Act 3 Chapter 44: See Hardy Run. Run, Hardy, Run!
"Do you know why my dear Fleur and I have spent our golden years together? Because it looks ever so much better than spending them rolling about in whatever beds we might land in, attempting to recapture lost youth. Though to be fair, both of us spent a significant portion of our youths being pursued and found the majority of those pursuits a pleasant experience, even when they necessitated a quick escape from time to time.
In the end, however, we both decided there is an age at which a pony must stop being pursued, find a place to settle, and take a deep breath. I will admit that a portion of the decision came down to how times we were both chased by furious mothers among our elite brethren, demanding to know what their very-adult children had gotten up to whilst trying to emulate our wilder days.
-Fancy Pants, Stallion Of The Year awards, L.R. 23.
An hour lying on my back passed without so much as an explosion, riot, or single snap of gunfire within my hearing. I studied the ceiling of my little prison cell/medical antechamber; there were exactly twenty-nine tiles visible from inside the curtain. I listened to ponies come and go. I ate what turned out to be a reasonably tasty salad covered in slices of apple.
Everything was calm.
Why, then, was I still smelling gunpowder and hearing the occasional crackle of burning skin?
I hugged my pillow to my chest for the nth time, still waiting on Scarlet to return with an adequate hat. The movement shifted the bed a little and bumped the side table, sending a cascade of folded cards onto the floor. There were dozens of them. Somepony out there was keeping foals entertained having them write notes of encouragement to ‘The Detective’. Considering I was supposed to be dead and the only ponies who knew otherwise were my friends, it was still a nice gesture.
Taxi knew that I needed time alone, but that left me with time to think. The paralyzing terror crept up from time to time, only to be drowned out by a wash of whatever neurochemicals Gale was pumping into my system to keep me from losing my mind. It wasn’t therapy, and it certainly wasn’t the kind of thing a person could rely on forever, but for that moment it was working well enough.
Knock, knock.
I pondered briefly whether or not to pretend to be asleep. Maybe, with a bit of effort, I might not have to pretend and I could let the rest of this day go without dealing with any other crises. Surely, whoever was at the door couldn’t have another world destroying crisis for me to deal with. I slid deeper under the covers and shut my eyes.
Knock, knock.
Knock, knock.
Knock, knock.
“Alright! Dammit, I’m awake! Come in!” I snarled, shoving the blankets off and rolling over onto my stomach.
A bright orange muzzle poked through the crack in the door.
“Sir, are you ‘awake’ awake, or just telling me you’re awake so I’ll stop knocking on the door?”
“Both! Get in here, kid.”
I threw my pillow back behind my head and slumped back into the pillows as Swift pushed open the door and tentatively eased inside, shutting it behind herself. She seemed bathed and her mane was back in the spiked fashion she seemed to favor, but she also looked like she’d just run a marathon powered only by coffee and donuts. Worst of all was the look in her eyes.
She looked like a cop: sad, angry, and determined.
Trotting to my bedside, she set my revolver on the sheets beside me and gave me a no-nonsense glare. “Here’s your gun, Sir. I hope there’s not any sort of ritual we have to do, because I’m too mad right now. Who shot you and set you on fire?”
“Didn’t Firebrand tell you?” I asked, picking up the Crusader. Out of habit I opened it, checked it was empty, then fanned the hammer a couple of times. It felt like it’d never been out of my hooves to begin with. Perfect.
“Firebrand didn’t see what happened. She only saw--” Swift hesitated, bunching the sheets in her hooves. After a few seconds, she forced her knees to relax. “She only saw your body and the house. She said you somehow managed to pull yourself down the stairs and were lying on the pavement. Sir, who did this?”
“Huh. Don’t remember getting off the porch,” I murmured, setting my weapon to one side. “Why does it matter, kid?”
“Sir, you are my partner. Somepony hurt you…”
“Yeah, and what are you going to do about it? It was somepony who killed me. They’ve got an army, kid. What have you got?”
Swift’s lips curled back from her teeth.
“Someone killed my partner...” she growled, her voice deepening in a way that was deeply unsettling.
Overhead, the lights suddenly began to flicker and dim, then grew so bright I had to throw a leg across my eyes. One of the bulbs exploded, sending a cascade of glass down on the carpet. The red crescent on Swift’s chest seemed to glitter, then burst into brilliant, shining flame.
The fire crept down her legs and seemed to sink into the ground, which became strangely transparent. I could see ponies down below, though not as I knew them; they were the shapes of ponies, written in shining light. Most seemed to just be going about their business, though a few stopped and appeared to look up in our direction. Their organs, their flesh and bones, and their pulsing hearts were all laid bare. It was a nakedness that left me embarrassed to witness it.
Above us, the magical fire spread, unsealing wall after wall and showing them for the empty, facile things they were. I could suddenly see the sky overhead, and the distantly twinkling stars. Even the ugly scar of the Eclipse, blotting out the horizon, couldn’t hide the majesty of the expanse. Each tick of the clock was centuries in a place with such visions.
All at once, the light surged upward, spreading out as my brain tried to process what, exactly, I was seeing. It was beyond me. It was beyond anypony I’d ever met, except possibly Mephitica. Distance was irrelevant. I was everywhere.
I glanced back at Swift, only to find my partner gone. In her place stood a gleaming angel, lightning dancing between her wingtips and wisps of power spilling from her teeth. Her eyes were two swirling pools, like black holes sucking down helpless stars. My breath caught, and I found myself leaning away from her, but what else was there to do?
When she spoke, it wasn’t the same little pony who’d come into my room.
“The city is my body and its streets are my blood...” she whispered, though I felt it as a vibration in my very bones.
I turned back to the view overhead, too dazzled to say anything. Towards the center of the city, there was the glow of the Uptown shield. It was the only place still hidden from the light.
That bizarre voice continued, feeling as though it was penetrating my very soul.
“They cannot hide outside their Shield. They cannot breathe, but that they breathe my air.If they try to run, I will bring lightning from beneath their hooves. They hurt my partner. I am the Warden of Detrot, and there is no escape!”
All at once, the lights flicked back on and the vision vanished. Swift blinked owlishly at me, then her knees wobbled, and she tumbled over sideways on the carpet. Her chest rose, then fell. I waited a second, holding my own breath, before her ribcage expanded once more.
‘Move, idiot,’ I snarled internally. I grabbed the call button on the side of the bed.
“Medic!”
----
A part of me still clung to the idea that we’d all walk away one day and be normal ponies again.
I’d have loved to see Swift with a fillyfriend or a colt, making out in the back row of some movie theater. Limerence might have made a really decent head librarian of some city library; the Canterlot Royal Archive was always seeking for scholars dedicated to the finer points of organization. Mags could have gone to some griffin school and spent her days playing with others her age; she might even have kicked that accent.
Taxi…
I don’t know about Taxi. She’s alive for no reason other than there’s never been anything capable of killing her, neither gangsters, nor Iris Jade, nor her father, nor even yours truly. In my idealized fantasies, she drives the highways of a better Equestria in her shining cab, healing souls and saving lives.
Where does that leave me?
With any luck, probably face down drunk in my favorite bar, trying to erase the memories, but with a talent that lies blessedly dormant for the rest of my life.
----
Thirty seconds later a half dozen ponies hit the door of my hospital room at a speed you’d think would have caused a pile up, but they shot through with mechanical precision, one after another. Four mares, two stallions, five of them in scrubs and one who looked like she’d just come from the shower. Her fur was still dripping wet. Their eyes shined unnaturally, like every one of them had a colony of glow worms living in their heads. As a herd, they rushed to Swift and gently, carefully picked her up with horn and hooves.
A second hospital bed was wheeled in and she was laid down in it. It was accomplished in an eerie silence, with nary a word exchanged between them. I watched the procedure with wide eyes, clutching my sheet to my chest.
It took me a moment to notice that all of them sported moon shapes on their flanks, shoulders, or chests. Finally, four of them filed out, while one nurses remained, running her horn over Swift. After a moment, she sighed and turned to me.
She was a short filly, barely out of her teens, with oak brown fur and an Aroyo facial tattoo that reminded me of a raccoon's markings. The light in her eyes brightened a few shades and she glanced around the hospital room, then centered on me.
“What were you talking about?” she asked. Her voice sounded odd, like two records played over top of one another and not quite in sync.
“T-Tourniquet?” I asked, hesitantly sitting up.
“Yes!” she huffed, then swayed on her hooves, catching herself on the edge of the bed. “Whoo...What in Equestria did she do? I thought keeping you alive was a drain but I feel like somepony just pulled my tail...except my tail is the city power grid!”
I slowly let the medical call button drop. “Wait, don’t you know? I thought you and she were joined at the brain stem or something!”
“Swift asked me for five minutes worth of privacy, and then suddenly the entire network goes crazy!” she replied, the puppeted pony turning to my partner and gently putting a hoof on her cheek. “I don’t know what happened, but she gave herself whatever the pegasus version of ‘mana burn’ is. Her ley-lines look like she just stuck a fork in an electrical socket!”
Worry made me sit forward. “Wait, she’s not-”
“No, it probably only hurt. She’s fine,” she hastily amended. “Pegasi can take lightning strikes without more than ruffled feathers. Oh, her mom is going to yell at me so bad, though. Can we please keep this between us?”
“Yeah, I don’t need to fall on the wrong side of one of Quickie Cuddles’s kicks again, either.” I sank back in my pillows and shut my eyes. “Damn…”
Tourniquet put her hooves up on my bed, her glowing eyes shining with unshed tears. “Hardy, I need you to tell me what you two were talking about. She’s my best friend.”
“She came in here and demanded to know who killed me,” I replied, then muttered, “I told her it didn’t matter. I didn’t want her going after him. That’ll be what I get for trying to protect her, again, I guess.”
“You know she hates it when you do that,” she admonished, giving me a poke in the ribs. “You also know she’s going to figure out it was Broadside. She’s not dumb. At some point it’s going to occur to her to ask the Ladybugs.”
“You want to tell her?” I asked.
“It’s your place to tell her...and it’s your place to keep her from getting killed. I can’t do that. I’m not her partner.”
Tucking my pillow back behind my head, I studied the puppet resting on the edge of my bed. “And what about you?”
She frowned and looked down at herself, or rather, the body she was using. “What about me?”
I threw my hooves in the air. “Please don’t play stupid, Tourniquet. Can we both at least admit you rushing in here with half a dozen ponies acting like some kind of bug hive-mind is a bit freaky?”
“Oh...that…”
“Yes, that!”
Sliding her legs off the bed, she turned and looked up at the wall, seemingly thinking about her response. Finally, without turning around, she said, “I offered them safety in the only way I know how.”
“By taking away their free will?!” I demanded.
Her ears stood up straight and she whirled to face me.
“They’ve still got their free will! Every pony who took my mark did it because they want to be safe, not because they want to be insects. I’m protecting them as best I can and I’d never take their individuality. They can say ‘no’ to me anytime they want to!”
“Then explain it so I understand, because I’m scared enough of dealing with mind controlled monsters without watching my partner being attended by them.”
Tourniquet let out an irritated breath and reached up to touch the tattoos on her host’s face. “Do you know who this pony is?”
“You know I don’t,” I said, maybe a little more sharply than intended.
“Then why don’t you ask her?”
“What?”
The glow in the mare’s eyes flickered out and in a matter of seconds, her entire posture changed. I hadn’t realized Tourniquet had a particularly formal way of standing until the mare shifted her weight onto two legs and shook her whole body as though shaking off a light rainfall. I could see the differences; Tourniquet stood like a foal at lessons, while the pony in front of me was more like an old house long settled in its foundations.
“I and I wishes de Shadow Lady would say when she goin’ to leave me longer dan two seconds before she do it,” she muttered, scratching her mane as her eyes turned in my direction. “You be de one dey call ‘Crusada’, yah? It be an honor!”
“I don’t think we’ve met,” I said, tugging the sheets over myself.
“Ye be in de Skids a month and some ago,” she said, holding out her hoof. I carefully bumped my toe against hers. “Ye de cop dat Miss Wisteria let through. De cop dat go and leave wid a trunk. I and I saw ye. I was in de alley beside de hotel. Then I saw ye again at de Nest bunker. Dey never lets me into de Nest, but I and I knows of it.”
I cocked my head. “Seems like years ago, now. Why didn’t they let you in the Nest?”
She laughed. It was a throaty, cheerful laugh, that brought a little smile to my face.
“Heh! Because I and I smells terrible back den! Eh, dat be not here, though. My name be Split Wick.”
“Huh. Good to meet you, Split Wick. You can call me Hardy or Crusader. Whichever catches your fancy. What were you doing in that alley that day?” I asked, curiously.
Split Wick’s ears fell against her head and she gave me a morose smirk. “I and I be a junkie, back den. Alleys be de natural home of de junkie, yeah?”
“Back then?”
She turned to look up at the ceiling. “Ye know of dis, but...one day, de sky goes black. Strange, how little dat changed.”
“What do you mean?”
“Heh! I and I wandered de streets. Same as always, since I were young. Days I wandered. My junk be gone, so one day, I lays down to wait to die, like I live: in de alley. I be there, and I hears a voice.”
“Tourniquet,” I murmured.
“Ye calls her dat, but to me, it be de voice of my Shadow Lady. She whispers from de dark and say ‘Get up, Split Wick! Ye be dyin!’ and I says I know. Then she say ‘I can save ye, but only if ye move!’ and I ask why she be wantin’ to save a waste like me.”
I flicked an ear to show I was still listening and Split Wick reached up to touch the crescent moon on her chest, closing her eyes for a moment as though relishing its presence.
“Ye know what she say? She say ‘De only waste be if ye lay there and die’. I crawl to de mouth of de alley and call out...and dere be Jambalaya. She take me to a hole in de ground and I meet a metal angel...and she takes de pain of de junk away. Den...she give me food, water, and a bed. I and I be up on my hooves in three days. Dat be only a few weeks ago, but...now, I have de voices of de brothers and de sisters up here.” She tapped the side of her head and wiggled her nose. “Dey will remember little Split Wick if she dies.”
I sat back on my bed and sighed. “Alright. I suppose I can accept that as a net positive. Can I ask you one last thing?”
“Aye? Ask. Dere be no question I and I would not answer for de Crusada.”
“What’s your talent?”
Split Wick turned sideways and shifted her flank so I could see her cutie-mark: a plant twisted in the shape of a healer’s staff. “I and I only ever tried growin’ things to get high. My Lady In Shadow let me grow things to save lives.”
“Alright. Can I talk to Tourniquet, again?”
Split Wick shrugged. “If ye decide to screw, leave a note on me side so I and I can get a potion from de shaman. Don’t want to be havin’ no foals just now, though if ye get a hankerin’ later, I might see through to it. Would be nice to give de Aroyos a colt of Crusada!”
I’ve no idea how I was meant to respond to that, but she didn’t give me time to come up with anything. A second later, the glow faded back into her eyes and Tourniquet stood up straight. Her cheeks suddenly turned bright red, probably mirroring my own as she slapped her hoof against her host’s forehead.
“And...and that’s...that’s Split Wick,“ she muttered.
“I’m sorry I doubted your intentions, Tourniquet,” I said, awkwardly.
“I don’t blame you. I didn’t just decide to become most of the city infrastructure. Mom over-engineered me.”
I tilted my head toward where Swift lay, breathing softly, her eyes closed like a peaceful little cherub of death. “What about her? Do you have any idea what she did a few minutes ago?”
Tourniquet shook her head. “Not a clue. I’m still learning all the operations wired into me, and the Warden system is almost completely opaque. Probably because Mom didn’t want me changing anything if I got bored. I think she also had ‘bigger things’ in mind if she ever got out of Tartarus.”
“Give me your best guess,” I said.
“My best guess is sort of scary,” she replied.
“I’m getting used to scary, methinks.”
“Okay, but don’t say I didn’t warn you,” she murmured, rubbing Split Wick’s nose in a little circle, then looking at it like she was surprised to feel a hoof on the end of her leg. She quickly put it down. “Phew. Sorry, still getting used to having bodies.”
“You’re stalling,” I grumbled.
“I...I’m trying to figure out a way to describe this where I won’t end up with the scariest pony I ever met mad at me!” She gestured with one leg at the bed where my partner lay, still breathing slowly. “I was the one who asked Swift to take my Warden mark! I didn’t know it would do that to her!”
I let out a long, heavy breath and did my best to sound composed.
“I’m not mad, Tourniquet. I won’t be mad, so long as you’re straight with me. Can you do that?”
“I...okay. Hardy, it was awful. Please, if this doesn’t make sense, just trust that I’m trying, alright?” she whimpered, her thin eyebrows knitting together.
“Done,” I said, putting a hoof to my chest. “Now go on.”
I could still feel the tension in her, but she made a show of letting Split Wick’s shoulders relax.
“W-what it felt like was...was like having my insides yanked on. I can normally feel at least a little of what Swift is feeling, but...that was crazy. She was so mad I thought she’d pop every breaker in Supermax. Half the lights are out right now and I’ve got ponies rushing to change fuses on every floor...”
“And you don’t know what she did?” I asked.
“No. All of a sudden I was blind. It was like being back in the darkness. All my cameras cut out and every sensor and powerline in the city was gone. If I could still pee, I’d have wet my servos! Then it was back and...and you were screaming for a medic. That’s all I saw.”
“Alright. I guess that’s good enough,” I replied, forcing myself not to clench my teeth. “Go on. Take care of what needs to be taken care of. Could you keep somepony within shouting distance and give us some privacy?”
The little mare stared down at her hooves, shamefacedly. “I’ll do my best.”
I offered her my leg and she carefully took it, lifting her glittering eyes to mine.
“Tourniquet, I’m sorry,” I said. “I was frightened and I took it out on you. You’re doing good work.”
“Hardy, don’t blow smoke up my circuits,” she replied, with a weak laugh. “I’m scared of me some days. I might have gained a bunch of inches and a whole heap of experience in the last few weeks, but it’s only been that long since I was a kid hiding in the corners of what should have been an abandoned building. Suddenly being a city didn’t make that easier, and having ponies beg me to keep them safe just gave me less time in the day to process this ‘adulthood’ thing.”
“I know. Maybe, one day, we’ll take you on this vacation everypony has been promising themselves.”
“Maybe. Swift should wake up in a few minutes. Just have her let me know when you want me to stop distracting her friends and family,” Tourniquet murmured, then turned and left, closing the door to my little hospital room behind her.
The door shut, and I lay back and put my hooves behind my head again. A tickle of smoke crept up my nose, and I blew it away. Of course, there hadn’t really been any smoke, but I’d learned in recent days that facts like that are completely irrelevant.
I’d have given an ear for a clock, but time was passing slowly enough without knowing precisely how many seconds I wasted just lying there.
A soft shifting of feathers alerted me to Swift coming around.
Her eyes opened, slowly, and she looked sideways at me, then down at the hospital bed.
“Sir…”
“Shut up, kid.”
“B-but Sir!”
“I said ‘shut up’!” I snapped, “Just lie there. We talk in five minutes. If you haven’t exploded, torn the city power grid out of Tourniquet’s hooves, and forced psychedelic images of the entire city into my bleeding cerebrum for a solid five minutes...then, and only then, we'll talk.”
Swift nervously toyed with the sterile hospital sheet pulled up to her chest, while I tried to figure out exactly what I needed to say to her. Her wings unfurled, then pulled in against her sides. I noticed a few feathers out of place, but didn’t say anything; ponies who live in glass houses don’t get to make snarky comments about their partner’s looks after they’ve been rolled in without most of their dermis.
Five minutes passed quicker than I’d have liked, but when it’d come and gone and Swift was still an unassuming little pegasus rather than the raging demigod, I relaxed.
“Kid?”
“Yes, Sir?”
“I’m not going to ask for an explanation of what you did a few minutes ago. I just need to know you’ve got a hoof on it. We’re hitting the Office soon. If you tell me you’ve got whatever that was under control, I will believe you.”
Swift gulped and shook her head.
“Sir, I have no idea what I just did. I don’t know if it’s safe to bring me. I just...I just got so angry at the thought of somepony h-hurting my partner...” She trailed off into a soft growl. Overhead, the lights flickered, but she glared at them until they stabilized.
“I’m bringing you, one way or the other,” I said, pulling my eyes away from the light fixtures. “I need my partner there and whatever you just did was almost enough to make me empty my bladder. I can’t imagine what it’d do to somepony who didn’t know you. I just want to know whether or not I can afford to put you in the line of fire.”
She pulled a pillow over her head, then let out a frustrated grunt and used her wings to push off the bed into a sitting position. “Ugh! I don’t...I don’t know! Can’t I just have one day where I don’t have to make any life or death decisions?”
“Every day is full of life or death decisions. Most ponies just don’t recognize them as such. You step out of your house, it’s a life or death decision. One day you decide life, and the world decides death. The only difference between us and those ponies outside is that they have the luxury of being surprised when the coin comes up ‘death’.”
“Please never write a philosophy book, Sir. I think you’d just make a bunch of ponies kill themselves,” Swift muttered, heaving herself over the side of the bed. Her forelegs shook for a second, but then she stood strong, spreading her wings as wide as she could in the little hospital room without bumping the nearest wall. “Oof...I feel like I flew a marathon.” She turned in a quick circle, looking at the ceiling, then the floor. “My sight doesn’t feel any different, though. I can still see downstairs and...ooh, Celestia, Mom is arguing with Dad...”
“You can’t tell what they’re saying, can you?” I asked.
“I don’t think I want to. Dad looks pretty angry, and whatever he’s saying is making her--” Swift’s eyes bugged out a little, and she scrambled out from under the sheets. “Oh poop! Mom’s about to--”
The building shook for a moment as a tremor rocked the foundation.
“What was that?!” I yelped.
“That was Mom breaking a wall. Two walls. Sir, I’m pretty sure she just heard about what happened at the Family’s place. Gran probably told my dad. She knows you’re alive.”
I slammed my forehead against the nearest bar of the hospital bed. It rang like a cast-iron pan hit with a baseball bat.
“Tell me you didn’t tell your grandmare all of it,” I said.
“I didn’t, but...b-but I’m pretty sure Iris Jade did.”
“Oh skies, I’m gonna kill her…”
Swift hesitated, then bounced out of bed onto the floor. “Sir, both Mom and Dad are headed this direction. Can I please run away now?”
Struggling to the side of the bed, I hauled myself down onto the floor. My legs gave out immediately as tingles shot down my limbs. I threw a knee against the bed, holding myself up as best I could. Grabbing my revolver, I snatched a strap off the edge of the bed and loosely tied it to my chest.
I took a stumbling step, and all four legs buckled.
“Only if you take me with you!”
----
There were four ponies with glowing eyes and crescent moons on their bodies standing guard outside. One of them was Split Wick. She grinned and tossed her head, before pointing down the carpeted hall toward a set of stairs.
“Ye be needin’ a safe way out, quick as quick? Yer cabbie be upstairs wid dat mad...thing she builds. She suddenly rush out of a meetin’ about a half hour ago sayin’ ye needed to be gone right quick.”
“Taxi’s got the Night Trotter rebuilt?” I asked.
“Aye, though it be not a cab anymore,” Split Wick said, tapping the side of her head. “De Lady of Shadows be waitin’ for ye at Supermax. Ye go to battle, says she.”
“And Limerence--”
“De nerd, and de little griffin all be in de garage.”
“Why didn’t I know this place has a garage? Alright, never mind. Tell Tourniquet ‘thank you’ and have her ask Stella to try to talk Swift’s mother down before she rips the building off its foundations.”
“I and I be thinkin’ dat may be a lost cause,” Split Wick cringed as another shudder rocked the undercarriage of the Vivarium. “Makes me wish my mother cared like dat.”
“Yeah, but I don’t need my Mom trying to strangle my partner!” Swift moaned, throwing her weight against my side to keep me upright. “Oh mercy, I hope Jade didn’t tell her we’re in some kind of romantic relationship.”
“This is Iris Jade! Do you think she didn’t?!”
She gave me a look of abject horror. The building vibrated under our hooves.
“Sir, run!” she squeaked, stepping away from my side. I stumbled onto my foreknees as she took a couple trotting steps.
One of our ‘guards’, a barrel chested stallion with a brick and trowel for a cutie-mark, stepped forward.
“Don’t take this the wrong way cuz I already got a husband...but ya can get on my back if ya like,” he said. “Ya legs don’t seem so hot.”
Muttering a quick thanks and with a bit of help from Swift, I hauled myself across his shoulders. He took off at a gallop with my partner in hot pursuit, grabbing the wall to swing up the stairs. I clung on for dear life, praying we’d make it before a pony more violent than After Glow got her arcanum around me.
----
Tourniquet’s people were at every corner, ready to direct us toward our destination and most likely keeping the coast clear. My ‘mount’ hadn’t even grunted when I climbed aboard and didn’t seem to notice my weight as he cantered up staircases and down the maze-like hallways. I quickly lost track of our progress, focusing mostly on keeping myself from tumbling onto the floor. Swift kept up, though just barely; whatever magic she’d used seemed to have taken a considerable toll on her.
Finally, after a solid five minute run, ‘Brick’ (as I’d come to think of him) skidded through a door held open by a sashed Stiletto with glowing eyes.
The Vivarium’s garage wasn’t anything like as massive as the Police Department’s, but it was still a place that commanded a certain respect. Every one of ten dozen spaces was full of different vehicles; from rickshaws to great, long limousines. At the distant end, a gated, double-wide ramp led up to ground level.
“Here ya go!” Brick said, rolling his back to one side. I grabbed at air, then slid off of the great brute onto my backside. “Ya ride is down there. Can ya make it?”
Swift slid up beside me and offered her leg. My hooves shook, but with her assistance, I was able to stand. Brick turned to the open door and vanished back inside, kicking it shut behind him.
“Sir, my Mom is...uh… dangerous when she’s mad,” Swift said, softly. “She probably wouldn’t kill you outright, but my grandmare once told me about a burglar who broke into my parents’ house just after they got married. He...he’s alive, because my dad was there, but his prison name is ‘Pillow’.”
A dozen nasty images piled into my brain all at once.
“Come on, kid. I am not in any condition to deal with a raging member of the Cuddles family. Stella can handle this. Let’s find the Night Trotter.”
A burgundy head poked out from the end of a row of cars up ahead of us.
“Hardy! Over here!” Scarlet called, beckoning us. “You gotta move! Iris Jade just congratulated your dad on being a grandparent about 20 minutes ago! I tried to stop him getting to your mother, it was too fast!”
My stomach dropped into my hooves. “Mercy, is somepony going to explain to her--?!”
He cut me off with panic in his voice. “Have you ever seen a mad Cuddles before?! You get out of her way and pray she burns out before she finds whoever made her angry!”
“Right. Where’s Taxi?” I asked, limping forward with Swift against my side.
“I’m here, Hardy!” my driver yelled. She sounded oddly muffled. “Just some final adjustments and we should be ready for a proper test drive!”
“Test drive!” I barked. “Are you saying you don’t know if this thing will work?!”
“You only gave me a few days!” she bit back. “I had everypony with an engineering or auto-mechanical cutie-mark working around the clock! Be glad the wheels turn!”
I swallowed, tilting an ear back the way we’d come. I’m not sure if it was ongoing brain damage or not, but I thought I could hear sounds of battle. Staggering around the last row of cars, I stopped dead, and my already unstable knees slid out from under my back end, leaving me sitting, gape mouthed and wide-eyed.
The area around Taxi’s...creation...was cleared of everything besides twenty floor to ceiling boxes of tools and a dozen blindingly bright construction lights. I’d some notion of what she intended when I gave her permission to use the full resources of the Detrot Police Department, but the finished product was beyond even my wildest imaginings.
It was a work of automotive, impressionist art.
It was a towering mountain of metal.
It was Flankenstein’s All-Wheel-Drive Monster.
If one were to squint from a distance, they might see the genetics of the two vehicular mammoths that spawned this wheeled leviathan, but every curve and facet spoke to something altogether mightier than either the A.M.V. or the Night Trotter. Somepony with a welding degree from a very dark university had managed to marry the cars together with a sympathy that made it look as though they’d never been anything else, though somewhere in this evolution, it had gained an extra axle and a meter of height. Through a gleaming silver grill, the Night Trotter’s spell core glowed brilliantly, like a dragon readying to breathe fire; it had many, many more wires affixed to it than I remembered from the few times I’d seen the cab’s hood up.
Most of the back of the truck looked like it was still meant to transport ponies, but the shapes were smoother and the weapons ports glittered with untapped menace. Larger wheels complemented a series of crystals across the roof and doors that seemed more purposeful than decorative. As a finishing touch, the whole thing was painted bright yellow, and a tiny, comical light affixed to the roof advertised ‘Cabbie For Hire’.
My driver’s hooves stuck out from under the front end on a rolling mechanic’s board, and I could hear the sounds of something being wrenched underneath.
Sitting there, eyes wide, I barely felt the moment something soft settled over my ears and a gentle kiss landed on my cheek. I blinked a couple times, then turned to find Scarlet sitting there, giving me an appraising look. After a short moment, he grinned, spreading his hooves wide.
“Perfect!” he exclaimed.
I reached up and touched the brim of a hat, then plucked it off my head, turning it over in my hooves. It was a lovely black that matched my coat perfectly, with a wide brim. I tapped the front and it made a soft *click* noise.
“What’s this?” I asked, tapping the spot again.
“Firebrand let me keep her scale,” Scarlet explained. “I had Habbidash sew it in. She only had time to enchant the cloth to keep it clean, but-”
“It’s beautiful, Scarlet,” I murmured, then set it back on my head. “I’ll be sure it comes back without any extra holes.”
“Knowing you, I’m going to be lucky if it comes back with enough of your head to bury. Oh, and there’s this,” he added, then pulled a stylish black clothing box from under a nearby car. He set it on the ground and shelled the top off. Inside lay my trenchcoat, cleaned and pressed, with a brand new gun harness folded across it.
“There was a disused diamond dog tunnel that ran under your street,” he explained. “It was a smash and grab to get the safe, but I don’t think we were noticed.” His ears turned down. “I...I’m sorry, Hardy. Most of the house is still there, but the front porch and living room are gone. The yard was still smoldering when we left...”
I smirked and set the top back on the box, then tucked it under my leg. “Mom would be glad to know the old place stood up to a fire.”
“I don’t think she’d like knowing you were the kindling,” Taxi grunted, sliding out from under the giant truck. “Limerence and Mags are in the back. We’re going to Supermax?”
“At quickest speed,” I replied, turning back to the truck. “Jade told Quickie that Swift and I were bunking together. Congratulations, by the way. You’re going to be a godmother.”
For a moment, Taxi looked as though I’d just told her there was a locked clown-car, full to the brim with mimes, being slowly crushed under the hooves of a dozen elephants: horrified and conflicted, but also amused.
“I thought Iris promised not to kill you?” she asked, finally.
“That doesn’t mean she won’t spend her spare time making me suffer. I doubt she knew or cared who Swift’s parents were.” I lowered myself onto my stomach and peered underneath the massive vehicle. “Why does it look like the Night Trotter’s spell core has some kind of mechanical cancer growing on it?”
Taxi wiped her hooves with a greasy rag. “Hardy, the manual is thicker than my leg and half of it was written on napkins in that language only engineers speak. Do you want a features rundown or do you want to run away from Swift’s mother?”
I shoved myself up and grabbed the box with my coat inside. “I think running is probably best. Scarlet, you want to join me on this love boat?”
“Ugh, yes! Of course I do,” he replied, but then his smile faded and he slipped his leg around my neck. “But...I also want you to live through the week. Quickie will listen to me once she’s calmed down. I’ll try to keep her from wringing Iris Jade’s neck before we can point them both in the direction of something that needs its butt kicked.” Leaning in, he rubbed his cheek against mine. “You...you go be amazing, alright, Hardy?”
“I’ll do my best, Scarlet,” I said, chuckling to myself. “You know, you’re going to make someone a damn good wife, one day.”
“H-Hardy! Please don’t tease me like that!”
I barely had time to catch him as he leapt into my forelegs. Then he was kissing me, desperately hugging himself to my chest with all the love that little body could muster. It was...nice. Sweet, even. It’s strange how quickly a pony can get used to having someone to kiss.
The clapping in the background reminded both of us that we had an audience. Swift was stomping her hooves and bouncing up and down while Taxi just sat there, hitting her lightly greased hooves together. Scarlet’s ears splayed back, and he stepped away, setting my new hat back on my head. His eyes were glistening, but he inhaled sharply and wiped them clear.
“I’ll see you soon,” I said, softly. “Give Lily my love.”
He gave me a weak nod, then spun and galloped for the building. The last I saw of him was his tail vanishing around the corner of a late model sedan. I couldn’t help running my tongue over my muzzle; he’d tasted like frosting.
Taxi giggled, spinning her key-ring on the tip of her hoof. “Well, that was adorable.”
“Says the pony who goes all gooey over a certain minotaur every time he’s in the room?” I sniggered.
My driver flashed me a lascivious grin. “That’s just sex. I’m pretty sure, no matter how good that minotaur plows my tail, I wouldn’t be licking my lips like that from just a kiss.”
“He probably ate a cupcake earlier!” I protested.
“Uhuh...keep telling yourself that. Are we going? Or do you want to gawk at the car and that colt’s flank some more?”
Swift piped up, just as I was readying a crushing retort.
“Sir, we need to leave...uh...now.” When I turned to look at her, her eyes were following something coming up from behind us through the floor. “My parents just reached the room we were in and figured out where we were heading.”
My heart skipped two beats. “How?!”
“A giant super-cab under construction in the garage kinda sticks out in everypony’s mind, Sir…”
“That’s...poor. Alright, everypony in!”
Without waiting for a response, I hobbled around to the side of the massive vehicle. It took me a moment to realize I had absolutely no idea how the door worked. I glanced back at my driver and she shrugged, then trotted over to my side. She pressed a spot on the side of the cab. There was a soft click, and the door swung open. A short set of steps unfolded right to my hooves.
“I may have let the engineers go a little overboard,” she muttered, sliding her foreleg under mine as she helped me climb up onto the seat. The A.M.V.’s seats had been replaced by plush, wingback chairs that looked like they ought to sit in front of a fire and come with a glass of scotch.
I dragged myself into the passenger seat, then leaned sideways to peer into the rear compartment. The same mad pony who’d decorated the cabin had been at work in the back; there was thick, red carpet on the floor, along with two long bench seats that must have been stolen from the club. A glowing crystal in a brass enclosure was set into the ceiling.
Stretched out on the seat with Mags sprawled against his stomach, Limerence sat with his horn glowing softly and a book in the crook of his hoof. He raised an eyebrow at me, then pointed to his muzzle. I gave him a puzzled look, then he made a little rubbing motion in the air. Reaching up, I wiped my mouth on the back of my leg. It came away covered in pink lipstick.
“Taxi grabbed you on the way up, Lim?” I asked, cleaning my hoof on the edge of my coat..
“No, I was already here.” He nodded his horn toward the light fixture. “Spell frames do take quite a long time to charge, lest I wish to cook myself again. That, and I knew we’d eventually be running away from something when you returned without any skin. I figured I would save myself a jog and get some work done at the same time.”
“What about her?” I asked.
Limerence looked down at the sleeping griffin chick, then shrugged. “She seemed uncertain why everyone was making such a big fuss over your death, though she lay beside your bed for several hours.” His horn lit up and he jiggled a paper plate I hadn’t noticed until that moment which was sitting on the carpet beside the bench. It contained the picked apart remains of what might have been a fish or small bird of some kind. “I presume at some point between then and now, she took a detour into one of the kitchens. She was round as a volleyball, so it must have been quite the meal.”
“I may need you to come up with a spell to let me know the next time she uses the toilet,” I said. “I don’t want to be within a mile of that bathroom.”
The driver’s door opened and Taxi hopped in, then retracted the stairs and shut it behind her. Up top, the roof hatch clicked, then Swift dropped into the back with a graceful little roll, catching herself on the nearest bench before throwing herself back into a seat.
“Sir, we have less than a minute before my mom is here!” she squeaked.
Limerence’s ears twitched and he looked suddenly worried, setting his book to one side. “Wait... Detective, are we running from Quickie Cuddles?”
“Yes, yes we are. I’ll explain in a minute. Sweets, shall we see if this thing you’ve built actually works?”
Taxi reached toward the steering column, then hesitated. Her eyes darted in my direction, then she slowly rested her toe on the ignition button. “Hardy, I feel I should warn you that...the first time I turned this thing on, there were some unusual effects from the magical fields coming off the engine.”
A peculiar prickle at the back of my neck made me twitch internally. I peered out the window just in time for an indistinct shape to sail past the window and explode on the wall of the garage. It looked like the remains of a small wagon.
I braced myself on the dashboard and shouted, “Sweets, there are going to be unusual effects from an enraged unicorn ripping my stallion bits off because my old boss told her I made her daughter pregnant! I don’t want to find out if those grow back! Punch it!”
She hit the ignition. I braced for the roar and was met with absolute silence. The engine made no sound whatsoever. I was ready to start cursing and begging for my life, when I felt a slight vibration under my hips.
“Is...is it supposed to be that quiet?” Swift asked, softly.
“I thought we might do well to be a tad less attention getting,” Limerence said, tapping his cutie-mark with his toe. “It took several hours to charge the spell frames, but as I have always said...silence is golden.”
I jerked back as a wagon tire smashed into the windshield, shattering into little pieces. Thankfully, it didn’t leave so much as a scratch in the glass.
Taxi goosed the accelerator and the vehicle leapt out of the parking space like a scalded rat. I heard a soft crunch as the front tire flattened an ill placed toolbox flat as a pancake. Out the windshield, I could see an oncoming magical field the color of a ripe peach expanding across the garage, shimmering with unspent energies as it crept over the parked cars. A few of them started to slowly rise into the air.
I couldn’t hear it, but I could feel the drone of powerful magic starting to build in the back of my skull. I’d have given an ear for my armor and spared a moment to the hope that somepony thought to pack it. Not that it was likely to do me much good against Quickie considering just how mad she was likely to be. Iris Jade picked her revenge well.
A flash of sharp, blue light spat from the truck’s front grill as Taxi slewed the back sideways to line us up with the ramp, and my stomach slammed against my ribcage. Bits of debris pelted the back bumper as the front half of a limo rolled passed my window into a pillar. I grabbed for my seatbelt and yanked it across my body.
“Everypony hang on!” I shouted over my shoulder.
“Hardy...Remember the ‘effects’ I told you about?” Taxi said. “They start when in second gear.”
“My death starts in first gear! Go!”
The silent engine shook the cabin and I was pressed back in my seat as we bolted toward the exit ramp. I was braced for launch, when a blast of sweet smelling, pink smoke poured out of the truck’s ventilation system. My eyes watered, and then I felt myself start to involuntarily relax. The sensation was like a light sedative.
We got a bit of air leaping off the end of the ramp into the lot behind the Vivarum. I braced for impact, but rather than landing heavily, it felt like a cloud caught us, barely jostling my hooves. A soft zebra chant started up, whispering cheerfully peaceful little notes through my brain that felt like somepony giving my neurons a light massage. I glanced at the radio; it was still off.
As I sat there, my mind started to wander a little and my shoulders unbound themselves. What did it matter that the world was about to end? It was a nice day for a drive.
A rather pretty, whorled design in what appeared to be some kind of light orange paint began to creep up the wall from the steering wheel, spreading out across the dashboard. I peered out the windshield, and realized we’d somehow gotten from the Vivarium straight into the city. How’d that happened? Was I not paying attention?
I turned to look over at my driver, which felt like it took several minutes to accomplish. A soft halo of light seemed to be emanating from her head as she leaned against the steering wheel. Tilting my head toward my other companions, I saw Swift sitting there with a big, silly grin on her face and an open M.R.E. between her forelegs. Limerence seemed to be meditating, or possibly had nodded off. Mags was still asleep.
Come on brain. Talk. I know you can.
“Why do I feel like I’ve just had a bunch of happy weed?” I asked, softly, so as not to interrupt the chanting.
Taxi leaned on the steering wheel, teeth gritted as she dropped our speed down to something less than super-sonic and pressed a button on the dash. A soft hum started up overhead, then dampened to a place it wasn’t more than barely noticeable. “Magical side effects. I don’t know. I’ll get it worked out the next time I can spend two days with a spanner and an arcane probe.”
“I meant ‘Why does it feel like the inside of your apartment?’.”
Taxi tilted her head to one side, tracing the design that’d sprung up on the dash with her toe. “Oh. I don’t know.”
“Lim?” I called in the back. “You want to chime in on this?”
Limerence opened his eyes and exhaled, then blinked a few times. “Ah, yes. Pardon, it is most hypnotic, isn’t it, Detective? The spell core absorbs the ‘intent’ of the user, the same as a unicorn’s horn might. It translates the intent into purpose. She overcharged the spell core, so it’s not just absorbing intent and turning it into speed. It may be absorbing some of her personality, as well.”
“Nopony mention Minox, or we’ll be swimming to our destination,” I quipped and Taxi swatted in my direction, though the blow missed by miles. “Is the invisibility spell working?”
“I was able to replace the battery system with a jimmied version one of the engineers threw together,” Taxi added, quirking her lip. “We’ve got a few hours of active camouflage. The gamma rays off the exterior are enough to fry an egg, but I’m not worried about someone trying to attack us getting cancer in 10 years.”
“And anyone who wants to get in our way between here and Supermax is probably not an innocent bystander,” I said, then looked back at Swift who was munching on a snack bar. “Kid, your mother...she’s not likely to chase us, is she?”
Swift shook her head. “She’ll only be mad until somepony can tell her I’m not pregnant.”
“And…what about the rest of it? The events at D.W.’s mansion?”
My partner was silent, and then her ears drooped. “I’ll ask if Tourniquet has a portable generator we can put in the back, here. You’ll probably need it.”
“That’s what I thought. Well, we’ve got a bit of a drive. I might as well let a certain fussy princess know what we’ve been up to,” I said, picking up my coat and fishing the magical walkie-talkie out of the front pocket. Getting out of my seat, I staggered into the back to find a quiet spot to sit for what I was sure was going to be a long, arduous conversation.
“Wait, is that a fridge? Who put a fridge in here? Oooh, is there beer?”
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HAHAHA ... Great chapter.
8638523 Thanks. It's an effort, but I do love putting these out.
-Chessie
A. Either Iris Jade is simply bullshitting or I am missing a joke.
B. A vehicle that actively releases and circulates the emotions and intent of the current user to all passengers and the vehicle itself... The world will fear the day Rage Cop goes to war.
C. A theory I have had in my mind for a while but I am not sure how to formulate without possibly spoiling. Would i be correct if I said that the reveal of the bad guy necromancer's identity will affect Limerence the most?
Ahhh... We now know where the beers came from during the conversation that is about to happen. Any good rig has a fridge (my cousin's interstate rig had fridge, freezer and microwave... made the Adelaide to Perth runs far more bearable)
True, she did promise not to kill Hardy... no promises were made about not encouraging others to do it for her!
This is the mare whose first reaction to Hardy was to set him on his arse with a hard hoof across the chops. Now she is destroying walls on her way to 'talk' with him again.... not the best sign for Hardy's short term health, eh?
Nice chapter, Chessie. Plenty of humour and an introduction to the undocumented Warden powers and an amazing piece of automotive engineering. Keep on keeping on and enjoy your New Year.
8638590 Iris Jade is mostly bullshitting, but she chose the right target. She knows, in a very personal way, what having Hard Boiled fuck with her relationship with her kid is like, whether or not Hardy was actually in on it at the time. Angry mommy unicorns are not to be underestimated.
2.Yes.
3.Yes.
That vehicle sounds like something you would see in mad max and motorcity...where could I get one?
8638857 Make friends with an Earth Pony assassin and give her the funding and engineering skills of an entire city to make one car out of two, then throw a spell core of indeterminate origin in it and pray the whole thing doesn't explode.
-Chessie
Every time a new chapter comes out, I always end up in a "more questions than answers" kinda situation. Don't get me wrong, I love that the story's continuing, but each new chapter like this (even though it's so full of that delicious character interaction) just makes me want to put my story on hold so I'll have less to rewrite. Maybe it's real life matters, maybe it's my own procrastination, but I've been much further behind on my writing than I'd hoped. I dunno, sometimes I just feel like I'm just not as creative as you are. Don't suppose you've got advice for that...? Anything's worth a try at this point, I'm feeling.
Swift's new power up (she's assuming direct control...by proxy), Iris Jade's rumor, Quickie Cuddles' immense scariness (which means she might hold a grudge), the kiss from Scarlet (seems like Hardy's feeling the love), and the new Night Trotter! That's 3/4 of my prologue turned on it's head. How do you do it?
My coworkers are looking at me funny, wondering why I am laughing like a loon!
So Swift can now power up to roughly “Goddess of Rage” (which I feel would make Granny Glow proud), Jade got her some petty vengeance siccing Quickie in Hardy, Hardy’s got a new hat, and Taxi has a new vehicle that screams “overcompensation” in a bid to outdo Princess Twilight’s “Royal Friendship Tank”.
All in all, a fun decompression chapter.
Welp, that was quite a trip...
...that has only just barely begun.
8638973 Creativity is a matter of discovering where the boundaries in your head are and tossing them out the window. You have all these things you tell yourself, every single day, and those are very comforting. Now burn them to the ground.
When you find yourself making a statement about the world inside your head, say 'And what if that's not how it is?'
My favorite example is 'Death is inevitable'. Except...what if it's not? And then you chase that path to the logical or illogical conclusion, no matter how far it takes you, and you keep chasing. Every time you run into one of those big, internal denials where you can't imagine things being a certain way, just imagine they are. Abandon your morality or your sense of the shape of the world while you're in fantasy and move beyondit.
Stop telling yourself anything is impossible or improbable and just do it. In fiction, you don't have to explain much. It just has to be internally consistent. If you can bullshit a reasoning (as I frequently do), then all the better. The human mind loves to nod along like it knows what you're talking about, even if it knows fuck all.
Don't forget this essential fact :
You Are God.
If you forget it, you can lose the spark of the infinite that drives your creativity.
You Are God.
-Chessie
Damn, Miss Cuddles is a weee bit upset...
I get this feeling that because Celestia and Luna are out of town, the World Magic is rearranging so that Swift takes over Celestias duties, and Torniquet takes over Lunas?
If Jade and Cuddles went after the same target at the same time, with extreme intent, jus how much Wish Machine power would be needed to hold them, that wouldnt be available for defence elsewhere? Aftre all, there must be a limitation in it somewhere, because the occupants havent just Genesis Device hit the rest of the planet.
As long as Hardy doesnt have to pull a Soul Kriket to compete with the Monolith Soul Drive, things shouldnt get Too bad?
Night Trotter 2 is a very nice machine, especially given the extreme limitation in available resources and time. Given enough, Id have liked to work on Maginanogoop for it. The first cell takes terrabucks, the next planet eater costs nothing.
8639175 There are going to be gods battling in the streets real soon.
Let's fucking rock.
-Chessie
Hmm, which is more powerful, Iris Jade or Quickie Cuddles?...
This week on Death Battle!
"We have two unicorns fueled by magic and rage. Iris Jade, the drug addicted rage machine that runs Detrot police department."
"And Quickie Cuddles, an over-protective mom with the most deceiving name ever."
"I'm Wiz and he's boomstick, and it's our job to analyse their weapons armor and skill to see who would win a Death Battle."
"We've had to bring them to the middle of the Saddle Arabian Desert to make sure there won't be any collateral damage. Both combatants have been told their daughter's are in danger and the other combatant is the one responsible, let's see what happens. It's time for a Deeeath Baaattllle!"
The part about a "clown-car, full to the brim with mimes" just killed me.
Thank you.
Gee, everypony and everybody has their turn at being superinflated with overconfidence at some point, so dense it's creating black holes of confidence everywhere. Funny thing though, so many self-declared gods, but they can do jack shit.
8639847 Thaaat's what climaxes are for! Throw everybody in the ring and see who wins!
-Chessie
8639644
That was a fun joke to write. Took four attempts to get the imagery right.
-Chessie
For all the cool stuff in this chapter, angry Swift probably sticks with me the most. Swift at this point is just...she lives up to her family name, methinks. She is the cutest little pony who would brutally dismember an entire army of mutant horrors with her bare hooves (and teeth) for her partner.
She is, dare I say, a sweet cinnamon roll. Too good for this world. too pure.
8641076 Yeah, a little. Swift is not going to be happy when she finds out who put Hardy on the operating table without most of his bits.
-Chessie
8641552
I mean...this is basically her first job, right? Swift is just getting exposure to that constant of the workaday world, terrible bosses. I think everyone's had a boss at some point that we wished would mutate into a demon so we could go all DOOM on them, right? My point is, it was bound to happen eventually! Might as well get it over-with early on, right?
8639014
Real talk: I know this comment wasn't meant for me. I just love it so much anyway. Thank you for writing this.
Still really enjoying this story and it's incredible stamina. It seems like numbers are on the side of the bad guys, while our hero has a royal flush of powerful pony cards in hoof that Nopony wants to take on directly. If he can wittle down the numbers his power team can steamroller the rest. He just needs a target to aim at.
8639014
Spoke like a true novelist
It just struck me that I've been reading this story for over five years, holy cow what a trip.
8656112 I really hope it'll be done soon. I want to write something else, but I can't leave this unfinished.
-Chessie
Well then,
Finally caught up... Holy shit, like strait from the pope to the porcelain throne. I remember reading the first chapter like "meh, I'll check back with this later." Now though I'm like "damn, past me fucked up."
Anyway, I await the next chapter, but in the mean time imma pull a Hardy and just "get a beer."
8656444
I honestly can't imagine what it's like writing the same book for five years, but I'm hella glad you're committed. If this died I'd be sad af.
8656738 How hard did you binge? I hear a lot of people binge hard for reasons.
-Chessie
8656834
Not too hard, if we go from ch. 1 to here I spent about a year, but if we go from ch. 5 to here then I spent maybe 2-3 weeks, so it was fun. And I mean no disrespect or anything but something about those first few chapters just seemed, boring, or more I felt there was somethings I should understand but I just didn't, so I was really confused but later on I just sat down and said "alright, lets do this" and found it really interesting after ch. 6 or so.
I have been following this story for over four years. Keep up the spectacular work. I love stories from imaginative people with twisted minds, and you are the cream of the crop.
That being said, I will be chewing the keyboard if Hardy doesn't end up an alicorn (the alicorn of washed up boozers perhaps?) by the end of this thing.
8673723
Alicorn? Alicorns are weeeeak. This is Hard Boiled. I have many more awesome things planned.
-Chessie
8674922
That's supremely tacky of you. Although I suppose that a single alicorn no matter how powerful or experienced cannot possibly hope to surmount every obstacle. In any case Celestia and Luna were out of the picture last I checked and Twilight is lacking harmony. Who knows where Cadence is...
I've been waiting for a good excuse to binge on my favourite story again and sleepless nights make it worth it.
Also that boy really needs to RUN more often and stall less! Next time he might not get so lucky. Poor Hardy!
You know, this backstory is eerily familiar. Usually dying minion of an Evil Lord tells backstory like that to explain their extreme loyalty.
8691142 I know, am a little tacky, but...I love you guys, so I will do something worthy.
-C
Certainly has been quite a loss of innocence here. Aside from the city-wide conflict and eclipse we have:
The whole bit with with voluntarily setting aside will in order to be controlled by someone else, laying aside your responsibilities and actions to someone else seems like, to my ill-informed "outsider-looking in" perspective, as part of the draw and appeal to certain fetishistic scenes IRL
(or maybe I am just spouting nonsense out my arse?)
My heroes dress in black!
What?
...
Oh.
OH!
Of course not! They have two.
That's a quite depressing way to look at her life.
Either one nurse, or two nurses, since we started with six and four left, so one of them spontaneously evaporated?
"Pessimism and the Art of Dying," by Hard Boiled, Alicorn of Justice and Alcoholism, published by Lunar Press.
Well, Jade would be happier with Swift dating Hardy than her daughter...
And when Canterlot is saved and the sun returned, Taxi is going to legally marry it.
Taxi! Don't you know that a mime is a terrible thing to waste?
Hardy sounds like he's ready to go race some chocobos instead of hunting Sephiroth.
9494012
Phlilosiphical pessimism is simply the idea that if we have an equal arbitrary choice between an optimistic awnser, or a pessimistic awnser to a philosophical question, you should always choose pessimistic.
For example, they would never chiose to believe in morality because morality is both arbitrary and optimistic.
Hardy is almost a textbook definition of philosophical stoicism, they are exestentialists that don't really believe in free will, and think that you should just go about life ready to deal with whatever it throws at you, both good or bad.
Basically, Individuals cannot change the course of life, so just deal with it lol.
(yes I know it was a joke, no I dont care)
Oo as much as blue jokes about hardy accending, this makes me think that swift might as well
Yeah, otay, thats totally going to happen hardy
Hahahaha
Uh boy
Um
Typo?
Beer and chicken!
By the way, not only do I want this in ebook
I want this in audible, though maybe you should do the first two acts in their own books and the third act in two or three
And I would happily pay 10 bucks for each book, but if you can make the first one an audible original where its free for a month you'll get a lot of readers
I'd offer to read it for you, but my English freaken sucks, my boyfriend might be willing to, he reads to me and my meta every night and has fun voices
You could prob ask the discord and get an actor for everypony (if so can I be a minor char that only has one or two lines?)
If anything the only one who needs to worry about that is ol Tourniquet... Look, one of these merge sessions is gonna turn out unexpectedly sometime.