A Dream

by totallynotabrony

Non-Compete Clause

I remembered that the Equestrian Education Association was sending hit squads after me and decided to get proactive.

After all, if someone tries to kill you, kill ‘em right back.

Of course, the Seven School Superintendents - now down two since I'd killed them - weren’t easy to find. Locating just five ponies in all of Equestria when you didn’t already know who they were was a task that I could accomplish with my surveillance, but not without hundreds of hours of reviewing footage.

So I didn’t. Instead, I let them come to me.

I swaggered into the bar aboard In Need of Beaning and sat down. Guinness asked, “What’s with the hat?”

“I borrowed it from Applejack. She’s got a whole closet full. Anyway, I’m putting together a reverse posse.”

“How does that work?” he asked, polishing a glass.

“Normally, a posse forms up to go after a bad guy. I’m forming this one to have the bad guys come to us. We’re just going to go hang out and kill whoever comes to kill us.”

“Doesn’t that carry the risk of, well, being killed?”

“Not with Tin Mare on my side and cannon fodder in front of me.”

“What about me?” said Libby in my earpiece. I decided not to reply.

“Anyway,” I said, “Now I have to find the cannon fodder.”

“Did somepony call me?” asked Cannon Fodder, walking in.

That was the thing about Equestria, every catchy phrase was someone, even Catchy Phrase.

“Just the mare I wanted to see. Here’s your hat.”

“Okay,” she said, frowning, but putting the hat on.

I went to go deputize a couple more ponies. And some non-ponies. What the heck. I even had some volunteers. In addition to Cannon Fodder, it ended up being the CMC, Ocellus, Smolder, Gallus, Yona, Silverstream, Sandbar, Twilight, and Josephine Jokester. I gave them all hats.

“This ten-gallon hat sure puts me to mind of Princess Celestia’s behind,” said JoJo.

I stared at her.

“They’re both too big,” she said.

I continued staring at her until it got awkward and she ducked her head and walked away.

I was seriously considering finding an excuse to kill her because she was not funny in the slightest.

The group of us saddled up. That’s only partially a euphemism. As part of standard school policy, we had uniforms. No, there wasn’t a rule to wear them. Uniforms at school are stupid. But we had them, because it never hurts to have a suit ready to go. Or in this case, a battle saddle. It was my school, after all. I wanted everyone to be prepared, just in case.

Despite the saddles, we had no horses to ride, that would have been weird, so Tin Mare just gave us a ride.

I wore my autodarkening sunglasses and sat on the tailgate as we flew. Twilight came to sit with me, holding a hoof on her cowboy hat to keep it from blowing away. I felt Tin Mare adjust slightly, apparently compensating for a change in weight balance. Yona sat down on the other side of me. That explained that.

“I think we’re almost ready,” said Twilight. “For our first superhero mission, I mean.”

“Did you have something in mind?” I asked.

“Well...no. I was hoping you could help us with that.”

I considered it. “Tell you what. Hang back a little bit. If this posse manages to scare up one of the Seven Evil Admins, we’ll flush them into you and you grab them.”

“Then what?” Yona asked.

“We kill them.”

A pained look came across Twilight’s face. “Do we have to?”

“You were the one who wanted to do the whole vigilante justice thing.”

“Yes, but you are the one who likes murder.”

I shrugged. “I don’t really like it, I’m just really good at it and a fan of how it offers permanent solutions to my problems.”

“People aren’t problems!

I raised my eyebrows. “Are you sure? You’re the one who wants vigilante justice.”

“Just because I think it’s interesting and nobody likes me!” Twilight suddenly seized up, apparently not intending to say that.

“So? Nobody likes me, but I’ve come to terms with that.”

“I like you,” said Tin Mare.

“Thank you.”

“Also, most ponies still think you’re the old Twilight, so maybe they would like you better if you weren’t,” added Tin Mare.

“See!” said Twilight. “That’s exactly why I need to be a superhero, so I’m not like your Twilight.”

“Fair enough.”

Continuing that line of conversation as if the previous one hadn’t happened, Twilight said, “It’s too bad Owlowiscious couldn’t come. He had some magic practice to do, so I left him back at the submarine.”

“Is he getting pretty good at it?”

“Well, as I’ve said before, pretty good for an owl.”

We talked a little more on the way. I’d picked a large open meadow at the foot of the mountains. It seemed like as good a place as any. If nothing else, we could tell the kids it was a nature hike or something.

Once we got to where we were going and Tin Mare landed, Twilight and Yona slipped away, leaving me with the rest.

I belatedly realized that most of them were schoolchildren. I had overlooked this. There’s a reason I’m the principal - I hate kids.

So of course they wanted to interact with me.

The CMC knew me pretty well, of course. The other kids I knew by name, but we’d had limited interaction. Particularly the dragon, Smolder.

Scootaloo introduced me. “This is my daughter.”

“What.”

I cut my eyes between the two of them. Okay, yes, I could see the orange and purple resemblance, but “How?”

“Well, dragons have eggs. Someone needs to sit on them. I had a weird summer break, okay?”

“But…” I shook my head. “Nevermind. I don’t want to know.”

I turned around, and then again to complete the full three sixty. “One more thing. Who’s the father?”

“Ember, I think. Kind of. She used to have that bigger dragon attached to her.” Scootaloo shrugged. “I don’t really think about it too much. I don’t really think too hard about much of anything anymore since I got my cutie mark. Life’s simpler now and I don’t want to ruin that.”

This had gone from being creepy and weird to surprisingly insightful life lessons, in addition to still being creepy and weird.

“Zonks, who’s that?” asked JoJo, pointing at a pony coming our way.

I didn’t recognize her. She was an older mare, a unicorn, and hooded. Nice, one of the EEA SSS, just who I was expecting.

She stopped a short distance away. I made sure the cannon fodder was in front of me.

“I am Baby Cakes, of the Equestrian Education Association,” she said.

“Let me guess...you teach sex ed?”

“Home economics.”

“That was my second guess.”

“You are going to pay for what you’ve done,” she said. “We’re going to stop you, we’re going to shut down your school, and then we’re going to rewrite the history books so that you never existed.”

“Not if I get my history book published first. It starts with the beginning of the universe.”

She took a stance. “Don’t change the subject. You’re toast!”

“You and what toaster?”

She pulled out a flamethrower.

Tin Mare, parked on the ground nearby, started her engines but I could see that if Baby Cakes was going to use that thing, Tin Mare wasn’t going to be fast enough. I went for my gun.

To my extreme surprise, Cannon Fodder tackled Baby Cakes and wrestled her weapon away.

“Holy shit,” I muttered aloud, and started forward, raising my gun.

The two wrestled across the ground and I couldn’t get a clear shot. The kids were cheering on the fight. Cannon Fodder rolled over on her back and got her hooves up, kicking Baby Cakes back and away from her flamethrower.

Baby Cakes ran. I lined up the sights, but stopped. Twilight and Yona wanted their moment. Also, shooting an old mare in the back seemed unsporting. She could at least face me and give me a chance.

I holstered the gun and gave chase, followed by the rest of the crowd. As Baby Cakes passed a large boulder, Mystic and Super Cow, costumed heroes, pounced.

Baby Cakes saw them coming out of the corner of her eye and threw a punch that hit Twilight in the shoulder and knocked her off trajectory. She landed badly and I heard something snap. Yona, however, took Baby Cakes down and held her.

I went over to Twilight. She was holding her foreleg. She sucked in a breath through gritted teeth.

“Is it broken?” I asked. “I’ve never actually had to deal with a pony breaking a leg before. I didn't think they were that fragile, Mystic.” I pulled out my Desert Eagle, but paused halfway through the draw. “Um…”

She waved her other hoof frantically. “I can fix this good as new! I just need a little magic and a little time.”

“Okay, fine.” I holstered my gun again.

Twilight got herself fixed up. The crowd gathered around she and Yona, talking excitedly about meeting real life superheroes and apparently not recognizing them in their spandex.

When Twilight was up and walking again, I pulled my Desert Eagle once more to finish up with Baby Cakes.

“Wait,” Twilight insisted again. “Do you have to do this? Isn’t there supposed to be some sort of due process?”

“She wanted to kill us,” I pointed out.

“But what if…” Twilight looked around before coming up with an idea. “We could take her to Canterlot to use as evidence. Maybe we could get the EEA shut down.”

“A public execution huh?” I rubbed my chin.

“That’s not what I said!”

“You didn’t have to.”

I holstered my gun again. I was practically getting bullet blue balls today, but I could wait for an audience.

We found some materials aboard Tin Mare to keep Baby Cakes restrained. This amounted to contorting her into a large burlap sack and tying the top.

We flew to Canterlot and got an audience with the Princesses.

There wasn’t any formal request or anything, we just walked in. They were with some nobles, but that didn’t really bother me.

“We’re with some nobles,” said Luna.

“I know,” I said. “Hey, we’ve got a senior asshole from the Equestrian Education Administration here and wanted to make a point.”

“What point?” asked Celestia.

“Well, first, I’m trying to publish a children’s history book. That’s unrelated, but still a point. I just thought you might like to know. It starts off with how the universe was created with a big wang.”

“That’s ridiculous!” said one of the nobles.

“Well, technically-” Luna began.

“Don’t get him started,” said Celestia. She turned back to me. “Either state your piece or get out.”

Huh, Celestia in this changed universe must be a little more strict.

“Either the EEA stops messing with me, or I’ll kill them all. Starting with this home-ec teacher.” I poured Baby Cakes out of the burlap sack.

“Th-this is terrible,” she cried. Apparently her attitude had changed quite a bit since incarceration. “This day has been just the worst!”

“I think it went pretty well. I put you in a bag.” I looked around. “Okay, it doesn't look like any EEA members are coming to have a frank and apologetic conversation with me, and I know they can do portals and shit, so I guess they don’t want to talk.”

I pulled my gun once again and took aim.

“Are you seriously going to do this?” demanded one of the nobles. “Get out of here now and take this stupid business with you.”

I paused, looking at her. “Huh. You know, you remind me a lot of a pony named Limestone Pie, at least an alternate universe version of her. She was kind of a bitch like you.”

“Limestone Pie?” said the mare, turning up her nose. “What a common, low-class name. What does she do?”

“Heroin, mostly.” I hastened to add, “But that doesn’t make you better than her. If anything, I’m dissapointed that you’re a bitch and don’t even need to be.”

“How dare you!”

“It’s pretty easy,” I said.

“That wasn’t a question!”

I looked at the floor in thought. “Jeeze, maybe I should kill you instead.” I looked up. “But I mean, that’s the beauty of high capacity magazines: I don’t have to choose.”

Her husband slid in front of her. “Now, now, let’s not be too hasty.” He turned. “Just look at her face, you’ve broken her.”

Sure enough, the mare wore a blank look, one eye occasionally twitching. “Did that happen when I called her a bitch?”

“I don’t think anypony’s ever done that before,” he said.

I shrugged. “If it can be destroyed by the truth, it deserves to be destroyed by the truth.”

“Like you?” said Celestia.

“Shut up.”

“You can’t just tell the princess to shut up!” interjected a guard, who had been nervously watching the whole exchange.

“Shut up.” I shook my head. “Where was I? Oh yeah, killing Baby Cakes.”

“Please, no!” She raised her hooves.

I sighed, rolling my eyes. “God, this posse went so far off the rails. It was supposed to be about justice but it turned into some sort of bullshit sentimental political quagmire.”

“Her name Baby Cakes and she teach home-ec?” said Yona. “She bake cake?”

“I can…” said Baby Cakes.

“Cake! Cake! Cake!” the kids began to chant.

I let out a long sigh and put my gun away. “Goddamnit.”

I brooded for a while that things hadn’t gone how I planned, but it did turn out to be pretty damn good cake. We kept Baby Cakes in cuffs because she still wasn’t trustworthy, but my mood started to improve, and by the time we were back at the submarine I had started to consider the posse successful. We’d not only eliminated another member of SSS, but we’d gained a cake baker.

I swaggered back into the bar with the posse behind me. Everyone was talking and laughing, and filled up the room as they came in.

I caught Guinness’ attention. “Whiskey for my men, beer for my horses.”

Guinness frowned. He leaned closer and quietly asked, “Which ones are which?”

Comments

[frostfiresnow]

Would i be wrong in assuming that twilight is a robot, whom after weeks of abuse from valiant, goes back in time to change the past, only to be killed by past valiant which in turn leads to events of season 2 -present?

Probably not...

[Lithl]

http://www.loony-archivist.com/babycakes/page1.htm

Also:

Particularly the dragon, Ember.

Should be Smolder here.

[totallynotabrony]

8934512
Fixed

[totallynotabrony]

8934504
I mean, that's at least as good as what I already had planned. Maybe. That might require going back and reading seasons 2+

[WanderingPony]

I see what this chapter was about, one of the most important choices you can be given to make.

Cake, or Death?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMMHUzm22oE

[Coretz]

I wore my autodarkening sunglasses and sat on the tailgate as we flew. Twilight came to sit with me, holding a hoof on her cowboy hat to keep it from blowing away. I felt Tin Mare adjust slightly, apparently compensating for a change in weight balance. Yona sat down on the other side of me. That explained that.

(emphasis mine). They're called transitions and yes, they are freaking awesome. I have a pair of prescription transition glasses, and they're my favorite glasses ever.

“Is it broken?” I asked. “I’ve never actually had to deal with a pony breaking a leg before. I didn't think they were that fragile, Mystic.” I pulled out my Desert Eagle, but paused halfway through the draw. “Um…”

Lol I thought this was going to be a reference to Ghandi—"A super calloused fragile mystic hexed by halitosis", but then remember the optional nickname...

[totallynotabrony]

8998686
Oh, just you wait. Give it three or four months.

[Amos Anon]

I caught Guinness’ attention. “Whiskey for my men, beer for my horses.”

I hate that song, but appreciate the reference. I'm conflicted... does this make me one of those "nuanced" people, or just an idiot?