Hearts against the Monarchy

by Chalanceless

Chapter Four - Season for Change

Hearts against the Monarchy
Chapter Four --- Season for Change
“Biting off more than you can chew is just what I'm afraid of.”

---

Lyra Heartstrings. Lyra bloody Heartstrings.

Twilight Sparkle angrily stomped in a puddle as she stormed her way home. The cold, dirty water splashed over her hooves and soaked through the hem of her dress, but that didn't even make it to the bottom of the list of things she cared about right now. She wasn't sure what annoyed her more: the fact that Lyra had tricked her, or that it was Lyra who tricked her. It hadn't made sense to Twilight how the Hearts against the Monarchy managed to infiltrate the Royal Barracks without triggering its magical defences; now it did. Obviously, they had a mare on the inside. A mint-coloured one. A capable mare like Lyra would have had no trouble dismantling a security spell matrix from behind its protective barriers. How did it take her this long to figure it out?

You really should be watching where you are going, said the all-to-familiar voice as Twilight nearly walked into a lamppost. The voice had followed Twilight out of the Vault, much to her dismay. She suspected that the hair clips were tied to it somehow, and the voice had neglected to answer her when she asked if that was the case. If that were so, she had no choice but to grin and bear with it, because there was no way she would get rid of the hair clips. They at least doubled her already considerable magical abilities, giving her knowledge of magic beyond anything anypony could imagine. She understood so much more now. The golden stars had already proved themselves infinitely useful in helping her to erase all magical evidence of her little escapade in the Vault, and of course, the crystal manipulation spell had helped her hide Phoenix Flare’s body—

She cut off her own train of thought. ‘Don’t think about it’, she told herself for the hundredth time. Anytime her mind drifted to thought about… Phoenix Flare, she stopped herself. It was too much to cope with. The gravity of what happened hadn’t even struck her until she was already home in bed. Her memories of everything following…the event… were blurry and indistinct. She remembered Fluttershy had been to traumatized to say anything to the others when they emerged from the Vault. The Hearts against the Monarchy had postponed their escape when they realized Fluttershy had fallen behind. The four mares took their friend away without asking her or Twilight what happened, and Twilight suspected they hadn’t gotten anything out of the timid pegasus since. Fluttershy was probably of the same mind as Twilight, avoiding all thoughts of the corpse behind a wall of opaque crystal…

You are not very good at this ‘not thinking about it’ thing, the voice told her.

‘If you don’t like it,’ Twilight thought back curtly, ‘You can always get out of my head. I’m sure there are more empty-headed mares around who won’t bother you with thinking. That Rainbow Dash seems like she’d have a lot of extra space to share.’

Rowr. How catty of you. And she was so nice as to tell you who her boss is.

Twilight half-groaned, half-sighed. She had done some research, and apparently Rainbow Dash had been an accomplished amateur racer and aero-acrobatic before her father had been promoted to Warden of the South and she had to give up medals and blue ribbons for brooches and pink lace. Evidently, her physical speed and agility didn’t translate into the same for cognitive function. Revealing her leader’s name with a slip of the tongue? It was a wonder the Hearts against the Monarchy were able to accomplish anything. Though, Twilight reconsidered, with Lyra as their leader, maybe—

Yawn. Are you going to keep walking the wrong way, or are you eventually going home? Twilight suddenly realized she had walked past her house about a minute ago. With the voice’s laughter ringing in her head, Twilight disappeared from the moonlit Canterlot street in a flash and reappeared standing next to her bed. Normally it would have been impossible for her to teleport directly into her house (all of Canterlot’s buildings were enchanted to keep just anypony magically waltzing in), but she had a couple of stars to help her out.

Exhausted from staying awake for a twenty-four hour long play, Twilight removed her dress with a lazy spell and dropped in a heap on her floor, too tired to care about fancy eveningwear. She collapsed on her bed as if her bones had disappeared. Twilight Sparkle needed sleep, and she needed it bad. But as her overactive mind would have it, sleep had the night off. Her mind was abuzz with thoughts of everything that had happened over the past few days. So many questions, all without answer.

What was she supposed to do about the Hearts against the Monarchy? She knew enough about them to put them away for the rest of their little pony lives, or even enough to end them. A part of her mind reminded her that she was responsible for enough death— ‘Don’t think about it’. She could have them arrested without implicating herself; there was nothing but their word to say she had been there, and all of the information about the Elements of Harmony her recent research yielded (which was surprisingly little) was adamant that there were only five Elements, so even if she did cartwheels around Canterlot Square wearing nothing but the stolen diadem, she was at no risk of being caught. The diadem, as it were, was lying in a box under Twilight’s bed, defended by every protective spell Twilight knew – which was almost every protective spell that existed. She thought about the other five Elements of Harmony, and the mares who now possessed them. Maybe it was okay for her to allow the Hearts to go free. Even after everything that happened, Twilight didn’t think they were that much of a threat to Equestria. The Elements of Harmony were a set; would they even work without Twilight’s diadem? Twilight had found nothing in her research that could tell her about the properties and powers of the Elements, only that they were what Princess Celestia used to seal away Nightmare Moon.

Twilight rolled over onto her back and turned her head to the window where her eyes found the moon, shining silver as the light from Celestia’s sun reflected off its full, round face. The mare in the moon stared back at her, the dark constellation of craters standing out upon the pale surface of the moon like a black sheep among a flock of white fleece. The moon was the ultimate testament of Princess Celestia’s sovereignty of and devotion to Equestria. How could Twilight deny all that the princess had done for her and every other pony on earth? She refused to allow herself to be affected by what Rainbow Dash had said, but doubt sank in past her mental defences nonetheless. Was it true? Had Celestia truly abandoned Equestria? Was she not everything Twilight had heard her entire life? And were all of Celestia’s personal protégées as vicious as Phoenix Flare? And how did she even know Twilight and the Hearts were in the Vault? Had the Hearts messed something up when they infiltrated the barracks? Had Twilight done something to trigger an alarm? Wondering about it gave her no more answers than she started with.

On top of it all, when Twilight had finally read that letter that had been with the ticket on Shining Armor’s desk, she discovered another decision she had to make. Twilight’s academic excellence had drawn the attention of the Astral Society, the most renowned group of unicorn mages in Equestria. It was an unexpected honour. Unfortunately, it was just another complication for her at the moment. She needed to sort out her thoughts on… everything… and she didn’t need this added distraction. Twilight needed to think… she needed… she needed.

She knew what she needed to do. Twilight nestled her head deep into her pillow, finally ready to sleep. It was then she noticed that the voice had been silent for quite a while. The voice was courteous enough to stay quiet when Twilight was talking to somepony else, but otherwise it had no qualms about pestering her all day. ‘Is the voice asleep?’ Twilight wondered. The prospect of disembodied voices sleeping was dubious at best, but that was a mystery for Twilight to unravel some other time…

After a good night’s sleep, Twilight awoke with today’s plan already formed. She freshened up, made herself presentable, ate a light breakfast, and lay in wait for her target. The ‘target’ galloped down the stairs, his mane in disarray and his armour just barely hanging off him. He was late, and he made his way to the door, but found himself blocked by one eager, determined lavender mare.

“Gooooooooooooood morning, my BBBFF!” Twilight said with a perky smile that screamed eighteen flavours of bad news to Shining Armor.

“Um, good morning to you too, Twily,” Shining Armor said, his face covered in a fine layer of unease.

“I was just wondering if I could tag along with you to work today.” Shining Armor looked confused, so she elaborated. “A career in the Astral Society seems like a perfect career move for me, but I don’t want to commit to anything without examining my other options. There are so many other fields that I could apply myself in.”

“Where is this going?”

“I want you to take me to the Royal Barracks’ Arcane Engineering division.”

=#=#=#=

A short while later, Twilight was back at the Royal Barracks, this time her nervousness was replaced with a sense of purpose. She made sure to stick her tongue out at her ‘favourite’ guard as Shining Armor escorted her beyond the security checkpoint. Twilight waved goodbye to her brother as he left to do whatever it is royal guards do, and she entered the disappointing warehouse that housed the Arcane Engineering division.

Though the exterior of the warehouse was shabby and dull, the inside was filled with colourful machines of every shape and size, and blueprints of crazier and crazier designs hung from anything that could support them. It was all too much to take in at once. Twilight stood in awe, rotating in place and looking all over.

Twilight’s amazement caught the attention of one of the division’s ponies. A beige earth pony with pink-streaked blue hair came over to her and cleared her throat. Twilight spun around and faced forward, blushing pink. “Can I help you?”

“I was… well you see… I was looking for—”

“TWILIGHT!”

Twilight’s immediate evaluation was that one of these machines around her had malfunctioned and fired off some sort of very loud and eccentric mint-green projectile that slammed into her and grabbed her around her middle, gleefully shouting her name. And then she realized it was just Lyra.

“Lyra?” Twilight wheezed. “Could you please let go of me?”

“Oh. Right.” Lyra laughed. She released Twilight. “Sorry about that. I was just so glad to see you again! We have so much to talk about.”

“Who is this?” the beige mare asked. She eyed Twilight with a little more suspicion than Twilight believed was warranted.

“Oh how rude of me. I forgot to introduce you.” Lyra slapped her forehead with her hoof. She put a teal foreleg around Twilight’s shoulders. “This is Twilight Sparkle. She’s a graduate from Celestia’s school. I ran into her a few days ago, and she’s the brightest mind I’ve seen in years.” She reached over and put her other foreleg around the beige mare. “And this is Sweetie Drops, but everypony just calls her Bon-Bon,” she told Twilight. “She’s my number one assistant, and an invaluable asset to Arcane Engineering.

“But now that we’ve covered all that, I need to give you the grand tour.” Lyra put her hooves on the ground and began leading Twilight into the labyrinth of half-built machinery. “As I said, we have so much to talk about!”

That almost certainly sounded like Rainbow Dash had told her about their little night at the theatre. However, Lyra acted as if that weren’t the case. She dragged Twilight through corridors of scrap metal and discarded gems, telling her the name and purpose of every device they came across. It all went in one ear and out the other, which was massively uncharacteristic of her; she was too mentally preoccupied to absorb information like the knowledge sponge she was.

They passed a clearing in the glorified scrap heap. Lyra pointed out two mares inside. “Those are two of my absolute favourite mares, and the some pretty impressive engineers. The one on the right is Octavia.” She pointed to a grey earth pony who looked back at them sternly.

“Stop playing show-and-tell with visitors,” Octavia said. “We’re already behind schedule on our current project.”

“It’s surprising to see an earth pony arcane engineer,” Twilight remarked.

“Octavia is a musician,” Lyra explained. “She can play a cello with just her hooves. She may not be able to do magic, but she’s can handle tools better than you or I could ever hope to, even with our magic. Also, I like having musicians on staff. It makes explaining magical resonance and harmonics easier.”

“Is the pony on the left a musician too then?”

Octavia let out a noise of derision. “By the loosest definition of the term, I suppose. If you can call ruining vinyl records and deafening electronic bass music.”

The pony on the left, a unicorn mare, matched her scoff. “It beats the boring old classical junk you play. Strings are for cats; dubstep is where it’s at.” The whitish mare stuck her tongue out at Octavia and blocked her view of the cellist with her spiky blue mane and violet-lens glasses. Twilight noticed that both mares had musical notes for cutie marks.

“That’s DJ Pon-3,” Lyra said, flinching as the two mares continued arguing. “She’s a bit odd, but nowhere near as much as me! It may seem like they don’t get along, but give ‘em something to do and it’s done faster than you can say electro-magnetic arcano-harmonizer.”

“Except for that current project Octavia mentioned,” Twilight pointed out as Lyra lead her away from the squabbling musicians and deeper into the warehouse.

Lyra laughed uncomfortably. “Well, that’s actually not her fault. The problems are on my end, not theirs. I’ve not been working on it for a while because of… other things.”

“I bet.” Twilight gave her a meaningful look.

Lyra looked back at her and nodded. “Come with me.” They reached a back room, which Lyra unlocked with a complex spell that was suspicious in and of itself. Twilight had her doubts about this back room, but she wasn’t going to leave here without some answers. The room was full of junk just like the rest of the warehouse, but Twilight was sure that anything incriminating was being hidden. Once inside, Lyra locked the door behind them.

Twilight thought about what to say. There were dozens of things she needed to figure out, but she couldn’t decide what to ask about first. Before she could decide, Lyra struck first.

“You should join the Hearts against the Monarchy.”

“What?!”

“You’d be perfect. You’re smart, capable, and you’ve seen what Celestia’s supporters are really like.”

Twilight immediately thought about the Eclipse— and immediately suppressed those thoughts. “Why would I do something like that? You’re criminals! Terrorists!”

“We’re no worse than the ponies in charge. Equestria is supposed to stand for peace, justice, and harmony. I believe Rainbow Dash summarized my thoughts on Celestia and her regime?”

Twilight said nothing, so Lyra continued. “Fact is, if you didn’t have doubts, you wouldn’t be here. Neither would I. If the Hearts against the Monarchy were truly in the wrong, if we were really just making things up and trying to cause trouble, you would have ratted us out already. You’ve certainly had the chance. You haven’t yet, because something Rainbow Dash said has gotten to you. You know there’s something wrong about the way this country is run. This isn’t the paradise we’re told it is. The wars our armies are fighting aren’t the just battles we’re told they are. Celestia isn’t the all-powerful, all-knowing, benevolent ruler spoon-fed to us since birth. She’s a sham. The ponies in charge are corrupt, and everypony chooses not to see it. Canterlot ponies are too privileged to care about the truth, but not everywhere in Equestria is this nice. The farther you get from Canterlot, the worse it gets. Celestia didn’t vanquish all the monsters like the storybooks say. Manticores, hydras, dragons do as they please, terrorizing common ponies while the army does nothing. They’re too busy killing other creatures in other far away lands. The Equestria you know is a fake, a convenient lie to satisfy us and keep us from looking at the inconvenient truths.”

“And what are these inconvenient truths,” Twilight questioned, not altogether sure she wasn’t convinced.

Lyra faltered. “We don’t know yet. That’s why we’re fighting. What I do know, I can’t tell you yet. Join us if you want to find out.” Sensing she still hadn’t won Twilight over, she pressed on. “Think about what you know about us. We haven’t hurt anypony yet, unlike some of Celestia’s pets I can mention.” That was true; the Hearts hadn’t actually harmed anypony as far as Twilight knew, quite unlike the military that okay with her dying as a hostage, and Phoenix Flare had… “We have a mission tomorrow that will show you the true nature of the Equestria you think you know. Come with us. You don’t have to do anything. Just watch.”

Twilight exhaled deeply. “Fine. I’ll just watch. But if you guys try anything funny, I’ll mail you to Celestia myself.”

“Fair enough,” Lyra gladly conceded. “I really hope you’ll join us. We could really use another mare on the inside.”

Twilight thought about that for a moment. A certain letter came to mind. “About how much of an inside mare I could be…”

---

An Introduction to Trixie Lulamoon

Trixie Lulamoon – better known as the Great and Powerful Trixie – wasn’t just an amazing azure mare with a beautiful ice-blue mane and brilliant violet eyes, she was also the (self-professed) most magical unicorn in all of Equestria. Trixie was the newest recruit of the Astral Society and, as she kept telling the Society, its most valuable member. Well, to say she was a recruit was slightly off the mark. In reality, Trixie had become a member of the Astral Society by winning a bet. It was a typical one of her travelling magic shows, challenging and besting ponies at anything they chose. At the end of the day, a member of the Astral Society claimed that Trixie couldn’t force her off the stage in a magical duel; Trixie accepted on the condition that if she won, she could join the Society. One magic trick later, the stage disappeared, and the Astral Society had no choice but to (reluctantly) initiate her into disciplined ranks of Equestria’s finest sorcerers. Trixie had been scheming her way to further success ever since…

=#=#=#=

“Trixie doesn’t see why she must waste her time waiting here when she could be doing more important things,” Trixie whined to nopony in particular. There were mares to spare and a surplus of stallions, but only a precious few were listening to Trixie; the rest had learned better. All of them were members of the Astral Society. They had been called to the main hall of the Ivory Tower – the headquarters of the Society – and were awaiting… something important, or so they’d been told.

“Quit whining, Trixie,” said a surly, mustard-coloured stallion with a spiky, blue mane. As a rule, he had less than no patience for Trixie; it may be worth noting this was the pony whose wager was responsible for Trixie even being here.

A lilac mare next to him gave him a swift kick to his shooting-star cutie mark. “No need to be so rude, Comet Tail.” Also worth noting, this pony – Sea Swirl – was the one who convinced Comet Tail to keep his word. “I’m bored too. Why were we called out here?” She brushed her two-tint blue mane out of her face. “I can stand around and do nothing at home.”

“Trixie agrees. Trixie does not appreciate her time being wasted. If something doesn’t happen soon, she will leave.”

The ponies around her nodded in agreement, all except for two mares who giggled in unison. “It sounds like they don’t know why they’re here, Twinkleshine,” said one to the other. They both giggled again. “You’re right, Minuette,” said the other. “They have no idea.”

Trixie scowled. “The Great and Powerful Trixie demands to be told what is going on.”

The pair continued their trend of giggling like a couple of school fillies. “We were summoned because we’re the unicorns in the Society,” Minuette began. “Except for the Star Masters, of course,” Twinkleshine corrected. “Of course. Somepony very important is looking for powerful unicorns for a very important reason.” “Not just anypony, either. Prince Blueblood himself is the one interested in us.” Minuette and Twinkleshine tittered simultaneously between each other’s admissions. “Isn’t that exciting?” they said together.

This speech pattern was business as usual for Minuette and Twinkleshine. Just as everypony adjusted to Trixie referring to herself in the third person, they had gotten used to the two mares alternating lines. Trixie secretly wondered if it were possible for either of them to get anything across without the other; nopony knew, as they were alone.

“Prince Blueblood, eh?” Comet Tail scratched his chin with his hoof. “I wonder what this is about. Maybe it has something to do with that military demonstration a few days ago. Something about ArMAREs, right?”

“I don’t know what that’s about,” Sea Swirl said with a shrug. “He probably just wants some powerful unicorn servants. You know, to help him carry his ego around.” This slight was met with unreserved laughter. Nopony in the Astral Society was overly fond of Prince Blueblood. The prince was famously unskilled in the magical arts, and it made him all the less appreciative of the Society and he let them know it.

Speaking of the magically-impaired devil, the hall’s polished oak doors opened wide to the sound of trumpets. A procession of royal attendants filed in, and bringing up the rear was – who else? – Prince Blueblood himself. The Prince held his head high and proud, deigning not to look upon the crowd of intelligentsia before him with his cold, icy eyes. He himself looked as regal as usual, carefully groomed from his perfect hooficure to his glossy, blonde mane with one strand artfully astray. His white coat shone, utterly devoid of any trace of dirt… unlike his reputation. The only thing out of place about him were the mares standing adjacent to each of his gold-and-silver compass rose cutie marks. Their white and gold robes made them unmistakable for anything but Eclipses, but the mares themselves kept their identities unknown with their hoods. Trixie thought the spell masters might be embarrassed to be seen serving a unicorn with no magical skills, but there was something sinister and unnerving how they stood in Blueblood’s shadow, silent and virtually without presence.

“I’m sure you know why I’m here,” Prince Blueblood announced, thankfully loud enough to drown out Minuette and Twinkleshine’s sniggers. “The Crown has tried to quietly control the situation and keep the common ponies from worrying, but rumour has gotten out about the recent troubles plaguing the military. A group of rebels have been buzzing about like so many flies. Before now they were just pests incapable of doing anything of consequence, but several days ago these rebels infiltrated the Royal Barracks and made off with five magical artefacts. They almost entered and exited undetected, but our royal mages detected a magical disturbance and dispatched one of Celestia’s Eclipses. However, the Eclipse has gone missing, and we’ve found no traces of the rebels.”

At the mention of their comrade, the two Eclipses shifted imperceptibly. Trixie’s sense of unease skyrocketed. Looking around, Trixie saw that nopony beside her had noticed. She felt as if her head had been plunged into ice water. Trixie wasn’t known for her ability to detect and identify magic, but even she could feel something off about these mares.

“These rebels call themselves ‘the Hearts against the Monarchy’,” Blueblood continued, oblivious to the demeanour of the Eclipses flanking him. When he named the rebels, he did so with so much disgust, a pony would think he had just watched the entire crowd in front of him vomit at his hooves. “My purpose here today is to recruit an élite task force of sorcerers to track down and exterminate these traitors. I want these ungrateful ponies gone yesterday. Now, who wants to volunteer first for this glorious task and do your duty to your princess?”

Prince Blueblood’s question was met with silence. Nopony said anything, but they were all thinking the same thing: what happened to that Eclipse? The Eclipses were the only group of ponies with more magical prowess than the Astral Society; if these rebels could take on an Eclipse, what chance did they have? These rebels were clearly a force to be reckoned with. There wasn’t a pony in the room particularly eager to throw themselves into this situation, nor did anypony want to be the first one to speak up. Nopony except…

“The Great and Powerful Trixie volunteers for this task force!” She stepped forward with confidence – perhaps overconfidence – the rest of the Astral Society could only dream of. “Trixie is not afraid of these rebels.”

Prince Blueblood regarded Trixie. He looked as if he were deep in thought, which some might call a fire hazard. “You seem a little rough, but you’ll do.” The prince looked past Trixie and surveyed the rest of the Society members. Nopony else spoke up.

“Trixie doesn’t need any help. She can defeat these rebels on her own.” Trixie shot a condescending look back over her shoulder. “These ponies are all too busy cowering behind their books. If you want these rebels gone, the only pony for the job is none other than the Great and Powerful Trixie.”

“Show-off,” Comet Tail muttered under his breath. He stepped forward, smirking at the shock written over Trixie’s face. “I can’t let you have all the glory. I’m in.”

With a deep sigh heavy with exasperation, Sea Swirl joined Comet Tail and Trixie. “You two are making the rest of us look bad.” She smiled. “Guess I should have paid attention in school when they were talking about how to resist peer pressure, eh?”

Not too far behind were Minuette and Twinkleshine. “We don’t really have a choice now, do we, Twinkleshine?” The mares giggled. “Not if everypony else is joining up, Minuette.”

Slowly but surely, more and more ponies stepped forward. Not many, mind you, but still a substantial amount. Enough to form a taskforce. Without further ado, Prince Blueblood gathered up his volunteers and they departed from the Ivory Tower. Amidst the ponies leaving for the castle, Trixie stopped dead in her tracks. She felt as if she were being watched, and when she turned around to check, she saw the two Eclipses staring back at her. Thoroughly spooked, Trixie bolted. The Eclipses watched her gallop away with a reserved sense of interest. Once all other ponies had left, the Eclipses teleported away in twin flashes of light to Celestia-knows-where.

=#=#=#=

More waiting.

Silently, but undeniably, Trixie was furious.

The nerve of that Prince Blueblood. Trixie didn’t care that he was royalty; she was going to use all the magic she possessed to wring out everything in his body that made him think he could make her wait outside his office for hours on end. The prince had led the volunteers to the royal castle and into what was called the Horn Tower. Once there, he explained that the taskforce would have its agents operate in pairs, so as to prevent somepony disappearing into the unknown as that lone Eclipse had. If one when down, the other could get away and inform the rest what had happened. Clearly, solidarity counted very little in Blueblood’s books. He had divided the volunteers according to personnel files the Astral Society had provided him with. Each pony was paired with another until the only one without a partner was Trixie. Prince Blueblood instructed her to come with him to his office, and when they arrived, he told wait outside while he spoke with the mare already in his office. She had been sitting in place with nothing to do since then.

After what seemed like forever, the door opened, and Prince Blueblood called out to her. “Trixie…” he checked a piece of paper he was holding, “…Lulamoon—” The Great and Powerful Trixie grimaced at his use of her full name, “—please come inside.”

Her blue face burning red with anger, Trixie stood up and marched into the prince’s office, slamming the door behind herself. “How dare you keep the Great and Powerful Trixie waiting!” She couldn’t decide who deserved her death-glare more, prissy Prince Blueblood, or the dumb lavender mare with the stupid purple mane who was already sitting in front of his desk.

“Watch your tone,” the prince said, the royal pain scowling at Trixie. “I am your prince, you know.”

Trixie scoffed as rude as equinely possible. “Trixie did not volunteer first to wait in a hall for hours.”

The purple mare beside her spoke up. “Actually, it’s only been fifteen minutes,” she said matter-of-factly.

Trixie opened her mouth to retort, but she looked at the clock on Blueblood’s wall and saw that it indeed had not been hours since the office door had first closed. “Actually, it’s been sixteen minutes,” she said stuffily and turned away, the source of her face’s redness shifting from rage to embarrassment. The other mare rolled her eyes.

“Anyway,” Blueblood said irritably and cleared his throat, “Trixie, this is Twilight Sparkle.” He vaguely waved a hoof at the mare Trixie refused to face. “She became a member of the Astral Society today; I managed to snatch her away from those bookworms just in time, and she has agreed to join our little pet project. She comes from Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns with the highest esteem and more awards than I care to mention. I believe she will be a great asset to this taskforce.”

Ugh. Celestia’s school. Trixie had nursed an ugly grudge against that establishment ever since they had refused to let her enrol as a filly. Her magic was ‘too flashy and not enough power’ and the examiners had deemed her to be suited to become nothing more than a cheap conjuror of tricks. Trixie had taken those words to heart, intent on throwing their criticisms back in their faces when she became the most magical unicorn in all of Equestria. And just look at her now, rising star of the Astral Society.

“And why is this little school filly any concern of Trixie’s?” Trixie snuck a glance out of the corner of her eye and was glad to see this ‘Twilight Sparkle’ bristle at her comment.

“She is to be your partner, of course.” Two jaws dropped, and the mares attached looked at one another with equally matching measures of dismay and animosity. Blueblood ploughed on, ignoring the reactions of the mares on the others side of his desk. “You two shall lead the taskforce in charge of eliminating these so-called Hearts against the Monarchy. Under your leadership – with your magical expertise, Twilight Sparkle, and your… tenacity, Trixie Lulamoon – these rebels will have nowhere to hide, and we all shall be rid of them. Your taskforce now has a name: Asystole!” Trixie’s eyes drifted to Blueblood’s desk, where she was not surprised to see a dictionary. She made a mental reminder to look up the word herself when she got home. “Now, I’m sure you two will need lots of time to organize your new taskforce, so run along now.” He dismissed them with a regal nod.

“So we’re working together, then,” Twilight Sparkle said weakly. She didn’t seem to happy at the prospect of that.

That was nothing compared to how Trixie felt.

“Hmph.” Trixie spun around, taking delicate care to whip her tail around and hit Twilight in the nose. It was a classic move right out of a popular high school filly’s repertoire; Trixie had tons of practice dealing them out from her school days, just as Twilight had practice receiving them. “Trixie doesn’t need your help, or anypony else’s.” She strode out of the office as Twilight rubbed her nose tenderly and Prince Blueblood watched the pair with restrained amusement.

“The Great and Powerful works alone.”

Comments

[Villain84]

Read Later!

[FinalFan]

They at least her already considerable magical abilities,
Something's missing or wrong here. "At least doubled"? Tripled? "Augmented" instead of "at least"?

empty-headed mares around you won’t bother you with thinking.
I suspect you mean "who won't bother you".

his perfectly hooficure
perfect

I don't suppose that's all of them, but it's the ones I happened to notice.

[Chalanceless]

2830789

Thank you for catching those! I kept rewriting those lines and ended up forgetting to change all the relevant words there.

[RoseOf1000Thorns]

WHY THIS NO FINISHED AAAAGGHHHUOFHIWUGFUIWGBHVHWVD

[Lauralite]

Hm... I hope this starts fetting updated again

[Lauralite]

Here's me commenting again, hoping you'll continue this

[Lauralite]

I'll just keep commenting and sending PMs from time to time in hopes that you'll come back with this story.

[Mooncalf]

Fascinating story. Hope you'll continue it.