Dr. Twilight Sparkle's House of Horrors and Unusual Shenanigans

by little big pony

It's Okay To Ask For Blood As Long As you Don't Tell Them What It's For

“Nero! I need some blood!”

Nero Cladius Divi Claudius filius, also known as Nero by his friends and “that weird tall colt with the weird wigglers” to almost everyone else, looked up from his three-week-old Gabby Gums article. Standing in front of him, with an eager smile on her face, was his boss, the part-time princess and professional mad scientist Twilight Sparkle.

The young princess looked as pristine as she did every morning. Her mane and tail had been fixed in such a way they gleamed in the sunlight, and her fur was trimmed and neat. There was also a bright, cheery smile on her face and a pleasant warmth in her lavender eyes. The mare before him didn’t look like a pony that would go asking people for blood. But he knew better. Oh, he knew better.

Yawning, Nero reached over and grabbed his coffee cup, taking a sip of its contents while he thought over what she had just said.

The rookie mistake would be to ask her why she needed the blood, but he was no rookie. Whenever maniacal laughter echoed throughout the house, the hair on the back of his neck would stand on end. If the word “Science!” was screamed, he knew to immediately duck for cover. The very sight of beakers and glass vials gave him flashbacks of events that would turn the stomach of even the most grizzled Solar Guard.

In the two months that he had been working with Twilight “the dork” Sparkle, he had become an old hand where her nonsense was concerned. He knew not to ask why she need blood because he knew that her answer would only leave him with more questions and a headache. So, setting down his newspaper and leaning back into his chair, he tried a different approach.

“What kind of blood do you need?” he asked matter-of-factly.

“Oh, any kind of blood would do,” the princess chirped, walking over to the table that he was sitting at and hopping up into an empty chair.

As she settled herself, the tip of her horn glowed. Across the kitchen, the half-full coffee pot was encased in a purple glow along with a ‘Number 1 Princess’ mug. With a flick of her horn, both objects were floated over. Nero, eyeing the coffee pot, slide his own mug over and gave it a little shake.

“And how much blood do you need, boss?” he asked as she refilled his mug while also helping herself to come coffee.

“Ideally I’d need ten gallons, but I’d appreciate whatever amount you could get me, Nero,” she said, giving him a bright smile before taking a princess-like sip of her coffee.
Again there was that temptation to ask why. Why did she need so much blood? Why did she need blood at all? Why the heck was she asking him for it like he had oodles of the stuff in his fridge? But again, he resisted the urge.

That was just what she wanted. He had to ignore the obvious trap and charge forward into the thick of it.

“Do you need fresh blood or will some stuff that’s a couple days old do?”

Twilight opened her mouth but immediately closed it, her ears folding against her skull and her brow furrowing in thought.

“I hadn’t thought of that, actually,” she admitted, looking down at her coffee mug with a frown.

“Well, if we need it fresh, then we’ll need to go out in the field to get it,” Nero said, drumming his fingers against the wooden table. “If you want to just go ahead and get the good stuff, I’d suggest that we set up a stand outside the castle offering ten bits for two pints of blood and see who we can get to come over.”

“It’s illegal to solicit blood from ponies without a proper license,” Twilight said, though she didn’t look very pleased in saying it.

“License? Why the heck would we need a license to get blood from random ponies?”

“A hundred and twenty years ago there was an incident with some unicorns in Canterlot. Back then it was popular to purchase blood from poor earth ponies so they could use it to fuel some of their more delicate spells,” the purple princess said, as if reciting it from a book. “The practice was eventually shut down when a demon was summoned incorrectly and rampaged through the city. Now not only are you not allowed to practice blood magic, but you need a medical license to be allowed to get any amount of blood from a pony.”

“Well that seems a little unfair,” the human said, laying it on a little thick. “Just because you had a few bad eggs doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t be able to practice dark magic!”

“I know, right?” Twilight said with huff, missing the sarcasm in his voice completely. “I’ve sent the princess half a dozen letters asking her to have the law repealed, but each time my request has been denied!”

Nero nearly rolled his eyes, but at the last moment he was able to reign in the urge. “You know, I’m sure if you went down to the hospital or the blood bank they’d give you all the blood that you need, law or not. You are a princess, after all.”

“I went the other day,” she said, her muzzle scrunching up and her cheeks puffing out in indignation. “I spent an hour and a half trying to convince the hospital director to lend me some blood, but no matter how much I begged, she wouldn’t give me any.”

The princess let out a raspberry. “She said something about me asking for too much or some horse apples like that…”

“Really? I can’t believe it! Ten gallons isn’t that much blood,” Nero said, shaking his head as he took another sip of his coffee.

Looking into his eyes, Twilight leaned across the table. She took a moment to look around the kitchen conspiringly, which had him rolling his eyes so hard they they nearly popped out of his head.

“I did the math last night,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. “The hospital should have almost fifty gallons of blood from the blood drive they had a couple of days ago. Factoring in the possibility that they might have had to use some of the blood already and a few bags of it might have had to be discarded for multiple reasons they should have at least forty-five gallons worth. More than enough that they’d be able to spare a couple of gallons.”

Resting his elbows on the table, Nero let what Twilight just said hang in the air for a few moments. Like whenever she came to him with a crazy or odd demand, he wanted her to think about what she had just said. In doing so, he hoped that she’d realize just how crazy she sounded and would take the necessary steps to fix the problem, whatever it may be. But, just like every other time he had done this, Twilight just stared back at him expectantly, waiting for him to weigh in on her “problem”.

Sighing, he took another sip of his coffee and quietly wondered what had happened to his childhood dream of becoming a traveling unicyclist.

“Well, if push comes to shove I can go down to the blood bank and show a little skin. You know how much they love giant, hairless stallions down here…”

A smile broke out across Twilight’s face once more. “I’m really happy that you’re willing to go to that far to get my blood, Nero,” she said gratefully.

“I was actually being sarcastic,” Nero calmly responded. “I’m not going to flaunt myself in front of those weird blood ponies. If I’m going to be doing any flaunting, it’s going to be in front of a rich, single mare that’s preferably in her early fifties.”

Twilight didn’t seem to hear, instead staring off into nothing with a glassy-eyed expression. “The scientific field needs ponies like you. Ponies that are willing to do whatever it takes to push the envelope, to set the bar a little higher!—”
“Not a pony. I was hoping you’d have figured that out by now, what with me having hands and all...”

“Ponies like Clover the Clever and Starswirl the Bearded didn’t stop their research just because ponies didn’t agree with their methods! No, they buckled down, they put in the hours—”

“I don’t remember reading anywhere that Clover or Starswirl worked with blood magic.”

“— and sure, they might have done some… questionable things, but it was for the greater good! Without their works we might not have understood the mechanics of earth pony magic, or how a pegasus can form a cloud!”

With a giggle, Twilight looked over at her resigned assistant, who was wishing with all of his might that he had slept in this morning.

“I don’t know if our experiments will be as groundbreaking as theirs, but maybe they will,” the bookworm continued. “Maybe we’ll make a spell that jumpstarts a magical renaissance, or lets ponies leave our planet so they we can explore Luna’s stars!”

“I have absolutely no idea how you can be… this at six in the morning,” Nero said, shaking his head. “I’d think it was impressive if I wasn’t the one that had to deal with it…”

Giggle now turning into a cackle, Twilight threw her hooves up into the air. “Just think about it, Nero. In a few years we might discover something so amazing that our names will be said in the same sentence as Starswirl or Clover!”

Ruffling her feathers in excitement, she hopped up onto the table and looking up at the ceiling. “I can see it now. I, the brilliant, daring, and virile scientist and you, the homely and humble assistant, forebearers of an important branch of science that helped make everyponies life better in ways that they couldn’t even imagine!”

Nero snorted. “Homely? I’ll have you know that I’m a solid seven and a half out of ten.”

“They’d have lectures on our work! There’d be statues of us erected in great places of learning! I might even get my own section in Canterlot library!”

“So we’re going to solve the mysteries of the universe with ten gallons of blood, then?” Nero asked, not quite sure that if he was ready for Twilight’s answer.

“Don’t be a silly filly, Nero! You can’t solve anything with blood,” the purple bookworm said, giving him a pat on the head that, to him at least, felt just a little bit condescending. “The blood is just for a few… experiments that I’ve been wanting to do for a while now.”

She ruffled her feathers in unrestrained glee.

“Though, you never know…”

Nero nodded, reaching into his back pocket and pulling out a small silver flask. “I’m guessing that these experiments are less than legal?” he asked.

“I won’t tell the poince if you don’t,” Twilight said coolly.

“You know you’re a princess right?” the human asked. “You’re supposed to act with some grace and dignity.”

Twilight smiled, looking deep into his eyes. “Science,” she simply said, her tone adopting an almost religious reverence as she said it.

“But—”

“Science.”

“Twi, you can’t just—”

“Sci-ence.”

For the third time that morning, Nero felt the urge to question why. Why had he decided to work for this crazy purple horse? He could do better than this, couldn’t he? Maybe he could get a job as a laborer, or maybe a baker.

Last time he walked by the local strip club in town he had seen that they were looking for exotic males. Maybe he could go and try his hand at that!

As he pulled the top off the flask, however, he had remembered that no one in Ponyville wanted a giant alien stallion working for them. All except Twilight, the one mare that no one else wanted to work for because they all knew how looney she was.

Groaning at his misfortunes, Nero, number one assistant to Princess Twilight Sparkle, poured half of the contents of his flask into his coffee mug. Putting the flask away and stirring his drink with his finger, he picked up his mug and took a sip.

Twilight, who had watched him do this, frowned. “Nero, you know that drinking this early in the morning isn’t good for you,”

Nero gave her the look of a man that has seen far too much in his young life and desperately wished that he was able to return to better times. Times when he still had a shred of innocence left and the world seemed a brighter place.

“We just had a five-minute conversation about getting ten gallons of blood,” he said, taking a big gulp of his “coffee”.

“We did,” Twilight agreed, as if such conversations were on par with asking someone about the weather.

“You know that most assistants do things like clean up after their bosses and get their schedules in order, right?

Twilight giggled, nudging him with a wither. “Aren’t you lucky you have such an interesting boss?” she asked.

Giving her a smile that didn’t reach his eyes, Nero made a mental note to check back on the strip club when he walked home later today. If he was lucky, maybe they’d still be hiring.

“It’s why I drink at six in the morning,” he said, raising his mug and toasting her.

Comments

[LordMentat]

I am sorry......but this seems oddly appropriate for this story....

[Alondro]

I can get Twilight 10 gallons of blood easily.

*eerie silence, Alondro just stares... staring...*

[VikingOtaku6]

8297785
Twilight, what are we going to do tonight?

Same thing we do every night, Nero; try to take over the world!

Hail Hydra.