The morning came with all the fury of a goddess scorned, blinding Lyra with the full power of the sun. In desperation she reached out with her magic for her last line of defense against Celestia's wrath.
The blinds closed, and she rolled over to go back to sleep. She expected to find Bon Bon lying next to her, but the earth pony's side of the bed was cold and empty. Lyra sat up, rubbed the sleep from her eyes, and looked around the bedroom. No sign of her anywhere, she thought grumpily. How am I supposed to sleep until noon all by myself?
She lay in bed a while longer, but couldn't get back to sleep. Resigning herself to a (relatively) early start, she rolled out of bed and took care of her morning routine. She found Bon Bon downstairs behind the small glass counter that showed off the variety of treats she had for sale. Her candy shop took up most of the first floor of their home.
"There you are!" Lyra exclaimed as she nearly tackled her marefriend to the floor. "Where have you been? You know I don't like waking up alone."
"I've been working," Bon Bon said patiently. "Which I'd like to get back to, actually. You're lucky that we don't have any customers at the moment."
"Darn right I am." Lyra kissed her, cutting off any further objections. She trotted into the kitchen and began making breakfast.
Bon Bon took a short break to eat with her and make plans for the day. Once they were finished and the dishes were cleaned, Lyra went for a walk around town. She brought her lyre along just in case she felt the urge to play. The weather was as bright and sunny as ever, even though the weather team was having trouble getting coordinated. Rainbow Dash was doing her best to keep her flyers organized, but there was just no helping some ponies.
Thunderlane was probably the worst offender. "No, no, no!" Dash admonished him as he frantically tried to straighten out his section of the sky. "Cumulus over here, stratus pieces over there. Get it together!"
There was a cool breeze blowing through the park that prevented the day from becoming too hot. It ruffled Lyra’s mane and played through her tail, teasing her like one of Bon Bon’s mandatory brushing sessions. She went for a quick gallop, letting the ground fall away beneath her as she made the most of the perfect weather.
When she finally got tired, she plopped down on her favorite bench and began to play her lyre. It helped relax her after the run, and she slowly caught her breath while clouds obscured the sun. There was a storm scheduled for tonight, if she remembered correctly.
The rain was still a few hours away, so there was no need to worry about it. Lyra leaned back in her seat, shut her eyes, and eventually drifted off to sleep. So far, the day was off to a perfect start.
*****
Wooden benches don't make for very comfortable beds. Lyra found this out the hard way when she woke up with a terrible crick in her neck and sore hips. Why did she bother sitting like this if it was so uncomfortable? She groaned and tried to get her bearings, unsure of how long she had been asleep.
It was probably around lunchtime, judging by both the crowded market and her own growling stomach. She thought about stopping at Sugarcube Corner on the way home, but decided against it. Bon Bon would have a fit if she thought her own marefriend was buying from the competition.
Lyra passed a few of her friends at the Apple family’s cart. Applejack usually sold the produce herself, but today she was busy helping Applebloom with another of the filly's harebrained schemes. Her brother had taken over in her stead. "Morning!" the unicorn called. Big Macintosh smiled and waved to her as he counted up the current customer's bits.
There was a mangy black goat standing in line. Something about it seemed to suck all the life out of the surrounding area, like a sudden cold spot in an otherwise warm room. It watched Lyra with unfeeling blue eyes, its rectangular pupils contracted in the sunlight.
She fought off a shiver and continued on her way. Bon Bon was still working the counter, and had just sold a heart-shaped box of chocolates to a brown earth pony with an hourglass cutie mark. He trotted away with a smile, brushing past Lyra at the door. "How's business?" she asked.
Bon Bon smiled warmly. "You're a waste of time."
Lyra nodded absently and headed toward the stairs. She paused halfway across the room, trying to process her marefriend's words. "What did you say?"
"I said 'business is fine'. What do you want for lunch? We've got a few things for sandwiches and some apples from that nice farmer pony."
Lyra rooted around in the kitchen until she found something to eat. Bon Bon joined her for a little while, but she had a shop to mind and couldn't be away from the counter for very long. They talked about music, and Lyra mentioned giving lessons again for some extra cash. The idea would have been more appealing if she didn't hate being around small foals.
"They cut her open." Bon Bon raised her eyebrows at Lyra's surprise. "The Cakes, I mean. They can't stay open. If they don't bring in more customers, they'll go out of business."
"Oh. Yeah, uh, I figured. That's a good thing, right? More business for you."
Bon Bon shook her head sadly. "They've got two foals and a mare that might as well be their daughter living in the loft. Even if it would help my business, it'd be terrible if they had to give up the bakery. They don’t have any other source of income, and they've worked so hard at it."
"I guess so," Lyra agreed, a little annoyed that Bon Bon was so sympathetic toward her rivals in the dessert business. She berated Lyra endlessly whenever the unicorn bought something from Sugarcube Corner, but insisted that she felt bad when they came on hard times. Lyra thought about crying hypocrisy, but that would probably ensure that she would be sleeping on the couch tonight.
The rest of the day passed as summer days often did. Lyra played her lyre, helped Bon Bon sell her sweets, and goofed off when nopony was looking. By the time the shop closed, she and Bon Bon were both ready to turn in.
Lyra cleaned up the kitchen while Bon Bon showered. After taking her turn, they snuggled against each other in bed and drifted off to sleep.
*****
Lyra woke in the middle of the night without anypony lying next to her. She rubbed her eyes and rolled over, wondering what had disturbed her.
Bon Bon was standing at the window, a frown souring her pretty face. "Bonny?" Lyra mumbled sleepily. "What's wrong? Come back to bed."
"You already know the answer to that," Bon Bon sighed. "You're going to ruin me, Lyra. This is your lonely, lonely life and you've got no right to trap me in it."
"What in the hay are you talking about?" Lyra asked. She rolled out of bed and put her foreleg around Bon Bon's shoulders. The earth pony didn't respond at all, neither pushing her away nor leaning into her. "You shouldn't say stuff like that. Whatever's bothering you, we can talk about it. We'll... what is that?" Something outside drew her attention, and she realized that Bon Bon was staring at it as well.
The goat was watching her. It stood in the middle of the road, so black that it seemed to cast a shadow on the darkness surrounding it. Its vibrant eyes were the only things that stood out in the gloom. Even with the wind and rain swirling around it, the creature never blinked.
"I'll hate you," Bon Bon whispered spitefully. " You know that, don't you? You're just going to drag me down until I'm as miserable as you. One day I'll think of the life I could have had and I'll realize that I was always better off without you."
"Why would you say that?" Lyra asked. Tears blurred her vision as a lump formed in her throat. "Bonny, I love you! I-I'd do anything to make you happy!"
Bon Bon's anger suddenly disappeared. The change registered too fast, like a jump from one scene to another in a poorly edited movie. "Don't look at it," she warned in a very different voice than she had been using a moment before. "Once you've seen it, you can never forget. I wouldn't wish that on anyone."
Lyra tore herself away from the goat's hypnotizing eyes. She couldn't remember when she had gone back to watching it. "What's going on, Bon Bon? What is that thing? Why are you acting like this?"
Bon Bon rubbed her eyes, and for a moment they glowed green. "It's what I brought back with me from Reaver territory. There are some things that we aren't meant to see, Lyra. We're so small, and they are all so very large."
The goat was gone when she looked again, and Lyra clenched her eyes shut. "I'm just dreaming," she said. "In a minute I'll wake up next to you and promise myself that I won't eat sweets before bed anymore."
Cold, bitter laughter filled the room. "Keep telling yourself that. It just makes my job easier." Her fangs glinted in the twilight as she smiled. "Go back to sleep, Captain. Go back to dreaming about a happy ending that you know you don’t deserve and a mare that you know you'll never have."
"No!" Lyra shouted as she stomped across the bedroom. "You shouldn't talk like that! I'm not listening! I-I won't listen! Wo shang mei er, mei xin, bian shi tou!" The awful lie of her cozy life began to sink in, and it brought her to tears. She wanted to go back to sleep, to wake up in the morning and forget all about this awful dream. Some small part of her knew that would never happen, and she cried at her inability to ignore it. "I'm happy here!" she whimpered. "I just want to be happy!"
"You will be," Bon Bon said. She went back to staring out the window, a melancholic sigh on her lips. "Ponies like you fight it on a subconscious level. You’re so used to misery that it doesn't feel right when you finally have what you want. It isn't easy to work around that." She rambled on, not noticing that Lyra had stopped crying. "Captain?" she asked, her ear twitching at the angry growls behind her. The smell of rot made her wrinkle her nose. "Are you paying attention?"
Lightning illuminated the room as Bon Bon turned around. Her eyes widened at the mass of ragged flesh and sharp teeth that lunged for her, snapping hungrily at her neck. She screamed as the Reaver crashed into her, throwing both of them through the window. Lyra's enraged howl drowned out the sound of shattering glass as they plummeted into the storm.
*****
The sunlight was blinding. The glass cut into her flesh. The wind whistled by, blowing shards from her mane and bringing tears to her eyes. Through it all, Lyra could only see the changeling in front of her. Her hooves had closed around Chitur’s neck, and she felt chitin cracking beneath them as her grip tightened.
They landed in the back of a wagon filled with lumber. Lyra ground her teeth in pain as something in her shoulder gave out with a quiet pop. “Chur ni-duh!" she screamed. She grabbed Chitur's horn and yanked her head back until the vertebrae ground against one another. “You want to make me happy? Then you can die!”
A storm of dust and wood splinters kicked up around them as Sereneighty flew overhead. Lyra smashed the changeling’s head into the boards beneath them over and over again, shouting obscenities and shutting her eyes to keep splinters out of them.
For the first time in what seemed like an eternity, she hadn't felt the familiar sense of inadequacy eating away at her. She hadn't felt like damaged goods or a lost cause. She had been loved unconditionally, and had returned that love in equal measure. For the first time in nearly a decade, she had been truly happy. It was one thing to long for such a life, but to have it dangled in front of her and then cruelly snatched away was more than she could bear.
By the time her legs gave out, the wagon was coated with green ooze and flecks of chitin. Chitur's face had been brutally caved in, and luminous blood dribbled through the floorboards onto the dry dirt. It took everything she had not to pass out right then and there on top of the broken body.
The best she could do, unfortunately, was to lean in the other direction. It was a short fall out of the wagon and onto the unforgiving ground. She coughed in the dust that swirled around her, exhausted and hurt in ways that weren't purely physical. A growing feeling of dizziness made her wonder how much blood she had lost, but she thought that it couldn't be anything serious. After all, hers hadn't been the first body through the window.
Something moved in the wagon above her. Like a corpse rising from its grave, Chitur rolled onto the ground next to her and barely managed to stay on her hooves. Her broken legs were quickly mending, and the deep cracks in her chest were being stitched up by glowing sparks of green magic. Her face had already been restored, although she was still missing some teeth. "I admit it," she said. "I'm impressed. If you'd tried that a few weeks ago, I would have been done for."
Lyra groaned and tried to roll over. "You're too late, Captain," Chitur said as she stomped on her injured shoulder. The pain was blinding, and her scream quickly became a breathless sob. "I've been eating well, and I'm overflowing with magic! A lowly thug like you couldn't possibly hope to threaten me. I could even take on the Ironbringer herself if she weren't already trapped in one of our pods!" A strange, oscillating whistle made her cock her head to the side. “Do you hear that?”
Mjolna’s hammer struck the changeling just behind her withers, shattering her spine and breaking apart the tough plates on her back to reveal the sensitive tissue underneath. Chitur collapsed with an agonized scream as her hind legs went limp. Green flames flared along the edges of the wound, and continued to smolder after the initial brush with cold iron.
Lyra saw the Ironbringer watching them from the upstairs window. She must have lost consciousness, because when she looked again the earth pony was standing next to her. “You look awful,” she grunted.
Mjolna gave herself a once-over. She was covered in green slime, and had torn open a few of the doctor’s stitches. “You do not look so good yourself,” she said with a trace of amusement. She grabbed her hammer and casually slung it over her back. “What made you think that going through the window was a good idea?”
Despite the pain and weakness keeping her down, Lyra smiled. “Seemed like the thing to do. Where’ve you been?”
“In the basement,” Mjolna said. “I was taken by surprise. Very embarrassing.” She looked over at Chitur, who was desperately trying to crawl away using only her front legs. Her back was slowly knitting back together, but it wasn't healing fast enough to do her any good. “Excuse me, Captain. Duty calls.”
"Jian huo!" Chitur shrieked as Mjolna stood over her. "Do it, you bitch! Just—"
A sickening crunch filled the air, and Lyra let out a breath that she hadn't realized she was holding. She rolled onto her stomach, determined to get her hooves underneath her. “You’re badly hurt,” Mjolna warned. “You shouldn't move.”
“I’ll be hurt later,” Lyra said. Standing up was so painful that it almost made her reconsider. She shifted onto three legs, shaking with the effort of supporting her own weight. “Get the body so we can go greet our guests.” Mjolna shrugged and grabbed one of Chitur’s legs in her teeth, an unsettling grin on her face as she followed the unicorn.
The posse had hunkered down just outside of rifle range while it tried to decide what to do next. There was a lot of arguing, but it died down as the unlikely pair approached. Lyra heard several startled gasps, along with plenty of swearing. She looked down at herself and was surprised to see a steady trickle of blood flowing down her legs. The trip though the window much have cut her much worse than she'd thought.
The only thing she could come up with to fix it was a rudimentary coagulation spell. Lyra wasn't a powerful unicorn, but she had picked up a few very basic spells over the years that sometimes came in handy. This one wouldn't be enough to save her on its own, but it might keep her from bleeding to death until she could get some real help.
“This here’s the killer you're after!” she said as Mjolna dumped the body in front of them. Everypony except Boxxy Brown took a startled step back. “You can all go home.”
"What happened to her head?" somepony whispered.
Lyra leaned over and spat out a glob of blood, causing a small stream to flow from her nose. This is just stupid, she thought grumpily. Is there any part of me that isn't bleeding? “What do you think? Look, as much as I like standing around in the hot desert sun, I'm running a little low on blood and patience right now. Are we done here?"
Boxxy Brown stepped forward to loom over the exhausted unicorn. “It’s a trick!” he warned. “You all know what changelings are like, and more’n half of the whores in that house are bugs in disguise! If we stop now, it won’t be long until somepony else winds up dead. Is that what you want?”
“He’s right!” shouted a mare directly behind the pegasus. “Burn the nest! It’s the only way to be sure.”
"This doesn't have to turn into a bloodbath," Lyra warned.
"It won't," Boxxy said. He hefted a shotgun, holding it casually over his shoulder."You’re bleedin’ to death right in front of us. We've got more guns than you, and way more bodies to use 'em. What do you have?"
Sereneighty roared overhead, the heat from her engines causing everypony's eyes to water. The tank on her belly opened to dump several hundred gallons of burning fuel between the mob and the cathouse. The flames surged across the ground, leaping high into the air and causing the crowd to backpedal frantically. "Desperation,” Lyra answered calmly. “It can drive a pony to do just about anything.”
She pressed the barrel of her revolver into Boxxy’s neck, making sure that the rest of the crowd could see it. “Don’t test me, friend. There are some good ponies in that house, and a little filly that hasn’t seen her real mother in weeks. They’re dear to me, and you ain't.”
“This isn't over,” Boxxy warned. “They don’t have the money to keep you on permanently. You won’t be here forever.”
Mjolna cleared her throat politely and pointed to the road leading into town. “She doesn't need to be."
Boxxy Brown's shotgun clattered to the ground, his jaw hanging slack with horror at the sight of a brown earth pony trotting up to greet them. The town's sheriff walked next to his deputy, looking perfectly healthy and incredibly annoyed. “I’d listen to the mare, boyo,” Caramel said. “She’s made ready to blow your brains all over half of our fair town. Best to live and let live.”
“I don't believe it,” Boxxy said. “I-I shot you! I shot you through the heart! We all saw you die!”
“Is that so?” Caramel asked. His deputy bared her teeth and growled like an animal, her eyes never leaving the frightened pegasus. “Screwy, what would ya call a pony that claims he killed an officer of the law?”
Screw Loose spoke in a low, guttural voice that sounded like it hadn't been used in months. “Under arrest.”
The sheriff tossed Boxxy a pair of hoofcuffs, handling the iron without the slightest bit of discomfort. “That sounds right enough. Would ya kindly put those on? Oh, and ya might not want to make any sudden moves. That Purplecoat looks like she'd consider shootin' ya anyway, just for closure's sake.”
Lyra glanced at her revolver and, for just a moment, was quite tempted. "Nah," she sighed regretfully. "Wouldn't want to give you sun-lovers the satisfaction."
*****
While Tick Tock tried to make sure Lyra wouldn't bleed to death, Doctor Stable examined Berry Punch. The poor mare had been rescued from a terrible fate, and somepony had to make sure that Chitur hadn't done any lasting damage to her.
Once he had given her a good once-over, Stable met Mjolna in the kitchen. She was still up and about despite his insistence that she get some sleep. “Too many changelings around,” she admitted. “They make me nervous.”
Since neither of them had gotten to finish their morning coffee, they decided to enjoy a cup in the lull following a near-death experience. “It isn't that I'm not happy you're alright,” Stable said after a while. “I just wish you’d be more careful, Mjolna. You and Caramel take too many risks.”
“I’ve survived worse,” Mjolna said dismissively.
Stable almost touched her shoulder, but he knew how she would react. He made do with putting his hoof down firmly on the table. “That's no excuse for being reckless! You've been through a lot today, and your body needs time to recover. Promise me that you’ll let yourself rest before pushing yourself this hard again.”
“No promises,” she said. The doctor slumped in his seat, disappointed but sadly not surprised. “But… I will try,” she added reluctantly.
Her friend smiled, his eyes twinkling green. “Good. I’m going to check on Berry again. She might have woken up by now.” He trotted away from the table and almost bumped into a massive red stallion dressed like a Shepherd. The magic levitating his coffee cup winked out, and the mug fell to the floor.
“What’s the matter?” Mjolna asked. Her friend took a step backward, then another, and continued until he bumped into the table.
Shepherd Mac watched the exchange pensively, waiting to see if any trouble would come of it. The boards balanced on his back teetered precariously. “I want to go home now,” Stable whispered, suddenly terrified out of his mind. His hooves trembled as tears began to form in his eyes. "Can we go home, please? Please, Mjolna?”
She stood next to him, as close as she could get without worrying about being touched. “Who is that?” she asked. “Doctor, what’s wrong? Answer me!”
The would-be preacher backed away, his shoulders hunched in despair. It was only after he was gone that the doctor could regain his composure. “I'm sorry,” Stable whispered. Picking up the pieces of his coffee mug provided a useful distraction while he tried to steady his hooves and calm his pounding heart. “I thought he was dead."
"Who, Stable? Who was that?"
Doctor stable cleared his throat and tried to dry his eyes. "That was the pony I told you about. He's the one we're all afraid of. That... that was the God-killer.”