The Adventures of Silent Shot (or, 014 Reporting for Duty)
By: Bronze Statue and lordvad3r95
Chapter 1: The Hooded Pony
Shining Armor sighed. It had been two weeks since his wife officially became the Empress of the Crystal Empire, and it was time for him to formally resign as captain of the Royal Guard and turn in all papers associated with the post. He still felt loyal to Equestria of course, but his duty was to the Crystal Empire now. Glancing at the clock tower, he noticed that his little detour through the park had caused him to be late for his scheduled meeting with the Princess.
“Dammit! That stupid ‘shortcut’ made me late. If I don’t hurry, I’ll have to wait until Monday to file that paperwork.”
Unbeknownst to the captain, however, someone had other plans for those papers. A hooded stallion was watching Shining from within a large oak tree. Watching his target pass under that tree, the mysterious stallion mentally counted to ten, then silently swooped down and landed behind Shining. Lighting up his horn, the assassin unsheathed two hidden blades. Shining Armor stopped at the noise and whirled around, preparing to surprise his attacker with a quick spell. Before he could fire up the spell or call for help, however, the hooded unicorn quickly stabbed him twice in the foreleg. Shining Armor tumbled, barely letting out a cry of pain. The hooded unicorn then spun around and bucked the captain in the ribs. Just to make sure that Shining Armor couldn’t escape, the hooded unicorn held a rag to Shining’s face. Shining Armor struggled for a few short seconds, then collapsed unconscious. The hooded unicorn wasted no time and immediately began rummaging through the captain’s saddlebags. Among pictures of Shining’s family -Hm, so his sister really is one of the other targets, and not just an alternate means to get to him, the hooded unicorn thought- and various letters of correspondence to the Equestria Games Committee, he found what he was looking for; a single scroll with a wax seal that said “TOP SECRET” on it.
“Well, that was easy,” the hooded unicorn said to himself in an Istallian accent, chuckling as he did so. He loomed over Shining Armor’s unconscious body and raised a foreleg to snap his neck. Just as he was about to finish the job, however, he heard somepony shouting.
“In the name of Princess Celestia: HALT, criminal scum! Man, I’ve always wanted to say that.” The Royal Guard had finally arrived on the scene. Since he had what he came for, the would-be assassin decided to leave instead of facing a small company of guardsponies; large numbers are much harder to cover up. He spread his wings and flew off into the night, leaving the guards that had gotten closer to the scene of the crime to stare in bewilderment; they could have sworn that the criminal was a unicorn.
Nothing ever happens around here anymore, thought Clean Forceps, the surgeon on call during the graveyard shift at Canterlot Emergency hospital. Maybe I should move to Detrot. At least my talents won’t be going to waste. Maybe I’ll just take a nap. He was just closing his eyes when the doors to the hospital burst open. Probably some rich colt fell and got a scrape, I’ll let somepony else handle it, Forceps thought, until he heard the commotion.
“I saw the pony who attacked the captain use magic, Princess! He was a unicorn!” one of the two guards, a pegasus, shouted as he saluted the Princess.
“No he wasn’t, you dolt! He flew off, so he must have been a pegasus!” the other guard, a unicorn, countered.
One of the Princesses is here? And the Captain of the Royal guard is injured?! “I know I shouldn’t be this excited about an injured pony, but I’m finally going to actually do what I signed up for!” Dr. Forceps jumped up and rushed to the waiting room. He carefully opened the door, and was instantly hit with the sound of two royal guards arguing more loudly than he had ever heard anypony argue, and he was from Bucklyn! I’ll just wait until they’re done to ask what the problem is. I don’t want to lose my hearing. Clean Forceps quickly closed the door, making the cacophony more manageable.
“Unicorn!”
“Pegasus!”
“Unicorn!”
“Pegasus!”
“Unicorn!”
“PEGASUS!”
“UNICORN!”
“PEGASUS!”
“Both of you, please be quiet. Your bickering is hurting my head. He’s probably like my wife; a winged unicorn,” the injured captain muttered from the stretcher.
The guards stopped arguing, and immediately felt sheepish. Princess Celestia’s expression darkened.
“Are you absolutely certain that the stallion that attacked you was a winged unicorn?” Celestia asked.
“I couldn’t see his wings, since he wore a hooded cloak. But it would make sense, wouldn’t it? Princess? I know I’m not one to talk, but are you okay?”
The princess’ normally calm demeanor had shifted. Her eyes widened, and she started looking around as if expecting somepony to jump out and attack at any moment. “Guards, contact Night Watcher. We have a situation that requires the Agency.”
“A-are you sure that’s necessary, Your Majesty?” the second guard asked, suddenly feeling very timid; nopony felt comfortable approaching Night Watcher.
“Yes. If this would-be assassin is who I think he is, then the situation is very dire and time is of the essence,” Celestia said. When neither of the guards moved, she urged, “Get going!” The two guards snapped to attention, and ran out of the hospital.
“You can come in now, doctor,” Celestia said. Clean Forceps jumped a bit from behind the door, then chided himself. Of course Princess Celestia saw me. He steeled himself, then opened the door to the waiting room.
“Doctor Clean Forceps at you service, Your Highness,” he said with a bow. “What seems to be the” -he looked up and saw the battered body of Shining Armor- “problem?” Forceps began assessing the battered captain’s condition. Even though it had been nearly a decade since he last had to actually identify anything besides a scraped knee or fractured leg, he was able to identify the wounds and damage as if he saw such things every day; diagnosis was, after all, his special talent. After a very short time, Dr. Forceps turned and faced Princess Celestia. “From what I can see, Captain Shining Armor has sustained multiple instances of proximal puncture trauma to the left anterior leg, possibly resulting in arteriolysis, severe blunt force trauma resulting in costripsy to right ribs three through nine.” For some reason, Dr. Forceps couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d heard of a similar case earlier in his career.
The princess nodded and said, “That’s very nice. Now, could you be so kind as to tell me what happened to him?”
If anypony other than Princess Celestia had asked him that, he would have rolled his eyes at them. As it was, he simply sighed and said in a monotone voice, “He was stabbed multiple times in the left foreleg near the joint. This may have severed an artery. He was also either hit with a blunt object or kicked in the ribs, which shattered more than half of his right ribs.” The doctor paused, realizing exactly what those injuries reminded him of. He gulped then said, “If I may ask, Your Highness, what was he doing? These wounds look similar to the ones Doctor Natural Causes discovered during her autopsy of Marelyn Maneroe twelve years ago!”
The princess leaned over to Clean Forceps. “I trust that you won’t repeat anything that you hear tonight,” Princess Celestia whispered.
“Of course.”
“It was an assassination attempt by the same pony that murdered Miss Maneroe,” Celestia said.
Clean Forceps gasped sharply. “Does that mean that-”
“Yes; Unless his methods have changed since he was last active, you’ll find traces of resiniferatoxin in the stab wounds, so time is of the essence. The Crown will pay you for your services, of course,” the Princess said.
“I’ll get right to it, Your Highness,” Dr. Forceps said. Celestia thanked him and left. The doctor grabbed his pager. “IV Drip! Test Results! Help me move this patient; we’ve got a surgery to perform!”