//------------------------------// // Chapter 59 // Story: Pandemic: Picking up the Pieces // by Halira //------------------------------// Jonathan Baker got out of his car in front of the Remedy-Stone residence. He briefly considered calling for some crystal ponies. Since learning that they could detect magic being used he had been tempted to bring at least one along on each of his visits to ponies of unknown magical power. That could be construed as a sign he didn't trust ponies though, and fostering good trusting relationships were one of his greatest personal strengths. He wasn't going to sacrifice that, no matter how nervous some ponies might make him. He didn't think Sunset Blessing was any sort of traitor to the nation secretly in league with the Equestrians. The unicorn had a history of running interference to Equestrian efforts. She also seemed to take far too much glee denouncing them and trying to make them out as the enemy of the people. What she said about Celestia even echoed what some above him had already not been shy in suggesting. He had already sent an email to his superiors detailing his talk with the Shimmerist unicorn and his personal impressions from it. He had cautioned that he felt she was just trying to worsen relations with the Equestrians, but there would be some that would take Sunset Blessing's words as further proof that Equestrians couldn't be trusted. Sunset Blessing was an effective guard dog of US interests and an effective administrator. As such he did value her input when saying her daughter was no threat. Despite her refusal to give up information, much like the night ponies had refused, she never displayed any sign she wasn't speaking the truth when she asserted Phobia Remedy was no threat to the US government. He still needed to know what was going on and present his findings to his superiors. As well as finding out how to bring her under some sort of jurisdiction. He walked up onto the old wooden porch and knocked on the door. He frowned after there was no answer for a full minute. Phobia Remedy's location was fairly well tracked since yesterday and she should be at home. She was also typically awake a few hours before noon. He raised his fist and knocked again more firmly. From inside he heard Rosetta Stone yell out, "Tempest! Are you just going to stand there or are you going to get the door? You're acting like we're under attack or something." "Whoever is at the door has not identified themselves or their intentions yet," he heard Tempest yell back. "Of all the...use your nose mare! That's Director Baker out there. Let him in," Rosetta fussed. "It could be a similarly smelling human. We can't go by smell alone," Tempest explained. "Tempest Shadow! Please open the door and let him in or let Rosetta get to the door to open it," he heard Phobia yell. "Is that a direct order, Phobia Remedy?" Tempest asked calmly. "Yes!" Phobia yelled back. A second later the door opened up and he saw Tempest Shadow in a black dress that didn't quite reach the ground and left her frontquarters exposed smiling at him in welcome. "Director Baker, it's good to see you again. Please, enter into this domicile," Tempest said pleasantly. He raised an eyebrow at her. "I had heard of your arrival back. An email was sent to me just moments before I got here clearing your presence in this town. It came as a surprise given your last visit." Tempest looked down. "I appologize again for my past behavior. I would say that Sunset Blessing brings the worst out of me, but that is no excuse. My princess had to make many assurances to allow me back on this world. I'm ashamed that I have embarrassed her with my poor control of temper." "I agree that Sunset Blessing can be trying to deal with at times. She's among other things a bit of a politician, and as such she is very good at pushing others buttons. Keep that in mind when dealing with her," Jonathan said as he stepped into the house. The room inside was simple, with only a computer desk and a lone chair for furnishings. It was surprisingly well lit for a residence of night ponies, due mainly to the many windows the poured light into the room. Rosetta sat a few feet away glaring daggers at Tempest, and Phobia sat in a corner looking frustrated. Phobia looked up at him as he entered. "Director Baker, I had been expecting you. I was actually expecting you yesterday to tell the truth. Sorry about Tempest not opening the door. She is a little overprotective...and this is coming from a night pony." "So I gathered from your loud exchange a moment ago," Jonathan said. "Please, call me Jonathan. We have known each a few weeks now and I think we can drop the formalities." "As you wish," Phobia replied, still tucked away in her corner. "I have a feeling this isn't an informal visit though. You have questions about yesterday, and probably about why I have Tempest here guarding me like I'm royalty or something." "Those would be two things I would very much like to have explained to me," Jonathan said . Phobia gestured with a wing towards the desk and chair. "Take the seat then. We can discuss things." He walked over to the chair and turned it around so he could sit in it properly and face the Phobia. "And Princess Luna will have no problem with you discussing these things?" Phobia frowned. "Luna has no authority over me or what I say or do. She's a friend, and has been a mentor too, but she's not my boss." Jonathan noted the lack of title when Phobia said Luna's name. A small detail, but possibly important. "To the point then," Jonathan said as he took his seat. "Why is Shadow Dancer convinced that you'll kill him, and that no amount of security will stop that from happening?" "To clarify, I have no intention of killing him, though that might be mincing words. I intend to see him punished, and the result might end with him being as good as dead. I would do it through the dream realm so there is no way you could stop me," Phobia explained "So you are engaging in vigilante justice with night pony powers then?" Jonathan asked. He didn't raise his voice or change his tone. Becoming hostile caused those being questioned to get more guarded. "Not vigilante justice. I have legitimate authority to do so. It isn't authority granted by the US government, but it's legitimate authority," Phobia explained. "Shadow Dancer is almost certainly a US citizen, and at the very least a person living on US soil. If the US government did not grant or allow this authority it's illegitimate," Jonathan said slowly. "While it's happening in the dream realm it isn't happening on any country's soil," Phobia said calmly. "I have to deal with ponies all over the world occupying the same space at once. Most the night ponies I personally deal with are in this hemisphere; Canadians, Mexicans, Brazilians, Venezuelans, Argentinians, Peruvians, Columbians...you get the idea. Do you know how many night ponies live in Haiti and the Dominican Republic? I didn't realize how hard ETS hit that island before taking this job. I even have to deal with the occasional night ponies from Western Europe and Africa. Any night pony sleeping while I'm asleep." "Sorry to interrupt..." Rosetta said with an embarrassed look. "What about Puerto Rico? Whenever I try to research what's going on there it says unknown at this point and time." Phobia looked at her mate. "All the Caribbean islands were hit hard from what I can tell. Similar percentage numbers as out west for most of them, maybe even higher on some. ETS reached them and spread rapidly. Cramped cities located on islands was a perfect recipe for spread." Phobia Remedy might have better intelligence on what was going on out there than the government did if she was telling the truth. Over a month had passed and some countries, particularly Caribbean ones, still had no firm data on how widespread infection rates had been. If she was right the Caribbean was going to be a bigger nightmare to deal with than they thought. News out of Puerto Rico pretty much matched what she said, even if most mainlanders weren't yet aware--or cared for that matter, since it was hard to get the states to care about what went on in Puerto Rico at the best of times. "And how many ponies do you have under you gathering intelligence if you can confirm all this? How big is your opperation?" He asked, ignoring it's illegal nature for the moment. Phobia smirked. "There's me and five other ponies, no others. Most aren't even on this side of the world." "Six?" He said in disbelief. "You gather this much intel and try to enforce your brand of justice with six ponies?" Phobia seemed very confident in herself. "We aren't normal night ponies. Normal night ponies wouldn't be able to do the tiniest fraction of what we can do, no matter how well trained. If you had an army of night ponies trying to keep up with what we do it wouldn't be able to match a fraction of our effectiveness." Jonathan frowned. "How? Is this a pony magic power level thing? Are you six the night pony equivalents of Wild Growth?" Phobia shook her head. "If you got a magic reading on me you wouldn't find anything particularly impressive. When I'm awake I'm a perfectly average pony, and you'd get the same readings on my body as I slept. The part of me tied to the dream realm is what is powerful. Night ponies aren't tied to the dream realm, nothing is but us." "Can you explain to me how you get tied to the dream realm then?" Jonathan asked. "We have to be tied to it by someone that was tied to it already. Once we're tied we can't be untied by anyone, anything, or any event--even death," Phobia said as she looked him in the eyes. "Luna bound the first three of us, those three bound the other three." Jonathan hardened his gaze. Perhaps there was something to Sunset's claims that Luna was trying to establish dominion over the night ponies on Earth. Phobia kept looking at him. "I can guess what you're thinking. As I said, Luna has no authority over us. Our creation was a necessity, and keeping the night ponies from getting out of control is only part of that." "What's the other parts?" Jonathan asked, still suspicious. Phobia looked sad again. "Magic has rules. One of these rules is that it needs controlling forces. This rule will often act against itself in a kind of magical entropy. It will over time spawn magical users as controlling forces. Then in time it will spawn a controlling force in the dream realm for magical users if there is none. That controlling force more often than not will simply destroy those magical users. Our universe suddenly gained a large number of magical users all at once. It was only a matter of time before it spawned a new controlling force." Jonathan put those pieces together in his head. "And you six are acting as that controlling force so the universe doesn't spawn one of it's own?" Phobia nodded, saying nothing. "And why you six? Why didn't Luna come to us and discuss this with us and let us decide who would serve in this position?" Jonathan asked. Phobia laughed. "I don't think you understand who your dealing with in terms of Luna, and I'm not saying that in terms of you should fear her or she has more right. I'm saying you don't understand how Luna thinks. I'm not saying what she did was right or wrong, I'm just saying you don't understand her to know her thought process." "Explain it then." Phobia got up and cuddled close to Rosetta before continuing. "Luna comes from a world where all major decisions are largely autocratic ones done by basically immortal beings. She and her sister move celestial bodies and weren't chosen by anyone to do so. She also comes from a line of beings that were those controlling forces I spoke about and none of them were chosen by anyone. Luna doesn't think in terms of consent by the governed. She thinks in terms of the powerful doing what's right for the governed." "That doesn't improve the picture of her. If anything it makes her actions more suspect," Jonathan said evenly. "I'm just explaining the terms that she thinks in, not defending them," Phobia replied. "Regardless, what's done is done and can't be undone and has to be worked with. Considering we impact ponies around the globe from nations with very different views it would have potentially dragged on for years for some consensus to be reached on who should hold this power. In that time the universe could have well made it's own creation and every pony would die while the world argued about who should save them. Were Luna's methods the best? Probably not. Were they malicious? No, they weren't. We're here now in any case and not going anywhere." "You haven't explained why Luna didn't at least inform us after the fact, or why none of you have stepped forward to inform us," Jonathan said feeling irritated. "We don't plan on keeping the world in the dark about us forever. When the time is right I'll personally go to the government and disclose everything," Phobia asserted. "There's no choice in the matter that me and the other five are going to hold justice over mind magic and dreamwalking, but that's all we will do. We aren't getting involved with politics or going to interfer with this government or any other government. I might even make some personal concessions to the government since I've been partially exposed. I'm open to discussing options, though those will only apply to me, not the others. I'm not exposing the others or speaking for them." "When is the time right?" Jonathan asked, still unsure what he believed out of this or what he was going to put in his report. Phobia was withholding information clearly, but she didn't give off any signs of lying. Phobia shook her head. "Not sure yet. Within the next five years probably. We'll contact the proper government channels when we're getting close to being ready. Now is not the best time to drop any more shocks on the world. Until then be satisfied that there are controls in place to make it so one of the things you don't have to worry about is night ponies trying to brainwash large swaths of the population like Shadow Dancer tried to do. I promise that in two days time every night pony that can dreamwalk will know who Shadow Dancer is, what he did, and that his actions were completely unacceptable. Any that were thinking of doing the same will be far less inclined to do so." That part would be easy enough to verify if something ended up happening to Shadow Dancer tomorrow. If this was all true this went beyond what he had authority to make any decisions on. Phobia was right that this kind of news could cause further panic and shouldn't be made public at this time. He looked over at Tempest. "And she's here why?" Phobia scowled. "Because Tattered Wing put me in a position where I'm exposed. Things could have been dealt with quietly without having all these complications if not for that. While anything happening to me doesn't prevent me from doing my job; Luna still doesn't want to see me hurt by vengeful ponies or scared humans. So I get a bodyguard." He got to his feet. He had no idea what his superiors would think or have him do. He had to send a classified report back to Washington and wait for a response. "I will be back in touch with you soon," he said as he looked down at the pony. "I'm assuming that you're going forward with whatever is going to happen tomorrow with Shadow Dancer?" Phobia nodded again. "It will be a trial. I can actually offer for you to have a witness to it and have them give a report to you. It would have to be a pony or a partial for me to bring them into the shared dream to watch, but if you can find somepony you trust and inform me of them before then I will make it happen. Crystal Dreams will be there defending Shadow Dancer's actions, though I can't say any answers she gives you about it won't be heavily biased as a result." "I'll see what I can do. Decisions above my pay grade must be made," Jonathan said. Way above his pay grade most likely.