517 It's a griffin soap opera.
-Chessie
7897363 Sweet Jesus, have you been doing nothing but reading Starlight Over Detrot for the last forty eight hours?! You burned through that QUICK!
-Chessie
7897512 I read fast ... especially when I'm re-reading ... and I have had time. Not much to do when you're sitting on an aircraft carrier with no planes on it. I think I have 20 more chapters before I'm caught up to where I stopped before, and can get into the new stuff!
... say, you don't happen to have this in a Kindle format, do you?
I feel like this is a reference to something, but I'm not sure what
7901054 Thank you for commenting on these chapters as you go through them. It's encouraged me to head back and do a few edits. I am fixing the things you bring up.
-Chessie
7903412 *gigglesnorts* Okay, yeah, that...that was great.
-Chessie
Pretty sure this is my first time commenting on this here story (which deserves a fuckton more love and recognition than it gets), so I wanted to rectify that. Love it to bits. It’s some of the most original and enthralling storytelling I’ve read anywhere.
Gotta say, though, I feel like the last couple lines referred to something I missed. Does Hardy want her to teleport him to the Moon where Canterlot presumably is? If it’s something else that a reader should’ve gotten, mind clueing me in? I mean, I presume that isn’t where he wants her to send him given the ridiculous distance/power involved and the little lack of air thing …
7907898 Ah! Yes, you missed a bit. He needed to get back to the garage to signal Commander Max to begin the evacuation.
-Chessie
7902036 Honestly I just comment because I hope it's amusing and keeps your spirits up for writing.
Incidentally, I'm going to PM you a question about Detrot background stuff. Had a thought ... and maybe it'll get me writing again.
7908668 Sure, hit me with it.
-Chessie
7907906 Ah, that was it. Thank you kindly.
7909449 I swear, your responses to this have made me smile the whole way through.
-Chessie
Ahh, finally caught up with an amazing story of love lust and psychotic power crazed beings who just have no idea what absolute power actually means.
So many tropes and shoutouts seen and adired as things have progressed, minor niggles being the more, realistic? aging rate of various characters, as in Pinkies party chamber she had a list of birthday parties for her parents, for another 500 years. she might have just been making sure, but other aging rates been proposed and explained etc.
Hard Boiled is still being steered and manipulated, but is Discord tweaking his directions to stymie the enemy who have been trying to compact the populance into ever more compact and localised places that heavy weaponry and point attacks can hit more easily?
Has Twilight checked the train station for that spell target?
Im just puzzled about the dragon attacks. How they even managed to do any form o warfare when combining Luna, Celestia, Cadence and Twilights abilities, I personally wouldve expected a planettary wide interdiction field. I mean, when you have dual 5 gigawatt orbital solar power stations with laser transfer, per station, you can have serious control. And not even including rocks from space. But the WeatherVane was something I woudlve expected more from the Shield.. Vinyls Bass cannon only works on large objects. the bigger the dragon, the bigger the steak.
I would say Im glad I didnt actually start reading, and commenting, far earlier, due to the stuff and back history of my OC I would as usual with others be offering, but either by accident or design, theres mentions and occurances already. Which is what he is good at.
Oh well, as long as Hard Boiled doesnt need to call on specialist heavy freight shipping by The Shed, things should go, not well, but eventually.
Ballistic
Orbital
Logistic
Ordinance
We Deliver.
But, if The Castle is being evacuated, what about Gale? she doesnt have the bandwidth through a single Ladybird to back up to Queeny and Tourniquet. Especially when it looks like Hal is on the way?
Nope. Hate to tell you this, Hardy, but you're gonna keep being a hero 'til the day you die. Suck it up.
7909781 >“Sweet Shine snuck some poison joke into my desk at the academy. I ended up with a white pelt and bright yellow mane for three days straight...”
>Hardy touches Poison Joke and only ends up with a hue/saturation slider malfunction? Lucky him.
He ended up looking like Taxi
It is also like being stuck in a tree full of screaming, defecating monkeys: those at the top look down and see all the smiling faces. those at the bottom look up and see arseholes shitting all over them.
7898321
Thank you for your service
Er ... Hardy ... this is not behavior appropriate for the future Alicorn of Justice.
*blam* "But I didn't promise no maiming!" "Aaaah! My knee!"
Missing a space. Also, last as in Jade, or last as her her corrupt-but-unnamed predecessor?
All hail Hardy, Alicorn of Inebriation And Occasionally Justice.
1) Hardy, that is no way to talk about your future mare-in-law. 2) I am now anxiously awaiting when Hardy will need a bomb strapped to his flank. THIS MUST HAPPEN.
Hey, by the time you get there, Lim should be able to cast his alcohol-be-gone spell.
What else is new?
Hardy, I'm pretty sure you can build a harem when this is over. Lily, Swift, Scarlet, Twlight, Unnamed Background Pony #5 ... (Five bits on Scarlet as head concubine.)
... does Mags count as a rookie?
I'm betting on Sang Freud.
Rogue bracket.
Missing quote marks at the end.
Line break.
Why am I worried that she was the one who poisoned Jade?
7912725
Pfft, it's a job. With, frequently, long boring spells and petty annoyances.
7910560
Please tell me that includes being a mare!
I really hope somepony remembers Lim is still off in the land of Nod and drags him down to the evac point...
7897512
Yeah, he reads super fast
He thought it would only take me a couple of days to read everything that's written to date
That might have been the case if I didn't have a fucked up, unknown, medical condition that make me stay up for 36+ hours and then sleep for 6-18 hours. And after about 20 hours of being awake it gets very hard to do anything, but I can't sleep
7912928
...y'know I could totes ask Chessie if they'd let me crackfic an alicornized Hard Boiled... Might be fun.
11652930
You can crack-fic anything you want to. M'always glad for more fanfic of fanfic.
-Chessie