One of These Things is Not Like The Other
“I’m telling you, she’s the best pony ever! I worked on her for weeks, getting her backstory all right and everything!”
“I don’t know man, she looks kind of… well, terrible.”
“Hey, don’t you dare call Nightblade Bloodmoon terrible!”
“…That’s it Josh, I give up.”
In the middle of a dark forest, beside a solid stone pillar toppled over onto its side, a shape rose up from the murky gloom. A pair of eyes, one green and one blood-red with cat-like pupils, opened and blinked. The owner glanced around her surroundings with complete confusion. A black hoof touched a puffy red-and-black mane, coming away with a tiny trickle of blood.
Wincing, the figure got to its own four hooves and looked down at where it had been laying.
“That’s… odd.”
She felt strange talking, almost like it was her first time. But it couldn’t be, after all she had memories of doing it before. Granted they were fuzzy, but they were there.
Beneath her hooves was a large scorch mark, three times the size of her. Sniffing, she could smell brimstone and sulphur, finding it not unpleasant. Her eyes caught a flash of white, and she tilted her head while leaning down to look at it.
It was a perfectly rectangular piece of paper, lines of black words written on it. Examining it closer, she found the gloom no issue as she suddenly understood what the words said.
“Name: Nightblade Bloodmoon.”
‘Huh, guess that must be my name,’ she figured, reading on.
“Half-Alicorn, half-zebra, half-changeling mare. Two-thousand years old but doesn’t age, super-awesome, super-strong, faster than even Sonic (and we know he’s the fastest), everypony loves her and finds her amazing, long-lost sister of…”
Nightblade could feel herself changing while she was reading, her body feeling different. She felt stronger, faster, more beautiful, more… unique. Slowly the doubt and confusion at the situation changed, her face gaining a smile. Looking back down at the paper, she shrugged and began to trot away.
“I don’t need any paper to tell me how great I am,” Nightblade chortled to herself as she headed into the dark forest. “I already know that I’m awesome.”
“You have the right to beg for your life, before we shoot you. You have the right to plead to whatever deity you worship, before we shoot you. You have the right to lament ever being filthy pirates in my subsector, before we shoot you. You have the right…”
Khewzis tightened his grip on the silver weapon he had looted from the storage of the Lambian research vessel, watching from behind the upturned table as the external hatch was steadily being cut through from the other side while the muffled threats continued. His three long fingers were just able to fit around the trigger designed for a stubby set of two, his Captain unfortunately having shot the entire crew and staff of scientists who had been the previous owners. A shame, he was certain that one of them would have at least of been able to remove the pesky trigger guard.
The blue line swiftly cutting through the door neared the end of the heavy-duty lock, the strange white metal not able to withstand whatever device was being used. Looking to his left, Khewzis saw that the other fifteen members of the pirate crew were ready with their own weapons. They only had the standard laser weapons of their homeworld, he managing to be the only one to find an alien gun on the ship.
“That alien toy of yours better work,” his captain, Huzart the Black called out from behind a crate. “If not, I’ll sell you on the slave market.”
Contrary to his name, Huzart was not actually black. Like all Tremions he had marvellous green feathers and a red beak, but the colour was more accurate in describing his twin hearts. When they had taken over the ship back in the last system, the crew had been swiftly put to the laser gun despite their easy surrender.
‘Could have used them as shields,’ Khewzis thought sourly. ‘Those fat little furballs aren’t good for much else.’
Any further thoughts regarding the previous crew were forgotten when the lock on the door fizzled, the clamps releasing. Bracing himself, Khewzis peered over the table with his looted gun at the ready. With any luck, it would be able to splatter whatever law-enforcement was awaiting on the other side.
“Ready, boys!” Captain Huzart yelled while waving his energy cutlass. “Nobody takes ships from the Lime-Flyer gang!”
Khewzis ducked behind his cover when a solid boom filled the narrow corridor, the circular hatch door flying off its hinge and bouncing off a wall. The solid hunk of metal came to rest on the floor, and he peeked up again to see what foe they faced.
Out of the billowing cloud of smoke advanced a bipedal black form, blue eyes piercing through the smog. It was a little shorter than a standard Tremion, even in its armour, and Khewzis was easily able to identify the alien.
‘Humans,’ he realised, frowning while more of them stormed the corridor with more care than their apparent leader. The grey-armoured ones with large, rectangular energy shields he could identify as regular space-borne human troops, but the one in black was a different matter. For one, instead of the practised entry being performed by the regular troops, the unknown merely walked out like he was invincible.
“Shoot them!” the Captain ordered with a fierce squawk.
Lasers shot out from the defended positions, Khewzis waiting to see if they worked. Unfortunately the red beams dissipated when they hit the large shields sheltering the main party of boarders, and seemed to merely scorch the armour of the creature in charge. In turn, return fire flashed out, blue energy bolts striking cover and the surrounding area. He was largely ignored, not having fired at all yet. That was soon to change, Khewzis leaning out to take aim at the laughing leader.
“Yo Ho Ho!” the black-armoured human chortled over the din, its large side arm blasting a hole through a crate and the chest of a pirate. “And a bottle of-“
Khewzis fired.
His gun glowed a brilliant pink, sparkles showing up briefly in his vision and a loud twinkling sound filling his ears. A wave of energy shot out of the squat barrel and smacked the insane alien leader in the chest plate, Khewzis wondering what would come next.
Instead of an explosion, the beam blasting out of the human, or even worse the shot just bouncing off, his mysterious weapon’s shot seemed to completely obliterate the biped. One second the creature was mocking them in their own language, the next it was gone. There was a slight cessation in the weapons fire, both sides equally confused to what had just happened.
”Good shot Khewzis!” the Captain cried out, both sides shooting again. “Get another of them!”
He would have been happy to comply, but unfortunately the humans had other ideas. All of the human soldiers stopped shooting once again and took cover behind their shields, two small cylinders flying out over them and heading towards the line of barricades.
‘Well, at least I got one,’ Khewzis mused, before the grenades exploded mid-air to shred him and his fellow pirates apart with thousands of metal balls.
“-Rum!”
The human in black armour finished his sentence a split-second before slamming down helmet-first into an empty wooden cart, his bulk shattering it into splinters. Naturally, teleporting into existence horizontally and then falling two metres onto his face was a bit of a surprise. Taking a moment to regain his composure, he stood up from the wreckage and retrieved his side-arm from beside him.
Due to his method of arrival and the sudden lack of pirates and laser-fire, he figured that examining his surrounds was the best bet. Looking out through his helmet’s visor, Nigel M Chalmers was greeted with a sight he didn’t expect.
“Okay then, not on a pirate ship anymore.”
He appeared to be standing in the middle of a market place, a horde of brightly coloured equines staring at him with mouths agape. Okay, it was less of a horde and more around the number of eighteen, but the pastel coloured ponies still unnerved him. Still, he had pirates to slay, so he raised a hand and waved at the creatures.
“Greetings, I come in peace. Take me to your-“ he stopped himself, unable to follow through with the line. “Spaceport.”
There was no reply, so Nigel sent a command through his helmet’s computer to find the information on the race he was speaking with. While it searched through the lengthy collection of the United Imperium of Planets databank, he tried to get a better idea of the locals from observation.
The males and females were easily identifiable, the difference in body shape and muzzle length making it easy. The majority of them were naked save for some straw hats and the occasional apron, but that didn’t rattle him considering there were many species who either didn’t have normally-visible genitals or didn’t care if others saw them.
After all, one of his best friends constantly bragged about his retractable reptilian reproductive rod as if it somehow made up for his measly height.
On the topic of height, Nigel judged that the horses were averaging around his armoured thighs, with a few of the larger males reaching his stomach. They were all a variety of colours that he could only describe as ‘happy’, mostly rich earthy tones such as reds, greens and chocolate browns. In addition to the vibrant manes and coats, they possessed extremely wide eyes and child-like tattoos on their flanks.
‘So,’ he thought to himself while slowly lowering his hand. ‘They’re either extremely poisonous or have no natural enemies.’
“No match found.”
“Okay then,” he muttered to himself at the computer’s notification. “Search network, authentication code three-seven-nine-one.”
“No connection to external databanks. No local signals.”
‘Wonderful.’ He looked around again, this time focusing on the buildings. They were nice but primitive, mainly built out of painted wood and stone with glass windows. ‘Out of a galaxy where you bump into space-faring races every five minutes, and into the backwaters.’
“Hey,” he tried once again, hoping that by a longshot the horses spoke English. “You guys don’t happen to have a star-map of the local area?”
No response.
“A tourist brochure?”
Silence.
“… space-phone?”
Still nothing, Nigel trying a different tactic.
“Achung? Konichiwa? G’day Mate?”
Despite his moderate understanding of each of the main language groups for the UIP, all was for naught. Nigel was about to fire-off a barrage of greetings from his suit’s database, but then finally it happened.
One of the horses spoke.
Well, the large grey stallion didn’t really speak, it was more of a… nay. Still, this prompted more nays from the others, except these ones were hushed. The alternating lengths of the alien speech, the buildings, and their simple attire led him to believe that they were intelligent. Either that or there was a rogue animal collector with serious mental issues.
Setting his computer to decipher the language, he tried to keep the locals talking to help it along. “Okay, well, I guess we can all work with this. I just need you guys to keep on making horsy sounds so let’s hear some more questions.”
The grey stallion tilted his head to the side and made to speak again, but it wasn’t a nay that Nigel heard. No, instead he received a loud whinny right from behind him.
Slowly turning around with the intent of not startling the horses, Chalmers came face to face with a very pissed off mare. The yellow pony was pointing to his feet and naying angrily at him, short green mane bouncing erratically as she fixed him with a glare from narrowed green eyes. Looking down, Nigel saw the splinters and two wheels, wincing under his helmet before looking back up. “I take it that you own this wagon… or used to?”
His words seemed to only make her angrier, but thankfully she backed off and retreated to a stall.
“I’ll pay for it!” he called out to her, hoping to smooth it over. “I mean, I don’t exactly have sugar-cubes on me, but I’ve got some-“
His offer was cut short when the first tomato splattered his helmet with red juice, his suit optics briefly sizzling to clear his vison of the fluid.
“Hey, ma’am, there’s no need for that!” A second tomato striking his chest only highlighted the fact that there had been a serious breakdown of communications, Nigel dodging a third. As the forth and five flew towards him despite three other horses naying at the mare in what he suspected was an attempt to get her to stop, he began to get a little pissed off.
His day had been wonderful up until the present; he’d even gotten to help the navy marines from the outpost he’d been stationed on board a passing pirate ship. Hell, he’d blasted a bird-pirate away to space Davy Jones. Then, he’d ended up in the boonies and now his armour was covered with tomato guts, courtesy of the angry horse who still wasn’t letting up.
“I said stop, you crazy horse!” Fed up with the assault, Nigel raised his handgun towards the pony and took aim. Despite being irked enough to kill her, he was lucky enough to have a brief flash of clarity. Aiming instead for the tomatoes the horse was using for ammunition, he fired a single shot.
A hypersonic round shot from the large barrel and plunged into the midst of tomatoes, the volatile chemicals in its core causing it to explode a split second later.
The ponies panicked at the loud gunshot, the mare who had been attacking diving to the ground after being coated with tomato chunks. Still annoyed at having his armour soiled, Nigel’s eye twitched at the uproar of panicked horse noises. Raising his gun so the barrel was pointing up into the air, he shouted at them all. “Hey, she bloody started it!”
Not thinking clearly, Nigel fired a second shot.
The panic only increased.
“Wow, I’m drop-dead gorgeous.”
Nightblade Bloodmoon grinned at her reflection in the clear lake, the perfect image of a mare looking back at her. Her red and black speckled horn, sharp fangs, luminous red and green eyes, and striped coat were amazing. Turning to her left, she unfurled a large bat wing and examined the black membrane. ‘Awesome.’ Spreading the other one, she delighted in the large wingspan and the pointed claws on the points.
She also caught sight of another object of interest, a picture sitting on the side of a plump-but-not-too-plump flank. It was a pony skull and crossbones, Nightblade wondering what it meant. ‘My… cutie mark,’ she recalled, tilting her head before smiling. ‘It looks cool, so that must be my special talent: coolness.’
Checking her short tail, just long enough to hide her other notable features from view, she gave the black and red strands a swish.
“So sexy,” she giggled, before her ultra-sensitive bat-ears picked up a loud noise to her left. It was a bang, followed by another one a moment later. Getting the feeling that she was supposed to go see what the noise was, Nightblade ambled off through the forest without a care in the world.
No bush scratched her coat, and no branch waylaid her as she made her way towards the edge. She hadn’t even seen any animals or monsters save from some harmless birds in the trees. Making it to a gap in the forest where the sun was shining through, she peered out as another bang rang out.
“Wow,” she murmured, looking out across the neat fields of grass and flowers towards the small town in the distance. “I’m so lucky that there’s a town right there, and a nice one at that.” Whistling to herself, she left the forest and trotted merrily on her way. Her stomach growled, Nightblade thinking to herself.
‘I sure hope they have lots of yummy food, I’m starving!’ It was then that she stopped whistling, head lowering.
“But… I don’t have any money.” Her good mood crushed, Nightblade’s pace slowed and she sighed. “I’ll have to do some work if I want to eat, it’s either that or yucky grass.” Her forehoof struck out at a clump of the before-mentioned vegetation, turning out to be a bad move. The impact unbalanced her, tripping her over and sending her tumbling down the hill head-over-hooves.
Luckily she landed in a soft bed of flowers, Nightblade breathing out a sigh of relief when she realised she was unharmed. However, there was a strange feeling under her stomach, and when she stood up her eyes widened.
“Wait, is this-?” Effortlessly, she used her magic to lift up the black saddlebag, popping the clasp and peering inside. A black hoof opened the sack that was the sole objet inside, revealing a glittering pile of golden coins. “Money!” Nightblade announced with glee, before closing the saddlebag and placing it onto her back. “Now I can buy all of the food I want!”
Trotting and whistling again, a very pleased Nightblade reached the town without even breaking a sweat. Nopony greeted her, causing her to tilt her head and advance down the only cobbled path. “Hello?” she called out, glancing around her. “Do you ponies sell quadruple-choc cupcakes?” Apart from a few terrified eyes peering out of windows, she got no response. Frowning, Midnight rounded the corner and found herself in a market place.
Stalls and carts piled with fruit and vegetables were abandoned, a group of five ponies huddled down on the ground with their forelegs over their heads. They were whimpering fearfully, pitchforks and hoes abandoned beside them while a guttural grunting barked out. Looking towards the source of the noise, Nightblade’s eyes widened with awe at the sight.
It was an intimidating two-legged creature, covered with metal that was as black as her stripes with spots of red all over it. It was so tall, nearly as high as the top of the signs above the stalls. The strange speech sounded male, and Nightblade’s mind instantly identified it as such. He was waving some kind of object around while yelling, but it was his chest that she was drawn to.
For on the left breast was a small picture of a white skull with a third eye in the forehead.
She glanced at her own cutie mark and back towards the creature’s, her heart fluttering madly.
“We’re meant to be together,” she murmured, a wide smile growing on her face. Then, she did a happy little bounce. She’d managed to find someone else who was red and black, and he was obviously angry, dangerous, and a different species that seemed to have no interest in making friends.
For some reason, it made a tingle shoot down her spine.
She had to have him.
“But no, tomatoes weren’t enough, were they? Then, you had to go and get pitchforks and farming equipment like I’m some kind of Frankenstein’s monster! I broke a god-damn wagon, and I’m bloody sorry about that, but you stupid horses won’t even stop whimpering so my arse of a computer can translate your stupid horse language!”
Continuing to rage, Nigel moved the barrel of his gun from one pony to the next. Each time the barrel passed over the stallions, they’d close their eyes and flinch back. Needless to say, Chalmers was quickly running out of patience.
“Come on, you… you… peasants! Nay some more! Speak! Hell, even begging for your lives could help!” He was only met with more whimpering, his finger tightening around the trigger. “I swear, if I don’t get some coherent speech in three seconds, I’m going to off you all and drag out another bunch of sorry saps!”
Starting with a brown stallion on the left, he pointed his gun towards the head. “One. Two. Th-“
“Nay!”
Just as he was about to make a very bloody encouragement, a red and black blur smacked into his side and tossed him onto the ground. Realising he was now on his back facing up, Nigel tried to sit up and positively dismember whatever had attacked him.
Unfortunately, he was pinned down with two forelegs firmly placed on his armoured shoulders. Looking up at his assailant, he stared at the small creature that had somehow managed to knock him off his feet despite him wearing armour that could take a rocket to the chest. To say that the rapidly naying abomination above him was a surprise didn’t really cut it.
Frozen with confusion, Nigel couldn’t look away as the monster continued to stare deeply into his optics while blathering on merrily. An attempt to raise the gun towards it was for naught, the single hoof somehow keeping his entire power-armoured arm from budging. His legs were likewise useless, the thing that he suspected was some kind of mare standing on them as well.
“You fucking what?” he questioned, recovering enough from his shock to address the attacker. Behind her, he could see the five ponies he had been on the verge of shooting rise up. Judging from the looks of utter confusion on their faces while they stared at the monster, he figured that it wasn’t exactly the norm for them either.
“Get off me!” he commanded, straining his limbs to escape. “I’ll skin you for a rug!” In return the mare giggled before restarting her nays, a smile plastered over her face. She had a set of sharp fangs, but it wasn’t her teeth or sharp horn that had him worried. No, his concern was saved for the look of what he could only guess was adoration in the mismatched eyes.
He desperately hoped that he was wrong.
“Look, uh, Miss,” he began, anger dropping from his tone. “I can’t really understand you, but I promise that if you let me go then I’ll leave town. Also, I certainly won’t just shoot you dead if you do. Okay?” The thing nodded before naying again, evidently having no idea what he had said as she leaned down and nuzzled the side of his helmet. That was the last straw, Nigel thrashing again.
“That’s it, you think that this is a joke!? I’ll gut you and send your-“
He was interrupted by another happy nay, Nigel preparing to unleash a tide of insults at the merry maniac.
“Translation complete.”
“-and then we’ll get married, have a wonderful honeymoon with lots of secret adult stuff, have a cuddly-wuddly baby, then have another…”
To be honest, he was stumped.
“The hell did I miss?” Nigel grunted, the mare standing on him gasping.
“You can talk!”
“Obviously,” he snarled back. “Even if I really shouldn’t be able to, considering the translator had squat to work with.” He narrowed his eyes, even if she couldn’t see them. “Now kindly get off me.”
The mare smiled sheepishly before leaping off to the side. “Oh, sorry,” she chuckled, rubbing the back of her head with a hoof and failing to notice Nigel aim his gun towards her. “I don’t really know my own strength, so I guess I have to be careful now that you’re my coltfriend.”
He paused. “I’m your what?”
“My coltfriend,” she repeated. “You know, my special somepony, my lovely lover, my ultra-special super-dooper cuddle-cutie.” She tilted her head. “You did say so, after all.”
Nigel actually threw up a little inside of his mouth. Swallowing the bile, he raised his left hand and counted off on his fingers.
“No I’m not. No. Hell no. I’d rather shoot myself.” All ‘coltfriend’ variations accounted for, he pointed at her. “Besides, my suit only started translating then, so there’s no way I could have agreed to that. I don’t even know your name.”
The pony puffed out her chest proudly, spreading her batwings out wide. “Nightblade Bloodmoon, most amazing pony in the whole of the world!”
Nigel nearly vomited again. Forcing it down, he turned his head to look at the brown stallion from before. The pony was staring at Nightblade with his mouth agape, but he looked at Nigel when he noticed the attention.
“Psst, is she… normal?”
The stallion shook his head, Nigel able to understand why he couldn’t find the words to reply. To be honest, even with all of the stuff he’d seen this still ranked among the highest on the ‘mind-fuckery’ scale.
“Oh honey,” Nightblade cooed softly. “Of course I’m not normal, I’m your very special marefriend.”
“Special is definably the word I’d use,” he muttered back, Nightblade too busy fixing him with a love-struck gaze to reply. It freaked him out, only the fact that he didn’t know what else she was capable of stopping him from putting a round through her skull. “Look, Nightblade,” he sighed. “I know you think I said I’d be your ‘coltfriend’, and I’m… flattered that you really seem keen, but I don’t think it will work out.”
Nightblade’s smile faltered. “But… you said you loved me and wanted to spend the rest of your days with me.”
“No,” he said with the upmost conviction. “I would rather be placed alive in a vat of battery acid for the rest of eternity.” He waited for her to break down into tears and leave him alone, but the pony-abomination instead raised a hoof and smiled again.
“I get it,” she nodded wisely. “Your ‘translator’ is broken.”
“Actually,” the brown stallion finally found his voice. “I think he’s made it clear that he’s-“
“In love with me!” Nightblade cheered with a flutter of her wings, before looking back at Nigel. “Don’t worry my love, I understand fully. You can’t help what you’re saying, you’re still learning.”
Nigel’s eye twitched. “I’m still getting pretty sick of this shit,” he corrected. “What don’t you understand about ‘I would rather suffer extreme agony than date you’?”
“Oh no, it’s not me that doesn’t understand. You’re just saying the wrong things.” She sat down on her rump, her tail swishing. “That’s what I love about you, you’re so assertive and confident even when you’re wrong.”
“You’ve known me for less than ten minutes!”
Nightblade’s eyes fluttered as she sighed dreamily. “Best ten minutes of my life. I can only imagine how great it’ll be a hundred years from now.”
He’d had enough. Standing up, Nigel holstered his gun and looked down at the horse-monster that had attempted to claim him as a lover.
For whatever damn reason.
“Nope.”
Turning around, he started to walk down the cobbled road, leaving a stunned Nightblade behind.
She didn’t know what had gone wrong. For some reason, her coltfriend was leaving the town without so much as a goodbye. Had she been too direct and rash?
‘Of course not,’ Nightblade shook her head. ‘I’m perfect after all.’
It must have been something wrong with…
With…
“Whoops,” she huffed. “That’s it, I forgot to ask his name. Wow, no wonder he’s acting a bit strange.” She glanced around, only a single pony remaining. It was a brown-coated stallion with a tan mane, the same one who had tried to talk before. He was staring at her strangely. “What?”
“What… what are you?” He questioned, taking a slow step back. “That thing was terrifying, but you… you’re just confusing.”
‘Confusing?’
“I’m not confusing,” Nightblade retorted. “I’m a half-alicorn, half-zebra, half-changeling. How much simpler do you want it?”
The stallion blinked. “That doesn’t even add up.”
“Yeah, well…” she struggled for something to say. “You are the one who doesn’t add up, I am. I’m awesome you know, I’m smart, I’m pretty. You’re…” she looked him over, rolling her eyes at his colour scheme. “So boring and plain, not like my sweetheart.” She licked her fangs at the memory of her lover, the stallion’s eyes widening at her long tongue and sharp teeth.
He took another step back, smiling awkwardly at her while retreating. “Well, ah, good luck with that. I’m just going to… to get back to the farm. Bye!”
Nightblade tilted her head when he broke into a full gallop, the pony disappearing around the side of a store. Then, she remembered her rapidly disappearing coltfriend, and she broke into a hurried trot down the road he had left.
“Sweetie! I’m sorry I didn’t ask your name, wait up!”
Galloping, her hooves propelled her along the road at a breakneck pace. Searching ahead of her, she saw her target walking ahead of her. His back was towards her, Nightblade worried that she had hurt his feelings.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t ask you your name and that makes me a bad marefriend!”
‘Actually, I’m a great marefriend, you’re just feeling funny.’
“Bugger off, leave me alone you crazy thing!”
Closing the distance, Nightblade skidded to a halt in front of him and turned around so she was trotting backwards. Looking up to him, she tried to peer into the glowing blue eyes that were staring straight ahead. “I’m sorry, please don’t be mad.” She got no response. “What’s your name?”
“Nigel,” the biped growled.
“See, that wasn’t hard!”
Her encouragement caused him to stop, Nigel finally looking down at her. Figuring they were taking a break, Nightblade sat down on her rump and waved up at him.
Nigel in return moved his hand towards his side, a part of the metal sliding back. He then pulled out the L-shaped object he had been holding at the market, Nightblade staring into the black hole in the middle of it. “Oh, what’s that?”
“One chance,” Nigel muttered, the object moving closer. “This is your one chance. Leave, now, and I won’t have to shoot you. Normally I’d already have done this, but I believe I need some time to figure out my situation.” He took a step towards her, Nightblade wondering what he was doing. “Go on, leave.”
“But I can’t,” she explained, smiling at him. “Don’t you understand? We’re coltfriend and marefriend now.”
Nigel sighed, before shrugging his shoulders. “Fine, your choice. No-one can say that I didn’t warn you.” With that, his finger moved on the device, pulling the small thing underneath it. Nightblade tilted her head at his words.
“Huh?” she questioned while he looked down at the thing in his hand. “What do you mean by that?”
“The hell is wrong with this?” Nigel ignored her, pointing the object towards a tree by the side of the road. Nightblade winced and folded her ears down at the loud bang, the tree gaining a smoking hole through its trunk. Before she could ask what had happened, Nigel turned the loud thing back on her and once again tried to use it.
Nothing happened.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” he groaned, Nightblade looking back up to see him place a hand over his head. “Please tell me that this isn’t happening.”
She could tell that he wasn’t happy, despite the unmoving face of his. Moving closer, she did the one thing she thought could solve the problem, hoping to get her one-of-a-kind coltfriend back to his cheery self.
Moving closer, she embraced him around the legs, nuzzling his metal thighs to calm him. “There, there. It’ll all be okay. I’m here for you.” Moving her head away to look back up at him, she gave him a warm smile. “See? There’s no need to storm off like before. I’m so proud of you for staying this time.” Hugging him again, she failed to notice his hands clenching into fists.
“Actually,” he replied slowly. “I’m currently trying my hardest to kick you, but for some reason my armour has decided that now is the perfect time to lock up.” Nightblade felt the tiniest tremor in the legs she was hugging, but she paid it no mind. “Let go, now.”
Releasing him, she got to her hooves and beamed. “Ready to go again?” She only got a stare in response. “Where are we going, by the way?”
Nigel didn’t tell her, instead he started to walk along the road in silence. Sighing and rolling her eyes, Nightblade followed along steadily.
‘The things I do for him,’ she thought to herself, hooves clacking on the cobbled path while they both headed towards the east.
She was still following him, following him without rest. He didn’t know what was wrong with her, but he was one-hundred percent certain that she was insane.
“Of course, out of all of the planets to be marooned on, I manage to find one with an obsessive stalker. One that’s apparently immune to anything I try.” He glanced back after his muttering, not surprised to find his tormenter trailing along behind. She wasn’t even puffing, an oddity considering that the sun was about to sink below the horizon and they hadn’t stopped at all.
There were of course other concerns. He’d tried to stab her, but his knife had constantly slipped from his grip before impact. Shooting her had no effect, his gun either jamming only to shoot as normal once he’d pointed it elsewhere, or the trigger not moving at all. He’d even shot a tranquilizer dart into her, but rather than knock her out it had seemingly filled her with energy. He half-suspected that she was some kind of prank his bosses were pulling on him, but even they weren’t that cruel.
“Hey, it’s getting late,” the thing commented from behind him. “We should find somewhere to stop for the night.”
“Tired?” he grumbled, not even bothering to throw in an insult.
“Nope!” she answered. “But you’ve been going pretty slow for the last few hours, so I bet you are.”
Resisting the urge to turn around and smack here, guessing that his hand would fall off or some other nonsense happening, Nigel instead veered off the road towards the fields of grass beside it. Spotting a knoll breaking up the flat landscape, he made his way over towards it without looking back.
It wasn’t a large hill, but it was big enough to hide him from the view from the road. Not bothering with a fire or anything else, he sat down with his back against the mound just as the sun suddenly dropped down and the moon came up. ‘Huh, that’s pretty damn odd.’
Unfortunately he had no time to ponder the cosmic oddity, the abomination sitting down beside him but thankfully not touching him.
“I’m hungry.”
“Then eat some grass.”
“No! Grass is icky!”
Closing his eyes for a few moments, Nigel opened them gain before turning towards her. She looked up at him hopefully, forelegs between her splayed out hind ones. “I don’t have anything for you.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“Are you really sure?”
His eye twitched. “Yes, yes I am sure.”
“Maybe you should check just in case?”
“I swear to god! Okay then, let’s check to see whether I have any pony feed on me!” He opened up the internal sidearm holsters on each side of his torso armour. “No food in here!” The small thigh compartments were next, only revealing medical supplies. “Zilch!” Next was the chest storage area, Nigel making an exaggerated check. “Nothin…”
“What? Did you find something?” Nightblade’s tail swished.
“Yeah,” Nigel muttered, passing her the oddly-placed and strangely fresh plastic-wrapped sandwich. Nightblade took it from him and eagerly unwrapped it, devouring the food with satisfied munches.
“Mmm, peanut butter and jelly, my favourite!”
“Well, wasn’t that lucky,” Nigel mumbled, not focusing on her annoying sounds at all. No, what interested him were the cylinders and rectangular blocks packed into the storage, the high explosives almost like a gift from the gods.
‘Soon,’ he thought to himself, closing the compartment and leaning back. He didn’t even brush Nightblade off when she placed a batwing around his shoulders. ‘Soon…’
Something was off.
Nightblade sleepily opened her eyes, still able to taste peanut butter in her mouth as she sat up and yawned. It was still night, a full moon shining down from above, and as she looked around she realised that she couldn’t see any trace of Nigel.
“Honey?” she called out, before noticing a weight around her neck. Moving her hooves up to touch it, she stared at the black rectangle after pulling it away from the rope. “Huh?” With it still in her hooves, Nightblade realised that there were more rectangles and cylinders under her legs and lying around her. “Gifts?” she wondered with a growing smile, raising the rectangle to her face in order to get a better look.
“As I walk through the valley of death, I fear no evil.”
Nigel stood in the bushes by the road, zoomed optics focusing on the pony licking the rectangle of plastic explosives in what seemed to be some kind of taste test.
“For I have strapped plastic explosives around the greatest evil in that valley.”
His finger mimed flipping the cap off a detonator, no need for one as the explosives were linked to his suit’s computer. Meanwhile, Nightblade was holding the block up to her ear.
“And I now throw it into the cleansing light.”
With his last line, he smiled and sent the detonation order.
The night sky glowed bright, a massive explosion sucking the surrounding air in before consuming the entire hill and field with a raging inferno. A fireball shot up from the centre, dirt and ash raining down while thick smoke filled the air. The massive boom would have deafened him if it wasn’t for his armour, pebbles that had previously been boulders pelting against the metal and bouncing off.
The heat alone scorched the leaves from nearby trees, blackening the once green ground.
Nigel basked in the warm aftermath, laughing to himself with his fists in the air. “Finally, victory!” Almost hopping from foot to foot, he gazed back out to the freshly made crater and felt a shiver of ecstasy shoot up his spine at sheer size of it. Nothing could have survived the blast, Nigel having used all of his high-explosives to ensure Nightblade’s removal from existence.
Feeling the need to gloat further, he strolled up to the lip of the crater while dancing around the flickering spot fires. It was over, sweet release from his torment arriving to save him none too soon.
Stopping at the edge and looking down, he almost fell into the crater thanks to the shock.
At the bottom for the twenty-metre deep hole, Nightblade was sitting on a patch of grass holding her left foreleg. A small gash about three inches long was visible in the fur, slowly leaking a small amount of blood. Noticing him, she looked up with a sniffle.
“Nigel, I’ve got a cut on my leg. It’s bleeding!”
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This girl is the ultimate pony clusterfuck. But that's not necessarily a bad thing...
More Nigel... I am so happy right now
Meh, she's not really complete without 10% Tatzlwurm in the mix.
Wow, guess Nigel is in for some trying days.
Woo, I'm on time for this party!
Y'know, only one chapter and I think this might be my favorite one.
6666 words, thats good start xD
Wha?
...BWHAHAHA! I don't know whether to pity Nigel or pity the world of this madness!
What the fuck are you on.
Congrats. It's been a very long time since someone did anything good with a black and red alicorn oc.
Oh dear... Invasion of the Mary Sues.
I just thought of an alternate title...
Nigel M. Chalmers Vs. the Bad OC.
~Crystalline Electrostatic~
50% more awesome.
It's as if Zecora, Luna, Rainbow Dash, and Chrysalis had a baby.
Dropbear, I swear to Profit, the Technocyte Virus, the Void and any other god, if you let this story become another "Predator turned Prey" I will rip you open and have a Kubrow make a nest out of you. Do NOT put this on hiatus!
-Alad V, Prophet of the Mutalist Empire
... One half is fifty percent, and a whole is one hundred percent. That is, in fact, three halves.
I believe that you can do the math easily enough to figure out the problem with this is.
5932268
Yeah. It means Nightblade Bloodmoon is 150%. That's 50% better than 100%.
if i was were he was i would just shoot my self in the face because there's no escaping that thing o-o
I do believe 'rouge' should be 'rogue' in this context. Unless the animal collector in question is red?
As for the story itself, pure hilarity! Nigel and Nightblade form a most... interesting couple.
I look forward to the next installment!
5932268 5932367 Not if you use calculus! Why? Because the derivative of that is 0, which you can integrate to get C. And C is, of course, arbitrary.
150% is also an arbitrary number in mathematics.
∴ Your mathematical expression is invalid.
5932268
5932976
southparkstudios.mtvnimages.com/images/shows/south-park/clip-thumbnails/season-10/1006/south-park-s10e06c02-awareness-of-manbearpig-16x9.jpg
Kind of reminds me of Assassination Classroom, except Korosensei isn't annoying. I'm enjoying it so far, so i'll favorite.
Dropbear, what have you created?
I'm confused and intrigued. Continue.
5932268
Satire:
noun
1.
the use of irony, sarcasm, ridicule, or the like, in exposing, denouncing, or deriding vice, folly, etc.
5932694
Damn, that one always, always gets me.
5933139
An abomination.
5932627 The gun wouldn't work, or the OC would find a way to rez him, because he's a love interest.
5931556 Your avatar is perfect for this fic.
Damn, that is some potent protagonist armor she's got there. Someone contact the SCP, we've got a Keter-class anomaly running amuck.
reminds me or Irwin in the grim adventures of billy and mandy who said he was "half-human, half-vampire, and half-mummy"
5931956 plus she has a black coat (well black and some red stripes) and red mane
...Just noticed something. Chapter 1 is 6,666 words. Story total is 6,667 words.
Where did the extra word come from!?
Oh no.
Featured already? Wow
Oh My God
Another story with Nigel in it?
Insta fave, like, and track. Can't wait for the next chapter.
5931740
ultinomics.github.io/dantonnoriega.me/images/man-bear-pig.jpg
5933033 oh damn. you beat me to it.
5933236 (//eyeroll)
Satrical:
adjective
Containing or using satire
(Of a person or their behavior) sarcastic, critical, and/or mocking of another's words or behavior.
synonyms sarcastic, ironic, mocking, sardonic, disparaging
"it does not seem he knew I was being satirical"
(//grin)
so if the picture is anything to go by, she's a black coated, red striped, bat winged, alicorn zonyling..........my head hurts thinking of it.
Then again, if said 'obvious mary sue' is there to advance the plot in a way that puts them as the butt of every joke, then yeah, it might work. Course, if she realizes she's not infallible, well, that might be for the best.
5931740 5932005 5931956
I don't even want to know what the family tree is like.
Honestly, if I was Nigel in this story, I'dve just killed myself by now. No if ands, or buts about it. Nightblade Bloodmoon is annoying as sin, and it's only the first chapter in.
5931492 That's the secret twist you don't find out till later to add tension and character development because Nigel M Chalmers is deathly allergic to Tatzlwurm's.
It's been one chapter and I already want to strangle her. This is going to be hell for Nigel, and hilarious for me
oh my god dropbear made another story...
5933236
Hahah! The nuances of the English language can oft be difficult to work with.
Could be worse though, rouge and rogue are close enough that it's easily explained by extenuating circumstance.
At least you don't typo 'all' with 'ass' and vice versa.
Yes. I've done that.
3/2.
Your math is flawed.
I don't think my body is ready for this.
Oh well!
5932151 Please leave Best Princess out of this
You can have Cadence though, I bet she'd love the attention
-
Hey, at least she's not 100% immune to damage
Although you'd probably have to lock her in some kind of container, like maybe a TARDIS, then lock that in a container designed to hold TARDIS' like the Pandorica. Then you'd drop that into the heart of a sun, punt it into a black hole, destroy the galaxy, reset the universe to kill her and scream in horror as she is reincarnated as your wife anyway
This should be interesting
This terrified me until I realized it was satirical
How do you be half of 3 things?
5933236
FTFY
First chapter has 6,666 words and the story it self has 6,667 words... Wtf.
5933977
Math police is best police
But yeah, I agree.
She would be a triple of all...
Else she would be 150%, which is in this case not possible. Ah, who cares?
Yay, another one threw several species into one! I am not the only!
Get the nukes...
All the nukes this world has! AND THE NEXT WORLD! AND THE WORLD AFTER THE WORLD AFTER THE LAST WORLD x100000-ENDLESS!
We stand no chance...