“Fetlock Skry,” a brusque, no nonsense, deep brown lunar guard captain led a pale tan earth pony stallion down a narrow stone hallway, “I’m glad you could make it.”
“Yes, Captain Shadow,” the stallion nodded thoughtfully, “I have to admit I was intrigued. I’ve worked with the Warlocks as a consulting detective on more than a few cases, and this is hardly the first time I’ve been offered a more permanent position.”
“And you’ve turned down every offer,” The captain came to an abrupt halt and flashed the detective a predatory smile, “And yet here you are. Do you mind if I ask why?”
“Simply put, yours was the first offer not to lay all the cards on the table,” the stallion returned the nocturnal mare's smile with a sly grin and replied, “And I do love a good mystery. A ‘position of leadership’, but with no offered rank, no mention of the unit’s name, and most telling, ‘directly accountable to Advisory Princess Luna’.”
“And this tells you what Mr. Skry?” The captain ruffled her leathery wings.
“Not as much a the fact that we are walking towards not the barracks but the dungeons to presumably meet my would be unit of irregulars,” the stallion replied easily, “There is no rank, because how could there be an official rank in a unit that does not officially exist? A unit of barely restrained, much less reformed criminals. One of Equestria’s worst kept secrets, I believe the tabloids refer to them as ‘The Pony Dreadfuls’. It makes sense that they would Fall under Her Highness Luna’s sphere of influence, given the recent restructuring. And her Highness needs somepony to hold their leash. I would ask if I was correct, but we are both aware that it would simply be a formality.”
“What do you know about The Dreadfuls?” Captain Shadow inquired.
“Less than I would like,” the detective admitted. “I know the Royal Canterlot Pest Control Division, or RCPCD is an even less public offshoot of SMILE. They handle situations deemed too dangerous for the Royal Guard, and too distasteful or potentially corrupting for the Warlocks. I know they are composed largely of unsavory sorts and outright criminals. And I know they were formed in response to certain events surrounding the second changeling invasion that the crown would prefer the little ponies just forgot about.”
“We’ve taken a less than active role on that front,” the captain smiled coldly, “Creatures inclined to do so always look for conspiracies, but ponies forget well enough all on their own. The circus of Madame Alias was just a ruse by Queen Chrysalis leading up to the invasion, the Shadow Hive was just a rogue gang of loyalist vigilante changelings, the Unspoken Prince was just a ploy by Discord, a simple magical construct made to oppose the encroaching enemy, there was no Nopony, that was a collective ‘herd anxiety’ fear, to rationalize the scope of the catastrophe…”
“Yes,” Skrye replied with a sly grin, “The little ponies just cover it up all by themselves. It’s that strange anti-sensationalism that the noted psychoanalyst Dr. Slip called, ‘The Assumption of Harmony’. Ponies want the world to be harmonious, and when it’s not we work to make it so, retroactively if necessary. And that’s why you need the dreadfuls. You need disharmonious ponies to defend against threats that exploit harmony and friendship itself.”
“I suppose you’re going to want to meet all the little ponies you’ll be working with.” The lunar mare smirked.
“You’re not even going to ask if I’ll take the job?” The earth pony chuckled. “By all means, let us get to know these dreadful little ponies.”
-=-=-=-
“Ants are in the sugar” The vacuous cyan changeling sang to himself within the holding cell. “Muscles atrophied.”
“Celestia’s sweet sunshine!” Fetlock Skrye screamed in well founded rage. “Are you insane?!?! Why is that thing here?!?!”
“We’re on the other side,the screen is us and we’re TV.” The impossible changeling thing sang across the void.
“The warlocks have ways to recover memories from the Glimmer Effect. I’ve seen maybe a half dozen alternate timelines, Mr. Skrye.” The Captain spoke in hushed tones. “You’ve seen what? A university seminar on the possibility that those things exist? That ‘thing’ has survived repeated instances of full universal dimensional collapse. It’s a useful ‘thing’, detective. You already knew you wouldn’t be working with good ponies.”
“Tear me open, sticking to my pony ribs,” the thing that looked like a changeling sang on, suddenly looking the detective in the eye, “Are all your fillies in abortion cribs?”
The detective snarled. “I’m sure you’re aware my niece was at ground zero in the attack at Baltimare University.”
““We are living in a post-Glimmer world, detective. We are not just aware of the multiverse, the multiverse is aware of us. That ‘thing’ is our top expert on multiversal politics,” The Captain snorted in disgust, “A pony can’t make bricks without digging in the dirt. I hope this won’t be a problem, you were recommended for your professional detachment.”
“Sour Sweet… I vaguely remember hearing about her,” the degenerate changeling spoke from within his cell. “In the papers… we used one of the anons for the attack itself, and they were never fully part of the hive mind, just plague drones we exploited the Good Doctor to import for us. So I don’t actually remember your niece, per se…”
The detective glared hatred but held his tongue as the changeling’s rant continued. “A hive mind is a cruel thing, Detective. Natural changelings are lucky to have never had one. Couple it with multiversal limited infinity and it is an unimaginable existential horror. I didn’t kill your niece, Detective. I was an unwilling brain cell in the artificial eldritch abomination that killed your niece. If it makes it better, I, personally, was high as a kite the whole time.”
-=-=-=-=-
RCPCD Personnel File 1101
Iam Noone (See Related Files, “The Nopony Collective”, “Povid Virus”)
Name: Iam Noone
Race: Povid Changeling Queen
Projected Gender: Male (usually)
Know Aliases: None, subject makes no attempt to hide his identity, even when disguised as another creatureDescription: In its natural form, Iam appears as a young, adrogenous changeling queen with an unusual color pattern. It has a bright cyan chitin and a disheveled, short, and oily blue mane with a matching ill kempt and tangled tail. It occasionally takes the form of an earth pony or Mirror World human. As a pony it seems to prefer pale tones of earth and ash, while as a human it prefers to keep its changeling coloration. Oddly enough, it makes no attempt to hide its identity with these forms. Instead going out of its way to make sure evercreature knows that it is still itself (note: Possible exploitable identity issues). It seems to simply “wear” these forms the same way another creature might wear clothing.
Back Ground: Iam Noone is the reason Summoning Magic is highly regulated. It is believed to have been brought into this universe in a badly botched summoning ritual (see related file: Dr. Fetlock) against its will and amalgamated into the so-called “Nopony Collective”. The collective itself consisted of a near infinity of humans who had become displaced in Equestrian timelines, only to be forced into a state of pseudo-non-existence, collectively occupying the same space within our universe. Very little is known of its human universe of origin, except that it was not a “mirror universe”, and it was a patient in a psychiatric ward when it was originally drawn into Equestrian reality. By all accounts its time pressed into a collective mind of near infinite multiversal versions of its own consciousness has done nothing to stabilize his already fractured mind.
Unlike most of the “Nopony” aspects, Iam was seemingly transformed into his current form in itshome universe via exposure to a viral agent it refers to as Ponid-21-C. This is important to note because it is, in fact, still very contagious. While harmless to natives of Equestrian reality (who seem to be completely immune from the infection), in humans its effects are devastating and irreversible, transforming the infectee painfully over the course of two to four weeks into povid-type changelings.
While Iam was a fragment of the “Nopony Phenomenon” that manifested itself in the weeks leading up to the second changeling invasion of canterlot, it has been judged to be a less than willing participant, if more out of apathy than conscientious objection. It was at least indirectly involved in practically all of the Nopony’s terrorist actions,culminating in the bombing of Baltimare University. The collective kept Iam too full of drugs to ask any real questions while exploiting its unique space time displacement to be, or not be anywhere that was to the advantage of the collective
Iam is fundamentally disconnected from physical reality. It both exists and does not exist at any given point at any given time. It is currently contained by the most intensive experimental spell-work to come out of the Glimmer Project. Within its holding cell Iam is forced to only exist in a single instance of space and time without exception. In the instance that it becomes necessary to deploy Iam in the field, it is paramount that all available temporal anchoring restraints be employed and tight control maintained, as it is a high-flight-risk,and if it escaped would be nigh impossible to recapture.
-=-=-=-=-
“One condition,” Skry turned his back on the mad changeling, “if I do this, the crown doesn’t get to keep their dirty little secrets anymore, not from me. I want access to every dreadful little file, on every dreadful little pony.”
“Done.” The Lunar captain’s smile came all too easy.