Act 2, Chapter 11: On With the Show
Starlight Over Detrot
Act 2, Chapter 11: On With The Show!
The inherent ability of sapient creatures to misrepresent reality provides a frustrating challenge for historians trying to sift through the morass, but it is somewhat ironically important for them to recognize just what kind of role lies play in history and society, and how they have grown and evolved with ponykind.
Actually, evolution is a good word for it; Lies are fascinating and complex animals. And much like animals, they range from giant striped whoppers to lies so small and subtle that the naked eye will never see them. While indeed many lies are pathogenic, the vicious rumours and Neighgerian banking scams being mimetic analogues to the plagues and predators of the world, a number of lies are commensal, or even symbiotic, when the truth would cause genuine harm or discord. While Aristrotle was one of the first to label Honesty as one of the Virtues of a Harmonious Society, this has been disputed by his successors; philosophers from Equinas to Immanuel Canter have argued that this seems strange, because there are so many times in life when Harmony is better maintained by lies.
Canter has, of course, written sufficiently of the little white lies that keep society lubricated, but sometimes we come to genuinely love our lies. Comforting but unsubstantiated fantasies regarding the world, the Princesses, and the afterlife can help ponies cope with life's brutal events. And what are fictional stories and tall tales besides dressed-up lies, entertaining whilst sparking imagination and wonder?
Some ponies even make a living out of dressing themselves in sparkling deceit, exuding greatness and power whilst genuinely possessing neither. If they're good enough, though, nopony will care; the audience will simply bask in the illusion.
--The Scholar
In a country where magic is about as mundane and common as bathroom tissue, you’d think a magician would hold absolutely no wonder. After all, any unicorn with the right arcane instruction manual can produce a rabbit from a hat or, for the demented, a hat from a rabbit.
Despite this, there remains in all of us a wonderment at watching somepony really good at appearing to break the cosmic rules of physics and continuity. Show ponies who know their art well can wrap their simple tricks in glitz and glitter and their more complex ones in layers of narrative that leave viewers breathless with anticipation.
I am not a pony that’s easily impressed, but Ghoulini, for whatever distasteful side-ventures he might have been involved in, was a master.
****
I’d done the sane, rational thing and gone for my gun, half ducking under the table. It wasn’t great cover, but it blocked line of sight and would serve if somepony started slinging low caliber bullets.
When it dawned on me that we were not under draconic or terrorist attack, I sheepishly returned to my seat and re-adjusted my tux. Luckily, most eyes were riveted on the curtain of flames stretching across the room, but Limerence shot me an amused look; I was thankful my new pink coat covered a blush reasonably well because my cheeks were burning brighter than that backdrop.
Chief Jade had retreated from the stage and, for a moment, the curtains simply burned, letting the tension build.
As suddenly as it came, the fire was snuffed, vanished along with the curtain itself, leaving a darkened shadow on my vision. I blinked several times, but the image remained. I noticed, after a few seconds, that it was in the shape of a pony.
Slowly, the spotlight irised open on the form of a stallion standing mid-stage. He was a strapping thing, wrapped in cultivated muscle that suggested strength, but it was the meticulously built body of a model with too many carefully treated curves to have ever brawled in the street. His mane was a shocking turquoise, framing a face the color of ripe blueberries, with a jaw so square it might have been set with a level.
He wore a thin, very white shirt which was puffed at the knees, and his flanks were covered in extraordinarily tight black pants that gleamed under the spotlights. His eyes were closed as he stood, head bowed low, seeming to wait for something.
A voice, which I quickly recognized as Telly’s 'dramatic' tone filtered through a modest depth of alcohol, came from the Castle’s public address system.
“From Canterlot, by way of the Far East, from the lands of Zebra lore to the farthest reaches of the Griffin home-land, the magnificent Ghoulini has traveled in search of the secrets of life and death. Now, he returns from these adventures with fresh knowledge to share.”
Ghoulini raised his head, lowering himself to his haunches and spreading his forelegs wide to encompass an audience already on the edge of its seats.
“Witness! The elements at his command! Water!” Telly’s voice echoed through the old stone fortress. A swelling, orchestral score started up, accompanying her words.
Ghoulini seemed to drink it in, his shoulders straightening as he lifted himself higher. A stream of water shot from between the floorboards, swirling around his body like a liquid cloth around a dancer. He raised one hoof, stepping up onto the water. I expected to catch a splash and spray in the face, but instead he simply hopped up onto it and began to walk slowly out over the crowd supported only by a stream of water. It was an act of supreme and impressive balance.
I looked for a gleam of telekinesis on his legs, but there wasn’t one. He really seemed to be walking on the water.
Something under the table shifted and I, reluctantly, glanced down. Swift stuck her nose up from under the tablecloth, her ears pasted back against the sides of her head.
“S-sir…” she whispered, “My… My jacket got put in the… er, the coat room.”
“So? Go get it!” I hissed.
“Sergeant Kiss Tell is running the coat room! He processed my entrance paperwork! He’ll recognize me!” she whimpered. A mare at one of the nearby tables gave me an inquisitive look and I suppose I did appear a bit touched in the head, talking to my lower half.
“Dammit, kid.” Reaching down, I grabbed Swift and pulled her up, pushing her back onto the chair next to mine. Pulling my own jacket off, I slung it around her shoulders. “I’ll want that back, you hear?”
“Y-yes, sir. Sorry, sir.”
Shifting myself in my chair, I looked up at to find Ghoulini had danced his way back to the stage, the whip of water sinking back into the boards. Just as it vanished, a squirt of some thick, multi-hued dust exploded at the edges of the stage.
Telly’s voice rang out overhead, “Earth!”
Sweeping his hooves left, then right, Ghoulini swirled the cloud down around himself. It obeyed with spectacular accuracy as he lifted onto his rear hooves, leaping across the stage with the agility of a ballet dancer and coming to rest, balancing on one foreleg. The dust gathered into a tight knot underneath him, then exploded outwards, masking the stage entirely in a dense, impenetrable fog.
“Air.”
Inside the dust cloud, a darkened shape lifted off the ground. It twisted in a slow circle, moving faster with each revolution until the dust cloud began to move with it, drawn steadily upwards and becoming thicker by the minute. At last, it became a miniature tornado, the figure inside spinning so fast I couldn’t make out any details. I’d heard of pegasi pulling that particular trick in mass combats against dragons and flying monsters of various kinds, but never a unicorn.
The air drew inward, a rainbow swelling down into the shape of a ball, revealing Ghoulini still turning slowly as he hovered a meter or two above the stage. His white shirt was immaculate, despite the physical activity, as he came to a gentle stop. He held between his forelegs what seemed to be a swirling mass of stone in every color imaginable. It pulsed and gradually solidified as the magician rolled it between his hooves.
“Fire!” shouted Telly.
Ghoulini’s lips curled into a devilish smile as he swung around, raised his rear legs, and bucked the stone out of mid-air. It shot out like a cannon ball over the crowd and despite knowing it was a magic show, I ducked.
A deafening roar filled the room as the ball detonated over everypony’s head, sending gouts of many-coloured flame spurting down amongst the crowd. Fear gripped me as the rushing light swept around my hooves, but it avoided them by several inches as it spread across the floor. I could feel the heat, but it didn’t touch me nor seem to scorch the marble.
Clapping his hooves together, Ghoulini pointed towards the crowd. With a soft pop, the fire turned into a field of butterflies that took to the air, streaming back to the stage and vanishing up the wide sleeves of his shirt.
All in all, it was pants-wetting, but one of the most impressive displays of magical skill I’d ever seen.
Landing at center stage, Ghoulini took a bow to thunderous applause from his audience. I even found myself clapping along and Swift was on her seat, rearing and flapping her wings in her excitement. Limerence, for his part, remained steadfastly slumped in his seat, unhappily sucking on the straw in his water glass.
“Come on, Lim.” I gave him a little push in the shoulder with one toe. “You can’t tell me that wasn’t amazing!”
“Amazing, yes,” he grumbled, “But it was a trick. A very clever trick, using smoke and mirrors. If magic is to be done, let it be through skill in truth, rather than illusion.”
“You think you could have pulled that one off? Even the illusion?” I asked.
“No,” he conceded, “but then, my talents involve useful activities.”
Leaving the snippy librarian to his sulk, I turned back to the show.
Ghoulini stood at center stage, a microphone having floated up to his muzzle.
“My friends!” the magician declared, his voice low and sensual, putting me in mind of a radio advertiser with a smoking habit. “I want to welcome you to the Detrot Police Gala! Tonight, there will be spills, chills, and more than a few explosions. But first, I wish to introduce my lovely assistant, Miss Patter.”
Raising one toe, he flipped it towards the side of the stage, causing a burst of flower petals to fall from somewhere overhead. A beautiful, heavily made-up mare in a spangled leotard strutted out of it and did a quick dip, first towards the crowd, then towards Ghoulini. I thought she might be an earth pony, thin of limb and curvaceous in all the right places, with a mane the color of wheat and a splotched coat of browns and whites, but she wore a very elaborate head-dress that covered her crown. She might have had a horn, she might not. Pretty as she was, she did nothing to take away from the sheer presence of Ghoulini himself; a prop.
“Now, for your viewing pleasure, a dance... but first, Miss Patter must change clothes. I do hope you won’t mind if she doesn’t leave the stage to do it.” The magician laughed as his assistant looked shocked. After a few appropriate gasps from the more sensitive members of the audience, he added as though it were an afterthought, “I suppose it would take a while to get out of that leotard. Let me see what I can do!”
Clapping his hooves, he made a throwing motion in Patter’s direction. A blast of glitter shot from his toe, covering the girl from head to hoof. It rained down her shoulders, pouring over the stage in a wave. Some even drifted onto my table. I touched a bit of it, rolling the shiny paper between my hoof and forelock. I’d expected an illusion, but it remained, even on close examination, completely real.
Returning my attention to the stage, I noticed the girl’s leotard was gone, replaced instead by a two piece dress of ruffled lace. She gave Ghoulini a properly relieved look, then raised her hoof. He pretended to appraise her closely, then grinned like he’d had an idea, “She is so very lovely, it would be impossible to decide on just one costume. Never mind then! We shall have many! Maestro, may I have a tune, if you please?”
The music started up again, this time a rollicking violin. Ghoulini pulled Patter to him and she let out a little noise of surprise, fluttering her eyelashes as he twirled her around him. Her hooves moved with his as they settled into a wild tango, dancing back and forth across the front of the stage.
As the violin reached a crescendo, the magician tapped his rear hoof twice and a tongue of fire seemed to lick its way around Patter, curling around her ankles then flaring briefly. Her outfit was consumed in an instant, but rather than leaving her naked on the stage, she was instead wearing a flowery skirt that hung over her flanks. She looked down, then up at Ghoulini before leaping back into his forelegs. He swung her sideways, tossing her into the air. Another squirt of fire, and again her outfit disappeared, leaving in its place a flowing ball gown that fluttered in the air as he caught her.
The dance continued for several minutes, each costume dying in a flash to be replaced with another more elaborate one.
I’d seen street magicians; they’re a dime a dozen. Never in my life had I seen such a fantastic display of magical prowess, but always Ghoulini’s horn remained unlit. We might have been there for an interrogation, but for the time, I let myself be lost in the childish wonder of it all.
Finally, breathing heavily, the two came to a stop and bowed deeply, to raucous ovations from the diners.
****
After what felt like too short a time, Ghoulini’s act came to an end, though it must surely have been an hour. He’d finished on a spectacular stunt involving his assistant swallowing a flaming sword right to the hilt before vanishing in a puff of smoke, only to reappear in a pair of angelic wings, descending to the stage from the rafters.
I was exhausted, hoarse from cheering, and with aching hooves from all the clapping. As the lights came up and both performers left the stage, not a single seat was filled as many an ‘Encore!’ was shouted. Well, I say ‘not a seat’. There was one, with a glum, irritable librarian fiddling with his pocket watch.
Swift and I ignored him, whooping and whistling until Chief Jade took the stage again at which point we both returned to our seats and did our very finest to look insignificant.
Uncoiling her microphone, Jade gave the crowd a magnanimous smile. “Alright, alright, calm down ladies and gentlecolts. Now, dinner will be served soon. Our own chef, Detective Griddle, will be arranging meals for the evening and your waiters will be by any minute.”
With that, she leapt down from the stage and began circulating the tables, shaking hooves and generally hobnobbing.
Limerence had his forehead buried in the tablecloth.
“Lim, could you give it a rest?” I grunted, laying my chin on one hoof.
“Excuse me, Detective. Stage magic is… Hm.” He seemed to think better of whatever he’d been about to say. “Never mind. It is unimportant. I will be fine.” He turned to the stack of menus at the center of the table, levitating one over in front of his face.
“Nopony hates something that amazing for no reason. Am I detecting a hint of...envy there?” I asked, slyly.
Limerence stiffened. “No!” he snapped.
“Oho, no way, you’ve been ice cold the last four days. You want me to back off, you tell me exactly why this guy rubs you so far the wrong way.” I crossed my forelegs and glared at him as he shuffled his rear legs, raising the menu higher.
“I would prefer not-” he began, but Swift interrupted.
“Come on, Lim,” she begged. “Whatever it is, I promise not to tell, and if we’re going to be working together, I feel better knowing something about the ponies I’m working with. I work better with others if I know they trust me.” She glanced towards me. “Right, sir?”
“Right.”
Swift's appeal to practicality got him thinking. With an annoyed sigh, Limerence tossed the menu back into the pile and shoved his pocket watch back into his vest. “...Fine. If it is indeed for the efficiency of the mission, I suppose I must. I share my father’s philosophies on debt, however, so I will expect that… should I deem it relevant… the two of you shall tell me something of yourselves, at a time of my choosing. Is this agreeable?”
“Fine by me,” I replied and Swift nodded.
Setting his hooftips against one another, the librarian stared at them for a long moment, putting his words in order. “...when I was… much younger… I had… Let's call it an interest… in the stage. Particularly in acts of rather more physical magic.”
“You wanted to be a magician!?” Swift whispered, as though somepony might overhear.
His jaw clenched as he continued dourly. “I… was very young, as I said. My father took Zefu and I to see a showpony performing at the Detrot Peace Memorial Theater. My brother certainly enjoyed himself; he laughed his way through the entire thing, but I found myself… truly interested, perhaps for the first time in my life. I poured through father’s library for all of the books related to illusion and non-magical disguise.”
“Sounds like a heap of fun, actually. Why the bitterness?” I asked.
“It was… my passion, but my brother and the other colts his age soon took to calling me ‘The Great and Powerful Limmy’, teasing me so endlessly that I could never get any study done, much less actually perform the few tricks I’d learned.” He slipped a bit coin from his pocket, holding it up between his toe before rolling it end over end, then balancing it on the tip of his hoof. He thrust it upward and I tried to follow the coin with my eyes, but it never landed. Limerence let a wisp of a smile cross his face, leaning forward and putting his hoof under Swift’s wing, pulling it out with the coin balanced on the end. She clapped her hooves together and giggled.
“Oh that’s good!” she squeaked.
“Thank you,” he murmured, then continued his tale. “I was not discouraged from my studies. As a matter of fact, I expanded their scope. But while my brother soon tired of his games, the other children did not. It became something of a challenge to them to find me each day as I would run off after classes, hiding myself away to read. I learned a spell to let myself walk on ceilings, and another to see in dark places. I taught myself to walk quietly, and to be seen only when I wanted to be seen. For a time...it worked brilliantly.”
I canted my head to one side. “What changed?”
Limerence lowered his eyes. “We got a new student in my class. A filly named ‘Pathfinder.' Her special talent was to find things. I was still a blank flank, but Pathfinder ingratiated herself to her fellow students by helping, each day, to find me.”
“Ahhh… no more studies,” I added..
He took a quick sip from his water glass, then went on, “I did my best, hiding in ever more elaborate places. Even the library wasn’t safe, and father has long believed in letting us handle our own lessons. I think, as he usually does, he considered this filly a ‘learning experience’.”
“Well, that’s not right,” Swift huffed. “Gran caught a colt bothering Scarlet once and when the colt’s dad told her that Scarlet should stop being so girly, Gran put them in both in panties and sank their hooves in concrete in front of the school.”
The librarian guffawed at the little pegasus. “One day I would like to meet this ‘Gran’ of yours.”
“You and she have a surprising amount in common,” I remarked. “Anyway, go ahead. Pathfinder.”
“Well, one afternoon, after an especially rough class where I’d had spitballs shot at the back of my mane and been forced to take an extra half hour of physical training after school, I was leaving the Archive to go and test a brand new spell. I ran headlong into Pathfinder and her comrades. They gave chase and caught me in an alley. They tore my books, kicked me, and I barely made my escape by running up the wall. Still, they pursued. Down the road, they on the ground, me on the roof.” He made the motion of windmilling his hooves. “I came to the old clock tower on Haven St. The other children would not pursue, but Path Finder, ever cruel and persistent, came after me. I decided I’d had enough and that this filly was an excellent test subject for my new enchantment”
“She came after you on a clock tower?!” Swift burst out.
Limerence shrugged and bobbed his chin. “Her talent was to seek until she found whatever it was she was looking for and she was very, very good at it. Sadly for her, I’d climbed to the very highest point of the tower. Her persistence was...” He hummed to himself as he tried to find the right word. “...unwise. She cornered me - or so she thought - near the bell, but I had timed my presence there very carefully. As she came closer, murder in her eyes...I cast my spell. I believe you’re familiar with it, Detective?”
“The one that makes everything quiet?”
“Silence. The spell is called ‘Silence’. I let her hit me once, twice...then shrank the field to encompass just my own head and ran down the other side of the building.” He gritted his teeth. “The pain was considerable...but it was worth it. Path Finder was never very punctual. She hadn’t kept track of the time, but of course, I had.”
Swift curiously touched the pocket with his watch in it. “Is that why you’re always checking that?”
He nodded. “It is as important to know when you are as much as where. It might have saved Path Finder if she had. As I was saying...we were meters from the bell when I cast Silence. For the first time since before the Crusades, the Bell of Haven St Clock Tower, where hundreds had sheltered from dragon attack, was silent at five o'clock...” His lips curled into a slightly demented grin. “...at least, until its third ring.”
Realization took but a moment to set in. “That… I can hear that bell from my apartment.”
“Yes, yes you can. It was rather loud, I’m certain, though I couldn’t hear it at the time. Pathfinder had to have her eardrums magically regrown and I acquired this.” He lifted himself in his seat, showing me his cutie-mark: the cracked bell. “Sadly, my passion for sleight of hoof was somewhat dulled by the experience. It was not tricks that saved me. It was practical magic, pure and simple. Hence, I consider only the practicalities of magic a worthwhile pursuit.”
“That still doesn’t explain your reaction when you heard we were going to come meet this character,” I murmured.
“I dislike fakes and show-offs,” he stated, evenly, though his gaze wavered as he said it. “Pathfinder used her abilities to demonstrate superiority over me simply to make others like her. Stage magic is nothing more than a display. Corner a show magician on a bell tower with an actual threat of violence and most will be no better than frightened foals. At worst, you may catch a face full of glitter.” He turned his nose up and picked up the menu again. “Sadly, all protestations aside… the fact remains that a part of me would still trade both left legs to be one of them. Cognitive dissonance is very irritating. I suppose I simply transfer that irritation onto the profession as a whole… and no, being aware of it doesn’t help, either.”
Swift and I sat, digesting that for a long moment.
“Alright, that makes sense,” I said and Swift gave an affirmative nod.
“If that is all the personal prying you wish to do, Detective, mayhap we should order our food?” Limerence suggested.
My stomach made a sound like a bear being dragged under a steamroller.
****
Detective Griddle was in the wrong profession, but then, not every pony can follow their cutie-mark to fortune. A truly great cook can easily end up propping up a desk if the jobs just aren’t there, and Detrot is one place it pays to have a pension and regular paycheck. Police work is that, if nothing else.
The vegetable curry I ordered could have easily burnt the ears off a dragon, but it was delicious right to the last bite. Swift settled on some sort of sandwich off the griffin menu which I didn’t look at too closely. It smelled distinctly of flesh, though, and the waitress gave her a look one generally reserves for watching somepony else tongue a urinal. I wasn’t even prepared to identify whatever it was Limerence ordered. It looked like some kind of bean dish, but with a hefty dose of eight or nine different dressings. I was thankful the Don was paying our tab because the wines with our meal came in bottles with vintages pre-dating the Crusades.
We ate, enjoying one another’s company, listening to a semi-talented band which included Telly on multiple vocals. She sat on an old, beaten piano, banging out some jazzy tunes while singing a chorus with herself, a bottle of scotch beside her as the band tried to keep up.
All in all, a better police Gala than any I could remember, especially considering I hadn’t been to one in nearly ten years. I suppose showing up as a guest — and in disguise — might have helped considerably back in those days.
****
The ‘additional privileges’ included with our tickets turned out to be a backstage meet and greet with the Great Ghoulini in his dressing rooms. Jade was still out there drumming up support for the police department, so it was a grass-green officer with buttons shiny enough to damage retinas who led Swift, Limerence, and I behind the stage and down one of the multitudinous hallways towards one of the unused office areas.
Somepony had tossed a bright golden star on one of the doors with the word ‘Ghoulini’ on it. The officer left us just outside with a firm instruction to wait until the magician called us in. As soon as he was around the corner, I dropped myself into one of the chairs beside the door. My stomach felt like it weighed the better part of a ton and I’d drunk more than a few glasses of the good wine, so the ground seemed a touch slippery. Swift was swaying on her hooves, though Limerence seemed entirely unaffected.
“How are you not even a little bit drunk? I saw you have at least four glasses,” I groused.
The librarian’s horn flickered for a second. “A simple spell to dissolve the alcohol in my bloodstream. Quite useful at occasions like this one.”
“Sir… I am really…*hic*... good, but I wanna nap…” Swift burped, softly, then stumbled over and sat beside me, laying her head on my shoulder.
I exhaled and twitched my chin at my partner, giving Limerence a meaningful look. “Do you mind?”
He rolled his eyes, then his horn glowed brightly and a feeling of warmth swelled up in my stomach, spreading down each limb until it felt like I had been wrapped in an electric blanket in front of a roaring fire. Then the sensation was gone and I was left feeling entirely, perfectly normal. Perhaps even a little refreshed. Swift lifted her head and put one hoof to her chest, puzzled.
“What happened?” she asked, sounding a bit disappointed. “I was feeling so nice!”
“Sorry, kid. We can’t be toasted while we’re interrogating somepony, much as I might prefer that,” I said.
“Awww… alright.” Swift plucked at her bowtie, straightened her mane, and smoothed her wings a few times until they lay flat. “I… sir, I've been wondering something. Doesn’t it seem weird that a show pony would be a criminal? I mean, I’ve heard of the Great Ghoulini before. Nopony ever said anything about him counterfeiting things."
"I know… Lim? You want to field this one?" I asked.
Limerence set his back against the wall and slid to the floor. "Father has seen more than a few of Ghoulini's fakes in his time, though only a fool would try to pass off a counterfeit to the Archivists. Granted, many criminals are fools. I know little of Ghoulini other than his works, but the underworld has its own mythologies and I make a point of following those."
"So, what do they say?" I inquired.
"They say he's quite likely the finest counterfeiter who has ever lived, though his work is recognizable if a pony knows what to look for. That armor, for instance, was subject to a thinning technique at the edges, meant to give an aged appearance. A casual observer, or even a non-expert viewing it at close range would not notice.”
I chewed on the inside of my cheek. “I was wondering how you picked that out. Anything else?”
He shook his head. “Little, I’m afraid. The police have investigated him at the behest of the criminal community-"
Swift made a noise of shock at that.
The librarian pinched his lips together, "Miss Swift, surely you cannot think the police a wholly independent adjudicator of justice? They maintain balance. Nothing more, nothing less. Ghoulini is a skilled counterfeiter, but the underworld does not like anything it cannot control or understand. He operates entirely outside of jurisdiction or allegiance, aside a very carefully maintained set of standards.”
I blinked at Limerence. “So how is it you think we’re going to get him to help us, then?”
He pulled at his lower lip with one toe and said, “That, I believe, is where we are taking a risk. We might get his assistance with this case if we can appeal to that set of moral qualms.”
“How so?" asked Swift. "I mean, he’s a criminal. Doesn't that sort of mean not having 'moral qualms?'"
Limerence made an offended sniff. “Simply because a pony does not feel the need to follow the law does not mean they are without standards, Officer. As I said, his code of conduct may be useful to us.”
A faint rattle came from the dressing room and it opened on the broadly smiling face of the magician. Up close, he was older than I’d have thought, though no less handsomely proportioned. He’d abandoned the ruffled white shirt in favor of a spangly jumpsuit that came up to his throat.
“Ahhh, my guests! Do, please come in! I was most intrigued when I heard just one group purchased all three of my backstage passes,” he greeted us, cheerfully, before retreating back into the dressing room, letting the door swing shut behind him.
I leaned close to Limerence and muttered softly, “Just how much were these tickets?”
He replied out of one side of his mouth, “You will be more comfortable not knowing, Detective. Let it only be said that if you were working for father on anything besides his grace, you would be very poor indeed, Stella’s credit or not.” With that, he pushed open the dressing room and trotted inside.
“Sir, is he serious?” Swift asked.
“Honestly, I’ve no idea, but I don’t think I ever want to find out. Accountants scare me worse than mob enforcers.”
****
The dressing room was a tiny affair, with vanity, sink, and dresser somepony must have scrounged out of the local thrift store just for this occasion. The old office was dingy, but one of the rookies must have been forced to give it a good scrub and polish to remove the worst of the ‘police grunge.' There was a small dressing blind covered in elegant scrollwork with the words ‘The Great Ghoulini’ painted across it.
A beautiful lounging bed had been brought in and lay across the side wall with Miss Patter, still in one of the frilly costumes, draped bonelessly over it with one hoof thrown across her forehead. She appeared to to be dozing, her chest rising and falling at even intervals.
Ghoulini was seated before the vanity's mirror, a deck of cards flipping back and forth between his hooves. He turned to the three of us and his face split into a gracious smile.
“Now, my guests. It is lovely to meet you! I, as you may have guessed, am the Great Ghoulini. May I know your names?” He rose from his seat, stepping forward and offering his hoof.
I flicked one eye toward Swift who looked slightly nervous. Limerence, meanwhile, was studying Patter with great interest. She still hadn’t moved from her spot on the couch.
“My name is Mister Thick. This is my associate, Mister Twitter… just call him Mister Twit. And this here, is Miss Snuggles.” I gestured at Limerence and Swift, who both shot me a furious glare. I turned back to the magician and lightly tapped hooves with him. “I must say, Mister Ghoulini...that was, without question, the most spectacular show I’ve ever seen. The trick with the vanishing koi…”
Ghoulini’s rich laugh filled the tiny room. “A magician never reveals his methods, but let me just say, that was as tricky as it looked, Mister Thick. We had to practice for quite some time to make that work, didn’t we Miss Patter?”
Patter acknowledged that with a flip of her tail and nothing else.
“You’ll have to excuse my lovely assistant. She’s quite moody after a show,” our host apologized, shifting on his stool. “Now, have you any questions? I can’t tell you how my performance happens, but if you’d like to ask me about myself, I’m happy to talk. My fans are, after all, where the magic comes from. Heh, the real magic is that someone’s willing to pay me to do this!”
Snatching a chair from a couple stacked beside the door, I turned it around and straddled it, resting my front hooves on the chair’s back.
“Yeah, I’d love to ask you a question or two.” I felt my heart beat a little faster. I do love asking questions, particularly when the pony being asked doesn’t see them coming. If I hadn’t been a cop, I would probably have been breathing heavily down microphones for a living like Sugar Lace.
I scrutinized Ghoulini. His face was kind and open, completely devoid of trickery or malice.
It was the kind of face only the most hardened criminals and the finest magicians can manage. It was the face of somepony ready to steal your wallet in a very friendly and likeable way.
I wanted to deck him, just a little.
“Why did you make a counterfeit chestplate for Nightmare Moon’s armor?”
****
In my defense, I didn’t actually know what was about to happen. I suppose caution would have saved me some injuries, but I’d already snuck into the Castle, escaped Chief Jade, and had several glasses of wine. At least, an alternative course of action might have kept Limerence from gloating quite so hard over having, once again, proved his assertions about my recklessness.
****
Patter jerked her hoof down from her face, saw me, then Limerence. She shrieked so loudly my ears ached and her horn flared brightly.
Ghoulini, great magician of the stage vanished, replaced by a glowing mannequin of some type of dark wood with silver rings running through it. The doll was roughly pony shaped, with articulated joints at knees, neck, and tail. It lacked facial features, ears, or muzzle, but it still had a properly solid set of rear hooves and a killing attitude.
If I hadn’t thrown myself backwards off my chair the second the creature appeared, I’d have caught his clumsily thrown buck square in the forehead. Even as an earth pony, even with a good thick skull, I’d have probably been a vegetable for the rest of my life.
Swift moved to leap between me and the doll as I scrambled to regain my hooves, but a second doll appeared from behind the small blind. It was identical to the first, though instead of the ruffled white shirt, this one wore only a set of black pants. It charged, going from zero to full gallop in under a second. It caught her in the mid-section and together, they spun across the floor into a heap of flailing limbs.
Limerence was already on his hooves, but instead of the obvious threats, he was bearing down on Patter. An explosion of multi-colored lights came from the couch where she’d been sitting, followed by a burst of confetti as she disappeared.
I rolled, leaping up facing the wall and kicking out with one rear leg. It connected with a sound like somepony giving a tree a good whack with an axe and the shock traveled all the way from my ankle to my shoulders. The doll flew backwards, smashing into the wall where it collapsed into a pile of kindling.
A feminine voice squealed and Patter reappeared beside me, throwing herself between me and the doll as it slowly reconstituted itself, one piece of wood reconnecting to another, each surrounded by an eerie green glow. The creature began to stand, but its front legs had been snapped clean in half and it stumbled, collapsing on its face. The girl swung to face me; her dark eyes were wild, like a mother who’d just watch somepony cold cock their child.
I kicked the air six inches below my chin; It must have looked awfully silly, particularly to anypony who doesn’t regularly wear a gun bit. Unarmed is just not my natural state.
Before I even had time to curse my compromising nature which had allowed me to enter the situation without a gun, Patter launched herself at me, apparently forgoing her magic in favor of attempting to throttle the life out of a much larger, much more powerful earth pony with her bare hooves.
Adapting to changing combat environments is one of the first things they teach in basic training, but little within that covers a hysterical mare determined to tear your throat out. Most police training assumes the officer is being attacked by a dangerous opponent, so it focuses heavily on damaging the essentials; groin, knees, and skull. Patter might have been dangerous if she’d been able to think long enough to use her horn, but she was well beyond that by the time she hit me, so I fell back on more gallant impulses and didn’t kick her head off.
Instead, I wrapped both hooves around her neck, turned, and swung her weight. She squealed as her rear legs came off the floor and she hit the ground with a dull thud, me on top of her, one hoof braced against her horn. It spat a thin beam of sparkling flames that blasted past my cheek, leaving a thin burn on my jaw. I gave the jut of bone a good, hard smack.
“Hey, none of that!” I snapped, as tears started dripping down her cheeks. “Where’s Ghoulini?”
The girl shook from head to hoof as I pressed my toe against her horn, but she slowly extended one toe. I looked up to where she pointed in the direction of Swift and the pile of sticks and doll parts she was still fighting her way free of. The doll she’d been fighting seemed to have given up the ghost, though she still had to pry its legs off of her mid-section.
“That’s cute,” I growled. “You want to tell me where he is, really?” She gestured frantically at the bits of wood. I narrowed my eyes, then carefully rose, letting Patter gulp down a few breaths. “We aren’t here to hurt him or you. We just want to ask some questions, then we’ll be on our way, alright? Get that thing off Swift, and we’ll talk.”
Patter closed her eyes and held up both hooves in a gesture of acquiescence, then her horn let off a quick spark. The doll holding on to Swift released her. She backed away, stumbling into my side.
“Sir? Are you okay?” she asked, worriedly.
“Aside a fresh set of bruises, I’m fine. How is Lim?”
Limerence was still rubbing at his dazzled eyes, sitting beside the couch. He’d been looking right at the filly when she pulled her disappearing trick.
“Celestia preserve, I do hate magicians,” he complained, rising to his hooves. “I… fear I may be temporarily blind.”
“Lovely. Alright, I need you covering this girl. Come to my voice,” I directed. The Archivist staggered up and moved towards us. I caught him before he could walk into the door, directing his forehead up against Patter’s shoulder.
“Alright, this is how this is going to work,” I explained, picking my chair back up and setting it in front of where Patter sat on the carpet. “We’re going to play twenty questions. You give me an answer I don’t like, like, say… trying to kill us… my friend here blasts you." I had no idea whether or not he could project blasts, but hopefully that wouldn't matter. "First question. Can you talk?”
She shook her head, then waved both hooves at the doll I’d been fighting, then the other in a heap against the floor. Her eyes were leaking a constant stream of tears as she looked at me, pleading.
“Alright, I… think I get it. Like I said, we’re not here to hurt you. If I let you get those things up… is it going to end with my friend here having to singe that pretty face?” I asked, pointedly.
Again, the head shake. I tapped Limerence’s shoulder. “If my hoof leaves your leg for any reason, turn her into a light bulb. Got me?”
“Understood, Detective.” Limerence gave Patter a light prod with his horn for emphasis.
“Sir… what’s… going on?” Swift asked, softly, looking down at her torn tuxedo with dismay.
“Honestly? Just a theory, right now.” I jerked my chin at the doll nearest me, then indicated Patter should do whatever it was she was going to. “Go on.”
The mare’s eyes were still fearful, but as her horn gleamed with arcane energies, she seemed to relax.
Gradually, the pieces of the wooden doll began to reassemble themselves. First, the ankles grew together, followed by the knees, then the torso which was composed of several jointed pieces. Lastly, the bulbous, wooden head rose and attached itself to the neck, interlocking neatly with the other pieces.
Patter breathed a low sigh, her horn shaking from the effort.
A set of eyes appeared on the doll, then a muzzle, and some ears. One piece at a time, like watching an artist sketching on a blank canvas, the Great Ghoulini re-appeared. Patter looked at me for permission and I pulled Limerence away. She immediately rushed to the statuesque figure of the magician, throwing herself at his forelegs. He put his knees around her neck, holding her to his chest for several seconds.
“Silly girl,” the doll murmured, the voice syncing perfectly with the lips though it obviously had no vocal cords, “We couldn’t keep doing this forever. You knew somepony was going to get the better of you eventually.”
The filly looked up at him, adoringly, then settled onto her belly under him like a faithful hound. He rested his hoof on her neck, turning to me. “Well... as… my assistant has not been tortured… I must ask, why the great Detective Hard Boiled would appear in our rooms, disguised, dyed pink, and with… that…” He turned and scowled at Limerence. “... that Archivist… if he were not here to kill us.”
Limerence would have glared back, but his eyesight still hadn’t recovered and he only managed to glare at the wall a half meter to the magician’s right.
“How do you know he’s an Archivist?” I asked.
Ghoulini rolled his eyes. “Oh please, Detective... the pocket watch? It is a gift to every Archivist on the day their training is completed.”
Limerence was taken momentarily aback. He sank onto his rear end, staring incredulously in the general direction of the magician’s face as he touched the chain dangling from his pocket. The watch had come loose sometime during the fight and he scooped it back into his jacket hastily, then asked, “How do you know that?”
With a hint of pride, Ghoulini lifted his chin in the air. “My assistant may be sadly… out of touch, but I do keep abreast of my competitors.”
“We are not competitors. You, sir, are a leech,” Limerence snapped, taking a step forward and stumbling over the leg of my chair, pitching onto his muzzle.
Patter tittered softly, crossing her forelegs. Swift had a tiny grin on her lips as she helped Limerence back up and dusted him off.
I held up my legs, and everypony, minus Limerence, gave me their attention, “No need to get nasty here. This was, in theory, supposed to be a friendly little meeting. I’ve got to ask, before we go on - You’re not...real, are you?”
The magician squared his magnificently proportioned shoulders and replied, “What is real, Detective? You have the look of a pony whose definition of that word is very shaky these days.”
“You know exactly what I mean,” I said, slightly annoyed.
Ghoulini sagged a little, then sat heavily. A brush floated off of the vanity and the strap wrapped itself around his hoof. He began absently combing Patter as he answered, “My body is wood. Timberwolf wood, to be precise.” He tapped his chest with one hooftip and it let out a dull thunk. “I move. I live.”
“That’s… alright, fine, but are you… I don’t know. Are you actually talking to me or is this another sort of trick?”
“I believe what you’re asking, Detective, is something along the lines of ‘Do I think?’ or perhaps ‘Do I feel?’” He chuckled, then leaned down and planted a loving kiss on his assistant’s forehead. She cooed, like a happy kitten, and rubbed her forehead against his thigh in a way I found vaguely disturbing. “They are both questions I’ve asked myself many times, though I don’t suppose it matters. What matters, I believe, is that Miss Patter seems to think I am alive.”
“I don’t follow,” I murmured.
“Oh? Is it not obvious? She wanted to be a magician’s assistant when she was young, and so she became.”
Swift’s ears were swiveled forward as she hung on every word. “You mean… you were her… imaginary friend?!”
He stroked the thin tuft of fuzz on his chin like he was thinking. I wasn’t even sure if that was possible, but there was something about Ghoulini that seemed designed to put a pony at their ease. It was marred, somewhat, by the blankly worshipful Patter still kneeling beside him, her horn glowing dimly as she maintained whatever spell was letting the conversation go on.
“My love was not… subject to a kind, caring youth,” Ghoulini explained. He gripped Patter’s thigh and pulled her sideways, lifting the dress away from her flank. Her cutie-mark seemed to be two faces, meeting nose to nose. When I tilted my head, the negative space between them seemed to form another face with a blank, empty smile.
“What’s that a talent for?” Swift asked.
“Oh? You can't guess? And no guesses from the great Detective?” The fake stallion smirked at me.
I examined the mark for several second, then reached out and pulled the skirt back down over her flank. Something about watching Ghoulini manipulate the girl was genuinely unsettling, although I supposed if it were really Patter doing the manipulating…
This could give a pony a brain cramp, I thought to myself. Then I had it.
“Faking. Her talent is faking."
“Got it in one!” Ghoulini laughed, offering me a pleased smile. “Few ponies have guessed on the first try.”
“So you’re… a counterfeit… counterfeiter?!” Swift’s eyes were open wide as she slid onto her rear end. “I mean… that’s really… really…”
“Brilliant?” Ghoulini offered.
“Weird,” my partner replied.
“Ahhh, I suppose it is that too, and as well, I suppose there is no purpose in hiding our ‘secondary’ profession.” The magician stood, going over to the second doll which was crumpled by the blind. He shuffled through the pieces, then turned to Patter and shook his head. Her lower lip quivered, but she held in another volley of tears as he went on, “Our works do pay the bills, after all. Timberwolf wood is not cheap nor plentiful and its enchantment potential fades after a matter of months. My...brother...here will need replacing.”
“That is how you’ve always managed an alibi! We have investigated you several times. These dolls can move about at will, taking on faces and bodies as needed. That is truly astonishing magic.” Limerence looked genuinely impressed as he said this.
“It is, isn’t it? Credit must go where it is due, though. Miss Patter was the one with the interest in books of adventure and magic, of daring criminals and clever sorcerers. I simply whispered to her from that place where she was safe inside her own mind. The creation? That was all her own.” Ghoulini hefted a piece of the other doll, rolling the broken pieces between his hooves.
I cocked my head to one side. “How did you… or… she… know who I am?”
“We witnessed your truly excellent prank upon the Chief of Police on the television.” He answered. “She sees poorly through my eyes, but her skills do make her quite talented at discovering what is disguised. When she saw you with her own vision, it was obvious who you were.”
Limerence gave the air next to Ghoulini’s face a look of puzzlement. “Would it be correct to say that this girl is… mute?”
The magician flicked his ears backwards against his skull and Patter whined softly, huddling closer to him as he replied, “She does not speak, Archivist. Speaking is how most ponies connect. The cruelties heaped upon her made speech a terror and over the decades, she's rather lost the skill. I suppose she could, but it's been many years since she tried and a pony doesn’t gain a talent for falsehood because they live a peaceful childhood. Regardless of capacity, you have destroyed many of my finest works. Neither of us especially wants to talk to you.”
Limerence lowered his left ear, looking for the first time as though he was genuinely hurt. “We do not make a habit of destroying art, Mister Ghoulini, or… whatever you are. I may disapprove heartily of how you make use of… or…-” He stomped a foreleg a few times, backing up his train of thought before he corrected himself, “-how Miss Patter...makes use of her talents, but I can appreciate them. We use her recreations as training aids in the recognition of fakes.”
Ghoulini sat a little straighter. “You… haven’t been destroying my work?” he asked, hopefully. Patter, unable to continue disguising her interest in the conversation, flicked her ears towards Limerence.
“Your pieces come to our attention fairly regularly,” Limerence continued, testily, “When it was determined that several of our most expensive losses had come at the hooves of one pony, we decided it would be worthwhile to begin a collection. My father, in particular, was impressed by your Leoneighrdos. Make no mistake, I don’t like magicians, I don’t like counterfeiters, and I most assuredly don’t like you and whatever… bizarre psychiatric illness you represent-” his voice softened somewhat, “-but I am not without my admiration for your work, however grudging.”
The magician bowed to the Archivist, then remembered he couldn’t see, and said, “Then I will say thank you. One day, maybe, we will pay your Don a visit and ask him if he might let us walk down memory lane, as it were.” Ghoulini turned to me. “Now, Detective...you have gone to great risk to meet us tonight and if it is not to kill us at the behest of these... Archivists... then I would know why you have put yourself in this dangerous position? I heard of your execution of the King of Ace, but then I’m afraid you dropped off the map.”
“It wasn’t-” I hesitated, thinking better of a complete recounting of those events. If Ghoulini wanted to think I brought down the King of Ace by myself, it might play to my advantage. “Never mind. I did take a considerable risk and I’d appreciate it if you answered some of my questions regarding your business. In particular, regarding the armor of Nightmare Moon.”
“Oh, yes...mmm…” The magician’s lips thinned into a sharp line. “I fear, Detective, there is nothing I can do for you. My assistant and I have strict guidelines and a confidentiality clause implicit. Torture is useless as well, were you so inclined to stoop to that. I am wooden, and Miss Patter is…” He glanced down at the girl who was toying with the brush on his hoof, chewing on it lightly and trying to pull it back towards her head. “...as you see her.”
Limerence almost mechanically plucked his spectacles from his pocket and set them on his nose. After a few seconds, he took them off again, slipped them away, and shut his eyes. “I know something of the contracts your customers sign. You have a clause which relates to ‘death,' yes?”
“As any sane counterfeiter would,” Ghoulini agreed, placing his hooftips against one another. “Our services are to promote the common good. Thievery should not lead to death. It is almost precisely the purpose of a thief that they sneak. To murder in the course of theft is to defeat the purpose of what we do. It is to lower oneself to the level of a thug. Artless, foolish, and the bane of a functional society.”
Swift’s nose twitched as she brought one wing around and used the feathertips to scratch her head. It was a weird thing to watch. “You mean… society needs thieves?”
Ghoulini, enjoying a curious audience, seemed to warm to the role of teacher. “But of course! The world is a cycle. Thieves ensure that the powerful may never be invincible, and that the weak always have recourse. Yes, we profit, but it is in theft that all great truth is found. I have counterfeited diaries of great ponies, works of art that would simply have lain in dusty warehouses rather than being appreciated in their prime, and glorious statuary that might otherwise simply have rotted were there not a pony willing to take the time and energy to resurrect it, polish it, and cast it back into the public eye as an ill-gotten gain.”
“But… that doesn’t make any sense! Why not just restore art? Wouldn’t that be better?” my partner groaned, putting her hooftip on her forehead.
“So much of what we value is only valuable if we believe it might be lost,” the magician explained, his hoof tracing its way down Patter’s spine. She shivered, then wiggled her flank at him, lasciviously. “Why, I counterfeited a painting by a relatively unknown bovine artist just a few years ago named Jackson Bullock. Fantastic, surreal, beautiful works, and yet he was almost entirely invisible to the public eye until somepony saw fit to steal and copy one of his works. Quite poorly, mind you -- couldn’t have gone unnoticed -- but once we had a few in circulation, he was suddenly a sensation.”
My partner’s face twisted up as she tried to make the logic jive with her understanding of the world and when it failed to, she did what smart police ponies do and let it wash with a shrug and a nod; facts are facts, whether we like them or not.
“Then, If death is your personal ‘line’, do you know Professor Fizzle of the Museum where the armor was kept?” I asked, easing down onto my knees so I could look Patter in the eyes directly. She shied away a few inches, but I kept her pinned with my gaze. "He’s dead. And your armor is sitting in the museum, locked up behind all those wards. They tore off his horn, girl. Sawed it right off.”
Patter, for all she might have appeared a simpleton, wasn’t hiding the look of abject horror at that particular revelation.
Ghoulini slid his leg between me and the girl. “I’m who you talk to, Detective.”
“Yeah, and you’re not telling me what I need to hear. So either you get her to talk, tell me what I need to know, or you go back to being kindling and she can wait a few weeks to get her ‘magician’ back until you can pay for another body.”
At this, Ghoulini’s eyes and lower jaw misted away, leaving the doll’s face somewhat lopsided-looking. Patter, her ears still pasted to her head, was making a very soft whine, trying to back away while still not rising from the floor.
The magician tapped the girl on the shoulder, gently, and pointed to his face. She looked up and her horn flashed, remaking his features. After she had finished the touch-ups, Ghoulini was no longer smiling amiably at me. Instead, he was glowering like a dog who’d just had his bone snatched away.
“Detective, threats are not necessary,” he rumbled, soothingly teasing Patter’s mane until she hid her face between her hooves. “We… mmm… if what you say is so, we will concede the greater good is served by relinquishing that information and since you have taken such a risk, I can only allow for the possibility that it is. Fizzle, very kindly, allowed us almost complete access to the armor during our study for its re-creation. Killing him should not have been necessary.”
“Then you know who stole the armor?!” Swift squeaked, hopping eagerly onto the tips of her toes.
The magician ground his jaw back and forth a few times, then shook his head. “No. I’m afraid I don’t. That… particular deal was operated through an intermediary. We were brought the materials and payment, then told to leave the finished product at a dead drop. We were given but four days to complete it. It was very much a rush job. Not… perhaps our best work, but we believed passable.” He peered at Limerence. “I must inquire how you spotted it. I thought I was quite thorough, despite the time crunch.”
Limerence grimaced as he thought back. “Your resin work on the breastplate was done too quickly. The resin cooled unevenly, such that the interleaving did not take properly on the metal work. It wouldn’t have been obvious until about five days after the initial forming was completed. I noticed a similar issue on a pair of griffin gauntlets we acquired not six months ago.”
“Ahhh...yes. The griffin king’s war gauntlets. Sadly, the pony who tried to switch those for mine was a poorer thief than he was a choice of artisan,” the stallion sighed. “That is, as ever, the problem with working on a time budget.”
“Who is this ‘intermediary?' You think he'd talk to us?” I asked.
“Doubtful, though your Archivist might at least convince him to allow you a visit. He is a broker for things unsavory here in Detrot who was, until recently, employed by a pony of your recent acquaintance, one ‘Mister Cosmo’. This stallion stepped into the vacuum left by the King of Ace upon his demise, though I believe a more powerful controlling interest managed to take over the vast majority of those holdings.”
“What’s this pony’s name?”
Ghoulini exhaled, sadly, “I don’t know. Sorry.” Swift slumped and even Limerence looked a touch disappointed, so the fake stallion quickly amended that statement with, “You must understand, that’s just not how this business works. He has a title. As Miss Patter is ‘The Great Ghoulini’, so this character is ‘The Drum Beat.' I believe the name derives from funny ideas about ‘the drum beat of progress,' though from his tactics he is a manipulator. I can give you his theoretical location, though for reasons I’m sure you understand, I can’t directly intervene on your behalf. He is… in a place that has a tendency to disrupt the spells maintaining my form, but I can at least point you to the entrance. From there… you’re on your own.”
“That’s the best news I’ve heard all day.”
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Aaaand we're off. With the previous chapter title reverted by popular demand.
--CEO Kasen
Hmm. The plot gets more and more convoluted. Keep up the good work!
As always, trippy, astonishing, and glorious
Love this guy. Even if he is an imaginary friend
Good as always, can't wait for the next chapter.
I imagine Ghoulardi speaking with the late Vincent Price's voice...
I really loved this chapter and the whole faux magician and (mute?) assistant thing going on here.
It's funny that I could write about this story till I got arthritis, but I can't write for crap in my college english class
I suppose this just interests and motivates me more
I love how Patter, for all intents and purposes, is just a glorified piece of wood making herself an accessory to a literal piece of wood. It seems like the more the story goes the weirder things get and the more mentally unhealthy individuals the party encounters. I also find it amusing that the party subscribes to the Jrpg logic of "If someone tells you to see someone, you must go see them immediately" and "If someone tells you to go somewhere or not to go somewhere then you must then go there immediately. It seems like all they are able to do at this point is meet people in private and dodge the cops. All I know is that I really want to see where this goes.
3365734
Glad you like it! Always ecstatic to have more readers!
3365763
Plot convolution remains a trend that refuses to divert course anytime in the forseeable future.
3366115
Pah, what has that "William Shakeswhatever" ever done that was good anyway?
3366193
Well, something's gotta be linear in this Gordian Knot of a story. If that has to be the downward slope created by a parade of deteriorating psyches, so be it!
--CEO Kasen
Ooh, I really like the idea of Ghoulini. I'm pretty sure there's a trope for it, but can't remember the name.
The fancy rich progress we-can-do-without-alicorns pony from last chapter is Drum Beat. Calling it.
3366617 Ghoulini is actually an odd one. He's a more original character concept than just about any other we've had so far. I half wanted to write him his own story.
3366193 You'd be...well, the 'original' concept for Patter and the reason the next chapter may or may not be a little late is that she was way, way way more fucked up originally. Her character was so fucked we actually had to change her completely. She was just too weird. This is the kinder, gentler version.
-Chessie
3367260
So being her own puppet master was a step down on the fucked up scale? Do I even want to know what that is a step down from?
What is it with Detrot and the mentally unstable? They're everywhere.
It's like kicking a hole in a wall and watching bugs spill out.
3366233
metaphoriacally beats me
Now there's yet another interesting chapter. (I know I say that about all of them but it's also true for all of them)
The great Ghoulini, made of Timberwolf wood from a pony who has a talent in faking. (Ghoulini being a sort of representation of Houdini perhaps?)
An imaginary friend too.
And still another character to learn of, The Drum Beat.
From the name alone i'm guessing he's like some 1950s politician. With attachments to the values of hard work and smiling a lot.
The temporary blindness of Limerance is an interesting addition to the mute girl in that interrogation scene. What's also interesting is Limerance has a talent in silence creation. Again another use of the senses (or lack of them) to add a strange twist on a topsy turvy world
I have to wonder if the magic the mute girl learned is similar to that used by the sentient stationary objects in a previous chapter from way back.
I am expecting some sort of reunion between Hardy and Jade to occur in future, can't wait for that.
Poor Taxi missed quite a show.
As always the plot twists and turns. twists and turns.
With the green fire, I was half expecting Patter to be a changeling. I have to say, this is better.
3367388 Considering EQUESTRIA itself? Mental instability seems rife. Every single one of the main characters of the show has had a psychotic breakdown of some kind or another and they all show signs of advanced mental illness. Kids show. Right.
3367369 Originally, Patter managed to incapacitate Hardy, Swift, and Limerence, knocking the three of them briefly unconscious. She then hid Limerence and Swift behind the blind, and awakened and interrogated Hardy by magically disguising one of the Ghoulini dolls as Swift.
She put a noose around one doll's neck and hung it from the ceiling fan, letting it dangle, kick, and writhe in an extremely life-like fashion. The other doll, still looking like Ghoulini, asked Hardy questions as his 'partner' apparently strangled to death in front of him.
Kasen vetoed that scene. I'm kinda glad he did.
3367546 We actually considered this one quite a bit, but I couldn't make it jive with what we needed her to be.
3367439 Blindness, weakness, insanity, corruption, cruelty...these are all themes that sort of pervade Starlight. It's a jokey, fun little story most of the time. Sometimes...not so much.
-Chessie
3367690
O.o
3367813 Like I said, a bit fucked.
-Chessie
3367884
Can't speak.
Squeaking.
3367946 I can't tell if that's a 'please write more things like that' squeak or a 'Sweet Celestia, you are one screwed up little kitty' squeak.
-Chessie
Some of that was my fault, insomuch as out of sheer morbid curiosity I told Chessie to go as far deep-end batshit as she could make it for that first draft.
I'm going to be more careful about telling her that from this point forward.
--CEO Kasen
3367690 ...I vote that you put that scene in your journal anyways, because even if it didn't happen, it'd still be cool to read.
3368131
What, and have the Swift Consortium use our urethras for sniper practice?
--CEO Kasen
3368300 ...yes...?
Because I want to read it. Maybe you could put a great big THIS DIDN'T ACTUALLY HAPPEN disclaimer on it?
3368305
Perhaps. I'll talk it over with Chessie when she regains consciousness from whatever quasiepileptic fit of debauchery she participated in last, and see if we should go in for kevlar underpants.
--CEO Kasen
3367690 ...I'd read it.
3368575 I'll see how I feel about that one. It was a heckova a thing. I did WRITE that passage, then deleted it. It was a bit harsh in general, and painted Patter as genuinely psychopathic rather than just weird.
-Chessie
3368055
The latter squeak.
Though that doesn't mean you shouldn't write things like that, I mean it's your story and one of the tags is dark so it should be expected.
Well, the scene does have impact and it's always interesting to see how the gang deal with stressful scenarios so it does have that going for it but it almost seems dark for the sake of being dark rather than it fitting in with the story dark.
If there was a lead up to it then maybe it could work. I mean I don't want to tell you guys what you can and can't put in the story otherwise it wouldn't be as fun to read.
Now if it was a different set of characters put in that scenario it could be interesting. Particularly if it's characters who Hardy wants answers from, it'd put him in a little moral dilemma.
Well the council has decided to defer to me on this one (seems to be more and more of a trend lately. you should see the paperwork that appears on my desk daily from them.) but i'm getting off topic. if that scene had made it into the actually story i doubt there would be rifles involved with the aftermath. more likely it would be pooled effort from Naikujibo, myself, and few of our other "specialists" in "negotiating" for a rewrite. heck i'd even allow meerkat to get involved. for some reason those two together can create some wonderful "accidents". as for my own credentials you can ask our recently reinstated Agent Simmons (after extensive therapy) on the effectiveness of my negotiation techniques. Agent Jolot is very good at making his points clear when "motivated". Thank you Simmons and...make sure to triple check the new calibration algorithms before sending them to appropriate agents. Yes sir. I hate when you do that. but back to the matter at hand if some of the readers would like to read this what-if scenario in your journal far be it from us here at the Consortium to deprive them of such things. just means we have to add more names to our "watch" list. (great. more paperwork.)
as to true Consortium business, all members are now required to go and read this. It is a side story in the Detrot universe mentioned in Kasen and Chessie's journal and after reading it myself have determined the information within may be useful in future projects. while reading it in one sitting isn't imperative, you should begin reading it soon.
3370917 *snickers* Well, you guys are gonna hate something I've got planned in the future, but I'm afraid it's story essential. Don't worry! It all shakes out in the end. That or everyone dies. I haven't decided yet.
-Chessie
3370943 Hey, it's noir, we knew what we were getting into.
3350509
Speaking of Kkat, I just couldn't get into Fallout; Equestria.
3367690 I'm also glad you rewrote that scene.
3368300 Had it been in the story, I'd have taken that shot. However I see no harm in showing people things you considered.
3370917 Thank you for considering me, I've been practicing my sniping. I reckon I could a urethra at 300 metres.
Overall I think Swift was very cute in this chapter, the image of her peeking out from under the table *squee* I just want to hug her.
Also I have to say, poor Patter, I sense much pain in her.
3372199
There's something about the missing verb that just cracks me up. It's the "I accidentally" meme of dick-shootings.
--CEO Kasen
3372813 Darn it, I missed that, I sometimes skip words when typing. I have no clue why that happens to me it just does.
Well, if nothing else, that outcome would certainly have put the lie to Lim's assertion that Show Ponies were useless in combat situations...
3417870 That...particular one is Kasen. The twistedness is sort of evenly spread.
-Chessie
She's sick, I'm twisted. Though, seriously, I may have come up with some decently screwed-up bits, but I'm not the one who came up with Cosmo's family.
--CEO Kasen
3419784>>3417870
I...am afraid I have largely been responsible for the genuinely demented shit. The school's history, Cosmo's family, Ghoulini... Kasen is responsible for most of the giggles. Slip Stitch, Stella, two upcoming characters who are...simply fuckin' silly as can be, but should be GOOD fun.
-Chessie
tfw you catch up to a really good story and have to wait for updates with the rest of the masses.
3421441Awww, yeah...There will be more every 2 weeks. New update coming Friday! Also, the more comments people leave, the more I write! Positive, negative, don't care. I survive on feedback.
-Chessie
3425687 Every two weeks! We release on Fridays, usually. Tomorrow!
-Chessie
3427089 YAY THANK YOU!
Wait, what?
Huh, so I guess Ghoulini is more like an independently-animated golem than a puppet?
I'm only getting around to this now because it didn't show up on my Favorites list when it was released, for some reason.
I have to ask where the imaginary friend idea came from. Were you inspired by kwakerjak at all? its a bet.
..............okay the idea you had for this character is so brilliant i am DAMN jealous. magician acts are in a sense a lie, and the biggest lie of of this magician is that, he is not real to begin with.......... that rather makes miss Patter somewhat scary. she was able to perform that entire act of magic while manipulating a puppet piloted by the schizophrenic voice in her head.......... i dare say such talent would rival Twilight Sparkle and would be dangerous if someone focused it into other magical fields.
though it makes me somewhat curious of what we would define the puppet as. in a sense he seems little more than a thing animated by her magic...... yet on the other hand he is a supportive and protective consciousness separate from her own mind it seems, if still in her head. would he be closer to the strange magic constructs mentioned?
it actaully somewhat reminds me of the batman villain Scarface. a timid man with an associative perosnality disorder, which he manifested through a wooden puppet. though in comparison, Patter is still rather innocent. sure lies to everything around her but that is because she trusts no one and nothing, relying on her puppet as both her caretaker and advocate.
......to reference the Honesty thing i think from last chapter. honest is not ncessarily telling the truth over saying lies. at least not the honesty that relates to harmony. honesty is the intention rather tahn the way you get around to it. Hardy is an honest pony, perhaps as hoenst as applejack, in the since that despite using dirty tricks and lies and a lot of underhanded, if at times brilliant, tactics, his intention is pure. he wants to end this threat and find the killer, the one behind it, and not for the reason of him gaining glory. simply so he can do what he knows is right and is to himself.
hell even Stella is honest to a point by this definition. he is as underhanded as can be and incredibly guileful, but in the end he wants to protect what he has created around him.
thoguh being dishonest is not a line for being wicked either. tome............. i would have to say is of the dishonest sort. his intentions are too cloudy and questionable, uncertain, yet he has a strong, if twisted, morality to him. Patter herself is not evil. sure she tried to bash in Hardy's head there, but she thought they were there to murder her.
I must say, this whole chapter - an illusionist who is not even real, given life through a mute unicorn, for the purpose of show business, and other needs that stem from a darker past....I absolutely love this entire concept. Bravo.
Now, based off what Ghouldini said, I am extremely suspicious of Mr. Diamante...
An introverted, silent, repressed pony projecting a dominant, suave, charismatic personality onto a wooden puppet? What could possibly go wrong?
A dark-brown earth pony with his black mane done up in cornrows suddenly stuck his head into the dressing room unannounced—
derpicdn.net/img/view/2012/10/10/118604.jpg
"Yo Dawg, I heard you like counterfeiters..."
Sounds a bit to me like the glazier's fallacy.
3367388
You know how bilges collect all the noxious run-off from the rest of the ship? I would imagine Detrot serves a similar purpose now for all of Equestria's crazies. It seems to be the nadir of Equestrian society, so eventually all the ponies on the wrong end of the hoofcuffs and straitjackets wind up there.
And that swelling of pride in the residents whenever Detrot is mentioned? The feeling of "this place may be a Tartarus-hole, but it is my Tartarus-hole, and I would not leave it for the world"? That was actually a low-grade Want-It-Need-It spell cast by Her Serene Highness Twilight Sparkle on the city itself to keep the residents contained. After all, the best prison is one that has no walls, but you do not want to leave...
3367690
I for one am glad you scrapped the original scene. Not so much outright horror as a quick, shocking spectacle. This version, I felt, was more subtle and dark. Those sections where Ghouldini hints at Patter's troubled youth, where Ghouldini manipulates Patter like a puppet, and where Patter worshipfully kneels before Ghouldini brought up some nasty implications. The more I thought about it, the more Ghouldini and Patter disturbed me and got under my skin like a botfly. Assuming Patter/Ghouldini was telling the truth, Patter is imagining and manifesting a separate, dominant personality for the sole purpose of being subservient and controlled by it. It sounds like those awful accounts of long-term domestic abuse victims where they become dependant on their abusers. Only in this case she is quite literally doing it to herself. Very dark and disturbing...
Did I mention she really got under my skin?
Act 2, Chapter 11: "On With the Show" - I do think that it was a musical from way back in the day, but most people just say it as to say exactly what the words say.(Tongue twister there)
Surprisingly, this story has had few spelling or grammar errors. But they are still very present.
I have, however, given up my major grammar nazi-ness some time ago. (otherwise id have some kind of a gripe every chapter)
But this is just a little bit of a glaring one:
"It's Sergeant Kiss Tell, he's running the coat room."
Or
"Sergeant Kiss Tell is running the coat room."
Fell free to pay me no heed, its just scratching at by brain so I bring it up.