//------------------------------// // For What Darker Purpose #3 // Story: The Black Cloak Files // by kudzuhaiku //------------------------------// This was a miserable place. No, this was the place where misery came to die when it was too miserable to keep existing. Bucky hated this place. The sun had gone down but it was still over one hundred degrees outside. The humidity remained at one hundred percent. The only thing that had changed with the sun going down was the number of blood sucking parasites in the air. The night was swarming with blood sucking insects. Reaching out with his telekinesis, Bucky crushed them, smooshed them, smashed them, he zapped them with a shock spell, but the blood sucking horde would not be assuaged. The air was now filled with the scent of swampy decay, sweaty pony, and fried blood sucking bugs. Reaching a point of irascible fury that was said to be one of his defining characteristics, Bucky transmogrified himself into an axe beaked griffon and then flew off into the night to wage war against the blood sucking menace. Sunset Shimmer watched him go, sipping a glass of iced tea. As she sat there, sweating, soaked, and drinking sweetened ice tea with lemon, she heard Hibiscus, who was sitting beside her, say, “He seems like the irritable sort.” Nodding, Sunset replied, “You have no idea.” Sunset, who noticed that Hibiscus seemed quite relaxed now, focused her attention on the old matron. “I bet this town has a lot of history. You strike me as being one of the lorekeepers of your community.” Sunset’s ears perked as Hibiscus took a deep breath and she waited, hoping that Hibiscus would start talking, perhaps revealing a few details that might be useful. In the distance, there was a thrum of magic, Sunset could feel it, it made her bones vibrate and her teeth hummed in her jaw. The night filled with brilliant flames as a pygmy dragon breathed out a gout of flame and an angry roar filled her ears. Sunset found herself smiling—Bucky could change forms the same way that Rarity could change dresses, typically at a moment’s notice and with devastating effect. “It could be said that in some ways, I am this town,” Hibiscus said in a low voice. “Blackwater and his family going back for all those generations, they had everything in life handed to them because they were unicorns. They had magic. They never had to work hard a day in their life. They never went swaybacked having to pull wagons or carts or sledges through the muck of the swamp. Just a flash of their horns and their work was done for them. They lived up there in that big white mansion up at the top of the hill and they lorded themselves over the rest of us… looked down their noses at us. They never had to get dirty like the rest of us.” Silent, Sunset said nothing and waited for more words to come spilling out. “My family, we worked hard. We broke our backs and we worked harder than anypony else. We had to fight to get what few scraps we had… and after so much hard work, we had ourselves a little bit of luck. Our hard work paid off. After all that sweating, all of that misery, after all of that pain and suffering, we pulled ourselves up out of the muck and we moved a little higher up the hill. It wasn’t much, but we kept moving upwards until we reached the point where we are now… only now, there is nothing. The town is dying and all of our hard work has been for naught.” The old mare let out a bitter laugh and Sunset felt a twinge of pity for her. “Now I don’t know what to do. We have nothing left… just the house and everything in it. We can’t even sell the house… nopony wants to buy it. Everything we have is worthless.” Sunset, who bit down upon her lip and chewed it, wanted to say a few things, but remained silent. She wanted to say, It seems to me that it is time to go off and work hard someplace else and reestablish yourselves. But she didn’t. She wanted to say, For all of your talk about hard work, you strike me as a mare that hasn’t worked a hard day in your life, but you clearly expect it from others. But Sunset Shimmer held her tongue. Bucky was the irrational one and as such, she was expected to be the patient and wise one. Lifting her iced tea, Sunset Shimmer took a long drink, her ice cubes clinking. As she swallowed, the unicorn maid burst out onto the porch and rushed to Hibiscus’ side. Sunset watched without looking as though she was watching, and her sensitive ears heard the maid whisper, “Zoysia has disappeared again, he can’t be found anywhere.” Hibiscus rose, getting out of her chair, and she looked at Sunset Shimmer. “You must excuse me, but an important matter has been brought to my attention. I must go and look after something, I do hope you will forgive me for being a poor host.” Before Sunset could even reply, Hibiscus was gone, hurrying off, and she had gone through the back door, the maid on her heels. Sunset Shimmer took another drink of iced tea and watched as Bucky continued to wage war against the winged horrors of the swamp. “Having much in the way of luck?” Bucky asked. He looked at Mask and Fever Cure. Both were sweaty, covered in muck, and looked exhausted. Both appeared to have been crawling around through the swamp. It was past midnight now, and the temperature still had not dropped below one hundred degrees. The sound of frogs and insects created an almost deafening cacophony all around them. “If I may offer my professional opinion,” Mask muttered. “Oh, please do,” Bucky insisted while making an impatient gesture with his talons. “I’d rather be in Tartarus. This place sucks.” Mask scowled, looked at his companion, and then back at Bucky. “Giant leeches, giant crawfish that can snip a pony in half with their claws, and don’t even get me started on the blood sucking bugs.” As Mask was speaking, Bucky’s makeshift bug zapper blasted another sparrow sized mosquito, causing the dark of the night to light up with a bright blue flash. “Everything here is magical,” Fever Cure said to Bucky. “We don’t know if it is necromantic though, that’s the problem. We’ve been using the orb of undead compulsion, but there seems to be no zombies. There is so much magical background radiation in this place that we can’t tell what’s what. I don’t even know where to begin after seeing some of the birth defects and congenital deformities I’ve seen around here. It could be necromancy, it might be a curse, but trying to find a specific cause strikes me as being almost impossible. The magic here is harmful, hostile, and the local wildlife has become quite fearsome.” “This is the perfect place to summon demons.” Mask’s eyes narrowed as he looked at Bucky. “With this much magical background radiation, the residual dark magic or necromantic energies from such an act would be nigh undetectable. Necromantic curses, raising the dead, a pony could get away with those kinds of things here… it is a whisper in a room full of shouts.” “Hmm.” Bucky’s face wrinkled as he began to think about the problem. “Bucky, there are animated piles of trash and muck and sticks that will attack you in the swamp… something has gone wrong here… I’ve never seen anything like it,” Fever Cure said to Bucky, his ears pitching forwards as he spoke. “Those… whatever they are… they float on the surface of the water looking like so much trash in the water and then they attack you when you get too close. This place is a nightmare come to life.” “The two of you look like you both could use some rest. Go inside, get cleaned up, get cooled off, and take a load off. I’m going to go have a look around.” Bucky, frowning, was not very happy about slogging through the swamp in the middle of the night. Mask nodded. “Good luck, Bucky… watch out for the giant flesh eating dragonflies.” “Wait… what?” The hill was steep, but the switchbacks that made up the path were manageable. Ruts lined the path, a wagon had been pulled up and down this hill many, many times. Sunset Shimmer climbed the hill, her breathing heavy, she was already panting in the hot, humid, early morning air. There wasn’t much of a view from up here, only trees, swamp, and the dilapidated town down below. A foul miasma hung in the air, the stench of burning and smoke. At some point during the night, something had caught fire out in the swamp, it was still burning, a column of smoke could be seen rising up above the stunted, twisted trees. Above her, the once white mansion loomed over the town. It was huge, tall, a plantation style mansion that had somehow been built on top of a hill out in the middle of the swamp. The white marble foundation it sat upon appeared to be in good shape, but the rest of the mansion had seen better days. The roof was sagging, the white paint was flaking off, revealing grey, somewhat rotten wood. Along the top floor, the windows all appeared to be boarded over. Seeing as how the roof sagged, Sunset guessed that the top floor probably got soaked every time it rained. The closer she got, the worse off the house appeared to be. One of the front columns was crooked and the balcony above the front door was askew. The house appeared to be in danger of falling over. Panting, sweating, soaked, Sunset Shimmer stood on the porch, her sides heaving, wondering why she hadn’t just transmuted herself into another form and flown up here. This was a miserable place—she worried that the heat was melting her brain into mush and making her stupid. The front door opened and an older pony came out, a unicorn stallion. He looked a bit unkempt, his mane was long and a bit disheveled. His pelt was a faded silver colour and his mane was a muted shade of dull green. He wore glasses with silver frames and darkened lenses, which blocked his eyes from view. Sunset noticed his cutie mark, which was a chess piece, a rook. His knees were getting knobby and his neck was crooked. “Mister Blackwater?” Sunset asked. “I am he,” the stallion replied. Before Sunset could say anything else, the stallion continued. “I know why you are here. I will help you in any way I can… I will cooperate with you completely… I just ask that you help me and I will give you anything you want.” “And what is it that you want?” Sunset looked at the old pony. He sounded awful, sorrowful, she felt a growing sense of pity for him and she guarded her heart, a little voice in the back of her mind reminding her that this could be a clever ruse. “I want my daughter back… she’s gone missing… and Hibiscus had something to do with it!” Blackwater replied. “Can you tell me why you think Hibiscus had something to do with it?” As Sunset spoke, she saw the rage boiling up in the old stallion’s face. He was turning an apoplectic shade of purple and his ears twitched in a fitful manner. “That rotten grandson of hers was trying to take advantage of my daughter, Brook! When I confronted Hibiscus about it, she flew off the handle and into a fit of rage… there’s witnesses… about half the town saw her screaming at her colt… and heard her too.” Blackwater fell silent and stared at Sunset through his darkened lenses. “Not long after, Brook vanished… she just up and disappeared. This happened right after Hibiscus swore that she would make that rotten grandson of hers sorry for what he did, shaming their family the way he did.” Sighing, Sunset Shimmer began to realise she was opening a can of worms. “Sir, do you have any proof that Hibiscus did this? I mean, what reason would she have to make your daughter disappear?” Sunset wanted to ask how a stallion Blackwater’s age had a daughter that was the right age for Hibiscus’ grandson, but Sunset realised that some stallions remained spry well into their elderly years. “My guess is she’s done traded my daughter off to whatever demon her family had summoned to cause all this trouble. A whole lot of ponies have gone missing over the years. When those investigators came to look into her dealings with the Bitters family, both of them got gone… vanished without a trace they did. Another batch of investigators came out to speak with Hibiscus… both of them got real sick… bloody noses, breathing problems, stomach problems, they both left and I don’t know what happened after that.” Lips pressing in a tight, straight line, Sunset Shimmer considered Blackwater’s words. Something was going on here, that much was for certain. “Please… find her… find out what happened to her… I love her more than anything… I… I… I’ll even confess to everything that is going on if you can find out what happened to her, even if she’s dead… I’ll do anything… I’m so sick with worry… I miss her so.” “Look, Mister Blackwater, confessing to a crime you didn’t do isn’t necessary. It is my job to find out what is going on here… I give you my word, I will do everything in my power to find out what has happened to your daughter.” Sunset Shimmer took a deep breath, held it, and then let it out in a slow exhale. “Now, Mister Blackwater, what can you tell me about what has been going on around here? The more you can tell me, the more I will be able to help you…”