//------------------------------// // Chapter 71: I Tried Being Reasonable // Story: A Long Way to Fall // by Cinders of War //------------------------------// Twilight Sparkle shuffled her feet unconsciously. "Poor Windy... Gone just like that. I was hoping she could get the right treatment." "Me too, after I heard all this..." Morning finished with a sigh. "I actually knew her, you remember? She came with High Noon to recruit me. As far as first impressions go, she seemed nice." "It doesn't even sound like the Assassin life suited her one bit." "I guess it really didn't." Morning Blade drummed a finger against her book's pages. "From what I gathered from Noon, she really just wanted to help make the world a more balanced place. Whether she could fight or not." "That's really a shame... Good ponies or people like that don't deserve to die." "How right your words sound, Twilight Sparkle. How right they are." Frigid Night walked down the halls as he headed for the roof. He had to talk to Mirror, after everything that had happened. Instead of Pierce, Mirror had killed Windy, and Frigid wanted to know why. He knew his best friend had been interested in the girl since day one, but now… Now he didn’t know what to think. He passed by High Noon on the way, noticing he was still down about the whole event. “Noon, you alright?” Frigid asked as he stopped to talk. “I know, it’s tough to lose someone you love.” “Yeah, it is, isn’t it?” Noon slumped lower and pulled his hat over his eyes. “I just wish I could turn back time. I should’ve told Windy how I felt earlier. I should’ve… I should’ve trained her better. I should’ve taught her how to defend herself better.” “Don’t blame yourself for that, Noon. You did your best. We all did. We gave her hints on how to operate. We should’ve done more for her.” “But I was her teacher. Not you. Not anyone else. It was me. I let her die…” High Noon looked away. “Where are you headed, Frigid?” “I’m… Going somewhere to think.” Frigid patted his friend on the back and headed out. He had no more comforting words to use. Assassins came and went. That was the life of a trained killer. They had to be prepared to lose friends. Frigid performed a leap of faith off the roof, landing down on the old mattresses below and headed to his secret place to contemplate on things. It was still midday, so a few rays of sun managed to pierce the darkness of his little cave, warming it up a little. As expected, Mirror Match was there waiting for him. She was wearing her now extremely ragged black robes, with some kind of harness beneath it. He could see the butt of a pistol poking out. “Friggy,” she greeted warmly. “You smell nice today.” Frigid regarded Mirror Match. She looked just as good as always, if not better. Her skin glowed with health and her hair looked freshly done. Certainly she showed no signs of the intense battle she had been embroiled with the week before, not even a single black mark or scar for it. “A-are… Are you… Alright?” he stepped towards her. “I heard about… All that.” Mirror sniffed derisively. “What do you think this is, amateur hour? It takes a lot more than that to slow me down… especially when I have you to come back to.” There was a folding table with a pot of piping hot tea on it, with two teacups and a plate of biscuits to go with them. Mirror gestured to two rocks that were positioned to be chairs. Frigid sat down opposite Mirror and she poured him a cup. It wasn’t long before the cave filled with the perfumed scent of dandelion tea. “Of course…” Frigid nodded. “But, what happened with Windy. Why? She’s the most innocent of all of us. And she wasn’t one of your targets.” Mirror stirred at her drink, looking pensive. “I’ll admit I lost my temper back there, Friggy, but it really gets to me, when people get in the way of my work. My queen is relying on me to execute any dissidents, and I did give them a chance to hand Pierce over… they had to learn somehow that standing in my way only makes it worse for them. If you’d prefer, I can shoot someone else next time?” “High Noon’s been really down, Mirror,” Frigid said as he picked up his cup of tea. “I just don’t know how to cheer him up.” Mirror picked up a biscuit and snapped it in half, popping one piece into her mouth. “You want my advice? Leave him alone. Time heals almost all wounds, Friggy,” she held out the other half of the biscuit to Frigid. “Trust me on that one.” He doubted time healed almost all wounds, but she was right. He needed to give High Noon his space to recover. He took the biscuit from her and bit into it. “Do you like it?” Mirror tittered. “I baked them myself, you know.” “Yeah, these are good,” Frigid continued chewing. “You’re a great baker, Mirror. I just wish our situations weren’t conflicting.” “Story of my life,” Mirror shrugged. “And I’ve lived a very long one.” Frigid had heard the stories. Some of the Assassins claimed she was something nonhuman, something old and terrible from some long-forgotten hellhole, but he didn’t know how much truth was in their words. After all, he’d never seen anything else but her fangs, and those could be done with cosmetic surgery these days. “I wish we could put all this behind us, this war.” Frigid finished swallowing the biscuit and reached for another. Those things were pretty good. “Once this is all over, what then?” Mirror regarded the question seriously. “Between you and me, I wouldn’t start planning your retirement just yet. You might not think so, what with the stalking and the killing and the hurting that the Templars have been doing, but back at headquarters, Mahogany Wood is worried. It’s making his hairline recede and I rather like that, but I have an uncomfortable gut feeling that this war hasn’t even reached its peak yet.” “Worried? What’s he worried about?” “Well…” Mirror’s face contorted into a sly smile. “I might be able to tell you, if you give me a kiss.” “A k-kiss…?” Frigid’s temperature suddenly increased by a few degrees. It’s been a long time since he could just casually kiss her. “Yes. Just for a moment, let’s leave this talk of Templars behind and just enjoy each other a bit. How about it?” Frigid was about to say ‘yes’ and tackle her to the ground, but at that moment, Mirror’s nostrils flared and her head jerked to the mouth of the cave, her pretty face twisting into a snarl. Frigid didn’t see anyone else, but his attention was focused mainly on the woman before him anyway. Then out of nowhere, a loud crack pierced the silence around him, making him flinch and instinctively cover his ears. A look of outrage crossed Mirror’s face, followed by a spray of red. Fangs shot out from her gums as the woman picked up the teapot and hurled its boiling contents at the intruder. High Noon stepped to the side and fired his revolver again, hitting Mirror square in the chest. The Templar uttered a simple cry of pain and turned to Frigid, giving him an expression full of hurt. Frigid quickly pushed past her and shielded her with his body. “Noon! What are you doing? Stand down!” “No. Not this time,” High Noon shook his head and put his other hand under the revolver’s handle. “I’m killing her today.” “Better men than you have tried!” Mirror coughed up one of the bullets and gave High Noon the evil eye. She unhooked a slim metallic canister from her harness and pulled the ring. The flashbang bounced once before detonating, its report almost deafening in the enclosed space. Frigid was thrown aside by someone’s hand and his vision was full of green flames, exploding out of nowhere. There was the sound of what he imagined were the clicking of bones in their joints, undergoing some intense pressure. From above him, he heard Mirror whisper to him, “Stay down, and don’t look.” There was another gunshot and the hiss of a smoke bomb. Frigid did as he was told, covering his head with his hands just in case. He had no idea what was going on, but there was plenty of sound enough to tell him it was a fight. The cave echoed with the hissing and growling of what must have been a beast of medium size and the sound of High Noon’s revolvers firing again and again, the bullets ricocheting off the cave walls with pings and zips. “I’ll kill you, Mirror!” Frigid heard High Noon shout. It sounded angry, though it had a tinge of sadness in it. “This is for Windy!” He heard another two gunshots before the sound of what must’ve been Noon reloading. Something green flashed in the smoke and the outline of High Noon dropped his gun, the barrel dissolving away. The tea table was seized by an unseen force and thrown at High Noon hard enough to shatter it and send splinters of porcelain and wood everywhere. Through it all, an eerie voice that sounded like two women talking just out of sync slavered at High Noon. “Do you have any idea how much effort it takes to get myself in order for this! You are a voyeur of the absolute worst kind!” Frigid rolled aside as High Noon’s face slammed into the ground next to his. The cowboy’s clothes were rent with what appeared to be claw marks and bites. A blackened, lean, and muscular hand tipped with talons closed around Noon’s neck, tightly enough to draw lines of blood. “I could kill you now, tear the insolent head from your shoulders,” the eerie voice said from the smoke. Frigid saw twin orbs of luminous green, like two lanterns. “But I think that’s too kind a fate for you. Attacking the queen’s kin… you’re lucky I don’t want Frigid to see what I can really do. Shoot me again, and I’ll feed you your own fingers.” The hand released High Noon’s throat and the cave mouth was outlined by a humanoid, yet anatomically impossible figure. Those fingers were way too long and sharp… “He’s all yours, Friggy.” And then it was quiet. Frigid got up to help High Noon to his feet as the smoke finally began to clear. Frigid’s head turned around, seeing that the walls in his little hideout were outlined with what looked like claw marks, and the tea table lay broken in the water, wood thrown all over the cavern. There was also what looked like the charred remains of Mirror’s outfit and harness. The weapons were still attached; she had left in a hurry. He pulled High Noon up, but the cowboy didn’t look like he was helping himself. “Bitten,” Noon said with almost disgust in his voice. “Can’t move.” “Oh, uh…” “Is this what you’ve been doing?” he interrupted. “Meeting with that traitor? Having tea? Even after what she did to Windy?” Frigid was having trouble coming up with an answer. For some reason, the only thing he could think of right now was Mirror Match. Her beautiful face, the way she walked, even about the smooth body under all those clothes. Then there was the image of what looked like something out of an old Trotsylvanian tale. Something vaguely resembling a human but with ghoulish, bestial features. Were the stories true? Was his ex-girlfriend really some kind of monster? “Frigid, I’m talking to you!” “Huh, hmm?” he babbled as he accidentally fell back against the rock wall. “Mirror Match… Please come back, Mirror…” “Have you lost it?” Noon barked at him. “If I weren’t paralyzed right now, I’d beat all your teeth out! Frigid, how could you do this to me? I thought you of all people would have my back, and yet here you are, meeting the enemy!” “Was that her?” Frigid asked dumbly. “That thing that was here. That wasn’t Mirror…” “Open your eyes, Frigid! That was Mirror Match. She’s not the girl you think she is! She’s evil and dangerous and you’ve been helping her!” “Noon, I’m sorry. You know I love Mirror. I still believe there’s hope for her.” “She killed Windy, Frigid. She killed her…” High Noon ended his shouted and closed his eyes in anguish. “I don’t know who you are, Frigid. You’re not the same person who helped me understand why I fight.” Frigid knew he had blown it. He should’ve been more careful coming to the cave. He’d been doing it often that he stopped looking over his shoulder when he headed to the roof. Now High Noon knew his secret and Frigid knew it wouldn’t stay a secret after what happened today. He was lost and he didn’t know how to come back. Frigid knew things were going to take a turn for the worse and there was nothing he could do but walk into that approaching storm.