All-American Girl: The Third Law of Motion

by Cody MacArthur Fett

Justification Noir

Brothers and sisters of the Equestriani Fascist Party, it is time I once again addressed one of the most common criticisms of our beloved movement. The criticism of which I speak is, of course, the wrongheaded notion that we wish to repeat the follies of the Second World War. Specifically, that it is our alleged desire to bring about in Equestria a reincarnation of the society propagated by the National Socialist German Workers’ Party, commonly known as the Nazis.

This falsehood is a side effect of the highly effective propaganda campaign waged by the Allied nations of World War II. During this campaign, Fascism’s good name was defamed in an effort to mobilize people to fight against the Italians. The Italians had in turn wrongfully allied with Hitler and his Nazi Germany because of the even more wrongheaded snubbing of Mussolini by their old allies prior to the war. They had turned their noses up at him, enacting unjust embargoes and restrictions, and for what? For having the courage to see a wrong in the Ethiopian slave trade and the willingness to fight against it by any means necessary, even unto war.

Make no mistake, though, that despite the grave insult the Allied Nations heaped upon Italy, allying with Hitler’s Germany was a grave error from every possible angle. It is also not something that we Equestriani would have done had we been in the same situation. In the same situation, we would have stuck fast to our old friendships and tried to work things out and never would have allied with a man who was so publicly abusive of everyone and everything. Our Fascism would not have been Mussoliniism and it certainly wouldn’t have been Hitlerism.

Fascism, since that is the word that is used, fascism presents, wherever it manifests itself, characteristics which are varied to the extent that countries and national temperaments vary. It is essentially a defensive reaction of the organism, a manifestation of the desire to live, of the desire not to die, which at certain times seizes a whole people. So each people reacts in its own way, according to its conception of life. Our rising, here, has an Equestriani meaning! What can it have in common with Hitlerism, which was, above all, a reaction against the state of things created by the defeat, and by the abdication and the despair that followed it?

So take heart, young people from across the interstellar veil, for the Fascists are your friends, not your enemies! We seek only to fight against those who would drag us into war, and to live in peace with those who will let us. A repeat of the Holocaust is what we fight against most of all.

Thus I make a public appeal to the American President, who no doubt has heard of our rise. Mister Cantwell, do not strike us down. We are no threat to you, and indeed might become your biggest ally in the future against the enemies of all life. If it would put your mind at ease, meet with me, the Boss of the EFP, personally, and I shall ease all your fears.

[Dated: October 12th, 2046; no public response from the White House was ever given to the article.]

---

The window to Just News’s old office was covered with a translucent curtain of rain, darkening the room and reducing the lights outside to yellow blurs, just as planned. Winter was coming soon, and for the first time in Brisk’s life, he imagined it might just arrive on time. Things had certainly changed for the better . . . well, most things.

“I hear that you’re dozing off in class again,” Brisk said conversationally, still staring at the rain soaked window.

“Not for long, and my grades aren’t suffering at all,” Keytone replied quickly.

Brisk took a moment to glance at his sister. Her black hair was coming back, her head looking less like a cue ball and more like a soot-covered lawn every day. Around her were scattered tablets, PDAs, datapads, and half a dozen other electronic devices that he couldn’t remember the classifications for. Her fingers danced over the holographic keyboard projected onto the table in front of her Advent Halcyon computer, a speaker mounted into the projector making a noise not unlike their grandfather’s old typewriter with each key activation. She was in her element, but dark rings surrounded her eyes, and though she never frowned, she didn’t do much smiling either.

“You know what I’m getting at, sis. You need rest, just like the doctor ordered,” he reminded her.

The retro-futuristic soundtrack stopped, and she looked up with eyes so dark in the poor lighting of the room they looked like two black pools with no bottoms. “You know why that won’t work, Brisk.”

He clasped his hand as a flash of fire ran across his vision. “Yeah, I know why,” he said, pausing for a moment to inhale not unlike a sob. “Just . . . I don’t know, take a pill or something to knock yourself out without making you remember. I don’t want to wake up one day to find out that my sister escaped death only to die of exhaustion six months later.”

“I . . . I’ll try, Brisk. That’s all I can do,” she relented.

“‘All you can do,’ huh?” he said with a sardonic chuckle, pivoting around to face her fully. “You say that while doing, what? Five different things at once?”

The smallest glimmer of a cheeky smile appeared on her mouth. “I’m a girl, remember? Our brains are supremely adept at multitasking.”

“Yeah, yeah, so you’ve told me a dozen times before,” he said, walking up to her and patting her shoulder.

“Listen, I’ve got to go now. Champion said she would be along shortly. You going to be alright until . . . ?”

“Yeah,” Keytone interrupted. “Yeah. I’ll be fine. Gives me more time alone to work.”

“OK then, I’ll see you home by eight?” he asked.

His sister paused for a moment, but then nodded. “By eight. I’ll see about my work getting covered.”

“Thanks, sis,” he said before walking out the door.

He was climbing down the stairs to the lobby when he saw her, small, fluffy, and lightish-red. One of her purple eyes was hidden behind that peekaboo Veronica Lake manestyle that had become so popular of late, and which Keytone had been planning to get before she lost her hair in surgery. That didn’t stop her from encouraging her friend to go and get the same style though, and it looked like she had finally taken her up on that.

“Good evening, Champion,” Brisk said as he walked towards the coat rack where she had just finished throwing up her own jacket.

“Good evening, Brisk,” Champion Pastry said, looking up at him with one sad eye.

“Keytone’s still up in her office, if that’s what you’re wondering about.”

“I was, actually. Has there been any improvement?”

“A little. I actually got her to smile a little when I pointed out a contradiction, and I got her to promise me she would be home by eight, so remember that.”

“Was the contradiction that she was multitasking a lot? Because the females of your species are really good at that.”

“Yeah, so everyone keeps telling me. Amazing how no one ever talks about how us males are really good at focusing on things though.”

“That's because it's not really remarkable, Brisk.”

“It might be boring, but it’s also practical.”

“I’ve seen your art, so I’ll have to give you that.”

Taking the lull in the conversation as permission to move, Brisk walked over to the coatrack to put on his jacket and hat. It was a large affair in a classic Manehattan style, but he thought he wore it well. The hat was a simple brown wide-brimmed fedora. Both had been waterproofed with hyper hydrophobic materials, perfect for a night like the one pouring down outside the door.

“We never should have let her go that day,” Champion whispered to herself as she turned away.

“No, we shouldn’t have,” Brisk replied sadly. When the earth pony turned around in surprise, he clarified. “My hearing isn't nearly as bad as it seems sometimes, and you’re not half as quiet as you think you are.”

With that, he exited the building into the cold night. Liquid ice fell, splattering against his coat and hat to bounce off like grease on a teflon pan. He wasn’t wearing any gloves though, so into the pockets went his hands. It was a cold November night.

He considered calling a taxi to get home. That would have been the smart thing to do. He wanted to take it slow, though, and center himself. So he walked home, which he could do, now that the government was finally cleaning up the streets.

No more Yellow Zones or Red Zones or even Green Zones, just one big city policed in its totality. It was a good thing to think about. Now if only it had happened earlier.

He knew he shouldn’t think like that, that Keytone had repeatedly told him not to. That didn’t matter; he had still let her go. It was all his fault.

If he had just put up more of a fight, she would have jumped onto that cart, Gabe would have flown home, and everything would have worked out. That day at least. Those Purehooves had probably been lying in wait for a while and would likely waited for a long time after. That is what he told himself. It wasn’t his fault.

Maybe it hadn’t been such a good idea to walk home. The rain had a way of making you focus inward, even more so with the cold. It must have been close to zero degrees centigrade.

Blast it. Blast the cold, and blast myself for doing this, he stewed.

He was getting closer to the residential district of the Old Green Zone, but he still had a few blocks to go.

No one else is walking right now. It’s just me and my stupid self.

He heard a crash in the alleyway he was passing; he ignored it. He heard a mare’s scream muffled; he didn’t ignore that. A Printer stallion wasn’t a coward, not with that call.

He rushed in and found under the illumination of a door light two cops with gold and black eclipse bands on their forelegs, the symbol of the Equestriani Fascist Party. They were gagging and beating a mare who around her neck wore a red bandanna, the red of the Purehooves. They all had frozen mid-struggle to look at him.

The cops were both armed. One was with a PPf-43 submachine gun, a weapon from Polara that was as cheap as it was reliable and chambered to fire the fast 7.62x25mm cartridge and its spinoffs. The other was armed with a CCA-2, a modular assault rifle designed for the Equestriani military, chambered to fire the formerly obscure 7.7x58mm cartridge. Both of those were military weapons, and yet strangely, Brisk had no fear facing them, a sure sign of madness.

“What’s going on here?” he demanded. Nothing legal, I’m sure.

“Just cleaning up some communist criminal filth,” one of the police ponies replied, her voice tripping with confidence.

“With a gag? In the pounding rain? In an alleyway out of sight from common passersby? With such overzealous force?” Brisk pressed.

The police mare’s eyes darted from side to side, as if looking for an escape route. “. . . Yes?”

Her floundering attempt to explain herself told Brisk more than a straight answer ever could. They clearly had attacked the bandana-wearing mare without either a cause or a warrant and were now trying to spirit her away to some horrible fate. The mare on the ground was even now pleading with her eyes and even mumbles for him to help her, an easy feat for someone from his family, and yet . . . He looked into her eyes again. They weren’t just pleading, they were filled with hate, hate greater for him than could ever be directed to the very ponies beating her, and a desperation that led her to temporarily put aside that hate.

Brisk had seen that plenty of times before, on the faces of those who expressed hatred and derision for anypony not a pony, but who always came crawling to them for help. That mare was a Purehoof and not just some unlucky mare who had gotten one of their bandanas put on her by corrupt cops, he was sure of it. She was a member of the same organization that had killed his best friend, maybe she even participated in the attack, and now she begging him, the stick, for help.

“Listen, you’re a human, right?” the cop asked, trying to break the silence while her partner applied more pressure to the mare on the ground. “This mare would probably kill you first chance she gets if she goes free. What profit is there in it for you if you help her?”

Brisk stood there in the rain, feeling the weight of the pounding water anew. The cops stared at him, and then each other. The mare on the ground suddenly looked panicked, her eyes darting around.

“What profit indeed?” With those words, Brisk pivoted around and exited the alleyway just as another muffled scream followed him.

The rain was cold. So very cold.

---

Celestia’s sun was warm and pleasing, just like the mare who moved it.

It was a good day for drawing, Brisk thought. His hand was once again dancing over his art book with a specialized pencil nestled in his fingers. This time, he was creating a landscape of the park in front of him.

So engrossed was he that he didn't even notice the earth pony who had come to stand right in front of his bench.

“Mind if I sit here?” he asked.

“Go ahead,” Brisk told him without taking his eyes off what he was doing.

The stallion got up on the bench next to Brisk with little effort. It would be another ten minutes before words were spoken again.

“You're pretty good at this, Mr. Printer,” the stallion said appreciatively.

Brisk stopped and then turned to look at his new benchmate. He was white from head to toe, wore one of those EFP tunics, and had a cutie mark on his flanks of snow falling in an S shape.

“You have me at a disadvantage, Mister . . .” Brisk asked, trailing off on purpose.

“Sorry. Where are my manners? The name’s Snow Serpent,” the stallion answered, putting his hoof out.

Brisk pressed a fist into the offered hoof, and the two appendages moved up and down in tandem.

“Good to meet you, Mr. Serpent. So what brings you to the park this day?” Brisk asked as the two grippers fell back at ease.

“Well, I was going to give you the pitch on joining the EFP, but that was before I sat down and recognized who you were,” Snow Serpent explained.

“So now what?”

Snow Serpent sat back. “Well, I suppose that I could still give you the pitch, but it'll be a long time before you could apply it.”

“I’ll graduate high school in a week. Where did you go to school?”

“Stalliongrad, on the island of Loshad, up by Polara. Our school system is a bit different up there. It’s mostly frozen, for one.”

Brisk allowed himself to chuckle at that. “I guess that would mess with the schedule. . . . Still, I don’t think I could join your organization. My family would have kittens.”

“Literally, or figuratively? I know your family is famous for adopting a lot.”

“Figuratively, in this case. They think your organization is violent and brutal.”

“They’re right.”

“. . . Wow. You came right out and said it.”

“Didn’t expect that?”

“No, I can’t say I did. You said you would give me the pitch on joining, and usually people leave stuff like that out of their pitch.”

“I thought that the honest approach would be better in this case. Especially since you’ve probably witnessed it first hand, but we have good reason to be that way.”

“Oh?”

“Mr. Brisk Printer, the world’s controlled by big forces, and none of them care about the little guy, here in Manehattan or anywhere else; we’re just chattel to them and their techno-consumerist ways. The banks, foreign militaries, and even political movements like the Purehooves, all they care about is squeezing the life out of us while they get rich.”

“That’s the way the game is played, as they say.”

“Yeah, but you know what’s the worst offender in all this? The one that hurts the most? It’s our own damn government. They should be the ones that care the most, and yet, they’re the ones that care the least.”

“The Princesses and Elements seem to care a lot.”

“Maybe that would have been enough a hundred years ago, but now? Now there’s just too much stuff going on. It’s clear the Princesses can’t handle it all, and that’s distracting them from what really matters. If that wasn’t the case . . . Why would things ever have gotten this bad here?”

“And this is why we need a shogunate?”

“You’ve been reading The Boss’s work!”

“Why wouldn’t I read Uncle Mac’s stuff? He was a big deal at the paper for years, and a close friend of our family.”

“Uncle Mac, huh? Here’s a tip then: if you do decide to join up? Don’t call him that. It would mess with unit cohesion.”

“Got it.”

“Anyway, my point was this, against all those big gigantic forces, how can we be anything but violent and brutal? Especially against the Purehooves? We want to save Equestria, and they want to remake it in their own hideous image using the most bloodsoaked ways possible. Against that, using anything other than political violence is a fool’s errand.”

“You don’t have to tell me how brutal they can be.”

“. . . Hey, I’m sorry about bringing that up like that. Gabriel and Keytone . . . the whole community is still mourning what happened.”

Brisk mulled over asking him to leave, but to his surprise, Snow Serpent got off the bench himself. The pony looked even more shaken than he did.

“Listen, I’ve got to go. I’m sorry for stirring up bad memories, but I still would like you to consider joining up. We’re doing a lot of good work out there -- breaking up slave rings, stopping Purehooves, making the taxis run on time -- and we could sure use the help,” Snow Serpent said, his voice going from uncommonly nervous with an accent that hadn’t been heard before to confident with proper Manehattan tones over the course of the sentence. “Well, goodbye!”

As he walked away, Brisk fiddled with his pencil as he mulled over the conversation. He looked down and found that the picture had not gotten any more complete since he last saw it. The only difference was that he seemed to have lost his train of thought.

“Blast it.”

---

“So, now that you’re out of school, do you have any plans for the future?” Ardent asked her son as the two of them sat at the dinner table alone. Keytone was once again absorbed in work, and Fit had taken the younger siblings to gymnastics practice and wouldn’t be back for another hour. Dinner had yet to be prepared, but they would start soon.

“I’ve been giving serious thought to a few things,” Brisk answered calmly.

“That’s more than you had last time I asked, so what are they? Where does my handsome young son see himself in five years?” Ardent inquired curiously and hopefully in a manner most motherly.

“Well, I’ve been thinking of joining the EFP Legions.”

Ardent stared at him like he had grown a second head. “Un-uh, try again.”

“What?! Why not?” Brisk demanded, confused.

“Brisk, sweetie, I know things have been rough lately, but what you’re talking about is insane,” Ardent told him, herself just as confused.

“How? How is it insane to join a political movement that’s helping people, helping this city rebuild for the first time in . . . ever?!” the younger Printer inquired.

“They’re a violent and brutally repressive organization! They scared the living daylights out of poor Mrs. Mango down the street, not to mention all the other people they’ve accosted.”

“Mrs. Mango kept telling you to keep me and Keytone muzzled in case we would try to eat ponies!”

“She’s 85 years old! She can’t harm anyone, and even if she was a spring chicken, her being rude does not mean some goldshirted thugs have the right to threaten her with bodily harm!”

“Those thugs are the only ones who have enforced any sort of law and order in this city.”

“I don’t care. No son of mine will become a monster shaking down old ladies for their ramblings. I forbid you from joining the Fascist Party, and that’s final!”

Brisk looked like his face had run cold at his mother’s words. “I guess I should have expected this . . .”

“Yes, you should have,” Ardent agreed.

“. . . After all, you’re the one that let Gabe die that day.”

Ardent felt like she had been kicked. Unable to react, she merely stared on, her lips quivering, as her son got up from the table. He looked angry, and it was that realization that finally shook her out of her stupor.

“Brisk! Brisk, what are you doing?!” Ardent demanded, panicked, as she scrambled after him. She found him in his room, picking up one of the bug out bags they had made two years ago.

“I don’t see why you care,” he said coldly, moving past her. “After all, I’m not your son anymore.”

“Brisk! That’s not what I meant at all! Brisk, just calm down, and let’s talk this out,” Ardent pleaded, the pegasus’s voice growing ever more panicked.

Her son was at the door by now, bag slung over his shoulder and hand on the doorknob.

“Brisk, please just think about what you’re . . .” Ardent stopped when her son turned his head to look at her.

Despite human claims to the contrary, Ardent found it hard to look at humans and not just see them as killers, but apex predators as well. It was like they were built from the ground up to be fighting machines, and they not only looked the part but could act on it, especially the males. That was hardly a bad thing in the pegasus’s opinion though; there were many species that were predators, and those instincts and designs could be turned to positive outcomes in just about every case.

There was a particular analogy Ardent had picked up while studying the raising of human boys, that of the sheepdog and the wolf. The logic went that human males were, in a general sense, naturally competitive, ambitious, and prone to value to action and violence, and that all those traits would either be channeled into positive pursuits and result in a sheepdog, or they would be allowed to run free and feral and become a wolf. It might not have been completely accurate in her family’s case, but she took it to heart as a lesson on the fundamental differences between ponies and humans.

So she tried to raise her oldest son up right and teach him how to direct his natural instincts into constructive desires, to control them instead of letting them control him. He would become a model Equestriani subject, and he would do it by just being himself. And it worked. He became a top scoring student at school, a kind hearted soul who helped out the needy, and a very good painter who, Ardent had to admit, always made his mother feel safer when they worked on a job together.

In that moment, though, for the first time in her life, she saw her son, and he terrified her.

Brisk stood there for several moments, his eyes burning with rage, his whole body tense with fury. Then he turned and exited the Printer family home, slamming the door on his way out. Nearly a minute later, Ardent collapsed onto the floor, weeping.

Author's Note:

Missteps: After re-reading this chapter, I’m not sure there were any grievous problems with this. Huzzah!

Successes: This was one of the last chapters (if not the last chapter) conceived of and begun for this story, and if memory serves it was after watching one of Razorfist’s Film Noir Archives videos. Really happy with how it turned out, especially the detailing in the first section and the emotions in the final. Brisk is more than a bit of a jerk, but I wanted to provide some kind of context for the reader to make them understand why he is falling the way he is. I hope I succeeded in that regard.