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// Chapter 3: The Sights of Night 
// Story: Pegasus Creed: Advent 
// by Baryski 
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Chapter 3: The Sights of Night

The night air felt good on my stiff wings; they had been confined by those hellish straps for the better part of the day.  But here, standing on top of a rooftop in the city, extra weight or no, it just felt right.  I could forget most of everything, even what I was up here for.  The one thing I couldn’t forget, though, was the pair of beady eyes boring into the back of my cloak.

He was waiting for me to make a mistake, I could feel it.  I knew he wanted what I had, he wanted the freedom I enjoyed from the master.  Even if it took sabotaging me...

In the dead night, above this one street; as I waited, and watched, I also imagined.  I imagined how he would wildly hack into my body.  If I was lucky he would sever my head completely in the first stroke, but he wouldn’t stop there.  He probably wouldn’t stop until the flesh had been rent from my very bones.  The very thought of it drove paranoia and fear into me, along with another thought.

I could kill him first.  The feeling of driving a sword through somepony’s hind quarters was something you can never forget.  He would quickly lose mobility in his rear end and would be helpless.  I would be free to take my time in making it look like an accident.  Maybe he slipped and fell off the building, and I was there to put him out of his misery?  Oh how I knew the feeling welling up inside of me.  The wonderful release of releasing the life from his body; of controlling the very moment he bled out.

NO!  You can’t think like that...  It was subtle, but it was there.  The voice of all my friends trying to keep me from those dark thoughts.  I used to relish in the kill, but they always kept me on the straight path.  I couldn’t kill with enjoyment anymore.  Now, I did it because it had to be done, and I tried to remember every pony.

For the time being I pushed the paranoia and fear out of my mind.  The wind whistled through the gaps in the large brick laid buildings and I watched as the last few ponies slowly cleared out of the now darkening back street.

A couple of hours ago the mayor had entered into the bottom floor of the building at the far end of the street.  To my understanding, she was meeting with the group she was funneling money to and was not to leave until she would not be noticed.  This meant an empty street and a window of opportunity.  

A few dozen minutes later she finally exited the building onto the empty street.  By god, she was even smiling as she walked out.  Was betraying her entire country something to be so proud of?  The thought of her happiness over something like that welled up inside of me, threatening to crush any light or happiness I had.  I wanted her dead, but more than that, I wanted her to feel every sweet second of it I could draw out of her.  It wasn’t right.  It wasn’t even what Creed had trained me to do.  But, at that moment there was only the hate and sting of betrayal gnawing at my strings.

I reared back a few steps and took a running jump off the ledge of the building I had been standing on.  I could have easily unfurled my wings and glided softly beside her, but that was not in my mind right now.  Hatred and gravity guided me as I hurtled towards her unsuspecting figure.  Unconsciously my right foreleg curled a little bit and the blade that was strapped to it sprung from it’s holster as I crashed to the earth.

In that final instant I felt that familiar sick pleasure as the blade arched across her flank.  The finely honed edge separated skin and muscle as it glided through several inches of her flank.  I could see the blood start to trickle down her back legs and knew she would want to scream for than anything.  But, I was far faster.  As I impacted with the ground I rolled once and, as I brought myself up, slashed that innocent half a foot blade across her neck.

Once again muscle and skin separated with the utmost ease and almost at once I heard the reassuring gurgle that let me know I had dug into her wind pipe.  Blood was pouring down her throat, muffling any screams and preventing anyone from being alerted.  But, more than that, she would now suffer just as I wanted her to do.  Yes, she would die now, she would drown in her own blood eventually, but before that she would feel the intense fear of her life slipping away from her.  She would live for a couple of minutes knowing she was going to die and feeling every last ounce of my wrath.

Then, all at once I noticed how blurry my eyes were.  Suddenly I was perfectly aware of the stream of wetness that had been running down my face this entire time.  I wanted to bat them off my face, to present a visage of pure hatred, but I couldn’t risk accidentally slicing myself with one of my blades.  So, instead, I watched the distorted figure of the mayor gurgle for mercy as her life slowly ran down her neck.  Her hindquarters slowly drooping as the muscles lost blood first then oxygen.

Finally, I couldn’t hold it back anymore.  The anger, the anguish, the sadness, and the distress all burst forth from me.  “Why!?” I screamed at the top of my lungs as the tears flowed freely from my eyes as the dam burst.

“Why!?”  The same question ushered forth again despite the fact that the now frantic form of the mayor no longer had the ability to respond to my hated.  I bucked once, hard, as the spring loaded device on my back reacted to the motion and shot the long sword out of it’s scabbard and past my head.  Effortlessly I grabbed the blade in my mouth without looking and enjoyed the abject horror that entered the nearly dead mayors face.
“WHY!?”  My scream was muffled from the sword now held tightly in my mouth.  But, it didn’t matter anymore as my scream transformed into a guttural howl.  I quickly launched myself at her and, in the last moment before we collided, my right wing flared instantly placing me perpendicular to her.  The blade slid instantly in between her eyes down to the hilt as I dropped back on my feet slowly.

Silence fell upon our little scene.  I couldn't bring myself to remove the blade from the now perfectly still mare.  And so, I cried, I cried for a full on minute before finally removing the three foot piece of metal from her.  As soon as it was free she slumped to the ground, a motionless pile of mare and blood.

I had lost myself in my emotions.  I had become unstable.  I had not acted as a Journypony of Creed should.  But, more than all that, I could not stop crying, not even now.  I replaced the sword in it’s scabbard sloppily as I continued to let the streams flow down my face.  Finally, I did the one thing none of us ever should.  I took the hood of my uniform off of my head and let my face breath in the night air to help calm my soul.

This is what having feelings wrought.  I couldn’t perform my mission properly and nearly messed everything up.  What’s the point of all these friends when one day I might have to kill them?  What happens if one day I have to murder Fluttershy?  Or, worse, Twilight?  No, when this is all over I need to find a way to cut them all out.  I can’t act like this again, I just can’t