The mother, who was named Bobby Pin, about fainted when she learned who she was selling to and that the sale was actually happening. Once she was over her shock, she was all business. We picked out sheet and quilt designs for each of the foals' beds, including Qīng Yǔ, and scheduled a date a little over four weeks away where the bed with the finished bedding would be delivered and put together. It was a little further out than I would like, but the father apparently made all the beds himself, and he had orders for other beds ahead of us and would need to order some materials as well since this was only the store model, and disassembling it and putting it back together could potentially damage it. A fresh one that matched would be put together at the mansion.
Once we were done and exited the store, we found my parents and Number waiting for us just outside it.
Number raised an eyebrow at me. "I get text notifications whenever any spending is done on that credit account. The other group is doing some minor stuff, but what did you buy in there, a car?"
"A costly set of bunk beds and custom-made bed sets," I replied. "I expect it will be my largest single purchase today."
Number blinked. "What are they made out of, gold?"
I shook my head. "No, but they are well made and not mass-produced. The foals seemed to love them, and I'm sure Méng will too."
She snorted. "Well, Wild said if you wanted to spoil them to go to town. I guess you took her at her word. Anyway, we can take the foals into the toy shops for you, but there's a shop nearby that you simply must-see."
I raised an eyebrow. "What kind of shop?"
Number pointed to the shop in question. "It's a pony salon that specializes in fur and mane dyes. I think you will be very interested in some of their marketing."
I looked at my fur. "Well… I am getting tired of this yellow, especially since it hasn't worked to hide my identity. Getting back to my normal colors would be nice."
"Oh, I don't think that will be a problem," Dad snickered. Mom and Sinker had to suppress laughter as well.
"Okay…?" I said, bemused.
Number lit her horn and disattached the cart from me. "Let me take that. I'm stronger than you anyway. Go on, treat yourself. I can pay for any toys for the foals, off my account, my present to them."
She took the cart from me and proceeded to lead my family over to the nearest toy store—one that specialized in stuffed animals, so I knew Qīng Yǔ at least was not going to leave without something. That filly loved her stuffed animals.
I hesitantly walked over to the salon and took a peek in, wondering what the others weren't telling me. There were a pair of earth pony mares working, one teal, one pink, both with neon green manes, and a single customer, another earth pony, who was currently laying on a small table on her back with a towel wrapped around her mane and another towel wrapped over her face.
One of the stylists, the pink one, came to greet me as I stepped inside. "Welcome to Celebrity Styles! We are running specials on mane cuts and curls today. How can we—" Her eyes drifted to my mark, and she audibly yipped and went running to the other stylist and started fiercely whispering.
I rolled my eyes. Not the most professional behavior. I didn't see any hostility from the pair, though, just fear, upon realizing who I was. I could probably put them at ease once they pulled themselves together enough to speak to me.
While waiting for that to happen, I looked around the shop and the listing of what they provided and what they did. Everything seemed very standard stuff for a salon, so I was unsure what my family and Number had been going on about—at least until I started reading through the fur dye selection.
"Sunset Blessing Red?!" I exclaimed. There was also Wild Growth Green, Sunrise Storm Yellow, Bob Blue, colors that matched with each of the Equestrian element bearers, and more famous ponies with corresponding colors.
"Please, don't sue us!" the pink stylist cried. The customer on the table sat up at this and pulled her towel off her face. The stylist instantly moved to calm the customer. "Not you! You're fine. Just lay down and relax. Nothing to see here."
The mare on the table looked at me, and her eyes went wide. "Is that Sunset Blessing? Why is she yellow??"
"I don't know!" the teal stylist cried. "Maybe it’s some weird protest of us using her color without permission? Oh my God! She's going to demand royalties!"
"We're going to go out of business!!" the two mares cried in chorus and then hugged each other as they bawled their eyes out. Seriously? Did they need to be that dramatic?
I gave them a flat look. "Are you done yet?"
"No!!" they shouted together and then continued crying.
Lord help me; ponies could overreact so much. In the past, I had people call me the most human pony and intended it derogatory since they meant the pony with the most human flaws. At times when dealing with ponies like this, I considered it a compliment. If they were human, they would have a little more self-respect not to behave like small foals.
"When you are done, I would like to have my fur dyed to my normal red and the highlights in my mane restored. I assume you know the proper colors," I replied as I sat down and waited. "And no, I'm not going to sue you or demand royalties."
The mares stopped crying and looked at each other while still holding on to one another.
"She isn't suing," the pink one said.
"She isn't asking for royalties," the teal one replied.
"We're still in business!" they exclaimed together, and they went back to hugging. Good grief.
They finally separated, and Teal—I wasn't interested in looking at her name tag to learn her name—came over towards me. "Yes! We can give you the full Sunset Blessing experience! In no time at all, you'll look exactly like hhhheerr...yourself!"
"On the house!" Pink added in.
"If we get to take a picture with you to hang on our wall," Teal amended.
The other customer, who had been settling back down, sat bolt upright. "Hey! Why does she get her stuff done for free, and I don't?!"
I decided to save them from an unhappy customer. "How about this; if you are giving me mine for free, I can pay for hers instead."
That instantly calmed the mare. "Works for me." She then went back to her former position.
"Wonderful!" Pink exclaimed. "Now, if you would just come over to this tub over here, we can start working on your fur. Please, set your saddlebags and phone in the bin to the side of it. We don't want to ruin them by getting dye all over them."
I did as instructed and got in the tub. The two of them came over and got to work.
"Hmm, this yellow dye job you've got, it is clearly the work of an amateur," Pink commented. "It looks fine now, but in two weeks, you would be a very spotted pony."
"Did you do this yourself?!" Teal asked in horror as if I had shot someone in front of them. "You should never let anypony but a professional touch your fur!"
"Sorry, not touching it is hard; I'm kinda attached to it," I muttered in annoyance.
"Don't worry. We will fix you right up!" Pink said excitedly. "We're the best stylists in the mall. Tell all your famous friends… and tell them not to sue us either."
"Or make us pay royalties," Teal added in.
"Or give us a bad review," Pink continued.
I rolled my eyes. "Just do your thing, and I'll decide how to review you."
That shut them up, at least for a minute. They were well underway into rubbing stuff into my fur with gloved hooves before they started mindlessly chattering again. They only paused to go finish up the other customer. The other customer was getting just a mane dye, and I saw the finished product, which was a navy blue with a white stripe running through it that looked pretty good on her and seemed to make her happy.
Mine took a little while, and I worried about how long it was taking. By the time I was out, and they did my mane and were satisfied that everything was appropriately dried, over an hour had passed.
I took the photo with them that they so desired, gathered up my belongings, sent a quick text to Number to say I was finished and to text me back her location, and then prepared to check out.
Pink was happily ringing me up for the other mare's mane job when she looked past me and cringed back in fear. "What are you doing here? You need to beat it, or we'll call the police—human ones."
"Please, don't hurt us! Just go away!" Teal cried. The two of them then ran together in a corner and embraced while breaking down in tears again.
If that wasn't worrisome, I didn't know what was. I turned to face whoever had them terrified and found myself facing a human woman. She was extremely pale, with short black hair that seemed like it had glitter in it. Her ears were in a human spot, but were oddly shaped. She was wearing a plain white short sleeve shirt and blue jeans, along with a pair of leather gardening gloves. I could see strips of glittery silver fur on her arms. I guessed she was somewhere in her late thirties or early forties. She was ignoring the two crying stylists and looking at me with contempt.
"You're supposed to be in jail!" Pink yelled out.
The woman didn't take her eyes off me, but answered the stylist. "I served my time. Reduced to eighteen months instead of ten years. Good behavior," she finished with a smirk.
"Well, you aren't wanted here! You need to leave...pretty please," Teal started with a yell and finished with a whimper.
I firmed up my stance. "I don't know who you are, but it seems you've been banned from this establishment. I think you should leave."
A ghost of a smile played on her lips as she advanced a step. "The name's Crissy, Crissy Fain, rhymes with pain. I heard you were in town and wanted to see you for myself."
"You keep those gloves on!" Pink yelled. "I mean it! Take them off, and I'm calling the police!"
"Don't let her touch you! It hurts, it hurts real bad!" Teal warned while crying.
Crissy smiled a wicked smile, but didn't say anything. I lit my horn defensively and took a cautious step back. "So, now you've seen me. Get going. I'm a skilled mage, and I can make sure you can't get your hands on me."
"Is that so?" Crissy asked with a smirk. "I'd like to see you try. I don't have all the powers a proper crystal pony should, but I've got my own variations. One of them is magic doesn't do crap to me, which means you can't do crap to me. More dangerous magic users than you, both ponies and humans, have tried. If I want to grab you, I will."
I took an involuntary step back in fear and her smirk twisted to an ear-to-ear evil grin, and she laughed. "Don't worry, Apostate. I just wanted to see your face. You have family here in the mall too, don't you? I think I counted twenty-eight people between who is in the mall and who is on that bus. I heard you've got some other friends staying with you too. What a large and happy family you have. You are truly blessed. I hope they're enjoying their day out on the town."
My horn flared as I snarled. "Don't you dare lay a finger on a single one of them. You're a Shimmerist, aren't you? Only Shimmerists call me that. Get out of here and tell all your buddies to leave me, my family, and my friends alone! And you can leave those stupid Blessingists alone too. I have nothing to do with them."
The woman chuckled. "It's cute how you act like you can do anything to me, but I'll leave. I just wanted to see you, Apostate. We'll see justice done for all your crimes, but not today. Enjoy the rest of your day."
She turned and left, leaving me still in a defensive stance with my horn lit and the two stylists still crying like babies.
I turned to them. "Who was she? What has she done in the past? Where do I find her?"
The two kept crying, but began answering my questions.
"She's a Shimmerist!" Teal cried. No duh.
"The worst of the worst kind!" Pink continued. "She hurts ponies. She touches you, and it hurts. Your magic doesn't work right for a few minutes after either. It won't focus and do what you want. It gets all frizzy."
Teal separated herself and sat down with a sniffle. "There was a lot of gossip about her after the last time she got arrested. They say she was only a partial after ETS ended. They put her in a camp and emotionally abused her until she rehumanized, but it didn't work all the way."
Pink looked down at the floor. "She developed powers, and the bad people from the government took her and tried to make her work for them. She wouldn't do it. They tried to use that one mind magic guy on her—you know the one, the guy who was in that big government conspiracy not long after ETS. His powers didn't work on her, so they just locked her up and tried emotionally abusing her more to try to force her to work for them."
"When all the bad guys in the government finally got revealed and taken down, she was set free, but she was really messed up in the head, and she hated other humans for everything they had done to her. She joined up with the Shimmerists and kind of laid low for a while," Teal explained.
"But the past year or two, she has gotten really nasty and violent. She's been arrested a few times and banned from this mall, but somepony keeps bailing her out," Pink concluded.
"She's bad, evil," Teal whined. "She really hates humans and the government, but she also kinda hates everypony who isn't a Shimmerist."
I frowned as I considered this. I had lots of financial resources when I was a Shimmerist, but I was more the exception than the rule. Who could afford to keep bailing her out? "You said you were calling the police and would make sure they were humans. Does she avoid humans?"
"Her powers don't work on them. You have to have magic," Teal replied. "The more magic you have, the more it hurts when she touches you. Most humans, even if they have a little magic, don't feel much when she touches them, but it is painful to ponies."
"She hates humans, but can't hurt them. She wants to be a pony but is kryptonite to us. Ironic," I mused. "Where do I find her?"
"We don't know," Pink replied. "You don't want to find her. She'll hurt you. Just get the police."
I certainly was going to contact the authorities about this incident. She very overtly threatened my family and me. I needed to make a few calls.
"Thank you for returning me to my normal colors and for the information about Miss Rhymes with Pain. I'm not going to sue you or demand royalties, but I recommend changing up your naming strategy before you get yourself in trouble. You can post up my photo if you want, although I'm not sure that will make you many friends with the Shimmerists."
"Shimmerists don't come to this mall," Teal replied. "Just the occasional human Shimmerist."
"They don't like the whole Unity thing," Pink explained.
"Seeing your photo up on our wall will get us lots of business from the Blessingists, though," Teal said, cheering up at the prospect.
"And most everyone else," Pink added on. "An actual celebrity came to us for a coloring!"
I rolled my eyes again. "Whatever, just rethink the color naming strategy before some celebrity who doesn't take as kindly to it takes notice."
"Will do!" the two said in chorus. Ponies doing that would never cease to creep me out.
I left the shop and salon prepping to make calls. I'd call Number, then Rosetta, then Paul to let them know a regular psychopath was stalking us. I'd call the feds after. She had me terrified, that was for sure. She had gone around counting every member of my family here before she had stepped into the salon. She may have been in touching distance of each of Yinyu's foals and just outside the bus where my grandfoals were. Could Tempest put up a fight against her? I didn't know; I had no clue how much magic Tempest retained after becoming human, and no idea if Tempest was armed with any actual weapon, so she didn't have to engage in hand-to-hand combat. I knew Number and I would be helpless. Jess, sadly, had the next most experience putting up a fight against psychopaths out of those present, and she had too much magic to avoid being incapacitated by pain. As it stood, the Youngs were our best defense against her. I wasn't even sure how helpful Starlight would be here. If Fain's powers got more painful the more powerful the magic-user was, then Starlight was the most vulnerable member of our group.
More worrisome was that dangerous as Fain was; she couldn't be behind the barking. The question was whether she was a rogue threat acting on her own or if she was part of a concerted effort aimed at me. She clearly had someone with deep pockets on her side, and deep pockets meant the ability to muster multiple threats. And I had so many enemies.
When I got home tonight, it was time to start doing some research and finding out who exactly could be likely members of the league of evil assembled against me.