I was down at the train station one morning with Applejack, Rainbow, and Rarity. We had tickets for a ride to the city of Manehattan. Fluttershy was still in Canterlot at the burn center and Pinkie had dropped everything to go take care of her. Twilight and Spike would be meeting us along the way and going to Manehattan with us.
I shredded idly on a guitar as we waited. Guinness had previously asked me why I was suddenly so musical, and I knew that the others were thinking the same thing. If only they knew. Bad things were afoot, and only rocking out would save us.
Rarity mumbled under her breath as she lugged her luggage to the train. “I didn’t used to have to carry my own bags. I miss Spike being around. At least we have an entire week in the fabulous city of Manehattan to look forward to!”
“It’ll be interesting, I suppose,” Applejack said.
“I’m going to be doing something of my own business,” I said. “It's more important than Fashion Week.”
“I thought you would say something like that.” Rarity rolled her eyes and brought out a sheaf of tickets. “That’s why I got everypony else tickets to hottest musical on Bridleway, Hinny of the Hills!”
The others cheered. Apparently this was kind of a big deal.
A few minutes later, as we were boarding the train, I noticed three mares hanging out together nearby. They were part of the group of ponies I had noticed before. Like before, the pink and yellow pegasus was missing from the group, but this time the purple and lavender unicorn, and double pink earth pony were also not present. It kind of gave me pause.
I looked at Applejack, Rainbow, and Rarity, and then back at the group of three. They looked almost alike, except their coat and mane colors were inverted. Interesting.
We got aboard the train and headed to Canterlot. I played my guitar a little as we went. Twilight and Spike met us at Canterlot and we continued on to Manehattan.
The city had taller, more modern buildings than anywhere else in Equestria. When we arrived, everyone was still talking about the upcoming show.
Twilight said, “Wow, Rarity! How'd you manage to get us seats for tomorrow night?”
“Oh, I gave some designs to the costume designer, so he pulled a few strings,” Rarity replied. “That is what makes Manehattan so splendid and amazing. You do something nice for somepony, and then you never know when they'll do something nice for you!”
“I know the feeling,” I said.
Silence fell over the group for a moment. Twilight gave me a look. “Valiant, what are you up to?”
“What, I start thinking along the lines of quid pro quo and you think I’m up to something?”
They all nodded.
I rolled my eyes. “Look, I’m on official business for Princess Luna. Anything I do you can blame on her, okay?”
That shut them up, although I could see they all wanted to ask what Luna had me doing. Instead of prodding me with questions about my task, they went back to discussing the show.
“It must be good if Rainbow Dash is impressed,” said Applejack. “Normally she doesn't even like musicals.”
Rainbow chuckled. “I know; ponies just bursting into song in random places at the drop of a hat? Who does that?”
totallynotabrony stopped typing for a moment and looked pointedly at the audience.
We went sightseeing for a little while Rarity was excessively nice to ponies. I was particularly interested in the pony Statue of Liberty in the harbor. We met one guy whose talent was apparently irritable cats.
After the tour, Rarity realized she had to go and rushed off to the fashion show. The rest of us went back to the hotel.
Twilight pulled me aside, out of earshot of the rest. “What does Luna have you doing?”
I considered that for a moment. It was secret, but Twilight was a Princess too. “I'll be assassinating a pony.”
Twilight gasped. “How can you do that?”
“I’m one of Luna’s secret agents, codename Alien. And hey, I’ll bump ponies off for you too, if you make it worth my while.”
“What did this pony do to deserve killing?”
“Dunno, but I’m sure Luna has a good reason.”
Twilight opened her mouth to say something but closed it again. “I’m going to have a talk with Luna when I get back. This doesn’t feel right.”
“Well, what do you think Luna has Cheerilee doing?”
Twilight paused, a sinking expression sliding across her face. “Are you saying that you aren’t the only pony Luna has committing murders?”
“I think you’d be very surprised at the enterprise she’s set up,” I said. “So ask yourself, do you really want to know?”
Based on Twilight’s expression, the answer was no. I said goodbye to her and left the hotel.
As I was walking down the street, I swung by the waterfront. It was a calm day, but the waves were beginning to pick up. I checked the time and hurried across town to my destination.
The apartment building was old and kind of run down. I went upstairs and found the right door. I waited a few seconds, listening hard. Down at the wharf, I heard a tsunami crash on the shore.
The giant wave crashed against the seawall and the buildings that faced the water. That would have been bad enough, but as the ocean receded, dozens of seaponies were left on the shore.
They were like seahorses, but ponies. They started attacking the citizens of Manehattan, mostly with nonleathal strikes because a land-bound seapony only has so much it can do.
I heard the screams and nodded to myself. It was time.
I opened the apartment door in front of me. Trixie had taught me a few things about lockpicking. The apartment was kind of dingy, made worse by the body parts lying around. Yuck. But at least I knew why Luna wanted this pony dead.
I went up to the bathroom door where I heard water running and opened that, too. Inside, a stallion was taking a bath. He covered himself instinctively, despite the fact that ponies are generally naked all the time anyway.
“Who are you?” he yelped. “What do you want?”
“Hi, my name’s Valiant. I just saw the kind of mess and murder you’ve got going on here.” I gestured over my shoulder to the rest of the apartment. “But fortunately for you, I have a solution for your forgiveness and redemption!”
He gave me a flat look and started to get out of the bathtub. I leapt forward and tackled him. “Surprise baptism, asshole!”
We fought in the bathtub for a moment until I had him pinned underneath me. I had my hooves around his neck and held his head underwater.
I let him up for a breath. “Do you accept Jesus Christ as your lord and savior?”
“What…?” he sputtered.
“Good enough for me.” I shoved him back underwater. I hummed Amazing Grace while I waited. Pretty soon he stopped struggling.
I got up and used a nearby towel to dry off. Not wanting to leave any evidence or hoofprints behind, I took the towel with me and closed the door with my tail.
I arrived back at the hotel, dodging street battles along the way. Having my towel helped. When I got back, I found everyone holed up in their rooms waiting for someone else to take care of the threat.
“I don’t understand,” Twilight was saying. “I thought seaponies were just a myth! The scientific ramifications are amazing!”
I reminded her, “You can have your science as soon as they stop attacking.”
Not even a hostile invasion can stop drama, though. Rarity was crying about some other designer stealing her outfits. From what I gathered, Rarity had given this Suri Polomare some special fabric. In fact, a lot more of it than Suri had asked for. Also, Suri’s designs, while incorporating a lot of the same color, didn’t really look alike. Rarity apparently could see the similarity, however.
I left the building before Rarity went into ultra-bitch mode. She had her friends do work and stuff, trying to get a whole new line of garments finished before the next day.
I went to talk to Suri. I was hoping that maybe there was some kind of mistake and that Rarity was overreacting.
There was no mistake. Suri was a thieving bitch.
“Let me tell you a story,” I said. Suri sneered. Her assistant, Coco, looked apprehensive.
“Back where I come from, the natives were invaded by outsiders. Regardless of the fact of who was right or wrong there, the natives were angry about their land being stolen. So they took something of their own: the scalps of their defeated enemies.”
“What does this have to do with me?” Suri asked.
I shrugged. “I just wanted you to know why I was scalping you.”
It was lucky that the seaponies were still causing havoc outside. It helped mask the screams.
Coco dropped all her stuff and ran while I was busy. I spotted a spool of rainbow-colored thread and picked it up. It shimmered with an interesting light and I decided to take it with me. It was like “free gift with purchase of mutilation.”
I left the building. In the streets, the chaos had died down. The seaponies hadn’t lasted long out of the water and their lifeless bodies lay strewn about. Pity they hadn’t thought of that before launching their attack, but I had just asked them to do it, not how.
This is probably a good time to mention that I was in good with the seaponies since I’d helped them defeat their arch nemesis, the mermares. Long story.
Anyway, back at the room, Rarity was still freaking out and driving her friends like slaves in a sweatshop to finish the new outfits. They had already missed dinner and the show.
I got Rarity to calm down and gave her some material and advice. She was a little reluctant to take it, but everything ultimately worked out for the best.
In the morning, clothing finished, we went down to the fashion show. All the designers were there. Suri’s head was heavily bandaged and she looked with horror as Rarity’s outfits were displayed – with patches of Suri’s mane for decoration.
Rarity won the show easily. Suri slunk away, picking up her pace somewhat as I gave her a look. Coco paused, giving me an expression that might have been thankful, before following Suri.
As we exited the theater, I saw cleanup of the dead seaponies was underway.
“I wonder what they’ll use them for,” said Rainbow.
“Perhaps organic fertilizer?” Twilight speculated.
“Hmm, I wonder if I could get some of that at the orchard,” Applejack pondered.
Rarity had arranged for another showing of Hinny of the Hills, and we went to see it. I went along for lack of anything else to do.
“How did you ever get them to agree to do an extra performance just for us?” Twilight asked.
“Remember my costume designer friend who got me the tickets?” Rarity said. “Well, I offered to make all the costumes for his next show!”
“Here in Manehattan?” I asked.
Rarity frowned. “Well, um...yes. It will keep me away from Ponyville for a while.”
I thought about the mysterious like-colored ponies that I kept seeing in Ponyville. Would the Rarity-analogue be affected by her absence from Ponyville? I decided that I needed to get to the bottom of that.
But first I had to report back to Luna about my mission. She wasn’t going to be happy about the whole seaponies-invade-Manehattan thing.