School of Hard Knocks

by Hoopy McGee


Shadow Games

Night had settled over the streets of Hoofington like a blanket, the darkness obscuring everything not touched by the silver light from the full moon above or the feeble pools of yellow from the streetlights. The normally familiar streets and homes were transformed into a bleak and alien landscape, devoid of color and detail. Through the filter of the moonlight, everything I saw was rendered in stark blacks and whites.

I moved away from Plum’s house as fast as I could, keeping an eye out for anypony who might see me. Since I was still in the residential side of town, there weren’t many ponies around. Most sane ponies were asleep in their beds at this time of night. I guess that provides an insight into my own mental state.

Sounds are amplified at night, taking on a greater meaning, not to mention a sense of intent. Is that clacking sound that I heard an indication of somepony who is up to something, or is that just the wind rattling a pair of window shutters? Is that rustling just leaves in the wind, or something following me?

It was impossible to tell; the dark hid everything. I was counting on it to hide me as well.

I made my way from shadow to shadow until I reached the business district. The normal hustle and bustle of the day was long over, and the only ponies I saw out and about were either on their way home from work, or on their way out to the bar. I avoided them, and for the most part they didn’t see me. My costume blended into the shadows almost perfectly.

The only one who saw me was an elderly mare tottering down the sidewalk with what looked like a cart full of groceries. I was half a block away when she called out to the little filly she must have barely seen in the darkness, asking if I was lost. I ignored her and continued on my way.

What had seemed like good, solid buildings in the daylight became silent giants at night, looming out of the dark like cliffsides. They towered over me, dreadnoughts in the sea of the night, making me feel even smaller than I usually did. I glowered up at them while I chewed on my toothpick and kept on moving, picking up my pace as I walked.

When I reached the Warehouse District, I was on edge. More so than I should have been. Every instinct was telling me that I was exposed and vulnerable, in spite of the outfit that concealed me in the dark. The toothpick in my mouth was a mushy, sodden mess. I spit it out and popped in a new one, crunching it between my teeth.

The guards didn’t see me. I had made plans to distract them, but they were too busy yapping at each other to bother keeping an eye out. Whoever their chief of security was, he needed a smack to the back of his head.

When I reached the damaged section of the fence, I was practically jumping out of my skin. Things had gone well. Extremely well. My life didn’t work that way these days. I found myself waiting for the disaster I was sure was going to happen.

After a few minutes, I realized that I was standing there staring at the fence for Celestia only knows how long. I shook myself and started forward, and that’s when I heard a noise behind me. Something small fell and clattered to the ground.

I froze, looking into the darkness for signs of movement. The noise had come from a nearby alleyway between two of the large buildings that made up this part of town. It would be stupid to go in there. Either nothing was there, in which case I’d be wasting my time, or something was, in which case I’d just be putting myself in danger.

I walked to the alleyway anyway.

I had only taken a couple of steps when a screeching cat shot out of the darkness and pelted away up the street. I’m not sure how I managed not to yell, but I did. And then I relaxed. Just a cat. It was just a stupid cat.

I was about to turn and walk back to the fence when it occurred to me that I’d seen this exact thing in movies before. One pony was following another and was almost caught when they knocked over some debris. Only the fortunate appearance of a cat, or some other unlikely animal, had prevented the pony from being caught.

It was stupid. That kind of thing only happens in movies. Still, I found myself walking cautiously to the mouth of the alley and looking in.

“Hi,” Plum said, looking embarrassed. I wasn’t able to stop the shout that time as I scrambled backwards and ended up falling flat on my tail. The toothpick tumbled out of my mouth as a steady stream of words came out of my mouth, most of them either incomprehensible or unfit for filly ears. Plum just stood there in her too tight Mare Do Well outfit, sans mask and looking sheepish.

“You sure do have a potty mouth,” she said after I wound down. I felt a surge of panic. How loud had I been? I had no idea. I got to my hooves and held one of them up to Plum’s mouth. Then I listened.

Nothing. No alarms, no guards. Just the regular sounds of the night. I turned to Plum, more furious than I can remember being in a long damned time.

“What the hell are you doing here?” I asked her in a tight whisper.

She shoved my hoof away from her muzzle. “I was going to play superheroes with you.” She wasn’t looking at me when she said it, frowning at the building behind me instead.

I’m not playing superheroes!” I hissed through clenched teeth. Meanwhile, my mind was racing. Maybe if we hurried, I could get her home and get back here fast enough to get inside. If I left it too late, I ran the risk of being inside when morning broke. No way I’d be able to get back to Plum’s without being seen...

“I’m not stupid,” she said, an odd tone in her voice. “I know that. I don’t think you’re a hero at all.”

I’d never heard Plum’s voice like that before. Tight and flat, like a sheet of paper being pulled on both ends and about to tear into jagged halves.

“You were going to go through that fence, weren’t you?” she asked.

“Come on, Plum. We have to go,” I said, taking a couple of steps backwards, hoping she’d follow. She stayed put.

“Did you know my mom works there?” she asked. My heart lurched, one single heavy beat, before going back to normal.

“Plum, we have to go.” It was the only thing I could think to say. She still refused to move.

“Answer me. Why were you going to go into the building my mom works in?”

I couldn’t tell her the truth. I wouldn’t lie to her. I ended up just standing there, feeling ridiculous in my superhero outfit.

“You think my daddy really stole something, don’t you?” Her face pinched as she said that. She looked like a different pony, now. “You think mommy is helping him. Just like the other policepony.”

That news surprised me. “There’ve been other policeponies?”

“Just one,” Plum said, more than a little heat in her voice. Her jaw clenched. “But he’s been out to the house lots of times. A couple times a week. Mom always cries after he leaves the house. She thinks I don’t know.” I’d never seen Plum really angry before. I didn’t like it. “You think Daddy is a thief. You think Mom is a thief. Just like him.”

She was breathing heavy now, her lungs drawing and hitching irregularly. Her face was drawn into a pained grimace, and she looked like she was about to start screaming or bawling any second. Probably both.

“I never should have trusted you,” she said. The venom in her voice drove me a couple of steps back. “As soon as you said you were a policepony, I should have told you to get lost.”

“Plum...” I trailed off. It was pointless. The deceptions had caught me up. It was time for some truth. “I have to show you something. Maybe it will help explain.”

I dug around in my saddlebag until I found the shipping manifest. I pulled it out and passed it over to Plum, who stared at the document in confusion. The moonlight wasn’t anywhere near bright enough for her to be able to read the thing.

“What’s this?” she asked suspiciously.

“During our first slumber party, I woke up in the middle of the night and heard something downstairs. It turns out that it was your uncle Figgy. He was trying to get your mom to do something illegal. Something to do with that manifest.” She looked from the paper and back up to me. If nothing else, she was calmer now. She looked confused, which was a huge improvement over looking like she was about to break down into hysterical tears.

“She refused to do it,” I said. “She told him to get out.”

Plum stared at me for a few seconds, then passed the paper back to me. I shoved it back into my bag and turned back to her. She was still just looking at me, so I kept talking.

“Your mom is a good mare. I don’t think she’s caught up in anything bad. Not that your uncle isn’t trying to change that. As for your dad... I don’t know. I can’t say for sure.” I had my suspicions, but that’s all I had. “What I do know is that your uncle is involved in something shady. And, with your mom and dad under investigation like that, if he goes down it could take them down too. Even if they’re not doing anything bad.”

I looked her square in the eye and said with all the sincerity in the world, “Plum, I want to protect your mom. I like her a whole lot. She’s what a mom should be. I will not let her go to prison because her brother-in-law is a scumbag.

“That’s why I’m here. I want to find out what was so important to Figgy that he was willing to put his own family at risk for it. I want to make sure that, when the cops do find out about it, at least Mulberry is clear. Your dad too, if he isn’t involved.

“I’m not here to get your mom or dad in trouble. I’m here to find out the truth. To make sure that only the bad guys go to jail. And if your dad is involved, I’m going to do everything I can to make sure he’s got the best shot he possibly can in court. I promise you that.”

During my speech, Plum had gradually looked down, refusing to meet my eyes. By the time I was finished, she was staring at a point just in front of her hooves. Her whole body was trembling. I wasn’t sure what was going to happen. I could only hope that, however she reacted, it wasn’t loud enough to get us caught.

She walked up to me, and I tensed up. There was no question on whether I would raise a hoof to her, so I was sure I was in for one hell of a beating.

The hug surprised the hell out of me.

“I want to believe you,” she said quietly. “I’m not sure I do, but... I want to.”

I didn’t know how to react. I stood there like an idiot.

“Okay.” Plum sniffled a little and released me. She wiped her eyes with her costumed leg and looked at me with eyes that glittered in the moonlight. “So, what, now we go in?”

“What? No. Now we get you home. Then I come back and I go in alone.”

“Hmm. Nah. That’s not gonna happen,” Plum said with a little half-smile.

“Plum,” I said, putting a warning in my voice. “This is dangerous enough for just me. The two of us going in together—”

“What? We might get caught?” She rolled her eyes at me. “Oh no, how horrible! We’ll get scolded and sent home!” She gasped melodramatically and pressed her hooves to the sides of her muzzle. “They might even call our parents! We could get grounded!”

She stared into my scowling face for a few seconds until she was sure her point was made. “We’re fillies dressed as superheroes, duh!” she said. “The worst that can happen to us is that they think we’re kids playing some stupid game.” Her eyes narrowed and she added, “And as much as I want to trust you, Cinnamon, I’m not letting you go in there without me. Try it and I start screaming right here and now.”

I was about to argue, but the look on her face set like concrete. I knew there was going to be no shifting her. And she was right, the physical danger was really low. But getting caught would cause all kinds of problems.

“Fine,” I growled at her. “But you do what I say, when I say. You do anything else, and we go home and let the chips fall where they may.”

“Okay,” she said, pulling her mask back over her head but leaving the goggles off. I turned and started walking towards the gap in the fence. “What chips?”

I checked a sigh, concentrating instead on squeezing under the chain link of the fence. It was a tighter squeeze than I’d thought it would be. When it came time for Plum’s turn, I was able to pull the damaged portion out of the way enough for her to wriggle underneath it. Her cape caught briefly. I had her take it off and leave it on the other side of the fence.

From there, we kept to the shadows. There were the crates piled up on the side of the building, just like they had been during the day. The small window glinted in the moonlight. But before I tried the window, it made sense to at least attempt to open the access door.

I didn’t expect the handle to turn, and I sure didn’t expect the door to swing open. But it did. Did I say the security chief for this place needed a hoof across the back of his head? I take it back. He needed a firing squad.

From the outside, the warehouse had merely seemed gigantic. From the inside, it was a vast cavern filled with crates, boxes and packages. It stretched out in front of us further than we could see, disappearing into gloom off in the distance, with the ceiling being a good two stories high. The lights were electrical, dangling from their power cords from the ceiling high overhead. Only about a quarter of the lights were on, keeping the vast space dim and oppressive.

We had entered the building in the middle of the east wall. To our right was what would have been a large empty space if it weren't filled with wrapped pallets, huge crates and large metal shipping containers. Some of these were stacked nearly to the ceiling. A quick glance at the words stenciled into the sides of those containers told me that they were loaded with everything from exotic produce to machined parts from Detrot. Along the north wall of the building, access was provided by a large industrial door that was designed to slide open, allowing plenty of space for loaded carts to come in.

To our left were rows of shelves running north to south, each shelf maybe twice my height. The rows had letters printed on the endcaps, A-B for the first, C-D for the second, and so on down the line. I could see that there were a lot more than twenty six rows, and I had to wonder what they used when they ran out of alphabet.

There was a good ten feet of space between row A and the east wall where we were standing. All of that space was littered with packing material; bunches of plastic and crumpled paper, boxes that were either flattened or just empty and plastic bags of those stupid packing peanuts that tended to stick to my coat. The workers must use all of that for shipping, but it looked pretty damned untidy just piled against the wall.

After I was reasonably sure we were the only ponies around, I stepped under a pool of light from one of the dangling lamps above us and took out the shipping manifest.

"If they ever emptied this place out, they could have a hoofball game in here, fans and all." I told Plum quietly.

She giggled, still sounding nervous.

“Aisle J, section seventeen,” I whispered to the filly. She nodded back, her eyes were wide and scared, underscoring the lie of her earlier bravado. “You okay?”

“I’m fine,” she said tersely. “Let’s just go.”

We walked ahead, glancing over from time to time to check the labels on the aisles. These shelves were where the smaller shipments were stored for processing. Everything from boxes as small as my lunch box to crates that Plum and I could both fit in easily were stacked on the shelves, each with a shipping manifest glued, taped or stapled to the front of it.

We found our big orange crate right where the manifest said that it would be, on an otherwise empty shelf. It was big, standing taller than either Plum or me. “What now?” Plum hissed. She sounded like she was coming loose at the seams.

“Just you watch,” I said, giving her my most confident grin. I had to convince her that I had everything under control. I couldn’t have her falling apart on me now.

Luckily, the crate was on the ground level. I hadn’t even considered the possibility that it could have been up higher, and made a mental note to kick myself for the oversight. Later. Right now, I had a job to do.

Together, we were able to pull the crate out onto the floor. The top was nailed down, but that’s why I had the nail puller. I put Plum on lookout and got to work.

Celestia help me, it was loud. The shrieking of the nails as I pried up the lid seemed to echo through the entire warehouse, a cacophony sure to wake the dead. I kept having to stop and listen for approaching hoofsteps, but nothing ever happened. Maybe the guards were deaf.

I finally got the lid off of the thing and poked my head into the crate itself, my flashlight clenched between my teeth. The smells of dozens of spices, both recognizable and unknown, hit my nostrils with an almost physical force. The wallop sent me rocking back on my hooves for a few seconds.

I stuck my head back in, eyes watering as I looked. As far as I could tell, it was herbs and spices from Zebrica, just like Figgy had said. The interior was loaded with ceramic and glass jars wrapped in cotton, cloth bags and wrapped paper parcels. It looked like everything was on the up-and-up, but this couldn’t be everything. If this were a legit shipment, there was no way Figgy would be trying to sneak it through customs.

I called Plum off of watch duty and had her come up next to me. We started taking the containers of spices out of the crate, stacking them on the shelf behind us. Eventually, I was able to crawl inside the crate itself, passing out package after aromatic package.

Nothing. I hit bottom, and didn’t find a damned thing. But something I couldn’t put my hoof on was bugging me about that crate. I turned to say something to Plum and that’s when it hit me.

I was standing taller than her. Not by a little, but by a lot. At most, the bottom of the crate should have given me an inch of a boost, but I was standing a full head taller than she was. I glanced down at my hooves, a grim smile dragging its way across my muzzle.

“It’s got a false bottom,” I told Plum, and she gasped, eyes wide. “Hold on, I’ll try to pry it up.”

It didn’t take long. The false compartment was well-hidden, but it came up with some gentle persuasion and more than a little cursing. I got out of the crate and pulled the wooden board that made the false bottom out with my teeth, then looked back inside, jockeying for position with a breathless Plum Pudding.

Here was what they were smuggling. But if those simple, identical ceramic jars were ancient Zebrican artifacts, then I’m a small pink donkey.

“What the hay is this?” I took one of them out, noting the thick wax sealing it shut. I hesitated, then broke the seal. The pungent smell that hit my nose was instantly recognizable and the cloying sweetness of it had me gagging.

“What is it?” Plum was wrinkling her muzzle in distaste even as she leaned forward for a better look.

I managed to recover from the overwhelming smell enough to gasp out, “Agllk nrrrgh...” I coughed, then cleared my throat. I put the lid back on the jar of foulness and tried again. “Aldavii nectar.”

Plum looked confused, and I couldn’t blame her.

“It’s a delicacy from Zebrica, from a very rare plant, harvested by an even rarer type of beetle. It’s supposed to be delicious, but the export is highly regulated.” I looked down at the sealed jars in the bottom of the case. “Each of these jars is probably worth about five thousand bits.”

Plum gaped at me, then looked down at the bottom of the case again. I could see her counting them, but I had beaten her to it. There were fifty small jars, all told. She looked back up at me, and I could tell she couldn’t believe me. Not that she thought I was lying, but that she literally couldn’t believe that there was a quarter of a million bits in illegally imported luxury sweetener sitting in the bottom of the crate.

“Really,” I told her.

“Ponies pay that much for this?!” Her eyes were wide and shocked as she asked it. I nodded.

“I guess it’s an acquired taste. The one chance I had to try it, I couldn’t get past the smell.” I didn’t tell her that it was also a mild intoxicant. Eat enough of it, and you’d simultaneously be chock full of restless energy, believe that you were invincible and be unable to walk in a straight line. A dangerous combination that had ended up with more than one aristocrat running full tilt into a wall at fancy Canterlot parties.

“One thing’s for sure, these ain’t no stolen Zebrican artifacts,” I said, and Plum smiled at me.

I picked up the jar I’d cracked open and pulled out my lunchbox, but the jar was too wide to fit. So much for using it to keep the evidence safe. I slipped it into my saddlebags instead. Plum gasped and shot me an incredulous look.

“I’m bringing it to the police,” I told her. She nodded, looking relieved.

I replaced the false floor, and together we piled the legitimate spices back in. I put the lid back on, and Plum and I had a fun time jumping up and down on the crate to make the nails settle back into place. The nail heads that were still sticking up were taken care of by laying the nail puller flat across the top and stomping on them until they were flush. Then we shoved the damned thing back where it belonged.

We were just getting ready to get out of there when the distant metallic rattling of the big loading door opening froze us in our tracks. Male voices, at least two different ones, were talking in the distance, the sounds of their hooffalls coming steadily closer to us.

“Hide!” I hissed at Plum. She nodded and scooted behind several boxes on the opposite shelf. There wasn’t room for me back there, no matter how she squeezed herself in. I had to look elsewhere.

The voices were getting closer as I scanned for a spot big enough to hide me. “...p-pretty sure it’s this way...” a stallion said, the tremor in his voice giving away his fear. A deep and rumbling bass said something in reply.

My eyes finally caught on a place I could hide. On the second shelf, behind a stack of flat metal cases that looked like steel pizza boxes with latches on the front. There was just enough room to climb behind them. I jumped up, grabbed the shelf and pulled myself up, barely noticing the rip I made in the leg of my outfit as I did so. I wriggled in behind the metal pizza boxes and held my breath, my blood pulsing in my ears as I listened. I pulled my hood back down to hide my face and moved just enough so that I could see down the aisle.

I had guessed that there were four of them, judging by the echoing hoof-steps. It turned out I was right. Four stallions in a group, who turned down aisle J and headed right towards where Plum and I were hiding.

Dammit.

I didn’t really register three of them at first. My attention was fixated on the big grey bastard coming up the rear. I’d never seen a bigger pony in my life, standing a good head above what I’d been as a stallion, and nearly as wide as he was tall. All of it muscle, from the looks of it. He had the look of somepony whose mom had gotten friendly with a minotaur, and the expressionless face of a bored statue. Each of his hooves were wider than my head was long.

His coat was steely grey and dull, his mane was black like cast iron, cropped short to his bulging neck. He was wearing half of a black suit on his forequarters. The garment was well tailored out of enough fabric to make suits for at least two normal sized stallions. The fedora on his head was pulled low over his eyes. Where that same hat had looked out of place and comical on Figgy Pudding, on this guy it simply underscored how little I wanted to mess with him.

I tore my eyes away from the colossus of a pony and his sledgehammer cutie mark and looked at his companions. I gave each of them a once-over, noting everything I could about them.

The unicorn was of average height and build, and he was wearing a half suit over his forequarters, grey and pinstriped. Green eyes. Red coat. Light orange mane and tail. Ball and chain cutie mark that led me to believe he’d probably been in the system since he was a colt.

The next stallion was a nondescript pegasus, not wearing anything except for a pair of heavy green canvas saddlebags. The pegasus was on the tall side, but lean and athletic, making him look like a stork. Brown and darker brown for coat and mane, green eyes. Scar on left front fetlock, white patch on left shoulder, possibly from an old injury. His cutie mark was a padlock and key.

I recognized the last pony in the group by his uniform. He was one of the guards who’d been on duty when I’d come in.

“I could get in real trouble for this,” the guard said, his voice cracking. “I just... you gotta be quick, all right?”

“Shut it and go,” the big pony said in the bass rumble I’d heard before. There was no anger in his voice, no emotion at all. The security guard backed away.

“Right,” he said in a terrified squeak. “I’ll wait out front.”

The guard got his tail out of there. I couldn’t blame him. I didn’t want to be here either.

The target of these three goons was, naturally, that damned orange crate. It looked like Plum and I had gotten here just before the smugglers had decided to take things into their own hooves.

The unicorn’s horn glowed and the thing slid back out into the middle of the aisle. The big guy grabbed the edge of the wooden lid with his teeth and just pulled, the whole lid coming off in a deafening screech. It didn’t look like he’d even put any effort into it; it was like he’d just taken the lid off of a box of chocolates.

The pegasus and unicorn started pulling the containers of spices out, piling them carelessly on the floor.

“Watch the merchandise,” the big guy said. The two ponies flinched and nodded at him. They started stacking things more carefully.

Once the crate was empty, the unicorn pulled out a crowbar from the pegasus’ saddle bag and pried up the false bottom. He stuck his head in the crate and whistled.

“Lookin’ good,” he said.

“No, it isn’t,” the pegasus said, frowning as he looked into the crate. “One of ‘em is missing.”

“Shit, again?” The unicorn spat a phlegmy wad on the floor. “I thought we took care of that little problem.”

“We did,” the big guy said. “Pack ‘em up.”

“You got it, Breaker,” the unicorn said.

The two of them got to it, loading the ceramic jars into the pegasus’ saddle bags. The earth pony, Breaker, spent his time standing there, slowly scanning in every direction. His eyes landed on the spot where my face was partially exposed, hidden in the shadows. I resisted the urge to yank my head back, concentrating on keeping as still as possible. He’d see the movement before he’d see my face.

His eyes moved on and I relaxed marginally. Then my heart clenched when he picked up the false bottom from the chest. My hoofprints were faintly visible on the wood.

“All done,” the pegasus said, his saddlebags bulging with ill-gotten goods.

“Go. Straight to the boss,” Breaker said.

The brown pegasus nodded and trotted away. The unicorn started to follow him, only to find himself barred by Breaker’s massive foreleg.

“We stay,” came the rumbling voice. “Somepony took our goods. Somepony small. Might still be here.”

I moved myself slowly back into the shadows. No sudden movements. And, as I hid in the shadows with my heart punching my ribs, I did something I almost never do these days: I prayed.

I prayed to the Maker of All. I prayed to the Princesses. I even prayed to the Elements of Harmony, and I hadn’t even heard of those things until a year or two ago. I prayed with everything I had that those stallions wouldn’t find Plum Pudding. They could find me, I didn’t care. But if anything happened to that filly...

I heard the still nameless unicorn’s hooves echoing as he walked north up aisle J. Breaker’s hoofsteps sounded like somepony beating a drum as he walked the other way. I moved again, slowly, just enough to see as the unicorn reached the end of the aisle. He turned back the way he’d come.

“Nothin’ here!” he shouted.

“Take a right. Check each aisle.” Breaker replied.

The unicorn nodded, turned, and started walking. I heard Breaker do the same, only in the other direction. They were going to check aisle by aisle.

My brain was running full steam. I saw two options. Option one was to stay put. They’d search the warehouse, not find us, and leave. Option two was to try and sneak out past them.

My decision was made for me when I looked down at the floor. The crate was still open, the contents stacked neatly beside it. The two stallions would be coming back to clean up their mess. If they found us then, running wouldn’t even be an option.

The unicorn’s hoofsteps were two aisles away now, if I were to guess. The same with Breaker’s. We could sneak past them if we were quick and quiet. Get to the door, get outside, get through the fence. We’d be safe.

Or we’d get caught.

I had the jar they were looking for. If it came down to it, I’d use it to get them to focus on me while Plum ran away. It was as good a plan as I was likely to get.

I slithered out of my hiding spot and lowered myself to the ground, wincing at the slight tapping sound of my hooves hitting concrete. I made my way to Plum’s spot as quietly as I could.

“Plum!” I hissed as quietly as I could. I poked my head around the box she was hiding behind. She was staring at me with wide, wild eyes. I could see her trembling, curled up into a tiny ball.

“We have to go,” I whispered to her. She stared at me like I was crazy. “We have to go now. They’ll be back.”

My ears were swiveling around on my head, catching the sounds of the stallions’ hooves as they walked, now even further away. Plum grunted as she pushed herself backwards out of the gap behind the crate. Soon enough, she was free and standing next to me. I held a hoof up to my lips and she nodded.

“Follow me,” I whispered to her. “Stay close, and don’t run unless I do or I tell you to. Got it?”

She nodded her head frantically.

“And keep your mask on,” I told her. “If they see you and we get away, they won’t be able to recognize your face.”

She nodded again. I crept my way to the end of the aisle, Plum right on my tail. I’d already grounded myself, drawing in as much power as I could as I did so. It wasn’t much, not against two stallions, but it was better than nothing. I stopped and listened when we got to the end of the aisle, listening for both stallions. I could still hear them walking, so I motioned for Plum to follow.

We turned right at the end of the aisle and moved towards the small side door, keeping an ear out for the stallions’ hoofsteps. The unicorn was the one between us and the doorway.

We crept along as fast as we could without making noise. I wanted to get past him while he was still walking away from us. We tiphoofed forward, finally reaching the aisle where the stallion’s hoof sounds were coming from. I risked a quick glance...

The aisle was empty. I stared, sure I was making a mistake. The sounds of a stallion walking were coming from the aisle, but there was nopony there.

“Well, hello there little cupcakes,” a cheerful voice said. Plum and I both jumped, with Plum making a muffled squeak of terror. The unicorn stallion stepped out of the shadows. He’d been standing near the packing material stacked against the wall, keeping an eye on the door. Clever bastard. “Neat trick with the hoofsteps, huh? A little spell I learned a while back. Keeps ponies from guessing where you are.”

The stallion was grinning almost wider than his muzzle as he walked towards us. His eyes glinted in the dim light of the warehouse. “Couple of little superheroes, eh? Used to play that when I was a colt, myself.”

Plum was pressing into me, and I could feel her whole body shaking. “Run when I tell you to,” I told her, too softly for him to hear. “Right to the door and all the way home, don’t look back.” Then, louder, “It’ll be alright.”

“Of course it will,” the stallion said, still grinning with that slash of a smile. “All we want is what you took from us, and we’ll let you go.”

Plum made a mewling sound of distress when I stepped away from her, but I got what I wanted: the stallion focused on me.

“Let my friend go, and I’ll show you where I hid it,” I told him as I circled away from Plum, my tail towards the aisles. I had to clear a path for Plum to run.

The stallion clicked his tongue, shaking his head slowly. “Nah. That ain’t how it’s gonna work, sweetheart. You give us the jar, and I’ll let you both go. Otherwise, you’re gonna get in trouble.” His smile turned saccharine, tinged with false pity. “Stealing. Breaking into a warehouse. All sorts of trouble for two little fillies. You give us the jar back, I forget all about it. What d’ya say?”

I was still circling around him, sidling along so I could keep facing him. He turned to keep facing me and, soon enough, his tail end was towards Plum. I prepared myself to charge him and was just inflating my lungs to shout for Plum to run when the stallion spun on a hoof and started walking towards the terrified purple filly.

“How about you, kiddo?” he said. She squeaked and scrambled backwards away from him.

Something in me shattered right then. I was stalking towards the unicorn, not even sure what I was going to do but with every limb tense and vibrating with rage.

“You stay away from her,” I snarled as I came up behind him.

He stopped and turned his head to glance back at me. I recognized the tensing muscles in his hind leg too late to get out of the way. I barely had time to turn my body when the hoof caught me hard in the saddlebags, sending me flying. Plum’s wail was drowned out by the crashing sound of my limp body slamming into a pile of empty cardboard boxes and packing material. I tumbled out of them and rolled to the floor.

The unicorn snorted and turned back towards Plum.

“I don’t wanna hurt you, sweetie,” he lied to her, all false honesty and concern. He took another step towards her, and Plum took another step back. Then another. Then her back was up against the end of one of the aisles and she had nowhere else to go. “We only want our jar. It’s just a bunch of smelly stuff, right? I just want to—”

My flattened lunchbox spun through the air, a streak of silver in the darkness like the wrath of Luna herself. It took the unicorn in the back of the head with a dull thud and then clattered to the floor. He stumbled forward with a shriek, his now misshapen fedora drifting to the ground. He spun to face me, murder in his eyes and blood running down his neck, but I wasn’t waiting for him. I was already charging.

He reared in surprise, then brought his forehooves down in a clumsy stomp that could have ended me if he’d landed it anywhere near me. I rolled underneath him, stopping by his back hooves. I balanced on my forehooves, drew my body in, and then kicked upwards with every ounce of grounded strength I had.

My back hooves sank into something soft and kept going until they hit pelvis. The unicorn let out a moaning gurgle and began collapsing. I ducked my head and went into a forward roll, coming back to my hooves right in front of a stunned Plum Pudding.

She had picked up my concave lunchbox in her forehooves and was staring at me with her mouth hanging open. I snatched the lunchbox from her and slammed it into my open saddlebag.

“Run!” I told her. She didn’t move. I gave her a shove. “Run!”

“You kicked him in his no-no place,” Plum whispered, incredulous.

“What?”

A loud clattering in the distance brought my head around. Breaker was coming. Not only that, but the unicorn was already getting back to his hooves. If there had been murder in his eyes before, now he looked like he was ready to burn down an orphanage. Rumor and stories will tell you that a kick to the privates will down a stallion for a good long time, but they’re wrong. The truth is that there are few better painkillers than pure rage and the burning desire to stomp another pony into jelly.

“Go!” I bellowed, and nipped Plum in the rump. She shrieked, startled, then seemed to snap out of whatever daze she’d been in. She ran for the door with me right on her tail.

The downed unicorn tried to stop us with magic, but his aim was off. Probably because of all the red he was seeing. He ended up knocking over the junk stacked against the wall in front of us. We got to the small side door and, while Plum opened it, I shot a quick look back.

Breaker was dimly visible off in the distance, galloping towards us with the noise, fury and inevitability of an avalanche.

Adrenaline is a hell of a thing. We covered the distance to the broken fence so fast we might have actually teleported. I made sure Plum went first, and I’d barely made it through the gap myself when I heard a massive crash from behind us. I scrambled over to where Plum was crouched down in the alley before I dared to look back.

Breaker was standing in what was left of the doorway. The metal door was listing drunkenly, attached by only the bottom hinge. The grey stallion, his grey coat shining silver in the moonlight, stood there with his eyes scanning the shadows as he looked for us.

Plum and I froze in the stinking alley, hearts thundering as we huddled together amidst the refuse piled on the damp stone surface. Time stretched far too long as the stallion looked, examining each shadow for us. I’m sure that it was only our dark costumes that kept us from being seen.

I don’t know how long it took, but eventually Breaker went back inside the building. I counted to a slow three hundred before I started to relax.

“Let’s move,” I said quietly to Plum. She nodded and we moved out, slowly and carefully. On the way, we picked up her cape from where she’d left it by the fence. It was a damned good thing that Breaker hadn’t seen it lying there.

It was a tense walk back. We stuck to the shadows as much as we could, looking over our shoulders every step of the way. To make matters worse, the sky was already starting to lighten by the time we got back to Plum’s house. There weren’t many shadows left to hide us.

The Pudding household was still sleeping when we got back. We went up to Plum’s bedroom as quietly as we could, where we finally stripped off our stinking, sweaty and torn costumes. Only then did I turn to Plum to bring up something that had been on my mind for a little while now.

“I kicked him in his ‘no-no place’,” I said, snickering. “Really?”

Plum blinked owlishly at me and then started to giggle. I couldn’t help it, I started laughing too. The adrenaline had drained, we were both exhausted and jittery, and the stress and lack of sleep had made us both more than a little punchy.

It wasn’t until a bleary-eyed and annoyed Mulberry opened the bedroom door and scolded us for being so loud so early that we managed to get our laughter under wraps.

“Sorry,” we said in unison. The mare shook her head and, muttering darkly about early mornings and a lack of coffee, went back to bed for another precious hour or two of sleep before it was time to start getting breakfast ready.

I was about to suggest a quick nap when Plum hugged me fiercely.

“Thank you for saving me,” she said. “I was so useless in there.”

“No you weren’t, Plum,” I told her. I hesitated, then hugged her back. “I never could have gotten that crate open without you. And nopony could have known those guys would show up when they did.”

We held the hug for a few more seconds before we broke. I heaved a sigh and went over to my saddlebags, wincing a little as I moved.

“Are you alright?” Plum asked. The concern in her voice stiffened my spine a little.

“Bruised ribs and ego,” I said. “Nothing broken. Lunchbox took the worst of the hit.”

“Poor lunchbox,” Plum said sadly.

“We’re lucky the nectar jar is still in one piece,” I said. “Otherwise the smell probably would’ve killed us by now. I think I should bring this straight to the police.”

“You can’t,” Plum said.

I blinked at her in surprise. My head was more than a little muddled, and I thought at first that I hadn’t heard her right.

“I can’t?” I repeated. She shook her head solemnly. “Why not?”

“You know that unicorn that was with them? The one you kicked in the you-know?”

“Yeah?”

“He’s the policepony that keeps stopping by to talk to my mom,” Plum said simply.

I stared at her while that sank in. That changed more than a few things, not the least of which meant that, if the unicorn had gotten a good enough look at Plum, he would be able to connect us to the warehouse. I tried to think of an appropriate response.

“Well, shit.”

Yeah. That about summed it up.