//------------------------------// // Angel Eye's story: Part 1 // Story: Shadows and Deception. // by Wolf-Baron //------------------------------// “Good morning New York City!!!! Now I hope all you men and ponies are having a wonderful morning! Today’s weather is gonna be sunny with clear skies and….” I slammed my hoof on the clock’s snooze button silencing the host’s loud voice. Seriously, why does Canis (the name of the radio DJ) have to be so loud on the radio? Especially on one of the few days I get to sleep in. Oh pardon me I didn’t introduce myself, my name is Angel Eyes and I’m 24 years old. Why I have that name? Well my mom told me she named me that because I had the “eyes of an angel” when I was first born. I’m a unicorn and I do have a nice pair of pretty green eyes which complemented my brown mane perfectly if I don’t say so myself. I lifted my head and stared out my room’s window as the shining blue city, hearing the horns beep and the video ads on them play as the jet shaped cars rolled on the streets. While the city looked pretty, it sadly couldn’t disguise the dark shades of the street life. Shades that I was all too familiar with. I normally work as a technician and repair mare at a human company called GigaByte Technologies, the founder and CEO (who is also my boss) named it. Bit of an erratic personality but I got along with him just fine although he had this bizarre habit of saying the words “science” and “technology” every five minutes. I spent most of my hours at work repairing and tinkering with computers and various other electronic devices. I’ve always been good with machines and being a filly in Equestria, I was one of the few ponies who could operate technology. Despite being very pretty, I was a geek and I sadly made no friends as a filly. Most of the other fillies used to pick on me and my love for human technology. My mom tried to get me to socialize with the other kids but despite my best efforts, I was often rejected (it didn’t help that my first play date was ruined because my teacher caught me trying to disassemble all of her household appliances). I didn’t make any true real friends until I was in high school and that didn’t happen until I moved from Equestria. I live in the human city of New York in the United States of Karelia with my live in girlfriend Vinyl Scratch. Now you’re probably wondering what a mare like me is doing living in a human nation, well, it’s a long story and not a happy one at that. It’s a long story of chaos, war, and all other sorts of shit. I don’t have much memory of the war; I was still a young filly. All I remember is waking up to the smell of smoke and fire and the sound of air sirens and fighter jets. I used to live in Equestria, more specifically, the small farming town of Ponyville, but then the third Great War occurred and I was forced to move. My mom had awoken me one night and told me to run away to my uncle’s house and take the next train to Coltonville; then take the next flight to the United States as soon as possible. All I remember is ponies running and screaming, the whistling of rockets and artillery, and the town set ablaze with fire and smoke. Damn I still have nightmares about it. I also remember her saying, “Don’t worry sweetie, mommy and daddy will join you and uncle soon.” But very tragically, I never saw my mother or father again after that. But that’s in the past, if there’s anything my uncle taught me, you put your past behind your where it belongs. Yeah I talk about my uncle a lot don’t I? Well he took me in after my parents died. Very great stallion he was too. He first came to Karelia with nothing but me and only twenty human dollars in his saddle. It was a tough start at first but soon, he raised enough money to purchase a bankrupt gas station and within a matter of years, he had his own little chain of convenience stores which kept us fed. Yes my life has been quite an adventure. When I and he first came to Karelia, I was shocked by the sights I had seen. These, things called humans were so strange to me when I first saw them. They talked funny and stood upright with no support of a tail or hind hooves. And they had funny names too; although then again, humans would consider my name strange too. To this day I’m still baffled at how humans look and act! How or why humans behave the way they do though is beyond my comprehension; I’m just a computer technician, not an evolutionary scientist. Of course the human nations have wild animals too. But just your standard ones not the exotic magical creatures like we used to have in Equestria; but most of them were probably fried when the bombs and megaspells hit. But in the city I live in, you mostly just see cats and dogs: occasionally you’ll spot a fox digging into the garbage in some alleyway behind the dumpster of a pizzeria. Dragons used to live in the human continents too over a thousand years ago; they were largely killed off by the humans during their medieval period. The dragons that did survive migrated to Equestria. Even though the human nations were located in the same world as Equestria, called Earth by the humans, their climate acted completely differently than Equestria’s. Don’t ask me why though it just does. For one thing magic isn’t as effective here. I remember reading somewhere that some human and pony scientists believe it may have something to do with the location of the magnetic field of the Earth and its relationship with the human continents. And that’s another thing about adjusting to the human nations, unlike Equestria, the weather here cannot really be controlled so it’s really up to the seasons. When I went to a human school, I was taught that weather had something to do with Earth’s rotation and axis which is very complex to me. Just because I can dismantle and reassemble a Dell Venue 8 Pro in my sleep, doesn’t mean I know how nature works. We could still use magic, but, the electromagnetic field that cloaked the human part of Earth made magic not as effective like it usually is. We can no longer perform transformations spells and other sorts of hoosafuzz. Instead we just do minor stuff like levitating objects. Not that I minded though as I mostly only used my magic for minor stuff like that anyway. Personally I could care less if I was an earth pony as I was perfectly good repairing computers with my hooves. I stretched my legs and yawned in the bed and got comfortable as thankfully today was Saturday; my day off. As I rolled over to get an extra few minutes sleep, I felt a soft pair of lips tickle my neck causing me to giggle. “Vinyl!” I laughed as my lover teased me. She seemed to giggle back in response. “Hehe, what? You look so damn cute when you wake up! Do you really expect me to behave this morning?” she teased with a grin and a cuddle wrapping her hooves around me. How did I find such a lucky mare is beyond me, but it happened. I turned around and stared her in the face; damn Vinyl had the nicest pair of magenta eyes any pony or human could ever lay eyes on. She was a very lovely unicorn with the most velvet blue spiked mane I had ever seen! Her coat was a soft white and she had a musical note for her cutie mark; mine was of a computer screen, go figure. She worked for a local radio station as a DJ and sports announcer. Not a bad position as she used to be an independent DJ back in Equestria when she was a filly herself. “It’s not fair that you don’t have to work today but I do!” she pined a little as she kissed my neck. I moaned a little at the touch and kiss of my lover’s tongue. Goddamn she’s a rose! And I was pretty damn lucky how I found her. Let’s just say it involved me accidentally running into her while grocery shopping. We’ve been together for around three years and counting and I couldn’t be happier. She was funny, full of energy, and not to mention the sex. Damn so much sex! She had quite the appetite for it. Oh God I love her so dearly, even if I do partially disagree with her taste in music as she loves dubstep while I’m more of an adult alternative mare myself. “But you do get the evening off today right?” I reminded her as I kissed her back. “It’ll be just you and me tonight” I reassured her with a bright and cheerful smile. She nodded and got out of bed. Her mane was untidy at the moment though. “Well I need to shower and get my mane ready for work,” she explained with a rather mischievous grin. I smiled and got up myself rubbing my eyes with my hooves. “Alright then, I’ll get breakfast ready.” I told her with a nod as she grabbed a towel from the clothing drawer. Breakfast was the usual one we always had: eggs, juice, and grain cereal. While Vinyl personally hated the stuff, I was helping myself to a nice cup of hot coffee (black with just a little touch of sugar). When ponies first moved to the human nations, we were first introduced to this new high caffeinated drink. Now most of us were practically addicted to it. I myself would rather go the rest of my life without magic than be without my daily cup of coffee. Vinyl was standing by the toaster whistling her favorite tune (Crave You by Flight Facilities) as she picked up a plate, levitating it with her unicorn magic. The toaster popped as two toasted bagels flew from the machine. Vinyl grabbed with her hooves gasping a little as they were hot and set them on the plate, levitating them both with her magic. She then grabbed a carton of cream cheese, also with her unicorn magic and sat down next to me by the table. The apartment we lived in was typical. It was on the fourth floor and had a wonderful view of the city especially at night. It was interesting because the cityscape gave this cool looking blue hue even during the daytime; most likely because as human technology advanced, so did building architecture. The city was full of blue lit skyscrapers now while the city streets were crawling with strange looking automobiles. Bright, neon lights and advertisements cloaked the building walls advertising products and services. I must admit, staring at them long did give you this extreme rush to go on a shopping spree. Learning to drive became an absolute necessity for pony kind. So much so that many human car companies began producing custom made cars that ponies could use although only the unicorns and earth ponies really used them. Pegasus on the other hoof obviously preferred to fly to and from their destination, although they still had to watch out for airplanes and police helicopters. Still sipping my cup of coffee, I lifted our TV’s remote with my hoof. We actually have quite a fancy large, HD TV in our living space; which was just across from our dining room and kitchen. It was very large and centered in the front of the right end of our living space. It didn’t match the purple wall colorings of our walls but I personally didn’t care. I just sat down on the table sipping my coffee occasionally taking a bite out of my bowl of cereal of Frosted Flakes. Yeah, I’m an adult mare and I’m still addicted to that cartoon cereal! Unfortunately, daytime television sucks ass, nothing but soaps, infomercials, game shows, and the news. Might as well see what’s on the news today, even though ninety percent of it was just bad news. Somebody got raped or shot or both. Give me a break! But the news was the best that was on so I tuned into them. I have to admit that the host of Fox Channel Twelve news was fairly attractive and a very nice looking young male human, despite my preference for females. However, true to my prediction, he was standing in front of a house which was taped with yellow police streamers advising citizens to stay away. “In other news today, the body of forty-three year old Nathan McDaniels was found beaten and murdered today by his wife when she returned home from her daily walk. Police have searched the house but have found no sign of an armed robbery. However, his cybernetics were cut off and taken away from him and the police chief suspects that this crime may once again be an act of violence towards people with cybernetics, typically referred to as ‘Cybers’ by the general populace. The police are still trying to crack down on this continuing trend of discriminate violence. Back to you Jennifer” The screen then cut to the piece de resistance of Fox 12; Jennifer Collins, the hottest new anchorwoman in all of New York (yes ponies can be attracted towards humans too, sue me!). Jenny had the absolute most gorgeous body of any female human I’ve seen. And her voice, oh my god! She had the voice of an entire choir of angels! Seriously, she should be on Broadway singing opera! Not working for a news channel. “In world events, the Celestial Empire’s military crossed the border into their neighbor; the Neo Lunar Republic in what they claimed was a response to a recent terrorist attack committed by a Lunar republic insurgent group called the Lunar Republican Army, commonly known as the LRA. The Confederated Terran Trimutive is deploying troops on the borders of the two clashing in what they claim is a mission of peacekeeping. Our president has stated that he has no intention to intervene but---” I turned off the TV there and then cutting off Jennifer before she was about to finish her sentence (sorry Jenny). I grow tired of the news media nowadays. Blood, politics, violence, sex, war, and murder, that’s all they cared about. As the old human saying goes; “if it bleeds, it leads”. Not to mention they loved to capitalize on all the violence and misery going on in this world at the moment. You see after the third Great War was over, many nations suffered. The United Terran Federation was gone and was replaced by the Trimutive, which in itself was little more than a rump state. The UTF’s old representative government was now replaced by a crazy radical socialist military junta who made it a personal mission to go out and to try to control the personal actions of every human and pony who was unfortunate enough to live there. Equestria was also split into two nations: the Celestial Empire and the Neo Lunar Republic. Both of these pony nations hated each other and were known to declare war on each other every twenty minutes over the most ridiculous reasons. The only reason most ponies fled to the USK was because it was the only human nation not to have its economy and infrastructure completely devastated by the war. But even then, with increase tensions between the CTT, the Celestial Empire, and the Neo Lunar Republic, every day, the USK found itself in a more and more difficult position to stay neutral. “Hey Vinyl, since I don’t have to work, why don’t I drive you to your work today. Maybe we can go out tonight; it’s been awhile since we’ve done that.” I told Vinyl with a smile. And I meant it too. We’ve both been so busy we barely had time to even talk to each other. “It’s a date!” Vinyl smiled back with excitement as she finished her bagel and walked towards the dishwasher and put them in. I finished my coffee and went to the closet to grab my spring coat and IPhone for the occasion while Vinyl grabbed her favorite pair of purple sunglasses. Ah finally a great day. I thought myself as I opened the door. Beeeeeppp!!! Beeeeeppp!!! My train of peaceful thought was interrupted however by my IPhone’s text message beep. I lifted the phone with my horn and operated the message. Strange, it was a text message from my human friend Anthony Trenton. We were friends since high school. However, even though we were still good friends and lived in the same city, we rarely spoke with each other as we had different fields of work. He was a police officer working for the NYPD’s SPDA (Special Police Detective Agency). He lived alone in New York’s Bronx district about a twenty minute drive away from my place, an hour and a half during rush hour season. As I said earlier, he lived by himself although he did had at one point a girlfriend but that relationship ended very badly (he actually called me on my phone sobbing that day). His text message read: How about we have lunch together this afternoon around 1:00. Text me back as soon as you possibly can. I really need to talk to you. “Who was that?” Vinyl asked me from behind. I shook my head with disbelief, “It was a message from Anthony, and he wants to speak with me over lunch.” Vinyl tilted her head with curiosity and confusion. “But why? I shook my head. “I don’t know. What would Anthony want?” This was strange as I hadn’t spoken to him in over eight months. The last time we spoke was during a city wide costume party for a local charity event. He occasionally sent me a text message and email here and there, but that was about it. He rarely wanted to speak in person anymore; which I personally just assumed was because of his line of work. When your career involves inspecting the crime scenes of violent murders and rapes, you probably wouldn’t be in a talking mode either. Vinyl walked up and tapped me on the shoulder, waking me from my train of thought. “I’m sure he just wants to catch up on old times or something like that.” She answered with reassurance. Thankfully Vinyl wasn’t the paranoid type who always questioned who I talked to. She and I both understood we had friends and family we would occasionally hang out with and that we needed to trust each other. “You’re right.” I said with a wink and a cheerful smile as I escorted my unicorn lover out the door. Today was going to be a great day after all. The outside of my apartment was a large hallway which was beautifully decorated with white plastered walls and soft colorful carpets. Me and Vinyl existed out and headed towards the elevator which led to the apartment’s lower levels at the end of the hallway. Normally I take the stairs as a little form of exercise, but that would take forever. Vinyl stood behind me as we walked down the hallway to the elevator. The hall was rather quiet today although that could be because me and Vinyl were up rather early and it was Saturday. We walked by Apartment Number Fourteen very carefully as the occupant was a forty year old human named Richter Sheldon who was notorious throughout the complex as being the biggest douche in all of Karelia. He supposedly worked as a novelist and an editor for an online newspaper, according to our landlord. I personally wouldn’t know myself because I have never read any of his books (nor do I plan to). All I know was that he was a complete asshole who would complain over the most ridiculous reasons. We reached the elevator and I pushed the call button with my hoof while Vinyl continued to whistle her favorite tunes. After what felt like the longest 30 seconds ever, the elevator arrived with its usual Ding sound. Vinyl and I stepped in the small cramped space; thankfully we were the only ones in it. I pushed the button which led to the bottom floor, where the parking lot was located. The elevator doors closed and with a sudden sinking feeling, we felt the elevator lower itself to our destination feeling the vibration and movement in our hooves. I remained quiet while Vinyl continued to whistle a different tune this time as she cradled her saddle bag of records she was taking to work. The elevator dropped us off in one of those dark concrete parking lots. There were dozens of rows of parked cars. We parked my azure blue jet Sedan at the end of the corner. It was an older 2015 model, but she got me and Vinyl where we needed to go. Vinyl was still learning how to drive so she had to rely on me or a taxi to be her main method of transportation. I levitated my keys with my horn and pushed the button. My Sedan made a distinctive beeping sound as the alarm turned off and it unlocked. I opened the trunk door so Vinyl could put her work bags into the trunk while I got into the driver’s seat and buckled up. Vinyl shut the trunk and entered the front passenger’s seat and buckled her seatbelt. I carefully backed out and drove out of the grey parking lot and onto the blue blackish asphalt of New York City. The trip to Vinyl’s place a work went rather smoothly today. Thank god traffic was rather light today as normally the streets of New York were completely crowded with cars and motorbikes. There was still a shit tone of traffic though but Vinyl and I just relaxed and listened to some music on the radio. We normally listen to smooth jazz in the car because both of our jobs are very stressful and jazz has this rather interesting calming effect. I drove very slowly in the busy streets keeping my hooves firm on the steering wheel. Why am I using my hooves instead of my magical horn you may ask? Well it is highly dangerous to drive with magic. In order to manipulate an object, you have to concentrate all your focus on the object you want to move. If I wanted to move the steering wheel with magic, I would have to focus on the wheel and not look anything else. As I’m pretty sure as you guessed, the typically outcome of doing such an act is your car crashing into a wall or pole at forty miles an hour. Not gonna risk that! There were a lot of ponies and humans walking on the sidewalks carrying bags of groceries and other wears while the police casually patrolled the streets. One thing that really stood out was the lack of pony cops. Yeah because ponies were still relatively new citizens to the USK and many other human occupied nations, we were still adjusting into the main stream culture. There were reports and accusations of police brutality towards ponies although I personally never encountered this problem (except that one time a cop called me and Vinyl “dykes” when he caught us making out on a bench in Central park). The building where Vinyl worked was a rather tiny one compared to the uber skyscrapers which neighbored it. It was also made largely out of brown brick instead of the shiny alloy which the skyscrapers’ infrastructure was typically made of. The building had a large satellite dish on top of it with the antennae tipped with a blinking blue beacon. In shiny bright purple neon lights above the main entrance it read: WKDS-New York’s top rated station! I pulled over the parking space of the street and set my car to park. Vinyl opened her door and I pressed the button to open the trunk. I gave my sweet lover a passionate kiss before she left. “Have a good day Vinyl!” I said with a cheering smile. “I’ll pick you up at five and we’ll have dinner tonight!” Vinyl grinned and nodded back, her glasses and smile almost shining even brighter than the buildings. “You too Angel,” she said as she grabbed her things from the trunk and closed it. “Can’t wait!” She waved goodbye and then headed off towards the entrance (damn her hindquarters does this cute little shake when she walks away!) Still parked though, I reached into my saddle bag and grabbed my phone. I needed to text Anthony back. Because I had the day to myself until five, I figured I could see him for lunch. Maybe catch up on old times. With my horn, I texted: Sure Anthony, I would love to sit down and chat again. Where would you like to have lunch? With the message sent, I pulled out of the parking space careful not to hit anyone and then I headed home. All while waiting for Anthony’s reply. I really do wonder though, what does he want to talk about?