Blacklight: Dead Man Walking

by The Salesman

Meetings and Flashlights

Celestia glared at the mountain of paper in front of her. The incident reports from both the military and civilian sections of the government disrupted by the invasion had come in earlier and it was truly an unholy amount of paperwork. Knowing that she would have to get through all of this before she could even think about taking a break, she sighed. Looking to the clock and then towards the exit of the office longingly, she figured that she would not be getting out of this place until at least six in the evening.

She was just glad that there were few seriously hurt or killed, aside from those poor souls that ran into Queen Chrysalis herself. Sending out the letters to the families of the deceased was always a horrible thing to have to do.

The Solar Diarch paused in her work as she heard a knocking on the door. “Come in,” she called. Who it could be?

“Acknowledged,” a strange voice from the other side responded before the door swung open, revealing Deadman. The human stepped inside before swinging the door shut behind him, sealing the room once more. “You wanted to speak with me, your majesty?” he questioned.

And the source of the majority of the paperwork decided to show himself. Everything that he did yesterday just created more and more reports to go through. Assault, inciting mass panic, foalnapping of royalty, the fact that he and her sister was in a nightclub in the first place, evading arrest, acting as a foreign military force on Equestrian soil, damage to the dungeons, and even more issues she cared not to list really added on to her workload.

“Yes, and first of all I would like to personally thank you for your assistance. Without your help, the invasion could have turned out far worse than this,” Celestia said and gave him a smile. As nasty as all the paperwork was, she was most certainly glad that he stepped in and stopped more ponies from being injured.

“It was my pleasure, your majesty,” he said, a green image of a smiling face briefly appearing in the air in front of his helmet before disappearing again.

“However,” she said, her tone suddenly becoming a bit more scolding “I need an explanation as to why you hit a pony in the nightclub, who is now in the hospital mind you, before running out into the night with my sister over your shoulder.”

Deadman did not seem to externally react at all to that, and stated “They hit me first and I hit back. I did not know whether it was the start of an attack by a group of hostiles, and as such I evacuated Princess Luna to a safe location.”

She sighed and asked “Did you really think that a lone, probably drunk pegasi taking a swing at you was indicative of a greater threat?”

“Yes,” Deadman simply responded, although she was certain that there was more than that behind it. Last night he didn’t even care

“In normal circumstances I would ask you very nicely to go hospital and apologize in person followed by paying for the medical bills. However, with your recent service I wish to let it pass, although I would recommend that you write a formal letter of apology,” she said. That was actually only part of the reason that she didn’t want him anywhere near the hospital. It would be most decidedly not be good for anypony’s recovery were they to see the world’s least subtle armoured giant stomping his way down the hall. Besides, if she knew the tabloids, they would end up crying out about how he came to finish the job or intimidate the pony into silence were he to do that.

“I believe that I will do so, your majesty, but I believe that I will need a small amount of assistance,” Deadman stated as he continued to stand completely still.

“Oh, with what?” she questioned. Celestia couldn’t particularly picture him as the type to ask for help.

“To put it quite simply, your written language and mine are not the same, despite the shared spoken language,” he stated without a hint of anything resembling emotion.

“What?” Celestia mouthed “How does that even work?”

Deadman sighed “If I knew I would tell you. I’m blaming magic, considering that the odds of it happening on its own is very small. Hell, it is even more unlikely than both of us somehow speaking the same language in the first place.”

“Regardless of how it works, we have to teach you our written language if you are to function in Equestrian society at all,” she explained. Celestia had never heard of such an event happening before. What were the chances that they spoke the same language but did not share the same written one? Granted, she didn’t hear of a creature from another world appearing here without the magical mirror before either, yet here they were.

“I imagine. What is the earliest date at which a teacher could be brought in?” he questioned.

Celestia thought it over with a hmm before she answered “I think that a teacher may not be the best bet for this. A linguist would probably be a better fit in this rather… unique situation. I think that during some time over the next few days somepony could be hired.” She made a mental note to add that onto her already large workload.

Nodding in acknowledgement, he then requested “Do you think that there would be any chance that you would be able to tell me what you have planned with Queen Chrysalis?”

She paused for a moment as she expected that she was going to be the one who broached this subject. Perhaps she could get him helping her with what she had planned. The Solar Princess decided that a bit of prodding towards his protective instincts was in order. “Our plans are currently to hire a psychologist in order to put her through therapy and figure out why she attacked us as well as-” she began.

“I’m sorry, your majesty, but that is just beyond a bad idea,” Deadman cut in.

“Mind telling me why?” Celestia questioned, taken aback at being interrupted. She couldn’t remember the last time anypony did so on purpose.

He took a moment to compose himself before arguing “First of all, she has magical mind control abilities if the little conversation I had with her before the fight indicates anything. Queen Chrysalis tried to do so on me and failed, but she seemed experienced with it. If there was ever an issue with that magic-restraining horn-harness she could just control someone in the room and use them to cut her out. Second, she is quite physically capable. An issue with one of the other restraints could easily result in a complete containment breach even with guards there. Third, she has to be a skilled manipulator, which could make her a threat even while disabled. After all, Princess Cadance said that she could shapeshift into another, and implied that she has done so in the past. Unless she mind controls everyone who knows those who she imitates, she must be fairly good at emotional manipulation even without her magic.”

She frowned and did her best to look like she was considering his argument, even though she was grinning like a madmare internally. He reacted just as she expected. “You raise a very good point, Deadman,” she replied “Indeed, you are the only one that we know of who is either immune or very resistant to her skills. Would you be willing to help monitor her when she is taken out of her cell?”

Deadman appeared to be deep in thought for a moment before saying “That would work, I believe. Just let me know when you need me.”

Celestia smiled and said “I’ll be sure to do so.” It was wonderful that she was able to get him on board so easily.

“Mind if I go now?” he asked, tilting his head slightly to the right.

“No, not at all. I’ll be sure to talk to you later,” she answered. For now at least, their business was done.

He nodded and slipped back towards the door and exited, closing the door silently behind him.

Privately, she wondered what he did with his spare time.

Deadman dug through the shelves of the maintenance closet, looking for anything that resembled a light bulb. Earlier this morning, he had noticed that the lights in the roof of his room were neither candles nor electrical in nature. Of course, he couldn’t pull apart the chandelier in his room to satisfy his inquisitiveness without major consequences.

However, he couldn’t imagine anyone would know or care that something from here got ‘lost’. It was then that he spotted it.

Towards the back of the shelve that he was searching looked to be a flashlight, albeit with a very large button to make it more usable with hooves.

Flashing his HRV to make sure that nobody was coming, he pocketed the flashlight and slipped out of the closet. With haste, he made his way back to his room and slipped in.

Immediately, he locked the door and moved over to the dresser, which would be his workbench for this operation.

Flashing his HRV, he made sure that nothing that looked too important was close to the surface of the device before he drew his tomahawk and ever so carefully cut into the device, the plastic-like material giving away easily under the stress. Making one long incision from right below the bulb to the base of the handle, he noted how similar it was to Earth plastic, even in how it was cut.

Using the axe again, he continued from the end of his cut to the left, and then back up to the top and turning right, cutting a square section completely off from the rest of the light. He removed the section and placed it off to the side.

The inside was almost disappointingly simplistic. There was a large, eight sided crystal prism which took up most of the handle connected to the light by two rubber coated wires, both of which were soldered to the opposite ends of the crystal in the handle. In addition, a third wire connected the crystal to the very base of the handle. He assumed that, logically, this was the ‘battery’ of the device. The large button itself looked to be a fairly simple push button toggle switch which broke the circuit by cutting off the connection between the crystal and the light through the wire merged into the top of the crystal.

“Reveal to me your secrets, light,” he muttered to himself as he sliced away more of the casing.

It didn’t take a genius for him to figure out that the battery for it was charged through the wire connected to the bottom, somehow. He guessed that the battery was magic based and that one could ‘feed’ power to it through the base and that wire. Deadman hmmed, figuring that it would probably have a sufficiently large battery life despite the fact that it probably required a unicorn to charge it. After all, they designed the button to be large enough to use with hooves, something that the unicorns wouldn’t need.

Carefully, he examined the ‘bulb’ of the device. Unlike bulbs back home, there was, surprise surprise, another crystal in the center, although the shiny surface coating the rest of the bulb interior was roughly the same.

Interestingly enough, the bulb didn’t appear like it was meant to be removed, it was built in. However, the glass lens that was sealing away the light was able to be removed rather easily. Perhaps this indicated that maintenance was an issue with the presumably light emitting crystal.

Deadman believed that it was time to test if the device was still functional. Withdrawing his tools from its structure, he depressed the button, toggling the disassembled flashlight on.

The light slowly came on, starting to glow red before transitioning into yellow, and being fairly comparable to an incandescent light from back home. The battery showed no physical change, which he did not expect. He thought it would start glowing a bit too.

It was then he heard the creak of his balcony door, which he had unbarricaded that morning, as it opened. Now that he thought about it, he probably should have left it barricaded. Glancing back over his shoulder, he attempted to ascertain the identity of the intruder.

To his surprise, Princess Luna was standing there in the doorway to the balcony. “Greetings, Deadman!” she spoke at a rather high volume. He prayed that she would not have an issue with the destroyed flashlight.

“Oh, hello Princess,” Deadman said, grimacing internally.

“How do you do on this fine night?” Luna queried, smiling as she walked into the room.

Deadman tilted his head before asking “Night?” and looking out the window. Indeed, the sun appeared to have just begun. “I suppose it is, and I am well, I suppose,” he stated.

“You did not know that the moon rose? What could you have possibly be doing that absorbed your…” she started, but trailed off as her eyes focused on the mess beside him. She sighed and shook her head “Why is there an active hand-held light cut apart on your dresser?”

Deadman shuffled on his feet uncomfortably before reaching over and depressing the button once more, turning the light off. “This isn’t what it looks like” he said on reflex.

Luna’s glare was rather unamused as she stood there waiting for the real answer.

Looking away, he admitted “Alright, Alright. I couldn’t figure out how the light bulbs here work without electricity, so I found something to take apart,”

She raised her brow inquisitively. “And that is why you found a flashlight to bring back to your room and cut apart?” she inquired.

He shuffled his feet once more as he looked for a way out. “Yes,” he confirmed.

“And you never thought to simply ask?” she prodded.

“Nope,” he confirmed again, once again missing the most obvious route of action.

Her expression softened as she came over to his side and looked down on it before saying “Did you at least figure out how it works?”

Blinking, he glanced over to her. He was okay with this outcome. “I think that I have the general idea, even if I don’t have the exact details. There are devices similar back home,” he explained.

Luna nodded, continuing to focus intensely on the pieces on the dresser. They both stood there for a while before she asked “Perhaps if you helped me out with something I would forget about the fact you dragged crown property up to your room to cut it apart.”

He sighed “Your majesty, are you really attempting to blackmail me?”

“It was an attempt at humour, Deadman. Besides, its something I think that you’ll enjoy,” she said. He didn’t think it was particularly funny and while he was most certainly interested, he was also a bit worried. What could one of the rulers of the country possibly want his help with?

“Mind telling me what exactly you want without being vague, your majesty?” he asked, too late realizing that perhaps he could have used a bit of tact there.

“To put it quite simply, most of the ponies around here could use a good scare and as the Princess of the Night, I am the pony most suited for the task. However, I could most certainly use some help, if you happen to be interested that is,” she explained.

Turning to her, he replied “Is fire hot?” Although she could not see the smile hiding under his helmet, it was most definitely there.

The Princess chuckled at his small joke before saying “I will need your… HRV for this as well as the remnants of the flashlight.” Deadman tried to figure out what she was going with this.

“You have my cooperation in this matter,” he said.

Nodding, her horn glowed as she lifted up the materials from the flashlight. She separated the light-crystal from the rest of the items and levitated it up to the ceiling lights. It glowed more intensely while it was up there, its colour changing to blue, before coming back down. Luna then placed it back into its original slot and fit the glass lens back into place. “There, it should now be able to control any of the castle lights it is pointed at,” she stated with pride.

“Is your plan to turn lights off on ponies through walls?” Deadman asked, sighing.

“Yes, why?” Luna replied “What is wrong with my scheme? It shall most certainly make them think that they are being plagued by the spirit of a trickster from beyond the grave!”

“Listen, your majesty, it is a bit… light on the trickery. It could just be a faulty wire or something like that. It won’t scare anyone.”

“And what do you suggest if you are so skilled at pranks and the like?” she asked, huffing a bit.

“Well, remember when I told you that one of my eyes is artificial?” he queried.

“Indeed I do, what of it?” she raised her brow again as she asked, obviously wondering where he was going with this.

“First, that eye comes out. Second, we are going to need some cream,” he chuckled deviously.

Deadman stood across from Princess Luna with his helmet off, pretending to be holding up his tomahawk for her to examine. The truth was that they were waiting for the guard who was heading towards their position right now. He was very surprised that she went along with his plan. His impression of ponies was that most of them were emotionally soft, squeamish beings. Luna, however, was cut from a different cloth, it seemed, if she agreed to go with this. Hell, she even had some ideas of her own to make it all the better.

The remote was resting beside one of Luna’s hooves, ready to step on it and trigger it at as soon as the time came.

Indeed, all that they had to do was wait for the guard who was doing her rounds to come around and pass right by the light-switch over there. They were positioned perfectly in the moderately narrow hall for this prank. Deadman’s back was to the direction from which the guard was approaching, and they were just the right distance from the wall that the guard had no choice but to walk through on the side with the switch.

As soon as he heard the guard come around the corner behind him, he started talking with Luna, who was only pretending to be listening. Instead, she was carefully watching the guard’s progress out of the corner of her eye, as per the plan. He could not do so himself, however, as his right eye was currently unlinked to the rest of his body. Shortly after they got here, he used the fact that his armour was hooked into his augmentations to decouple the artificial eye’s connection to the socket. While it was annoying being half blind, he could manage.

“And now, about the handle of my tomahawk. The grip is designed to be beneficial for both swinging and throwing,” he said, faking conversation.

With the sound of the guard’s hooves slowly approaching the designated position, Luna tapped her hoof on the floor twice, signaling that it was time.

Her hoof drifted over to the right, and she gently prodded the button of remote, the lights flicking off.

“Gah!” he yelled as he rapidly retrieved the packages of cream from his pocket and impaled them on the pick-like end of the ultrasonic tomahawk with a wet sounding stab before tossing the remainders of the packages away. Dropping the tomahawk on the ground, he dropped into a kneeling position and closed his right eye. Luna really had an excellent idea in magically blocking sound created here from going far.

“What happened?” Luna asked at a high volume, although he fucking knew for a fact that the Princess could see as easily as if it were day. There was no way that ruling the night didn’t come with night vision.

There was the sound of a pony fumbling around in the dark, before the light came back on with a flash.

Luna gasped and knelt down to examine him “Deadman! Are you hurt?” Off to the side, he heard another shocked gasp, this one coming from the guard.

His arms shaking, he reached down and grabbed the tomahawk, staring at the blade coated in the thick white fluid as well as making sure the angle was right so the guard could see it too.

“My eye,” he mumbled.

“Oh no…” Luna said, going slack jawed in mock-shock as she too stared at the blade.

He dropped the tomahawk once again, it clattering to the ground. With it at rest, his head slowly swivelled over to face the guard, who herself seemed to be stuck in a state of very real shock. “You did this,” he stated with a grim look on his face, standing back up to his full height as the shaking of his limbs disappeared.

“I- I didn’t mean to!” the pony stammered out, backing up into the wall and almost actually knocking out the lights this time.

He simply stared at her, and slowly walked over to the guard, who seemed to attempt to shrink away as he closed the gap. “Look at what you did,” he whispered, hand reaching up to his face.

“Please, Deadman, it was an accident!” he heard Luna call behind him in fake fear, but he ignored her, as was the plan.

With a small pull, the eye and the fake optic nerve came free from his eye-socket with a single grunt, but it was still hidden behind his hand. As the guard stared up at his imposing figure, he crouched down to look straight at her shaking figure and pinprick pupils. Her reactions further lowered his opinion of the guard, as she was a tiny bit too thick to even attempting to get help.

He then ever so slowly turned his hand around and shoved the eye directly in her face, which seemed to stare directly into her soul. “Look at what you fucking did!” he shouted in false anger, attempting to not smile.

A shrill scream piercing the air as the guard screeched with all her might, sounding more than a bit like what one would hear in a horror movie before her eyes rolled back and she collapsed into a heap.

For a few moments both Deadman and Luna stood there in silence, Deadman taking that time to reattach his eye, before they both broke down into fits of laughter.

As Deadman laughed he barely had enough time to get over to where he laid down his helmet down and slip it back on before he had to start supporting himself against the wall, his lungs calling for air as his eyes watered.

Luna too had similar issues, slumping against the wall and staggering towards his position as her fucking loud laugh echoed through the hallway.

Continuing to howl, Deadman slid down the until he sitting down, back resting against the wall. This was just too much for him to handle. The look on that mare’s face was beyond priceless. If one were ever to develop a scale to measure fear quantitatively, they should use that mare’s terror as the base unit. This made his regular pranks look like nothing.

Stumbling her way over, Luna, eyes watering, all but collapsed against his side, wrapping her front legs around his neck to stop herself from falling completely to the ground.

While it supported her for a while, it didn’t last forever. Deadman realized that he was starting to laugh hard and long enough that his stomach started to hurt as he slowly fell forward and curled up into a ball, lying on his side.

Luna was involuntarily dragged down too, landing beside him as she finally started to stop, if only because she ran out of breath to laugh with rather than ceasing to find it funny.

Stopping soon after, Deadman looked to the alicorn in front him and smiled before coming to an unfortunate realization.

“So, did we have any plan to get out of this without getting in shit?” he asked, still chuckling a bit as he finally managed to catch his breath.

“Nay, I don’t believe that we did,” Luna said, also catching her breath rapidly “But I think I have one.”

“And what is it?” he questioned, looking over to the unconscious pony across from them and almost breaking down into laughter again.

She stood up on slightly shaky legs and walked over to the pony before her horn lit up with magic and created an aura around the pony. A second later, the pony disappeared in a flash of white. “There, I teleported her back to her bed in the barracks. When she awakes she will probably think that all of this was a weird dream. Even if she doesn’t, who is going to believe her, especially with your eye intact?”

Picking up his tomahawk and standing back up, Deadman walked over to Luna and said “I must say that I had fun hanging around with you, Princess Luna.”

She smiled, turning and starting to trot down the hall. Pausing mid-step, she turned back towards him. “Do you want to accompany me as I raid the pantry?” Luna questioned.

Nodding, he walked alongside her and stated “When we get there I’m cooking you something from back home, Princess Luna.”

Chuckling and starting to walk again, she smiled “Please, Deadman, when we aren’t in a formal setting, feel free to call me Luna.”

“Acknowledged, your maj- Luna,” he said, following her into the castle and away from the scene of the crime.

Author's Note:

And after a long wait, here it is. Now, I must mention that I have plans to go over the earlier chapters to search for mistakes. They should start being edited fairly soon.

Comments

[Jack Kellar]

a large, eight sided crystal cylinder

You'd be better off calling that a prism.

[The Salesman]

4252051

Didn't think of that, thanks. It should be fixed now.

[TG Growl]

We're gonna need a bigger dock for the size of this incoming ship

[Eclipsemlp666]

It's been a year since you started this story, are you going to make a bonus chapter?

[Solowing32]

The earlier chapters could use some grammatical revision here and there, but so far as i can tell, not bad. notbad.jpeg

[hs0003]

And so it ends.

[Derpyous]

When is the next update going to happen?

Is this story dead?

[LaBirdie]

THIS STORY BETTER NOT BE DEAD IT IS AWSOME

[WardenTheEternalWatcher]

I fucken loved this story lad and shame that it didn't get updated since 2014....Blacklight is my fav game...