//------------------------------// // Tables // Story: Waters: An Equestrian Gangster // by King Genesis //------------------------------// Maretreal Meanwhile... "This son of a bitch is killing me on the inside." Abe facepalms while holding his phone. "You have some alcohol left in any of your pockets, Dosh?" Both workers sent on a mission by Eye Patch, trying to sell a box of something, are now in a narrow, empty and lonely parking lot located next to a jewellery store. Both of them are waiting for a black door in front of them to be opened by the owner. Dosh, laying back against the wall, next to the door, shakes his head while crossing his arms. "No," he replies. "I have my own sweat if you want to." Abe, sitting in one of Rusty's cars' backseat, with the door left open, chuckles. "I wish I haven't heard that." He stands up and laughs louder. "This is fucking crazy. This day... must be some kind of joke." "A fever dream," says Dosh, also laughing. "I don't even know why in the fuck I am here... but money smells so good." "I'm laughing because I don't wanna cry, man... firstly, the reunion..." Abe points at the partner. "You know what I am talking about, right?" Dosh nods his head. "Yes, that reunion. That's why I came here to drink... the last thing I wanna see is an angry Bloodswan. Once my boss left, I ran away." Abe facepalms one more time, concerned about everything. "Damnit, man. I'm worried about Eye Patch... and then this W thing... between his stupid plan with Snowblind and now that he got caught by these two women... this boy is gonna drive my mind mad." "I understand the thing with him and Snowblind trying to get his friend out of jail but..." Dosh raises his shoulders. Why would he be trapped by two school employers?" He laughs. "What was he doing there, in the first place?" Abe chuckles back, but only says while raising his shoulders, lying with no remorse: "He had some task... Eye Patch told him to go there, maybe to look for a dealer of some kind..." Dosh raises an eyebrow. "How strange... dealers in schools?" He bites his lips. "And a Maretreal guy going to Canterlot?" "You can't express your opinion about that..." Abe laughs. "You are a Fillydelphia guy in my city." Suddenly, the black door is slowly opened by a short, green-skinned man. "Um..." he says. "Uh, god... Would you help me? This bag is heavy, please..." Dosh appears to the rescue and grabs a black bag from the man. Once he looks at the big red man, he smiles and looks at his associate: "Now you are hiring big boys for your work, Abe?" "Might be right," Abe crosses his arms after scratching a cheek of his face. "We'll call you later, Emerald Pick. Eye Patch will give you the price we told you last week. Now we are a bit busy, you know... reunions and reunions everywhere..." "Yeah, I know," he chuckles. "The life of the man in the street, am I right? Grabbing hidden things in the dark of the parking lot..." Abe opens the trunk with a button from inside the car for Dosh to leave the big bag inside. "Yeah, you missed the part where I have to take care of my own ass." Emerald Pick laughs while closing the door. "Goodbye, Abe." He does not get any answers and locks the door to never come back. "The man in the street..." Dosh chuckles while closing the trunk. "Is that how you call yourselves here?" Abe checks the phone while getting in the driver's seat. He checks his phone... not even a text message from Jack. He sighs and looks at the time: 12:15 P.M. "It's a saying... these dudes don't tend to call us like what we really are." Dosh gets into the car, sitting in the passenger seat. "You say... they don't call you... mobsters?" "Not in that way," Abe grabs the keys. "Lake of Mage Meadowbrook, uh... I think I have to go to the right and then turn on the left... yeah," he turns on the car. "I mean, not only in that way, Dosh... they don't call me like what I really am... a worker." Canterlot High "Oh, and here it is." Rainbow Dash shows the new kid an enormous, green pitch outshined by the yellow sun. "Dash." Twilight is inside a hall, laying back against one of the doors which lead to the soccer pitch. "This is not the cafeteria..." "I know, I know!" replies Dash, stretching her arms and a smile. "I'm showing him the places I know." Swift Arrow focuses on the weird shape of the pitch's circular goals for a second, distracting himself from everything and softly laughing on the inside until Rainbow Dash softly nudges his shoulder: "You have to come here in February and watch us play the yearly local soccer cup. Last time, we were only 4 teams but the matches were..." she stretches her arms, closing her eyes due to the emotion. "Craaazy! The crowd went nuts every time! Isn't it, Twilight?" "I remember it," she smiles. "However, those last matches where everyone went crazy... I couldn't be there because I was in my room studying for that incredibly hard Maths test..." Both Dash and Swift Arrow turn their heads around while the girl shakes her head. "Twi!" she says. "Not all of the time has to be spent on reading and studying..." she starts walking into the hall, while Twilight follows her. Swift Arrow does the same, passing through the door and looking around the long hall. He observes the countless green lockers, the calm beige colour of the floor, and the smooth blue of the doors. Everything seems innocent and peaceful. An absolute amusing ambience. However, he finds something specific that calls his attention. Not many students, including the two girls and, supposedly, him, are walking through the hall and looks like almost all of them have the same age and appearance. Adolescents which are on the verge of the adult world... but he says almost all of them when he stops his eyes and observes two kids, pre-adolescents, getting out of a door with a scary sight. His eyes feel like they were made of glass, due to their shine and lack of soul in them. They don't seem to be scary, but scared of something. The taller kid, an orange-skinned boy with cyan hair, has a cloth on his head which he also passes to his friend, a shorter, plumper boy with brown hair and smooth light blue skin. Both of them look at each other for a second while the shortest kid passes the cloth over his head. Their sight, their eyes... are they afraid of something? "Hey, Swift!" The kids listen to that shout and turn around. Swift Arrow slowly turns his head to Dash and Twilight. Rainbow smiles at him. "We thought we lost you, dude! What were you doing?" He blinks, going back to reality, and tries to justify himself. "Uh, sorry... I was..." he is about to say something, an excuse, but shuts up when he turns his head one more time and finds out the kids are gone. They have disappeared... like an illusion. He has to come up with something quickly and takes a look at the ceiling. "These halls are beautiful. I've never seen anything like that..." The three of them now look at the ceiling. "Yeah, I agree with you..." says Dash, smiling. "Once you see what the cafeteria looks like, there's no going back." "Speaking about dorms," suddenly mentions Twilight, slowly heading to another place. Rainbow and Swift unconsciously follow her. "Have the Principals told you which will be your room, Swift Arrow?" Swift remains silent for a second, looking at both girls, and puts a hand over his jaw. "Well, they told me about the dorms but... they didn't tell me which one would be... I don't even know what they look like, honestly." "Well... we can show you how they look like if you want," says Dash, then looking at her friend. The nerdy girl only raises her shoulders. "If you want to, we can show you the place," she adds. "The dorms are apart from here, in the building behind the school. It's not far." Swift Arrow thinks about what she says for a second and comes up with a conclusion: firstly, he nods, then smiles and says: "Sure... a quick tour, then." "Great!" Rainbow Dash nudges his shoulder. "Let me present to you the rest of my group and then we'll go to the dorms..." He finds out he has been unconsciously walking, following them for almost a minute and a half, messing around halls and halls, until they stop in front of two huge brown, windowed doors. He can see through the glass a big space filled with students cleaning tables and chairs. He also finds that strange big man, with white skin and blue short hair, standing in a corner. Preceptor Shining Armor was his name? He looked at him with those eyes... "You want me to present you to everyone?" Dash looks at Swift Arrow, and the boy feels his whole body shrink. Seconds later, after looking at a confused Twilight, she laughs. "Just kidding..." Cafeteria Rainbow Dash opens the door and all of the students look at who is entering: once they look at Rainbow Dash and Twilight Sparkle, everybody goes back to their tasks, but when Swift Arrow dares to cross that door, everybody stops again and looks at him for a second, which he feels like endless years. He takes a brief, quick look at all of them, not focusing on their reactions, but on their faces for less than one second, except for that guy who's been observing him since he entered the school. The preceptor is observing him with cold eyes, but he does his best to ignore them. He slowly waves his hand to everyone, makes a small smile and magically one by one goes back to what they were doing. A few of them answer him back, waving their hands, and then there is a special case. One of them, a girl with pink poofy hair and a round pink skirt is standing right in front of him, coming out of nowhere and at just a footstep of distance. She fastly stretches her hand and makes a smile so big that scares him: "Hello!" she says. "I'm Pinkie Pie! What's your name?" "Pinkie!" shouts Dash, who is now sitting at a table, surrounded by her friends. The poofy-haired girl grabs the boy by his shoulder and fastly carries him to them. He, in fear, puts a hand over his fake hair just in case it falls to the floor. All of the girls smile, and the boy does the same, although being uncomfortable due to how Pinkie Pie reacted. He looks at all of them, but focuses his attention on two girls: one of them, a pink-haired girl with a white tank top and a green skirt, that seems to be insecure, due to her trying to hide behind another girl which shows another kind of attitude: a classy, pretty girl with white skin and beautiful, shiny dark blue hair. Her appearance brings elegance to the table. "We apologise," she says with a not-so-bright smile, caressing a small, purple dog who is sleeping over her lap. "Pinkie Pie is always enthusiastic about meeting new people..." "It's OK," replies Swift Arrow, quite nervous due to all of the new things and people around him. "Um... yes, a bit too enthusiastic... but OK." The girls chuckle, and Swift Arrow feels the preceptor is slowly getting nearer to them. "Celestia told me to show him the school," says Rainbow Dash, looking at them all. "He's Swift Arrow, our new classmate." "Hello, Swift Arrow," fastly replies a girl with orange skin and red and yellow hair. She waves her hand at him. "My name is Sunset Shimmer. Hope you have a great course..." Sunset Shimmer. Didn't Dko told him she was a naughty bitch? She doesn't seem to be so naughty at first sight... what did she mean? "Oh, thanks." He smiles back. "Thanks. Nice to meet you." A blonde girl with clear orange skin, freckles and a cowboy hat stretches her hand to him. "Hello, fella," she says. "Welcome to the school," He, smiling, shakes his hand with hers. "I'm Applejack." "Swift Arrow," he replies. "Nice to meet you." Once he and Applejack stop shaking hands, a pink hand appears in the middle and grabs Swift's. "Hello, Swift Arrow!" she fastly shakes her hand for a second and lets him go, with a smile bigger than the previous one. "Pinkie Pie is my name. It's nice to meet you!" "Uh..." Swift Arrow doesn't know how to react and smiles. "Nice to meet you too, Pinkie..." "Rarity," now says the classy girl, triggering something into Swift Arrow's mind. He slowly turns his head to look at her. "Pleased to meet you, darling." "Pleased to meet you too, Rarity," he stretches his hand to her and she does the same, shaking hands. At that same time, the insecure girl, hiding a part of her face behind her pink hair, slowly raises a hand and softly waves it to him with a smile. He, confused but not shocked, does the same. "Hi... hello." "She's Fluttershy," replies Dash, before approaching his ear. "Don't worry, she's just very shy at first but then she will open to---" "Dash!" a soft voice in a really low tone, almost sounding like a whisper, is heard on the table. All of them look at Fluttershy who is blushing. "Aw, Fluttie!" she says, with a cute gesture. "I didn't say anything..." She laughs and then the rest of the girls begin to chuckle for a second. Swift Arrow sees something in them... all of them chuckling at the same time shows the strong love and care they have for each other. A strong friendship... Everyone seems to be very kind but there's something in the middle of the table he does not see but can feel. A tension... something not solved. Something that may be worrying all of them. Now she knows the face of the girl his long-time partner and protector ordered to protect and is actually surprised at how different both grandfather and granddaughter are from each other. He would never have believed this classy girl with her beautifully fixed long, dark blue hair is actually related to a bossy, moody guy with a big orange moustache, squared shirts and some of the dirtiest hands he's seen in his hometown. "And you live here in Canterlot, Swift Arrow?" That question brings him, one more time, back to real life. He feels lost for a second, trying to find out who actually asked that question, and blinks to calm down. "Um... if I'm currently living here?" "Yeah," replies Sunset Shimmer, smiling at him. At the same time, Rainbow Dash approaches Rarity, who leaves the dog to her friend Fluttershy, and both of them sit in two chairs at a corner of the table. Swift Arrow looks at them for a second but tries to focus on Sunset, trying not to call attention. "I mean..." "Yes, yes," replies Swift Arrow, looking at her. "Um... well, I've been planning to move here, to Canterlot, you know, but I have... quite a complex story about my living residences... I lived almost all of my life in Manehattan, but I did some days in Baltimare... and a whole year in Maretreal." "Huh... well..." Applejack nods her head. "You got a look in almost every place, sugar cube... Manehattan, Baltimare, even Maretreal..." "Maretreal..." whispers Fluttershy, holding the sleeping dog, but she gets interrupted when somebody else speaks, feeling guilty. "I'm sorry," says Rarity, getting back into the team. "Before you came here, I was talking to Rainbow Dash about something personal..." a second of silence. "...and we have just finished. Sorry if that made you feel..." Rarity doesn't know what to say, but Swift Arrow answers: "No, it's OK," and smiles back. "You were sharing a private thing... I have my own things too, it's not a problem. You have your personal stuff to talk about too," he chuckles. "I'm just a newbie talking to you." All of the girls chuckle, surprising Swift, until Sunset Shimmer says: "Do not feel like a newbie, Swift Arrow..." she looks at him with kindness. "You've got to feel welcome... we are open to everyone in this school, and everyone else is and should be too." There is a moment when all of the girls look at each other with a glimpse of confusion. It didn't even last a whole second but felt like a really long, uncomfortable moment. Maybe what Sunset said, thinks Swift Arrow, doesn't feel so real after all... "I agree with her," then says Dash, and nudges his shoulder, "You're welcome to Canterlot High and we also welcome you to us, and maybe everybody else..." "Feel like this is ya new house, sugarcube," adds Applejack with a small chuckle. Swift Arrow, from out of nowhere, feels warm on the inside. He doesn't understand what is going on now, and makes a small, unconscious smile, showing his teeth. Apart from that small group of friends, a man cleaning a table is still observing him. He can't take out from his mind the fact he walked into the room behind his little sister Twilight Sparkle. Shining Armor is still asking himself... who is, really, this mysterious man? Jack's Car Wow. On the other side, Jack is hiding under the sunglasses that present him as the fake Sargeant Tied Shoe, laying his head against the car seat headrest. This day must be some kind of joke... or a dream. He has to wake up. He has to wake up. Of all the men that could have possibly been behind Cattle Prod... why the worst and most dangerous choice has to be near the one? He says to himself, to calm down, that they don't know if that weird, small man is actually that man... but falls again when he thinks about the other thing... Two different eyes. Two different eye colours. He only knows two men in this world with heterochromia, the name of that condition. One of them is a crippled old man rotting inside a wrinkled yellow skin. However, he is not any old dork... it's Father. The boss itself. The other one, the one who matches best with Luna's description, is none other than his heir, his remaining son: Bloodswan. He doesn't even react to what he was thinking, because it seems that whoever it is up there, in the skies, it's just laughing at him. This can't be possible... this must be also a mistake he's just making in his mind, appearances do match sometimes... do they? He looks at the school entrance again. The purple building. No one he knows or recognises is standing at the entrance and tries to calm down, but then he looks at something weird in his rear mirror: a car stopping right behind him. It's a car he has never seen in all of his time in Canterlot: an old but well-kept brown one, and observes the man on the inside. He doesn't know him. He hasn't seen him anywhere. The mysterious man slowly gets out of the beautiful vehicle, hiding his eyes with sunglasses. He is using a smart brown suit which matches his dark yellow skin and dark brown hair. Besides, he is holding in his mouth a small wooden pipe. Once he closes the car door, he takes a bit of his time to take a full look at the school. He observes the building while getting a box of matches out of his pants pocket, lighting one of them to turn the magic pipe on. Jack doesn't say anything and keeps observing the man, completely surprised by him. Who is him? Who is this man? What is he doing right here? Jack slowly touches the car door, about to come out, but decides not to do anything when the mysterious man turns around and releases smoke from his mouth. He whispers something to himself: "Oh boy, here we go..." and softly puts a hand over his car's roof for a second to cross the street just later. Jack doesn't stick his eyes from him. He may not know him, but there's something in that guy... which makes him doubt his appearance. Hall "And you keep him in the school?" "Yes. I left him to my parents once and didn't end so well... they overfed him and got a bit sick after that." She pauses. "Oh, how foolish! I didn't tell you his name... he's Spike." Three of them are on their way to the dorms. Twilight is now holding her dog, named Spike, in his arms. He seems to be still sleeping, but has one of his eyes barely open, looking at Swift Arrow. The boy, having no experience getting on well with pets, looks at him with confusion. "Do you want to caress him? He does not bark... even less biting." "Nah, it's OK..." Swift Arrow stutters. "Um... I'm not a pet guy." "Oh, really?" asks Rainbow Dash. "Wait until you see my pet Tank. He's a turtle..." Rainbow Dash pauses for a second to chuckle, "...but the best turtle on this planet." "And everybody's minds changed when they met Angel," adds Twilight. Swift Arrow raises an eyebrow. "Angel?" he asks. "Fluttershy's bunny," she replies. "She is always playing with him while hanging out in the dorms. He's so cute! It's the prettiest." Suddenly, Spike starts growling slowly while opening his eyes and looking at his owner. "Well," she corrects herself. "After Spike, of course." The three of them pass through a big grey door at the end of the hall and find themselves in a small green space located in the middle of both big buildings. Once they come out of the purple school, Swift Arrow looks at a place he couldn't see while being in the car. A quite smaller but still big beige building filled with front windows covered by white curtains. Right at the entrance, two big brown doors welcome everyone who enters the Canterlot High dorms. "These are the dorms," Rainbow Dash says. "This will be your home during the week." Swift Arrow feels no air in his lungs for a second until he lets it go. He calms down and observes the building with a vague glimpse. "Wow," he only says, shocked due to the new presence... "I have never seen this part of the school." "It's because the purple building is more visually attractive for the cameras," Rainbow Dash jokingly replies. "You want to take a look at one of the dorms for men? They're all the same but..." "I'd like to," replies Swift Arrow. He, for a moment, turns around to look at the school's backdoor, thinking about Rarity. He wants this to be faster, before time or the day itself eats both Jack and him for granted. "I'd appreciate it, girls." "Sure..." says Twilight, smiling and caressing Spike. "There's not too much to show you, though. The normal stuff you would see in a dorm, such as shared beds, a small bathroom..." Swift Arrow's skin freezes when he hears those two words together: shared beds. Will he really end up sharing a room with other students? "Oh, Professor Dry Law!" Twilight Sparkle stops and approaches an adult man who was walking in that small space between both buildings. Both Swift Arrow and Rainbow Dash look at him, and the boy gets attracted by his unique appearance: a pretty brown suit, cool and shady sunglasses and what most calls his attention: a small wooden pipe in his mouth... and he's actually smoking from it! "That's Professor Dry Law," Rainbow Dash tells him. "He teaches Law in Junior and Senior year of Canterlot High... and I'm afraid we will have him again on this course, one more time..." she sighs. Swift Arrow looks at her. "And what are you afraid of...?" She closes her eyes, yawning. "Yike... students, except for Twilight, not even participate during his classes because everybody falls asleep by just looking at him..." "Well, I don't know..." Swift Arrow responds. "Law is not my thing but... that pipe is actually really cool." Dry Law and Twilight Sparkle laugh at the same time while having their conversation. "Gosh, don't tell me they are talking about..." Rainbow Dash facepalms and sighs. "About what?" "Well, let me put you in context..." she touches one of his shoulders and shows him her other hand. "Do you know that the College Course has a final essay where you have to make an exposition about a free topic, right?" Swift Arrow gets surprised at that and doesn't know what to say... will he be unlucky enough to fall into this? Or maybe, by the time he disappears from Canterlot High, teachers wouldn't even have mentioned it. "Yes, yes," he says, unsure of himself. "Well, Twilight has been obsessed with this final exposition since we finished Senior Year a couple of months ago... and is literally typing anything she hears or thinks about as a possible topic." The boy makes a small chuckle. "I don't judge her because even I know that is a bit hard... but I already told her it's not necessary to over-analyse topics and make scraps of something that hasn't even started... what if the Principals decide that this essay is not necessary this year? And all of her effort... you know..." "Yeah, I understand..." Swift Arrow feels Dash's hand getting out of his shoulder. "She may have done all of that because of nothing." "Yes, yes..." she says, and facepalms one more time. "And these last few days she came up with some really bizarre topics. Yesterday she was talking to me about..." she chuckles. "I'm embarrassed to tell you because it's a topic you will never see in an exposition." Swift Arrow smiles, trying to find out what she's meaning. "What? Why?" "Well, it's..." she laughs. "It's quite bizarre but, I swear my friend never investigates things like this..." she bites her lips, still chuckling. "She wanted to make an essay about the equestrian mafia." Rainbow Dash couldn't see him when his face changed completely. From a sudden curiosity for finding out what she meant and a small chuckle, everything for Swift is now concern and shock. The boy remains confused, with a serious face, slowly turning around to look at Rainbow Dash. "Really?" "Yeah, big surprise, isn't it?" She raises her eyebrows and shoulders but doesn't feel what Swift Arrow is actually feeling right now. Confusion. Shock. Is she really gonna do that? "I swear Twi was never interested in this but saw potential in it because one of our teachers used to work with this journalist, um, I don't remember his name..." Swift Arrow's skin begins to feel goosebumps again. Which journalist may she be talking about? He is only thinking about one. Just one journalist. "A journalist who wrote about the mafia?" asks Swift Arrow. "Don't you mean?" "I think his name was Edinburgh," adds Rainbow Dash. "You know him?" Swift Arrow sighs after hearing that and doesn't know what to say. This is the day where everything magically connects with everything else. "Edinburgh Tyler," he says, chuckling. "Yes, I know who he is... or was..." he takes a look at the school's backdoor. "My... friend used to read his articles and stuff... such a shame he died. And you said there was a teacher here who worked with him?" Rainbow Dash nods her head. "Mr Parsons... he's now our kind but also monotonous and a little bit boring History teacher... I think we will have him again on the Course." Things are being clarified. Edinburgh Tyler. Mr Parsons... maybe Glasgow Parsons? The infamous duet Jack always talked about? "Oh, jeez." Twilight Sparkle returns after her quite long conversation with Professor Dry Law, who only waves his hand to both Dash and a mysterious Swift Arrow lost in reality and enters the school. The boy looks at the nerdy girl now, raising one of his eyebrows, a little bit surprised. "We have a long conversation about the law." "Rainbow Dash told me you were going to write an essay about..." he pauses for a moment. "...gangs?" Dash raises her hands, trying not to say anything, while Twilight only bites her lips. "Well... it's one of the options I have for my final exposition but I don't think it is the one I will choose, honestly. I truly don't like this kind of thing, I prefer topics related to numbers and science, but I decided to type it in my notebook because I can write huge paragraphs from it." She takes a breath. "I've been structuring arguments against the horrifying crimes committed by the late gang Clock of Canterlot in the past... and analyzing the behaviour and reaction of the equestrian society at that moment to verify and conclude in several things I've been writing about." The three of them are approaching the beige building. "Besides, Mr Parsons, who worked with Edinburgh Tyler in the '80s and '90s, told me that I have his support." "Hmmm," Swift Arrow stutters, looking at the door, trying to sound helpful but not too evident. "Seems interesting, Twilight..." he looks at her. "Can I call you Twilight?" She smiles. "Yes, sure." When he's about to say something, Swift finds out the dog, still lying in Twilight's arms, has now both eyes open, and is straight looking at him. "Seems good, it may have potential, but I don't know how the Principals will react to someone speaking about illegal business and crime organizations for an exposition. It's... I don't know, it sounds... unappealing." Both girls get silent while walking through a small stairway to arrive at the entrance. "Well..." Rainbow Dash appears again. "I'd lie if I say I don't agree with him..." Twilight only nods her head. "That's what I've been thinking this week... it's a possible option I can choose but... I always think about how Celestia and Luna will feel when her student Twilight Sparkle speaks about... guys in suits who make crimes and live in the dark." "That doesn't sound Twi to me," replies Rainbow Dash, chuckling. Swift Arrow opens the door. Dorms The entrance is a small room which breaks in half, leading to two wide halls. The left one has a sign that says: MEN and the right one has another that says WOMEN. Both halls have doors on both sides of their walls and finish with a large white stairway on their end. "I'll think about it." Twilight looks at Swift Arrow. "These past few days I've been investigating and researching lots of scientific stuff... and I get on better with that." "Well, I'm not telling you to leave it definitely but..." Swift Arrow swings his head. "I'm saying that it may be a bit out of what the school staff is expecting to... you know." "Yes, you're right" Twilight Sparkle nods her head again, and looks at the room in front of them, observing the halls. "Um... This is the entrance of the dorms. All of the students sleep here and all of the floors are divided according to our school year. Apparently, we are going to sleep on the last floor this year." "And all of the rooms are basically the same?" asks Swift Arrow. "According to what you told me." "Yes, in fact," replies Rainbow Dash while looking that one of the rooms in the hall of men has its door opened. "And look, there is one right there, which is open. Do you want to take a look?" "I don't know," says Twilight Sparkle, unsure. "Can we, as women? We will cross the halls of--" "Twi!" interrupts Rainbow Dash, about to hug her friend. "The world is not going to end because of you stepping into a hall meant for a different genre..." Swift Arrow only chuckles while approaching the door. However, Rainbow Dash runs and passes by him, being the first one who arrives at the door. "I won!" Room 5 Rainbow Dash knocks on the door, barely moving it, and finds out there is actually no one in. She decides to enter and shows both Swift Arrow, Twilight Sparkle and a now woken up Spike a normal dorm room from Canterlot High: a calm ambience, with a smooth blue floor and cyan-coloured walls. There are three double-deck beds in the room, two stuck to the wall, opposite the entrance, and the third one next to the door. The three of them are also separated by two big cupboards and another brown door inside. "These are the beds... which are really comfy." Rainbow Dash touches one of the pillows. "I'd admit that I prefer sleeping in one of these beds rather than my actual mine." "Well, there are not too many differences in comparison to our old room..." says Twilight Sparkle and then looks at Swift Arrow. "We had Room 25 last year. Three double-deck beds just like here, and we even convinced the Principals to add a single bed for our friend Sunset Shimmer. We made the best parties in that room." Her eyes start shining. "Gosh..." "Let's take a look to the bathroom to see if these boys know how to keep it clean," says Rainbow Dash while slowly opening the brown door, but suddenly her joking way of speaking fades away: "Oh. No." Twilight's eyes stop shining and raises an eyebrow. Swift Arrow moves away and enters the small bathroom, only to find Rainbow Dash looking at the bathroom sink full of burnt cigarette butts. He approaches the small bath hidden by curtains, passes by the narrow hall occupied by the sink and the toilet, and finds the cigarette box inside the bathtub. He grabs it and reads the name of the brand: "Crazy Stickmen." "Ew... how gross," says Twilight while looking at the burnt butts in the sink. Spike, now on the floor, smells the burnt tobacco and starts growling. "Who was smoking here? In the dorms? And dared to leave the cigarettes in the sink?" "Here you have the box," says Swift Arrow, giving it to Rainbow Dash and laying back against the bathtub. "From what I know, uh... Crazy Stickmen is a pretty expensive cigarette brand..." "I think these are the ones Duke Starlight and Little Ace smoke together," replies Rainbow Dash before putting her head against the white ceramic of the sink. "Gosh... every time we turn around... these guys... this guy, is ruining everything..." A tense moment until Swift Arrow unconsciously lets something go from his mouth: "Who? This guy?" he says, "Cattle Prod?" and at that moment both girls stick their eyes to him, feeling like nails touching his skin. He gets surprised at their reaction. "You know him?" asks Twilight. Spike growls at Swift Arrow now, and he looks at the dog. He blinks and then looks at the girls. "Well... the Principal mentioned it to me... he looks like someone people are afraid of." "Yes," Rainbow Dash replies, shaking her head. "Most students and teachers are afraid of him... but I'm not." She puts her hands over the sink, looking at herself in the mirror. "I'm not and I won't be. He's just a silly little bastard, a foolish bully." "And watch out for yourself," adds Twilight, looking at him. "He has a certain thing with the new students." Twilight expects Swift Arrow to reply with concern, but he only lets a chuckle out of his mouth and makes a smile. "Thanks, Twilight. Looks like we have a special case here..." He shakes his head. "Well, if I've got to be honest... I've already dealt with this kind of people before." "But..." Twilight raises a finger. "He's not any kind of guy... he's a special guy. He doesn't want to mock you or make your life impossible... he truly wants you to feel scared of him. He wants to be over everyone else. The new student we had last year... Cattle Prod put his head in one of the toilets... and flushed it while he and his friends were kicking him in his legs." Spike growls one more time, while the three of them get surprised at hearing that. Swift Arrow feels actually shocked... how could they let something like that happen? How could the Principals keep him in the school after what he had done? "Well... that's not going to happen with me," replies Swift Arrow, gaining new air on his body. "If he tries to intimidate me... I'll defend myself." "That's something I'd do," replies Rainbow, looking at him now, "but he has a group of friends who follow him like dogs... and they are very dangerous. If there is something that I can't stand, I'll confront it..." then, she closes her eyes and shakes her head. "... sadly, even I can't challenge four bullies alone. You'll need help with that." "I hope not." Swift Arrow bites his lips. "I truly hope not... but if he tries to say or do something to me or any of you... I'll stand up." "I'd do the same, then," replies Dash while stretching her hand to him. "Together if we stand up?" Swift Arrow looks at her hand and then at Twilight. The girl only takes a breath while looking at both. Spike is silent while Arrow stretches his hand too and shakes with Rainbow Dash. "Together." Once they both stop shaking their hands, somebody else opens the door. A thin, grey-skinned man with short black hair, holding a mop. "Oh, excuse me," he says. "Am I interrupting something?" Spike growls at him, something that makes Twilight look at the dog angrily and calm him down. "No, nothing," Dash smiles and points at him, looking at Arrow. "Swift... he's Dumpling, one of the school janitors." Arrow smiles at him and stretches his hand, wondering if he heard something they were talking about. "Hello," he says. "I'm Swift Arrow... new student." Dumpling shakes hands with him. "Hey, nice to meet you..." he smiles and looks at the girls. "Mind if I clean here? You can come back later if you---" he stops talking and lets Arrow's hand go when he looks at the burnt cigarettes in the sink. His kind smile fades away. "You... you were smoking?" Rainbow Dash shows him the cigarette box and he understands what happened. "I think they did it... again," she says. Dumpling sighs while looking at himself in the mirror. His tired face really shows Swift Arrow what he has been dealing with. "These kids," he says, and then looks at Swift Arrow. "You truly got in a quite special rats' nest." He chuckles. "Don't worry. I told them I'll defend myself." "If you say..." Dumpling looks at himself in the mirror again and chuckles. "Wish you luck, then." Dorms The three students and the dog walk out of the room, not so talkative as before. Twilight bites her lips looking at the new kid and tells him: "Sorry for... you know, the cigarettes on the sink. It may have felt like an... unappealing welcome." Swift Arrow smiles on the inside for Twilight's use of that adjective he said before. "You don't have to apologise for anything..." he tells her. "You did nothing wrong, Twilight." "Yes, we know," replies Dash, shaking her head, "but... who leaves burnt butts on the sink? It's not only gross... it's insulting." Swift observes how Spike is looking at him again while being held one more time in Twilight's arms. "Don't care about that, I know you didn't do it..." he smiles at both Dash and Twilight and they understand what he meant. When Twilight opens the dorm's door, they find out there is a man sitting on the stairway, reading a sheet of paper which is inside a folder. When he turns around, Swift looks at him on his whole: an old man who literally almost looks like Fletcher. A grey-skinned man with white short hair and a grey goatee, wearing a clear brown pullover, grey smart pants and black shoes. He kindly smiles at all of them and Twilight, surprisingly, fastly waves her hand to him. "Mr Parsons!" she says. "Hello!" Dash smiles at her reaction, but Swift Arrow freezes when he hears that name. Is he the guy? "Parsons?" asks Arrow, surprised. "Glasgow Parsons?" Once Twilight and Mr Parsons stop waving their hands, the kind old man gives a look to the new boy. "Yes," he chuckles, standing up and keeping his folder under his arm. "Glasgow Parsons itself... and you are?" Gosh... this has to be a joke. Swift Arrow laughs because of all the weird casualties and things he and his partners have found on this day... what else do they need to worsen this already over-stressful noon? Now Jack's father's old partner is teaching classes at school? Just wow. "Wow," he replies. "I never met you in person... I-I-I'm Swift Arrow, a new classmate in school." He wants to say something else. "A... friend of mine used to tell me a while ago the articles you wrote along with..." Swift Arrow decides to pause right there, in order to not make things feel tense. "Well, that person." Parsons' smile fades for a second but rises up again. Swift Arrow looks at Spike for a second, but he doesn't even react. He's only observing Parsons. "Yeah, I know..." looks like he is holding that smile for too long. "I know what you're talking about... it was a time in my life that it's already over, but sometimes I tell stuff about that in my classes so... oh," he looks at Twilight curiously while approaching them. "Speaking about that, how are you going with your project, Ms Sparkle?" Twilight's reaction is a little mixed. He gets happy but concerned when she looks at Swift Arrow. "Uh, well... I've been thinking about it and, um..." she chuckles. "I've been talking to Swift Arrow and Rainbow Dash about the project and... they told me that they didn't know if it was the best idea to be presented to the Principal and Vice-Principal..." Parsons chuckles but at the same time, he feels they are right. "Well... it's always good to take a risk but... I think those stories you wanted to analyse... may not make Ms Tia and Ms Luna feel too comfortable..." he smiles at her. "I said you had my support but it was... a tricky choice to write." "Yeah, Mr Parsons," adds Dash, getting into the conversation. "She started investigating those disturbing stories... Today she was telling me about that urban legend that has been spread around Equestria during these last few years," she laughs while Twilight looks at her seriously, trying to tell her not to say something that may embarrass her in front of the professor. "About... about a human pet!" She chuckles. "It doesn't make any sense." However, Swift Arrow forcibly smiles while hiding his true reaction: fear. She mentioned an individual which is actually pretty real rather than fake. He is one of the things he fears the most in this whole world... every time they name it, gangsters got scared and beg for their lives... Grey Blackle... "Uh, I was just investigating, you know," fastly replies Sparkle looking at Mr Parsons, trying not to blush. "My brother told me that urban legend he knew, and I looked up his name on the Internet... um..." she touches her forehead. "Grey... I don't even remember the full name because of how confused I was while reading the story..." she squints her eyes. "Grey Master was its name?" Mr Parsons tries to answer, but somebody else does it for him faster: "Grey Blackle," unconsciously replies Swift Arrow, not having any conscience of what he has just done. He became so focused on the memories and stories his older partners Jack and Abe told him about the fearful human pet he forgot he was standing in that stairway. A surprised Mr Parsons looks at him while the girls do the same seconds later. "Oh, yes," he smiles quickly. "I remember that story from an Internet forum... it's so weird." "Oh," Mr Parsons laughs before the girls chuckle with him, leaving the tension aside. "I was wondering where you got that name..." "Internet magic, Mr Parsons," replies Swift, and then a cellphone starts ringing. Parsons raises his eyebrows and checks his pocket. "Oh! I've got a call." Parsons gets out his cellphone and looks at its small screen. His kind smile breaks for a second and his pupils shrink but his lovely attitude is born once again when he looks at the students. "I've got to go... it's a thing from my family... see you around!" he fastly turns around after waving his hand for a second and fastly walks away with his folder under his arm. "See you later, Mr Parsons!" shouts Twilight. Swift Arrow, however, still remains focused on how that smile did break for a second while he was looking at the phone screen. It may be something irrelevant but... what if it wasn't? Who called...? Bathroom A knock is heard from the other side of that beautiful small bathroom surrounded by white and yellow tiles and decorated with a golden-coloured toilet, a red sink, and a mirror, whose border is covered with gems of different colours, where one of the main gangsters of the country is looking at himself: Eye Patch is observing his injured face, with just one eye. Somebody knocks again. "Five seconds," orders a robotic voice from outside, something that makes Eye Patch react quickly, fastly washing his face with cold water, putting his special glasses on, hiding his scar behind a dark, opaque glass and getting out of the bathroom. Maschine is in front of him, in silence, covering the whole entrance. He slowly makes a gap to let him barely come out of the bathroom in one piece and turns off the lights. The reunion is about to get started. He passes by another narrow hall of the big mansion and stops at a door where Sharp Baton is standing, looking at a phone. "Hurry up," he tells the one-eyed man. "My uncle's impatient." Living Room Sharp Baton opens the door and reveals the whole scenario to Eye Patch: a wide rectangular table standing opposite a small stairway which leads to a room upstairs. The big white room is filled with beautiful furniture decorated with golden statues of everything, even a golden severed head of someone standing over a cupboard. There are three chairs on both sides of the table, confronting the actual bosses of the six cities of Equestria. Eye Patch sits in the middle chair on the right side, in front of Big Baby and with his best partner on his left: an old but really attractive woman with purple hair and soft lilac skin, wearing a pink dress. Her name is Seductive. All of the bosses, except for one, are already sitting at that table: Eye Patch, Maretreal. Big Baby, Canterlot. Seductive, Las Pegasus. Sabretooth, Fillydelphia. Splinterbone, Baltimare. Bloodswan, Manehattan. Bloodswan hasn't appeared yet, so his chair is still empty. Big Baby and Eye Patch look at each other in silence, with pure hatred. Next to them both, on their left side, Splinterbone and Seductive try to distract themselves from their own impatience, closing their eyes. Alone, next to Eye Patch's right side, Sabretooth is waiting for the final men, putting his hands on his pockets. In the table's corners, outside from the chairs, three workers of Father and his son are waiting for everything to get started. Sharp Baton is next to the door, Maschine is near the stairway, and Speedster is unfolding a clean, new steel wheelchair on one of the front sides of the big table. Nobody speaks. Nobody says anything. Eye Patch, not trying to take his glasses off, slowly moves his head to look at Seductive. She slowly opens her eyes to look at him back. They don't say anything but try to communicate their feelings about this in silence until they hear a chuckle. He fastly moves his head to the one who made that sound: none other than Big Baby, making a small smile in silence. Eye Patch clenches his fists because of his anger but gets distracted when Splinterbone, Baltimare's owner, a pink-skinned lady, still old but younger than Seductive, opens her mouth, looking at Sharp Baton. "Are you really sure that Equestrian Intelligent Agency did not hear our phone conversations when you told us to come here?" Everybody looks at Splinterbone, wondering why did she take an effort in asking that... in the house of the crazy rulers. Sharp Baton, surprised, looks at his partner Speedster who is still unfolding the wheelchair in silence and then at Baltimare's boss again. "Ms Splinterbone," he says. "If the EIA heard what we said on the phone, we would have already found out and this reunion would have been cancelled... and all of the EIA workers could have been dead at this moment." All of the bosses stay in silence while Splinterbone raises her eyebrows in pure shock. "Does that answer your question?" Her hands tremble for a second and then she blinks. "Y-yes... it does." Suddenly, the door from upstairs is barely opened and everybody in the room points their eyes at it. A dark yellow hand covered in a white suit gets out from it. The gangsters already know who he is, and feel shivers all over their bodies. They are scared but, at the same time, resented and frustrated. "Maschine," says the mysterious man with a raspy voice, pointing at the worker. "Come up here and help my father to go downstairs." "Yes, Mr Bloodswan." "RAAAAGGHH! ARRGH!" the shouts of what does not even sound like a man scares everybody at the table. Another... thing that they already recognize. Some of them knew it returned because Father and son wanted to. The human pet. "Shut the fuck up!" shouts the mysterious man upstairs, which makes the strange sound stop. "And you dare to shout like a beast while poppa is speaking... I'll put you in the lake at midnight. Naked." "Not lake! NoT lAkE!" Maschine starts walking upstairs while the mystery figure finally opens the door. A small man with yellow dark skin and wine-coloured short hair, dressed in a white suit with a red tie and showing his peculiar thing: his eyes have two different colours. The left one is blue while the right one is green. Everybody looks at him holding a chain in his hand, which is from a big steel leash attached to a man's neck... or the scraps of a man. A turquoise-skinned man with a worn-out black jacket, a ripped dark grey shirt and dirty black pants from an old tuxedo suit. He's barefoot, drooling and one of his eyes has a pupil that can be barely seen because of how small it is, compared to the other one which has a normal, human size. He's sitting like a dog, observing all of the disturbed gangsters with his monstrous sight while his master, the white suit man waves his hand to everybody. "Greetings, partners," says Bloodswan in a white suit, slowly walking downstairs while holding his human pet, Grey Blackle, with the leash. "So long without observing some beautiful faces." Maschine stops walking to salute his boss, raising a fist in silence, without even changing his dead face. Bloodswan looks at him and starts laughing. "You're always with that stupid statue face, Maschine. Cheer up a bit..." he laughs louder while looking at his partners. "Cheer up! Today's a sunny day! A sunny day for everyone, isn't it?" He looks at his partners while getting downstairs and leaving the leash to Sharp Baton, who greets his uncle by giving him a kiss on his left cheek. His uncle hugs him back and slowly kisses his forehead. Everybody else doesn't say anything while he sits down next to Big Baby and in front of Sabretooth, showing a wrinkled paper ball he has in one of his hands. "So..." somebody else breaks the ice. Sabretooth gets the hands out of his pockets and puts them on the table. "So what?" asks Bloodswan, raising an eyebrow and looking at everyone. "You didn't tell me if it was a sunny day or not." "It is, indeed," replies Eye Patch. "Yes, it is a sunny day," says Seductive. Splinterbone only nods her head. Big Baby chuckles in silence, nodding his head. Sabretooth snorts while looking at the boss. "It is a sunny day, Mr Bloodswan," he replies to him. "However, something has been the cause of my concern since this morning... and I'm wondering why you did call us for." Bloodswan, eager to answer, puts the wrinkled ball of paper on the table and points at it. "This is the cause," he says. "You may ask yourselves... how can a stupid paper ball be able to make up an emergency reunion, asking all of the members of the Equestrian Commission to show up quickly?" he smiles like a child for a second to all of them until he changes back to an angry face. "I'll answer your questions and solve your doubts once my father sits on that wheelchair." At that right moment, Maschine comes out of the room, calling everybody's attention by holding in his big arms an old man with dark brown hair and pale yellow skin, covered by just a grey dressing gown. Once the gangsters see that old man, they stand up from their chairs, except for Big Baby, who can't do it and only observes from behind. Maschine slowly walks downstairs and helps the old man, along with Speedster, to make him sit down in the wheelchair. He softly moves his arms and adjusts his painfully aged back into the chair and looks at everybody who has just sat down. The old crippled man, squinting his eyes with two different colours (red on his left and green on his right), looks at his smiling son and then at Big Baby, where he stops. "You didn't stand up," he tells his guy. Big Baby only grinds his teeth. "Sorry," he says. "I've got a problem with moving and standing up fastly... I'm extremely sorry, Father." Father slowly nods his head. "Next time I'll tell Sharp Baton to do it for you." Then he looks at everyone at the table. "I called all of you because... something terrible has happened." He closes his eyes to take a breath and everybody looks at him now. "This morning, when I read what my son Bloodswan is going to show you... I felt my whole legacy was insulted. The respect and appreciation I have for each one of you... was damaged, while reading it. The lack of respect that I felt today ran over my whole body, my sack of bones." The gangsters begin to show more concern due to this. What is he talking about? What did he read? Is it something worse than they think? "I arranged this meeting because... I truly want to know who dared to send me something like this. I want you to tell me the complaints you've been hiding from me and my family because, right now, I'm totally eager to hear all of them." His slow but grave, menacing voice scares everyone at the table, including his own workers, except for Maschine, the human pet Grey Blackle, standing like a stone next to his master the Father, and his son Bloodswan, who is impatiently waiting for his moment. Once he stops talking for more than a second, his son grabs the paper ball and shows it to his father: "Shall I read it now, father?" The boss of the bosses only nods his head in silence.