//------------------------------//
// Chapter Sixteen: Rebuke 
// Story: CRISIS: Equestria - Divergence, Book 3 
// by GanonFLCL 
//------------------------------//

Dawn had meticulously packed her suitcase with all of the necessary items she needed for the upcoming diplomatic retreat: a few changes of clothes—two professional dress suits and three casual dresses—her rechargeable toothbrush, a fresh bottle of her preferred shampoo, a fresh tube of her preferred toothpaste, a datapad containing the current series of novels she was reading, a portable music player loaded with classical music and equipped with a pair of tiny earbuds, a scarf in case it got cold, her make-up kit, and a backup pair of glasses. Two, actually. Just in case.

She knew that she wasn't forgetting anything. She'd checked five times and even used a checklist just to make sure, which had in turn been double-checked by a logistics program on her computer.

She didn't know exactly how long this retreat would take, so she knew she had to prepare for an extended stay in Hope's Point. Gray had delivered the news this morning: not only had Twilight and Winter taken an expedition down into the deep ocean, but the southern delegates were en route and would be arriving tomorrow afternoon. Dawn needed to be in Hope's Point well ahead of that so that she could physically and mentally prepare herself.

Curaçao knocked at the open door to Dawn's bedchambers to get her attention. "Have you gotten everything packed?" she asked.

Dawn nodded. "Yes. I have meticulously packed—"

"I know what was on your list," Curaçao interrupted with a grin. "I put it together myself. You do not need to repeat it to me. You are ready then, oui?"

"Yes." Dawn took a breath and nodded firmly, mostly to herself. "This is a momentous occasion, sister; New Pandemonium has never engaged in diplomatic relations with the southern nobility before outside of Champagne's trade agreements, and those were with minor lords and ladies, not the heads of the noble households."

"Oui, I can imagine that you're feeling pretty nervous. Not just for those reasons, of course."

"Naturally. A representative from House Silver will also be present. Father has not interacted with anypony from his old family for hundreds of years. He is not nervous himself, of course, but I am filled with… anxiety." Dawn shook her head. "House Silver is technically our family, albeit not by blood, and separated by generations. I have never met a 'distant' relative before…"

Curaçao set her hoof reassuringly on Dawn's back. "You will do fine, ma sœur. Her Majesty will be there to help smooth out any edges, non?"

"Yes. Yes, of course. Her Majesty already possesses a working relationship with all of the major noble houses; she will most assuredly ensure that there are as few troubles as possible in these proceedings. The successful resolution to this summit is imperative to the survival of not just New Pandemonium, but Hope's Point as well, and the Utopian and Zeb'ra'den societies."

"Oui. And do not worry, I will handle everything on this end, here in our city. You only need to concern yourself with your own mission."

"Naturally." Dawn paused for a moment. "Are you certain that we should not—"

Curaçao put a hoof to Dawn's lips. "No. That information stays between you and me; I have not even told Velvet and Insipid yet. Trust me when I tell you that it is better this way, for now."

"I still do not understand—"

"And that is why I insist. Let me handle that, Dawn. It will be better if I tell them in the first place, and I will choose the proper time and place to handle it; Havoc and Gray understood my reasoning, so you should as well." Curaçao then smiled and drew her little sister in to kiss her forehead. "Everything will be okay, ma sœur. Just trust me."

Dawn sighed and nodded. "Very well. Father has expressed to me on multiple occasions that he trusts your judgment on a multitude of topics, so I shall extend to you that same courtesy."

"Heh. Merci."

Another knock came at the door, and Dawn and Curaçao turned to see a young filly standing there, one of the Shadows: Serendipity. She was a white-coated pegasus with a short black mane with white stripes in the bangs. She also had a large splotch of black on her coat over her left eye that could be easily mistaken for a tattoo, but it wasn't. She was wearing a professional-looking dress suit, which Dawn approved of.

"Miss Dawn?" the filly said. She then nodded at Curaçao. "And Missus Curie. Hello."

Curaçao smiled. "Ah, bonjour, Serendipity. I like your outfit, c'est très pro."

The filly smiled back and ran a hoof along the chest pocket. "Thank you. It's my new work uniform." She then turned to Dawn. "Miss Dawn, could I ask you a question?"

Dawn hummed. "I was just preparing to depart for Hope's Point, as you are no doubt aware. But I suppose I have a few moments that I can spare for my apprentice if she has an inquiry that requires my insight."

"Well, it's less of a question and more of a… favor." Serendipity tapped her hooves together briefly. "I wanted to know if… could I come with you to Hope's Point, Miss Dawn?"

Dawn raised an eyebrow. "You wish to join me on my diplomatic retreat?"

"Yes ma'am. As your apprentice and the future leader of the Shadows once we are old enough to form a proper team, I feel it is my duty to learn more about my role. I have studied under you for years and learned a lot about how to delegate tasks and inspire others, but I haven't learned how to interact much with other ponies outside of the group.

"While I'm confident that I can handle these sorts of things on my own, I don't want to coast on supernatural luck all the time. I want to feel like I'm making it work out because I did a good job by myself."

Dawn considered this for a moment. On one hoof, taking Serendipity along would complicate matters slightly, as Dawn's arrangements were made specifically for her and her alone. Gray or Havoc might volunteer to help if things didn't work out as planned, but that was a complication in and of itself if the two continued to be insubordinate.

On the other hoof, the filly made a compelling argument, as there was no better way to learn the ins and outs of diplomacy than by sitting in on such an important summit. If Serendipity was to one day take over for Dawn as leader of not only the Shadows, but the entire city—Dawn knew that she would not have the same longevity that her father had—then it was only logical for her to learn from an early age how these things worked. 

Not to mention that if Serendipity met these southern nobles now, while she was young, she could already start forming beneficial relationships with them, or rather with their children. In politics it wasn't always a matter of what you knew, but who you knew that was important.

Dawn nodded in agreement. "While I am hesitant to bring anypony else along on this retreat, the logic in your suggestion is sound and wise. The benefits far outweigh the complications that could arise from having you along. So, yes, you may join me."

Serendipity smiled and pumped her hoof. "Yes. Thank you, Miss Dawn. I won't let you down."

"Of course you won't. If I might impose a few ground rules, however? You are there to observe, not to participate; I want no sudden outbursts, no speaking out of turn, no speaking unless spoken to, at least insofar as any actual meetings in which you are observing. You may interact freely with others outside of these proceedings, but you are to be on your best behavior. Is that understood?"

"Yes ma'am."

"Good."

Curaçao smiled and approached Serendipity to pat her shoulder. "After what I just witnessed, I think you might just be a successful diplomat already, oui?"

Serendipity smiled. "Thank you, Missus Curie."

"I suppose that you are also looking forward to seeing your friend Sunspire again?" Curaçao asked with a cheeky grin.

Serendipity nodded. "Yes ma'am. As a member of my team I wanted to check in on him and get a report—"

"Mmhmm," Curaçao murmured, her grin widening. "It is alright to admit to wanting to see your friend because you miss him."

Dawn, eyebrow raised, interjected, "Why would she want to go to Hope's Point in order to see Sunspire?"

Curaçao blinked. "Because Sunspire is in Hope's Point? Still in Hope's Point, I might add? Velvet has been quite upset about the fact that he has been there for an entire month, far longer than you initially suggested he would be gone."

Now, Dawn blinked, looking at the floor as she processed this information. "No, that cannot be accurate. Sunspire is currently in the tower's library, is he not? He finished his expedition with Winter quite some time ago."

"Oui, and you didn't bring him back during any of your visits to Hope's Point since then," Curaçao said, her expression somewhere between angry and disbelieving. "Are you telling me that you forgot?"

Dawn shook her head. "No, of course not. Sunspire must have requested that he remain in Hope's Point for the time being, likely to assist with the issues that have arisen there over the past month. Failing that, Winter most assuredly requested that he stay for that same reason. I must have forgotten to inform Velvet about it. Would you take care of that for me?"

"Mmhmm. Well, ma sœur, just make sure that when you return home this time, you bring him along with you." A brief tilt of her head towards Serendipity. "And Serendipity as well, oui?"

Dawn rolled her eyes. "Of course, sister."

Curaçao shook her head, then turned back to Serendipity with a smile. "Have fun, Serendipity."

"Thanks, Missus Curie," the filly replied.

After Curaçao left, Dawn turned her attention to Serendipity as well. "I will depart in ten minutes. You have that long to prepare yourself for the trip; pack a suitcase—"

Serendipity reached out into the hallway and pulled in a small suitcase. "Already packed, Miss Dawn."

"You… you are?"

With a big grin, Serendipity replied, "I already knew you'd say yes, Miss Dawn. I guess you could say it was a lucky guess."


*****


Serendipity had never been outside Pandora Tower before. It wasn't explicitly forbidden, apart from a short period following the attack on Miss Velvet that got Caramel hurt; Overseer Pedigree had since lifted that temporary ban once the sandstorm had cleared, though he required that all Shadows leaving the tower had to do so with armed guards. Serendipity had just never taken advantage of the privilege. She wasn't interested in joining Rebel's little skyball team and she couldn't imagine herself in Razzle's high-society clique.

She'd never actually thought much about leaving the tower, either. Miss Dawn did all of her work inside the tower outside of a few major exceptions—emergencies that required her physical presence, naturally—and so that was where Serendipity would spend most of her time too. She had no reason to want to leave, not when everything she needed or wanted was right at home, within easy reach.

But then Sunspire left the tower to go on some sort of "adventure". Miss Velvet had called it an expedition, but that was just another word for adventure. It hurt just a little bit that Sunspire hadn't told her that he was going out into the Wastelands. She was even just a little bit worried about him; the Wastelands were supposed to be dangerous, even if he did supposedly have a good guide with him. What if he got hurt? What if he was lonely?

Now, though, she was here, in Hope's Point, the so-called Jewel of the North—she was careful never to use that nickname around Miss Dawn, of course. The city wasn't nearly as big as New Pandemonium was, and even the tallest buildings here were small compared to some of the taller buildings back home, and that didn't even include Pandora Tower. All of the ponies seemed nice enough, not at all the sorts of ponies she expected from what Miss Dawn said about them. And it was so clean.

She didn't know what to make of the fact that the city had both a surface level and an underground level, the latter of which she and Miss Dawn walked through now. Sure, she knew the city's history, but it still seemed so odd to her; being underground, as a pegasus like herself, was just an odd, odd, odd sensation. Her body luckily didn't have to rely on her eyes to know which way was up.

The royal palace, though, was a treat. It was a series of towers arranged around a central structure, all of it colored in the gold and red colors of Hope's Point, and all of it decorated in Hope's Point livery. The city's emblem was a black lighthouse on a field of gold and red, a symbol that inspired hope and progress; this contrasted with New Pandemonium's black flaming sword against a field of just red, a symbol of strength and war.

She and Dawn were greeted at the gates to the palace and allowed entry after only a few seconds, just enough time for the guards to acknowledge their presence and identify them. They were greeted again once they got inside, this time by a mare who Serendipity knew was Her Majesty Queen Blackburn herself, in the flesh; she was accompanied by a smaller mare, a bodyguard if Serendipity had to guess.

"Shadow Associate Dawn," Blackburn said simply with a brief nod of acknowledgement.

"Your Majesty," Dawn replied, her own nod a little deeper. "I hope that my arrival is not too early and inconveniences you. I wanted to ensure that I am physical and mentally prepared—"

"Don't need an explanation. Understand completely, agree with you." Blackburn's gaze turned towards Serendipity. "Had originally planned to arrange a hotel for you, as before. New guest altered my plans. You are?"

Serendipity bowed, as was appropriate before royalty; she'd been taught well and knew how to act. "Serendipity, Your Highness."

"My apprentice," Dawn clarified, adjusting her glasses. "I wished to have her along so that she could observe the diplomatic summit and perhaps obtain knowledge as to how such proceedings are handled. It was her suggestion."

"Hmm. Acceptable," Blackburn agreed. "Would allow the same for Bluebolt were she older, if she wanted."

Blackburn then nodded and turned her attention back to Dawn. "Because of additional party, have decided to put you up in the palace as official guest. Environment more appropriate for a young filly, more comfortable. Accommodations being made to room; unexpected development, not ready yet. Will be soon. Until then, you may leave your things with palace staff, relax in lounge."

"Ah, thank you, but no thank you, Your Majesty," Dawn said. "We will certainly leave our luggage with your staff to deliver to our guest quarters, but Serendipity and I have some other arrangements to attend to, namely that I must speak with my sister Gray to obtain a standard report from her."

Blackburn raised an eyebrow. "And Havoc?"

"Hmm. I suppose I could pay her a visit. Though we are no longer associated professionally, I still feel it prudent to check-in with her on other professional matters; Curaçao still consults with her in regards to Admiral Jetstream and I wish to ensure that such discussions are proceeding well."

"Hmph. As to be expected. Assume you are bringing your ward along, will advise you to keep her close. Wouldn't want you to forget her someplace."

Dawn raised an eyebrow. "Would you care to clarify your meaning, Your Majesty? I am afraid I do not understand what you are referring to… ah. My apologies. I was unaware that you were under the same impression that Curaçao was. I have not 'forgotten' Sunspire here, he merely requested that he be allowed to remain here and assist in the endeavors surrounding Pandemonia."

Blackburn narrowed her eyes. "Indeed? Never mentioned this. Another 'secret'?"

"Oh no, not at all. It merely slipped my mind in all the excitement of the past few days, you understand."

"Hmm… very well. Can only take you at face value for now anyway; will confer with Sunspire when he returns."

"When he returns from where?"

"From the deep sea expedition. Winter and Twilight allowed him to accompany them."

Dawn nodded in understanding. "Ah. A good decision. His special abilities will benefit them in their search as it did for the expedition into the gryphon ruins.

Serendipity felt her heart and stomach sink a bit. "You mean… Sunspire isn't here? He's going off on some dangerous mission again?"

Dawn gave Serendipity a look; it was rare that she would direct that look towards Serendipity of all ponies. "Surely the mission holds no danger, otherwise Twilight would not have allowed him to come along. There is no need to worry about him."

"Perhaps. If danger is present, Twilight will keep him safe," Blackburn said, giving a much softer look to Serendipity. "Will agree that worrying accomplishes nothing, however." Her gaze went back to Dawn. "Now, you wish to leave luggage here, will accept, allow you to go about your business. Otherwise, would prefer you kept your distance until summit. And beyond, if possible."

Dawn paused, then took a short breath and nodded. "Very well, I will put forth maximum effort not to intrude upon your privacy so long as we are on this retreat, Your Majesty." She gestured for Serendipity to follow her. "Come along, Serendipity. We will visit with my sisters and carry on from there."

"Yes ma'am," Serendipity said with a nod.

As they left, Serendipity glanced back briefly to get a look at Blackburn as she watched them go. She'd never claim to be as good at reading ponies as, say, Missus Curie was—nopony was as far as Serendipity knew—but she could see the way the queen looked at Miss Dawn, and it was not a pleasant look. There was a fire in her eyes there, more than just a simple dislike, but there was also… something else. Serendipity couldn't put her hoof on it.

The queen's eyes met hers briefly, though, and softened immediately before she turned away and began attending to her own business. Serendipity was used to seeing softness in Miss Velvet's eyes, but this was different too, and again was something she didn't quite understand.

The trip back up to the embassy where Missus Gray lived was short and quiet. Miss Dawn despised small talk and only ever participated in it if absolutely necessary or if somepony else initiated it, and she usually tried to swiftly get out of it. Serendipity had learned very early on that it was best to stay quiet and only speak when spoken to, or if there was an absolutely critical piece of observation that needed to be expressed.

As such, she didn't say anything either, just looked around the city and compared it to what she'd heard and read about it over the years. For the most part she felt as if the city's old reputation as a pirate haven of debauchery and sin had hardly been earned; there were certainly establishments here and there that Serendipity could tell were not meant for little colts and fillies or even most upstanding adults, but they had those up north too, didn't they?

And the ponies here seemed to be, as she'd observed earlier, nice enough folks. They dressed like the northerners did—though the fashion sense was different—and walked like the northerners did, they had varied accents like the northerners did and most of them were originally from the north anyway. 

Miss Dawn was supposedly trying to broker peace with these ponies, but Serendipity had to wonder: why were they even at war in the first place? How could anypony hate other ponies that weren't really all that different, and for no good reason?

When she and Dawn arrived at the embassy, the door was answered a moment later by a unicorn stallion in what looked like a butler costume… or maybe he was actually a real butler? "Ah, Shadow Associate Dawn, welcome," the stallion greeted with a polite bow. "Madam Skies has been expecting you. She was not expecting any additional company, however."

Dawn gestured at Serendipity briefly and with only her eyes to let her know she should introduce herself, which she did.

The butler nodded politely. "A pleasure, Miss Serendipity."

He then gestured for Dawn to enter, which she did without so much as an acknowledgement. Serendipity followed right behind, though she at least nodded in thanks to the stallion, who gave her a little grin in turn before closing the door behind them and then hurrying ahead of Dawn to lead the way inside.

After ascending some stairs they found Gray Skies in what looked like an office, though not an office like Dawn's. Dawn's office had originally belonged to her father and she hadn't done anything to change it, at least according to Dawn herself. It had a minimalistic design to it, unladen by decorations that would normally inhabit an office; Missus Curie's office had lots of decorations, for instance, mostly photographs of her family.

Missus Gray's office was more of a mix between the two, relatively minimalistic but with clear personal touches that Miss Dawn's didn't have, like a mini fridge in the corner and a family photo—just the one—on the desk. Missus Gray herself was leaned back in a comfortable, reclining office chair, her rear hooves kicked up on her desk, staring up at the ceiling and tossing a ball up, catching it, then repeating.

"Madam Skies, the Shadow Associate has arrived, as well as an additional guest, a Miss Serendipity," said the butler as he showed the mare and filly into the room.

"Thanks Highbrow," Gray said without taking her attention off her ball-tossing. "That'll be all for now."

"Of course, Madam." He then bowed and headed off elsewhere into the house.

"Gray," Dawn said simply, taking a step forward. "As I communicated to you before my departure, I wish to be provided with a status report to overview during my stay here in Hope's Point. It is imperative that I am up-to-date on the situation here so that I may best formulate my negotiation process."

"Uh-huh. I'll get it to you."

Dawn blinked. "You do not have it already prepared?"

"Nah. I don't do the report work this early in the day. This is the time I set aside for calls, meetings, and other stuff like that. You're the only meeting I've got scheduled today, actually, so I'm taking it easy until lunchtime."

"So you do not utilize your substantial unassigned time to perform other tasks?"

"Nah. I've got a system and it works."

Dawn's eye twitched. "How long must I wait for the report?"

"I'll get it to you when I get it to you."

Dawn snorted and took another step forward. "Sister, I tolerate a lot of unorthodox behavior from you," she said through clenched teeth, "but this is an unacceptable work ethic from a pony in your political position. I will not have you delay my planned schedule because of your sheer laziness."

"Hmm." Gray shrugged. "Nah. If you don't like it, tough. Like I said: I've got a system, and it works. You've never complained about it before. Why start now?"

"Because I was unaware that you possessed such extraordinary dilatoriness, more than I ever remember you displaying in years past." Dawn shook her head. "Your performance reflects upon me, and I will not allow my own reputation to be tarnished because of your ineptitude."

"What are you gonna do, fire me? Like you tried to do to Havoc?"

"The thought had crossed my mind."

Gray smirked and shook a little with laughter; she still did not take her eyes off of the ceiling. "Go on then. Do it. But you're gonna have to explain it to Curaçao when you get home. She likes my report schedule; I set it up to make things comfortable for her. Anypony else gets put in here, they're either gonna screw up the good thing Curie and I have, or they're just gonna do what I've been doing anyway."

Dawn grumbled something under her breath. "Fine. Deliver that report to me as soon as it has been completed. I would prefer to at the very least read it over dinner. Is that acceptable, or would that impede upon your lethargic lifestyle?"

"Dinnertime's fine, sure."

"Good. Now then, are there any other matters to discuss?"

"Nope. I don't have anything more to say to you."

"Very well. Then I will take—"

Gray then caught the ball and stopped. "Wait wait, that's not right. I do have one thing to say. Almost forgot." She turned her attention fully to Dawn now. "You know that Pandemonia woke up again about a week ago, and how she's walking around now, right?"

Serendipity had no idea who or what "Pandemonia" was; Miss Dawn had never mentioned… "her", apparently. Was Pandemonia a pony?

Dawn raised an eyebrow. "Hmm? Yes, I am aware of this. Is this somehow relevant to your report?"

"Sure is. See, she wanted to take a look around the city, y'know, get a feel for all the stuff she missed out on over the time she's been gone. Flathoof and I offered to give her a few tours around to help her come to terms with all the changes, and to help her get acclimated to her new body. My idea."

"Really? That shows a surprising amount of initiative coming from you, enough that I would be willing to guess that this was your husband's idea, not your own."

Gray smirked and tapped her hoof on her desk. "See, there's one of those back-hoofed compliments again. The kind of stuff that gets Havoc all riled up." She shook her head. "Not me, though. I don't need to get angry about it. You know why?"

Dawn snorted. "I do not even understand what you mean by 'back-hoofed compliment', but I suppose you are going to give me some spiel about it?"

"Oh, no, nothing like that. I'm gonna tell you how I'm getting back at you."

"How you… what? Provide me with some clarification, sister. This prattling of yours sounds like nothing more than nonsensical drivel."

Gray smiled. "Well, y'know, I'm supposed to be representing how great our city up north is, right? Yeah… I haven't been doing that with her. In fact, I've been doing nothing but tell her how great Hope's Point is, how it's this city—not ours—that truly exemplifies every value that she represents: a triumph over adversity."

Dawn's eye twitched. "Gray, you know that that is a complete misrepresentation of events—"

Gray barked out a laugh. "Ha! Is it, though? I can guarantee you that Dad would agree with me on this one. He even said it himself: Nihila did everything she could to destroy cities like Hope's Point from even getting started. Hope's Point's founders are the only ones that resisted, the only ones who stood up to Nihila—to us—and said that they weren't going down without a fight.

"So yeah, I've been going on about how great this city is and how lousy ours is. I've told her all about how New Pandemonium does nothing but try to crush everypony down, and how most of the ponies who do rise above it all just treat everypony below them like garbage. But you don't even need me to tell you that; you've met folks like Treasurer Vendetta, like Taskmaster Concrete. They're not exceptions to the rule, they are the rule."

Dawn's teeth were grinding together so loudly that Serendipity could hear them. "Then perhaps I had better set the record straight with her."

"Oh, you can try," Gray said with a smirk. "But I think I've put the idea in her head by now that Hope's Point is the real Jewel of the North." She then leaned back in her seat and started tossing the ball again. "Just thought I'd let ya know. Wanted to do it face-to-face."

Dawn seethed in place for a moment, then turned for the door. "Come along, Serendipity. I have nothing more to do here."

Serendipity was about to turn and follow, when Gray called out to her. "Oh, hey! Serendipity, you don't have to go if you don't want to."

"Huh?" she asked.

"I know it's been a long time, kiddo," Gray said, sitting up in her seat and turning to her with a smile. "You're looking good. You got pretty tall, actually."

"Oh. Um, thank you Missus Gray," Serendipity said with a nod.

"If you want, you can stick around here for a little bit. Green Guard gets home from school in an hour or so and I just know he'd dig seeing you again, like he did with Sunspire. They're pretty good friends now from what I've seen."

Serendipity blinked; she was shocked. Shocked. "Green Guard is friends with Sunspire?"

"I'm pretty sure, yeah. Sunspire was over here every other day to chat with him, it feels like." Gray tilted her head. "Green's a bit more sociable than he was last time you saw him. It's been, what, five years right?"

"That's right. You really think he'd want to see me? We were never friends before."

Gray smiled wide. "Sure! He wasn't friends with Sunspire before, either, so why not?"

Serendipity smiled and looked at Dawn, who was most decidedly not smiling at the moment. "Um… Miss Dawn, can I—

"Do whatever you like, Serendipity," Dawn said simply. "Just be back to the palace before bedtime; I will not tolerate you waking me by coming back to our guest chambers late at night, understood?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"And remember, you are representing more than just New Pandemonium, you are representing me. I expect you to be on your best behavior."

"Yes ma'am."

Dawn grunted and turned to the door. "Then I will see you again when you return to the palace. If you require an escort, I am certain that Ambassador Skies can accommodate you."

Serendipity watched her go, unsure what to make of what had just happened. She certainly felt lucky that Miss Dawn had agreed to let her stay, but she didn't feel all too happy about it. She'd never seen Miss Dawn talk with any of her sisters like this before, or rather, she'd never seen any of Dawn's sisters talk to her like Missus Gray just did. Were they on bad terms right now? That certainly didn't feel like any normal argument.

Well, whatever the reason, she hoped that this was the last of it that Miss Dawn would have to deal with for the rest of the day.


*****


Obtaining Havoc's new address had been rather simple, though Dawn found herself rather unamused with what the destination looked like. This was where Havoc lived now? A little insignificant shack that sat along a row of other, identical shacks? She'd been under the impression that Havoc had good relations with Queen Blackburn and King Lockwood; surely they wouldn't allow a close companion to live in such squalor?

She walked up the path in the front yard and made her way to the door, then gave it a short little knock and waited.

It seemed as though the information she'd received was accurate, because Havoc answered the door, wearing nothing but a casual shirt with some foul language written on it. "Dawn? The fuck are you doing here?" she asked, genuinely surprised.

"I will be in Hope's Point for a period of days to attend the diplomatic summit that Her Majesty is organizing. Surely you are aware of it?" Dawn asked, adjusting her glasses.

"Well, yeah, I know all about that whole thing. I wasn't really gonna get involved with it though, so I didn't know you'd even been invited. Or did you just invite yourself and everypony else just let you have your way like usual?"

Dawn grunted; her sister certainly knew how to grate her nerves in a hurry. "On the contrary. As the southern delegates will be discussing matters regarding Pandemonia, Nihila, and how we plan on moving forward with our world's future, it was a logical decision to include New Pandemonium in the discussions."

"Yeah, or they just need you there because they need to talk to Dad," Havoc scoffed. "Otherwise Curaçao or Gray should be there instead."

"Curaçao has other matters to attend to back home in regards to our search for Nihila, and Gray is the ambassador to Hope's Point only, not to the entirety of the world; she has no business being involved with these proceedings."

"Spoken like the wonderful sister you are."

"Honey? Who's at the door?" asked a voice from behind Havoc.

"It's nopony, babe, don't worry about it," Havoc called back.

A mare came up to Havoc's side dressed in a bathrobe, her damp mane indicating that she'd just gotten out of the shower.

"Oh. Hello," the mare said when she saw Dawn standing there; she wasn't smiling, which was rather rude. "I know you. You're Havoc's sister Dawn, right? I remember you from the royal wedding a while back."

Dawn tilted her head slightly. "That is correct. I am afraid that I do not know you, however. You say that you remember me from the wedding, but I cannot recall your face whatsoever."

"I was Havoc's date?"

Dawn shook her head. "That does not assist me in my recollection of events."

"Are you sure?" the mare asked, tapping her chin. "I'm pretty sure we introduced ourselves."

"Just forget it, babe, she didn't pay attention to anything that didn't have to do with her or revolved around something she could use to make herself look good," Havoc growled.

"My name's Cotton," the mare said, offering her hoof; at least she'd finally learned some manners. "Cotton Rose."

Dawn didn't take the other mare's hoof right away, but she did once it was clear she wasn't still wet from the shower. "Golden Dawn," she said simply. "But you already knew that, apparently."

"Look, what are you doing here?" Havoc snorted. "You know I'm not with the NPAF anymore, and you sure as hell know I don't want to talk to you."

Dawn closed her eyes and took a short breath; Havoc always did have to be difficult to deal with. "You are assisting Curaçao with the matter of Admiral Jetstream and his integration into our inner circle. I am merely checking in, so to speak, to ensure that this task is still being performed to a satisfactory degree."

Havoc took a step forward and poked Dawn in the chest. "You don't get to check in on me anymore, Dawn. I don't work for you, I don't work for your fucking city, and I don't want to talk to you. Curie and I have our arrangements, so that's gonna have to be good enough."

"Considering that I am in charge of all Committee proceedings and that Curaçao acts on my orders, I believe I am entitled to know—"

Havoc took another step forward, her nose just inches from Dawn's. "Fuck. You. I don't want to talk to you. If you make me say it again—"

"Honey, maybe you should just head back inside," Cotton suggested, running her hoof on Havoc's back. "You know you're supposed to be trying to take it easy."

Dawn raised an eyebrow. "Why does she need to 'take it easy'?"

"Not that it's any of your business, but the doc says that I fucked up some of my recovery process because I'm stressed out all the time," Havoc grunted, teeth bared. "No thanks to you, of course. I'm supposed to try and keep calm and find healthier outlets for my stress."

"Which means you should just head back inside, hop on the couch, and relax," Cotton said, a little more emphatically. "I'll give you a lil' massage in a few minutes, 'kay?"

"Yeah… alright." Havoc snorted at Dawn, then turned back around and headed into the house without another word.

Dawn grunted and shook her head, then turned to leave; this had proven an unfortunate waste of time, but then most things revolving around Havoc were.

"Hey, do you mind if I ask you something?" Cotton said before Dawn even got all the way off the porch.

Dawn rolled her eyes and turned back to the mare. "I have more important matters to attend to over the course of the day. Unless this is of crucial importance—"

"It is."

"Very well," Dawn sighed. "What is it?"

Cotton tapped her chin. "Well, actually, it's not so much a question as it is a statement. I wanted you to know something."

"Yes? Get on with it."

"That mare in there?" Cotton said, gesturing towards the house with her hoof. "I love her more than anything in the world. She makes me happy, and I like to think that I make her happy too. That's why I married her."

Dawn raised an eyebrow; she had to have misheard that. "What nonsense is this? Havoc isn't married."

"Yeah, she is. To me. She made it a point not to tell you or even invite you, but I'm making it a point to let you know now."

"Why?"

Cotton stepped down the porch until she was inches away from Dawn. "Because I wanted to tell you to stay away from her."

Dawn scoffed; this mare was clearly hysterical, which explained a lot. "You have no authority over me."

"As her partner, yeah, I kinda do. It's my responsibility to look after the mare that I love, to protect her from things that would hurt her however I can, and the one and only thing that can still hurt her is you. So stay away from her." Cotton gestured back at the house again. "This is our house, and you're not welcome here.

"I don't want you talking to her in person, I don't want you trying to talk to her with that little telepathy thing you have, I don't want you writing her a letter or giving her a phone call." She then poked Dawn in the chest to emphasize each word: "Stay. Away. From. Her."

Dawn sneered and adjusted her glasses; they'd come askew from the poking. "Or what? Do you know who I am?"

"I know exactly who you are, Golden Dawn, and I don't care. I wouldn't care if you were the Empress of the World and the strongest unicorn to ever walk the earth. I'm warning you now: if you do anything to make my Havoc upset again, I'm gonna make you wish that you hadn't. Got it?"

"Hmph. It is evident why Havoc would join with you in matrimony: you are both brutish, uncouth, barbaric individuals who are under the delusion that you are more powerful than you actually are. Good day, Missus Rose."

With that, Dawn turned and stormed off without so much as looking back.


*****


Dawn returned to the royal palace sometime after mid-afternoon, having only stopped briefly for a small lunch break before continuing about her day. She'd expected to be getting back around dinnertime so that she could make some preparations before it was time for sleep, but she'd finished far sooner than she'd originally anticipated.

Serendipity wasn't here yet, likely because she was still spending time at the embassy with Green Guard… that was the name of one of the Shadows, wasn't it? No, it couldn't be. Sure, Gray had made mention of a few things that indicated that this "Green Guard" would know who Serendipity and Sunspire were, but there was no way it was the same Green Guard. He was still up north at Pandora Tower, wasn't he? She'd have to check when she got back.

No matter. What mattered was that Dawn currently had a fair amount of free time that she didn't originally plan to have, but that tended to happen when plans fell through unexpectedly. 

So, since she wasn't hungry enough to partake in an earlier dinner, and since she didn't have a report from Gray to look over yet, and since Serendipity hadn't returned, she had to kill time somehow. She did so by sitting on the room's comfortable sofa, leaning back with her music player in her hoof, and listening to some music while trying to take a nap.

As for why she had so much time to herself, it had been rather strange, actually. She'd been disappointed but not entirely surprised that Gray and Havoc had stonewalled her attempts to obtain information so readily; it was to be expected since the two were currently "upset" with her because they didn't agree with how she ran things, but eventually they would have to come around.

It was the other ponies who she attempted to meet with, and who had declined her invitations, that came as a bit of a surprise.

"Sorry, Dawn," Applejack had said. Dawn had found her in the city's militia barracks, specifically in their gymnasium, training with Captain Flathoof. "I'd love ta have a chat with ya but as y'all can plainly see, I'm busy wit' trainin'."

"Training for what, might I inquire?" Dawn had asked.

"Fer whatever might come at us if we're gonna fight against Nihila ta save everypony? I mean, I figured that'd be obvious."

"Ah. A wonderful notion, and an admirable application of forethought. If only my other sisters were quite so willing to take actual initiative, aside from Curaçao of course. Gray would rather laze about all day and complain that I am interrupting her 'schedule' than provide me with any sort of update as to her progress here as Ambassador."

Flathoof had grunted, but not said anything. An odd reaction. Did he disagree? Surely not. As Gray's husband he would most certainly be more aware than anypony how much of a lackadaisical layabout Gray was.

"Look, Dawn, if'n y'all don't mind, you're distractin' me somethin' fierce," Applejack then said before turning back to whatever it was she'd been doing before. "Maybe another time."

"Very well, another time then."

Dawn had then sought out Rarity, finding her in the city's fashion district. She was accompanied oddly enough by a zebra mare. Dawn had never met a zebra before, so she very much was looking forward to having the opportunity to have a conversation with the two. It would be like killing two birds with one stone: information obtained from Rarity as to what may have transpired during her stay here during the sandstorm, and a chance to converse with a zebra.

"Dawn, dear, you'll simply have to forgive us," Rarity had said, not at all stopping her pace along the sidewalk. "My darling friend Zyra and I are going gift shopping you see, and I simply cannot allow you to accompany us, as you may just spoil the surprise."

Dawn had scoffed at that. "Preposterous. I am well-acquainted with the importance of keeping secrets. Whoever is to receive this gift would never learn about it from me."

"Oh, but what if the gift is for you? Then you would ruin your own surprise, would you not?"

"Hmm. No, that is a logical conclusion. Perhaps afterwards—"

"Oh goodness no, dear, we're going to be shopping for quite a while," Rarity tutted, nose in the air. "I simply must pick out the perfect gift, and that will take me some time if I'm to do so discreetly enough that whomever is to receive the gift does not become aware of it before I deliver it."

"Aha. Very well." Dawn tilted her head towards the zebra… Zyra? "You are Zyra, yes? I have never met a zebra before. Perhap I could partake in a conversation—"

Zyra shook her head firmly. "No."

"That…  was a remarkably straightforward response. Why not?"

"Because I don't want to, mostly." She tilted her head towards Rarity. "And because I am accompanying Lady Rarity on her shopping trip. I cannot both converse with you and accompany her, and I would rather do the latter."

Dawn paused, confused momentarily by the "Lady" Rarity remark, then shook it off and nodded. "Yes, of course, that is another logical conclusion. Very well. Another time, perhaps?"

"If we have time, darling, we'll consider it," Rarity said as she dragged Zyra away. "But I've been oh-so dreadfully busy lately. I just don't know when I'll be able to find the time. Anyway, we simply must be going. Ta ta!"

Dawn watched them walk off. "Ta ta…? Hmm."

With that option exhausted, Dawn's next target was Fluttershy, who was quite conveniently located in the same place as Pinkie Pie, whom Dawn planned on seeking out afterwards anyway. 

She found them both at the royal palace in one of the wings that had some sort of… "play" room? There were assorted toys and games all over the room, which the two mares were using to entertain Princess Bluebolt and Princess Fireglow, the daughter and son of Queen Blackburn.

Bluebolt had similar coloration to her mother, albeit with her father's golden eyes. Fireglow, on the other hoof, looked nothing like either parent, with a bright red coat and a golden blond mane. His eyes still resembled his father's, though. Both were dressed comfortably in airy, light outfits.

"Aha, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, how fortuitous that I should happen to locate the two of you within the same vicinity," she'd said. "As the saying goes, 'like killing two birds with one stone'."

Fluttershy frowned. "Please don't use that turn of phrase, Dawn."

"Hmm? Why not? Did I use it incorrectly? It was my understanding that this precise situation perfectly fits within the parameters appropriate for that particular idiom. It is a southern expression in which one successfully accomplishes two separate goals with one single action."

Fluttershy narrowed her eyes. "I know what the saying means. I didn't ask you to explain it. I asked you not to use it."

"Oh. Hmm. Very well." Dawn shrugged and adjusted her glasses. "At any rate, I was hoping to have a conversation with the two of you in regards to any information you can provide me as to your trials and tribulations over the course of the past few weeks, or lack thereof. My sisters did not provide me with any such updates, and so I am seeking it directly from the source."

"Uh, well, we're kind of busy right now actually," said Pinkie, gesturing at the young Fireglow who was bouncing in her lap and giggling… quite loudly.

"I can see that, certainly, but surely you can still—"

"Nnnnope!" Pinkie then swept Fireglow up and danced about the room with Fireglow, earning more giggles and some clapping as well. "Too busy! Dancing with a little colt! Byyeeee!"

Dawn blinked and turned to Fluttershy, who wasn't actually doing anything immediately obvious with Bluebolt, just watching her fly about the ceiling. "Well, if Pinkie is too preoccupied—"

"I'm busy too, Dawn," Fluttershy said simply. "Sorry. Maybe some other time."

"But… but you are not in the midst of any sort of strenuous activity that would constitute a distraction."

"I guess I'm not."

"So… then you are not too busy?"

"Oh no, I'm definitely too busy. I have to keep an eye on Bluebolt just in case anything happens, hmm? Much too busy."

Dawn looked up to see that Bluebolt wasn't even actually flying around, just drawing artwork on the ceiling using some crayons. The art was atrocious. "I… but…" She sighed and rolled her eyes. "Very well. I do not understand much about the caretaking of youths, it seems, as I cannot see any reason why you cannot spare some attention."

"No, I suppose you wouldn't," Fluttershy quipped, a hint of… something in her voice. Not anger, certainly; Fluttershy didn't get angry, that was something that anypony and everypony knew as a point of fact. Very strange; perhaps she had something stuck in her throat that was causing discomfort? A popcorn kernel, most likely, which were quite vexatious little annoyances.

With that, Dawn then… returned to her room, as she had no other individuals whom she could interview. She knew better than to attempt to get Queen Blackburn engaged in a private conversation just yet—the situation there was horribly delicate—and she was under no delusions that she could attempt the same with her husband King Lockwood and expect anything different. And with Winter, Twilight, and Rainbow off on the expedition, that left her with nothing.

The issue here was obvious, of course: everypony was just so preoccupied and concerned with the news of this world being in danger that they were stressed beyond belief. Clearly they were merely trying to distract themselves from the truth until an opportunity presented itself to give them something better to do.

After all, what other reason could they possibly have for not acquiescing to Dawn's requests?


*****


Twilight had been on an airship before, though apart from the very short trip from the Checkpoint to Hope's Point, the only airships she'd ever been on had been back at home, and those were… decidedly different from the ones in this world in pretty much every way. She'd been on a boat before, too—airships back home were basically just boats that could fly, but she meant a sea boat—but she'd never been on one that could travel underwater.

In fact, the last time she could remember being underwater for an extended period of time was when dealing with the Storm King's invasion. Those had been less than pleasant circumstances, even though the results ended up being enjoyable in the end. Traveling through the water under the ocean at depths that she knew should be crushing their vessel like a tin can was, well, exciting.

"How in the world does this ship survive being down here at this depth?" she'd asked relatively early on into their journey, looking out one of the large portside windows at the sandy ocean floor; she'd expected to see some kind of sea life, but there wasn't any.

The Comet Chaser's engineer, Copper Blaze, responded, "Are you asking for a super-detailed explanation, or are you asking that as like a real basic 'how does this work?' kinda deal? 'Cause I can totally do both. Or either."

Twilight gave Copper a big grin. "Oh, I'd love a detailed explanation."

"Radical. The Comet Chaser used to be one of the fleet's standard cargo ships, but as a part of the peace treaty agreements we all had to start converting our ships to new purposes. Captain Ember volunteered us for the new deep sea exploration program; Her Majesty figured that if we had the resources, we might as well start seeing what's down here, yeah?

"So, like all airships in the fleet, we're equipped with a shield system that protects against outside elements. These new shields are fully powered by the ship itself, rather than using the old Diffusion system." Copper held up her hoof. "Don't ask about it. I don't know how the gnarly old system worked, just that it did. And we don't use it anymore anyway. And Her Majesty doesn't want anypony talking about it.

"Anyway, the new shields still defend our ships against stuff like the Belt of Tranquility or most of the NPAF's airship-grade weapons, but they also protect us from water pressure down here under the sea and stuff. So… that's how the ship survives down here. Yup! Pretty rad, right?"

Twilight tilted her head. "That's the detailed explanation? I was expecting a detailed account of all the numerical data or something, like how many watts the shields require and what level of pressure they can handle."

Copper's eyes widened a bit. "Ohhh. Well, I can't give that information to you. That's, like, trade secret stuff, my dude. Princess dude."

Twilight sighed quietly, then smiled and nodded politely back. "Well, you at least gave me some kind of idea about what's going on." She looked back out the window. "Why aren't there any fish down here, though? Or any sea life at all, actually? There's no coral, or seaweed, or clams or crabs or oysters. Nothing. Just a bunch of sand and rocks."

"Oh, that's easy. The water out there's real gnarly and stuff, filled with like… well, not pollution, 'cause Hope's Point is really clean like that, but like…" Copper tapped her chin. "Y'know how there's this whole Wastelands thing goin' on up on the surface?"

Twilight nodded. "Yeah. I got a chance to see it for myself, and it certainly lives up to its name. It's like a mix of badlands and desert, but with none of the life you'd expect from either of those."

"Right right, same thing down here. It's like… an underwater Wasteland. Only at least there aren't any Gargantuans down here to try and tear you apart and stuff, heh. Imagine trying to dive out here and you've also gotta deal with mutant bug monsters. Totally bogus."

Twilight's mind drifted to Aculeata briefly, and she wondered how her new friend was doing. There was no gentle way that Twilight could think of for her to tell the Gargantuan queen that she was the last of her kind; Twilight didn't even know what the heck had happened that caused that in the first place. Apparently the other queens—ones who apparently hadn't changed like Aculeata had—went to war with each other and killed one another?

It was a horrifying thought.

Hopefully Aculeata's development meant that Twilight could figure out something to do so that maybe, just maybe, they would be able to keep her race alive. Maybe Aculeata and her future children wouldn't be the same Gargantuans that everypony knew and feared before, but that could only be a good thing, right? And if her theory was correct, if Acuelata really was developing into some sort of… proto-changeling, then maybe there was a chance. 

Especially when—not if—she and her friends saved this world and brought Aculeata back to their Equestria. King Thorax might know something that could help.

"So there's really no life down here at all?" Twilight asked, her hoof on the glass of the port window.

Copper shook her head. "Not on the northside, no. Once you get to the other side of the Belt, though, yeah, you'll see life all over the place. Ooh, if you ever get a chance to visit Seaside, you've gotta try their seaweed rolls. They're righteous. My fave's got avocado and cucumber and this salty tofu stuff. I don't know what the heck 'cali' means, guess it's an old Seaside word or something? But mmhmm, totally rad."

Twilight blinked. "Seaweed rolls? You mean sushi?"

"Awww yeah, you know what I'm talking about, and you pronounced it right. Nice. You'll fit right in, dude. They don't like it when you pronounce it wrong."

"Right."

True to the word of Queen Blackburn, it took roughly a day for the Comet Chaser to make its way from Hope's Point to the edge of the Belt of Tranquility, which Twilight had only seen pictures of before, but came to understand that it was an equatorial storm that quite literally wrapped around the planet's entire equator, right where the magical energies of the north and south Beacons met.

To Twilight's genuine surprise and wonder, the storm wasn't just above the surface of the ocean, but below it as well. She could see the water in the distance churning with what looked like murky storm clouds and little flashes of light. From out here it resembled a massive wall that stretched all the way from the ocean floor up, up, up as far as the eye could see in the darkness of the depths.

"Why the heck did it take so long to get here?" Rainbow asked as she looked out the window at the edge of the storm. "I saw the map. This should've taken a few hours tops, less if you were flying really fast like me."

"Oh yeah, right on dude," Copper said with a grin. "But that's, like, air travel. We move a lot slower underwater, y'know? Water resistance is totally higher than wind resistance, plus there's all this gnarly pressure down here, and sea currents. If we move too fast, the shields have to work too hard to keep up with the ship."

"Huh. Yeah, alright, that makes sense."

The ship's ensign, Starlight Spark, looked out the window at the storm along with the others, pressing her nose right up against the glass. "Gee whiz, that storm's still spooky even down here. Spookier, even."

Rainbow snorted out a laugh. "Did you just say 'gee whiz'? How old are you, kid?"

"Twenty-one?" Spark replied, tilting her head.

"You're twenty-one and you still say 'gee whiz'?" Rainbow gestured at Sunspire, who was at the window on the opposite side of the ship. "That kid's like ten years old, and he doesn't say 'gee whiz'."

Spark scrunched up her nose and stamped a hoof on the floor. "I can say 'gee whiz' if I want to! You're not my supervisor!"

"Are we really going into that storm to find the ruins?" asked Hourglass, who was standing next to Sunspire. "Not to sound like a ninny, but that doesn't look safe. At all."

"Safe?" Copper snorted. "Who ever said anything about being safe, my dude? The Belt's not even safe on the surface. That's why we've got these rad shields and stuff, yeah? Don't you worry though, the Comet Chaser can totally take it. Captain Ember's gonna take us in, and she wouldn't do that if she didn't think we'd all get back out okay, okay?"

Speaking of which, Twilight decided that now was a good time to head up into the ship's cockpit to speak with the captain, and with Winter, who had spent most of the trip so far up in the cockpit rather than here in the main cabin. Twilight didn't mind; it was only logical that one of the members of the expedition team should be up with the captain to observe things from her perspective, and Winter was probably the most practical choice.

The cockpit was loaded with all sorts of gadgets and technological devices that Twilight didn't know the purposes of, but she was able to restrain herself from asking about each and every one if only because she'd done a little bit of pre-flight—pre-dive?—reading from a technical manual to get a basic idea.

The real draw was from Captain Ember herself, as the pegasus mare was locked into a glass cylinder in the center of the cockpit area. Her wings had been coated in a black, oily substance that resembled latex, and the cylinder was filled with water; the captain was wearing a breathing apparatus and goggles, obviously. Whenever the captain shifted her wings, the ship itself shifted its fins to match her movements.

The system worked similarly if the ship were in open air instead, only without the water and need for breathing gear. Air would be funneled into the chamber in that case, shifted in such a way that it would reflect wind conditions outside the ship and allow the pilot to obtain proper lift. It was remarkably simple, yet elegant, and a brilliant method to allow the airships to fly with the precision of an actual pegasus.

According to a book Twilight had read at the Checkpoint, the New Pandemonium ships operated more like the flying boats she was accustomed to, albeit more sophisticated than anything back home. But that was the extent that Twilight knew about them.

Winter was standing near the forward viewscreen—it wasn't an actual window, but a monitor linked to cameras on the ship's exterior—watching as the Comet Chaser steadily approached the underwater storm. The terrain below was no longer broken shelves, but legitimate sea floor, dark and deep. 

She turned briefly, apparently having heard Twilight's hoofsteps on the metal floor, and nodded at Twilight with a tiny hint of a grin on her lips. "Come to check up on us?" she asked, turning her attention back to the viewscreen.

"Not really. I came up here more because I'm interested in seeing what it all looks like from this angle," Twilight replied.

Winter nodded quietly to herself, then glanced up at Twilight again. "Your neck's gotta be killing ya, mate. How're ya holdin' up?"

"Oh, I've been better."

Winter was referring to the fact that Twilight had to stand slightly hunched over to fit through most of the ship's corridors outside of the passenger area, and even then she couldn't look up without having her horn scrape against the ceiling. Twilight's response was about the nicest way she could put into words just how uncomfortable she was; what she really wanted to say was that being so tall was a mixed-bag, but that seemed inappropriate to say to somepony so… short.

"We're getting ready to enter into the Belt," announced Captain Ember—the apparatus allowed her to speak and communicate normally with the crew while still breathing air. "I know this is the first time anypony here's ever seen the Belt from this angle. Go on, gimme your thoughts."

"It looks just like any old storm I've ever seen before, minus the weird colors of the lightning," said Twilight, tilting her head more to get a crick out of her neck than to get a better view. "Which is weird since we're, y'know, underwater."

"Have you ever seen it up close on the surface?"

"Just pictures, that's it. So I guess this is my first time seeing the Belt in person at all."

"It's a helluva lot different down here than up top," Winter said, her gaze still transfixed forward. "Like ya said, it looks like any old storm should look. I'm guessin' it's not quite as potent down here as it is up there?"

"And you'd be right," Ember said with a nod.

"Makes ya wonder why nopony ever thought to try and dive under it before now."

"Wellll, I do say less dangerous, not undangerous. Underwater turbulence isn't exactly a walk in the park, and we still have to deal with lightning strikes, even if not as frequently. No fire cyclones though." Ember shook her head; Twilight noticed the viewscreen mimicking the motion. "But then again, it's dark down here, and the depth pressure is constantly pushing on the shields."

"Ah. Yeah, that could make it difficult." Winter shrugged. "Oh well, wishful thinkin'."

Ember then rolled her shoulders and spoke into the intercom system: "Okay everypony, heads up. I'm taking the Comet Chaser into the Belt now, so you may feel a slight sensation of discomfort as we make our way into and through the storm itself. I would highly recommend taking your seats and fastening your seatbelts until I provide the all-clear."

She turned to Winter and Twilight. "You two don't need to worry. The cockpit is gyroscopically-balanced. You won't feel a thing, though you might notice a few warnings here and there. Not to worry; all perfectly normal."

Once she finished with her announcement, Ember tilted her wings forward more sharply and the Comet Chaser sped forward straight towards the storm.

Twilight noticed the change almost immediately, though as promised she didn't feel a thing. Multiple instrument panels lit up with varying yellow, orange, and red lights, and the cockpit itself filled with an orangish-red glow punctuated by a somewhat mild warning klaxon. If not for all of the signs of danger all around her, Twilight might have been able to say this was a deceptively calm experience.

The viewscreen told a different story entirely. The current under the sea whipped about in such a way that Twilight was almost certain that there wasn't just a single current down here, but multiple, all of which criss-crossed at random. The only evidence that the water wasn't perfectly still and calm was the sheer abundance of sand particles whipping about in every direction.

The Comet Chaser's spotlight wasn't the only light source down here anymore, either, as streaks of lightning—underwater lightning—shot to-and-fro in both the distance and relatively close by. Some of the bolts would streak by close enough to actually strike the ship, causing the subtle, almost invisible golden glow of the energy shields to flare up in response. 

The blatantly physics-defying aspects of it all boggled Twilight's mind; nothing she was seeing here should have been possible. Even the most powerful of unicorns didn't have the magical fortitude to break the laws of nature so completely. If she had ever actually needed proof that the Beacons and thus this world's alicorns were powerful, so much so that they were possibly in a league above even Celestia and Luna, then this was it.

And despite all that… the Comet Chaser was able to pass through it with what seemed like only a minimum of effort. That itself was all the proof Twilight needed that the technology of this world could potentially surpass magic someday as the dominant source of power a pony could have, if it hadn't already. What would that mean when these ponies eventually had to migrate to her Equestria? An intriguing thought indeed.

The casualness with which Captain Ember was able to approach the ordeal—the mare was humming—was such that she barely even reacted when everything went back to normal an hour later; she didn't even so much as breathe a sigh of relief. 

"Okay, we're through the edge of the storm and inside one of the eyes now," the captain announced. With a sidelong look at Twilight, she added, "For the record, there aren't any eyes on the surface level, so this was a pleasant little discovery we found the other day."

"You mean the waters here are actually calm?" Twilight asked, looking out the viewscreen at the darkness of the ocean and seeing no signs of tumultuous activity.

"Yes and no. It's calmer here, where we're currently located," Ember said. "But we found out that there are more than one eye out here, and everything else is storm, storm, and more storm. They're just like the eye of an actual hurricane, only there're so many of them that it feels like the Belt is basically just a whole bunch of hurricanes smashed together. It's weird."

"I'll say it is. That sounds physically impossible. Surely the storms would merge together into one single hurricane, right?"

"Apparently not, and hey, if you think that's weird, the eyes don't even move. They're easily-mappable safe spots, at least from the data we collected." Ember gestured forward with her hoof without adjusting her wings. "Now, we're gonna be moving through this storm's eye a little ways to the southwest, then we end up popping back into the storm for a few hours again as we make our way to the next one, and so on."

"And when do we reach the ruins ya found down here?" Winter asked.

"Our estimates put us at the initial discovery point in thirteen hours, but that was just an outlier. The main bulk of our discovery is about sixteen hours out from here, and we're supposed to be trying to go further out and deeper down than that."

"Right, we need to find a section of the city that's intact enough that we can perform some sort of archaeological examination," Twilight said with a nod. "Ideally we would find an intact section of the actual continent that sank down here so that we'd potentially have an air pocket."

"We didn't find anything like that on our last trip, but with a few more eyes looking around maybe we'll get lucky," said Ember with a smile. "If you two wanna stay up here, you're welcome to, but Ensign Spark should be getting meal prep done for lunch within the hour if you wanted to head down to the passenger lounge."

Twilight stuck around for a little bit to chat with Ember and Winter about the nature of this undersea phenomenon—the ramifications of the Belt of Tranquility's existence still shocked Twilight to her core—but eventually she headed down to the passenger area to spend some time with the others during lunch.

Lunch was nothing special, of course. Because the Comet Chaser was an exploration vessel, not a luxury liner or a personal transport, the meals were designed to be neat, compact, and quick and easy to prepare with minimal power. 

Ensign Spark served everypony a partitioned plate with one serving each of three different kinds of… stew? It wasn't liquidy enough to be soup, but it wasn't solid enough to be a loaf or a hunk, and it wasn't unsightly enough to call it slop or a blob. More like a porridge, maybe, or some kind of thick oatmeal, but made of other kinds of foods.

The largest… portion consisted of vegetables—Twilight could taste carrots, celery, and peas—in some kind of mushroom-based gravy. The next largest was a bizarre mixture of corn, green beans, and mashed potatoes. The smallest was pretty much just a serving of chocolate pudding and tapioca mixed together. It all tasted real, of course, not like the synthetic Dolor stuff they made in New Pandemonium, but it was all so… odd.

It wasn't bad, actually. Just odd.

Sometime after lunch, though, Twilight headed back up into the cockpit to observe things with Winter and Captain Ember again. Hours had passed and there were still more hours yet to come before the ship would even come across the slightest hint of evidence. 

Twilight wasn't bored, of course. Having never been down this far below the ocean surface, and not having done so within the safety of an armored vessel like this, she found it fascinating to at least take in all the other sights… or lack thereof. It was so dark down here through all the murkiness that aside from the Comet Chaser's searchlight and the distant sparks of lightning within the storm outside the eyes, there really wasn't anything to see—

Twilight was absolutely, without a doubt certain that she'd seen movement ahead. It was only for a brief moment, barely a second, but she'd seen it. "Did anypony else see that?" she asked, stepping towards the viewscreen to see if she could catch another glimpse.

"See what?" asked Winter, now looking at where Twilight was looking.

Twilight pointed at the screen. "I swear I saw movement just— There it is again! It's bigger this time, don't tell me that you can't see it!"

Ember flicked the ship's spotlight in that direction. "I didn't see anyth—"

The trio of mares let out a collective gasp. Twilight had indeed seen movement, as the light had reflected off of the scales of some sort of huge serpent that had been quickly moving off into the darkness. But then the spotlight had gotten its attention, so now it was coming towards them. And it moved fast.

"What the hell is that?!" Winter blurted, staggering back and running right into Twilight.

"Brace yourselves!" shouted Ember.

The huge serpent opened up its massive jaws and snapped down onto the Comet Chaser, but luckily the shields took the entirety of the impact, flaring up gold in the process. Instead of latching onto its prey, the creature just slid right off, unable to get a grip onto what was essentially an immaterial object, or more like squeezing too hard onto a bar of soap.

Confused but not disheartened, the creature swam off into the darkness again, but Ember kept the spotlight on it so that it was easy to follow; it was definitely coming back for another pass. Ember tilted her wings to try and evade, but the Comet Chaser was not an agile ship by any means.

Copper rushed up into the cockpit room just as the serpent tried to bite down again, and again couldn't find purchase. "Whoa, Cap, we're getting some gnarly turb—" She saw the sea serpent sliding off again and swimming into the darkness. "Whoooaa! What was that?!"

"I don't know, but we sure pissed it off!" grunted Ember. "Let's see if we can convince it we're not on the menu!"

Copper immediately hustled over to one of the stations on the main panel and tapped a few buttons. "Roger that, Cap. I think the mining laser oughta do the trick."

"Minimal power, please? I don't wanna kill it, just scare it off."

The serpent swept around again, this time trying to sink its giant fangs into the side of the Comet Chaser. Twilight saw Copper use a joystick to aim a camera on her monitor right at the beast's underbelly, then hold down a trigger; a laser beam fired out of whatever device the camera was attached to, striking the serpent.

Steam swiftly rose up from the impact point and along the laser's path, and the beast let out a hideous screech that everypony inside the ship would be able to hear. It seemed to do the trick well enough, because the serpent ceased its attempt to chomp down on the Comet Chaser's shielded hull and swam back off into the darkness. It didn't look like it was coming back, either.

"That's right, get outta here!" Copper called off after the beast. She then turned to Captain Ember and pumped her hoof. "That was bitchin', Cap! I didn't know anything even lived down here!"

"Yeah, you said nothing could live down here," Twilight said, giving Copper a curious look. "I thought the waters were all tainted and polluted?"

"Oh, naw bro, Princess bro. Remember, that's just on the north side of the Belt. We're inside the Belt now. The water down here's not polluted, just super magically-charged and stuff." She clapped her hooves together. "Aww, dude, they're gonna be so stoked that we found a sea monster down here! Righteous!"

"Is that what we're going with?" Twilight asked, looking meaningfully at Captain Ember. "Just 'sea monster'?"

"Unless you've got more specific information that we don't know about, that's what we're gonna use for now, yeah," Ember said with a breath and a nod. "We sure didn't see one of those on the last trip here. Good thing too; we only installed the mining laser for this trip since we thought we might need it to open up a path."

"You don't normally travel with means of defending yourselves?"

"Against what?" Ember retorted. "Until just now nopony even thought there was anything down here, and nopony down south has ever reported about sea monsters either. Congratulations, Princess Twilight: you were here when we discovered a totally new lifeform. A hungry, nightmarish lifeform with lots of teeth. Fun!"

"Yay," grunted Winter, finally pulling herself up and away from Twilight; Twilight had nearly forgotten that Winter was still there right up against her legs like that. "So now I've got to worry about fuckin' sea monsters too while we're all down here in the deep, dark depths surrounded by the most powerful magical phenomenon known to ponykind."

"At least it didn't get through the shields," Ember said, rolling her shoulders. "A hull breach down here would be… uh, pretty bad. I don't know if that thing could pierce the hull, and I'd rather not find out either."

"I wonder what it was even doing here," Twilight murmured, stepping closer to the viewscreen and looking off in the direction it had fled. Nothing but darkness, still. "Did you see the way it was moving before it spotted us?"

"Can't say that I did, no."

"I'm no expert in zoology or anything, but it was definitely moving too fast to just be swimming from place to place. Animals don't put that much effort into moving, otherwise they tire themselves out. A predator like, say, a cheetah, would only move at that kind of speed if it was chasing prey, or running away from something."

"So, either that thing was chasing something else, or something else was chasing it?" asked Copper, eyes wide. "Whoa, gnarly. I don't wanna think about what kind of thing could be a predator to something that big."

Winter turned her head up to glare at Twilight. "Yes, thank you so much for puttin' that thought in my head, Twilight. Now I have to think about whether there are more big fuckin' serpents and monsters down here. Wonderful. Terrific. Just bloody fantastic."

"Are you scared, bro?" asked Copper, her tone and expression sympathetic even though her words didn't really do a good job of indicating that.

"There's a difference between 'scared' and 'concerned', mate. I'm concerned that we're in enough danger as it is down here in this fuckin' tin can surrounded by an entire ocean's worth of pressure, so we sure as fuck didn't need to add bloody sea monsters into the mix."

"Well then, let's hope that that thing was just chasing something else, something much smaller and not at all dangerous, hmm?" suggested Ember. "Why don't you head down to the passenger cabin and rest a bit, Miss Glow. It'll do you good."

Winter grumbled something under her breath then stormed off towards the aforementioned passenger cabin. "You got any booze on this rust bucket?!" she shouted before she got too far.

"This is a dry ship!" Ember called back. "We liquor up in port, not while on the job!"

Twilight heard more grumbling, the sound of Winter kicking something, then more grumbling as Winter stormed off again. She sighed and shook her head; Winter really needed to find a better way to relax than drinking alcohol. Twilight was growing concerned with how much of the stuff Winter consumed on just a regular basis, not to mention flare-ups like this might have led to.

But she was in no place to try and convince Winter of anything, and this wasn't the time to do it anyway. So she turned back to the viewscreen, watching Copper head off back towards the passenger cabin as well now that her job was done, and she focused herself entirely on looking off into the distance for any more signs of danger.


*****


Curaçao had long since grown accustomed to taking on Dawn's role in New Pandemonium City, and in more ways than one at that. Her shapeshifting abilities allowed her to take on the form of any pony, within reason, and it wasn't uncommon for her to take on Dawn's form to pretend to be her for some particular task when Dawn was otherwise preoccupied.

Tonight was no exception. She'd requested an evening meeting with the Committee so that Dawn would have plenty of time to get out of the city and situate herself in Hope's Point enough that she wouldn't suddenly pop back home for some unexpected reason, and also late enough that the entire Committee—herself included—had time for dinner before they had to report in.

She sat in Dawn's office in Dawn's chair at Dawn's desk in front of Dawn's computer, none of which had been changed whatsoever since they belonged to their father. Apart from the scorch mark on the desk, of course, which was a new addition courtesy of a particularly… agitated Havoc shortly before the sandstorm had reared its ugly head. Since she was in Dawn's body she didn't even need to adjust the seat to be comfortable, an amusing benefit of her power set.

As usual, the windows on the screen winked on as the members of the Committee answered the conference call, though Curaçao noticed something—somepony—new: a brown-coated unicorn stallion with a sturdy jaw and an orange mane tinged with gold, which he kept in a neat little ponytail. His image was currently occupying the spot normally taken by Taskmaster Concrete Girder.

Which meant that he was the Taskmaster's stand-in, obviously.

Luckily, the other members of the Committee noticed as well, so this was actually a new development, not just something that Dawn had neglected to mention. "Who are you?" asked Admiral Jetstream first, slouching slightly in his seat. "This is supposed to be a private conference call."

"Sorry, sorry everypony," the mystery stallion said, his tone pleasantly mild. "I'm supposed to be serving as Taskmaster Concrete's stand-in for all Committee proceedings. I guess his notification hasn't made the rounds yet. I could've sworn he said he was going to send it immediately after dinner."

"Ah, there's your problem," quipped Champagne Diamond. "He's probably still eating dinner. I don't think the words 'after dinner' mean anything to him without the word 'mint' right after them."

Curaçao-as-Dawn adjusted her glasses—it was a spare pair that Dawn kept in her desk almost exclusively for Curaçao's use. "It is customary protocol for an official stand-in to introduce themselves with proper expedience. If you would kindly do so now, we can proceed with this meeting rather than waste time with asinine questions and juvenile insults."

"Right. Sorry again. My name's Jackhammer, Chief Engineer on the Silverlane Project."

"Ah, then you're the same Jackhammer that I've corresponded with over the years?" asked Champagne. At a few raised eyebrows, she clarified, "The Silverlane Project is an undertaking to expand the piping system beneath the city so that we can increase our fresh water stores. We voted on it… something like eight years ago? Wow, time flies, doesn't it?"

"I didn't know that we were still working on it," noted Treasurer Vendetta, stroking his chin. "Huh. Well, that explains why water stock prices have been so steady all this time. I've been wondering about that for a while."

"You say that Taskmaster Concrete assigned you as his stand-in?" asked Secretary Quill.

"That's right," said Jackhammer. "I've been the Chief Engineer on more projects for Concrete in the past twenty years than anypony else in his employ, so I guess he trusts me not to screw things up. Silverlane is just the biggest endeavor at the moment so it's my lead project."

"That is acceptable. Are you aware of the responsibilities of the role?"

"Yeah, pretty simple stuff. I'm just here to observe, report in, and offer opinions and debates in the Taskmaster's stead, but I still have to bring details to him if there's gonna be a vote where he needs to break a tie."

Curaçao-as-Dawn nodded firmly. "Exactly. You may participate in these proceedings, but technically you do not have a voice; your voice is that of the Taskmaster's, not your own, and you will not be permitted to state your opinions unless specifically consulted. You are a privileged observer, nothing more. Is that clear?"

"Crystal clear, ma'am. Doesn't bother me any. I was never cut out for politics, otherwise maybe I'd be the Taskmaster instead, huh?"

"Hmm, quite."

Curaçao then began the proper procedures to start off the meeting, as she had been the one to call for it and as such it was her responsibility to do so. Once the necessary minutiae were out of the way, she then immediately proceeded into the purpose of the meeting:

"With the peace summit with Hope's Point delayed momentarily, we have entered into an unfortunate, precarious position politically," she started. "Her Majesty Queen Blackburn is understandably enraged, and it is only by sheer happenstance, some unexplained change of heart, that she has agreed to merely 'hold off' on the proceedings for the time being.

"If and when the peace summit is rescheduled, Hope's Point will most certainly have additional demands in place, reparations for the events that transpired in which the royal family was ambushed and attacked by a rogue faction within the NPAF. Hunting these insurgents is still a priority, which is still under the jurisdiction of Admiral Jetstream and Director Underhoof; hopefully soon they will be suitably dealt with."

Curaçao then took a short breath before continuing. "With this in mind, we must be prepared to make additional concessions in the peace proceedings, and as such it is best if we are not caught inattentive moving forward. We require additional bargaining chips to bring to the table." She then gestured to Champagne. "Chairpony Champagne, if you would present the offer to the Committee as you presented it to me?"

Champagne nodded and cleared her throat. "The name of the game here folks is resources. Now, the Wastelands are named that for a reason: there's nothing out there but pure shit. We already have mining agreements in place to mine Goldridge, and those are non-negotiable. Everything under our city is ours, and everything south of the coast is Hope's Point's. So, what does that leave us?"

"All that's left is Redblade," said Vendetta, steepling his hooves. "I see where you're going with this, Champagne, and I'll say it before anypony else does: that plan is crazy. We can't set up a strip-mining operation in the volcanoes. Your department doesn't have the money, even if I agreed to triple your budget."

"Ah, but the NPAF budget is already quadruple my own," Champagne said, touching up her mane. "And they already have an abundance of materials that would come in handy with this little project I had in mind."

Quill tilted his head far to the side. "Surely you can't be serious? The NPAF doesn't have the equipment to build any sort of practical base of operations out there."

"Oh yes they do." Champagne fluttered her eyelashes at Jetstream. "Go on, tell them what you told me."

Jetstream nodded. "With the proper application of our shielding technology, it is theoretically possible to maintain a safe haven within the volcanic region. It would not be particularly large, and workers would still be required to wear extensive and expensive protective gear, but it is doable."

"And what sort of timeframe do you anticipate?" huffed Vendetta. "This Committee's been attempting to set up a mining base in Redblade for the past century. It just doesn't work. We don't have the numbers or the technology."

"The AMP Troopers would suffice for both," Jetstream said with a little grin. "It's not a perfect solution, but they are cheap and easy to produce, enough that we can easily replace them if needed, and they can be easily repurposed for mining. With the fleet dismantling proceeding faster than ever, we have an excess of AMPs that are just sitting around in warehouses with nothing to do."

Vendetta stroked his chin again. "Hmm. A single AMP trooper is cheaper than the average salary of a mining engineer, and they won't ask for hazard pay, and we avoid the potentiality of lawsuits over injuries and deaths. Makes you wonder why we never thought of this before…"

"The simple explanation is that the NPAF budget has been solely dedicated to purely military purposes until the most recent few years, where they have been able to branch out into assisting with law enforcement," said Curaçao-as-Dawn, adjusting her glasses. "In other words, because the peace summit has allowed us to repurpose our military, we can capitalize on new money-making opportunities."

Vendetta's grin widened in a predatory smile. "Ah, il mio bel girasole, you have no idea how much I love it when you talk dirty."

Curaçao had to fight the urge to vomit. It was bad enough that this loathsome creature constantly flirted with Dawn, but did he have to be so sleazy about it? She wanted to chastise her sister for nearly killing him a month ago in a fit of rage. Nearly killing. Dawn should've finished the job.

"Essentially," interjected Champagne, "the plan would be to establish a base camp at the edge of the Redblade Mountains first that would be operated by NPAF troops so as to protect our claim from potential threats—giant bugs, raiders, whatever—while the AMPs scout the volcanic region to find the richest deposits possible."

"What exactly would they be looking for?" asked Quill.

"The Redblade Mountains have a high iron content, but it's not the same kind of iron that we mine for under the city. This iron has a high concentration of magical energy, which could potentially increase its strength and durability, either by itself or as an alloy."

"Durasteel made from that stuff could certainly provide a lot of protection," noted Jetstream.

"If there are no further questions, I believe that the case has been presented and we can proceed to a vote?" Curaçao-as-Dawn suggested.

The Committee agreed, and the votes were cast. Since Taskmaster Concrete could not vote unless there was a tie, there were only six votes to count; all six were in favor. Curaçao knew she didn't even need to bother listening to their reasoning or worry about a possible tie. Champagne and Jetstream were openly proposing the idea and would naturally support it without suspicion; Blutsager, loyal to the family, would vote in favor without question and justify it as a logical decision.

And of course, there was no way Vendetta wouldn't vote in favor of it, not when he knew that he could use this insider knowledge to invest his wealth in the proper channels and make more money than anypony would know what to do with. He didn't even hide it, for that matter, noting that he was going to invest in the city's AMP production and the iron and steel sectors. If all went well, he'd make a mint by the end of the year.

It just took some subtle manipulation. Or not-subtle, depending on how one looked at it.

Of course, none of them—not even Blutsauger, Champagne, or Jetstream—knew about the changes coming to the world very, very soon. Curaçao had made the decision, against Dawn's disagreement, to keep the information that Winter had given them a secret from everypony. 

It was easy to justify hiding it from the public—nopony wanted chaos in the streets; it wasn't as easy to justify hiding it from the Committee—their resources could prove useful; it was hard to justify hiding it from Velvet and Insipid for now, though, mostly to herself.

With Insipid it was obvious: she was too much in the public eye and even the tiniest slip-up would spell disaster. It was the same reason she didn't tell the Committee, since any change in their behavior might arouse suspicion and lead to the truth. With Velvet, it was just a matter of not wanting to saddle her with more potential emotional trauma after everything she'd been through with Caramel, not so soon.

Other than that, Curaçao still had a good reason for it, a very good reason, but she didn't speak it aloud, not to Raspberry, not to Dawn, not to anypony; she barely even allowed herself to think about it, keeping it in her subconscious on purpose even now so that she wouldn't even give somepony a reason to suspect that she has suspicions. The only pony she knew she could tell was ironically her father; it was ironic because he was the only pony she literally couldn't tell.

Information was power, after all, and if there was information that only she knew, that only she suspected, then she held all the cards. And right now, she had a feeling, a very bad feeling, that she needed to hold onto just that one trump card: the fact she suspected something that nopony else did.

Everything would depend on it.

Dawn's computer then beeped with an incoming call from… ugh, Treasurer Vendetta. Curaçao groaned quietly to herself, then took a breath and answered the call. "Treasurer," she greeted as Vendetta's image appeared on her screen. "I was not anticipating a private call at this juncture. What business do you have with me?"

Vendetta grinned slightly. "I'll keep it simple, il mio girasole. I know that it is getting late, but I was wondering if you would join me for a drink and some dessert while we discuss these new ventures we're taking. I have some ideas that might be interesting to you."

Curaçao-as-Dawn grunted. "Treasurer Vendetta, I cannot fathom why you would believe that I would ever deign to engage in a private conversation with you outside of my office ever again. Our last encounter did not end on pleasant terms."

"Oh, on the contrary, I was quite pleased with our last encounter. Granted, I had to spend a few thousand bits making repairs, but it was a small price to pay to see the fire you have inside you, even for a brief instant."

"Be that as it may—"

He held up his hooves. "If it makes it more agreeable to you, might I remind you that our private conversations are all automatically recorded when carried out over this connection?"

Curaçao ground her teeth together briefly, then perked up and nodded, a sudden wave of self-satisfaction flowing through her. "Very well, your point has been made. Provide me with a location and I will be there in thirty minutes."

"Meraviglioso! You will not be disappointed, my dear," Vendetta replied with a smile.


*****


Curaçao arrived at the provided location exactly thirty minutes after Vendetta had provided it to her. It was a smaller Baroque restaurant in the eastern Baroque District, one which she knew Vendetta owned and which was well-known for its world-class pizza and its intimate atmosphere. It had a reputation as a premier location to bring somepony out for a date, which was no surprise at all. 

Vendetta was obviously relying entirely on Dawn's lack of awareness of social norms to subconsciously influence her. It was clever, but sleazy.

Now, Curaçao did not arrive here as Dawn, of course, but as herself, dressed up in an appropriately fancy cocktail dress—black, naturally—accompanied by an evening clutch, the only part of her ensemble that wasn't influenced by her shapeshifting magic. Her mane had been all done up in a luscious ponytail, and her tail was kept pleasantly short to compliment the dress. 

She always looked her best, after all; to do anything less was just lazy.

There were two burly-looking earth ponies at the door, dressed in nice suits and looking every bit like a couple of regular goons that worked for Vendetta's crime family; the Treasurer wasn't filthy rich just because of his good business sense, after all, and his criminal connections were practically an open secret.

Curaçao made a show of walking past the two with a purposeful swagger in her hips, then "accidentally" dropped her purse in such a way that its contents—mostly make-up products and a few prophylactics she didn't need—spilled onto the sidewalk.

"Oh no!" she exclaimed with the perfect inflection to draw their attention. She then made a show of bending over to start picking everything up.

Naturally, it worked like a charm, as the two bruisers stepped over and started helping her pick things up. One of the two gave her a coy smirk. "You, uh, alright there dollface?" he asked. "Need a hoof? Maybe two?"

"Oh, no, I'm just fine, thanks," she responded with a small smile of her own.

"Yeah you are," quipped the other goon, who had a couple of the prophylactics in his hoof. "You lookin' for a good time tonight, sweetheart?"

Curaçao grinned again and looked between the two. "Do you know what I love about stallions like you?" she asked. "It's that you actually think you're being nice and friendly to mares when you do this stuff. You wouldn't even dream of hitting a mare, because you think we're weak and need a big, strong stallion to save us. I bet that I could do this—"

She cracked her hoof into the temple of the left stallion hard enough to knock him out cold. Proper application of force to the proper area with the proper follow-through did wonders, and it didn't hurt that beneath her soft, sensual-looking exterior were muscles that she'd trained for years.

"—and you wouldn't even lay a hoof on me," she finished, looking at the other stallion.

Said other stallion looked at his fallen comrade, then back to her, holding up a hoof. "Whoa whoa, listen girlie—"

She struck him first in the throat, then followed it up with an uppercut while he was grasping for the impact point. Out like a light, so they said. She then smoothed out her dress and let out a breath. "'Girlie'… hmph. Tu l'as mérité, mon ami."

Curaçao then stepped in through the door of the establishment, which was utterly empty of any ponies except for herself, a single bartender at the bar, and Treasurer Vendetta seated at a single table at the center of the room. She assumed that there was a cook in the kitchen too, of course, but he wasn't out here.

Vendetta stopped sipping his drink immediately after Curaçao caught his eye; Curaçao wished that she had a camera on her at the moment to capture the bewilderment and anxiousness on his face at the moment. He didn't say a word to her as she approached the bar, either, just watched.

"Amico mio, per favore chiama un ambulanza per i due stalloni fuori," she said in a perfect Baroque accent to the bartender. "Oh, e potresti farmi un Barolo Chinato, per favore? Grazie."

The bartender glanced towards Vendetta rather awkwardly, and the Treasurer gave him a short nod. "Subito, signora." He then swiftly made the drink and brought it to the table just as Curaçao was approaching it.

But Curaçao did not sit down just yet, she just stared at Vendetta, who remained seated and stared right back at her. "Aren't you going to invite me to sit, Treasurer?" she asked coyly, a light grin on her face. "It's rude to keep a lady waiting, non?"

Vendetta stared for a moment longer, then took a sip of his amaretto, stood, and gestured for her to take a seat. "If you would care to join me, of course."

"Merci." She patiently waited as the bartender pulled out her chair for her before heading off to make that phone call, then took her drink in hoof but didn't drink just yet.

"To what do I owe the pleasure of your company this evening, Spymaster Curaçao?" Vendetta asked, his tone an even mix of polite and curious. "I do not recall inviting you out for the evening."

"Oui, you did not invite me at all. But you did invite my sister, Shadow Associate Dawn, did you not? At least, that's what she told me you did. And as I monitor all of her incoming and outgoing calls these days, naturally I was inclined to believe her." Curaçao set her glass down and tilted her head as she glanced at Vendetta. "What I don't know is why."

Vendetta slowly took another sip of his drink. "I invited her here to discuss some business ideas I had in regards to the new development project we just approved."

"Ah, a perfectly normal business meeting, oui, over dessert and drinks in one of the most romantic restaurants in the city. I'm sure that you had no ulterior motives there at all, Treasurer, no secondary reason to invite my little sister to be alone with you in such a place."

"What sort of ulterior motive would there be—"

She held up her hoof. "Save it. I know what you're doing, Vendetta, and I have known it for a very long time. My sister may have taken a while to realize your intentions, but I am no fool. This—" She gestured out and around the restaurant. "—is the last time it will happen. There will be no more coy attempts at 'dates' with the Shadow Associate. Do I make myself clear?"

Vendetta smirked. "Or what, cagna? Let me guess: you'll kill me? You already threatened to feed me my own hooves years ago if I came anywhere near that lovely mare at that masquerade ball, so obviously she was important to you. Let me guess: fillyfriend? Tsk, certo che sei lesbica." He shook his head. "I imagine that you'd do something similar for your little sister."

"Oh, non, you misunderstand me, Treasurer. If you ever come near my sister again, I will end you. Not your life, mind, because death is too good for somepony like you." She smirked right back at him. "I will ensure that your entire empire crumbles to dust around you. That you watch your wealth slip through your hooves, day by day by day, until there is nothing left.

"I will destroy your businesses and your investments. I will ensure that you are considered toxic to investors and bankers across the city. I will tear the heart out of everything that you have built, and I will show it to you before I crush it beneath my hooves. And best of all, I will do it all legally, so that no insurance company will reimburse you for any losses.

"When I am done with you, you will wish that you were dead, because I will have taken everything away from you except your life. And then, only then, might I consider granting you what you want." She lifted her drink to him. "That is what I will do to you if you get near my sister ever again. Do I make myself clear?"

Vendetta stared back at her for a long moment, then smiled and lifted his glass to her in turn. "I like you, Spymaster. Very well, you have yourself a deal: I'll keep my distance from the Shadow Associate. Shall we drink to that?"

Curaçao clinked her glass against his, but did not drink. "We're in agreement, Treasurer, but I don't make it a habit of drinking drugged beverages." Before he could speak, she interjected, "Your signal to the bartender was not as subtle as you thought it was, and he is not as smooth at choosing a different glass to pour into as you think he is."

"Aha… well, I suppose you earned your title and position for a reason beyond just nepotism then, didn't you?"

"Were you planning on drugging Dawn, by the by?"

He paused, then shook his head. "No, never. You'll forgive me for my candor when I say that I wanted to earn the right to bed that beautiful sister of yours. There's no fun in taking away the challenge by using drugs. I know you think that I'm a sleazy piece of shit, Spymaster, but I do have standards."

"Hmph. Good answer. You're lucky that you're telling the truth." Curaçao then gestured at her glass. "Now, if your bartender could get me an actual Barolo Chinato, we can talk business."

He raised an eyebrow. "What?"

"You called my sister here to discuss business, did you not? I happen to know that while you gave her a lousy pretense to get her to come here in person, you did honestly intend to discuss business with her. I appreciate that you mix business with pleasure so readily. She's not here at the moment, however, but I can bring everything that we discuss to her attention, non?"

"I… suppose that we can discuss business, sure." He cleared his throat, then signaled to the bartender to pour another drink—and his gestures clearly indicated that there would be no funny business this time—before turning back to her. "I don't suppose you'd, ah… want some dessert to go with it? I hear this place has the best tiramisu in the city."

Curaçao could only chuckle at the suggestion.