I should have known it was going far too well for me. We’d secured the services of the pirates in exchange for me arranging a royal pardon for their leader, and those services would come in the form of a muster of every available ship they had, mainly what we would call Cathaynese junks armed with cannons and the odd airship, with all available hooves on deck to raid the docks and all timed, in theory, to coincide with a slave uprising from within and a kirin resistance attack from land. There they would wreak as much havoc as possible, which, I had been assured in the strongest possible terms without resorting to a live demonstration, was a lot, and they were free to make off with whatever they pleased from the enemy by way of additional compensation to the crew, not that I particularly cared about that. The Changelings wouldn’t know what hit them, and I’d be home free before the week’s end, hopefully sipping perfectly chilled champagne from Chrysalis’ own flagship as it flew across the ocean back to Equestria, observing the smouldering remains of the docks as they disappeared beyond the horizon.
[The Black Flag Fleet was not known for its record keeping, but Equestrian colonial anti-piracy operations reported that the majority of the pirate fleets were made up of civilian ships of varying size known as ‘junks’ and a small number of airships that had been outfitted with cannons. Exact numbers are unknown, but intelligence had placed an estimate of around one hundred to five hundred ships, albeit spread out over a wide area. This proved to be both an advantage and a disadvantage to anti-piracy measures, as colonial forces always had numerical and material superiority over any raiders they encountered, but the losses inflicted with each engagement were relatively low. Only a hoof-full of ships were known to be what one might consider a true ‘warship’, but these were employed sparingly.]
Once we’d hashed out the arrangements, aside from when exactly we’d launch this daring raid of ours as we still needed to coordinate the efforts of multiple different groups, we took our leave. It was around midday, after being given a quick lunch by our pirate hosts consisting of dry biscuits of such hardness that they could be used as roofing tiles, washed down with diluted rice wine, when we set off again. I felt strangely confident about our chances, which, looking back now, really ought to have been a warning of what was to come; nevertheless, at that moment it looked as though I, for once, might finally have everything sorted. The kirins were on my side and so were the pirates, and Square Basher and her fellow slaves were ready to start smashing things the moment things would finally kick off.
The journey back to Marelacca held little indication of what was to come; if anything, it was about as equally uneventful as the journey out and just as tense. We did encounter those mysterious figures, the kuda bunian, again, and as before they did nothing but stand in the shadows, their features seemingly obscured by more than mere shadow, and watched us trespass through their forest homes for the second time. This time, I waved politely at them, and I think I saw one of them smile, though I could not say for certain that it had a mouth to smile with, and they melted back into the forest never to be seen again. We took fewer breaks this time, as each of us, buoyed by our apparent success, was quite eager to get back before the sun set and curfew began and to tell Uncle that we were one, small step closer to his eventual goal of a free Marelacca.
It was around mid-afternoon when we arrived back in the city, passing through those same dreary suburbs as before, towards its vibrant, beating heart. I was hot, sweaty, and I probably stank about as half as bad as Cannon Fodder after that very lengthy trek, and all four of my legs expressed deep anger at being put through far more walking than I have ever done before in my life by inflicting a great deal of pain, but the rare sensation of something approaching optimism had wormed its way into my soul. The city was its usual charming self; the ever-present crowds of ponies plying a trade or just talking were everywhere, under an afternoon sun that was utterly merciless. The presence of Blackhorns and their ridiculous propaganda posters did spoil the scene somewhat, but it was still inspiring in a way to see ponies and kirins going about their daily lives while they still had the liberty to do so. The ever present noise of conversation, of wagons laden with goods dragged through the streets, of vendors and hawkers announcing their goods filled the air with its multitudinous cacophony. In spite of myself, I found myself almost smiling. The sensation lasted right up until I felt a huge, cold hoof on my shoulder, and I looked down to see the glistening chitin of a Changeling Purestrain. Silence fell like a heavy woollen blanket, even in this busy street.
“Hello, Prince Blueblood,” said Dorylus.
I turned my head, following the path of this hoof clamped firmly over my shoulder along a leg riddled with holes, and then up to see the Purestrain’s grinning face beaming down at me. A cold sneer of indulgent triumph was on his stupid face, and I felt my blood drain from my face. I pushed myself away from him and clasped my magic around the hilt of my kris, and was a little surprised when he simply stood there grinning like an idiot and let me do that, but I looked around and saw that we were surrounded on all sides by Blackhorns armed with muskets. I inelegantly returned it to its hilt. The three kirins had dropped their saddlebags, sat on the haunches, and held their forehooves up in a gesture of surrender; the damned thing is they looked to me in apparent hope that I could get them out of this mess. Cannon Fodder had already drawn his kris, holding it earth pony-style in his mouth, but he dropped it when I sadly shook my head. Beyond the ring of muskets aimed at us, the crowd of native ponies and kirins had gathered around to watch, under the supervision of more Blackhorns who held them back from the proceedings.
“Come now,” he said in that sickeningly sweet tone he reserved for gloating, “did you really think that we wouldn’t find you eventually?”
“Frankly, no,” I said, drawing myself up as tall and straight as I could; it took the utmost effort on the part of my princely reserve and bearing not to be reduced to a blubbering, shaking wreck. Short of a miracle, I was finished. It was about this time in silly adventure stories that somepony swoops in to save our hero at the last moment, but this was not one of those. “But how?”
“It was simple,” he said, still puffing out his chest like a damned peacock. “Somepony told us, though not without duress, if that makes you feel any better. You can paint yourself whatever colour you like, but you still look like Prince Blueblood. You don’t exactly blend in with the crowd. I must say, it was very entertaining to read the reports of you slumming with that kirin fried rice vendor and going off to see pirates, but I’m afraid it’s time to put an end to this little farce.”
“What have you done with her?” I demanded.
Dorylus shook his head, but that insipid grin of his only grew wider. Though I was filled with fear, I longed to wipe it from his face. “She’s nothing for you to be concerned about. In fact, you won’t have to worry about anything ever again. You’ve become tiresome, and I’ve already wasted far too much of my time and effort on you.”
He pointed his jagged hoof in the direction of the wall of what I assumed was an office building of some sort; it was a blank sort of wall, with bare concrete and only a few windows. By the side of this structure was a narrow alleyway that receded into a pitch black darkness even in the stark bright light of the afternoon. The drones parted, pushing the curious crowd that had gathered away to form an equine tunnel that led to this nondescript wall. A sensation of utter dread overcame me when it rapidly dawned on me what he was planning.
“Up against the wall, if you please,” said Dorylus. Two Blackhorns advanced to grab me by the shoulders, their muskets jostling against their shoulders, but he interrupted them with an imperious wave of his hoof. “No, wait.” A cruel grin formed on his face. “The kirins first. Make him watch.”
White Spirit swore profusely in Cathaynese; when the Blackhorns moved to grab him he threw a punch, striking one in the cheek with a hoof. However, another drone seized him roughly by the shoulders. Bright sparks flickered over his horn, like a cigar lighter about to ignite. The drones saw this, and a drone transformed his hoof into a sharp blade and plunged it into the struggling kirin’s neck before he could burst into flames. He died gurgling on his own blood, which spread across the ground under his twitching body, sparks still dancing over his horn. Somepony in the crowd screamed in horror, and the Blackhorns barked orders at them.
“Someone always has to spoil it,” said Dorylus, shaking his head.
“You bastard!” I spat; rarely had I been filled with such rage. It boiled up inside me, briefly overcoming my fear.
“Ah, I can walk there myself!” snarled Guiding Light, pushing away from the advancing drones. Silver Star immediately broke down; a great, sobbing wreck, howling at the injustice of it all, he begged them on behalf of his wife and two sons. His friend helped him up, and sensing the futility of it all, he half-walked, half-carried him over to that foreboding wall, where they stood, embraced together.
“You don’t need to do this!” I shouted. A drone grabbed my upper foreleg as I tried to lunge at Dorylus. “You have me! You wanted me! This barbarism isn’t necessary!”
“Oh, but it is,” said Dorylus, his voice disconcertingly calm and amicable. “They helped you, Prince Blueblood, and that is why I must set an example.” He turned from me to address the crowd of ponies and kirins, who watched aghast at the murderous proceedings. “Gather ‘round, my little ponies and kirins, and see the price for defying the Hives!”
At a barked command a line of Changeling drones formed in front of the two kirins, Guiding Light staring defiantly at them and Silver Star sobbing pathetically into his chest. I wanted to look away, but I couldn’t; I owed them that much. Another shouted order, and the Blackhorns raised their muskets, and the final command brought the rippling, sharp crackle of musket fire. The shots ripped into the kirins’ bodies, and they fell in a bloodied, still heap, wrapped in each other’s hooves. A chorus of horrified screams rose up amidst the gathered crowd, some ponies and kirins, incensed by this outrage, began to push against the ring of drones around us, shouting profanity and insults at their so-called liberators.
“You’ll pay for this,” I hissed, fighting in vain against the strong grip of the drone restraining me. It wasn’t bloody fair; war never is, but they weren’t soldiers, as if that makes the wanton slaughter of modern warfare any more acceptable. To this day I ask myself what I could have done to have stopped this, but then if I had nobly gone first then I would not be here to write this for your elucidation and they might have still followed. Though I knew them only briefly, they remain three faces to haunt my dreams and mock me for surviving where they did not.
“I’ve heard that phrase more times than you’ve had whores,” said Dorylus with a casual shrug. “Your turn now.”
Cannon Fodder loudly and wordlessly protested, but he was pinned down by no fewer than three drones, and still he struggled in vain against them. As for me, I saw the futility in defiance and went along quietly, dragged along by this single drone, stumbling as much from fear as from the rough state of the tarmac. My heart was hammering in my chest, sounds became unclear and indistinct so that I could barely make out what my aide was shouting to Dorylus. The noise of the increasingly volatile crowd sounded as though they came from behind a sturdy brick wall. I think I heard one of the drones pointing out the increasing anger of the crowd to an oblivious Dorylus, but when I looked over my shoulder I saw that he was far too invested in watching me die to worry about such trivialities.
I fell, my legs giving out under me, and the drone was joined by a second to drag me on my hindlegs to the bloodstained, bullet-marked wall. The two dead kirins stared up at me with empty, accusatory eyes - I should have done something, they seemed to say. The drones dropped me next to their bodies, their blood splashing on my stained coat. I looked up to see the dreadful sight of the firing squad: five drones, having reloaded their muskets, stood at ease before me under the eye of a sergeant. My body shook uncontrollably, tears streamed down my eyes, and I might have soiled myself; hardly an inspiring sight, but I think I could be spared judgement over this.
“Chrysalis wants me alive!” I shouted in desperation, as if that might save me. “What will she do when she finds out you just had me shot?”
“Oh, I’ll lie,” he said. “You and your kirin friends were gunned down trying to escape, of course. She’ll soon be too busy ruling Equestria to worry about that.” Dorylus looked as though he was about to leave the grisly business of commanding the firing squad to the sergeant, and the plucky drone looked to be quite keen to be the one to give the order that ends the life of Lord Commissar Prince Blueblood, Hero of Equestria and Scourge of the Hives, but with the eagerness of a foal with a new toy the Purestrain darted forwards and all but knocked the sergeant aside. “Let me do this. I’ve always wanted to lead a firing squad, and I’ve waited so long for this moment. Atten-SHUN!”
The drones snapped to attention immediately, their disciplined hoof stomps sounding like a single crack of a musket. I shuddered at the sound.
“Present!”
The barrels of the loaded muskets were levelled directly at me; five black holes from which would spit fire and lead that would rip my flesh into ribbons as it had done for those two poor kirins. This was it. The end. Nopony was coming to save me this time. There was nothing for it, except…
Dorylus had only taken the intake of breath required to shout the word ‘fire!’ when I took my chance. The dark alleyway was to my left, not more than a few pony-lengths away, so I picked myself up off the ground and ran for it.
“Fi- hey! Where is your honour?”
“In your wife!” Do Changelings even have wives? I don't know, but it was the best quip I could come up with.
I didn’t look back, but I imagine that if I had I would have seen the five drones and Dorylus watching with slack-jawed amazement that I would simply run away. I’d already thrown myself bodily into the rank, disgusting, refuse-filled cleft between two buildings by the time they’d recovered their senses.
“Don’t just stand there, you idiots! Shoot him!”
A volley of musket fire followed me into the alley. I heard the thuds of the musket balls smacking into concrete. One whizzed close past my head and struck the wall ahead. I galloped hard; they would not be far behind. Inside this alley was all manner of detritus, apparently having served as a dumping area for rubbish by the homes and businesses all around. I scrambled over piles of empty, rotting cardboard boxes, decayed food, and smashed furniture, not daring to look behind. The sound of a crowd cheering my name, oddly exhilarating, was ringing in my ears as I plunged head-first into the darkness, but was overcome by the buzzing of wings behind me.
The alleyway forked, like a maze. I scaled over the remains of a broken armoire, and gave it a buck with my hindlegs to send the mass of wood sailing into the air behind me. Whether or not it struck any of the drones I’ll never know, but I like to think it did. At the time, however, there was very little thinking that I was capable of doing; there was only run. My instincts led me back out into the street, but I was greeted with a scene of extraordinary mayhem.
I have never been in a riot before; they’re normally things that princes are supposed to run away from when the lower orders take offence to a cake-based quip when they can’t afford to buy bread. Here, however, the churning mass of shouting, screaming ponies and kirins provided the perfect cover for me to slip from the Changelings’ grasp. An angry mob had formed, so spontaneously that they hadn’t had the time to make placards or signs with pithy slogans to explain what they were so upset about, but I quickly got the gist of it.
From what I could tell, based on my special talent’s instincts rapidly putting everything together for me, they were marching straight towards where I had last seen Dorylus and…
“Cannon Fodder!” I shouted to nopony in particular, as the realisation that I had left him behind with the Changelings hit me with the force of a rampaging yak. Guilt and fear make for a potent mix, and I was positively swimming in it. He was going to be fine, I reassured myself, as I paced about in the street and fretted about whether or not I should go back for him. My aide was a resourceful pony, at least in certain situations when he was allowed to use his initiative, and he would invariably get out of this mess by himself.
However, right then, there was little that I could do for him on my own, and the sounds of shouting and of things being hurled and smashed, distant but growing louder in intensity and volume, from the direction of the increasingly embattled Blackhorns had somewhat reassured me that the enemy was not having a fun time of it. The crowd continued to surge forth, chanting aggressive slogans that, though I did not understand most of their language, certainly made their feelings on the public execution of three of their neighbours open to very little interpretation. ‘Changelings go home!’ was about as much as I could understand, and I would have assumed that the other slogans were nowhere near as polite.
Though the city had seemed relatively calm for the few days I have lived there, at least the very brief snapshot of the city under occupation that I had seen, it seemed as though all of the underlying tension had finally come bubbling forth, like a pot on a stove. I slipped into the crowd, relieving one confused earth pony peasant, who I assumed had visited from the countryside for the day and found himself swept up in the madness, of his bamboo conical hat and placing it on my own head along the way, not quite advancing with them, but aiming to get to the other side of the street where, I hoped, the pursuing Changelings emerging from the alleyway would not spot me. From there, standing in the shadow of another building, I watched with growing trepidation as this unruly mob advanced; I could not see what was going on further ahead with Dorylus and the Blackhorns, and I certainly had no desire to go and see for myself, but it could not have been good.
It was not long, just enough time for me to catch some of my breath, before the inevitable happened. The sharp crack of musket fire cut through the noise of the mob. A pony or a kirin somewhere screamed, and the defiant, volatile atmosphere of the crowd was instantly replaced with one of fear, like a wave had swept through them. As one, they all seemed to flinch, as though possessed of one mind that was now ridden with mortal terror. A few continued to advance, still bellowing themselves hoarse with their catchy slogans. I heard another crack, and this time a chorus of screams arose as a response, and those amongst the mob blessed with a healthy sense of self-preservation strong enough to overcome their outrage turned hoof and fled.
I was swept along in a tide of equine bodies. From all around I was pressed in by the panicked mob, and forced with little recourse but to go along and, much like a roiling sea itself, try to keep my head above the surface. Panicked shouts filled the air. The Changelings were behind us, I was sure of it, pursuing this most visible defiance to their rule yet. The crack of musket fire continued intermittently, amidst the screams and cries of the crowd, but, as I was helplessly pushed along by the panicked ponies and kirins all around me, they seemed to grow more distant. As I pushed, pulled, and kicked my way through the press of bodies towards a relatively empty side street, occupied only by a few more citizens of sufficient sense to get out of the path of the mob, and paused to catch what remained of my breath for a second time, I heard the unmistakable sounds of combat; the clash of steel and the bark of orders was faint, but it was something that I’d heard more than enough times for it become ingrained in my memory. There was the roar of fires being started, kirins turning into niriks, I assumed, too, amidst the general cacophony.
Lost and alone in a city that was on the verge of tearing itself apart, I decided that my best course of action was to try and find Uncle or Spring Rain and let them sort it all out for me. Her house was closest, at least according to my temperamental special talent, and so I pushed and kicked my way through the mob, followed its subtle tug down the side street away from the obvious sounds of violence, and out into another main street. Here, ponies, kirins, and Changelings alike milled about in a general state of confusion, with some on both sides having banded together. A Blackhorn officer argued with a collaborationist police officer, who, in broken Ponish, objected in quite strong terms at being ordered to stand against his fellow ponies. Another shouted at a growing mob of ponies, some armed with kris daggers and others with bricks, bottles, sticks, and anything they could find, that had formed around his beleaguered little unit. The news had travelled exceptionally fast and, as ever, had gained a few embellishments along the way. As I could see it, unless Dorylus was clever (he might have been cunning but from what I had seen he certainly lacked in terms of intelligence) he would have a full scale insurrection on his hooves. I, for one, did not want to be a part of that, so I hastily turned away from the tense scene before further violence could erupt and scampered away down the street like a spooked cat.
My special talent led me through wide thoroughfares and back alleys alike. Away from where the mob had formed around the impromptu execution wall, which I have heard is now the site of a memorial of sorts, the city was calmer, but still quite tense. [The site has indeed become a memorial to the uprising and the victims of the Changeling occupation of the city. The bullet holes in the wall and the scorch marks on the ground are still visible in that street.] I didn’t exactly stop to speak with the ponies and kirins I found wandering the streets, but each of them seemed to be in an understandable state of frightful confusion and apprehension about what had just happened. Rumours were already spreading -- a public execution of kirin resistance members that rapidly got out of hoof and resulted in the Changelings firing on a spontaneous demonstration was how I recalled the situation, but from picking up the snippets of hushed conversation that I could understand one would be forgiven for assuming that the occupiers had suddenly and without provocation fired on innocent civilians and as a result the entire city was rising up to throw out the invaders. There were a few more extreme theories being voiced, such as the Blackhorns rounding up all of the kirins in the city to shoot them en masse or that they were going to force all of the ponies in the city onto those big, strange airships that nearly everypony had by now seen in the docks to ship them back to the Hives. Most worrying of all was the rumour that Prince Blueblood was in the city, somehow, had miraculously survived a firing squad (that I did so by running away from it was a detail that hadn’t survived going through the rumour mill), and was about to lead a glorious uprising that would cast out the invaders, liberate the entire city, and then ponies and kirins will live in harmony in a free and independent Marelacca.
Aside from the obvious reason of keeping myself safe from the Changelings actively trying to hunt me down, I’d endeavoured to keep myself as hidden as possible to avoid that sort of thing. Now that the metaphorical cat had been released from its bag-prison, the citizens here were going to have expectations of me that I could not possibly fulfil. Still, my primitive disguise, such as it was, seemed to be holding up for the time being. I still passed squads of Blackhorns trotting along the streets, ponies diving out of their way, their muskets jostling against their shoulders, in the direction of the carnage. Overhead, small swarms of drones swept overhead in loose formations that would have given Rainbow Dash a fit due to their sloppiness, low enough that I could have downed one by throwing my new hat like a frisbee heavenwards. Instead, I pulled said chapeau low over my eyes and walked on through the streets, and when it occurred to me that I might be making myself look even more suspicious by wearing a rice farmer’s hat like Shadow Spade’s fedora when she’s stalking her mark through seedy San Franciscolt, I was rather amazed that my disguise was working. So much for ‘not blending in’. However, as I would find out, the Changelings had rather more immediate and deadly problems on their hooves.
After a few more turns through twisting back alleys, where I was accosted by a homeless pony who demanded money from me and wouldn’t stop until I kicked him into silence, I came out into that same market area I had ‘worked’ in with Spring Rain before. I cursed my special talent as the place was absolutely crawling with Changelings, but as I crouched behind a large rubbish bin overflowing with discarded food packaging, I saw that they did not wear the same dull grey uniforms as the Blackhorns. No, they were the drones in Dorylus’ war-swarm, who had by now spent the entire occupation sitting idle in the docks. Armed to the teeth with muskets, I observed them from my hiding place as they went from stall to stall, shop to shop, rounding up terrified ponies and kirins. They segregated the two, bringing the kirins to one corner of the market square and the ponies to the other, though their treatment of the two races was equally harsh; I saw one elderly pony fall, and for that he received a musket butt to the side of the head. He did not get up.
This, understandably, incensed some of the creatures here, kirins included. The roar of ignition was soon followed by the anguished screams of Changelings, who burned as these incandescent niriks charged them and wrapped them in a fatal embrace. All Tartarus broke loose. Muskets cracked and smoke quickly filled the square. Ponies grabbed whatever was at hoof - rocks, cooking implements, and cleavers - and turned on their oppressors in an instant, and a hideous brawl to the death broke out.
This was my chance. Darting out from behind the safety of the rubbish bin, I scrambled across the square. I leapt over a collapsed drone, his face caved in by a hot wok, and collided with a pony and another Changeling engaged in a frantic struggle for survival. Instincts kicked in, and I drew my kris and plunged it into the drone’s neck, the spray of ichor splashed down onto the pony's face and he was pinned beneath the twitching, bleeding corpse. Shouts and cries of pain filled the air, and I kept moving.
Ceremonial but deadly dagger in my magic, I squeezed through the melee to a corner of the square. This wasn’t a battle as I’d known it with clear lines and formations, but something worse. The Changelings, being disciplined, fanatical soldiers were clearly having the better of it. I saw ponies and kirins, innocents who had been caught up in this horrendous mess, cut down alike with bayonets as they tried to flee. Others, seemingly knowing that they were doomed, were determined to go down fighting, and fought back with clumsy, amateurish strikes with whatever improvised weapons they had. Only the niriks seemed to be able to meet the enemy on a relatively equal level, and the stench of burning flesh stung my nostrils and throat.
A shrill cry from behind distracted me. I turned, and saw a gaggle of foals - ponies and kirins - huddled behind a stall. They stared back with wide, terrified, tear-rimmed eyes. Faust, they shouldn’t have been caught up in this; they looked no older than seven years. Looking back at the brawl, I saw a gap in one wall where another alleway led to an empty side street. It was our only chance.
“Follow me!” I shouted at them. Well, I couldn’t very well leave them there; I didn’t know for certain if anypony had recognised me, and Yours Truly abandoning foals to save his own skin was hardly going to be a great look.
For some reason they all seemed to trust me, and the youngest only required a little additional coaxing to encourage them to follow. They stuck close to me as I trotted against the wall, the foals galloping to keep up. A kirin seemed to take notice of what I was trying to do, and threw himself against a charging drone, checking his advance, and they rolled into the melee, never to be seen again. One foal tripped, so I grabbed him and threw him on my back where he wrapped his little hooves around my neck for dear life. We tore into the alleyway and kept going, not stopping until we emerged into the relative safety of the next street.
I had assumed that they would thank me graciously for the brave rescue and trot off merrily home to excitedly tell their parents about the fun adventure they’d just had, when I realised that their parents had probably been left behind in the market square. The sounds of carnage and violence continued to echo down the alleyway we’d just ran through, so their fate didn’t particularly bear thinking about. So that’s how I found myself the custodian of four little brats, who, upon reaching the relative safety of the next street over, immediately began complaining about being hungry and scared. When I rescued them, what I was supposed to do with them after hadn’t really occurred to me.
Again, leaving them to their own devices in a city rapidly descending into outright civil war, alone, defenceless, and unsupervised, would not reflect well upon me or my dubious reputation, so now I was saddled with looking after them until I could find somepony else to take that onerous task. Spring Rain was a mother, I recalled, and was clearly missing her taken foal, and in my fear-addled mind that made her the perfect individual to unload these foals on. If anypony thought it odd that a strange stallion was leading a gaggle of foals away they kept it to themselves, and the growing number of Changelings stalking about the streets occupied the majority of their attention anyway.
In fact, the only attention that I received from then on came from a few of the collaborationist police officers, those that were still trying desperately to keep some sort of order, telling me to ‘remain indoors’. Well, I can safely say that remaining indoors was precisely what I wanted to do with the rest of my life after yet another near-death experience, so I nodded politely and trotted off with greater urgency. I did stop every so often to look behind me, and before long I saw plumes of roiling black smoke rising into the air, drifting on the hot breeze.
As for the foals, well, they seemed to be handling the grim situation about as well as could be expected. The one whose sobbing had quietened down into gentle weeping expressed what I felt but had to keep inside. He at least was being comforted by a filly I assumed was his older sister. Quiet words of reassurance were not something that cropped up particularly regularly in my limited vocabulary, but as their grasp of Ponish was about as limited as my grasp of Marelay, as long as whatever I said was in an appropriately comforting tone then the exact words didn’t particularly matter. But as the more precocious of the foals started speaking, apparently bombarding me with the sorts of questions that foals invariably ask of all adults, I managed to pick up a bit more of the vocabulary. Before we reached our destination, I would know the local terms for ‘cat’, ‘tree’, and ‘Power Ponies’.
I was almost dead on my hooves by the time I reached Spring Rain’s home; sick with fear and exhaustion, but relieved that I had finally found at least some semblance of safety. My charges too, the foals, were likewise tired, but hadn’t complained too much for the entirety of the journey there. The streets here were curiously empty, most ponies having presumably taken the advice of the police officers and hidden themselves inside or perhaps joined this spontaneous outpouring of dissatisfaction at having their city taken over. This time I didn’t bother to knock, but simply pushed the front door open. It was a little surprising to find that it was unlocked, and I feared the worst when I felt the door open under a gentle nudge of my magic. However, where I feared to find drones raiding the house, that sense of dread turned to relief when I saw Spring Rain, Uncle, Cannon Fodder, and three other kirins gathered in the living room. So much relief, in fact, that I almost failed to notice the drawn daggers and loaded muskets aimed in my direction.
“Ah, I told you he’d turn up!” exclaimed Spring Rain excitedly.
“You were worried about me?” I asked, truly surprised at her concern.
“Aiyah!” She pulled a disgusted face, but even I could tell it was an act. “We just need you to help blow up the docks, then you can go back to Equestria and we never have to see you again, lah!”
One of the other kirins scoffed. “So much for that, eh?” he said. “Now the city’s crawling with Changelings, and they’re rounding up everyone.”
“How do we know it’s really him, anyway?” asked another one of the kirins.
It was a fair question, and unfortunately none of them seemed to know the appropriate spell that would answer it in a second’s time. “The three kirins you sent to take me to see Golden Hook,” I said, “their names were White Spirit, Guiding Light, and Silver Star. I’m sorry, I couldn’t save them.”
"Names are too easy," he shot back, narrowing his horn an inch towards me. "You must do better than that."
I took only a second to think about the answer. "White Spirit," I began. "He told me some ridiculous story about mares who die in childbirth becoming banana vampires. Or… vampires who hide in banana trees? Chewing on our guts like noodles?"
Spring Rain let out a long, mournful hum, though a hint of a smile touched her lips for an instant. "Ah, that's him alright, lah."
Uncle nodded his head solemnly, and with a wave of his hoof the other kirins lowered their weapons. Tentatively, I stumbled in, and though I was tired, I managed to summon sufficient mental energy to cast the appropriate spell enough times to confirm that the ponies and kirins here were not devious Changelings. The sofa that had served as my bed for these past few days looked so very inviting, and I wished that I could simply throw myself upon it. The foals followed me in, likewise with wide-eyed apprehension at the heavily-armed strangers all around them, that is until Spring Rain darted into the kitchen and emerged with jars of sweets for them.
“It’s chaos out there,” I said with an exhausted shrug. “I pulled the foals out of the brawl in the marketplace. I hope their parents are well.” I looked to my aide, who stood there with his usual empty expression. “Cannon Fodder, how in the blazes did you get here before me?”
“When you escaped the Changelings and the ponies started throwing things at them I walked away,” he said. “I don’t think they bothered to chase me.”
Of course, only Cannon Fodder could have escaped from a firing squad by simply walking away as though from a gaggle of overly enthusiastic peddlers on the street trying to sign one up to charity donations. Still, I was immensely relieved to see that he was safe, though I refrained from bounding over and embracing him, both for the reasons of propriety as much as concerns over cleanliness.
“We’ll look after the foals,” said Uncle. “You look awful, sir. Please sit down before you fall over.”
I didn’t need to be told twice, only once, and I collapsed onto the much-abused sofa. Instantly, I felt a wave of exhaustion take me, as though whatever energy I had that sustained me through this awful day had been sapped from my body. I might have fallen asleep right there if Uncle hadn’t kept on speaking.
“What happened?” he asked.
I lifted my head with utmost effort from the sofa; he must have known, I thought, but probably wanted to hear it from the prince’s mouth. “There was a firing squad. Dorylus and a group of Blackhorns caught us as we returned to the city. They shot the three kirins, then they lined me up. I escaped.” It was prudent, I thought, to gloss over the manner in which I had made my not-so-heroic escape. “And then a mob formed and attacked Dorylus. I didn’t see what happened, but I heard musket fire, so I would assume that the Commandant had done something terrible and cowardly. With nowhere else to go I made my way here, and saw Changeling soldiers, not Blackhorns, rounding up civilians in the market square. A fight broke out and those foals followed me here. Do you mean to say, Uncle, that this uprising was not your doing?”
He shook his head gravely. “No, we had no intention of causing this kind of uprising before our mission, sir.”
“Then who did?”
“I expect…” he said, then trailed off, stroking his wispy beard in contemplation. “I would believe that executing three kirins in public provoked a spontaneous outpouring of anger, and when they voiced their anger in the only way a mob of enraged creatures can. The Changelings’ heavy-hoofed approach will only lead to an escalation. This is fortuitous timing.”
I boggled at him. “I’m glad my near-execution and the outbreak of civil war has been so convenient.”
Uncle had the sense to look a little bit ashamed of his remark. “No, you’re right, it is a tragedy,” he said. “But think about it, sir. The entire city is on the brink of open rebellion. The Changelings will try to clamp down on this before it spreads, and while they’re doing that the docks will be vulnerable. The last thing that they will expect is to follow through with our plan now. If we’re going to do this then we need to do this now, before the occupiers can re-establish their hold on the city.”
“Right now?” It was insane, madness, and I’m certain I’ve used those exact words far too many times to describe a great number of the operations I’ve been involved with over the years, but few words come close to matching my feelings on the matter. “I’ve only just spoken to the pirates, and Square Basher and the slaves may not be ready either.”
“And neither will the Changelings!” Youthful energy, in stark contrast to his advanced age, seemed to flood into his withered frame, and he was almost vibrating with excitement. “We must strike now!”
His reasoning was sound, as much as I hated to admit it; knowing Dorylus, his attention would be diverted not only by the rampaging mobs and fires in the city but also by Queen Chrysalis no doubt screaming at him for failing not only keeping order in her occupied city but also in capturing me again, if he too hadn’t already been lined up against a wall and shot for his repeated failures. Besides, in a way I thought it might be best to get this next horrible thing over and done with sooner rather than later. Every moment that I spent here and not safely on an airship flying back to good old Equestria was one closer to the roving squads of Blackhorns and soldiers finding me and not even bothering with selecting a nice wall to line me up against before just shooting and/or stabbing me. There was, however, just one other thing:
“May I at least have a nap first?” I asked. “I’ve had a rather emotional day.”
“No,” said Uncle, still beaming happily. “They’ll find us here soon enough. We move now.”