Of a Certain Adventurous Pony

by RavensDagger

Arc Two: Gardening Clubs - Out the Back Alley

I got out of the alley as quickly as I could, telling myself that the dumb idiot deserved his crappy fate. In the end, he was still probably a level three or so, he could figure it out if he applied himself. And anyhow, I got my own flank whooped so many times and survived that I’m sure he could stand on all fours after one measly beating.

The scene around Rarity’s boutique had changed in those few short minutes spent in the alley with Black Ruby. The amount of Judgement had increased and the two psycho mares were long gone. Meanwhile, the sheer amount of pure noise had grown dramatically.

Somepony had parked an ambulance nearby and a line of ponies waited to be checked on had formed. I saw, from afar, another such vehicle speeding away while armoured carriages approached, filled with soldiers and city guards.

Firefighter ponies were cordoning off the roadway while others created a walkway above the crime scene, leaving it untouched while allowing the traffic to keep on. Beyond those lines the crowd was growing thicker by the second, with students, teachers and normal passerby gathering to catch up with the gossip.

And I was supposed to find clues in this mess? Crap.

I sat down and allowed myself to frown at the entire play. So, basically, Protagonist blew the crap out of a high-end, exclusive store, stole some shiny rocks, and high-tailed it, all the while pissing off some OP mares and grabbing enough loot to make your average gamer and/or dragon drool. But why? I’d’ve hit a bank first. Get physical bits that can’t be traced. Or, do this at night when nopony would notice the heist. Something wasn’t adding up.

And speaking of addition.

Trotting through the crime scene, a bright yellow-hardhat on his already mismatched head, was Omni Disciplinarian. He looked towards me, baggy eyes opening wider when they spotted my sorry flank. “Tight Wedge!” he called out, abandoning the few ponies around him to rush towards me. “Hello, Tight Wedge. It has been a while since our last meeting.”

“Yeah, a few days,” I said.

“Yes, three, to be exact. Or approximately seventy eight hours. Or four thousand six hundred and eighty minutes, that’s how many seconds?” He looked away, smiling faintly and dumbly at the glass-covered ground for a bit while the gears in his head spun. “Ah, it’s—”

I shoved a hoof over his muzzle, cutting him off. “Hey, mate. I came to say hello, not learn how to count. I, uh, well, I was wondering if you knew about what happened here.”

“Hmm? The robbery? Yes, I know a few things. Why? Why do you want to know?” He leaned in towards me, eyes narrowing while locks of his oily orange mane fell out of his colourful hat. “Are you one of them?”

Do I have to remind you guys that this fellow is built like a brick? Because him leaning over me is sorta terrifying. Nerd rage and all that. “O-of course not! Black Ruby wants to know, and frankly I’m a little curious too. Some of these things don’t add up all that much.”

He smiled, showing off a row of perfect teeth while his wings flapped happily behind him. “Ah, well, if your question is about addition then I’m your pony.”

“Yeah, sure.” Weirdo. “So, why’re you here? And what’s with the silly hat?”

His smile only grew, and so did my discomfort. “Ah, patterns!”

“Patterns?”

“Yes, patterns. The local guard sometimes need to find patterns in certain cases, or hints hidden behind math. It’s my specialty. So I volunteer some time and get a light reward in return. But this case is rather simple, all things considered.”

I nodded, pretending to have understood all of that but keeping some of it for later consideration. “Right, I was wondering if there was something or other that stuck out. Black and I already figured that the gems were for spells or some-such?”

His eyes lit up and he did a weird little dance on the spot. “Brilliant! Good job, Tight Wedge. Indeed, there’s a connection between the jewel heist and magical manipulation. In fact, our dear Protagonist stole not one gem of great value, despite having them within hoof’s reach. Every gem taken was non-decorative and better suited for enchanting than making a mare look pretty.”

“Anything more specific than that?” I asked, trying to push him into confessing just a tab more. So far he’d only confirmed the things we’d thought up.

“Well, there might be one more thing,” Omni admitted. He rubbed his eyes with the edge of a hoof. “I’m not supposed to tell you this, but, well. Preliminary readings say something rather intriguing. Protagonist arrived with twelve ponies. He left with twelve.”

“Okay, the point is?”

“One of his minions was seen galloping away by hoof. He wasn’t teleported with Protagonist’s group.” Omni smiled at me, but it was a slow, saddened smile. “You can do the simple math, right?”

Twelve, minus one, equals twelve. Yeah, perfect math. “Who was the mystery pony? Somepony on the inside?”

The budding mathematician shook his head, messy hair bouncing around. “Nope. Here’s one last bit of information. A certain famous mathematician, one I look up to, had a scheduled meeting in this store today, during the attack. We don’t know where he is anymore.”

I swallowed hard, taking in the new information slowly. “What sort of math?”

“He was a well-known doctor, both in the academics and, in a lesser fashion, in the field of medicine. He, that’s Doctor Numberphile, was in this city for two reasons. One, to attend a conference, and two, to spearhead and oversee a project dealing with advanced genetic manipulation.”

The pegasus stomped a hoof into the ground. “Those bastards. I really wanted to attend his seminar on applied mathematics and how to cheat your way into med-school.”

I nodded, touching the tip of my chin with a hoof. “Thanks for the info, Omni, I’ll try to figure a few things out.” I turned, not bothering to say bye, ‘cause I wanted to get home before next week and was not totally interested in getting a seminar on the proper usage of decimals. “Oh, and keep me informed on the going-ons here. I have the sinking impression that things are going to get funky.”

Author's Note:

Edited by:
]The Misfits

Omni’s a weird one.

I don’t just mean his portrayal here, which is pretty weird too, I guess. But I mean his weird attachment. I want all of my major and somewhat-major characters to be fun to read and approachable. I want you guys to like them. Omni’s not... normal, in his liking-ness.

He’s not exactly charismatic. In fact, if I were to meet that sort of person, I’d likely want to smack him. But his sheer nerdy passion kinda makes him.... fun. In a boring way. Maybe it’s not him on his own, but the way he views and approaches the world around him that makes him relatable?

Dunno. More of him soon.

Also, this marks the end of Arc 2: Gardening. I think it did its job of introducing the baddies and the main characters. Now to start the trot towards the first conflicted climax! Arc 3's going to be... interesting. And I want most of you to die during Arc 4. I'll pull every cute trick in the books. And cte is something I can do!

Muahahahaha!

Math sucks IRL,
Ravens D. Dagger

Comments

[Web of Hope]

Arc 4 will kill us, huh? Sounds sexy.

[Minitheif]

"Math sucks IRL"
Dear sir, I must respectfully disagree.
That said, I can't wait for more of this. I suspect this will be one of those stories where I'm struggling to remember what's happening, but that means that the plot is complex, not that there's a problem. Basically, if things aren't spelled out at some point in the text I won't be getting a lot of it. Either way, should be fun!

[RavensDagger]

3400050
Note taken.

I'm mixed as much light-hearted fun with complex intrigue s I can here. It's weird mix.

[Minitheif]

3400074 It is a weird mix, and somehow you're pulling it off. And typically the issue with intrigue is on my end, not the writer's. I just don't have a head for politics, or similar scheming.

[thispenguinisdead]

I'll be looking forwards to the next two arcs.

[the other sans]

And cte is something I can do

Cte? What is this some kind of code? You want us to suffer from this don't you? Does it mean Compost Teleports Everywhere? Citing This Enemy? Cuddling That Emissary? This is MADNESS!

[Chainlinc3]

...I really want to see Wedge just flip a shit on one of the Protagonist's goons at some point. Just like "Oh, you're level 3? Boo-hoo, CRY ME A FUCKING RIVER. GODDESSES, HAVE YOU EVER WORKED A DAY IN YOUR LIFE YOU SORRY PIECE OF --" etc, etc. Meanwhile, Black Ruby is just looking on from a safe distance, mildly bemused. :P

Aside from hoping the hero has a minor breakdown, this was entertaining. Omni went up a few notches from "WTF is this guy doing?" to "Eh, he's pretty cool." So that was fun. Kidnapped genetic engineer... well, I think we can all guess where THAT's going. Fun times are ahead!

[Blurry]

Still loving it! *more positive reinforcement*
I love how all the main characters have a catch to them; like a single contrast that makes them immediately different and more interesting than a standard 'cookie-cutter' persona.

Also maths (yes mathS :p) rocks. About 50% of my study is devoted to the wonderful subject aha haa.

[RavensDagger]

3401627

Hmm. I don't think either of the main gals know that he's a level one. That mighyt prove interesting.

[Phil Lee]

Nice work. I realise that you didnt enjoy watching index; but have you considered giving the light novels they are based on a try. ( there are translations online at baka tsuki)

Ponyfied misaka was awesome.
Looking forward to accelerator. (the guy is my favourite main character from the books... He's less brutal in the tv series)

[RavensDagger]

3403734Are they (the translations) any good? Bad English is a pet peeve of mine.

[Chainlinc3]

3403435
Unless you had him let it slip off-screen, they don't. It's one of the reveals I've been looking forward to. :P

(Also, the baka tsuki translations were... acceptable, when I last checked on them, about eight months ago. I could tolerate them, but they didn't really make the story "pop" in a way that held my interest, so I eventually gave up.)

[Phil Lee]

I remember them as being particularly readable in english quality. The only thing being is that they are direct translations from the japanese source material... It does help that i saw the first season of index first, so i developed some expectations of the light novels. Not to spoil anything, but if you like the toaru universe, it's really worth trying to slog through the entire thing from the beginning, all the way through to the toaru new testament novels. Im just about to catch up on the new testament novels ive missed now. Your fic reminded me they updated

[Phoenix999]

I was originally drawn to this fic because of the description being closely modeled after the A Certain Magical Index and A Certain Scientific Rail-Gun world. They were always a favorite of mine, so I wanted to give this a chance.

I like what you've done with your characters. While I suspect that Black Ruby won't be the subject of any serious romance, she's a likable character and I can see how she will help the story along. I'm a fan of the crazy nihilist, Happy End, and I have high hopes for her character and interactions with Tight Wedge. I'm really interested to see when (or if) Happy End and Black Ruby find out that Tight Wedge is a level 1. It appears that they haven't quite figured it out yet, probably assuming that he's at least a level 2 or 3.

Tight Wedge presents a bit of a toss-up for me. On the one hand, I like how he's essentially under-powered but has redeeming character qualities (much like the protagonist in A Certain Magical Index). On the other hand, he tends to have blind luck most of the time. While I can buy this to a point (the story hasn't pushed the boundaries too much), luck only goes so far. Also, the name.

[ibyea]

Wait, why is a mathematician overseeing a genetic project or doing stuff in medicine? That is way out of the field. (yes, I know, nit picking, but I am a nit picking kind of guy ) Also, math does not suck!