"...and for your show of bravery, and..." Shining Armor shuddered, "...determination... in taking out all of the attacking changelings, I reward you with the highest honor we can bestow upon you in the Royal Guard. The Celestian Sun!"
The guardpony-turned-prince magically lifted the sun pendant from it's velvet casing and put it on your chest. It was too bad Celestia had still been recovering from Chrysalis' attack, or she might have been here to give it herself. You beamed with pride at the ponies in the crowd, many of whom wore queasy smiles as they half-heartily cheered. Undeterred, you lifted your monster-sized automatic shotgun into the air in triumph. You'd taken every single changeling that had rushed you down with it, and by God were you looked awesome while you did it!
The Mane six stood by as well, trying their best to stand steady. You figured they didn't really want to think too hard on that day; the awesome might hurt their fragile brains. After all, you were awesome enough to take out the changeling hoards yourself, and they didn't really get enough credit when they had finally used the Elements of Harmony... to clean up the mess you'd left behind. Yeah, you were awesome, and you knew it.
"Was there anything you wanted to say to the crowd?" Shining asked warily.
"Nope!" You said with a smile, lowering your gun. "I'm good. You can all go home now."
Shining nodded to the crowd, and they turned to leave without another word. He'd told you that they might not have been as enthusiastic, given that it had happened only yesterday and they were still recovering, but you forgave them. In any case, you thought with a sigh, you wanted it over and done with. You'd been awesome, and now? Now you wanted to be rewarded so you could go back to brooding about your dark and troubled past. Maybe fix another disaster a few months from now.
The Mane 6 and Shining made a half-circle around you, and you could tell by their faces that they wanted to know what you were planning next. Hell, Fluttershy was too scared of your awesomeness to even look right at you (she probably should have used more soap to get those bloodstains out of her coat, now that you thought about it)!
So Shining asked the million dollar question: "What were you thinking of doing next? As you know, we're authorized to reward you with an unlimited sum of money and anything else you want. So... what does the man with everything ask for?"
You nod to yourself, thinking it over seriously. The others waited patiently as your dark emotions played across your face, until finally you had an answer. You smiled. THAT was how you'd stay humble, without taking too much and making everyone hate you.
"I want..." you started. The ponies leaned in closer. "...a dead end job I won't like too much, with a steady paycheck, and a nice apartment."
Shining's mouth tried working for a moment, but no sound came out. Finally, he managed to sputter, "W-what?! You want... WHY?"
"Because everyone will probably start to hate me if I just took whatever I wanted. I'm crazy-awesome, not crazy-stupid. Besides, this place'll have problems out the ass soon enough anyway, and then you can call on me to fix them again." You snap your fingers. "Just like that, I'll leave my crappy job behind, and then I'll make everything safe again. Plus, it's not like I plan on working too hard at it, anyway."
Applejack looked like she'd swallowed something nasty, and she turned and walked away muttering something about work and always doing your best. Whatever.
Shining shook his head, and put a hoof to his face. "Right... so, what even is a 'dead-end' job where you come from?"
You think about it for a moment, and smile mischievously. "I can think of one or two..."
"NO!" You shout for the umpteenth time at the hapless construction worker. "It's gotta be called 'McDoonald's.' Not The McDonalds' Place, not The Old McDonalds' Eatery, and nothing else having to do with the farmer and nothing with a 'The' in it! McDoonald's, as in a guy named Mic-Dune-Ald's Burger Joint. And no," you said in a completely reasonable tone, pointing to the unfinished sign above the half-completed restaurant, "we're not adding Burger Joint to the end, no matter how much you want it to make sense!"
"But sir, how will they know it's a burger joint if we don't add something say'n it is?" He asked, ears flat against his head.
You take the yellow construction helmet off your head and sigh. It'd only been a few weeks, but nothing in Equestria seemed to work as an easy, screw-around kind of job, short of actually just accepting the blank check Shining was willing to write you so you'd 'just go hide in a corner and stop terrorizing ponies.' He'd actually said that to you! To you, after you'd killed the Changling Queen and everything! No respect...
"Would you prefer we called it 'Crack in the Box?' Or 'Toxic Hell?' How about 'Equestrian Fried Chicken?'" The worker paled and looked at his hooves. "Yeah, I didn't think so. And we're not opening a McDonalds in Equestria. Those corporate bastards don't get that from me."
The worker blanched again, also for the umpteenth time. Ponies couldn't stand foul language, it turned out, but fuck 'em. You weren't changing your vocabulary for a cartoon. Not today, not ever. You waved him off, and he walked over to his crew to give them the news. They didn't seem to be taking it well; one threw his helmet to the ground and walked away from the others.
Honestly, you half wanted to quit right there. It almost wasn't worth the effort to get this thing started anymore. You'd spent about two seconds thinking about it, and it'd taken more than two weeks to get this far, even with a panel of advisers taking care of most of the details. Still, random crap cropped up everywhere, and you apparently had to go fix it yourself. Damned ponies.
Speaking of, another one was walking over to you in a three piece suit, his dark blue mane slicked back in the style you'd requested of all the corporate sleazeballs you'd already started to hate. Goddamned establishment...
"What do you want?" you asked your would-be boss, annoyed. He kept his face impassive, and you couldn't see his eyes behind the reflective sunglasses all those Men-In-Black types seemed to wear.
"We've been running the numbers, Sir, and we'd like you to-" You cleared your throat. He tried again. "We've been running the numbers, Grunt, and you need to look them over for us. And get them done by the end of the day. On my desk. Or else."
"Damn it, now?" You groaned, ignoring his grimace at the curse. "What's the problem this time?"
The corporate bastard almost showed you sympathy, but you'd told him specifically not to. Ever. Anyway, he almost showed you sympathy (the bastard) as he pulled the stack of reports from his suit jacket. You snatched them from him with a snarl, and looked them over. The projected profits and losses from a restaurant in Canterlot catering specifically to the meat-eating griffons didn't look all that promising, if the report was to be believed, and the health department had already complained about the menu. Twice.
"...You know what?" You asked the corporate pony, who raised an eyebrow. "I don't even care anymore. Finish the damn fast food place without me. I'm not getting paid enough to deal with this bull-shit. I quit."
You threw the stack of papers into his face and walked off, ignoring his confused stare. You had other work you could be doing, like drawing awesome pictures of what you'd look like as an Alicorn. On fire. And you had other ideas of jobs you could be doing, too...
"Ok, Chief, now try it one last time." You told the Chief, your commanding officer. He almost had it!
The over-sized pony nodded, putting his Chief of Police hat back on his head. He motioned the other pony, wearing a read dress, out of his office and eyed me levelly. Then he spoke.
"Do you know why I wanted you in here, Detective?"
"Why's that, Chief?"
"BECAUSE YOU'RE A LOOSE FUCKING CANNON!" He shouted, standing up on his desk. He hadn't even flinched at the cuss word this time! "You're too close to this case! You're causing more damage than you're fixing, and I've got the mayor on my ass about you every time I turn around twice! You're good, Detective, but I'm startin' to think you're a little too good. You're making the rest of the force look like a bunch of pansies, and you're throwing protocol out the window! You don't make the laws, Detective! Get used to it!
"Now..." he continued, "unless you can give me one good reason why not, I want your badge and your gun. You're off the case."
"But Chief-!" I protested, but he cut me off.
"But nothing! Detective Night Stick was only two weeks away from retirement, you know that?! He's in the hospital now, trying to recover from that fight you had with the local gang. What what do we have to show for it? One good reason, detective. Name one."
Before I could speak, the pony in the red dress burst into the office, followed by another police officer. "WAIT!" She shouted dramatically, coming to my aid.
"Sorry sir! I tried to stop her, but-" The beat cop apologized.
"But nothing." The chief cut him off. "What's she even doing here?"
She looked at me significantly, a single tear in her eyes. "I just wanted to stop you from making a terrible mistake. This Detective burned the gang's hideout down because of me. Me and my baby, Starlight. She and I were taken hostage by the gang, but this Detective here?" She said, gesturing to you. "He managed to get us out of there. I don't even want to think about what might have happened if he hadn't..." She finished, looking away. She wiped the tear from her eye while the Chief watched.
"Is that right...?" He asked. Then he looked back to you. "You know something, Detective? You've threatened civilians, wrecked two squad cars, set three buildings on fire, knocked another two down... and you've also stopped the Diamond Dogs gang, put an end to the smuggling ring, and you personally saved the lives of at least two ponies in terrible danger." He shook his head. "I can't believe I'm saying this, but... you've done good work, Detective. Thank you."
You smile bashfully, and the beat cop left the three of you in the office, closing the door.
"Brilliant!" You shout, and the Chief broke out in a grin. "You've got it down pat. Where'd you even come up with that line about burning buildings down? That was awesome!"
"I do my best." He responded, accepting the praise. "Too bad it's probably never going to happen, though."
You stopped cold, and your smile very, very slowly fell away. "What's that supposed to mean?"
"Are you kidding?" The chief laughed. "We don't even have smuggling rings in this city! Gang violence hasn't been a serious problem in centuries! We just teach it to the cops in case something does come up, so they'll be more prepared. Better to know and be ready than not, right? Anyhow, this was a load of fun, I've got to say. Thanks for coming in today, 'Detective.'"
"B-but the Diamond Dogs! Didn't they kidnap Rarity that one time? Aren't they a problem?"
"What? No! They've more or less realized that ponies shouldn't be messed with. Heck, Rarity goes down there all the time now, and the Dogs just leave her alone. They're harmless."
"So what you're telling me is... this has all been a colossal waste of time?" You ask, dejected.
"Hay no, er, Hell no! It's been a blast! Haven't had this much fun in years!" The Chief responded, his smile wider than ever. Even the pony in the red dress gave a nod, managing to ignore the foul language. "If you wanted to come back another time to do this again, that'd be all right by me."
You put your face into your hand with an exasperated sigh. He was probably right, too. The major event had already happened; the Changelings had come in to attack, and you'd killed them all. Hell, you'd probably done your job too well. No, nothing wanted to do anything interesting. They were probably in fear that you'd be after them. You were probably the scariest, most powerful being on the planet, after all. After all, most of the crime had probably gone down in Gotham after Batman had taken out the major criminals.
Wait. That was it! You knew what you'd be good at!
"Thanks for talking to me, Chief." You told him with a slow, evil smile. "I think I know what I'm going to do next."
"So you're telling me you want an army?" Shining asked, still trying to wrap his head around it.
"Yep."
"You want the ruins of the old castle in the Everfree Forest renovated and done up in dark and metallic colors?"
"You got it."
"And it says here you want... 'a whole bunch of bitchin' science equipment?'"
"Plus a couple of scientists to work with it."
"...what does that even mean? 'Bitchin' science equipment?'"
"Don't worry about it."
"...moving on. You want a bullet factory?"
"Yeah. I'm running low on ammo."
"You showed up with ten thousand rounds of ammunition for that... thing. How the hay are you running out of ammo?"
"I spend a lot of the time at the range, now that it's been set up for me. You'd be surprised how quickly this thing chews through shells."
Shining didn't answer. He just put the file back down on his desk, took a bottle of pills out of his top drawer, took two out and swallowed them whole, squeezing his eyes shut as they went down. When he opened his eyes, they were inevitably drawn to you. He started staring at your awesomeness again, and then asked the same thing he'd asked twice already.
"Seriously, what's up with that outfit?"
You sighed. "For the last time, it's a re-creation of M. Bison's outfit from that one movie about Street Fighter. I got it from Rarity. No, I'm not saying anything else."
Shining looked at the pill bottle again, longingly. After a long pause, he regretfully put them away without taking any more. His voice wavered slightly as he said, "You're serious. You want the stuff in this file?"
"For the last time, yes."
"...OK." He caved, like you knew he would. "I'll get the paperwork done."
"Thanks." You told him in a flat tone. FINALLY you got to get up, out of the chair, and back to planning. You had so much-
"Grunt?" A voice asked, standing at the door. It was the Corporate pony, the one you didn't like.
"What do you want? Didn't I tell you I quit?" You asked, narrowing your eyes at him.
"Yes, but..." He shook his head, wonder and confusion on his face. He reached into his suit jacket and pulled out a file, then waved it at you. "We've finished the McDoonald's, and... it's a hit! The griffons love it!" He shook his head again, still trying to figure it out.
Duh. It was your idea, after all. Even after you quit, it still managed to be the best thing since sliced bread.
"Don't care. New projects."
"But Grunt, you're making a killing out there! You don't want to come back and get us started on other big ideas?"
"No, ya corporate asshat, I don't. I'm working on other stuff now. So piss off."
The CEO, or VP or whatever the hell he was knitted his brows in disappointment, but left without another word. You wouldn't miss him. You'd never stoop so low as to accept a corporate job. You had bigger plans. Starting with the Everfree Castle.
"Let me know when things are squared away, Shining," You told the guard, who still staring at you without really understanding the genius in your mind. "I want this done right."
"For the love of God, just fix the damned thing!" You shouted at the lowly science assistant.
They'd been working on making a computer that could connect to the internet for the better part of a month now, and they weren't any closer now than they had been when he told them about it. They were Scientists, damn it! They were supposed to know this stuff!
The scientist scurried away, out of your renovated throne room. You steepled your gloved fingers, elbows sitting on the cushy throne's armrests, and slouched down behind them. This was taking way longer than it should have. Not the defensive measure against the Elements of Harmony, because that had actually only taken your Research and Development team a couple of days to crack, but instead the plan itself.
Shining Armor kicked the huge doors to the throne room open, nostrils flaring as he stomped up the long carpet to your throne. He set his hooves, looked you in the eyes and practically snarled.
"What do you want, Shining?" You asked, bored.
"WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?" He exploded, pawing the ground. You stood with a sigh, and turned away, your cape covering your back as you looked to the back of the throne room where several scientists worked. You waited, and he delivered the line better than if you'd told him to:
"Do you think this is some kind of game? First Equestria, then the world?"
"Of course!" You shouted, turning. You gave him a big, goofy grin, but he just looked livid. He practically frothed at the mouth.
"There's no way you're getting away with this! You're going down!"
"Well, yeah, but that's not until later. Then I can realize my mistakes and join the heroes again, once more protecting the world from Evil!" You shouted, holding up one gloved fist.
Shining's anger slowly fell away, replaced with a dumb look as the gears in his mind slipped and stalled to a halt. He stood there, in shock, just staring at you with his mouth open.
"Guards!" You shouted. "Take Shining away. He's got to go tell the Princesses so that the Elements of Harmony can come down here and stop me themselves."
Several guards rushed from wherever they'd been hiding and dragged Shining Armor away, who had started gibbering like a lunatic. No matter. You had other things on your mind.
Like that damned conquering of Ponyville. Problem was, when you'd gone over there? They'd just kind of accepted it. You'd yelled, fired a couple rounds from your machine-gun-shotgun into the air, and they'd just kind of fallen in line and listened to you. The mayor even signed the document stating that you had conquered them without giving it a second thought, and the Chief had laughed the whole thing off and signed right alongside her. What was up with that?
Next up on the list was Manehatten. Then the R&D team said they'd have the special shoes ready so that you'd be able to walk on the clouds of Cloudsdale and take them over, too.
...So why was the takeover of the world so boring?
You sighed. You know what you could go for? Some McDoonald's.
"...and a diet coke." You finished ordering. The unicorn behind the counter shook slightly as he marked it down, clearly unable to handle all your awesomeness this close to him. The entire restaurant of griffon customers had cleared when you'd come in, but then again, the guards outside might have had something to do with that. Not that it mattered. You wanted your order, and they were going to have it out in just a few minutes, you were sure.
"O-order number 57, sir. It'll be r-right out, s-sir." Damned skippy it was!
You didn't care enough to give him a second look, choosing instead to go sit down at one of the tables. They'd gotten most of the decor right, given that it was supposed to be a crappy fast food place, but the seat cushions? Probably waaaay too high quality for a place like this.
While you waited for your order, the bell above the door rang.
Celestia herself sat down across from you, and her face was impassive.
Neither of you spoke. You, because you're dark and brooding, and she because she was studying you. Let her. Maybe she'd become more awesome by proxy if she studied your style, eh?
The cashier/waiter magicked the tray holding your lunch across the McDoonald's and onto your table, and you started in immediately. Mmm. Greasy fast food...
The Princess calmly waited for you to finish your entire meal, her ethereal mane flowing in the non-existent wind. When you finally finished, you wiped your hands on the napkins and wiped your mouth with a burp. You pushed the tray to the side, crossed your arms and leaned back.
"Soooo..." You drawled, "what's this about, Celestia? Come to surrender?"
"Yes, actually." She told you bluntly. She remained impassive.
You, on the other hand, were shocked. "What?! Why? You're not supposed to just give up!"
Celestia shook her head sadly. "I'm not willing to watch my ponies suffer because I forced them to respond to a bloody coup. I'm not going to watch them go to war with you, and I'm not going to risk the Elements of Harmony on you when you were so eager to kill the changelings and their queen. So I'm doing what I think is best for my country: I'm stepping down." She bowed her head in shame. "You've won."
But-but the plan! You had a plan set up and everything! You were going to go out, do a couple of suedo-evil things, get the Mane 6 to try (and fail) to bring you down because of your defensive measure, and then you were going to realize what you were doing was evil and apologize! You, apologize!
Your mind raced, trying to think of some way to salvage this. While you thought it over, Celestia stood to leave.
"I'll be in my throne room, waiting." She opened her mouth to say something else, but couldn't. She walked away, leaving you sitting there, stunned. You'd... actually won.
Now what?
Your gun was laying against Celestia's old throne while you sat atop it. Honestly, at this point you were almost ready to pick it up and just shoot the bastard green-coated bastard. He never even stopped to breathe!
"...And at your order, we're prepared to raise taxes on the obscenely rich and cure world hunger, all at the same time!" the presenter said with a flourish of his orange mane. He tapped the huge picture of a happy face he'd thrown in when he'd heard he'd be presenting his idea to you, rather than Celestia herself. Of course, the Princess herself was sitting in a chair not to far from your throne, listening more intently than you were. You'd tried paying attention, but that was three hours ago. And he just never shut up!
It took you a moment to realize that he had finally finished his presentation, the third you'd heard today. It didn't help that this one had been several times as long as the previous two, but they'd been pretty boring, too. Wasn't crap like this the kind of corporate scheme you had specifically been trying to avoid earlier? Even so, you'd been told that the new legislation that you'd already passed would invariably make the country a better place. Whoop-de-freakin'-do.
You looked sidelong at Celestia, your head adviser. She gave half a smile and nodded, letting you know the legislation was sound.
Right. Because it made total sense. To be honest, half the crap you'd heard him say when you actually were paying attention didn't. One thing in particular had bothered you, and now that he had finally shut up, you could ask him about it.
"Why is a huge chunk of the money from the taxes going to the 'hide those who remain' fund? As in, ya know, half of it? And while we're on the subject, what exactly is that fund? Who's it for?"
The presenter's smile became forced, and a few beads of sweat broke out over his brow. "Uh, that's nothing, nothing to worry about at all..."
"I can look into it later," Celestia broke in, speaking quickly. "We can get it squared away in the re-writes if you OK it now, your highness."
Right.
Total sense.
"...If you're going to straight up lie to me about how the country is being run, don't even bother." You said, disgusted. "I'm done with this charade. I don't even want-"
Your attempt to surrender the throne back to Celestia were interrupted as Shining Armor broke into the room, flanked by the six Elements of Harmony. Celestia quickly grabbed your gun in her magic and threw it across the room, quickly stepping away. Shining stepped out of the way and Twilight walked forward, flanked by her friends. Took them long enough. It'd been way too long since you'd done something this interesting!
"We're here to st-"
"Stop me, yeah. Let's get started, shall we, Twilight?" You asked, rising from your throne. You didn't have your gun; that was good, because at this point you actually might have shot them for taking so damn long.
"We've taken your army apart from the inside, incapacitated your guards-"
"Will you just shut up and shoot me with the friendship thingy already? I'm seriously bored over here."
Twilight took it in stride, and she and the others began to float into the air as the magic took them. Waves of energy flowed off of them and the air shifted in a miniature wind storm as they were lifted, growing in intensity until Twilight finally opened her eyes. They glowed white, and the rainbow-harmony-wave-cannon-thingy fired up, high into the air before crashing down upon you.
When the dust finally cleared, you were still just standing there, bored. "Is that all?"
"I- w-what?" Twilight asked, confused.
"First thing I did when I got the scientists? I got them to make me something, powered by my own awesomeness I might add, that made me invulnerable to the whole-" you waved your fingers at the air, "-rainbow thing."
You let it sink in, and the six Elements of Harmony sank to their haunches, realizing that they had failed.
"But seriously," you continued, walking forward, "I was basically giving up when you showed up anyway. This place is seriously boring. I mean, things started out well enough, yeah? But now they suck. Everything sucks. Hell, if there was a story about what was happening, right now? It'd be boring and it'd suck. So... you win. I wasn't supposed to win in the first place anyway; I half expected you all to show up the moment I got started with the whole 'Take Over the World' thing. Seriously, what took you so long?"
Twilight looked away from you sheepishly, not sure how to respond.
Shining Armor, on the other hand? He was furious again.
One moment you had your attention on the Mane 6, and the next moment you were being tackled to the ground and stomped on by one seriously pissed off Captain of the Guard. "THAT'S ALL YOU HAVE TO SAY FOR YOURSELF?! WHAT TOOK YOU SO LONG?! I'LL..."
You didn't hear the rest of it. Getting your head smashed into the floor isn't really good for the whole 'paying attention' thing.
You woke up a few hours later, and your head was throbbing like Vinyl Scratch had just unleashed the base cannon between your ears. You were in a cell, in some dungeon somewhere. Probably beneath the castle in Canterlot, if you thought about it. Of course that was where you'd end up. You were so dark and broody that something tragic was just waiting to happen to you.
Celestia was standing just outside the bars, watching you. When you finally looked her in the eyes, you saw some combination of pity, disappointment and a lack of understanding. When she spoke, she spoke slowly and softly. She asked you, "Were you really planning on giving up the throne, just before they had gotten there? Were you really planning on giving up?"
"Of course I was!" You spat. She didn't understand you. Nobody understood you. "I was even going to apologize and everything! I didn't really want the throne! I just wanted to fight you for it! I wasn't even going to hurt anyone!"
"Like you weren't going to hurt the changelings?" Celestia asked, chiding.
"Hey, that was totally different! She was declaring war on you, and she attacked you and everything! What else did you expect me to do, when they were ready to consume all the love in Equestria?!"
Celestia slowly shook her head, never taking her eyes off of you. "We'd had other contingencies in place if they had come anywhere near succeeding. Luna had even left mere moments after the attack, and had gone to recruit our allies among the other major species. She'd been leaving every night, making sure they'd be ready to assist us if we had failed. Even then, it's unlikely there would have been much, if any, bloodshed.
"We didn't need your help."
Her final words stung. Of course they had needed your help! You were awesome! You were...
"The changelings themselves were devastated by your attack." Celestia continued. "You killed most of their species with that weapon. Did you know that? They were forced to promote a new Queen, which wiped out most of their remaining power, their love. They, as a species, have nearly gone extinct. That 'hide those who remain' fund? It's for their protection. From you."
You looked up at her. She didn't look angry. She didn't even raise her voice; it remained soft and quiet throughout. That same look, that pitiful question, lingered in her eyes. They asked, "Why?"
You looked down at the ground. You'd been doing the right thing. You had done the right thing...
Silence fell between you for some time.
When you finally broke it, you asked the same question that had led up to this mess, the same question that had been leading you on long after you'd 'saved Equestria.'
"What now?"