“The dead art a map. Between foothills and mountains of corpses lays a most narrow road which a pony must trod if they would survive these dark days. Remember thy fellows, stand shoulder to shoulder, and above all, keep thee to the path.”
-Princess Luna, to her troops on the first morning of the Los Pegasus Campaign. The phrase ‘keep to the path’ became a battle-cry.
“Iris, if you’re there, we’ve got a situation. Stick Mags in an overhead compartment and get up to the top of the path. There are a dozen PACT troopers sitting up here, and they’ve captured Lily. Over.”
Static. I adjusted the walkie-talkie’s dial and tried again.
“Iris, if you’re there, we need backup. Over.”
“Sir, do you think they found her?” Swift asked.
“If they did, there wouldn’t be a full squad of them out there,” I replied, looking up the stairs toward the house proper.
“Who is this ‘dangerous unicorn’ of yours?” Bones asked, rooting through one of his pockets. He produced a pack of cigarettes and tapped a lonely fag out into his hoof, then an ancient, gem-powered lighter, pressing the glowing ruby to the end until it lit up. He inhaled, and hot smoke billowed out of his chest.
“She’s the former Chief of Police. Bit of a lunatic and a multiple murderer, but she’s reliable enough when you point her in a direction and get out of the way,” I answered, cocking my head. “Can you...taste that?”
“Yep. Don’t know why. Promised myself I’d keep that one for the day I got out of there, if it ever happened. Flavor is crap, but I’ll buy a fresh pack on the way back. Not like it matters now, right? Can’t give myself cancer anymore.”
“That thing still has a charge?” I asked, pointing at the lighter. He passed it to me, and I examined the inscription on the side: ‘To Egg Head, from another egg head, Twilight Sparkle’.
“Somepony pretty special gave me that lighter. It’ll probably still light up a hundred years from now.”
“Princess Sparkle is pretty special, yeah,” I chuckled. My grin grew a little wider at Bones’s perplexed glance. “Sorry, there’s a long explanation behind that. One I’m sure I’ll be telling you if we’re alive in the next hour. We’ll trade horror stories.”
Bones took a slow drag, letting the ember burn down as the smoke curled out of his eye sockets. “Don’t know as I want to live through this, but if it means more cigarettes, I’ll make a go of it. Wonder if I can make it to five packs a day if I don’t have lungs to ruin?”
“Don’t count your chickens yet. We’ve got to fight our way out of here first.”
“Sir, are we sure fighting is a good idea? Three of us against six of them would be tough enough,” Swift put in. “Even if I don’t have to aim, they’ll have at least one lightning cannon, and if they’re really inclined to kill us, they can just torch the house.”
“Whoever owns this building sent them, kid. You think they want it destroyed? They’ll keep their heavy ordinance in check. I suspect they’ll probably wait for us to come out. PACT troopers fight best in open air. You think they’ve got something on them that’ll let them know how many of us are in here?”
Swift idly nudged her trigger bit with her hoof. “Probably. They’ll have at least one unicorn who can cast some kind of heat-signature spell or who is authorized to learn mind-magic for fighting hypnotic monsters. They could cast a truth-speak spell on Lily, if nothing else.”
“Or just hurt her,” Bones added, nonchalantly, as he finished his cigarette and stubbed it out. “Little girl like that? Civilians don’t hold up under torture, whatever the cinemas might say. Wouldn’t even have to do much to a filly as panicked as that one was when she tore out of there. Wave a knife under her nose, and she’d either faint or tell you her own father’s whereabouts.”
I wrestled the image of somepony waving a knife at Lily out of my mind. Rushing out there in a ball of rage was as likely to get me killed as accomplish anything. Unfortunately, our options were a bit limited.
Flicking the Crusader open, I looked down at the crystal bullets, nestled in their firing tubes. It might have been the light, or it might have been something else, but I could have sworn I saw a gentle movement under the surface of the gems.
“Six shots,” I sighed. “Kid, you better be on point once the crap hits the fan. I don’t care if these things can penetrate dragon armor. I’m not going to be able to shoot twelve moving targets with six shots.”
“Heh! That’s not six shots, colt,” Bones cackled. “Just you be sure not to turn that dial to ‘sun’ until you’re ready to start killing. Once it’s on, there’s no stopping until the round is expended or you’re dead. When the Crusader’s magic is on you, you’ll know how to use it, but there’s no ‘pause’ button.”
“What sort of magic are we talking here?” I asked.
“Can’t say as I know, exactly. Something Sparkle came up with, but Luna’s people perfected. If I could explain it, believe me, I would. All I know is what I felt and what I saw.”
“Which was?”
The skeleton turned toward the wall, looking off into the distance.
“Beautiful, perfect, immaculate death. The skies opening and fire raining down. It was like Tartarus opening under my hooves, and suddenly I had all the beasts of the pit at my command. When you are on the Crusade, you know what it is to be a god,” he whispered, then with what I imagine would have been a dirty grin, he added, “Sort of what I imagine screwing one of the Princesses is like, actually. Religious, you know?”
Swift made a sound like a mouse having a heart attack, and her ears turned bright red. “Eep!”
“Oh, don’t be so surprised, filly. Two eternal beings with thousands of years to live? Pretty sure they’ve buried a few hundred lovers apiece. Lots of experience, between those white and blue thighs.”
My partner groaned and covered her face with one wing. “Please stop making me think about this! We have to go get Lily!”
I shut my gun, pulled the hammer back, and flicked my sleeve back down my leg.
“Then listen up. This is as much of a plan as I’ve got. Feel free to chip in.”
----
I strolled through the darkened mansion, my hoof trailing down the wall. Behind me, I could hear the sounds of splashing liquid up and down the halls, but I kept my eyes ahead. The foyer was right in front of me.
Passing by one of the open doors, I peered through the window toward the yard. Five indistinct shapes stood in the grass out there, flashlights pointed at the mansion. I paused long enough to wave to them, until I was good and sure they’d seen me.
A feminine voice with the telltale distortion of magical amplification rolled over the house like a peal of thunder.
“Mister Hard Boiled. This is the PACT. We know you and Officer Swift are in there. Come onto the porch, lie down, and put your forelegs behind your necks. We have one of your fellow conspirators here. If you fail to comply, we will execute her, immediately. You have two minutes.”
Two minutes.
Lovely. Best hurry, then. Mustn’t have the plan fail because I’m a little slow on my hooves.
Of course, the ‘plan’ was the sort of thing a pony jots down on a napkin during a night of heavy drinking. It was an outline for hope with a million things which were likely to go wrong. How do you plan for a fight with an entire squad of heavily armed soldiers?
Worry for Mags was gnawing at the back of my mind, but I had some small consolation insofar as that if the PACT had managed to catch her, they’d have been using her as bait instead of Lily. Speaking of Lily, why hadn’t she told them about Bones? They’d have mentioned him in their little threat if they’d known he was a danger. Probably just the panic, but it was an advantage in a situation where we were desperately short of resources.
I flicked my coat’s collar up and tipped my worn hat down as I rounded the corner into the foyer. By now, they had to have seen my flashlight beam, but I made sure they were getting an eye-full, playing it across the windows and reflective surfaces. I had the strangest sensation, for just a moment, that the screaming, cringing, sobbing faces in the paintings were watching me as I trod my way through their domain.
Reaching the door, I put a hoof on the handle. Back the way I’d come, I could hear my companions moving from room to room, preparing my distraction.
‘No going back, you fool,” I thought. “Even if she hates you, she’s got a mother and father to go back to. She’s got a whole life to live, where she’ll have a half dozen foals, build a nice farm, and spend her days plucking cherry trees far away from these cruel streets. If she’s smart, she’ll take a few months and just try to forget you and the horrors you showed her.”
Could be dead in ten seconds. Again. Wouldn’t that be a thing? All it would take would be one sudden movement and one idiot a little too quick on his trigger. Eh. I was never that lucky.
I pushed open the door and strolled out onto the porch into the glare of at least six high powered lights. Reaching up, I covered my eyes with one leg so I could get a look at the yard.
“Hard Boiled! You will get down on your stomach, immediately!” It was a mare’s voice, husky, and with a bit of a lisp.
“And if I don’t?” I called back.
After a second, the four center-most flashlights refocused on the space between them. About ten meters from the end of the stairs, a roughly feminine shape in full body armor stood between five others in similar getup. It was hard to make out many details, but there was no mistaking the flash of white fangs hooked over her lower lip.
A slumped shape in nurse’s scrubs lay at the trooper’s hooves. She was holding a pistol in a field of orange magic against the side of Lily’s head, casually pressing the girl’s muzzle into the ground with the barrel. Lily seemed to be unconscious, so small mercies there; no need to give her more nightmares than she was already going to have.
“Then I smear this filly’s brains across the yard, blow your kneecaps off, and the homeowners can bill me for the cleanup,” the officer said, letting her voice amplification drop. “You want to play with me, Hard Boiled, I will kill this bint. We’ve got more troopers in the air, and you’ve got no way out of here. Now drop.”
I cocked an ear back toward the house. “Look, lady, I don’t know what the characters who sent you told you about me, but I’m pretty sure they didn’t send you out here with complete information.”
“My information is complete enough,” she growled, tapping the barrel of her gun against the farm-girl’s head. “You’re here with your partner, and that psycho driver of yours is back in Detrot. She might be dangerous, but you are just an alkie cop who doesn’t know when to die.”
I trotted over to one of the rocking chairs and hefted myself into it. The flashlights followed me, along with what I suspect was enough firepower to level the house.
“You know, a few months ago, I’d have agreed with you?” I chuckled, “Since then, I’ve learned a few things about myself. Namely that screwing with me is incredibly, incredibly lethal. Let me tell you, that was as much a surprise to me as it was to a long list of other people.”
“I don’t have all night, pig. Get down on the ground and get your partner out here before—”
I held up my hoof, and the smart part of her brain stopped her muzzle dead in its tracks.
“I wasn’t done, officer.”
The PACT mare shoved the barrel of her gun harder against Lily’s unconscious face.
“Are you out of your damn mind?! I will slaughter this filly in a half second—”
“For instance!” I interrupted, rocking the chair back and forth. “This house behind me here. You’ve probably been given some ‘orders’ regarding the house. Probably didn’t want it damaged too badly, did they? What are you going to do now that it’s full of kerosine and all of the spare propane canisters we found in the generator room are wired up to grenades?”
I couldn’t see her eyes, but I’m pretty sure they’d just bugged right out of her head.
Of course, the first corpse would choose that moment to land in the yard.
There were no screams. Just a wet thud as a heavily armored body spiraled out of the sky and landed face first between the officer and myself. It was a stallion, his face deformed by giant teeth and a very surprised expression forevermore on his features.
Hopping down from the chair, I strutted out to the edge of the porch and tilted my head up toward the roof. Bones was peering over the side as all the flashlights in the yard centered on him. Let me tell you, a living skeleton throwing a carcass off a rooftop will draw some eyes.
“Sorry about that!” his disembodied voice called down. “Lost my grip! Must be getting old! Anyway, that’s the last one up here! You’re on, colt!”
Thankfully, the sight of an undead pony was enough to keep most of the attention up above. Certainly more than enough for me to throw back the sleeve of my coat and flick the switch on the side of the Crusader to the stylized sun.
“F-fire! Bring it down! Keep Hard Boiled alive!” the lady PACT officer screeched, but it was already too late. Oh, stars and moons, it was too late. She was doomed, but it was okay, because how could anything not be okay?
I closed my eyes and drew a breath that seemed to take a week as the brilliant runes along the side of the Crusader lit up like a Hearth’s Warming Eve display.
My heart slowed, and the world ground to a halt beneath my hooves.
I exhaled, and breathed out peace and joy. I could taste my mother’s delicious split pea soup, Juniper’s sweat as he held me to his chest in the late hours of the morning, and the bagels from that nice little deli shop up the street from my old apartment. I could smell a fire, burning in the hearth of my father’s home, and in that moment, I was free.
Opening my eyes, I smiled down at the PACT officer. She was still standing there, her face frozen in that mask of alarm, trigger bit dangling loosely from one side of her fanged mouth. Now that I noticed it, she had very nice eyes.
She’d need to go, of course. Couldn’t have her threatening Lily Blue. I loved Lily. She was kind and sweet, deserving of all favor in the eyes of the divine being I’d become. It would be too easy just to rip the PACT filly in half, though. No, there was a reason not to do that, wasn’t there? Yes, there was! Good ponies needed questions answered, and I’m a good pony. After all, the Princesses themselves blessed me with the powers of the heavens.
I leapt off the porch, landing amongst the PACT operatives. One of them let out a frightened squeak, but I had the Crusader against the armored plate on his chest before he really had time to be properly afraid. I would change that, for the others, but the fools did need a demonstration. The death of one of their own would suffice. Maybe all of them, but certainly this one.
Pulling the trigger was unnecessary. The Crusader knew what I wanted.
A silver flash exploded from the end of my instrument and speared the trooper through the breast. His brilliant, red eyes faded to emptiness. Funny. He had lovely eyes, too. Someone really should pluck them out and save them. Maybe later. I needed that other mare’s gun to stop pointing at Lily. That did mean taking the hoof, and possibly the leg it was attached to.
Yes, the leg would do nicely.
I swept the Crusader’s muzzle upwards across her knee and the silver blade passed right through the soft, fleshy parts with nary a jerk or twitch. A perfect slice, that one. I wished I could do it twice, but as the mare reeled back, clutching at the gushing wound, I felt a tingle of interest from behind me. One of the others had finally gotten around to leveling a weapon in my direction. Not that it would stop me, but why allow him to fire? It would waste good bullets, and those were at a premium.
I lashed out with my rear leg and caved in his chest. Glancing back, I watched his body spin through the air, knocking his nearest companion off her hooves. She was unlucky; the weight of the corpse hitting her in the face displaced one of her vertebrae, paralyzing her lungs.
She would miss my heavenly touch! Couldn’t have that, now, could we? Suffocation was such a pitiful way to go, and death should be gentle; so sayeth the kind god. Lopping her head from her thin shoulders was the work of a thought and a flick of my wrist.
An explosion rocked the air, and I looked up just in time to catch a tiny form blasting out of the bottom-most windows of the grand mansion as a great gout of fire followed her out. Her little turrets fired beams of luminance which tore a deep furrow up the middle of the yard. I considered her for a moment that might have stretched for several days. She was a good pony, a pegasus, who must be preserved at all costs, but who could take care of herself.
Let her have one. She needed to taste blood and glory.
One of the PACT troopers had taken to the air, but he didn’t stand much of a chance against the Hailstorm. His wings were frozen solid between one breath and the next as she strafed low over his head, sending him barreling into the grass nearby. I casually crushed his skull with my toe as she looped off into the air, then turned to look for more enemies. There were more who needed to see the profane majesty of my power—
No. No more. How sad.
Just Lily, lying there unconscious, and the PACT trooper I’d gifted with a permanent reminder of her failure to resist me. She was wailing and flopping about in a tiny pool of her own blood, but the major arteries had been nicely cauterized by the Crusader’s passing. I made sure of that.
Turning back to the house, I watched as flames licked their ways up the facade, boiling out of the windows. Deeper inside, more explosions went off, and parts of the roof began to rain down around me. It would be consumed soon; fire upon my altar, a suitable sacrament.
Something was slightly out of joint, but it took me a moment, in my euphoric condition, to really put my hoof on what it might be. Twelve. There had been twelve. Six in the yard, four on the roof, and two more...somewhere. I’d killed or disabled five. Bones took the four on the roof.
Where were the other three?
I noticed a gentle glow coming from amongst the trees not far away, and three dead bodies clutched in an olive-green light levitated out of the branches to drop at my hooves. A moment later, Iris Jade strolled out, looking very pleased with herself. Oh, how very much I would have loved to cleave that mare’s head off. Why not? Was I not a god?
Bones appeared at my side. How’d he come up so silently? Very odd. I stood there, impassively, as he lifted the leg with my Crusader on it. A part of me thought I should probably kill him, but was left asking myself exactly how and why, and in my momentary confusion he had time to press the switch on my revolver. It tipped back to the ‘stealth’ setting. The breach popped open, and one of the crystal bullets flew out, smoking like a hot ember.
I frowned at it as it lay in the grass, smoldering in the light of the burning mansion, then felt a quiet need to sit down.
‘Why not sit?’ I thought. ‘A throne! A throne for your god!’
As it turned out, dirt made a pretty good throne.
A puff of dust scattered into my vision. I didn’t remember laying my head on my hooves, but there it was.
“Is...is he all right? My skies, are all of these ponies dead except her?!” a voice squeaked.
Whose voice was that? I couldn’t remember.
A few seconds later, another voice replied from someplace inside my head, “By the looks of that nosebleed, he popped a few blood vessels. Probably bleeding on the brain. He might cook, might keep. Hard to say. Without Apple Bloom here, he’s probably screwed, unless you’ve got some high powered healing magic on you.”
“W-we have healing magic! We just need a unicorn or a power outlet! Did he really do all this?”
A third voice, hard and female, cut in.
“I watched him do all of this, Officer Swift. I would respectfully request you explain the talking skeleton. Then you will brief me on your partner’s capabilities. Also, why is there a blinking light on Hard Boiled’s chest? He’s not been replaced with a machine, has he?”
“Oh, ponyfeathers. We’ve got to get him out of that armor!”
“I’ll go tie up ‘Stumpy’ over there, so you can work. Not that she’s crawling anywhere fast in that condition. Anyone got a restrictor ring? Eh, screw it, I’ll just bust her horn.”
I think that is about the time I wisely lost consciousness.
----
Flow. Space. A time apart from time.
I drifted along, enjoying not having a body for a little while. It was probably going to cost me at some point, but that was a problem for another me who would be along at some future date to suffer all the consequences of present-day indiscretions.
I moved amongst the heavens, and their eyes turned in my direction. It might have been the brain damage, but I had a pretty good notion that they looked a tad desperate. Desperate heavens. Odd idea, but then a fair bit of blood was probably pressing on essential parts of my neurology and complicating this ‘thinking’ business I kept insisting on trying to do.
Maybe they’d let me die this time. Wouldn’t that be nice?
The fuzzy, empty warmth of the womb surrounded me, but that was plenty. Juniper was out there, somewhere. I could feel him on the edges of whatever constituted my consciousness, but it was as though he couldn’t quite make himself seen. The glowing presence I’d been gradually coming to associate with Gale fussed with something internal, and my thoughts became a little clearer.
Oh, goodness. Had I really done all that?
Memories poured in from whatever hole they’d been temporarily tucked in, and I saw the terrified looks on those PACT trooper’s faces as I tore them limb from limb. Part of me kept saying ‘feel guilty’, but it was a very soft voice and drowned out by the relief that I’d somehow kept Lily alive through the brief battle. Police doctrine said she should probably have died in that scenario.
My father’s face loomed large in my mind’s eye, shaking his head with a disappointed expression. I’d stolen cookies precisely once, and after he looked at me like that, I never wanted to do it again. He’d never approved of killing. I think he’d drawn his gun only a hooffull of times in his career.
My father’s weapon. My grandfather’s weapon. My weapon.
A tool of holy wrath. The perfect killer. A weapon only a pony who desired peace for Equestria could wield.
Had I honestly spent all those years carting something like that around on my leg? It was a bit like discovering you’ve had an un-exploded bomb in your yard since you were a child. Once you know, you feel the need to tip-toe, even though you’d run across the same spot a hundred times and it’d never gone off.
I’d barely restrained the urge to slay Iris and Bones. Murdering the two of them wouldn’t have required the effort most ponies put into their morning bowel movement. Killing should never be that easy, and I didn’t even really know where the urge had come from. Well, I knew where the desire to kill Iris lived, but Bones?
Speaking of that skeleton in my closet, how’d he gotten down there? In all likelihood, probably the same way I had: investigating threats to Equestria. The ‘Family’ was an extra layer and deserved further inquiry, however. Though that did assume I was going to wake up at some point before—
----
I heaved a breath into my aching lungs. Fire. I was breathing fire. They’d thrown me on a funeral pyre and now flames were climbing down my throat. The pain was unbearable, but screaming felt good. Soothing, even. I screamed and I screamed, for a solid twenty seconds, until my chest seized and the hot, metal taste of blood filled my mouth.
Something rustled nearby, in the badly lit space.
No, it wasn’t the space. My eyes just weren’t working properly. One wouldn’t focus, and the other was full of flashing lights. What was that a symptom of? Oh, yes. Stroke.
That was not the word I needed to be thinking, just then.
Panic welled up in my stomach, and I began to flail at the air, trying to get my hooves under me. They weren’t obeying, but I had to do something. I couldn’t just lie there while my brain bled itself dry. Was that what happened during a stroke? No, you just talk funny.
Suddenly, the notion of being stuck speaking in an incomprehensible babble struck me as absolutely hilarious. I started laughing uncontrollably, rolling back and forth as my cerebellum tried to burst out of my forehead. Goodness, the headache was unpleasant. Maybe I shouldn’t have swallowed all those bagels. Bagels were good. Bagels that were gone were sad.
I started to cry.
“Calm, little pony. Be calm. You are safe.”
The voice was motherly, but also powerful enough that I felt it in my chest. If nothing else, it did the trick. My awareness drifted out again.
----
Waking sometime later, I tasted blood on my teeth. Had I bitten off my tongue?
No, there it was, right there. It even wiggled. That was nice.
‘Alright, Hardy. Eyes, next.’
I forced my eyelids to cooperate, wrenching them open. Oh Celestia, why did I do that? Light is horrible! I snapped them shut again.
Working my jaw a little, I mustered up a bit of saliva and a sort of weak croaking noise. Something shifted and pressed against my muzzle. Wonderful, sweet water flowed over my lips, and I gulped at it, sputtered, then swallowed a few sips as my throat started working again.
Talking was hard, but it didn’t matter much. I couldn’t think of anything worth saying. There were too many questions in my head to make it worth asking any of them.
Cracking one eye again, I tried to make out my benefactor. All I got was a glimpse of something the color of a muddy river, sitting nearby. It didn’t look like a pony, but if it’d wanted to kill me, torture me, or eat my brain, I was helpless as a spring lamb.
“Bragleflagen…” I tried.
Eloquent and concise, as usual.
Fortunately, whoever was there seemed to understand.
“You are safe, Detective. Your friends are nearby. The brain damage is almost repaired, but I suspect you’ll want to lie there until your speech centers are working properly again. More water?”
“Flagpokebleh,” I replied.
The cup returned, and I took another few swallows, then lay back and shut my eyes again.
----
When I awoke next, it was with a pounding headache, though feeling considerably more together. My neck was stiff and moving was difficult, but with an effort I shifted onto my side and propped myself up on one elbow. I couldn’t see much, but the impression I got was of a large space with only the flicker of a fire nearby for light.
Working my mouth a bit, I swallowed and tried to find some words.
“H-hello? Somepony out there?”
“Yes, Detective,” something very nearby whispered, “Speak softly. Your friends are asleep. Well, except for that unusual creature with no flesh. He is outside, smoking a tobacco product.”
I lowered my voice as best I could. “Where am I? What happened?”
The voice was unfamiliar and female, but held no malice. It reverberated through whatever I was lying on, and I could feel it right up through my chest. Speaking of that, what was I using for a bed? It felt soft and cold, almost like snakeskin.
“You are in our refuge, on the edge of the city,” she murmured. “I’m afraid we could not bring your transport along, but we will deliver you to a safe place, if you know of one. We followed you as you left the city, but couldn’t continue into the woods. We witnessed the PACT troopers pursue, and when you reemerged, the vehicle was attacked by a second squad. We killed them and offered your friends sanctuary while you recover.”
“Who is ‘we’?” I asked, pushing myself up until I could get into a sitting position.
“I don’t know if our name would be meaningful to you. However, it is not often we are graced by a Crusader. I’d thought you all died in the war.” There was a chuckle that shook me from head to tail, before the voice added, “Though, considering you survived multiple lethal brain hemorrhages, I suppose I should not be amazed one of your kind still lives.”
“You want to talk to an ‘original’ Crusader, go grill the skeleton. I’m just a stand in.” I wiped at my eyes with the back of one fetlock, clearing a bit of crust. The room was steadily resolving into a cave or cavern of some sort. “How long?”
“Since we rescued you? Nine hours, twenty-eight minutes.”
My ‘bed’ shifted under me, and I felt myself being gently tipped over. Throwing my hooves out, I caught myself, stumbled, then managed to stabilize. Raising my head, I blinked a few times before turning to face the source of the voice.
As my vision cleared, I did a quick two step backwards.
“Whoa! Yikes! Okay, check me on this, because I have recently had several strokes which might be messing with my perception. Are you a dragon? My brain is telling me you’re a dragon, and I’ll be the first to admit it’s not in top shape.”
“Then your brain must be doing better,” she replied, with a smoky laugh. “Earlier you thought I was a teacup with a forked tongue!”
For a dragon, she wasn’t the most impressive I’d ever met, only about a third the size of Vexis and barely large enough to require two bites from a hydra. My circle of draconic friends was a little larger than it had been, but I’d never seen one quite her color before; she was a soft, milk chocolate brown with a sheen to her scales that reminded me of silica or chrome.
Her thin wings spread out on either side of her back as she lay on her belly beside me, claws tucked under her chest and slitted green eyes glistening in the firelight. Two fleshy flukes spread out from her slender face, giving the appearance that she was wearing a bonnet or hat. Something about her was vaguely catlike, and I realized I’d been lying draped across her coiled tail.
A tiny voice in the back of my head said I should probably be a tad more freaked, but I’d long ago pitched off the end of the weirdness spectrum. Besides, waking cuddled up to a friendly lizard wasn’t the worst thing that’d happened to me today.
I took a quick stock of myself. My clothing was gone, except my coat, which I’d apparently been using for a pillow, and my hat, which was resting beside the fire. Somepony had removed my gun harness, but left the Crusader duct taped to my shoulder.
We were in some kind of cave with a number of short pathways leading in various directions, down some of which I could see the red glow of the sky. The dirt underhoof had the texture of a disused diamond dog burrow. In an indentation not far away, a small campfire let off a stream of smoke which left through a hole in the ceiling. My friends, with the exception of Bones, were sprawled around it in a sleeping heap.
Mags was sprawled on Iris Jade’s stomach on one side of the fire while Lily had her forelegs around Swift’s middle, using one of my partner’s wings for a blanket. I couldn’t help a tiny grin of pride at the sight.
They’d all survived.
“I know that smile, Crusader,” the she-dragon said, softly. “It is one of a commander allowing himself a moment’s respite during which he realizes he has taken no casualties.”
I shrugged and leaned against her scaley side. “You got it, sister. What should I call you?”
One of her powerful wings lowered around my body, snuggling me close to her.
“Firebrand,” she replied.
“That’s a pony name,” I said.
“Yes. My mother was an Equestrian sympathizer during the war, and the rightful leader of the dragons. All those with us are of the tribe the Dragon Usurper drove into exile. We are called—”
“Emberites,” I finished, then couldn’t stop a weak laugh at her surprised expression. “Eh, sorry. Guess that wants for an explanation, doesn’t it? I captured a dragon and her brother a few days ago. Vexis and Ambrock. They explained a bit of the situation out in the dragon kingdom.”
“Captured…” Firebrand’s face-flukes twitched, and her tongue snaked out for an instant, as though tasting the word. “You captured two dragons?” She snickered, covering her mouth with her claw. “And...and one of them was named Ambrock?! Little Chicken?”
“Actually, my partner over there did the capturing, but yes.”
The she-dragon lowered her head until it was right in front of me, turning this way and than so she could see me out of both eyes.
“Hrm...When I carried your bloody body out of that strange, armored vehicle, I was curious about where this much vaunted reputation of yours came from. You were obviously dead, and you looked rather harmless, but your friends insisted we bring you. That unicorn...the vicious one...was pumping enough magic into your corpse to flatten a building.”
“I’ll be sure to thank her for that,” I muttered. “She’s going to want my firstborn child, mind you…”
Firebrand squeezed my middle with her wing and used one claw to brush a bit of my mane out of my eyes. “Imagine my surprise, when you began breathing several hours ago.”
Looking down, I realized the pouch over my heart was open and quickly zipped it shut. “Most of my friends have gotten used to it. If you see a pony with a checkerboard for a mane, would you mind not telling her I died again? She’s violent and won’t take it well.”
“I will take that under advisement. You know, the few ponies we’ve spoken to talk of you in hushed tones. They call you ‘Bulldog’, ‘Dead Heart’, and ‘The Detective’. Now that I see you, casually speaking of capturing dragons and of your repeated deaths, with a Crusader on your leg, piles of PACT corpses lying behind you, a hydra’s...organ...on the roof of your vehicle, and monsters riding at your side, I cannot help but feel that your reputation is well deserved.”
I picked up my hat, brushing dust off the brim before flicking it onto my head. “The reputation comes with downsides. Can’t exactly go for tacos anymore, now can I? Did any of my friends tell you what happened after I passed out?”
She folded her wings against her side, pushing herself up onto two legs. “They wished to wait for you to be up and about, futile as that sounded at the time. The rest of my clan are out scouting, but will return soon.”
Cocking my head, I peered around the cavern. “Then who is guarding ‘Stumpy’?”
Firebrand quirked one eyebrow at me. “If you are referring to the female PACT Trooper, the skeleton rendered her unconscious, and we fed her an herb which placed her in a coma. She’s back there.”
“Good enough. Thank you for picking us up. Don’t know as I had any more fight in me, just then. Speaking of a fight, I need to piss. Which way is ‘out’?”
“Heh! After a death, I can imagine one would be quite ‘pent up’. As to your rescue, it was our pleasure, Crusader. Your kind are dragonbane, but in dark times heroes often take strange forms. Go. I will wake your friends and let them know you are alive. That hallway there will take you to the latrines.”
----
My muscles were still a tad stiff, but the headache was going as I wandered in the direction Firebrand had indicated, taking my time and enjoying the sensation of breathing again. The Crusader felt like a millstone attached to my leg, but it was entirely secondary to the weight of questions in my mind. We’d answered some and managed to create a hundred more.
The low passageways were barely wide enough for a dragon Firebrand’s size, but comfortable enough for a pony. Thankfully, it didn’t seem to be a terribly deep cave network, and Taxi would have likely found it a very pleasant place to camp out. Still, nothing would dispel the scent of dragon and diamond dog. I wanted, more than anything, to feel concrete under my hooves again.
At last, I rounded a corner and found Bones sitting just inside the cave entrance. He was sitting against the wall, a lit cigarette smoldering between his crooked teeth and his eyeless gaze staring off at the eclipse. The cave was above some type of industrial mine or quarry which looked to have been in use until very recently. A few pieces of bright orange earthmoving equipment sat at the bottom of the pit, partially covered in tarps to keep them safe from the elements.
He looked up at my approach, acknowledging my presence with a flick of his boney tail before going back to watching the unchanging red sky.
I trotted over to the edge of the cliff, cocked one back leg, and relaxed.
‘Ahhh…’
Best thing in the world, after a stint in the afterlife. A post-death wizz is one of those things few ponies appreciate the gravity of. It’s a sacred ritual, reserved only for the elite undead amongst us. It should be done in the comfort of a marble bathroom, in a gold inlaid toilet, with a butler standing by holding a pile of warm towels and a bottle of champaign cooling in a bucket of ice somewhere nearby.
In lieu of that, you can find a cliff outside a dragon’s lair, hike your leg, stick your tail in the air, and try to hit a bulldozer.
As I finished, I became aware of Bones standing beside me. He ground his cigarette between two teeth and nodded at the vast hole in the ground.
“Was that good, then?”
I sat down on the cliffside, letting my tail dangle over the side. “It was. Can’t say as I wouldn’t trade it for a peaceful death some days, but I’ve got a friend of mine who won’t let me go until after she does.”
“Heh, sounds like Apple Bloom. She’d get very ‘experimental’ every time one of the old team died. I remember she spent a month trying to bring Twist back.”
“Sounds like she’s got attachment issues,” I commented.
“You know, that’s exactly what Twist said when she was back on her hooves.” Spitting the spent butt of his cigarette over the edge, he snapped a fresh one out of his pack and, with a practiced motion, lit it and inhaled nice and deep. “Ahhh...I missed a good smoke. Someone left a carton back at the house. Never thought I’d miss the war, but at least in a dragon’s labor camp you could get a cigarette. It was certainly more interesting than being strapped to a slab with no hope of rescue for a few decades. It has been a few decades, hasn’t it? You look about mid-thirties, minus the mileage. Last I saw you, you barely came up to my knee.”
“You mean since since you vanished? Yeah, about that.” I followed his eyes off toward where the eclipsed sun hung sullenly in the sky. “You ready to tell me what you were doing out there?”
His teeth clacked against one another as he sat beside me, idly smacking his tail against the ground a few times. “Same as you, I imagine. You must have figured out that the Shield isn’t all it appears. When you met with Apple Bloom, I assume she told you about Project Sixty-Six?”
“She gave me the broad outlines. Crazy mare is running one of the most dangerous street gangs in the city, so you can imagine she was a bit loose and fast with her details. Still, the city is a giant wish machine. It lines up with other things we’ve pieced together.”
“That sounds like Apple Bloom,” he snickered, before soberly setting his cigarette between two of his knee bones. “If you don’t mind, when did your grandmare die? I’d have said goodbye to her, iffen I thought there was some chance I wouldn’t be coming back. Wasn’t the first time I ‘expired’ in some violent fashion, then showed up a few days later after handling the situation.”
“I don’t remember much. She died a couple years later. Heart attack in the night. My dad said she went peacefully.”
He nodded, sagely. “Good. Filly like that should have some peace after marrying a soldier. What about your father? How is he doing?”
I inhaled sharply, and Bones sagged a little.
“How?” he asked.
I screwed my eyes shut and hunched forward a little. “He was working a street beat and some gangers robbed a liquor store. Dad was first on the scene. It was two kids, barely into their teens. When the other officers arrived, one of the kids panicked and tried to shoot the store owner. Dad jumped on him, and the other one pulled a second gun and shot him in the back.”
Bones listened, impassively, smoke leaking from the black holes where his eyes once were. When he spoke, I could hear the sadness in his voice as it rolled through my head.
“Damn, colt. I’m sorry I wasn’t there. Saving a life was how he’d have wanted to go. I know that’s no consolation—”
“No, it isn’t, but it’s done. He died, Mom died, and we’re here at the end of the world. So, why did you leave?”
Sucking the cigarette into his mouth, the skeleton rolled it around his teeth, then settled it back in the corner of his muzzle. “Well, as I said, it wasn’t the first time someone sent an assassin after me. I expected some petty little dragon lordling whose father I gutted during the war. I started following some very strange breadcrumbs. The assassin was hired by—”
“Let me guess,” I interjected, and he waved a leg for me to continue, “An all-powerful lawfirm that only seems to exist when nopony is looking for it?”
His neckbones crackled as he turned back toward the cave mouth. “Yep. Umbra, Animus, and Armature. The ghosts that haunt my dreams every night. As you’d expect, I broke into their ‘offices’.”
My heart rose a little. “That was on my list of places to stop, next. What’d you find?”
“There’s nopony there. The building is a facade. There’s a secretary and a few lawyers, but no records, no money office, and no indication of who the owners really were.”
I slumped onto my side, then rolled onto my back. “Well, damn…”
“Heh, colt, you gotta keep your chin up! It wasn’t all bad. I had to dig into the city records, and that’s when I discovered a funny little overlap between their ‘ownership’ of that diamond mine you found me in and the Shield corporation’s pylon.”
“And that’s what brought you out there?”
“That...and the Family.”
“The Family? You mentioned them back in the basement, but I was sort of preoccupied with the ‘undead relative’. Come to think of it, I’m still bothered by that.”
Bones looked down at his wasted body. “You and me both, colt. Nothing to be done about that now. Well...maybe nothing. The Family are the center of this; if anypony knows how to get me either dead for good, or back to the world of the living, it’d be them.”
“Yeah, but...who are they?” I asked.
“That’s the million bit question. I found that house and I got dragged into that chamber where they had three skeletons like me, writhing around on hospital beds. I sat there for an hour before some crazy necromancer with a hood over his face comes in, pushes those three into the wall, then casts a spell on me and hooks up the chains. Then he left, and left me there. It was all very businesslike. I’ll tell you this, too: the bastards were real careful with what they said around me, but those other corpses—the ones in the walls—weren’t always.”
I couldn’t suppress an eager grin. “They talked! You got the whole background? Who is their contact in Detrot? Who is setting all of this up?”
“Honestly? Not a damn clue. Most of them were half mad, or all mad. I did find out one little tidbit, though. Those last three to go in the wall? They were supposed to be ‘the last ones’. You’ll never guess what their names were.”
I leaned back from him slightly. “Not...not Umbra, Animus, and—”
“—Armature, baby.” Bones chuckled, snapping a hoof in my direction in a dramatic sweeping motion. “You nailed it. Of course, they don’t go by those names at home. They’re all one bloodline. They go by the initials ‘D.W.’, whatever that means. Never could get a straight answer out of any of them regarding that.”
“Did you ever find out what that pit was? Seemed an awful lot older than the house. I mean, building a Shield Pylon in a mine is downright weird on a good day.”
He shook his head. “You got it all wrong, colt. That pylon came first! The Family have been around for centuries. Maybe even since before Luna fell. That pylon? That pylon is a whole lot older. Keep in mind...there used to be a giant hill right where that house is, at least based on my research. They had time to dig that hill to the ground.”
“But the Shield Corporation—”
“—built all future pylons based on that one. It was the original. The very first. They powered it with tortured souls and whatever terrible magics it gave them were so valuable they sacrificed every generation of their family to it when they’d run out their usefulness. They were fed to that pylon.”
“The paintings…” I breathed. “All those paintings of tortured ponies…”
Bones dropped his cigarette at his hooves and stomped on it, sending up a spray of sparks that drifted away on the breeze.
“The paintings were a threat and a reminder: the price of failure was your soul used to fuel their personal wish machine. Unfortunately, that wasn’t enough...so they built themselves a city. A city of wishes.”
My teeth ground against one another. “Detrot. You’re telling me they built Detrot?”
“Close as I can figure, yes. Umbra, Animus, and Armature are just the latest. Well, them...and their children.”
I squinted at him. “Their...children? I thought you said they were all related.”
“That they were,” he replied, turning back to the cave and strolling back toward the dark hole. “Two brothers and their sister.”
“I’m going to pause the conversation right there for a quiet ‘yuck’ noise,” I murmured. “So, what you’re telling me is that their incestuous progeny are the ones making a mess of my planet?”
“Them, and one big unknown.”
“A ‘big unknown’?”
Bones stopped for a moment and jerked his head for me to follow. “Yep. Just what was inside that pylon?”
“I...I don’t know. Wasn’t the pylon...wait, you’re saying that pylon was some sort of container? A vault or something?”
“Heh, I’m glad your daddy raised you smart. A vault, or maybe a prison. It was definitely the support system for something that is now gone. They took whatever was inside and moved it a long time before they stuck me or their parents into that machine. I can’t say for sure, but they might have lured me out there for that purpose. Apple Bloom put enough magic and enchantments into my body that I powered that thing as well as three ponies. Even without its occupant, I’m pretty sure that pylon can warp reality in some fairly impressive ways. Good thing you burned the house. It probably didn’t so much as nick the pylon, but they’ll have a dickens of a time digging it out.”
I went to follow him, but my front knees went a little bit wobbly under me and I stumbled against the wall of the cave passage.
“Ooog. Right. We’ve got to brief everypony on what you just told me, then get back to the city, but I am going to need a breather. Being dead and surprised takes it out of a body.”
“You’re telling me that, colt?”