Come round the midnight hour · 11:00pm Apr 25th, 2017
Waiting, Dim rolled a cigarette for himself. A little hashish, a few calming herbs, a hint of cloves, and some cured blue lotus leaves. When the cigarette was done, he stuck it into the end of a long, slender, silver cigarette holder. He didn’t much care for the smoke to blow back into his eyes, because it stung something awful. With a flick of fire magic, he lit his cigarette and began puffing.
There was a delightful little picnic area a short distance away from the train station, a place for travellers to stretch their legs and for the townsfolk to have a pleasant lunch in the sun. At midnight, it was deserted, but that was no surprise as most of the town had gone dark. The firepit had not seen use in quite some time and was empty, devoid of even ashes.
Much to his surprise, another unicorn approached, a mare. Dim began to size her up, taking note of everything he could. She appeared to be the studious type, because she was thin and slight. Hers was not a body accustomed to hard labour. Eyeglasses glinted in the faint available light, thin, fragile wire frames ill-suited for adventuring. She had a long mane and tail, which meant that she either had sufficient magic for instant grooming, or the available time for long grooming sessions. Either seemed as likely as the other. She was graceful and almost right away, Dim noticed that she wasn’t very watchful. The mare only looked ahead, at him, and she never took her eyes off of him to check her surroundings.
A sign of foolish inexperience.
“You have a job for me?” Dim asked when she was close enough for his soft voice to be heard.
“Indeed I do, Lord Dark.”
Eyes narrowing, Dim considered killing her right here and now. His senses detected that she had some weak, paltry, rudimentary defenses going, but nothing he couldn’t smash through in an instant. Killing her might be a hasty mistake though, and he decided to learn what he could from her.
“Lord Dark, I am Lady Blue Rhyme, and I too, am an Equestrian noble.” The mare drew herself up to her full height, which wasn’t much, and she did her best to look commanding. “I have come with an job offer, a unique one, and to offer you a position suited to one of your talents.”
“I am listening,” Dim said as his silver cigarette holder hung from the corner of his mouth. With each word, there was a puff of smoke.
“My Master wishes to employ you,” Lady Rhyme began, and she looked up at Dim, her eyes watering from the smoke he had blown into her face. “This is no mere position of underling, but he acknowledges your rightful position of rulership and your princely blood. He wishes to restore you to your rightful position so that you might rule over others, and all he asks for in return is your allegiance to his cause.”
“I suspect I know who your so-called master is.” Dim’s voice was now a dull, disinterested monotone. “I have no interest in kneeling before a smelly goat—”
“I ask you to reconsider, Lord Dim.” Lady Rhyme’s demeanour shifted and she did her best to look commanding, imperious. “You will either join us willingly, or agents will be sent out to collect you. You are simply too valuable to be allowed to remain as a neutral player. Your ability to corrupt light is something my Master desires a great deal.”
Dim did not find her the least bit intimidating, not in the slightest. He had hallucinated things more dangerous than this mare. His silver cigarette holder rose like an excited erection, then sagged a bit as his lips tensed and relaxed. “Your Master is an idiot and he is mistaken. I do not corrupt light, I merely turn it into darkness.”
“It appears that my Master knows more about your magic than you do. If I were you, I would take this as evidence that there is much you could learn. There is much power you could have—”
“There is no power in slavery, you degenerate, disgusting primitive. Your so-called master will not share power, but consolidate it. You will only be useful to him for as long as he needs you, and then he will consume you, you foul, feckless, whorish little bint. Slatterns are only useful for as long as they remain fuckable, and you… you will not last long. You are weak-willed, spineless, and gullible. You should run back home, little filly.”
Baring her teeth, Blue Rhyme snorted.
“You bore me,” Dim announced. “I am leaving.”
“I can’t let you leave.” Blue Rhyme’s horn ignited.
“Funny you should say that,” Dim retorted, “now I can’t let you leave.”
He just... doesn't come across as a hero or a good guy. Bad things are about to happen, yo.
And with that, my respect for Dim goes up
"Ah, you think darkness is your ally.
"But you merely adopted the dark. I was born in it... molded by it."
This is gonna get toasty for Blue. I wanna see!
The lesson Dim is really gonna give to Grogar.
Dim knows his place in the dark, not to destroy the light, but make it brighter. As even though he is part of the dark, he knows that it is not something that the world should suffer from.
He is no villain, he is no hero.
A good Anti-hero is indeed hard to come by these days.
Nice to know that Dim has standards.