“The enemy is putting pressure onto the south east quadrants,” a high ranking officer said from his end of the table. Dim mana lanterns hanging in the large tint cast a sheen over his and every other stallion’s graying manes. “I suggest we move our artillery to strike their advancing lines so that we can give the infantry located there time to dig a trench where they’re at.”
“Uhm… But I thought they were ordered to dig a trench four days ago.”
“Well, now they’re digging a better trench! And as for the enemy’s flank--”
“Uhm…” An enforcer raised his hoof and sniffed the air. “Sorry to interrupt, gentlecolts, but…” He blinked. “Does anypony smell something foul?”
“Like… Spark forbid, mustard gas?!”
Josho materialized in a flash of light. He landed with a thud on the meeting table, denting it in the center.
“Zounds!”
“By Ledo’s mane!”
“How the devil…?!”
“At ease, buddies,” Josho grumbled and stood up, still steaming all over with the mana of his long-distance teleport. “I’m sure you’re all doing the Queen some major service. Brownie points all around. Now…” He squinted and peered across the hazy tent. “Seccy? Seccy, where are you, ya old bastard?! We’ve got some fat to chew. Flaming, evil, tattooed fat--”
“A spy?!”
“Guards! Guards--”
Josho grunted, “Hey! I didn’t ask to see any guards! I just wanna have a word with my old buddy Seclorum--”
“How about we remove your head?!” One old stallion aimed up with his rifle. “Then you can talk to the pit of Xonan bones to the north of camp?!”
A flash of light. Somepony tapped on the officer’s back.
He turned around and gasped into Josho’s muzzle.
“Now now…” Josho telekinetically snapped his rifle in two and waved a hoof. “Never whip out your piece in front of another stallion.”
“Get him!” Another pounced.
Josho jolted forward with the weight of the officer on his back. His eyes rolled back. “Oh for the love of--”
Flash!
He materialized ten feet away, his body yanking forward as he flung the weight of the shrieking stallion teleported with him. “--oats!”
“Gaaaah!” The stallion flailed as he crashed through a gun rack.
The others pulled out their rifles and aimed at Josho. “Who do you work for?!”
Another burst of light. Josho materialized between them, knocking them to the floor with a stealthy blast of mana. “Tell me where Seclorum is and I’ll tell him!”
“We don’t negotiate with cloak and dagger assailants!” A stallion gripped onto Josho, trying to telekinetically cancel out the energy in his horn. “Especially this close to the front!”
“Nnngh! Fine then!” Josho snarled as more sparks danced between his eyes. “Negotiate with my ass!”
When he teleported this time, he materialized a dozen feet up, almost touching the top of the tent. He fell in reverse so that the officer was behind him. They collapsed through the table with the full weight of Josho slamming into the poor stallion’s body. The breath exited the pony’s lungs with the force of a hurricane.
Josho stood up, brushing himself off as a ring of Ledomare’s highest ranking officers writhed and moaned around him.
“Worst game of ‘Go Filly!’ I ever did play. Meh…”
A little belated, a thick phalanx of guards rushed in, cocked their weapons, and aimed at Josho’s fat figure. “Freeze! Do not move!”
“Really?” Josho turned and sighed. “Well, this is at least a slightly sexy way to go out.” He cracked the joints in his neck and prepared to out-port the enforcers’ weaponry.
”Stop!” A raspy voice boomed. “Everypony! Don’t move a muscle! That means you too, soldiers.”
The young guards glanced at each other nervously.
Josho swiveled around, squinting at a figure in the shadows.
“It takes a great deal for a pony to infiltrate this war room,” the pony said. His body leaned left and right. Hisses of steam echoed from his side of the tent. “It takes even more restraint to inflict no lethal damage when my bumbling excuses for subordinates have given you every damn reason to.”
Then, with grinding and rattling noises, the Prime Enforcer strolled forward. As Seclorum came into the manalight, metal rods of brass reinforcement glinted along his forward and rear legs. A metal brace surrounded the breastplate that hugged tight to his chest. Finally, a steel cap had been molded around his unicorn horn. A savage burn mark covered his upper right brown, and half of his mane on the same side of the skull refused to grow, causing him to part over the black and gray stalks from the left to cover the scarred areas. A pair of silvery blue eyes reflected Josho’s blank expression.
“Josho, as I live and die slowly,” Seclorum murmured. “I’ve known you to do stupid things before, but this takes the friggin’ cake.”
“Seccy…” Josho took a deep, warm breath as he gazed at his old friend. He blinked. “You look like shit.”
“I certainly feel like it too.” With a whirring noise, Seclorum raised his metal-reinforced forelimb and pointed dead-center at Josho’s obese form. “Which means my patience had worn thin months before you even lighting-bolted your way into this place using that freaky-ass special forces skill you learned ages ago. The only reason I haven’t ordered you shot is because I’m wondering why you haven’t drank yourself to death.”
“I wonder that at times too,” Josho muttered. “But we haven’t got time to bond over old, rosy-nosed memories.”
“Hmmph. Thank the spark.”
“But I did come to tell you that your butts are gonna be pumped full of manaplasma.”
“What, did you join the Ledomaritan navy all of the sudden?”
“No, you liver-spotted melon fudge!” Josho frowned. “The Xonans! They’ve captured the Lightning-Bearer!”
The room filled with shrill gasps.
Seclorum’s jaw fell. “Fortis’ ship? The Pride and Joy of the Queen’s Armada?”
“Look, I don’t care if it’s the Queen’s favorite turd!” Josho barked. “The tattooed freaks have stolen it, and they’re gonna fly that crap up here in hopes that they can sneak past enemy lines and fry us all to bacon from behind! And what’s more, their friggin’ Queen of Executive Powers is riding a magical floating mountain with some goddess-forsaken beast inside!”
Seclorum’s face twisted into a sicker and sicker scowl.
Josho blinked. “Is any of this coming to you straight, or am I gonna have to belch it?”
Seclorum frowned. “You must have really dove deep into the bottle to whip out this cute little number.”
“Excuse me?”
“Excuse yourself, soldier!” Seclorum hissed. “Or else you used to be one! Jumping in here, interrupting important battle strategies with some… pissed-stupid faerie tale!”
“Oh, and just what are you planning exactly?” Josho grumbled. “Carving yourself a smaller butthole to climb into while Xona marches all over us?! What the Hell is all of this accomplishing, Seccy?! It ain’t like you to be on the defensive! Where’d your balls hide? In that fancy new metal truss of yours?!”
“I don’t have time for this…” Seclorum waved to the line of guards. “Take him away. Find some… concrete box with a bottle of booze and leave ‘em there to rot.”
As the soldiers marched up and converged on Josho, he blurted in a loud voice: “‘Ultimo Douglas Barbarian Forty Two!’”
Seclorum--in mid turn--froze and held his hoof up.
The guards stopped just inches from wringing Josho’s neck.
Slowly, Seclorum pivoted around, his eyes icily staring at his old companion. “...Nightshade?”
Josho nodded.
Seclorum’s lips parted. “...the book of flame?”
Josho nodded again.
Seclorum stood still for a few seconds. His blue eyes darted around, then fell on Josho again. “You’re certain she’s on your side?”
“Please don’t ruin this,” Josho grumbled. “It took two-thirds of the cells still left in my brain to memorize that stupid crap.”
Almost a minute passed. Finally, Seclorum waved off the guards--and the officers as well. “Leave us.” When they hesitated, the veins showed in his neck. “Now!”
Awkwardly, everypony left.
“You…” Seclorum shuffled towards the far end of the tent with whirring, hissing limbs. “Waddle with me.”
“Hardy har har…” Josho trotted alongside him. “Jeez, look at you. Been seeing any sexy fire hydrants lately?”
“I’m not in the mood, Josho.”
“Good. Cuz neither am I. Let’s talk Xonans.”