//------------------------------// // Insane // Story: Daily Equestria Life With Monster Girl // by Estee //------------------------------// The empty forge had yet to fully cool. There were things which had to be done in order to properly bank the flames: bringing the temperature down at too great a speed could do its own damage. But the girl, carefully peering around the edge of the doorway, could see where the process had been started, left at a point where it could go the rest of the way without supervision. There was still some heat left to the fire. Enough to create its own reddish glow, something which reminded Cerea of the armory's protective spells -- and it was the only constant color in the little world. The lighting devices mounted in the ceiling were having issues. They flickered, changed intensity, and a girl who'd rapidly become fed up with fluorescents kept waiting for a buzzing sound which never came. The important thing is that Barding got out. He seemed to have left just before starting work on an ingot: still held fast at the workstation, just about cool enough to touch. And... ...that's odd. "This shouldn't be open," Nightwatch whispered. They were trying to produce as little sound as possible: a goal which Cerea felt was invalidated by the mere fact of centaur existence. "It's usually open," Cerea softly countered. Which was actually somewhat odd all by itself, because temperature control was a huge priority in a smithy. Pegasus magic might offer aid here and there, but a closed door was an assist which didn't have to worry about running down the charge. "Just about every time I go by --" "That's you," the pegasus stated. "...sorry?" "You didn't know him... before." The black mare paused. "Well, you sort of did. For a few hours. He didn't like to be interrupted. Or disturbed. Or reminded that other ponies existed. You had to sneak requests onto the corkboard and hope he didn't hear you. And now he leaves the door open a little more when he's working, so you can see him working and -- come in." There didn't seem to be anything the centaur could say, and having her hands go behind her upper back to awkwardly clench at each other wasn't an effective substitute for words. "But he locks up when he leaves," Nightwatch continued. "Because it's still his smithy." "He gave me a key," the girl quietly observed. The silver eyes looked at her, and the clenching transitioned into wringing. "He would have locked up," the pegasus semi-repeated. "Especially if he was evacuating, because he'd want to protect everything inside." Cerea took another glance inside. "I didn't know about the door." And here it comes... "But... he usually would have put those tools back. If something isn't being used, he gets it out of the way. Because he's always saying the smithy is too small and he can't have anything taking up space when..." She still felt as if nausea was permeating every cell of her body: pushing it down to background awareness wasn't the same as being rid of it, and Cerea suspected it was just waiting for its chance. It was everywhere within her. It could at least do her the courtesy of blocking off the blush. "...I already take up so much," she reluctantly finished, and looked at the splayed tools again. "What would he have been trying to make? I've never seen him use those metal shears." "Or somepony broke in after he left," Nightwatch considered. "It's not like the armory: you could get in here, if you tried for a while. And if they were looking for a way to cut something." They both examined the lock. "I can't tell," Cerea reluctantly admitted. "There's already so much scuffing." Barding kicked the door closed a lot. At least he got out. ...please tell me he got out first. That somepony didn't come by, and made him cut something, and then they... ...if I'm wrong, if this was me, if they knew we worked together and they went after him because of -- The nausea surged. Her right hand untangled from the left, getting free just in time to brace against the door. The frame softly groaned as it took her weight, and the centaur frantically pushed herself away from the new source of sound. "Sorry!" she hissed. If anypony heard... ...if anypony heard, it might be the ones who were supposed to be down here. But if the Guards were still present, then the prisoner hadn't been evacuated... She tried a deep breath, pushed the nausea down again as her ears frantically twisted in every direction. Nightwatch, already on high alert, could only match the results from the second action. "What are you getting?" the pegasus whispered, as they both listened. The girl tried to sort. Isolate and identify. The saturation wasn't as bad on the lowest level. There was a degree present, because scents traveled. They'd brought some of it with them just by using the passage, but... there was less to go through. It was still hard, with the illness so close to the surface. Just having to make a deliberate effort... Even at her best, there would have been issues. The forge normally operated at high temperatures: something which created its own disruptions within the olfactory world. Determining when Barding had departed was effectively impossible. But when it came to other presences... The forge door opened for her. Just about nopony else ever went inside. "I don't hear anypony coming. Do --" and paused, as the little knight shook her head. "Good." "And -- smell?" Nightwatch asked. "I can't pick up an approach right now." The air currents of the basement meant that range detection for scent wasn't fully reliable.. "But there were ponies here. A mixed group." Reluctantly, "I think at least one of them is hurt." Please don't let that be Barding. "Blood?" Nightwatch whispered. Cerea slowly nodded -- then quickly added "Not much. It's mixed in with fur. Not enough to drip." (She checked the floor for bloodstains anyway.) "When you say mixed...?" "Three species." She didn't think there was any need to specify 'no alicorns'. "I think... at least five of them? But it could be more." Another breath. "And..." ...what is that? A mare. Angry -- -- no. It's more than anger. It's related... ...isn't it? She didn't have a context for it. No pony she'd ever encountered had been emanating that exact mix of acrid toxins and putrid fumes -- -- nopony I've seen. I scented this before, didn't I? Traces... "Five," Nightwatch hesitantly whispered. "It could be more." She was having that much trouble. "The prisoner was assigned two Guards. Maybe reinforcements came down, but... Is one of the ponies a unicorn mare?" Cerea had to force the nod. "It doesn't tell us much," the little knight reluctantly concluded. "One of her Guards would be a unicorn. I don't know if any mares had this exact shift, or if somepony got called away and a mare had to swap in. And I can't ask you to tell me if they were wearing armor. Not in here. So we still need to reach the cells." Assess and evaluate. Again. "Do you want me to try tracking the ones who were here?" Quickly, "I'm not sure I can. But I could try --" "-- do you know which way they went?" The girl tried to focus again. "It's hard," she finally admitted. I can't... "-- your back knees are buckling a little," Nightwatch instantly said. "Maybe you should --" "...I think they doubled back on their trail." Her right hand shakily came up, pointed. "It's all in this direction." "And that goes towards the cells," the pegasus reminded her. "So..." Cerea started to take a step forward. The dark tail hit her front cannons. She stopped. "Neither of us is up to a big fight right now," the little knight observed, and fur rippled against its natural grain. "Maybe we can each manage a few kicks. But this is close quarters, and... you said at least five. Our job is to get a look at the cells. And if we find those Guards, and they're with her -- we can help. If somepony is just breaking her out now, we could try to do something. But the bigger the group, the more trouble we're in. You can punch a pegasus. You can't punch lightning." Her feathers rustled. "Not that there's a lot of moisture down here right now. But you get the idea. We have to be careful, Cerea. And sometimes... that means retreat. She's not worth your life." The girl was silent. "Cerea?" No answer. "You're a civilian now," the Guard said. "Or that's what you keep saying. I can brief you on traps which aren't working because you should still be part of the staff. But we're on palace grounds. And in this situation, I can still give you orders. So if I tell you to run, we run." Coming from most people, it would have sounded practical. Fair. But Cerea was dealing with a Guard. "Cerea? I need you to tell me --" "...yes." And they moved. Part of the girl still wished they weren't the ones performing the check, but... there was no one else. There had only been so much time they could have spent on a search for anypony to go in their stead, all they'd found was Squall -- -- he was looking at my face. No. My mouth. I think he was waiting for me to say something about his wings again. -- and after that, they'd had to go themselves. The castle was riddled with secret passages. But when it came to accessing the basement, the most ready route they'd had available just happened to come out near the smithy: something which put it a considerable distance from the cells -- but it was still faster than galloping around the upper levels until they found a more direct route, because that would have meant switching palace wings. And what would they learn, when they reached the cells? Guards present, a prisoner within... had the alarm been ignored, with the Guards deciding their most defensible position was right here? Or they might have doubled back. A scroll from the Princess would have told them about the traitor, and they could have decided not to risk going up. Make a stand on familiar ground. Maybe more Guards came down to help. Maybe the traitor came down to help. Cerea didn't know who it was. If it was just a matter of finding somepony who hated her -- -- concentrate, focus on my hooves, I just have to get there... ...four legs and two arms... ...I'd almost feel sorry for Rachnera if it wasn't for everything else... ...there were a lot of candidates, and anypony they might have found on the upper levels could have been exactly the wrong pony to tell. She just didn't feel it was Squall, because... he'd had his chance, in the corridor. A clear shot. And he'd just tried to order them out. Or he was getting us out of the way so he'd look good later -- -- she was almost certain it hadn't been Squall. Perhaps he simply didn't hate her that much. The lights flickered. Colors distorted, here and there. And she couldn't say it was too quiet, because there was still so much going on overhead. There were times when they heard distant shouts, screams, and some of those came from pain. And there was a slow-building rumble in the air, a sound which reminded the girl of the worst protest days and the times when the anger had grown loud enough to reach the basement. Just a little more, and the world would begin to vibrate. There might be more of them coming. A siege. She was living a story again and somehow, no part of it concerned having the world find another way to remove her clothing. The girl had done some of that herself, with that one flank just about fully exposed to the world. She didn't even know if the sling would work. It wasn't the best kind of fabric for improvising the weapon. Snapping the stone out at high speed... that usually took something a little more solid. If I get it wrong... It could be argued that they were both helpless. Helpless together, guarding each other's flanks. But Nightwatch could still access some of her magic, where the girl had none. (Or too much, none of which could actually be used.) And if Cerea didn't move in time -- -- if something happens where she needs to fly and I can't -- She forced her knees to straighten, and the effort got them out from under the palace wing. Into the space which lay below the Courtyards, and so much else. They were trying to hurry. But there was only so quickly they could move while trying to stay silent, and... one of them was currently grounded, while the other's biology not only made that permanent, but had potentially elected to ignore all possible influence from human blood and go strictly with centaur. A few hundred kilograms of mass were going into battle with the concept of 'move silently' and if they won, it would be because stealth had died laughing. Her hooffalls were too heavy. She was too heavy. Sliding her keratin didn't produce much of an improvement, and the nearest circles of adhesive felt were a world away. They were also pausing every so often to listen. Check for scents. It was all slowing them down. We're probably too late already. If anything happened at all. Maybe they just evacuated her and somepony came down here because... the attack meant they needed shears. For some reason. Or she's still here. Or I was right, and the invaders got her out ten minutes before I ever thought of anything. It wasn't a story. The heroines didn't have to arrive in the nick of time. Reality seemed to prefer the graveyard humor associated with failure. ...an empty cell. Two corpses in front of it, where the Guards fell. Two more statues -- -- they were coming up on an intersection. There was a choice of three branch trails. Right is mostly storage and one of the hidden passage entrances. After a while. There's a lot of bends. And then there's a public ramp. Left for the armory. That's almost a straight shot, once you get past that one angle. Eventually, the cells. Forward is the barracks -- Nightwatch's ears twisted. The overhead light bent towards yellow, rushed through red and slowly dimmed its way towards pink. "I think I hear hoofsteps," the little knight whispered. "To the right. And... maybe voices? It can be hard to tell down here, but we wouldn't be getting much of anything from the upper levels. Not when we're between them." Paused. "Um. Well, there's that rumble. That's getting louder. But it's not voices." She advanced half a step, listened again. "Maybe... multiple voices? And..." The black fur creased across the confused frown. "...a little echo. Like somepony is almost... singing?" -- had the invaders gone into the barracks? They had tried to destroy whatever they could reach, and the barracks were where people lived. Cerea couldn't picture them as having any reluctance to enter. More towards... pleasure. "Cerea? What do you hear?" But the girl wasn't really listening. Not to anything which came from the outside. Her ears were filled with the cacophony of joyful destruction. ...she lost her apartment. Almost everything she owned. I saw what she brought in. There was so little left. Her semicircular canals were beginning to roar. Both left-side hooves stumbled. They targeted her once. They would have done it again in a heartbeat. She might have lost the last of it. Because of me. ...I told myself they're after the arsonist, but this could still be me she's supposed to be my friend and the only thing I've done is hurt her She was just barely aware of her body's increasing tilt. all I do is hurt the people I care about everyone and everypony I shouldn't be here -- The nausea surged. Balance was lost. It felt as if it took everything she had simply to direct the near-fall, because Nightwatch was too close and having a centaur's weight collapsing on top of a pegasus was a nightmare all its own. But it was that dread which let her push, gain some degree of control over the direction and in the end, she didn't fall. She just went sideways, and the wall took her weight. The stone supported her, while the coolness of the contest suffused her flank. Both sensations were nearly lost in the jolt. She massed a few hundred kilograms. (She tended to round down.) And when that much weight collapsed against stone, all at once -- it hurt. The girl cried out in pain, and even that was nearly lost in the thud of her body being taken up by the stone. Nearly. There was a period of time when no reaction came, because sound required time in which to travel and when it arrived, minds still had to react. Nearly three whole seconds. "SOMETHING'S DOWN HERE!" burst towards them from the right-side path. "SOMETHING BIG!" And then there were hoofsteps. Racing, accelerating, and the movement pushed the air ahead of them, rage and fury and those traces of blood and something else, a factor which she couldn't identify and there was no time to think about it, not when the pegasus had just jumped, spinning in the air with a painful flare of wings to land staring up at Cerea, eyes wide and fearful and desperate -- "RUN!" Nightwatch shouted. "CEREA, RUN!" When it came to what happened next, the girl blamed her mother. Because the parent had spent a lifetime in wiring direct controls, making sure The Voice Of Authority went directly to the hooves while completely skipping over the brain. And Cerea pushed herself off the wall, got some space between herself and the pegasus before making the turn (and she'd gone left, still trying to complete a self-assigned mission), did her best to gallop while the nausea just kept surging, she wasn't racing down the hall so much as constantly falling forward while never quite finishing, four legs was too many to control and she couldn't push the nausea back, it just kept coming, it was going to overflow and consume her, she was being chased by the void and when it caught up, she would be nothing -- -- and then the lie caught up, because nothing else did. From most people, it would have sounded reasonable. You were told to run, and then you ran. But she was the only one running. Guards got in the way. And Nightwatch hadn't left the intersection. She'd stayed behind, trying to buy time. Her life for -- -- it was what almost brought the centaur down. She went into a different wall, and the near-rebound threatened to make the impacts go uneven again. The shame saturated her at a level which began to work with the illness, she was just barely able to clutch at her hair and the panic attack was coming, it was coming, she was alone and useless and she'd left her friend, her sister to die and the illness just kept rising and there was no sword and no courage and no chance and it was all her fault all her fault all her fault she had to turn back she had to her head was reeling, her body was collapsing, but she had to go back they were to the right, they didn't sound all that close, they'll need time to navigate the lights were flickering and changing hue, they were brownish now and her skin had been dappled in a shade to match her fur, she couldn't focus and everything ahead of her was red red glowing red it runs on its own charge, one of the strongest charges in the palace, because it has to keep working if everything else shuts down She was mere meters away from the armory. Her arms dropped. The girl's head snapped up. Hair flew back, and the nausea dropped into her hooves. Move! She managed to stop the renewed gallop just short of the door. Nightwatch had shown her how to open the armory, because that was one of the secrets. There were multiple huge locks on the door, and they were mostly present because anypony trying to get in without authorization was going to waste a lot of time in looking for multiple huge keys. And in the absence of a ring which didn't exist, they could potentially spend happy hours in pressing on tumblers and waiting for the right click. The click was virtually guaranteed. Some cell doors clicked. But the locks had a purpose. Because spells which had no way to truly think could still be taught to recognize authorized personnel. Nightwatch had shown her how to open the armory: namely, if the spells had been attuned for the person approaching, then they pushed the locks aside, and then touched there and there. There was a pattern, a rhythm, a beat, a nasty result for anypony who missed it, and all Nighwatch had done was show her the procedure. Abjura had dropped by on the following night and performed the attunement. Just about every weapon Equestria had ever produced, found, rediscovered, or confiscated was on the other side of that door. There was going to be something which could take out the attackers and if she found it quickly enough, galloped back before Nightwatch was hurt -- -- she shoved at the locks, touched the right locations, and the red glow winked out. The door started to open, she got her fingers on the edge and pulled to make it open faster, all she needed was the right weapon -- -- the right magic. She'd left the Guard before being briefed on everything kept within. Actual testing, finding out which items a centaur could activate -- there had been no chance. Cerea possessed only the vaguest idea for what most of it did, and hardly knew if anything would work for her. The door had opened, and glowing beads lit the path into confusion. Anything I could take is a weapon against us. They recognize that I'm using something, the unicorn collects it, and then -- Her frantic gaze darted from one hue to another. Violet. Gold. Red. Untested blue. ...I can't just stand here and I have to close this if I hear anypony coming, if the invaders get into the armory -- -- she was looking at what might be the most potent collection of weaponized magic in the world, and it was all useless -- -- her ears twisted. There was shouting, back the way she'd come. And she couldn't make out the words, but the furious tone suggested somepony had just been spotted. -- I don't have time -- A singular color gained her attention. She grabbed it, made sure to collect the bead, backed out as quickly as she could, resealed the door and galloped towards shouts and rage and rushing wind, something which almost seemed to be pulling her forward because some of the channeled air was being taken from her current corridor. The area was trying to equalize. That meant air was also blasting in behind her. The hospital gown's skirt, just barely anchored at the dock of her tail, fluttered dangerously. Leave me something to breathe, Nightwatch please be breathing and she was trying to gallop faster, the nausea hadn't been shaken loose but it seemed to be having a hard time keeping up, she needed speed but she also needed to be capable of stopping in time before she trampled the wrong ponies, she cleared the corridor's angle and Nightwatch was right there, still on her hooves, still fighting, keeping the attackers from advancing with wind speed alone, but one wing wasn't moving properly, the gusts were faltering and there were two pegasi on the other side of the intersection, hovering as their legs wove under their bodies, taking some portion of the little knight's magic apart, and she saw an earth pony wearing oddly-thick metal shoes pushing forward against the atmospheric tide and black-furred legs starting to buckle and that was when everypony in and around the intersection finally registered the tremendous racket produced by a centaur galloping indoors. The attackers looked up. (She didn't have time to count them.) And what they saw was something larger than any of them, where the forward-set predatory eyes were alight with malice and silver wires crawled up one side of its face and there was no sword, but the giant was moving fast and its hand was glowing, it wasn't supposed to have any magic and its right hand had light leaking out from between the fingers -- "-- shall we watch thee deal with this?" was, in Cerea's opinion, a thoroughly inadequate battlecry. Her arm went back. Her arm came forward. The throw landed dead-center in the intersection. Twice. And the attackers -- stared. Some physically braced themselves, while others attempted to dodge. But for the most part, their focus remained on the point of impact. Rooted to the spot, frozen with dread of what the magic might do. The little piece of keratin stayed exactly where it had hit. Something which wasn't a hoof: merely a section of lost horn which had been carved to resemble one, with small symbols engraved around the edges. After a moment, the little glowing tan bead clattered to a stop next to it. And nothing happened. They had simply stared, while nothing happened. Cerea considered her first battlecry of the confrontation to have been something of a loss. The second, while arguably obscure and considerably lower in volume, seemed to make up for it. "Blitzschritt," the centaur quietly informed them, "offers greetings." And then she was among them. The Sergeant's lessons held: it was easy for her to become surrounded, to be swarmed -- if the attackers had the numbers. But she kept her legs moving, the intersection gave her a choice of directions in which to dodge and leap, and -- Nightwatch was there. She didn't have magic. She had size, strength, and got in several free kicks because the attackers had been waiting for thaums which had never flowed. A pegasus risked coming in high, and so got to discover that the girl also had hands, a decent range of reach, and the headbutt had remained on standby. And whenever somepony tried to go in over her lower back, attack her from a place they assumed she couldn't readily reach or simply went for a knee... the little knight would already be in front of them, and a Guard without armor was still a Guard. Guards knew how to be fought. There were robed pegasi. Earth ponies, equally covered, and it was one pair of each. There were also kicks, Cerea managed a punch on somepony whose jump went a little too high, and the pegasi were the first to drop: Nightwatch kicked one into a stupor, and the specimen whom Cerea had headbutted wound up losing all interest in the waking world. The centaur kicked twice, reared up and crashed down once, and the first earth pony was out -- -- the remaining combatants just barely heard the hoofsteps approaching from the right-side corridor, and yet all of them looked. Because hoofsteps could mean reinforcements. It was just a matter of whose -- -- to some degree, Cerea was still trying to work out what ponies found attractive in each other. But she'd seen Fleur, and understood what place Fluttershy's partner occupied on the bell curve: all of it. The new unicorn mare, now visible at about fifteen meters away, almost ambling towards them with her head down, softly humming to herself as half-hidden eyes regarded the general direction of the floor, seemingly possessing no interest in the battle or anything which wasn't her own hooves... possessed none. She wasn't ugly. But physically, she was almost utterly unmemorable. Her coat hue could be tracked along a system of paint chips until the moment the observer reached the shade of brown designated as 448-C, at which point they would probably be asking themselves why they'd bothered. The mane and tail were arguably trying to put a little variety into the mix, but that particular shade of burnt orange didn't exactly help. It didn't complement, and it didn't highlight. It was just... there. And nothing about the mare seemed to have been groomed for some time. Her build was strictly average, narrowing down to noticeably slim hooves. She wasn't remarkably tall, or thin, or short, or anything. It might be possible to forget the mare five minutes after passing her on the street, or in five seconds, or at the moment anything actually caught your notice. And she wasn't paying attention to the fight, or the ponies, or the centaur. She casually trotted as if there was no hurry at all, she hummed to herself and the last earth pony standing saw her, looked around, saw that he was the last, and he turned away from Nightwatch, oriented towards the unicorn's corridor and charged. The shod stallion's forehooves slammed into each other on the second step. Blades snapped out of the metal's forward edge. And Cerea didn't understand. She had scented his rage, didn't need to guess at the intent -- but he hadn't used the shoes before this (although there might not have been an opportunity, given how he'd had to activate them), the knives were out and the mare hadn't even noticed, he would reach her within seconds and the force of the charge would drive metal deep into flesh, she didn't have time to wonder or think or do anything but chase while she grabbed at the place near her upper waist where stretched-out gauze had attached the makeshift sling, she got it spinning, loaded a stone, launched it with a silent prayer -- -- it hit just behind and between the ears, at the base of the poll. The stallion stumbled. But he was an earth pony and even with centaur strength behind it, the inadequate sling meant the impact hadn't been enough. He stumbled, the pain made him slow down, he almost went off-course before recovering -- -- but he'd slowed down. Relatively speaking, there were very few ponies in the world who knew what it felt like to have someone grab them by the shoulders. Most of those lived in Mazein, and so reasonably wouldn't expect the experience to be followed by being flung over a mare's back and into the ceiling. Gravity noticed. The earth pony, having gotten to experience 'up', decided to stay down, Cerea stopped galloping, ending the charge some five meters from the unicorn. She didn't know who this was. But the attackers had been trying to conceal their identities beneath robes and layers of winter clothing, and... this mare was nude. It seemed to indicate some chance of having her be a member of the staff. And with the strange way she was moving, not really paying attention to anything at all -- she might be hurt. Concussed, under a spell... Or it could be a trick. The girl had to approach with caution. She didn't see an injury. (Scenting one was out of the question: the last of Nightwatch's wind was coming from behind her, and all of the air was blowing towards the mare.) There was still a horn -- -- several things happened in rapid succession, and Nightwatch's scream came first. "CEREA! DON'T!!" The unicorn's ears twitched as they received the name. And then she casually looked up, and saw the centaur. Glanced at the bare flank, where the sword would have been. "...oh...!" That was all she said, at least to start. A single small peal of delight. And now that she was looking up... she did have a distinctive feature: her eyes. Under normal circumstances, they would have been a rather bright amethyst. But they didn't reflect. Nothing shone from them. They didn't pull in light: they crushed it -- -- the unicorn looked at the centaur. The other aura ignited. And then it was the world. and the world burned the toxic fumes which rose from a soul which had turned into magma, heat surging as the shell of normalcy fell away, the aura was everywhere and everything and the girl had never been in the presence of anything like this, didn't know how to block or moderate a sense she'd never needed to filter, the aura reached into her and tried to sear away anything which didn't fit and that was everything, she was staggering, helpless, she couldn't focus and it felt as if she could barely scent or see anything but that horrible aura, the illness rose to greet its best ally and the girl knew the madness was in the palace just before it wrapped itself around her throat. The mare's horn ignited. And the corona was also amethyst -- to start. But something happened as it flowed forward, seemed to split just before it reached Cerea: the second portion angled off behind her, out of sight. The initial burst seemed to be collapsing in on itself, much like those horrible pupils. Gaining density at the edges, as the natural sparkle became muted within something which looked so very much like a mottled bruise -- -- the field projection wrapped itself around Cerea's throat, just below the translator's disc. It was solid. It squeezed. The centaur, lost within the burning aura, could barely think. Her hooves, tapping into the core of desperate instinct, scrambled backwards. There had been field loops at Palimyno: some of the unicorns had attacked with them and after she'd been beaten, a number had tried using the tactic to divide up her weight before finally resorting to the net, with earth ponies doing the dragging. But the Sergeant had taught her to defeat a loop with mass, test her body weight against the corona's strength and watch the projection break -- -- she tried to pull her way out of it, and the unicorn had been ready for that. The corona blazed a little brighter, with the projection simply stretching as the loop pressed ever-inwards. It was... better than that one police officer had done. The one from the first castle. Had she ever learned his name...? The girl distantly registered a very loud thump. It took a moment before she realized it had been the sound of her own body dropping to the ground. The secondary, softer version which came from behind her seemed to be something of a mystery. Her hands came up. Fingers clawed at the projection, tried to tear it to pieces. It didn't work. And all the while, the loop kept contracting. Because Fluttershy had been right. The neck was just about the same for every species, and so many interesting things passed through it. The girl had four lungs -- and one airway. I... The mare was... smiling. Something almost purely joyous, exultant, and -- peaceful. ...why wouldn't she be happy? She's bringing the monster down. She thinks she's saving the world... Her vision was beginning to go grey at the edges. The smile was going to be the last thing she ever saw. It was... actually a rather lovely smile... But her ears were still working, at least for a few more seconds. And the mare... "We separate the bad fillies," the unicorn softly, almost gently sang. "Reinforce and drag..." She didn't want to hear that. Not as the last sounds to ever reach her. The girl's ears tilted backwards -- -- another sound. Half a gasp, cut off around the edges. Somewhere behind her. Cerea, eyesight still narrowing in as grey began to fuse with black, found the loop hadn't fully encased her neck's joints. Head and waist both turned, and she saw where the branching projection had gone. Nightwatch was down. Choking, as the second loop squeezed her throat. Her wings came to a stop, splayed across the floor instead of refolding. The last of the wind died, and the unicorn's scent finally reached Cerea. Something acrid and constant and burning, almost on the same level as the aura. The scent from the clearing, only elevated beyond mere traces and given the proper context. The stench of insanity. The wind had died, and the pegasus would be next. no this is my fault i can't do anything i'm the reason she's down here (the illness surged, almost blocked the aura) she's going to me because of The silver eyes were starting to bulge. To dim. The girl forced herself to turn forward, even as the loop contacted a little more. She could barely breathe. But the disc covered her larynx, and for what little air she could reach at all... she could still speak. "Just me... you can have me, please, I surrender, you can kill me... just let her go..." The unicorn, who seemed to be looking down at her now, simply tilted the brown head slightly to the left. The girl's arms dropped. Illness filled every finger, and she was starting to lose that sensation too. It was almost a mercy. She was helpless and lost and she had killed her friend this mare is killing my friend and death would at least make the illness go away. She was... going to see her sister. And she would do so in the company of another sibling, because they would enter together. I shouldn't have gone in. Shouldn't have brought her. My fault. ...she's killing us There would be another statue in the gardens. Just one. The centaur had quit. "Not her... please..." The head tilt went the other way. "My... my life for her..." But the mare smiled, and sang a little more. Cerea's failing ears lost the lyrics, but... she didn't need them. She understood. There was no such thing as enough surrender. And the little knight's life was just one more thing to take. ...my life for her... my life her choice to come with me to try and protect me to sacrifice Lights flickered overhead. Yellow, grey, teal. Her arms were coming up again. A final desperate clawing at a collapsing bond was also instinct. History had taught her that. France had given the world the mass-production executions of the guillotine -- but before that, there had been a lot of hangings. my life for I swore One last push of the legs. Maybe the unicorn wouldn't be ready for that. I swore Her knees were trying to straighten. The loop moved with her. But the unicorn didn't seem to be taller any more. maybe I can just fall on you I swore my partner my sister somepony I love She had to try something. To try anything, the last thing, the only -- you can have me Her tail trembled. One hand clenched. The other went back. The unicorn, peacefully aware that the girl was seconds away from death, simply watched. But she was almost up. She just needed one hoofstep. One moment. One thought. but I swore my life for all lives my life for HER life and maybe you'll kill me BUT I WON'T LET YOU HAVE HER And the closing field of black went to grey, thinned before evaporating under the onslaught from twinned brilliant flashes of purest white which bloomed from somewhere behind her upper torso, and every trace of the illness vanished as her head cleared and she knew exactly what she had to do and her sword was in her hand. She didn't question its presence, any more than she thought about the odd, brief sensation which arose from within, as if something almost fully spent had just drifted out of her skin. She felt it briefly brush against the nape of her neck as it left. There was no need to question the blade's presence. It was her sword. She knew what she was supposed to do with it. Her right hand moved, and the edgeless excuse for a weapon did the only thing it was capable of. It cut through light. The split projections fell apart. Oxygen rushed into Cerea's lungs, a second gasp sounded from the pegasus, and the staggering unicorn just barely managed to get her head up -- -- she wasn't really staring at the centaur. Cerea felt as if the unicorn was focusing on a point somewhere around where the torn-away hospital gown would have been. That seemed rather rude. She swung the blade, and the unicorn cantered backwards. Just barely getting out of the way. "No!" the mare whispered, and to hear the syllable within the aura was to witness a concept collapsing in upon itself. "Nonononononono...!" The aura didn't wink out. It twisted, flared, turned against the unicorn in a new form of backlash, madness pressing from without and within. And then she turned. She ran. Cerea had other priorities. For starters, there was breathing. That seemed to be very important, especially when the breaths weren't her own. She risked six quick inhalations: her lungs gratefully accepted the gift, while her bra dutifully held. And then she rushed across the short distance to the pegasus, and dropped down to be at the little knight's side. "Are you all right? How's your breathing?" Silver eyes flickered to Cerea's face. Moved to the exposed left flank. Repeated the actions -- "Nightwatch! TALK!" The little knight took a breath. "Um," she said. "Um. Um. Um..." Close enough. "Can you get up? I don't think you should fight." "UM..." "I'm going to put you in the armory," Cerea decided, and placed the sword into its scabbard. (She had the sword, so she had a scabbard. That was only sensible.) "It's the safest place. And then I'm going after her." "...I..." The silver gaze flickered again. "I can get in there myself. You'll lose too much time... Cerea -- Cerea, you have to --" "You're sure?" That with a quick check of the fallen combatants. Two of them were still semiconscious, both were staring at her, and neither was making any attempt to move -- -- the robed mare noticed the attention, and promptly passed out. Cerea resolved to kick the stallion during the exit, followed by calling the situation solved. Attacking herself didn't really seem to be helping anything. Attacking the intruders, however, was much more practical. "-- that was the arsonist..." The centaur felt her lips pull back from her teeth. "...Cerea, she's a hackamore..." She was roughly familiar with the term, which was probably why the wires hadn't hissed. She just had no concept of the local context. "She's a --" "Her mind is missing a bit. This is crazy -- you just... you just --" "-- into the armory. You promise?" "I promise. Um. Cerea --" She reached forward with both hands, got the little knight up on her hooves and gently kissed the black fur of the forehead. "Good. I'm going to go hurt her now." And then Cerea straightened to her full height, turned her body until she was facing the proper hallway, got the kick in... She didn't question the sword, the scabbard, the sudden cure, or any other part of it. There was no need. She'd read a lot of stories, and some of them had even been American. She understood how this worked. When it came to how the brain might attempt to find comfort during strangulation, this particular result was a rather literal classic. Mr. Bierce's writing suggested she could make her dying dream last long enough to do some real damage. She had a Cause. She took the first breath. The Second. Then she moved. And she was galloping through the twisting lights of the hallways with her ears scooped forward for sound and her olfactory bulb going for every possible trace, the mare had a lead and it was possible for her to take strange turns, but all Cerea had to do was find the scent or hear hoofsteps and neither one happened first. It only took twenty seconds of running before the first signs reached her, and they consisted of a continual litany of "Nonononono" with no music left in it at all. It almost reminded her of somepony. She kept moving. And then she saw burnt orange hairs whip around a corner. It was more of a chase than she'd expected, than she'd ever wanted. Cerea was stronger, could move faster over an extended distance than a minotaur across a short one, and the unicorn had no hope of matching that. But the pony was smaller and in the hallways of the lower level, that gave her more freedom to maneuver. She was zig-zagging, taking every turn she could find -- and Cerea had to slow before moving around corners, trying not to slam any part of her body into the sides. The arsonist could manage everything at what would have otherwise been a negligible top speed, and that corona kept igniting, over and over -- -- she stopped aiming at Cerea after the second deflection, because the resulting moment of weakness was letting the centaur catch up. Instead, she started aiming her field through open doorways, pulling out random objects and flinging them backwards: the high ones had to be blocked or dodged, while the lower pieces had to be jumped. The first piece of tipped art suggested they were moving into the more public areas, shifting the second demonstrated some decent field strength as Cerea realized they were probably on the verge of a public exit, she had to vault the fallen statue -- -- it was pure luck. There were hidden paths into the lower level -- but there were also public ones, because just about anypony on staff might need to visit the device repair shop. You couldn't stay lost forever, and the unicorn had spotted the most common way up and out. Slim hooves hit the incline, and Cerea could hear the mare's breathing beginning to labor: the unicorn wasn't used to this level of exertion. The centaur took the slope, braced her own hooves in the designated dents, took a left turn at the top as newly-fractured jewels in the wall turned every reflection into an endless collection of distortions, and then they were both coming out from behind the Resplendent Ramp. They were in the Syzygy. The connecting point of Solar and Lunar wings and when they were on the main level, that meant they were at the entrance. The exit. And three of the doors were open, two were off the hinges, there was a tremendous amount of noise outside, the arsonist was racing through the empty Grand Hall towards the outside and bad things happened when the girl went out of bounds -- -- it slowed her, just for a second. The unicorn gained some distance, galloped through the smallest exit. Then the centaur remembered that it was her dream. She could do whatever she liked. She went for the largest door. She left the palace, racing forth into winter. She entered the final phase of the war. And the first thing she heard was the rumble of hooves and rush of wings closing in on the palace, because the second full wave had been set to provide an additional level of distraction. It had arrived exactly on schedule, it was coming directly at her, and it was moving somewhat faster than it probably should have. It didn't have to worry about getting through the gates, because that had already been done. The attackers were a little more concerned with what was coming up behind them. The faction leaders don't understand herd mentality. They can't, not when they've told themselves to be something separate. They forgot the reason it exists in the first place, and then they overlooked some of the ways it might function. Things they told themselves would never happen, and the dedicated repetition of a fervent belief has yet to create actual Fact. They don't understand that ponies in public can be skittish, wild weather can produce anxiety, and a few are considering whether bunny stampedes can be weaponized -- but the herd will always protect its home. Its leaders. And it's more than just the herd. As with the initial attack against the gates, there are ponies here who didn't intend to be. A few have been carried along by rushing bodies and would really rather be elsewhere. And with just about all of the city's police either inside or somewhere on the grounds... there's been nopony to direct traffic. Some ponies were scheduled to be at the palace around this hour, didn't know what was going on, got pushed in by the jostles of grouped movement and streets which now seem to only lead one way, couldn't get out, and now they're taking what shelter they can. Cowering within doorways and arches and against nearby walls. Trembling, shivering, and trying to stay out of it. They're about to become very important. But when the assault began -- and as it continued -- ponies were leaving the palace. The police were alerted early. Those who were evacuated to the streets had to go somewhere. The whole thing has been kicking up a lot of noise, because that's the nature of the distraction: the sheer volume is going to produce some degree of investigation. And Glimmerglow looked at the flag of her nation, and then oriented on every other -- because Equestria acts on its own too often, and a nation forgets it has friends. She went to Embassy Row. All of it. And now there are cloven hooves, twinned horns, clacking beaks coming in through the air, and they're joined by pegasus feathers and earth pony voices and there's a unicorn Guard who was supposed to have the day off at the very front of it all. He got the word just in time. It's not just the herd, although that's the majority of it. There is a new army charging in behind the second wave, because Canterlot has arrived. There's been a few battlecries on this day. (Some of them took the form of legal statutes.) The unicorn, with hundreds charging in behind him, adds one more. "Okay, assholes! We'll take it from here!" The second wave raced forward, no longer so much in an attempt to enter the palace as from knowing what was coming up behind them and trying to find any way out of it. Very few of them truly noticed the rather ordinary mare galloping towards them, because there were other priorities. But then they saw the centaur. And the centaur had the sword. The sword was supposed to be gone. It was part of what had made the assault possible. In theory, anypony could take on a Princess if they were quick and clever and ready to defeat two ponies who were so obviously weak, but nopony had any concept of how to deal with the sword. (And for the attentive in the second wave, there was more to stare at. There was that which they could barely allow themselves to see, and refused to believe.) The second wave was racing forward. But 'forward' was where the centaur was, she was coming towards them, one of the unicorns desperately tested for a faked blade with a corona projection and when she cut through it, that was when the terror began to take over. Call it... centaur panic. They didn't want to go forward. They couldn't go back. The conflict broke the wave, turned it into eddies and puddles of robed ponies who weren't entirely sure what to do next. The answer, at the moment Canterlot caught up to the drastically outnumbered ponies, became 'fight'. Or, more precisely, 'lose'. The arsonist was galloping, and now she had bodies to block for her: ones which didn't even have to be tipped over. All she had to do was steer around the little battles without getting involved herself, squeezing through the small spaces which the centaur couldn't use. But she was tiring. Her breathing was becoming ragged, because she'd barely exercised for moons and hadn't even done much in the way of casual trots before her exile had begun. She didn't have much time. All she could do was use the battlefield as an obstacle course. And there was just so much to avoid. There were five ponies who'd lined up against a female yak, because the dri with the long braids was wearing a badge designating her as part of the Solar staff and if there was anything the faction members wanted to do more than than establishing themselves above other ponies, it was getting rid of everyone who wasn't a pony at all. There were five of them and they all had magic, so it didn't matter how big she was. And a member of the species whose portfolio was for destruction casually glanced at their line, charged forward, and hit the group's collective weak point. Smashing, done properly, was something of an art. There were zebras everywhere, and whiffwings was free for the asking. Several griffons were at work. Stares lanced this way and that. Two ponies dropped to the ground, rolled over to display bellies and helpless throats, and that was enough to make four more break. One of them left the cobblestoned streets, detoured across the nearest patch of soil, and a white-furred paw stained with the residue of fine powders shot up out of the earth, grabbed an ankle, and began to drag the screaming pony down. The arsonist had to get past all of it. So did the centaur. And none of them were paying any attention to her, not just yet -- but no matter what she did, the centaur was still close behind... ...they scatter before her, clearing the path, and the target senses something is wrong. Ponies are a prey species, and the fact that centaurs are mostly herbivorous doesn't change the rest of the facts: forward-set eyes, ears meant for directional focus of sound, added to speed and strength and power. There are many ways to create a monster, and the one the girl knows best is rather basic: you tell someone they're a monster over and over again, then wait to see how long it takes before they agree with you. But even with something which is just starting to enjoy meat, you still might get a predator. Prey knows when it's being hunted, and so the unicorn glances back. Sees what's charging it, and the horn ignites, because it's all she has, it's what makes her better and something has to get through -- but there is a sword, and every desperate attempt at projecting the corona is deflected, parried, rendered into the sort of fading light which might be seen in dying eyes. The centaur charges, it's faster than any unicorn in the world, and it can't be stopped. Nopony in the city will try, because there are invisible walls bordering that charge path and they are being maintained by fear. The unicorn mare is small, because they're all so very small. The centaur could pick her up with one hand if she gets the leverage, slam her into a wall and then just because the sound produced by the impact is so pleasant, she could do it again and again and again. The unicorn has magic -- but that's the only thing she has. Take away that power and what is she? Something which could be hurt. Something which could be dominated. Something a living nightmare could be in charge of -- -- there were too many kinds of assault under way, and some of them were sensory. She'd never been outside in a crowd like this: when it came to Menajeria, she'd barely been outside at all. Cerea was getting what felt like every species scent at once: the flurry of emotions in the air was trying to produce the same level of disorientation as a Tokyo intersection. And there was too much noise in the battle. Her ears kept trying to retreat under her hair. But it was her dream, and she kept going. It was actually turning into what she felt was a rather nice dream. Having familiar faces turn up was a good touch. She spotted Vanilla Bear, who was absolutely no good whatsoever at actual fighting -- but the enthusiastic leg flailing seemed to be putting in some work. Crossing Guard turned up several meters beyond that, working in conjunction with the cattle from her citizenship class. Abjura was countering workings in all directions. Acrolith had settled for trying to find a vegetarian equivalent to mincemeat, and was making it out of vegetarians. There was a demon of scorch and singe making wreckage out of several attackers, and that almost seemed to be bad. Then the furious avatar of hard-galloping pain resolved into Barding, and that was worse. Because an earth pony who had spent most of his life in a forge was going to see that considerable natural strength magnified by Quite A Lot. He didn't like anything which was happening, he wanted to know if anypony had seen the girl and he was going to keep kicking ponies until one of the attackers said where she was. Plus he had somehow come under the screaming impression that somepony had to have been touching his tools and, for no reason Cerea could think of, he stopped next to one groaning body and asked if it knew the hoofball schedule. There were also four minotaurs up ahead, as part of a solid, thick line of defenders. She could see the horns. Having four meant increased odds of getting a female. Of course, spotting a familiar salt-and-pepper mane had just cut it down to three chances -- -- it was a thick line. But there were gaps to work with -- if you were the size of an average unicorn mare, and the arsonist slipped through one of them. Cerea kept up the chase, the ambassador heard pounding hooves and turned just in time to see her, the girl tapped every last bit of strength which the Second Breath could offer and started to line up for the jump -- -- which was when the breadth of that line truly registered. I can't. Not on her best day. Not during her best dream, not without sprouting wings. No centaur could jump that far, true or not. She could just barely make out what might be a landing spot through the shifting bodies and it was more than six times the length of her own body away, she had to pull up and find a way to go around-- -- but the ambassador had already seen her. Muscles began to shift under his shirt, and there seemed to be a pattern to it. A sort of dance, conducted without any true movement. Pectorals tightened, released. Biceps tensed, hooves scraped at the ground, he looked at her, and the Second Breath was abruptly and utterly outclassed. Strength flooded through her, supercharged every muscle as her potential soared beyond maximum capacity, adding power without mass and fusing it to everything she could already do -- something which happened as Torque dropped to one knee, braced a big hand against the street in search of support. She understood. It was a loan. He was going to need it back, and quickly. Cerea grinned. Accelerated further, picked a launch point -- -- there were screams. There were a lot of screams, and she belatedly realized that some of them had been going on for a while. But several recent examples had been produced by the fact that quite a few people now had a centaur going over their heads. She really hoped none of them looked up. She had half of a hospital gown for a skirt. It wasn't really intended to do anything for preventing spectating from underneath. The landing had her scrambling to recover balance. The increased strength seemed to help her with the impact, but it hadn't done anything for her body's durability: a hind hoof had just chipped. And immediately after most of the local world heard her come down, the extra strength went back to its source. She didn't object. Torque was part of the fight, and wrestling certainly required a certain degree of power. But there was still a period of transition where she was trying to adjust, reorient, pick up on the arsonist again, and it was also the moment when the enemy pegasus went for the sword. It probably hadn't been the worst idea for a move. Swoop in, get her teeth around the blade, and count on having momentum provide the power required for yanking it out of the girl's grip. In fact, as far as disarming Cerea went, it worked to perfection: the girl felt the hilt being pulled away from her palm, and then she got to see the pegasus rolling across the cobblestones because at the instant the pony had taken up the sword, all capacity for flight had gone away. The sword fell out of the mare's mouth. Several random hooves kicked at it, and none without penalty because even a brief moment of contact produced revulsion and the desire to stop -- but it was skittering across the street, moving out of the girl's sight -- -- that wasn't fair. This was her last dream. She wanted it back. And then the hilt was in her hand again. It was a very accommodating sort of dream. Quite a few of the combatants saw that. A number of the robed ones started up a new scream. Some of Canterlot's defenders apparently felt the need to sit down, and indulged on the spot. Cerea galloped. She spotted the arsonist, who was approaching the edge of the battle. Behind her, the noise seemed to be lessening, with the sounds of combat fading away. There was an odd, familiar sensation of being watched, although she took some comfort in the fact that no one was recording anything for upload. The unicorn mare was galloping. But there had been sweat sliding from the dull brown coat for some time, and it had taken on a new aspect: the white bubbles of froth. The arsonist had very little left. Running out of strength, space, and those she could hide behind. They were almost out of the central fight and once they left the main battlefield, there would be nothing but -- -- and that was when she saw the children. After it ended... that was when somepony explained their presence. There were always those in a war who'd simply been trapped. A class had been scheduled to tour the palace at a given hour, the teacher had brought her charges in from an unusual approach angle, traffic had pushed them along, just about everypony who could have directed the flow away had rushed inside -- not the Hillsborough Crush, not when none of the youths had been hurt, but a distant kin. Nopony had realized what was happening until it was too late. They'd only been there for a few minutes. There were colts and fillies cowering near a wall, because they were having so much trouble in simply getting away. They were all too young to have magic, and the teacher was trying to watch over them -- along with several police officers, a number of city ponies, and two griffons. The adults were trying to move the children to safety, protecting them from something worse than chaos. And they were almost out, but they were young and fearful, using the wall for shelter and bracing both, staying as close to each other as they could in order to share a different kind of strength. The arsonist saw the children. She saw the unicorn trying to help the pegasus along. Her horn ignited. Mottled bruises wrapped around two young necks. "Reinforce and drag," offered the first bars of the song, as the choking began and the unicorns among the adults instinctively, desperately aimed their own fields at a working they'd never seen before, tried to counter and failed as everyone else turned towards the lit horn, trying to line up a shot for the backlash. "Reinforce --" -- and the centaur caught up. The blade slashed through the projection. All four of the mare's knees bent, and the light fell apart. "YOU'RE MAKING ME DO THIS!" the arsonist shouted. "IT'S YOUR FAULT! IT ALWAYS WAS! NONE OF THIS WOULD EVER HAVE HAPPENED IF YOU DIDN'T EXIST! YOU'RE A MONSTER -- " The centaur's left hand went down as the upper torso bent forward in concert with folding foreknees, and then the girl's fingers were under the mare's right shoulder. She lifted, almost casually. Released the Second Breath as she straightened, because it felt like she'd had it going for too long already and she didn't need it for this. Then she took four hoofsteps forward and slammed the mare's back against the bracing wall. The pony's weight was being supported by one hand, pressing the unicorn against stone. The other arm, pulled well back in order to get the proper alignment, was holding the sword. A blade without an edge, which had a rough approximation of a point. The point was against the mare's throat. No one moved. No one spoke. Behind her, the last of the fights fell apart. That was how it had to be, in story and dream. The world watched. Waited. "I saved your life," Cerea softly began. "Twice. Once in the underlayer of the palace, because the ones who did all this to break you out of the cells... they must have decided they couldn't get you out any more. That's why that last one tried to kill you. It's the same reason they invaded in the first place: so you wouldn't talk. He tried to cut you with a hoofblade, and I. saved. your. life." The arsonist's horn was dark. She didn't speak. Not with the sword against her larynx, and the centaur so ready to push. "And then you strangled me, just as you tried to strangle them," the girl went on. "You tried to choke a Guard. My partner. The same pony whose home you burned, when you nearly killed a foal --" Which was when she started to hear the crowd again. Cerea didn't know how public the arrest had been, or if there had been any photographs. It was quite possible that very few of the group had found the time to look at a newspaper that morning and in any case, she didn't know if her dreams came with news coverage. But the story of the foal had been in the press for moons now. A city waiting for recovery, or... the word that it would never come. Perhaps none of them had seen an article and if they had, the mare was the sort of pony whose face was forgotten within minutes. But Cerea had just told the entire capital who the unicorn was. The sound was growing, and it was something much less than happy. "-- because you don't care. Because you'll blame anyone except yourself. And I saved your life twice: once in the corridors --" Her own voice felt so calm. Almost... otherworldly. The dream had to be drawing close to its end. "-- and once in Tartarus. When I had to kill Tirek, for the sake of the world --" It triggered another sound: one which she swore had to have shaken the palace. She let it pass. "-- and for all of you." I'm crying. I can feel the tears. Running down my face, where everyone can see. Knights don't cry -- -- sometimes they did. There were circumstances under which it was permitted, and one of them was watching an ancestral home burn. "Because it was all going to happen again," she didn't quite whisper. "I destroyed my only road home, because the one who built it is dead." (She missed the next ripple of sound.) "He thought I would have to save him. Save myself. But I chose all of you. Because that's never a choice at all, is it? I gave myself up for you, I died for you, for the world and your lives and for magic --" The unicorn's eyes had gone blank. Words were still going into the ears. But it felt as if comprehension had been dismissed. The supporting hand shoved. The mare gasped. The sword's point... "-- and what do you use it for? What's the only thing you've ever used it for? To hurt somepony else! To attack Guards, to strangle children! Without thought, without reason, without caring." Just a little more softly, "And you call me a monster? WHAT ARE YOU?" Which was when she realized that the point was starting to indent the throat. "...please..." the mare whispered. But the query was only in the voice. It didn't feel as if any of it had reached the eyes. Or perhaps she simply couldn't see it, through her own flowing tears. Killing is easy. I've already done it once. "You have earned no kindness," the centaur harshly declared. (And still, no one moved. Held back by the sword, the dream, the moment.) "What are you, without your magic? Is there anything left? Should there be, if you think a horn is all which could make someone worthy of life?" She leaned in, realigned the sword to keep the point where it was. Came face-to-snout with the shaking mare, and felt her breasts pressing against the heaving ribs. Another source of pinning weight and with the unicorn, the mere contact would be torment. "You have no magic," the girl whispered. "Not unless I allow it. You have no breath unless I allow it. I'm guessing you find the concept familiar..." She felt the heartbeat of another, thudding against her chest. Counting off the last moments there would ever be. I promised to hurt you... And she would have asked herself what a knight would do, when a defeated foe possessed neither honor nor a hope for change. But she didn't feel like a knight. There was the question of how a Guard might finish it. No possible answers applied to her. There was a certain query as to the method Centorea Shianus preferred. The girl just wasn't sure Centorea Shianus existed. That filly had been an artificial construct, forced to hold together by the weight of eternal pressure and the heat of her mother's endless fear. Perhaps, at the end of all dreams, she simply needed to decide what Cerea wanted. The girl was at the conclusion of her life, watched by her conjured figments of crowd and children, and she still wasn't entirely sure who 'Cerea' was. But she knew who she wanted that mare to be. "I want you to think about that," she told the unicorn, looking directly into those horrible eyes. "In every moment, for every breath you have left to take. I want you to think about being helpless, like a choking child. I want you to think about everything I could do to you, everything you deserve --" The supporting hand let go. The arsonist slid down the wall, and the edgeless blade almost followed the full path. It simply shifted as the mare dropped, and all four of the centaur's knees bent and her legs folded, with the plastic putting a shallow trench in the fur while the sword's point moved from throat to horn. The girl, in the closest approximation she could ever find for a crouch, leaned in as much as her upper waist would allow. "-- if I wasn't. so. nice." Her free hand touched the mare's warm face. Closed the listless eyes. And there was only silence. No one in the huge crowd moved. It felt as if the world had barely breathed. The tableau was frozen, and only the unicorn's heaving ribs provided any sign that life went on. A false life, at the end of dream. It was over. Cerea closed her eyes, and waited to open them again in Lala's presence. To... see Nightwatch, one more time. There would be a long talk. Apologies. Tears. And then, perhaps, her sisters might forgive her. After that... perhaps there would be a chance to make a new friend... ...a new sound entered the world, something half-familiar. Soft pads moving across stone, with little clicks added in as claws contacted the rocks. She just had to scale up for canid and biped... "Centaur?" Yapper whispered. ...typical. She couldn't even get the perfect ending. Just barely moving her lips and trusting the disc to work regardless, "What?" "Centaur should probably carry her in. Or give her to the other Guards. Or police. Find a restraint. Sword can't stay there forever." "I can't." "Centaur hurt? See some bruising around throat." There was a brief pause. "Also see --" "I'm dreaming," Cerea unnecessarily explained. "I have to let it end..." This pause was longer. "Dreaming." Four claws rudely poked into Cerea's left shoulder. "OW!" "Not dreaming," Yapper firmly established. "Centaur weird --" ...wait. What? But -- -- which was when they heard the wings. Multiple pairs, moving in from the palace -- but two of those sets were huge and powerful, swooping towards them, descending -- Cerea opened her eyes, looked up just in time to see the white horse and dark mare coming down, flanked by multiple pegasus Guards. Multiple sapients scrambled back, trying to provide touchdown room. The day landed on her right, with the night on her left. And the first thing the white horse did was to examine the bruising on the girl's throat, followed by a glare at the arsonist. Given another moment, there would have been an order given: the first of many. To bring out a restraint, and secure the prisoner again. But it all had to wait, because the dark mare had landed on the girl's left. She, too, immediately began a basic examination. Looking for injuries. The alicorn stopped. Stared. And a mare who knew about the power of stories pushed aside every reaction which could be offered to the impossible until there was time to deal with it, made room for the necessary and seized the only moment they might ever have. Her horn ignited. The corona projected into the sky, expanded as it twisted in shape and color, until an intangible centaur some fifteen times the size of the real floated above them all. "SHE IS ONE OF US! OUR SAVIOR, TIREK'S SLAYER! ONE OF OURS, ONE OF MINE! ARE THERE ANY WHO DARE TO DISAGREE?" A city stared up into cold winter air. Saw the projected image, an exact replication of the girl who was low against cold stone. Looked at the exposed left hip, with its icon of a sword superimposed over Moon. And no one could say anything at all.