Issue 10: Happy End!
Tootsie opened the door quietly and walked into the house. Lyra was sleeping on the couch, snoring. Tootsie sneaked past her and trotted into the kitchen. She winced – it seemed like something had died there.
The explanation could be found on the fridge. Tootsie looked at the yellow sticky note and smirked, reading Lyra’s haste hoofwriting.
Dear Bonnie,
I tried to make a dinner. Chili was mostly fine. Don’t look into the sink, please.
Love u,
Lyra
Tootsie shrugged and walked upstairs, to her room. She took off her costume and lay on the bed, sighing. Bon Bon could be back in any minute and Tootsie wasn’t sure what to expect from her. She rested her head on the pillow and looked at the ceiling.
Bon Bon knew. But Tootsie also knew that the pony she considered the more boring of her two mothers was apparently a secret agent or something of that kind. Could they swear to each other that they’d forget about it and move on?
Tootsie recalled a time when she was eavesdropping on the headmaster of her orphanage. She always knew that “Let’s give those two freaks Tootsie, she’ll do just fine.” uttered while reading the results of psychological tests didn’t mean anything good, but only now she realised what he meant.
“Tootsie?”
Tootsie gasped, opening her eyes and realising that she had fallen asleep. She turned on her bed to see Bon Bon. She wasn’t wearing the bulletproof costume or any weapons anymore, but her expression suggested that Tootsie was in trouble.
“Get up,” Bon Bon said. “We have to go.”
“Where?”
“You’ll see,” Bon Bon replied. “Take your costume with you.”
They trotted downstairs, where Lyra was still sleeping on the couch, drooling slightly. Tootsie looked at her, hoping that Lyra would wake up, but apparently a fight with feral chili left her so exhausted that even the incoming herd of yaks wouldn’t manage to do so.
Bon Bon led Tootsie to the basement. “Don’t worry,” she muttered.
“I watched too many horror movies to stop worryin’,” Tootsie replied. “Lyra let me watch ‘em,” she added, seeing Bon Bon’s expression.
“I’ll have to talk to her about that once I’m done with you,” Bon Bon replied, walking through the part of the basement scattered with various things Lyra, Bon Bon, and Tootsie didn’t need anymore, but didn’t want to throw them away either. Bon Bon walked to the shelf by the wall and lifted a jar of pickled cucumbers.
The shelf moved away, revealing an entrance to another part of the basement. Tootsie’s eyes widened: it was stacked with racks full of weapons, ponyequinns with various kinds of armour, and endless shelves of maps and gadgets Tootsie didn’t know; a large map of Equestria was hanging on the wall, pins stuck in seemingly random places.
“Wow…” Tootsie whispered. “Where did ya get all dat stuff?”
“Oh, various places,” Bon Bon muttered, grabbing a richly-ornamented dagger and sighing. “I got this one from my first marefriend.”
“And what happened to ‘er?” Tootsie asked.
Bon Bon spun the dagger and pierced the nearby shelf with it. “Long story.” She lowered her head. “Anyway… For starters, you’re a moron. You have some good ideas, but you’ll need a lot of training. Not to mention your absolute lack of tactical skills, finesse, and–”
“T-trainin’?” Tootsie raised her eyebrows.
Bon Bon patted Tootsie’s back. “You want to be a superhero. I get it. But if you want to be a superhero, you need to be a good one.” She took Tootsie’s torn outfit and looked at it. “This thing only slows you down and makes you more visible.”
“Well, da outfit is da point of bein’ a superhero, innit?” Tootsie asked.
“Too bright,” Bon Bon said. “You want it to show your patriotism, make a small detail to show that. Dark colours are much better.” She walked to one of the ponyequinns and took a black and grey bulletproof suit off of it. “It should be your size. You can paint a small flag on it, but that’s all I allow.”
“Why do dey even make ‘em filly-sized?” Tootsie asked. “Also, my suit is also bulletproof.”
“And much heavier. Also, look.” Bon Bon took one of the metal plates out of Tootsie’s old suit and grabbed a small gun from the rack. She threw a plate in the air and shot at it. The bullet hit the piece of metal and pierced it clean, bouncing off the ceiling and falling on the ground in the distant part of the basement.
“That was one of the weakest guns I have here,” Bon Bon said, lifting the plate. “Imagine what’d happen if one of those kids shot you.”
“Bloody hell,” Tootsie muttered.
“Indeed,” Bon Bon said. “On a side note, you hardly use your potential. Like, you’re a unicorn and you beat ponies up with a lead pipe? You shouldn’t let them come close; you’re not fast enough for them. Also, I’ve heard about that history with Silver Spoon’s mansion. You’re good with disguising yourself, changing your voice… And yet all you could come up with to defeat those filly scouts was a frontal attack.”
“It worked,” Tootsie muttered.
“Till you met Cranberry Crisp who changed your head into a jar of jelly,” Bon Bon replied. “You should train not only your body, but also your mind to be able to fend off all kinds of psychic or magical attacks directed at you.”
“Is dat even possible?” Tootsie asked.
“It is necessary, my fair lady,” Bon Bon said. “Like, how can you think of defeating a Zebrican cockroach without knowing how to ignore its mating call which causes brain damage upon longer exposure…”
“I’m pretty sure I ain’t want to know dat,” Tootsie muttered. “Anyway, what else can ya teach me?”
Bon Bon smirked. “Imagine our living room. How many things in it can you use to kill somepony?”
Tootsie thought for a moment. “One thousand, two hundred sixty four, including mommy Lyra and the room itself.”
Bon Bon nodded, smiling, and patted Tootsie’s mane. “I guess we’ll move on to the second lesson then…”
Twist groaned, kicking the chair and throwing her armour on the table. The room at the top of the tower was full of her scattered equipment, but she didn’t care. She sat on a battered armchair and hid her face in her hooves.
“What’s going on, sis?” Nursery Rhyme asked, walking into the room.
“So much effort…” Twist muttered to herself and grabbed a screwdriver from the table. “And at the end of the day, our least-gifted sister owned us like a bunch of dumb fillies.”
“Umm… Maybe because we are a bunch of dumb fillies?” Nursery Rhyme asked. “Except Button. You know, this armoured carriage is somewhat cramped and I saw that he’s definitely a colt.”
Twist didn’t even turn her gaze away from the open panel of her armour. However, her reply would make Tootsie Flute proud.
“I’d rather not go and do it myself,” Nursery Rhyme replied. “And I think Button doesn’t get it yet. Sadly.”
Twist rolled her eyes and removed some burnt wire from her armour. “Would you kindly go and check if you aren’t on the other side of the town?” She sighed. “I’m currently thinking of my greatest defeat and that I don’t want to do that anymore.”
“Is this why you’re repairing your armour?” Nursery asked.
“Well, somepony else may want to use it.” Twist raised her head. “And currently it’s useless. It needs something to protect the wearer against the psych attacks, it needs a more stable energy source, it needs more power, ability to fly, some cooling system because it’s damn hot inside, more flexible joints, more efficient power consumption, reduced emissions…” The light shone in her glasses. “In fact, I think that the body inside might be an issue. It needs to be fused with the armour permanently and its durability must be increased. The armour has to be controlled by the brainwaves… Do you think my– I mean, someone’s bones can be replaced with something stronger?”
“Err…” Nursery scratched her mane. “I guess it… may be a thing… Do you want the subject to be alive after the whole procedure? And how important is the immunological system to you? Because you know, bone marrow is there and it wouldn’t be wise to remove it. Also, what kind of chip do you want to use? Because the most effective thing I ever put in somepony was a disulfiram implant we injected Berry Punch with subcutaneously.”
“What?” Twist asked. “Can you repeat the last word?”
“It was under her skin,” Nursery replied. “She bit it out after three days.”
“Like, with her teeth?” Twist smirked. “Cool.”
“Yeah. Twenty stitches,” Nursery muttered. “So, when do we give you cybernetic implants?”
Twist smiled, grabbing a piece of her armour and prodding it with a screwdriver. “As soon as possible…”
Button looked at the bottom of his glass and sighed. He knew that he shouldn’t drink so much chocolate milk, but this time there was no alternative. Twist and Nursery were nowhere to be found and Button feared to think about Tootsie’s fate. He shrugged and downed the glass in one go, shuddering at the taste.
“Another one?” Tagalong asked, raising the bottle. She was sitting on Button’s desk, waving her legs in the air.
“No, thanks,” Button muttered. “Mom says I’m lactose intolerant.”
“Okay.” Tagalong shrugged and drank chocolate milk directly from the bottle. “So, what are we gonna do now?”
“Mom baked cookies,” Button said.
Tagalong sighed and took another sip of her chocolate milk. “I meant, what we’re gonna do with that superhero stuff. Like, I actually had friends, who didn’t want to shoot anyone... “ She scratched her mane. “Well, maybe except Tootsie, but…”
“Well, now the other filly scouts should be fine,” Button muttered.
“Yeah, but they don’t know about me,” Tagalong said. “Like, do you know that I once checked how much chocolate milk it takes to kill you?”
Button’s hoof froze over his glass. “How much?”
“I don’t remember, but I remember jumping out of the window because it was quicker and less painful than the side effects of too much chocolate milk.” She shrugged. “But that wasn’t that interesting. Do you want to hear a story of how I hanged myself? It’s not the best idea when you can’t untie it…”
Button downed his chocolate milk and winced. “I think I’ll pass.”
Suddenly, the window of Button’s room opened. He turned to it, feeling cold air entering his bedroom. To his surprise, a couple of vines caught the frame of the window. Soon, Dinky climbed inside and jumped on the floor. She was still wearing her outfit.
“Hello,” Dinky said. “Oh, chocolate milk!”
“Feel free to help yourself,” Button deadpanned.
“I was just telling Button a story of how I hanged myself.” Tagalong smiled. “But he didn’t want to listen.”
“Why would you do that?” Dinky asked, taking a sip of her chocolate milk.
“I saw a colt I liked talking with some other filly.” Tagalong lowered her head. “Took me twenty minutes to die… each time before I managed to reach the rope and free myself.”
Dinky nodded. “And I noticed that I got my first superhero scar when we were fighting those filly scouts.” She lifted her hoof to show a small cut, barely an inch long. “Now I’m gonna be more superheroic than ever.”
“Dunno.” Button shook his head. “The only scar I got was when I slammed my head against my desk while playing The Great Wonderbolts Race/”
Dinky chuckled. “Twist told me that it was because you found out you couldn’t take off the uniform and spend a whole race staring at Spitfire’s–”
“Enough.” Button blushed and looked around the room, searching for something or somepony to help him change the topic. Eventually, his eyes rested on Tagalong. “Hmm, didn’t your parents notice that you hanged yourself?”
“They didn’t really care,” Tagalong replied. “I don’t think they ever noticed that I died.”
“At least they don’t ask questions,” Button said. “What if they sent you to that lab Bon Bon mentioned?”
“I don’t want to think about it.” Tagalong shuddered. “At least they can’t see any scars, because they disappear.”
“There are some on the inside, I guess,” Dinky muttered, poking Tagalong. “You know that I almost let Tubby loose when we fought?”
“What would happen then?” Button asked.
“It wouldn’t be nice,” Dinky replied in monotone. “It wouldn’t be civilised. It would make the four stallions of apocalypse look like little colts.”
“Umm… are you okay?” Button tilted his head and looked at Dinky.
“More or less,” Dinky replied. Tagalong leaned closer to her and hugged her.
“I’ll help you,” Tagalong said. “Could you also help me?”
“Of course.” Dinky nodded.
Suddenly, something silver flew through the window of Button’s room and hit the door of the closet, piercing it almost completely. Button looked at it and raised his eyebrows. A small silver spoon wasn’t telling him anything.
“Spoon again? Who threw it here?” he muttered to himself and picked the spoon up.
“There’s something written here,” Dinky said, pointing at the inside of the sharpened bowl.
Button looked at the text.
Hello,
That stunt you pulled was awesome! Too bad your group got busted... Do you want to join me? I could use some allies and technical support. I can provide experience and almost unlimited funds.
The Silver Spooner
Button scratched his mane. “The Silver Spooner? I saw her once. She’s that weird filly who lives in Silver Spoon’s basement.”
“Are we joining her?” Dinky asked.
Tagalong shrugged. “Well, it’s not like I have anything to risk… We can as well do.”
“I guess Nursery would kill to see that…” Button muttered. “I’m in.”
“Knowing Nursery, I’m afraid she’d do that,” Dinky said. “I don’t know… It’d be bad if Tubby…”
“Maybe that Silver Spooner knows how to stop him?” Tagalong asked, patting Dinky’s mane. “Also, I’ll be with you...”
The match was coming to an end. One of the teams was hopelessly crowded on their half of the pitch and it seemed that not even Rumble could stop Scootaloo from scoring another goal – the ball just seemed glued to her hooves.
Tootsie was standing in her penalty area, watching the action from some distance. She didn’t like to run and the role of a central defender suited her – especially since other kids knew that an ill-advised counterattack could end in a few broken bones.
“What’s going on?” Truffle Shuffle asked. Unlike Tootsie, he couldn’t exactly choose his position – as the fattest foal, he was destined to be a goalkeeper. “You don’t feel like yourself, today.”
“I do?” Tootsie asked.
“You didn’t chase me across the pitch with a stick when Rumble scored a goal,” Truffle Shuffle replied. “And you only punched Shady Daze once.”
“He looked at me,” Tootsie muttered.
“Yes, but usually it would end up in a brawl.” Truffle shrugged. “Something happened?”
“I ain’t slept well,” Tootsie replied, looking at the other half of the pitch, where Scootaloo and Ruby Pinch were fighting in the mud for some reason. Apple Bloom, despite being in one team with Ruby, was circling around them, trying to hit Ruby from behind.
“It never stopped you before,” Truffle replied.
“Wanna get a print of me hoof on yer arse?” Tootsie asked, glaring at him. “Bugger off, mate, if ya wanna live.”
“Like you’d really do that.” Truffle smirked. “You didn’t hit me since the Hearts and Hooves day.”
“I always can do dat again…” Tootsie walked closer to Truffle, who backpedalled.
“But seriously, what’s going on?” Truffle asked. “I’m trying to help.”
“You’re tryin’ to get buried in me backyard.” Tootsie lowered her head, aiming her horn at Truffle. “If ya really need to know, I may leave da town soon.”
“What?” Truffle exclaimed. “Did Lyra and Bon Bon–”
“No,” Tootsie replied. “I just decided dat I wanna go to dat school in Manehattan. Y’know, to become a professional florist in a few years. And maybe get some boxing trainin’...”
“So, you’ll finally beat ponies who want it?” Truffle asked. “That’ll be some nice change…”
“If ya ask me nicely, I can break yer jaw.” Tootsie walked away, towards the other side of the pitch. The match came to a definite end; Tootsie’s team won by ten goals, seven bruises, a broken tooth, and some torn hair.
Tootsie, however, didn’t care about that. She sat on the grass, outside of the earshot, and looked at the sky.
“Carrot Top,” she muttered. “I hope ya ‘ave a special place in hell for dat cover story…”
Equestria, the land I love
A land of harmony
Our flag does wave from high above
For ponykind to see
Carrot Top barely suppressed a groan. She looked at the filly scouts gathered in a circle and sighed. Why did I tell them that I’m their new scoutmaster?
The scoutmaster, she corrected herself. They never had another scoutmaster and the pony that walked away with Carrot Top’s former colleagues never existed. She looked at Sunny and Peachy, who seemed pretty uncomfortable singing along with the filly scouts who had every intent to kill them just two days ago.
At least they’re gonna go to Manehattan with Bonnie’s kid, Carrot Top thought. It wouldn’t be safe to leave them here.
“Ms. Top, are you okay?” the littlest filly scout asked in a high-pitched voice.
“Yes, I am,” Carrot Top muttered, barely paying attention to the filly. “I guess you know the second verse?”
“Of course we do!”
Carrot Top sighed. Sometimes, I hate those little–
Equestria, a land of friends
Where ponykind do roam
They say true friendship never ends
Equestria, my home
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Looking forward to it, 'cause this has been a fun ride.
Also, it's always nice to see someone else showing the same fondness for background fillies that I have.
Oh man, it's over already? I need hero fillies in my life! (I'm classing Button as an honorary filly. He wore that waitress outfit like a pro).
This was a ton of fun. You've put together an awesome team. I can't decide between The Potato Mare or Captain Cockneigh for my favorite. This story seriously needs way more views. I was thinking about throwing it into The Shameless Self-Promotion Bureau, but I figured you might want to do that yourself. (Not that TSSPB always nets you much, but no harm in trying)
Also, cyber-Twist should be called Twyst. Or maybe Twy5t.
I can't wait for the sequel. ^.^
This story was a mess for me to read.
The main problem for me was that, despite you separating the dialogue from the narrative onto their own lines (most of the times), the banter between characters often muddled the two and made it difficult to tell if the story was finally moving forward or gags were still being drawn out. This story, had something of a slow start and a disjointed plot. (Intentionally so?)
Though I do want to see her character develop more, I'm not sure what the plot significance of Nursery Rhyme was outside of introducing the Potato Mare - which could have also been accomplished in Chapter 2 - aside from maybe making Tagalong's DNA disappear - which hadn't been presented as a real problem for her up until now.
Also, I have no clue what the significance of either the Silver Spooner or her storyline were in the general plot;
#1: How did she know somepony was trying to steal the necklace? Did they tell her?
#2: Why didn't she take care of it herself?
#3: Why create OC relatives for her? Were they supposed to be some kind of red herrings?
I could wave potential plotholes away if they're small enough - but for me, this story's biggest problem was that it had too much idle banter - which may very well be what most people like about your work, and indeed, I think it's a strong point of yours - but the balance between story and comedic dialogue was very fuzzy here and not in a way I liked. As a result, events often feel disjointed and rushed.
To illustrate this (ironically, using a chapter which was intentionally uneventful - I hope):
In Issue 7: Slow Day! :
One moment Nursery Rhyme is filming them all, then Tagalong is approaching with a supposedly important message and getting killed, then she's crashing in an unfinished glider because of an off-hoofed remark, then the chapter's over.
Also, I have no idea what the whole, “A chav and a zebra are in a cart. Who pulls it?” exchange was all about. There's just so much pointless chatter in here that it all just muddles together.
On a side note, you missed a huge oppurtunity to make Tagalong's green raincoat costume in the design of a parka hoodie covering all of her face except for her eyes.
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I ended up making it a one story rather than a series of one-shots. Also, the plot was somewhat inspired by Silver Age of Comic Books. Making sense was rather optional back then:
comicsalliance.com/files/2010/11/dccaptainamerica.jpg
She observes everything in town, including the main characters. Which directly leads to this:
She was testing them, in case of bigger threats in the future. She gave them a message and in the end of the fic she proposed them to work with her. She'd disqualified Sunny and Peachy right after witnessing the whole HayDonald's action since she thinks they cause too much property damage (she tells it to Button in chapter 6).
Well, Silverspeed is a canon character, actually. She first appears in the same episode as most of the background pegasi, that is Hurricane Fluttershy. As for the rest... Well, someone had to show up at the party, after all.
My apologies for ridiculously late response. I'd had..."complications".
I get that and I hadn't known about Silver Speed being a canon pony (still not sure why she was inserted here, though), but what was the purpose of Tootsie Flute and Octavia's exchange?
Also, something I forgot to mention: As you may well know, the darkened text boxes used for things like the writer's descriptions at the end of story's - which was also the format you'd marked the notes the characters had received - do not appear in HTML downloads of the file, at least not for me. This left me further confused on my first read through.
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I didn't know of that issue – I never download anything anyway.
Also, Octavia recognised Tootsie's accent and thus Tootsie had to talk herself out of it.
Can we please get a sequel?
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I kinda started writing one a few years ago but never finished.