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1: Lyra Taken2,404 words
2: The Train2,513 words
3: Revelations2,731 words
4: Trixie2,945 words
5: Hearth's Warming Eve2,161 words
6: A New Way Forward2,336 words

1: Lyra Taken

Ponyville
20 Harvest, 1502
1420 Local Time

Ponyville really was a wonderful place to live. Even on a dreary, rainy day like this one, Bon-Bon could appreciate the quaint beauty of a little village like this. The town was filled with small houses with charming old architecture and no dark alleys to speak of, and its ponies milled about in the slow pace of village life even with the poor weather, stopping under umbrellas and awnings to share small talk and gossip as rain fell down in sheets around them. Even the seemingly endless crises, large and small, that seemed to plague Ponyville ever since Twilight Sparkle's arrival three years ago didn't dampen how much Bon-Bon loved the town - if anything, like most Ponyville residents, they only made her more determined to stay.

It wasn't her problem anyway. There was a time when she'd worried about retirement - when Bon-Bon first came to Ponyville ten years ago, she'd had frequent nightmares about what might happen without the agency to protect ponies... but in the end, nothing came of them. In fact, ever since the Elements of Harmony appeared, Bon-Bon had few worries at all other than keeping Lyra from spending all of their income on My Little Human merchandise and Princess Twilight collectibles.

In fact, it was towards Lyra that her thoughts turned as she finished her shopping rounds for the day. The last thing she'd expected coming to Ponyville was to find love, especially with such an excitable mare... not to mention Lyra's bizarre hobbies and interests. But there Lyra was just a few years ago, alone in a new town with jam-packed saddlebags and a lyre over her back, and of course Bon-Bon had had to help her out with a place to stay; she'd always had trouble resisting a pretty face after all. Somewhere along the way their love had just... happened. Polite tolerance of Lyra's interests gave way to buying custom plushes for the unicorn's birthday, strict household boundaries turned into hoof-holding snuggles on the sofa, and somewhere along the way 'best friends' ended with a moonlit concerto and a kiss that felt like being struck by lightning.

What really hurt, though, was that for all the time she spent listening to Lyra gush about Canterlot, music, Twilight Sparkle, and 'anthropology', Bon-Bon hadn't been able to share her own life with her friend. She wanted so badly to tell Lyra her stories about exotic locales, bizarre monsters, insane villains, and beautiful mares... but it was Sweetie Drops who saw all of those things, and Sweetie Drops didn't exist anymore outside of a dusty suitcase stashed in a secret crawlspace. All Bon-Bon had were boring fabrications about going to confectioner's school in Baltimare.

It had been a relief when last week's bugbear attack had forced her to reveal her secret identity, but it had only brought a new sense of tension into their relationship. They might have made up and hugged at the wedding, and to an outside observer, it might look like there was nothing wrong between them... but Bon-Bon knew better. She could read even a stranger fairly well, and Lyra had become an open book to her - and the story inside wasn't pretty. The way Lyra pulled away just a little from their hugs, the constant veiled reproach in those pretty eyes, and a dozen other little hints all told Bon-Bon how much her lover was hurt.

As lost as she was in her thoughts, she didn't notice she'd already reached the flower stand until she felt somepony poking her in the chest. As distracted as she was, Bon-Bon nearly jumped out of her skin at the contact, and it was a testament to her discipline that she didn't slam sweet Roseluck into the ground on pure instinct. "Bon-Bon, are you alright?" The red-maned flower pony asked. "There's a line forming behind you, you know."

"I... I'm sorry, Roseluck." She managed a sheepish smile. Rule number one: stay in character, no matter what. 'Bon-Bon' was kind and quiet, and she couldn't let a few relationship problems shake her into showing the steel beneath the velvet. "Do you have the flower arrangement I asked for?"

Roseluck smiled kindly. "Of course I do." She turned and stood up on the cart, gathering up the large bouquet of yellow and white roses Bon-Bon had ordered a few days ago. "Did you and Lyra get into a fight?" she asked as she put the flowers carefully in Bon-Bon's shopping bag. "Mare's Day isn't for another four moons, and I've never seen you buy so many roses."

"You know I don't like talking about my personal life, Roseluck." She chuckled a little and gave Roseluck three bits for the bouquet. "Don't worry about us. It's nothing some flowers and a bottle of wine can't help me apologize for."

She thought through how she'd apologize as she made her way home. Something like this probably felt like some form of grand betrayal to Lyra, and so Bon-Bon thought that the best thing for it would be a big romantic gesture to help show that her feelings were genuine. The flowers were a start, and she had a batch of toffee-filled chocolates cooling in the kitchen back home. And tonight she was planning a late-night picnic at the same place where they first kissed, with Lyra's favorite sandwiches and a very old bottle of red wine she'd gotten after saving the mayor of Canterlot from a hungry wyvern. She'd been planning to save it for proposing, but if if things kept up like this it would be collecting dust next to her old crossbow for the rest of her life.

Bon-Bon heard a scream as she rounded the corner to head home, and she immediately dropped her bags and started running. She didn't want to think the worst, but it was hard to help but wonder if that was Lyra's voice. Another cry of pain from ahead gave her a burst of speed as she realized with horror that it was coming from her own shop. Bon-Bon came crashing through the glass door with a practiced roll just in time to see a pink earth pony mare in a heavy, hooded cloak holding up a small cube no bigger around than her own hoof, a thing of rune-etched brass and silver that Bon-Bon immediately recognized as a Capture Cube - a magic device meant to hold a monster for transport. And what she was doing with it was nothing short of horrifying. Lyra was scratching and scrabbling at the counters with hooves and magic alike, crying in pain and desperation as she was sucked and stretched and compressed into a glowing vortex on one side of the cube. Bon-Bon immediately sprung into action, dashing forward and grabbing Lyra's leg with both hooves. "I've got you, Lyra!"

Lyra sobbed heavily and said something that wasn't coherent as she sunk deeper into the Capture Cube. "Lyra, don't worry!" Bon-Bon shouted. "I've... I've..." She trailed off and looked into Lyra's eyes, feeling tears welling up in her own as the unicorn continued to sink. She didn't have her... not even close. A cube like this could hold a full-grown dragon, and her own strength wasn't nearly enough to counter it. "I'm sorry, Lyra," she said with a choked sob, and let go of her love's hooves to instead tackle the other earth pony. There was nothing she could do for Lyra right now, but if she subdued her attacker, she'd have all the time in the world to open the cube.

The other mare was easily as strong as her, and didn't seem unfamiliar with fighting. They rolled on the floor as Lyra continued to be sucked in, trading blow for blow with their front hooves. Bon-Bon had the advantage in skill, using her shins to block and deflect most of her opponent's punches, but Lyra's attacker seemed to have the edge in sheer sturdiness - she had a poor defense but flatly ignored clean barrel punches like they were nothing, and seemed heavier as well. The best thing would be to end this quick with a knockout; the moment this stranger realized she had the size advantage it would be over. Bon-Bon started striking at her foe's face, one particularly good punch knocking the mare's head back and causing her hood to fall, but Bon-Bon's shock at seeing her face gave the pink pony the opportunity to hit back hard to knock Bon-Bon away and get back on her hooves.

"It wasn't supposed to happen like this," Pinkie Pie muttered in a dark tone that was entirely unlike her, as Bon-Bon writhed on the floor from the pain of catching a hoof to the throat. She picked up the now-dark cube and looked at it before depositing it in an unseen pocket of her cloak and turning back to Bon-Bon. "You were supposed to see her get taken but not..."

"P-pinkie..." Bon-Bon gasped, trying to find her hooves and stand. "Please..."

"I'm... I'm sorry, Bon-Bon, or Sweetie Drops, or-or whoever you are." Tears glistened in Pinkie's eyes, and her hoof was shaking as she pulled a small crossbow from her cloak. "It wasn't supposed to be this way. I was just supposed to get Lyra and get out. But now I've got to hurt you, and I'm so sorry..." She closed her eyes and whimpered a little as she fired, catching Bon-Bon squarely in the barrel and knocking the smaller mare on her back. "I'm sorry, I had to do this..." Pinkie ran, crying, as Bon-Bon struggled to breathe around the bolt lodged in her diaphragm.

'Pinkie Pie... why would Pinkie Pie do this?' Bon-Bon thought. 'What did we ever do to her? No, I can't think about that now. Survival now, questions later.' Ignoring the pain in her gut, not to mention the thin trail of blood she was leaving, she started crawling for the back of the confectionery. She had to get to the trapdoor in the stock room - there was a medical kit with her old gear. Push back the shock and pain and betrayal and survive to keep fighting.

The shop was tiny, but it was a slow and painful slog regardless. She couldn't stand, and could barely breathe - each shallow breath felt like a red-hot sword plunging into her. The tumble down into the crawlspace was worse. Bon-Bon couldn't climb down the short ladder so much as fall down, and she fell on her barrel - nearly blacking out from the landing as pain lanced up and down her body. But there it all was right in front of her: a big black duffel bag, a small metal briefcase, a steel crossbow, and the dusty bottle of wine she'd been planning to share with Lyra. 'But Lyra's gone now,' a little voice in her head whispered as she unzipped the bag and started scrounging through the old gadgets and costumes for the little hard case that would be at the bottom. No, she couldn't think that way. Had to stay focused, think about the positives.

'Number one, the case is here,' she thought as she dug the little box out of the bag and opened it to find bandages, stitching materials, a flask of vodka, and tools. "Number two, Lyra is alive.' She drank half of the liquor and then quickly poured the rest into her wound with a whimper of pain. 'Three, Pinkie Pie is noticeable. There are going to be witnesses.' Bon-Bon prematurely grit her teeth and grabbed a pair of forceps. The bolt had to come out, and this was going to hurt. 'She's got no training, either. She should have shot me from the start.' She cried out loudly in pain as she pulled the bolt from her barrel. Thankfully, the head was a simple point and it came out clean, though she was gasping raggedly for breath after and had stars dancing in her vision. 'Stitches, got to close it up. Get a needle...' Though her hooves were shaking, she managed to thread a needle and start stitching her wound shut. In hindsight, she was lucky... it didn't look like it had done serious damage. She'd been hurt worse on the job before, and if she was careful it would heal in a couple of weeks.

'Five... Five, that's not really Pinkie Pie.' There was no way to know this for certain, but every instinct she had was telling her it was true. The real Pinkie would never hurt anypony, at least not intentionally, and she vaguely remembered Lyra saying that Pinkie, Twilight, and their friends were in Canterlot anyway at some kind of state function. A changeling was unlikely, and while Pinkie Pie had once cloned herself, those duplicates had been far too simple-minded to pull off something like this. That still left glamour spells, old-fashioned disguises, long-lost twins, morphing potions... any number of potential explanations.

Whatever the case was, she had to move quickly if she was going to catch up. As soon as she finished tying off the stitches and wrapping a bandage around herself, she started digging through the bag for equipment. Magic detector... a bit too sensitive but it might help her if she could get it tuned right. Bag of holding, obvious choice. No need for the monster hunting gear, but some sleep darts and a couple bottles of ether might reduce casualties if fake Pinkie had accomplices. Rope and grapnel, always handy. Wristwatch with a hidden switchblade, extra crossbow bolts, the collapsible crossbow itself... everything went into the bag. Last was clothes, something to help hide her injury. A nice turtleneck sweater to look unassuming, a thin jacket she could use to stow her stuff, and a simple skirt to hide her cutie mark, just out of habit. She threw a few extra outfits into the nearly bottomless bag as well, just to be safe. Finally, she dug out an old pair of mirrored sunglasses and carefully polished the scuffs off of them. How many ponies had she been behind these shades? Just one, she realized. Her other identities might wear glasses, or color contacts, or even shades very similar to these, but only one pony had ever worn these.

Agent Sweetie Drops slid the sunglasses onto her face with a sigh and a sense of finality. It was time to go to work.

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