Previous Chapters
Close
Chapter 11,141 words
Chapter 21,734 words
Chapter 32,120 words
Chapter 4701 words
Chapter 51,578 words
Chapter 61,377 words
Chapter 7 (unfinished)834 words

Chapter 7 (unfinished)

A hard rain tumbled down onto the poorly-lit platform. This time of night, Trottingham Station was usually quiet, save for one or two midnight specials. One in particular stood on the rails — Engine 46; all glittering brass and sharp black paint, fresh from the yard — occasionally letting off blasts of steam and softly hissing as the boiler cooled from a hard run.

Above, dark clouds covered the night sky, a pallor of smoke and smog churned out by the city’s mighty factories.

The engineer quietly shook his head to himself as he watched the train’s sole occupants depart. It was strange that nobility chose to travel by rail, but these two rewrote the definition of the word.

Strange, as in not only reserving a private trip from Canterlot to Trottingham, but buying the train that did it. Being a new engine, he was a new engineer, and still unused to the job. Scratching his leg, the engineer figured he was now an employee of the crown.

One of the nobles tapped on the side of the train. The engineer poked his head out. “M’lady?” What, was he going to get a tip or something?

“Keep the coals hot, Pop Smoke,” said the noble, hurried glancing about under the brim of a fedora. “We’ve a hunch that we won’t tarry here for long.”

“Yeah, sure —” the engineer turned to crank the lever for the bellows, then paused. “Wait, my name isn’t Pop Smoke...” He looked back to the noble.

But the noble had vanished, along with the other one. The lonely platform was empty.

Frowning, the engineer shrugged. “Whatever. Now… where the f**k am I supposed to park this thing?”

Two alicorns trotted gamely through the twisting alleys of Trottingham, each clad in a thick detective’s coat with holes for wings, and slick fedoras. Princess Luna puffed at her pipe as she walked, paying the dark recesses of the path no mind. Beside her, Princess Twilight Sparkle took a drag of a cigarette, before launching into a coughing fit. Wheezing, she glared at the larger of the two. “Why exactly do we have to be smoking, again?”

“‘Tis the way of things.” Luna flipped her collar up against the rain, gritting her teeth. “All hard-boiled detectives do this. Didst thou forget to read the reference novella we gifted?”

“Of course I read it. Half the book was the main character being melodramatic and the other half unnecessarily violent!”

“Exactly.” Luna wistfully smirked despite her surroundings, despite the cold rain and filth of the alley, despite the miserable state of her city —

“—Oh no, you are not using this as another excuse to live out another one of your fantasies.” Twilight stomped a hoof, accidentally catching a puddle and splashing everywhere. “And we are not turning this into a second Pudding Incident.”

“THOSE DAMNABLE SENIOR CITIZENS HAD THEIR TAPIOCA COMING TO THEM!” seethed the Night Princess. At the shocked expressions of two nearby station employees, she leered. “Free healthcare for the elderly? Heh! Once upon a time ‘twas considered an insult to live long enough to claim benefits from the Crown. But ponies today are soft and pudgy, thoroughly whipped and filled with bits both chewy and repulsive. Just like their damned tapioca.”

The cost-benefit analysis of replying to Luna’s outburst scurried through Twilight’s head before she lost her train of thought to another fit of gags and half-choked breaths. Her cigarette landed in a pool of stagnant water and fizzled as she crushed the nasty thing under a hoof.

“Just… ugh. Do you have any other information about this villain, other than the fact that scrying with body parts is, oh, disgusting? And illegal?”

Exhaling a cloud of earthy smoke into Twilight’s face, Luna grinned sadistically and plodded ahead as menacingly as she could. “Were it up to us, the wholesale slaughter of demons both large and small would still be a pastime enjoyed by our most beloved subjects. Far be it from us to waste perfectly good, choice cuts of demon. But to answer your question, dear Twilight, yes. We know several secrets the new Don could not hide from my Eye.”

She paused to glare threateningly at a passing nogoodnik, spooking him into a nearby alleyway where he was immediately laid into by a rival band of hooligans. Trottingham was just one of those towns.

“Through the visions of hellfire and brimstone, we have burned many a carefully-hidden truth into our mind. ‘Twas only through our arcane skill that we could now assure you of the fact that the new Don…” the princess puffed away at her pipe for tension, “...once met a pink chicken.”

Luna nodded sagely to herself.

“And it was awful.”

The rainy streets muffled the noise of a certain lavender librarian’s despair. Together, the two Princesses vanished into a maze of brick and gloom. Trottingham swallowed them up.

It wasn’t likely to spit them out anytime soon.

Author's Note:

Yes, there was a long wait. Rust is super busy, Moniker is super busy, and both also both super lazy.

Super deal with it.

Deuces.

938 views

460

Previous Chapters