“Thank you for your help,” came the calm statement of a mare trotting out the front door of the local bookstore.
Oakfield’s - as the locals had so fondly come to know it – was a two storey bookstore situated on the at the tee junction where Makeover road met Flat street. It was a quaint affair that had recently come under new management. Before the deed to the property was taken it belonged to a local, but no more than a month ago an unpleasant purple unicorn and her shifty dragon sidekick asserted themselves.
The unicorn’s name was Twilight Sparkle, and on her first day in town she assaulted a defenceless young filly and got our only farmer fired! The dragon, Spike, scared the poor previous owner into selling the property and running away. Twilight was known for her impressive scowl, which was matched only by her cutting wit; using both to her advantage, she somehow managed to accumulate a small collection of friends.
Pinkie Pie: a crackpot baker from downtown Partyville. Applejack: The once sole-farmer for the entire district. Even Rainbow Dash: the unemployed horror sci-fi novel fanatic. Twilight somehow convinced all of them to like her, and against all odds, they still did; they spent most of their time off at her stolen store, even Saturday mornings!
Twilight scoffed at the latest customer that came into her store, if they didn’t like her, why did they insist on shopping there? The latest one was just another brain-dead woman going about her day, visiting the bookstore and buying something because the cover was colourful.
As much as Twilight hated her oppressive warehouse home, there was precedent there to keep her wits sharp. She knew her place, and low as it was, it gave her a sense of scale; Twilight knew her limits and consequences intimately. There’d been no room for error in Panhandlershot.
But in Partyville? The only problems she ever came across were her levels of patience, everyone smiled and said thank you and wasted her time. The only actual threats kept themselves hidden. How was she supposed to know what was wrong if there wasn’t constant overwhelming threat of bodily harm around every corner? If Twilight had to pick some asinine bright side, the only thing she could come up with was the local ghost society constantly keeping her on edge.
Knights, High Royals, Guardians; they hid themselves, but they still walked the streets of Partyville. As a Hunter, Twilight knew she was always on thin ice, which relaxed her at least. But even that didn’t give her comfort when the local ponies had nothing happening behind the eyes. Applebloom had her suspicions for why most of the adult ponies could barely hold a conversation, but Twilight knew the truth.
Not that she’d ever explain it to the kid, any edge she had she held firmly to her chest. Pinkie Pie explained the liberal mind wiping the same night Twilight asked her out. Twilight looked over at her marefriend talking about something with Applejack, the Hunter wasn’t listening. They’d been dating for about two week by that point, and in that time they’d at least gotten to spend time together. Twilight enjoyed her time in the relationship until it dawned on her two days in.
Pinkie was too nice.
Twilight shook her head, instead turning to Applejack. The two earth ponies moved in with each other shortly after the ex-farmer was freed by the Whisperer. Twilight suspected she should probably be jealous. With Applejack no longer enslaved by the Ghost Council, she was free to actually do what she wanted, and Pinkie had put her up at the Bakery. Pinkie was surprised when Applejack asked to move in, but accepted a few days later. Which was what made Twilight’s lack of jealousy surprising; shouldn’t she have cared? If you’re dating somebody and you go out together, shouldn’t you feel more than indifferent to them spending more of their day with somebody else?
She looked at Pinkie and the best she could muster was turning her deep glare into a more neutral expression. She couldn’t bring herself to care in the end; honestly what bothered her more was her new roommate.
As if summoned, hooves sounded from the stairwell on the left side of the store. It was the very same set of stairs that lead to Twilight’s upper loft. It had everything she needed to live comfortably, a bed, a desk to do research, a kitchen, the ship in a bottle she decided to start building…
“Twilight, we have a problem.”
…and Binding freeloading assholes that forced her into being a counterspy of some kind. “What?” Twilight demanded, the less she saw Applebloom the better, and considering her day had that far been at least bearable, she wanted nothing to do with the little stain.
Applebloom made her way over to the older ponies by the check out. “I was talking with Nona while you were running your store, and there’s been some movement with a few key players.”
Narrowing her eyes, Twilight couldn’t help herself from asking, “Who is it?” That is, she wasn’t able to stop herself from asking, no matter how hard she wanted to.
Pinkie turned to Twilight, “Nona?” She whispered.
“The Whisperer.”
Applebloom nodded, “First of all, there’s been some activity with a group of ponies from outside the city. They’re basically harmless, but worth looking into, they might be sliders.”
Twilight nodded, she didn’t particularly care about sliders, for the most part they almost always left her dimension before much even happened. They always talked about amazing powers or being able to fix everything wrong with St. Orangeberg, then when they spent any extended period of time in they city they left crying. They wanted to fix everything, but what was broken? Nothing, that’s what; the only thing wrong with anything was the people that lived there. And it was pretty laughable to think anyone could fix the city without some sort of mass genocide of some kind.
“Secondly, there’s been an increasing issue with the clones. It still isn’t enough to care about, but it might as well be dealt with now, get it over with, you know?” General agreement came from Applejack and Pinkie. “Finally, and most importantly, is what the Executioner has been up to.”
The reaction to hearing the title was immediate. Twilight shivered and in a rare moment for her looked worried; there was nothing more dangerous to a Hunter than an Executioner. Pinkie’s eyes widened and she took a step back, her regular nightmares about the local Executioner left her sweating when she woke up. Applejack though, reacted violently.
“WHAT THE FUCK HAS SHE DONE?!” she growled in her accented voice - the anger always bringing the Polish out of her - and stomped her hoof into the floor. Applebloom hadn’t been expecting that sort of reaction and backed into one of the shelves. Not even Scootaloo’s violent hatred of Pinkie Pie could have prepared the red-maned Earth pony for such an outburst. Twilight, without realizing it, had jumped in front of Applebloom, her body moving on her own.
As a moment of calm washed over the room, Twilight inwardly cursed herself and her stupid Bound curse. She had no choice in being Applebloom’s bodyguard and protecting her. It was not only inconvenient, it was a giant bitch.
“Well?!” Applejack yelled, a touch more calm, but still fuming.
Applebloom knew she was safe when Twilight walked back behind the counter. “Well, the Executioner has been far more active recently, he’s been moving ghosts and building power; Overall he’s been far more threatening. Nona believes that if we don’t do something soon, it’s possible that the Executioner will come after us directly. And nobody wants that.”
Pinkie nodded in understanding, and Twilight simply tried to calm her beating heart. There was no way in fuck she’d survive an encounter with an Executioner. He’d trap her in her own body, rip off her limbs off and keep her alive and suppressed just to torture her until she lost her mind. There was nothing more bone-chilling than an Executioner…
Another slam sounded out in the bookstore; Applejack looked frustrated and impatient, “If we’re taking care of her then I’m going, none of you are ghosts, you don’t know what she does like I do. Her eyes have been haunting me since the day I died, and I want to make her pay.” Applebloom didn’t have time to react before Applejack stormed out of Oakfield’s.
“I’ll…” Pinkie spoke, watching her roommate leave, “I’ll keep an eye on her. Ghosts can’t die, but you never know with an Executioner.” With a nod shared between them, Pinkie exited as well, leaving Twilight and Applebloom behind to parse what just happened
After silence filled the space left by Applejack’s explosive outburst, Twilight exhaled, relief washing over her. “Job or not, I’ll gladly let anyone else take care of that.”
Applebloom nodded in agreement. “Yeah, I wouldn’t want to deal with any of what’s gonna go on there.” The open sign hanging on the door settled back into its place before the red headed kid took her own breath and turned to Twilight. “Right, well it sounds like that’s being taken care of, what about you?”
“What about me?” Twilight asked indignantly, narrowing her eyes as if remembering she was supposed to hate Applebloom.
“Which of the two jobs are you going to do?”
Twilight stared for a moment, trying hard to forget that she basically had no choice in the matter. “As far as clones are concerned, I have a small assortment of notes on dealing with them back at my warehouse. But I’d rather not have to deal with the lunatics that live there today. So considering my two options, I’ll tackle the slider situation.”
A smirk crossed Applebloom’s smug expression. “Afraid, Twilight? I didn’t think you’d get spooked by a couple ponies asking for your lunch money.”
-SMACK-
A loud sound rang out in the bookstore as Twilight slammed her forehead hard against her checkout counter. “I JUST WANT TO KILL HER!” She cried out, Applebloom knew it was directed at her, but that was half the fun. If she wasn’t sure she could get away with it, Applebloom wouldn’t have said anything.
“When you’re down sulking,” Applebloom spoke, “You can handle something simple, while I go to your warehouse and grab your clone notes.”
There was a full two minutes of nothing before Twilight let out a muffled response, “What do I have to do?”
“There’s a scientist next district over that’s apparently an expert on clones, and should be able to help you, find her and ask her to help deal with the problem.”
“UUUUUUUGGGHH…” Twilight dragged herself back upright before looking at Applebloom’s stupid smug face, “You mean Ashton?”
“No, other direction, Sideo Breach.”
“Okay, good, as fun as being forced to work for you should be, I don’t feel like getting hustled today.”
Twilight officially hated Applebloom, the little shit thought she knew everything, and constantly flaunted her invisible superiority of being the Whisperer’s latest host around. If it were a level playing field, Twilight would have absolutely killed the kid by now. Just slit her throat out back, quick and easy, plus the ponies in Partyville probably wouldn’t notice... the living ones anyway.
Not everybody in the district had impaired brain function though, just the ponies that had yet to die. The ghosts were actually fairly smart, acting stupid to fit in. There wasn’t a sure fire way to tell them apart yet, but Twilight was still working on that. Thankfully the ghosts that hated Hunters and justified Twilight’s job to begin with weren’t really the ones that lived in Partyville. No, they apparently resided elsewhere, at some sort of ghost council military compound somewhere downtown. Instead, Partyville was designated high society for the ‘noble’ ghosts to get their freak on or some stupid bullshit.
At least that’s what her extended research into the topic netted her. Applebloom brought her back to the present though, “Are you even listening?”
“Of course I’m listening,” Twilight sneered, “You want me to go find some expert scientist in Sideo Breach while you go to my warehouse and find my own notes on clones I wrote down almost a decade ago.” Applebloom nodded at the recap, “My question though is why you don’t go find the expert while I go to my warehouse: I know the area better, I know where my notes are organized, and I’ll probably be faster.”
Applebloom smirked, withholding information, she winked before her eyes rolled back in contemplation. A moment passed by before her eyes returned to normal. “I thought it’d be funnier not to tell you, but basically the reason boils down to it making a better story.”
Twilight rolled her eyes, “Right, the different Twilights ‘sister’ thing,” she stepped out from behind the counter and looked around the store, Making a note to fix the hole in the floor another time. “You ever find it surreal to think we’re just characters in some book written by a sadist asshole?”
“Eh, maybe,” Applebloom answered, tilting her hoof back and forth, “I try not to think about it. If I’m a character or not, it doesn’t really change who I am, or what I want to do with my life.”
Twilight teleported the two of them up to their small apartment loft, Applebloom grabbed her side bags and trotted over to the fridge while Twilight herself went over to her desk and unfurled her maps for inspection. “Yeah, see, I get that - obviously - but what about free will? If I’m a string of text on a screen I basically have no control over anything I do.”
“But would you even if you weren’t? Who said free will was inherent anyway?” Applebloom stuffed several cans of Banana Smash into her bag and zipped it up.
Applebloom nodded at Twilight, the unicorn finished studying the map before rolling it back up and placed into back where it belonged, “I’m not convinced.”
“And why’s that?”
Twilight teleported them back downstairs, ready to leave. “Because if I’m under control by some shitlord god, how am I anything more than a puppet? I need to know that I-“
The door swung open suddenly and loudly, interrupting Twilight’s thought, standing in the doorway was none other than the rainbow-maned pegasus Rainbow Dash, she looked frantic and a little confused. Twilight and Applebloom gave a synchronized eye roll at seeing Dash, but she looked at the purple unicorn.
“Twilight, you have to help me,” She asked, walking up to them both, “There’s a pony out here that looks like me and she won’t leave me alone!”