Something I had learned really quickly is that cursive was an annoying thing to read. That and nearly every book here was written in it, though I guess that had to be expected. Sorting through the shelves was also a nightmare, and it was only when we figured out that the shelves had been arranged alphabetically as a whole did we start to get anywhere with the search. My bag was quickly becoming filled by books like: 'Magic,a History' and 'Unicorn Spells for Beginners'. While others dealt with politics and history of the nation of Equestria and its neighbors.
Once my bag was full, however, I had other plans. I gave Amber my backpack after taking off the mask of Aku and told her, "There's some bits in the bag, feel free to spend them in town before heading back. I need to have a talk with someone who is going to show up."
Amber rose a feathery eyebrow, "Ya sure about that boss? I mean, she's the element of magic."
I nodded, it was going to be a short talk. Besides I had both a rosary, and a spare puppet with me as well as the mask, I wasn't as armed as I wanted to be when this episode happened, but that wasn't going to stop me if I could help it. She bade goodbye and I returned the farewell, my mind looming on the possibilities ahead. I had to smirk, as I slowed down the puppet at the mountaintop into idle inactivity and summoned my unused one, bringing the mask over its head. The next step was leaving, cloaked in the shadows that were Aku, I made sure to leave the door unlocked. I managed to dip into an alleyway, and was rewarded by a brief flash as a certain Unicorn teleported to her front door a few minutes later and then vanished again, not even bothering with the door. But the important thing was that she was home, and now all that was left to do was to wait for her friends and mentor. I wasn't disappointed to see her friends running hard towards Twilight's place. I rolled my eyes as I saw Celestia further back, taking a much more casual stroll towards the same library.
I waited a few minutes for Celestia to enter the library before I approached with my puppet of Aku, both of us having a stern expression. We entered through the second story window, and listened as what I knew as scripted went down. First came Twilight's Sparkle's voice, still a bit worried and shell shocked, "Princess Celestia, wait! How did you know I was in trouble?"
The royal voice of their princess graced by ears, and I had to resist the urge to wince at the overdone motherly tone, "Your friend Spike made me aware that you were letting your fears get the best of you. I commend him for taking your feelings seriously. Now, if you will all excuse me, I must return to Canterlot." The sound of hooves stepping away, presumably towards the door, "I'm expecting some mail."
"Y'all heard the Princess. Spike, take a letter." A country twang rang out seconds later as the door opened and shut, Applejack clearing her throat, "Dear Princess Celestia, We're writin' to you because today we all learned a little somethin' about friendship."
Fluttershy's voice, soft yet angelic chimed in, "We learned that you should take your friends' worries seriously."
"Even if you don't think that she has anything to worry about." Rainbow's voice added, for once not sounding like she was challenging everyone else around her to be better than her.
"And that you shouldn't let your worries turn a small problem..." Rarity, her voice ever an attempt at being an Canterlot elite, left her sentence unfinished for a friend to add off of.
Pinkie, ever unpredictable in her antics, "...into an enormously huge entire-town-in-total-chaos Princess-has-to-come-and-save-the-day problem!"
Having come full circle, Applejack added the parting note, "Signed, your loyal subjects."
Once Spike had caught up, he couldn't help but mutter something in a tone too quiet to hear from the door, and they all started to laugh once more. I rolled my eyes. We were once more off script. At least where it mattered. I waited for the sound of dragon fire before I made my move. I casually opened the door, and eyed them all, none of them were facing me, all their eyes were toward each other or the front door as they made their way towards it, well all but one. Spike saw me at least, and he asked quite loudly as he took in my apearance, "Uh... Girls?"
Twilight turned her gaze back to her assisstant, "What is it Spi-" she noticed me.
"Messing in a god's domain yet again Twilight Sparkle?" I said, adding the typical villain smugness to my voice.
"You!" Twilight's once look of jolly turned to rage. I interrupted her before she could say more though,
"Yes, it is I." I gave them a brief pause before adding, "How incredibly observant you are."
The rest of them turned around, once carefree expressions turning to leveled glares, Applejack added in unhelpfully, "Isn' tha' the guy who interrupted our celebration a few days ago Twi?"
"And. If I heard the royal guards who went after him correctly," Twilight confirmed, her voice becoming more feral and edgier, as her stance went from casually standing to what you'd expect from a football player about to tackle someone at the start of a play, "Put. My. Brother. In. A. Coma."
"At least I didn't destroy a town with an army of Parasprites that suffered under your previous attempt at playing in a gods domain." I countered, "Food for thought."
"Thought Food?" Pinkie exclaimed, killing any sort of tension that was building up in the room, "Oh, that sounds juicy. And creative! Wonder-what-flav-"
Applejack stuck a hoof in her mouth to get the pink menace to be quiet, but it was to no avail as Pinkie also noticed, "Hey you're also that new pony who came to Ponyville the same day we beat Discord!"
Everypony except Twilight looked at her, "Uh... Sugarcube, You mean to say that he's been to Ponyville before?"
"Uh. Duh." Pinkie said enthusiastically, "I mean, I did just say that, and I-am-known for knowing everypony in ponyville, its always-so-exciting-to-see-somepony-new!" She realized something, her high pitch tone tuning downward somewhat, "Oh wait, he put Twilight's brother in a Coma? How come I never knew Twilight had a BROTHER?!"
"We're all just as surprised as you are Pinkie." Rarity said, looking between her pink friend and me, "But this is a bit more important at the moment, understand?" Well, great, already broke the continuity. Wonder how much Canterlot Wedding is going to change in the future now.
"Oh-right!" Pinkie looked to me, and before I knew it she was in my face and I was leaning backward to get some personal space from the pink maniac, "Normally I throw a party for every pony in ponyville, but you're dead-set on becoming a villain," She sighed, "That means no party, well at least my-itchy-mane-says-there's-going-to-be-a-new-pony-soon. Though-I-don't-quite-understand-what-burning-ears-means..."
"Pinkie!" Rarity, Applejack, Twilight, and Rainbow had shouted for the third time, their previous two shouts having been drowned out by the rapid pace distracting monologue that was Pinkie's rant.
"Sorry!" Pinkie exclaimed, cartwheeling back to the rear of the group next to fluttershy, who was trying her best not to hide in a bookshelf apparently, "I'll be quiet!" with that she turned her lips into a zipper and shut it tigh- Wait. how did she do that? Ugh, brain hurting.
Twilight turned her attention back to me, now that her pink friend was being silent, her rage seemed to have dimmed at least a bit, "What do you want Puppet?"
"Puppet Master." I corrected, "And, as I said, I'm wondering why you find it funny to mess in domains that no one should. Changing the dietary habits of an entire species? Or inducing a spell that would cause psychological changes to everyone who looked upon an old doll?" I droned off, "What of turning an spirit to stone again after it spent a thousand years petrified as a glorified statue for birds to poop on? Where do you stop Twilight Sparkle?"
Twilight sputtered, and Rarity, surprisingly, was the one to respond, "Anyone with those fashion tastes must be positively blind. The first is normally a sanctioned way of getting omnivorous creatures off certain diets. While the third was necessary because Discord was evil!"
I couldn't help but notice she left out the second one, so I answered before she or one of her friends could, "And the second was due to not taking Twilight seriously, I know. But it doesn't change the fact that in a proper court Twilight would of been arrested for such a thing. Rather than a biased judge that favors her. Though there is a flaw in your logic, Rarity."
"And what's that buster?" Rainbow remarked, a rather irritated look on her face, like she'd rather be trying to pummel me to submission with her hooves.
"Is the spirit of disharmony actually evil?"
"Uh... Duh."
I sighed and turned to the side, walking towards one of the many bookshelves that lined the library portion of Twilight's home, "Ever heard the phrase, 'Life is nothing without a little chaos to make it interesting'?" I checked their faces, and a look of confusion was plainly seen on at least half of them, those being Applejack, Rarity, and Pinkie pie; Twilight still looked mad though, and so did Rainbow. Fluttershy, however, was still hiding behind Pinkie. I smirked, "Some say Love is a product of Chaos, fascinating subject, for another time at least. But that is not your lesson to learn, not today at least."
"Surrender, Puppet Master." Twilight responded, her horn lighting up. Oh joy, "And maybe your punishment will be lessened by Celestia."
I took a moment, as if I was actually considering that ridiculous notion, "Hmm, I never did believe in a biased judge and jury. So nah."
She fired off a spell, and I deadpanned as the rosary around my neck activated, deflecting the spell and out of pure chance hitting Rainbow in the face, who fell to the ground stunned. It was just not her lucky week. "And with the beginnings of a fight, I leave."
"Not so fas-" Twilight began, but I had the puppet of Aku flood the room in darkness before leaving, another spell bouncing off it and into a shelf, causing books to fly everywhere.
I ran back up the stairs and jumped out the second floor window, being caught by my puppet as we made our get away. I smirked as I saw the populace below panic at seeing a large black flying bat like creature with flaming eyebrows and a green face go past them. The fliers keeping their distance and having looks torn between 'what' and 'the hell' on their faces. By the time the darkness in the library faded, I was already at the edge of town, and into the forests that lead between my lair and ponyville. Having dispersed Aku so he was like a shadow in the air in the dimly sunset lit forest, and slowed down to a casual stroll.
I chuckled, "Can't wait till she finds out some of her books are missing."
I heard a distant angered scream, of a certain lavender mare, and my chuckles dissolved into full out giggling. What? Men can giggle. Well I guess it was more of a cackle, but still! I resolved to work on my evil laugh later as I hiked my way through the forest, I could cheat and let Aku carry me back, but I was going to need to be physically fit in the days ahead, and slacking off now would only hurt me later. Distantly through my other senses I heard and saw Amber arrive back at home, and I stowed Aku's puppet back away, interestingly enough, the doll kept wearing the mask when it turned back to its smaller marionette form, the strings now carrying a miniature version of Aku's natural state instead of a blank puppet.
It was such a pain to climb a mountain though, but with Glados, I guess I wouldn't have to. After installing an elevator of course. I started to have her dig downward with a mental command as I walked, occasionally spreading out the dig and creating new floors beneath her and opening small holes in the mountain, large enough for a Camera to peek out of and check progress. I wouldn't want to overshoot, or undershoot after all. And the added space would allow not only safety, but more room to do whatever I wanted in the mountain. Though the first few floors were dedicated for finally storing the tremendous dragon hoard above ground before I started working on living quarters. I think it was this distraction that made me fail to notice my next attacker until he was up in my face.
It was a scrawny foal of a pony. Wearing painted black chain mail, and a variety of cotton pouches probably filled with different things. His fur was a light, almost pale, brown and his mane was a similarly pale green. What I didn't fail to notice, however, was the large almost short sword length knife he held in one of his hooves. "Give me all your money." The kid threatened.
"Funny, but as you can see I have no bags." I said, "Though I hear there's a bounty on my head for disturbing the peace if that's what your meaning."
"And you're unarmed!" The kid threatened, he lunged at me, and I went backwards, to avoid being stabbed, drops of something green hit the ground from the blade.
I raised an eyebrow, "What pray tell is that?"
"My knife, you see, is coated in poison." the scrawny foal declared, in an almost gloaty edge, "The smallest cut can be fatal."
He moved to stab at me again, and this time the rosary activated, deflecting the blade of its shield, however some of the liquid stayed on it, burning away at it.
"Take care," the kid said, both an edge of worry in his eyes, and mild surprise, "My knife, has quite a burn."
I rolled my eyes, and reached for my marionette, "Don't bother fighting back, I'll have quite the time-" But I raised an eyebrow as the kid did something very stupid, he licked his blade, "Carving you-"
He looked at his blade, realizing what he just did, "I probably shouldn't of licked it..." he responded, as if casually talking about the weather, and then he collapsed.
I face-palmed. Really? Just really? I walked up to the kid, and kicked the knife away before rolling him over to his back. Yep, he was truly out of it. I checked his pouches, for some sort of antidote, I found several empty vials, and some plants I didn't know, but nothing on antidotes. I sighed, great. And just how was I supposed to stop this kid from killing himself?
I sighed, well there was only one zebra in Equestria I knew who brewed potions in canon. I summoned Aku, having him pick both the kid up and the knife, and flew him towards the Everfree forest, I knocked on her door and dropped the kid off and the knife, leaving him there before she could answer it, I could trust that she of all people would be able to put two and two together before it was too late. And I already had one would-be-killer in my lair. I didn't need a second one. Let them join me out of wanting to, not some life debt.
I resumed my walk, dispelling my puppet back into its marionette form as it reached me again as if nothing had happened. Once I had reached the base of the mountain, I sat down and waited as the elevator system continued to grow, and was rewarded as a few minutes later I found myself staring at myself through a camera. Success. Now it was time for me to get back to work.