Tuxedo Mask ran up the stairs, taking each flight three steps at a time as the shouts and stomps of the government building’s limited security detail echoed throughout the staircase. Through their kicking of doors down, bunching up, and generally tripping over one and another’s hooves as their mob became larger and larger, they were giving their quarry an unnecessarily long lead.
As the building’s security personnel closed in upon him, he kept fighting for his escape; the only way out of this mess was up.
Tuxedo Mask made it to the top floor, blowing through a guard who stood between him and the door labeled “ROOF ACCESS” by grabbing him on the head, curled up, causing the pony to fall forward beneath the weight, and then broke his collarbone as Tuxedo Mask’s knees kicked up and into his shoulders. After that simple obstacle, the unicorn threw the guard down the stairs, and allowed him to trip the hooves of his many compatriots.
He slammed through the door and charged the small distance between the doors and prepared to escape. There was a glimmer in the darkness, Tuxedo Mask did not try to stop or reverse his momentum. Instead, he dove away from the dark shadows and slid to a halt on the ground.
In a strike that would have meant decapitation, a glimmering spur descended from the dark, piercing the white and clean textures of Tuxedo Mask’s jacket, tearing clean down the seam.
Tuxedo Mask spun back to his hooves and stared into the shadow between him and the door.
Two glimmering spurs stepped out of the shadow, revealing a pegasus.
Both of the ponies looked towards the way the unicorn had come, hearing the hustle and bustle of the pursuers, and then returned to each other.
The two reared, shifted their bodies into wide, stable stances, and put up their dukes. Indra raised his sparkling spurs. Tuxedo Mask raised his right hoof, bending it upwards at the elbow and then towards his opponent at the wrist. His left leg came out horizontally and the rim of the hoof met the side of his right elbow.
Pony vs. pony, pride vs. pride, instinct vs. instinct; they only had time for one strike, one blow that would matter. Freedom or imprisonment, glory or humiliation.
The unicorn wearing the frowning white mask with a red teardrop shuffled forward. Indra, in his uniform and tie, advanced as well.
Indra wound his hooves above his head and swept down like an axe. Tuxedo Mask struck his left hoof out, reaching up and towards the two falling, razor sharp, stars.
The jacketed leg met with the two sharpened pieces of metal, and the spurs won. They cut through the jacket and whatever else was in the way until they met with something very hard and became stuck in it.
The enigma, with his right hoof, struck straight out at his opponent. Moving like a cobra’s poisonous bite, the white hoof struck Indra right in his trachea.
The pegasus fell away from the masked unicorn. As he hit against the wall, the white sleeve of his equal’s jacket ripped in half.
His combat spurs had indeed struck clean and true, his form was perfect, and their condition was flawless. But instead of flesh and blood, the weapons had impaled themselves in a clean sheet of body armor, leaving this fox unharmed.
If it was any consolation, even though he was currently gasping for breath through a wounded throat, he could take pride that, unlike all of the other forces in the Office, he had actually gotten a good, clean blow in.
In the northeastern corner of the building, Tuxedo Mask pulled out his large purple knife and, using magic, made two equal lacerations down the back of his suit. After the deed was done, his horn glowed, and two beautiful, transparent wings began to form upon his back.
Before the wings were fully formed, he sprinted to the end of the corner of the structure and dove off, diving down and, as the thin crystalline pallets absorbed the impact of the air, leveled off into a glide across the street. Pegasi patrolling the skies, as well as the troops on the ground illuminating the building with spotlights, shifted all of their attention from the dark building and illuminated the escaping thief. All of the troops in the area had been given specific orders to take him alive, so as soon as the attempted escape began, everypony focused their energy to ground Tuxedo Mask’s flight.
It took 10 seconds for the first two winged ponies to collide with their target, and their landing was anything but gentle. The two changed their gliding momentum and redirected their course into a large, gothic window. The impact of the additional weight cracked the prosthetic wings, but it was the collision with the window shattered them completely, turning Tuxedo Mask back into a unicorn.
All three members of their haphazard flight landed hard upon the floor and slid to a stop. Each had bumps and bruises across their body, and had to stagger to their hooves, but the worst off was the one who was- at one point- dressed the nicest. His mask had fallen off in the crash and skidded across the dark and empty room that they had arrived at. It currently rested at what appeared to be the only door of the room, which, while made of glass and wood, had white curtains on it that blocked the lights from the other side.
One of the military troopers jumped onto the unicorn and held him down with his hooves. “You’re under arrest!” he shouted.
To his credit, it was a good thing to say at the time, except he had no previous knowledge of what had happened to the previous half dozen individuals who happened to have shouted that same phrase throughout the night, so what came next was a surprise… to the soldier at least.
Tuxedo Mask, his face concealed in the dark, struck out with his hoof, hooking the pegasus in the side of the face before kicking with his bottom leg right into attacker’s groin. The pony fell on his rump, freeing his aggressor. The combat troop fell to his bottom with his front hooves down, nursing the area between his legs that the armor did a very poor job protecting as tears fell from his eyes.
Disoriented and weak, he could not do anything but struggle as the white intruder reared, grabbed him, placed him across his shoulders like a firepony carrying someone, lifted him over his head, dropped him, and at the same time brought his rising knee up to meet his falling head. The pegasus, after the impact of the rising knee on his falling chin, stood straight up on his back hooves and lazily fell flat onto his back, promptly going to sleep.
While his friend was being incapacitated, the other pony sprung to his hooves, charged the rearing unicorn, and threw his hooves around him in a hold. The two grunted and fought, and the pegasus was slowly beginning to win. The soldier forced the unicorn down, and slowly caused Tuxedo Mask’s knees to buckle. His core resistance to the oppressive force began to crumble, and slowly the unicorn’s chest began to curl inward-
Just to explode upwards with an unanticipated jump. Tuxedo mask fought back up and back-flipped over the soldier while still grabbing his hoof. With a mighty tug, he turned the pegasi around, grabbed his head and kicked his legs out, allowing gravity to send both of them straight to the ground and knocking out the last soldier.
Tuxedo Mask stood, sidestepped the sore lumps on the floor, and used his hooves to crack his neck. Gingerly, he walked to his exit to escaping –the doorway that his mask had landed by- and stopped by it.
Using magic, he grabbed his crying mask with a frown and brought it to his fac-
“Freeze!”
He stopped in mid motion, looking through the tiny eye holes in his mask that was about to become one with his face, and saw what could be a platoon of pegasi, all armed with a variety of crossbows, and aimed right at him.
“Drop the mask!” one shouted.
He turned to them, reared, and grasped his mask in his hooves. Like a horseshoe, he tossed the white plastic mold in a way that it would stop right before the army of troops.
The soldiers watched the mask. A few braced themselves or moved away in fear that it was about to explode on them. But instead of performing some sort of spontaneous combustion, it instead sat motionless, acting as ordinary as any other mask in the world.
They followed the facewear back to its owner and looked at his face, wishing to see the true identity of the one who had caused all the trouble at the National Offices of Archives and Securities and had been nearly impossible to apprehend.
From the light outside the door, there was clear illumination over the body of the pony they sought, and, revealed behind the mask of a sad pony crying blood was…
A white mask of a pony Laughing so hard that bloody tears of joy fell from his face.
“Now get down on the ground, nice and slow! Now!”
He stood, with his hooves in an “I surrender” position, and slowly set them behind his head. In a fashion that was not meant to frighten the armed pegasi, he fixed his dirtied and misaligned hat, and corrected it on his head.
The reared pony with his smiling and laughing mask slowly removed his hooves from his head and began to lower them on his body. Held breaths by the armed ponies were slowly released, and nerves began to slowly settle.
When his hooves were about half way between his core and his shoulders, he backed up one step, forced the double doors behind him to open, and slammed them shut behind him.
Immediately, the pony in charge shouted, “Hold your fire!” twice. He did not know what was on the other side of the door, and even if this terrorist had just stolen from a government building, he did not need civilian casualties added to the fiasco.
He, with his soldiers in tow, charged the glass double doors and slammed them so hard they chipped the walls that they opened into. Every crossbow was pointed in a different direction as soon as the doors were open, intending to get a shot and stop the escaping unicorn, but what they saw was not exactly what they wanted to see.
Mr. Beelzebub was not lying when told Commander Stronghelm that he had prior engagements later in the night, and the combat troops who had just kicked the double doors in had just found what it was.
There were ponies, hundreds of them, all wearing white masks, all wearing white hats, and all wearing white tuxedos.
Large inflatables shaped like bottles of wine were strewn through the room, and waiters with trays full of alcoholic beverages traversed the white crowd. The banners that lead from the rafters above read, “15th annual Magnum Costumed White Wine Mixer”.
“What are we supposed the do?” a private asked.
The leader of the team could only stand silently with his mouth open and view the party before him. He had no definite answer, the private’s guess was as good as his.
The burning archives below the building acted like kindling for a cooking pot of stew as smoke syphoned throughout the government building and out of the opened office windows and into the night.
The public, perched on rooftops, out of windows, and on the street of the square, watched as the fire turned the Offices into an oversized chimney. The staff of the building, both on their own accord or by the assistance of their coworkers, had evacuated and gathered outside of the building like they had prepared for with the fire protocol. Firewagons had arrived at the scene and the fireponies escorted hoses down into the burned and charred foundation of the structure to dissolve the immediate crisis.
The Chief of Security, like all of the other ponies who worked in the building, was standing by the gate to the streets and watched the fires burn much of the evidence involving the one who had breached and escaped from his security.
He covered his eyes with his hooves and then slowly dragged them down his face, hoping that by some miracle this whole catastrophe was just a figment of his imagination, or an evil image that he needed to wipe away. But it was not. And with each time he stressed the fur around his eyes, he kept seeing his responsibility go up in smoke.
A pony ran up to him and saluted, “Sir! All personnel are accounted for!”
The Chief stopped, a sour taste beginning to develop on his tongue, and then asked him to repeat himself.
“Everypony managed to be evacuated safely. There were a few unconscious friendlies in the basement, but the fireponies managed to rescue them and they are on their way to the hospital.”
“No fatalities?”
“No sir.”
The Chief went back to rubbing his eyes again. He had been played with. Whoever came after them had just made the entire security force look like inept rejects. He walked right into the building, signed in, was admitted into the secure offices, burnt their building down, had his way with the security force, and was now gone without a trace.
This was going to be a nightmare explaining everything that happened. He was going to be a disgrace to his nation. If there was a nearby rock, he would be inclined to hide underneath it until he died.
A mare, looking around through the crowd at ponies, saw him and ran over.
“Sir, have you seen my father, Commander Stronghelm? He was with the representative from Canterlot when he-”
“The Commander is fine,” he answered in a deadpan tone, “He was found in his office and is now on route to the hospital to be examined.”
The young mare rejoiced and then straightened herself up again, “Sir, I was on duty when the Representative arrived, I believe I have-”
“He wasn’t a representative!” the Chief spat, “he was an impostor!”
“Well…” the mare stammered, “I think I may have a clue to help you.”
“Well, get on with it then.” He said, turning his gaze to give her his full, albeit sarcastic, attention.
“I think he was using a fake name-”
“No shit!”
“I… Meant to say… Think I know what his name means, it may help us.”
“Fine, go ahead.”
“He said his name was ‘Beelzebub’. In college, I had to read a story, and well, the name, ‘Beelzebub’, It’s from the mythos of an extinct religious group called the Solari. It’s one of the surnames for the Devil.”
The Chief smacked himself on the face and began to sarcastically laugh aloud, “Oh, that’s just great! We were attacked by the Devil! I’ll be sure to tell the investigation team that the pony who whooped our asses was the physical incarnation of sin!”
The mare tried to protest, giving reasons as to why that may be helpful, but eventually gave up and walked away from the ignoramus. He continued laughing to himself and cursed the smoke that was beginning to slow its flow as the fireponies undoubtedly put out its flames in the basement.
As he kept mocking the mare that had tried to help, a voice came up behind him and asked, “What happened here?”
He didn’t even give the speaker enough courtesy to look back, “Oh, didn’t you hear? The Devil walked into the front doors, broke into the archives of a secured government building, stole Celestia knows what, kicked all of our securities’ asses, and got away. What the hell do you think happened? Somepony put aluminum in the microwave?”
“Oh, really? The devil? Nopony was able to stop him from escaping with whatever it was that he had stolen?”
“Nope!” the chief continued, “he just bent us all over and had his way with us all.”
“Well,” the voice said, “that is very problematic. I am sure you have your hooves full and do not need another distraction. I’ll just be on my way.”
The Chief, taking the statement as strange, turned around and looked at the pony behind him as he began to turn.
“Who are you?”
The pony behind him, a navy blue winged unicorn wearing an incredibly nice three piece suit, with a black jacket, grey vest, cream shirt, and a red tie, adjusted his glasses and used magic to reach into his vest pocket. “Esproc, Mr. Esproc.” He showed a business card with a royal seal on it, “I was sent on behalf of Shining Armor due to a recent incident that has made his attendance not possible. The message should have arrived earlier in the day. I was here to arrange Princess Luna’s visit… But, it looks like I’ve seen enough. Have a nice night.”
The chief’s jaw dropped to the stone courtyard as he recognized the name that had started the events of the night. The winged unicorn turned around and walked out of the courtyard.
The chief, once more, fell to the stone and began to sob into his hooves, wishing for the night to end without having anything else going wrong.