Ahh... Back here again, are we? Man, do I have a tale for you this time around. Let’s get the boring stuff out of the way first, before we continue on where we are now. What? No, no, no, you can’t actually think the stuff that happened was anything but boring. Really? Okay then.
Fine, I admit, it was kinda awesome. So, we had a bit of an adventure after a presumptuous magician came to town and caused some chaos. Her outlandish tales got on the nerve of all our friends and me, which brought about some situations I’d rather not talk about. Suffice to say, after an Ursa Minor attack during the night, no one wanted to see Trixie in town anymore.
I’m not sure what happened to her after she left, I wasn’t really in the mood to find out. She did make a fool out of my friends. I know my vindictive side was speaking here, but I hope she stubbed her toe on a door. Shocking, I know.
The day after that got us on a week-long journey to the mountaintop to get rid of a dragon snoring smoke. Bad case of smoker’s lung he sported, suffice to say Fluttershy saved our asses. And by everything holy, did she bring down retribution on the dragon after we got pummeled into the dirt. That tongue-lashing will go down in the history books, I tell you.
After our grueling journey, we all had some well-deserved rest for a few weeks. We were nearing the end of summer by now and thus it brings us to today.
I finally decided to get off of my lazy ass and do something that I’ve been pushing away due to work and training. Currently, I was on a train headed to Manehattan and I’m sure you could guess as to why that was.
The train cabin I was in reminded me quite a lot of the Hogwarts Express if it was all cutesie and whatnot. It was even called the Friendship Express, for Horse God’s sake!
I was reading a book I took with me to pass the time, one of the ones from the Adventure Guy series which reminded me of Nathan Drake from Uncharted way too much. As I read a particularly thrilling passage where he tried climbing out of a derailed train car, I heard a commotion from outside the booth I was staying in.
“If you screw this job up again, there won’t be a next time, Sentinel,” the voice whispered harshly as I heard someone get slammed into the wall. The sound of a blade being drawn made me cautious as I reached for my own. “Do I make myself clear?”
“Yes, sir Marrow, sir!”
“Good,” this Marrow guy said, and then they were gone. Whatever that was about, it couldn’t be anything good if he had to threaten people with a weapon to get them to comply with his demands. Not long after that, the train slowed to a standstill, arriving at our final stop.
I packed my things away and got off the train, looking around. Well, if you squinted a bit you would actually think you were standing back in New York on Earth. Busy people of all walks of life were going about their day in the big city with the nickname of a fruit.
Okay, how to go about this... What I needed to do was better left to be done after nightfall, so that left me with a few hours to burn off the daylight with. With an idea in mind, I stalked down the streets to a particular place I remembered on Earth. Sol, on the other hand, separated himself from my other half to go scout out the place I needed to be at later this day.
While I did that with him, I focused on Lux to see if the place I had in mind also existed here. Rounding a corner I saw the little restaurant tucked away between two buildings, looking as rustic as ever. The windows looked like they were ripped out of a fairy tale book and above the door was the name of the restaurant.
It was a place I visited a long time ago and it brought back the fond feeling I had for it. It was a German-style restaurant and I couldn’t wait to try some of the food again.
A waitress quickly showed me to a table and I couldn’t keep the grin off my face as I looked at the dishes from the menu. German food was great, seriously. If you never had some, you were missing out, I tell you.
After I satisfied the Hungry God that called itself my stomach, I began strolling down the streets to find anything that struck my fancy. Might even find some things for the girls to bring back to or try shopping for some Christmas gifts. One could never start too early with that, after all.
For Rarity, I bought some high-quality coloring pencils she could use for her sketches. I seem to remember her using some of these kinds before and those were already pretty short from usage. Some new ones would probably make her happy. I thought of buying her some jewelry, but firstly, I hadn’t enough money to go with something I think she definitely would have loved, and secondly, it wasn’t something you gave to just any person. I would basically just admit my feelings for her, should I do that. Ya know, I’m a coward, I didn’t want to risk my friendship with her.
And seeing that I wasn’t that far away from a shop selling enchanted items, I went to go look in there to see if I could find something for Twilight. The man behind the desk gave a ‘Welcome’ without even looking up from the book he was reading, apparently content to let customers browse the store without making sure nobody stole anything.
Considering this was a store for enchanted items, it was safe to assume an enchantment made sure nothing got stolen. He could be a bit friendlier, though.
Anyway, looking around all the stuff on display I smiled as I saw an enchanted tea set. The description said it would keep the tea warm and serve the liquid within when you told it to do so. I was very interested in how the enchantment worked. Maybe it worked like voice activation on smartphones and the like? I thought of buying it for Fluttershy, seeing that she was the one that drank tea the most in our group, but decided to keep looking for other things first.
The friggin’ thing was expensive for a tea set.
The enchanted clock not that far away from the tea set looked like a digital clock from Earth, but with the tell-tale glow of magic as the numbers. It looked neat, but wouldn’t make for a great gift in my opinion.
A bag caught my attention next, but the price on it made me cringe. It seems a bag of holding was only for rich people then. A bummer. Such things are majorly useful but at the price equivalent to a supercar? By all things Horse God, fuck no!
What I wouldn’t give to know how to make those... A dream for now, sadly. My skill with magic likely wasn’t enough to actually create a bag of my own. Twilight might be able to, although I was skeptical she knew how to make those. It wasn’t exactly common knowledge and by what I have read about those, the exact process was very complicated and a closely kept secret. The materials played a big part in the creation, too.
Next up in the stuff that was noteworthy, I saw a bunch of feathers. Quills to be exact. The description said that those were dictating quills, meaning they would write by themselves as you spoke to them. Kinda like those things in Harry Potter. That would actually a great gift to either Twilight or Spike.
You know what, both of them could use them equally so I’ll get two of ‘em. The rest of the stuff here wasn’t anything I would consider as a gift, so I bought two enchanted quills and left. Maybe I would come back later if I didn’t find something for Fluttershy.
Rainbow Dash was easy to get something for, she was a massive Wonderbolts fan. And what do you know, there were a few fan shops around. I decided to give her a scarf with their logo on it. It would come in handy during the winter months, I’m sure.
I didn’t find anything else during my window shopping that I felt would be good for either Applejack or Pinkie Pie. Pinkie would most likely be happy to have sweets, so there was always that option left to consider. Those I could get before Christmas, though.
Before the day ended and the shops closed I decided to pay the man with the enchanted items a visit again. It was the best gift idea I had come across all day for Fluttershy, so I guess I’ll stick with it and pay the money. My pockets definitely felt lighter after I was done for the day and found a hotel to put away my stuff in and keep up appearances.
Wouldn’t do to have someone get suspicious, what with the crimes I was about to commit. I mean, I certainly didn’t view them as such, but I was looking out for myself here. Those forged papers needed to get into those buildings or I was screwed once someone got the idea to dig a little deeper.
It was a bit hard to get my hands on those, and the money I had to pay set me a few paychecks back, but they were worth it. The only problem was, I needed to get them to where they should be and put an official seal on them.
The stuff I do for Horse God, man. And myself, but still. The first thing I need to do is get in and not let myself be discovered doing so. Second on the list was finding where to put them in the building and thirdly, put a stamp of the city on them.
Oh boy, if I wasn’t in over my head.
At around three in the morning, I mused about how I should go with this. The bracelet around my wrist looked invitingly at me and I stared back.
Was it wrong to use a weapon meant for a hero to commit crimes with it? Some part of my mind protested the action as I touched it on Lux. A second later I stood there in the light-eating outfit that I haven’t seen since my first two days in this world. It still looked as breathtaking as I remembered it. Okay, this would do nicely.
There was no way I could do this with Sol, so I had to use my stealth capabilities with Lux for this mission. I didn’t need the string-less bow, but perhaps it would find its use this night.
No, not to kill anyone. Just to, you know, knock someone out. No one needed to see me doing this, but there was the possibility that I would get discovered and had to fight my way out. By that point, the mission might as well be considered failed, though. Let’s just hope it doesn’t come to that.
I climbed out the window and jumped the short drop down to the ground, rolling to lessen the impact. Okay then, not many people still awake, but still enough to report me for being a suspicious sneaky shadow and stuff.
As I ran through alleyways I admired for the first time how the black leather-like armor felt like a second skin. Way better than my normal armor, but comparing both of them was doing it an injustice. It felt like I was wearing something of legendary quality instead of something that qualified as outstanding. The armor Luna gave our little group was of high quality, but nothing could reach up to this.
“No!” a voice of a woman stopped me in my tracks. “Stop! Let go of me!”
Fuck, fuggin’ fuck... What do I do? She sounded like she really needed someone to save her day, but I didn’t want to get seen doing anything shady.
If I went to her, there could be a chance someone would see me, or even remember me later to give a description to the police.
On the one hand, save a girl. On the other, risk getting exposed for playing hero.
I felt like I had this argument with myself before...
Anyway, no one would believe her having seen someone wrapped in a cloak of light-eating... whatever it was made of. And it wasn’t like anyone could see my face under the hood. As long as no one makes the connection of a break-in and a vigilante saving a woman in distress, everything should be alright, right?
Growling, I made my decision and sprinted in the direction the shout came from. Hopefully, I wasn’t too late to arrive at the scene. Something told me I wasted too much time already, though. I had to hurry!
Running around frantically I had to search some alleys before I saw them.
Two men were standing watch, while a third did the unspeakable. My skin crawled and I saw red. I don’t care what happens to him and his goons, he would pay for that.
The two that stood lookout weren’t the most intelligent, judging by the brawn instead of the brain. Both were ripped, which was a problem. I had no idea of how I would fare against people that relied entirely on strength to get their will done.
If my training with Luna taught me anything, though, it was that strength wasn’t the end all be all. I could work their strength against them if I was quick enough.
And speed was something I was pretty good with on Lux.
Naturally, they saw me coming from a mile away, but they were a bit to slow to react. By the time I was reaching them, one tried to warn their little leader. The other got a kick to the face, stunning him.
I grinned as the other one went to punch me, but hit his friend instead as I dodged. There was nothing quite like making your opponents hit each other, instead. His friend, as dumb as he is, hit back thinking it was I that hit him. Using the bow I knocked them both down, before striking them with it on their heads.
One fell unconscious, while I had to ‘help’ things along on the other one with a brutal kick to their head. That left only one rat to deal with.
By now even he got the memo that something wasn’t right. Too bad he couldn’t defend himself from a round-house kick to the side of his head. That was too kind on the sorry excuse of a living being but did the job. I debated whether to twist his neck around or not, but that would probably catch unwanted attention. And I didn’t want to traumatize the poor woman with my ruthlessness if I could avoid it. Instead, I would tie them up when I find something to bind them with. For now, I had a woman in need of some support.
The girl lying on the dirty ground was barely older than myself. She had light green hair and blue tear-stained eyes. Her clothing was ripped in several places and some bruises could be seen through the holes.
I grimaced at the stench of male musk in the air and tried not to throw up. God, what a sick fuck. My burning hatred almost made me pull out one of the knives from the thugs to slit his throat with, but my vindictive side wanted him to be forever in prison, to be abused by anyone that saw this act just as heinous as I felt about it.
That would put him into an eternity of suffering, while simply killing him won’t do it justice.
The girl flinched as I lightly touched her shoulder, but her eyes got back some of their light as she noticed I wasn’t going to hurt her as he did.
“Come,” I told her, offering my hand to her. “Let’s get you somewhere safe and those three locked away, okay?”
She nodded at my gentle tone of voice, hugging herself tightly as she stared forlornly into the distance. It seemed she could stand at least without problems.
I berated myself for having it let come this far, to begin with. If I were just fast enough, this could have been avoided. This was my fault for taking too long to make a decision about whether to keep to the shadows or not.
The only silver-lining I could see was that the man didn’t get to finish.
The girl didn’t even react when I told her to wait at the entrance to the alley as I bound the three worms with some chains I found lying next to a dumpster, rusting away. I was quick to arrive with Sol to drag them away to the police department. The girl followed Lux as I carefully moved her towards someone that could help someone like her.
Meaning, I left her at a hospital and let the nurses find her at the emergency station.
With that done, I continued on my original task of infiltrating government buildings. It was ironic that after stopping a crime, I would commit one. Well, technically vigilantism was also considered a crime, but that was stupid in my opinion.
Who wouldn’t enact a bit of justice if they found something like that happening? I don’t care that you were supposed to find or call the police for them to take care of the problem when you were just as capable of dealing with it. If you had the means to do so and did not, you were just as much at fault as the one committing the crime.
God, I sounded like Spider-Man. With great responsibility comes great ass-kicking, bla bla bla.
Admittedly, I wouldn’t make a great Spider-Man.
Anyway, I found myself standing atop a roof just next to the building I wanted to get into. I could see some people moving around there, likely whatever nightguard they employed to keep the building safe from people like me. Too bad no one ever looked up.
I took a bit of a running start and jumped across the gap down to the slightly less tall building. Wasn’t the smartest idea, but it worked out. The problem now was, how do I escape after I was done? That would be future-me’s problem for now.
Pulling out some lock picks, I tried my best at getting the lock of the rooftop access open. It took me some frustration and way too much time, and some broken picks, to get it to finally open.
Without making a noise I opened the hatch to peek into the darkened corridors. Letting the fold-out ladder down, I slowly made my way down to the floor. Putting the ladder back up, I began to sneak around so I could find what I was after.
Most of the rooms were just offices, so I went to the next floor all the while avoiding the guards with their pesky flashlights. I found a locked door, but after I got through the lock I just found a janitor closet. So much for getting my hopes up. At least I found a floor plan on the wall and determined that there was nothing on this one.
Once more I went down the stairs to search for my target. I almost ran into a guard as I was about to round a corner but was swift enough to slip into a room before he could turn around. I waited for a few minutes before opening the door so it was slightly ajar. The coast was clear for the moment and I took the opportunity to find another floor plan.
It was actually plastered over the janitor closet of this floor, with a sticky post on it saying ‘Don’t lose it this time, Argent!’. Whoever that was, he needed to keep better track of his things.
Like the master key I found in the room behind the locked door. That would at least spare me the risky process of trying to open these doors. Seeing that the floor didn’t have the room I was gunning for, I went down once more.
I was nearing the end of a hall when the first complication occurred. A guard was coming up the hall I was in and I was to slow to enter a room. The one I tried was locked and fishing out the key would have taken to long.
So I did the only thing my panic-induced mind told me to do and stood still while pressed to the wall. I sighed in relief as he only just looked into the hall before turning around to go back onto the patrol route he followed.
Well, until he turned back around again because he heard me exhale too loudly. Actually, it wasn’t that loud, but in a silent building picking up on this wasn’t that hard.
Hastily I cast a spell I was all too familiar with by now.
“Hello?” he said, unsure if he did hear anything. He went up to where I was standing and I had to keep my hand on my mouth and nose with a death grip. If he heard me breathing out in relief from down the hall, there was no doubt he would hear me breathe from right next to him.
God, I loved the ‘Notice-me-not!’ spell so much right now. Even though the edges of my vision started to get blurry. Fucking move away, man! I couldn’t hold my breath infinitely.
For once Lady Luck smiled upon me as he shrugged and went back to do the work he was too incompetent to do. The ‘Notice-me-not!’ spell had one glaring weakness and that was that you could see a slight wavering in the air if you were suspicious of something fishy going on.
This time I was able to breathe in deeply to replenish my oxygen as he was gone around the corner and out of ear-shot. Gosh, that was close. I ended my spell and continued on. While I did want to keep it going, it would leave me too exhausted to actually flee once I was done here. No need to waste energy when I can sneak around just as well without. In a bind, I could cast it again.
Seeing that I could open the door behind me now I went in and found a big office of someone important. Going through some of the documents lying on the desk I learned where they kept the legal documents of the citizens of Manehattan. Apparently, they recently moved them around and what I was reading was the report on that.
Due to fire hazard moved to... Oh, come on! The second basement floor? I could have searched the whole night away going by this rate. Well, at least I now had an idea where to search.
Locking the door after I left the office, I made my way back to the stairs. Or wanted to at least. The friggin’ guard from earlier was standing in front of the door leading to them. How would I get past him now?
Well... I had one very bad idea and a slightly less bad one. First option, add to my list of crimes by setting the building on fire, or for the second option, knock him out.
The question was, what would I do? Sure, the inner pyromaniac within me wanted to cackle in glee while causing havoc, but my rational part argued that I couldn’t live with myself after I would be done doing so.
Mentally counting to ten, I sprinted at the unsuspecting guard before he even had a chance to react. A loud crack echoed out as my bow connected with his nose, followed by a headbutt to his forehead. He went out like a light, slumping to the ground. I winced rubbing my own head.
Okay, now I was on a time limit, better start to get a move on in that case. Shoving him into the staircase with me to hide him from the other guards for at least a little while, I quickly made my way down to the basements second floor. I had no idea how long it would take for people to notice his absence, so even if he didn’t wake up anytime soon, someone would get suspicious soon.
I cursed as I saw three guards patrolling through this floor instead of the usual one or two I had observed on the upper floors. How many guards did they hire for this building, man... It seemed the head honcho was a paranoid person.
One of them, I could tell, stood in front of the door I was after. Or the door that most likely had what I wanted to get in to. The storage room for all the legal documents.
That meant one more guard I had to knock out while the other two were free to give out an alarm that an intruder was in the building. And at least one of the patrolling guards was in the line of sight of the other ones. At this point, I thought it would be easier to rob a friggin’ bank.
Which was not an idea I entertained for more than a minute. Nope! No way.
Perhaps... Okay, there might be a way I could delay them from getting the other guards, but I had to be fast. As soon as I left the confines of the staircase I needed to lock them with the key. If they couldn’t get through the door as I dealt with them, they couldn’t warn the others, right? Perfect plan, if I do say so.
Once more I counted down from ten and held the key at the ready. Springing into action, I closed the door just as quickly as I opened them and put the key in. A ‘Hey!’ came from the guard down the hall as he spotted me and I turned the key in the lock.
Phase one complete. Starting phase two of my masterplan.
Dodging to the side, the guard overextended his arm and I punched him in the kidney. The other guards appeared at the end of the hall, both of them drawing their nightsticks. No matter, I just had to avoid getting knocked out by them.
The guard I was already fighting with retaliated by throwing another punch. I went with the motion of stepping backward before he connected the hit to lessen the severity somewhat. I dodged once more to the side, but this time he was wise to not overextend. At his next punch, I did a backflip kicking him full-force in the chin. I barely avoided getting hit by one of the guards blunt weapons as they tried to take advantage of a perceived inability on my part to react fast enough.
A sweeping leg strike saw at least one of them lose balance and fall to the ground. Through the motion of a roll, I put enough swing into the attack with my bow to make him unable to continue the fight. Have fun in La La Land, my dear.
Seeing one of the remaining guards make a break towards the staircase while pulling out a key of his own, I threw my bow to put a stop to his plan, while fending off the other guard. At the very least my attack made him let go of the key in his hand, so I had a few seconds to deal with the other nuisance. I expertly dodged the strikes of the man, he was after all not as fast as some of my friends and certainly not as fast as one of Luna’s mirror images.
So, that gave me an idea.
Summoning my clones they dogpiled my opponent while I went after the one struggling with the key. Kicking up my bow from the ground, I swung it heavily against the side of his head. That took care of this one and my clones made short work of the other one.
“Sorry, boys. Nothing personal,” I said to their unconscious bodies while I went and opened the door to the archive.
Finding the proper registry was easy enough in the maze of drawers and lockers. Without hesitating, I deposited the forged documents in their rightful places. Or wrongful, depending on how you view what I did as good or bad. Not that I care about the particular righteousness of my little breaking and entering.
How many crimes did I commit this night, again?
I went back up the staircase once I made sure the door was locked up again and tried to come up with an escape route. And judging by the commotion upstairs, I needed one asap. The foyer of this building was an obvious choice... if I wanted to get caught by more than five guards in that area alone.
Damn, you would expect they were here to prevent a break-in from happening. By how paranoid the big boss here seemed to be, I think there had been one recently. I’m going to make his paranoia worse, aren’t I?
Another option would be to fight myself up to the top of the staircase. In doing so I would need to fight even more than the previous option. It would be offset by having to fight them one or two at a time, seeing that the staircase was only so wide to allow that many people to fight reliably side by side.
I preferred the last option of jumping out a window and making a run for it. The problem with that was, that I needed to get to the second floor of this building where the outside windows were located. The fucking building had none on the first. And by the time I got there, the guards would be hot on my trail. Well, better that than the other two options, I guess.
Before the first guard could reach me I was already running down the hall on the floor where I needed to be. Okay, then. Judging the direction it was going, the main entrance was to my left, so going to a room on the opposite end would get me the best access to a guard free road. Well, almost guard free, as there could always be some there now to prevent my escape.
Not that they would be successful in that regard, I told myself. Couldn’t get caught now, could I?
I managed to slam the door of an office into the face of the men chasing after me and swiftly locked it to buy myself time to get the window open and get out. Down on the streets, I saw two flashlights scanning the windows for movement.
Alright, as always, I counted to ten and got ready to flee and/or fight. Let’s hope it stays with flee, then.
Pushing the window open as I felt it to be the right moment to do so, I jumped out and rolled down on the ground to avoid injury. As soon as I was back up I sprinted down the streets as guards and police gave chase.
“Crap,” I muttered to myself seeing the law enforcement come after me, too. Ducking into an alleyway, I continued to run from the law at the best speed I could maintain for an extended period of time.
And just as I thought I managed to lose them, another policeman spotted me as he entered the alley on the other end.
“Surrender now, or we will use force!” he told me. I turned around, but there stood a woman ready with a weapon and cuffs. Double crap. What to do, what to do...
“Lady, we got some questions for you, please just come with us,” the policewoman said as she slowly started to get closer to me. Crap, crap, crap. Think, come on, think!
Where is the most likely place they won’t get to me?
You know, people always forgot to look upwards.
Giving a grin, I jumped on the dumpster to my side and then jumped to the fire escape ladder above me. And thus, the chase continued over the rooftops of Manehattan.
Forgot some people in this world had fucking wings, man. It was a bit thrilling running and leaping from roof to roof, ignoring the very possibility of me not making the jump and ending up as a pancake on the earth below me.
For good measure, I led them on a wild goose chase to make sure there won’t be a connection between me with my armor on and me without it. So, how did I lose an entire police force from catching me?
By standing at the ledge of a jump to a building impossible to make. Now, now, I know this doesn’t make any sense to you yet, but bear with me. This all will get cleared up in a second or two.
“Stand down and put your arms in the air!” the policeman said from behind me as I looked at the drop before me. Well, I won’t survive that for sure.
“Or what, officer?” I asked back, putting on a sultry voice. What? I have to make it distinct and completely different from my normal voice, don’t judge me.
“Whatever you did in that building, we want to know it and we will get answers!” he told me, slowly approaching me. I saw a few Pegasus-Blessed flying around the building we stood on.
“My, my... What special attention you gift me with,” I returned, looking down at the ground in an obvious way to indicate that I was thinking of jumping without a way to break my fall.
“Just a counter-measure to make sure no one makes any stupid decisions tonight,” he answered back with a sneer. Somebody doesn’t like me all that much, do they?
“I think we’re way past that, my dear,” I smiled back in a condescending fashion. His childish attempt to stop me from doing what I wanted wasn’t going to work.
“Get away from that ledge, please. The crimes you committed this night aren’t worth taking your life for,” he said, changing his approach from goading me away from doing the monumentally stupid act of turning myself to a pancake.
“Goodbye, officer,” I mocked him and then I was past his vision. Naturally, he scrambled to look over the edge in hopes that a Pegasus-Blessed caught me.
The thing is, I sat right beside him as he stared disbelievingly at the body on the ground. A moment later it flickered and vanished, another version of me running away in the distance and no one was chasing after that version.
“Damn it!” he shouted and ran to get off of this building. Hah, what a fool. He didn’t actually believe that an illusionist would continue on fleeing while out in the open, did he? Not to mention the one down below couldn’t be real either, because that would have meant that I actually went through with jumping from the building.
At least it got the job done, getting them away from me. It would have been awkward to have him see through my rouse. I was glad he was as gullible as he was, though.
I was interested in the fall-out of this little shindig. But that could wait until the next day or so. Sleep sounded very enticing right now. This time I wasn’t harassed by anyone as I made my way back to the hotel.
The next day saw the whole city under lock-down for the big bad illusionist that was a mystery to the police. I stayed mainly in the hotel anyway, so there was little chance of them finding me.
People were agitated about this, no wonder about that. Some gossip I overheard was about the police searching for a supposedly mass-murderer. Great.
What is it with people jumping to conclusions without any information? Was it so tempting to label me a mass-murderer from the get-go? The nerve. But then again, I was mightily tempted to rip the heart out of that guy that abused the girl the night before.
During the night I decided to scout out the train station and get a picture of the situation there. And would you look at that, they had friggin’ magic scanners. That wasn’t something I was expecting to see. That piece of magi-tech wasn’t very common. They basically functioned like a metal detector, but for magic.
Seems like I won’t be leaving Manehattan for quite some time, then. I had no idea how they got at my signature, but I could take a guess. Probably residue from me using my illusions. They must have a competent mage here for them to program it into every scanner they brought here.
I don’t think I could fight my way out of a city. The train was obviously out, so how about the roads? Not an option either as I looked down a street and saw a control point. They played for keeps, huh? I could try sneaking through them with a ‘Notice-Me-Not’ spell, but there could always be the possibility of them detecting the shimmer in the air.
Okay, a city full of people that were too suspicious of me for me to use my best spell for stealth. Lux couldn’t fly, so that went out the window, too. Not that I could fly with Sol that well, either. So even if I wanted to, I couldn’t carry myself out of this city through the air.
I sighed and went back to the hotel. There must be a way, I just couldn’t see it yet.
Morning came all too soon. I found myself some breakfast and headed out to see how the lock-down looked today. As was usual, the people of Manehattan were bustling around and I overheard a thing or two. The newspaper agencies were in a frenzy to get all the latest news and there was actually a sketch, badly drawn if you ask me, of me in a demonic fashion grinning maliciously.
I wasn’t that fat, was I?
The headline read ‘Mysterious woman infiltrates government building, Objective unknown’ while the article spoke of the incident in more detail. They actually held an interview with the police.
On another note, it was funny seeing the second article also be about me, but in a positive light. That one held the title ‘Vigilante saves the day!’ and reported the actions that transpired in the alley. There was no description of the savior, so there was no connection between both articles.
If only they knew... What chaos would that unleash, I wondered. I could see the headlines already, ‘Hero or Criminal?’. Thus, another day went by without anything happening, really.
During the daylight hours, I should say.
At night, I went out again. There was still another matter I needed to investigate, and with me now being stuck here, it was the perfect opportunity to do so. The name of the guy on the train eluded me but considering that he had a job to do, something that most likely involved some form of crime, I’m sure I could use my time to do some good.
Cloaked back up again in my light-eating mantle, I stuck to alleyways and rooftops to get around the city. I had to avoid some Pegasus-Blessed here and there but had mainly no problems with getting around. They didn’t know where to focus their search, which was fine by me.
It was fun to stop a few petty crimes here and there, I had to admit. My main target didn’t show himself this night, though. I had nothing against that if I were honest here. Whatever they wanted to accomplish needed for them to plan their actions out, and that meant more time for me to find them.
The next day had the people talking even more, as the vigilante they read about was apparently the same person that broke into a government facility. Who would have thought that?
My alter-ego was creating quite a few waves in the opinion of the people. Some already started to make arguments about why I was good, while others vehemently discredited everything I did as mere criminal activity. Both sides had some truth to them. My actions weren’t entirely heroic as some people thought, but on the other hand, they weren’t that bad, either.
Try to tell that to the people, though. Those were stuck with the black and white view of either or. Arguing against that was like pulling teeth. A few days went by with this back and forth and I made no progress on the front of the man I tried to track down.
It didn’t help that I had no idea how he looked and only had his voice to go by. Currently, I was standing on the roof of a building overlooking a bank on the other side of a street. I had seen someone fishy go in there and stopped to investigate. Sol was my little scout because I couldn’t go around activating my bracelet with him. Well, I could, but considering the fact that everyone could see my face if I did wasn’t something I was willing to accept.
And what do you know, the guy that looked suspicious had friends equally as shady. They didn’t make it obvious that they knew each other, but when you see people trying to hide weapons, they must be a group. Judging by their voices, none of them were the guy I was after. Didn’t mean I wouldn’t put a stop to their schemes.
Before I could leave with Sol to get ready to intervene with Lux one of them grabbed hold of me and put a knife to my throat, screaming for people to get down to the ground while his friends threatened the personnel and customers to follow his words.
I sighed and got down from the building I previously stood on. Five armed men versus little old me. Looking at each of them with Sol, I analyzed which one needed to go down first. Two burly men with machetes, one scrawny boyish-looking adult with daggers, the head honcho with a short sword, and one guy that pulled out a crossbow out of a bag. Two melee, one support, and two that looked like they never fought in their entire life.
The first target would be the one with the crossbow, then. He would cause me the most grief out of the assembled group. And he was also the one that would be the easiest to pick out.
As was customary by now, I counted down from ten before acting. Silently I slunk into the building as I made sure none of them looked at the entrance. I had to wheeze on Sol as I created a distraction with him and got promptly punched in the gut by brawny guy number one.
Better that way than for them to notice Lux behind their ranged fighter. Making quick work out of that guy, I kicked away the crossbow in case he recovered anytime soon. And then came the realization.
He shouldn’t have been target number one.
The boss of their little group saw me and sneered, activating an enchantment on the sword. The magic of the blade caused it to burst into flames of an eerie green color. Well, too bad for him I had two bodies to work with.
Kicking him into the nether region, he went down crying like a little girl. He shouldn’t have taken Sol hostage, I thought with a grin. Taking my prize in the form of a shiny new sword, I engaged one of the thugs as Lux fought the other brawn for brain.
Well, everything went perfectly. Couldn’t say they put up much of a fight against the combined might of my bodies. Lux finished her opponent first and I cut through the machete of the other guy with ease. He promptly surrendered to me after seeing his weapon dealt with so efficiently. That sword was scary, I had to say.
But, you know... I never get the easy route. The little scrawny kid I thought was no threat at all? Yeah, well he stood directly behind Sol and nicked my cheek with his dagger. A dagger that was quite obviously poisoned.
So, there I stood, time flowing in slow motion as I saw my other body standing there without a chance to react and the kid holding the dagger in my face.
I did the only sensible thing I knew would let me attack from the distance between my female body and my male body. Reacting on instinct, I drew back a string that previously wasn’t there and let loose an arrow made of pure moonlight.
Would you look at that, the bow wasn’t useless! Would have been helpful to know before getting fucking poisoned. That poison was running through my male body now and I had no idea what it would do. I felt slightly numb already, though. Paralyzing effect? The question was, how far would it paralyze me? There was the possibility of it not stopping with the heart, after all.
I wasn’t a poison expert and this world had a whole slew of poisons I never even heard of.
So, my arrow struck the asshole in the chest and Sol slumped down to the ground. Just my luck to get into such situations, wasn’t it? Thinking on the warning words Horse God gave me of the timelimit I had before something serious would start happening, I didn’t even want to imagine how bad it would get while seeing my poisoned male half lying on the ground, gasping desperately for air.
I ran over to the man lying a bit behind Sol and pointed a new arrow I nocked directly in his face.
“Where is the anti-dote?!” I screeched at him in my fury, thoughts addled by the pain running through my veins on Sol. Instead of answering my demand, the bastard just grinned with blood flowing from his lips.
“RAAGHR!” screaming bloody murder, I gave the young adult a mercy and killed him on the spot. He would have continued to bleed out anyway. He was a talking corpse, for all I cared.
“The Shadow Stalker just killed him...” I heard whispers from the terrified people around me, but I ignored them in favor of checking the injury on Sol. The cut on the cheek wasn’t very deep, it wouldn’t leave a scar probably. Judging by the heavy sweating, the body was hard at work at trying to get rid of the foreign substance. It was a losing battle though, which didn’t improve my mood one bit.
Okay, how to go about this... I needed to position my body in a way I wouldn’t suffocate first and foremost. So I repositioned it that it was lying on its side and propped the head upon the elbow of the arm. Next up, I searched the body of my poisoner.
Some bubblegum, a few hidden blades, but no anti-dote in his pockets. Just some crumpled up notes with gibberish on them. Might try to decode that later. For now, I took one of his poisoned blades and had one of the bank attendees look after my body while I sprinted to the hospital to get someone to try and analyze the mixture on the knife.
The staff at the hospital were understandably surprised to see me come crash through the emergency doors. Some were wary, but one particular brave woman came to investigate why I was barging in like that.
“Poison... injured... bank...” I wheezed out, giving her the dagger. A breather was all I needed with my female body, I was more concerned about my male body at the moment.
And boy, the mention of someone injured rallied the people around me like nothing else could. At around the same time, the police found out what happened in the bank as someone else went to go get help. Still needed the bastards restrained, but as long as they remained unconscious I would concentrate on the more immediate concerns.
A few hours later had Sol admitted into a hospital room being monitored and on an intravenous bag. The poison was actually that of a manticore and was easily identifiable by the smell alone. I was suddenly glad the manticore in the Everfree didn’t poison me or I would definitely be dead already. Small miracles.
One good thing came from this debacle, though. The police were now distracted with what happened at the bank and how someone managed to smuggle such a potent poison into the city.
And the one using the poison? Yeah, let’s just say he wasn’t the only one with access to it now. All over Manehattan reports came in from criminals poisoning people here and there, which caused the hospitals to fill up quite fast. I got to answer a few questions on Sol to help the police and give my witness report.
Lux, on the other hand, had her work cut out for us. I was doing what I could, but I couldn’t be everywhere at once. The thing is, I got a really bad feeling about this. The encoded message I found on the body of the robber in the bank wasn’t helping me in any way to get behind this mess.
That brought us to the here and now, I was once more stopping a mugging at a local convenience store when the police also arrived. Now, I was in quite a pickle. There was not enough time for me to stop the criminal and also flee the police.
To my surprise though, the police wasn’t interested in me. Well, they kinda were, but they didn’t want to arrest me. Okay, maybe some did, but the guy that led the chase a few nights ago stopped them from doing so.
“Lady, we don’t want to hurt you,” he began while the robber looked between us. Shrugging I let lose the glowy string and pierced the shoulder of the idiot holding the clerk hostage. If they weren’t here to stop me, then I could just as well do the job first and have a chit-chat after. The man holding the weapon let it fall with a scream and I vaulted over the counter and swung my bow full tilt in his face.
“Was that necessary?” the police officer looked at me exasperatedly. I made an exaggerated motion about thinking on it and gave a non-committal shrug with a small grin.
“He asked for it,” I answered back, kicking the asshole for good measure. Then I turned to the clerk in concern. “Are you okay? Did he nick you anywhere with the blade?”
The young woman gave me a shake of her head as she threw herself around me in a hug. I gently stroke her back as she let out a sob and I reassured her that it was over now. A police officer took her away from me after she continued to shower me in her gratitude. Looking at the unconscious man on the ground I went up to him and searched him. Like the other times, I found a crumpled up note in his pocket with the same gibberish on it.
“We have actually been decoding these messages,” the policeman in charge told me. I turned to him interested as he continued on. “Every one of these has a specific time they instruct these criminals when to go out and cause trouble. We still have no idea what purpose this all has, but we are suspecting it is used to cause a distraction to the police force. And you, it seems.”
“Me?” I asked bewildered. If someone didn’t want me to find out what was going on, then we needed to stop this asap.
“Some notes have specific instructions to make these actions deliberately obvious so they catch your attention. Whoever is behind this, they go to great length to remain in the shadows. Every person we have interrogated always says the same thing: They found the poison with two notes in their apartment promising them high amounts of money for completing the task set out for them,” he explained to me. “The first note tells them how to decode the second one and instructs them to burn it after the fact. The thing is, whoever gave them the notes wants us to find the encoded ones, hence the crumpled notes on their person.”
“I don’t ask this lightly of you, but we need your help in this case,” he said. I bit my lip at that. It would give me way more attention than I liked, attention that could pick the interest of the Princesses. But on the other hand, I was stuck in trying to get closer to the person behind all this.
“Only on a few conditions, Mister...” I started, a plan forming in my mind.
“Secure Shackle,” he answered back. “Name them and we will see if we can abide by your demands.”
“Firstly, I don’t want the Princess Celestia to know about this,” I said and while he looked confused at that, he gave a nod. “Secondly, I don’t want to reveal my face to you or anyone I’ll be working with.”
“That can be arranged. Anything else?”
“After we are done, I want an official pardon for any crimes I may have committed over the last few days. Is that clear?” I asked and I sure as hell wouldn’t budge on that. Either I got that, or we would continue to work separately. I hoped he wouldn’t deny me that because I needed their resources more than they needed me.
“I can’t promise you that,” he said to me, giving me a glare. “You killed a criminal, that has to go punished.”
“Fair enough,” I said. “But I don’t intent to rot in prison for what is right.”
“You have a seriously screwed up view on what is right or wrong, Lady,” he spat. “What you did was wrong on so many accounts, I couldn’t list them all.”
“What would you do if someone just tried to kill a person in front of you and you had no idea which poison the bastard used?” I shot back, getting up to his face. My sultry voice made him nervous as our lips were just inches apart. “I am a very vindictive person, my dear. I don’t play for keeps, I do what I deem necessary in the moment.”
“What kind of life have you led to turn out like this?” he asked perplexed. I gave a smile at that and stepped back from him.
“I was chosen to be a champion. But I decide how to enact their will. And let’s just say that my benefactor... understands that sometimes you have to get your hands a little dirty for the greater good,” I answered barely above a whisper. “I don’t remember much of my past life since some weeks ago. And the few memories I have don’t give me much to go on for me to know what kind of person I was.”
“Very well, then. We will see what to do about you once we have the perpetrator behind bars,” he said. My words seem to have at least left an impression on him. What kind, I couldn’t possibly guess at. “And no killing from now on, do you understand me?”
“I can’t make promises like that,” I said and before he could object, I continued on. “But I will do my best to reign in my... impulsiveness.”
“That is all I ask for,” Secure Shackle told me. “May Harmony guide us.”
“Oh, Harmony won’t guide you tonight, my dear. Let’s just say Hope is on our side.”
“If you think so.”
And that is the story of how I made a temporary peace with the police of Manehattan. Unbelievable, right?
The thing is, this world didn’t need heroes that did the right thing all the time. Maybe what it needed more was someone that got the job done at the end of the day. I wasn’t hero material anyway. The anti-hero route appealed to my taste way more. Screwed up morals? Check. Willingness to get my hands dirty? Check that two times. Selfishness to look out after my own before others? Fuck yeah, check!
My friends would come before the rest of this world a hundred percent of the time. There was nothing more worthwhile that I wanted to protect more. Heck, even Celestia and Luna would come before the rest of the world if I had a say in it. I couldn’t save everyone, but as long as I keep those friends of mine away from harm everything would be okay in my opinion.