//------------------------------// // 5| The Hunt // Story: The Evil Paradox // by Alcatraz //------------------------------// Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy wealthy and wise, but not me. I was often like an angry she-devil that would (not literally, of course) murder someone if they woke me at an ungodly hour. Within the hour after getting up, I was in the throne room for a majority of the day dealing with mind-numbing bureaucracy, spending seemingly endless hours sitting in a stone chair with a quickly flattening cushion, and it was doing a number on my dainty princess ass. The third day of being a pretty pony princess was absurdly hot, and being as bored as I was and not wanting to sit in the stifling heat, I had a parchment with the teleport sigil on it next to me, teleporting away empty glasses of water and getting refilled ones sent back with a fresh wedge of lemon. As well as a test of distance, I also learned I could still get the spell to work with minimal effort. Drinking all that water also gave me ample opportunities to use the aptly named restroom. When I was in the library on my third day for that very reason, I conveniently overheard a mare and a stallion talking about something called a “cutie mark”. Further research lead me to discover the youngest documented age of a pony, a five year old got her mark in enchantments. That filly must’ve had a lot of magic to be naturally good at something as high-level as that. In the evening, Celestia and I went up to my room to lower the sun and raise the moon. My scientific and logically inclined brain was in a continuous struggle to understand how doing so was even possible. A human using an unknown magical force to control the path of a goddamn moon of all things was beyond surreal, and something I was likely to get thrown into the loony bin over if I said anything back home. Every time I rose the moon, it was like a wave of invigorating energy washed through me. Sitting on the dais and basking in its radiant white light made me feel full of life, something I didn’t understand at the time, and I had to find out why. It was Celestia’s responsibility to raise the sun just like the moon was for Luna, but how did that come to pass? Were certain ponies predisposed to getting certain cutie marks? Did they appear during a specific set of circumstances?? I resigned to study that issue tomorrow, electing to crawl into bed like a drowsy two year old. Normally when I went to bed on Earth, I’d often toss and turn for longer than I should to get to sleep. That wasn’t a problem since coming to Equestria. Whenever I laid down, I closed my eyes and let out a soft, relaxing breath, then felt myself slowly drift off to sleep like it was an innate command. There were a couple things I’d discovered when perusing the dream portals. A number of nightmares I entered into often had an amorphous, floating cloud of smoke that terrorised its victim, like that eight legged freak from the first night. I had witnessed them shapeshift multiple times into various creatures to scare the ponies senseless. Were the creatures something that those individuals feared? Beyond that, I wasn’t sure what else the smoke did or what it was. As unoriginal as it was, I just called them Smokers until I found out otherwise. And that brought me to the next discovery: physical attacks didn’t work on them. Whether it was myself, sticks, stones–heck–I even tried using an iron fire poker and throwing salt at the things. Somehow, the tangibility of the objects in a dream had next to no effect on the Smokers, and left me wondering how I could affect them. Brute force wasn’t working.I had magic, so I came up with an idea, though in hindsight it seemed like a horrible idea at the time, but I really had nothing to lose by trying. As I found out from repeated experiences, if I fell off a cliff, got caught by a Smoker, or suffered what would have otherwise been major or lethal trauma in the waking world, I’d get pulled back into the portal room. I had my own personal respawn! In one dream, I emerged from a portal into a house, wondering where the occupant was. Normally they’d be absorbed in their own little world, but that wasn’t my immediate concern. All the little knick-knacks dotted around, and furniture gave the house a lived-in feel, but the oppressive darkness and a cold sense of isolation put me on edge. It was like being in a horror movie and trying to hide from Freddy Kreuger. I helped myself to a quill and parchment from a nearby desk and drew two sigils, one on each side, before picking up a letter opener. I went out into the hallway to find a Smoker, which involved walking around the endless maze of gloomy corridors for what felt like hours. As I rounded one corner, I spotted an inky, floating menace, lazily floating down the hall. We both stopped in our tracks, staring each other down for several tense seconds in a Mexican standoff. As fast as I could, I brought the letter opener to bear in front of the parchment, worked my magic, and the knife was propelled forward, flying through the Smoker and causing the path through to singe and burn from the inside out, like holding a cigarette lighter under a sheet of paper. Despite the lack of a mouth, its pained, high-pitched growl was like rusted nails scraping down a chalkboard. It then formed a spear point from itself, sliced open the roof, and leapt from sight as the slice closed itself right after. I stared, dumbfounded. Huh, that was new, I thought. I mostly expected it to jump me like the other dozen or so times. Where the hell did it go, and for that matter, how? As I tried to process what just happened, there began a gradual, quaky rumbling from all around me, increasing with every passing second. I froze in place as my head snapped to and fro, trying to figure out what was going on as every surface of the house began to dissolve like bubbling acid. As the house was slowly eaten away, I saw a thick, oily darkness consuming the cosmic clouds at a steady pace as the portals began to disappear one by one. While I hadn’t been here that long, I knew that wasn’t right. I began to fly as fast as I possibly could to the narrowing point of the clouds, at least hoping if I made it in time, I would wake up. The darkness coalesced into a point as it finished eating everything, then I was forcibly yanked from the realm like the Grim Reaper pulling me to hell, wherein I sat bolt upright with a deep gasp. Taking a few breaths to calm myself, my attention was caught by rustling from the other side of the room, a cloaked figure standing by the bookshelves. Barely illuminated by the moon, I saw them toss a few unrolled scrolls onto the floor among several other scrolls and books. They stopped what they were doing and froze when I gasped, then snapped to look at me. In an instant, the figure launched itself faster than feasibly possible at me, pinning me to the bed with legs as thick as tree trunks. The hood of their cloak hid most of their facial features, but I could see their emerald green eyes and menacing gaze, partially lit by the moonlight pouring in from the doors to the dais. “If you want to keep your vocal cords intact, I’m going to take what I came for and be on my way,” the masculine voice threatened. Well, that went from zero to one-hundred real fucking quick. He made a very, very poor decision. I had the power to raise and lower the moon, and he thought it was a good idea to break into my room? I lurched forward to headbut the intruder, but forgot about my horn and ended up carving a bloody canyon across his forehead. He roared and fell back and off the bed, knocking over the bedside table. “Wrong move, asshole!” I shouted, jumping off the bed, where I immediately got to punching the stallion across the face. With one particularly hard punch, his hood fell back, exposing a rust-red stallion underneath. I tried flaring my magic to grab something nearby to knock him out, but instead felt a painful sensation roll through my head, making me waiver. Seizing the moment, the stallion swung hard at my shoulder, and the impact knocked me to the side, giving him enough pause to shove me off and scramble out from underneath. He darted back over to the bookshelves, picked out some scrolls from their cubbies with his mouth, dropping one in the process. With no time to pick it back up, be bolted toward the doors. I cut him off with a tackle and he rolled under me, where I was quickly awarded with a kick to the gut. Those muscular legs knocked the wind from me and my eyes bugged out of my head. The cheap shot gave gave the stallion enough time to shrug me off and stand up, but I clamped my teeth onto his tail and pulled. The sight of his wings flaring out from underneath the cloak definitely surprised me, and he looked back to me, glaring daggers of exasperation, cuts big and small, all over his face, not to mention the bruises that’d show up by tomorrow. He reared a hind leg and kicked me hard on the muzzle, sending me rolling backwards onto the stone floor. The door suddenly burst open and I saw a pegasus guard run in, and in the split second I looked back, the pegasus had already taken flight. The guard ran up to me as I groaned in agony. “Princess! What happened?!” “I-I got a-attacked,” I mumbled thickly, my head and vision swimming, my nose feeling like it was broken. Was that blood I tasted? That wasn’t good. Two other guards ran into the room and looked at the scene before them. “You,” the pegasus barked to one, “go wake Radiant. And you, go wake Celestia. Now!” They ran out without saying a word. My eyes drifted shut. “Ugh, my head is killing me…” “It looks like you got a concussion, Your Highness. Try not to fall asleep.” I concentrated on the guard’s talking as best I could so I didn’t fall unconscious, and as my vision slowly returned, I saw Celestia and the doctor, Radiant, run in, backed up by the two guards from before. “What. Happened?” Celestia demanded through gritted teeth. “I heard a commotion, shouting, swearing, and by the time I got here, Princess Luna’s attacker had already fled.” Radiant rushed over to my side and dumped her bag next to me, tearing into it. She pulled out the little penlight thing, then started assessing me with her expertly trained eyes. “Mild concussion and possible broken nose… Can I get some water please?” she said, and fished out a few bottles, gauze, and scissors from her bag. Despite all the commotion, Celestia’s concerned gaze was fixated on me. “What is that?” she asked, and I gave her a very confused look. Using her magic, I felt something slide off my horn, the pain of my headache alleviating slightly. “Is that a…” She paused, a look of horror written across her face. “Luna, did you get a good look at the pony who did this to you?” I nodded a nasally “Uh huh” and winced as the doc dipped some gauze straight in the pitcher of water brought over from the desk, then wiped the crimson from my muzzle. “Can you tell me what they looked like?” Celestia said. The dizziness had cleared up slightly, so I told her while it was still fresh in my mind. “Green eyes, rust-red coat, wings, stallion… That’s it.” “Pardon me, Your Majesty, this will sting a bit.” Radiant used some gauze with disinfectant to further clean any cuts on my face, then began to gently assess my nose. “You didn’t see their cutie mark?” Celestia asked. “They were wearing a cloak,” I said. “Well, the good news is no broken nose,” Radiant said, “but the concussion means you’ll have to take it easy for a couple weeks. There’s a nasty cut on your nose, but that will heal up fine.” She cut a strip of gauze, squeezed some kind of viscous gel onto it, then pressed it against the cut as I winced. Celestia turned to the guards behind her. “Fetch some pegasi and sweep the exterior of the castle. If anypony—and I mean anypony—is out and about that matches Luna’s description, throw them in the dungeon until I can question them.” The two guards left immediately, then she told the first responder to stay put. “Luna, do you know what they were doing?” Celestia said, and I just pointed over to the bookshelves. She looked over at the torn pages, scrolls, and books everywhere. “What did they take?” “Some scrolls…” I trailed off, tired and woozy. “Why?” Irritation crept into my voice as I felt myself drift off again. “I don’t know.” “If I may interrupt?” Radiant interjected. “Try not to go back to sleep tonight, Princess. I’ll be back in a few hours to change the bandage. Concussions need to be monitored for the first couple days.” She turned to Celestia. “I’ll let you three talk.” After Radiant left, Celestia wasted no time in levitating me back into bed, propping me up against the headboard with a mound of pillows. “Can you tell me what happened from the start?” I took my time so I didn’t get anything mixed up, then she addressed the guard still present. “By these accounts, you didn’t enter the room until well into the altercation.” “I was knocked out, Princess.” “You wait until now to mention that?” “This is the first chance I’ve had to mention it, yes.” “Standard issue helmets are designed to prevent bumps on the head, Sergeant.” And it suddenly became my turn to say something. “Sarge, give me your helmet.” Celestia looked at me, perplexed. “What do you need his helmet for?” “Just trust me. Please.”  Celestia reluctantly levitated over the helmet, and I turned it over in my hooves. If my assumption was correct… There it was! “You’re right, Sergeant, you were also assaulted,” I began, and turned it to show the both of them. “See the dent?” Celestia couldn’t really contradict the guard anymore. “There were two of them?!” the guard said, aghast. As he stared at the helmet, his eyes suddenly widened. “Pegasus,” he spat. “They were flying above my field of vision.” “Or, perhaps a unicorn used a spell to remain hidden, but that’s not important right now.” Celestia interjected, not unfairly so. “In any case, join the search party and relay the new information. If you haven’t found anything by first light, they’d likely be long gone. And if you find any scrolls, bring them straight to me.” “Yes, Your Highness.” The guard promptly galloped off down the hall. Celestia closed the door with a soft click. With slumped shoulders, she looked to me with a troubled gaze. “Oh Luna, I’m sorry this happened.” “Don’t be,” I said with a dismissive wave of a hoof. “You’ve got nothing to apologise for. It’s the other two we have to be careful about.” “What do you think was so important that this pegasus decided it was worth breaking into your room over?” I laid back, comfortable, and closed my eyes to ponder the question. “I’m not sure he intended to fight,” I said after a while. “I was in the dream realm when it began dissolving around me, then I woke up.” In her magic, Celestia turned over the thing she removed from my horn, a ring, scrutinising it carefully. “What is that?” I asked, my eyes fluttering from a wave of drowsiness. “Dark stone. Made from the rocks that fall from the heavens; they lack magic because they’re not of this world. Creatures use them against ponies because of their anti-magic properties. I have a collection of these so I can try to find out who made it, and where it came from by analysing its composition.” It took me a moment to realise that, in fact, Celestia was talking about meteorites of all things.  “Did it pull me from the dream?” “Once worn, it renders any magic useless.” Celestia sighed. “I’ll keep an eye on you until Radiant returns, and I can help you clean up the mess. Maybe we’ll figure out what was stolen.” That made sense, so I gingerly got out of bed to join her. I couldn’t help but giggle that the ring became a disservice for the stallion. We gathered up the parchment lying all over the floor, then stacked everything on the desk to sort out where they came from. From the scrolls and books that remained in their niches, it wasn’t too hard to figure out where things went. “Can you pass the rest of the maps, please?” I asked, halfway through reorganising. Celestia looked through several scrolls aloft in her aura. “I don’t have any here,” she said momentarily. “There was more than that. Check again?” She gave each tube’s title a careful look before moving onto the next as I stole a quick glance around the room to see if we missed any. “How many are there supposed to be?” Celestia asked after a minute. I began to pull all the maps from their cubbies, where I proceeded to lay the big one out on the floor, followed by matching the smaller maps to each region. “...Five, six seven, eight,” I counted. Despite being dazed and confused at who-knows-what ‘o’clock in the morning, the realisation couldn’t have come soon enough. My eyes eventually wandered over to the south-east part of the map and I leant in closer. “There were eleven, so there’s two missing, not counting the dropped one.” “Which ones are they? I’ll double check,” Celestia said. “The big mountain range and the forests around it,” I said, pointing it out. After a few moments of briefly checking the scrolls, Celestia looked at me and shook her head. “Those two are definitely missing. Why somepony a thief break into the private chambers of a princess for some maps?” “Either he took the wrong thing in his haste, or he found what he was looking for.” “Now we just need to figure out what that something is. I’ll look into tightening security tomorrow, but in the meantime, let’s get this cleaned up,” Celestia said. It didn’t take long to clean up the room. After everything was accounted for, including missing and damaged, Celestia went to fetch some tea. I looked at the maps half absentmindedly, trying to figure out why he apparently needed maps for a mountain range and forest. When Celestia came back levitating a steaming pot and corresponding cups on a tray, she looked me up and down. “Something wrong?” “There has to be something we’re missing,” I said. “You don’t break into somepony’s room in the middle of the night without a very good reason. Are these maps something you can get in a library?” Celestia briefly looked them over. “Maps like this aren’t easy or cheap to make. Multiple pegasi have to go on extended scouting missions to chart everything, assuming they even return in the first place.” She righted the bedside table and pulled it over to set the tea tray down, then poured two cups. “It begs the question of how knowledge of these maps got to that pegasus.” Celestia let the question hang in the air, so I took a sip of tea to help me think.  The soothing warmth did wonders to ease the headache while we deliberated over the bigger metaphorical picture. After we drained half the pot in comfortable silence, and with nothing else to do, I elected to straighten up the desk, stack the damaged books and scrolls, then began looking through some of the books I got from the library.  Celestia picked up her tea and took an idle sip before peering over my shoulder. “How can you study in your condition?” “I’m not really. More like making a few notes for later. Just need a way to pass the time and stay awake until Radiant returns.” Then I remembered the clock. I levitated it over from the floor next to the bed and looked it over. To my annoyance, there was a great big crack over the glass face. The hour and minute hands were frozen over the one. “A pity,” Celestia said. “I’ll have Horologium fix it tomorrow.” I assumed Celestia meant a pony who works with clocks. “Those pegasi cretins caused me to wake up before my allotted time. They will regret it,” I muttered under my breath. Celestia laughed at that. “What do you plan on doing with them?” “I’ll stuff every nightmare I can find into their dreams. They’ll be too terrified of having nightmares to go to sleep.” “That seems rather vindictive, don’t you think? Assaulting a princess is a serious offense, though not entirely unforgivable. If it were up to me, I’d keep them in the dungeon for a few years then banish them from the kingdom under threat of execution if they ever returned.” Execution?! I was horrified at that thought. “I hope you don’t carry through with that if they happened to return. Regardless, I can understand that the fear of having your head lopped off would keep you from coming back.” I leaned back and stared off into space, pushing those thoughts out of my head. “What about remanding them indefinitely?” I said after a while. “Locking somepony in a small cell in the castle’s dungeon for the rest of their life is ridiculous. Regardless if we make the law around here, you still have to consider what you’re doing to others.” I sighed in annoyance, took a deep breath, then a drink of tea. “You’re right. I’m sorry. When you find yourself in a revered position, it can be hard to stay grounded at times.” “I’m surprised you said that. Where’s the cheery and giggly Luna I’ve always loved?” I stared at Celestia, both horrified and confused. Did she catch on to me that quick?! But, to my continued confusion, she just chuckled and playfully nudged me with a wing. “I’m glad to see you’re taking more responsibility for things lately,” she said. Oh, so that’s what she meant. Crisis averted. “Well, it’s not every day that something like this happens.” Given my unique situation, I meant that in every sincerest form. “We’ll decide what happens with that stallion if or when he gets caught, as well as his supposed accomplice. Let’s focus on the task at hand.” “Of course. Is there anything else you need?” From all the tea that shot straight through me, it was only a matter of time before my stomach began to rumble. The way Celestia’s ears flicked toward me, she must have heard. “Perhaps a snack?” she asked with a small grin.   “...Yes, please,” I said sheepishly. Celestia poked her head out the door and whispered something inaudible, and I heard someone trotting down the hall before she closed the door. “Who was that?” “Another guard I asked to watch your door.” “Because that worked out so well the first time,” I said with a sarcastic roll of my eyes. “Oh, Luna,” Celestia playfully chastised, and we shared a small laugh. She came over to the desk and sat down beside me, where I had a few open books and my scroll of notes. “Now, how can I help?” “Well… Remember the ink bottle incident?” She nodded. “Tonight made me think. What if we used something like that for intruders?” “Hmm, that’s actually not a bad idea,” Celestia said, pleasantly surprised. “Though, catapulting them skyward might require peeling them off the ceiling. But, I think you’ll find…” She picked up the grimoire I had yet to return to the library and opened it roughly half way. Putting it back down, I saw a runic array with the symbol of a keyhole in the middle and blocks of notes on the page. Celestia looked at the page for several seconds, then went over to the bedroom door. Her horn lit up, and right before my eyes, the same patterns began appearing on the door. She touched a hoof to the keyhole, and a yellow outline of her cutie mark lit up like an ephemeral glow above the array, then sank into it. “Come over here and open the door.”  I had no idea what Celestia did, so I decided to humour her. I gripped the handle with magic, pulled, but nothing happened. I looked up at her, confused, and tried again. Nothing. Celestia chuckled to herself. “Try putting your hoof on the keyhole,” she said, so I did. A white glow of the crescent moon showed up and sank into the array. “Try the door again.” With a shrug, I opened the door with ease. “What was that?” “A locking spell. This one is currently set so only you and I can open the door. Like a key in a lock, the spell needs a recognised magical signature to open, so you’ll need to open it for everyone else.” That was actually rather cool, but there was one thing wrong with putting it on the bedroom door. “As useful as that is, that pegasus came in through the large doors,” I said pointedly. “No matter,” Celestia said. “One array works on all doors within the room it’s cast. I’m surprised you hadn’t seen that spell with how long you’ve had the book.” I smiled sheepishly. “Ah, heh... I’ll put it back tomorrow. But, this situation begs the question of why there wasn’t a spell in place to prevent something like this from happening.” “Hindsight is a fickle Mistress.” On that note, soft knocks came from the bedroom door. Whoever was on the other side couldn’t open it, so I had to. “As requested, Your Majesties.” The guard held a basket laden with a display of fruits you’d see being offered to royalty. Grapes, bananas, mangoes, pineapple; it made me wonder if Celestia specifically requested all of that, or simply asked for some fruit. The only thing I couldn’t recognise was the weird green orbs. “Thank you,” she said gratefully, closing the door behind her. “Come, let’s go outside.” I hadn’t had an opportunity to see what plain old fruit tasted like, so I was eager to find out. Celestia and I sat out on the dais waiting for Radiant to return and casually ate away. As it turns out, the green fruit tasted like an orange. But weren’t oranges, well, orange? In any case, the fruit was exponentially more delicious than anything I had on Earth. Getting some food in me did a world of good, and it wasn’t much longer until Radiant came back. After running her little tests to see how I was faring, she changed the bandage, where I found out that viscous gel was… weirdly both glue and an antibacterial paste. I made a mental note to find out the ingredients so I could invent a revolutionary medical product on Earth. Radiant gave me the all clear, though warned me if there were any persisting symptoms to summon her. Celestia told me that I could go back to sleep, though she’d wake me when she raised the sun. She slept for a couple hours until it was time to lower the moon, curled up on the rug next to me like an oversized lap dog while I slept in bed. After Celestia gently roused me and asked how I felt, she was nice enough to let me catch up on lost sleep while she began the day after I lowered the moon. With my worries at ease, being among the dream portals was more than welcome.