It's Your Power
Coco Pommel was not a good mare, and she hadn’t been one since she got her cutie mark. With the type of powers she had, nopony would be. That was what she told herself whenever she tried to escape the sorry existence she lived.
That was just the way of the superpowered world and the heroes and villains that came with it. She’d learned young that good and evil had nothing to do with the way you were, and everything to do with what your cutie mark gave you. For some ponies, it gave them powers beyond anypony’s wildest dreams; for others, it gave them nothing but a talent and a purpose. For Coco, it injected darkness into her heart, because that was the only way ponies like her could survive.
These days, every job had superpower screenings, and for many ponies in Maretropolis’s dark underbelly, it had been a choice between going hungry or joining with a villain. Coco had resisted it with everything she had, swore she would be the one to break the trend, but in the end, none of it had worked. The answer was always going to be that simple: she had a destructive power, and destruction only breeds more of itself.
Her particular villain went by Knitpicker, a pink earth pony that could fuse objects together and who was currently trying to figure out a way to tear them apart. For what ends, Coco barely even knew--the relationship between a villain and her hired musclemare was rarely that intimate. Knitpicker had simply given her a salary, the power-canceling collar on her neck, and a plan.
“Find the hero Radiance and collect as much information on her as you can.”
Finding her hadn’t been the hard part--there had been speculation for ages that the famous fashion designer Rarity was really the Power Pony Radiance. And really, all Coco had needed to do to get her where she wanted her was to go to a few sewing classes at the community center and feed her a sob story about how her powers had made her homeless. From there, Rarity’s legendary generosity had kicked right in, and before she knew it, the two were living together. Dating. Doing everything that heroes and villains should never do.
As Coco geared up for another late night robbery, Rarity lay sprawled on the couple’s couch, her eyes blissfully ignorant to the deception her marefriend was putting on. Just like always.
“Hey,” whispered Coco. “I’ve got another night shift at my parents’ grocery store, so I’m heading out. You look like you’ve had a rough day, so get some rest, okay? I better not see you awake by the time I come back.”
I better not see Radiance at the crime scene, she translated internally. Because Knitpicker doesn’t want you to know the truth yet.
The final plan would be coming to fruition in a couple of days. All Coco would need to do is drop her guard at the right time, reveal her identity, and wait for Radiance to fall off her game. It was harsh, really, far harsher than anything Knitpicker had ever had her do before, but they couldn’t have Radiance interfering anymore. Learning that her marefriend played for the other team, hopefully, would keep her from doing just that.
Coco stole a final glance at her sleeping marefriend, wishing that this happy dream didn’t have to end, before stealing away into the night. With a single tug at her tie, Coco let her true form come out, a vaguely equine being with shaggy fur and needles running down her back. The most infamous henchmare in Maretropolis.
More than a few ponies had wondered about her other form. The current theory was that Knitpicker had fused her with a porcupine in some sort of failed experiment, though radioactive mutation was still a popular one as well. Nopony wanted to believe that such a thing could be the result of a cutie mark, that it could have happened to any of Maretropolis’s foremost designers.
Thorny Rose didn’t care if anypony saw her as a monster, because Coco Pommel had admitted to that reality long, long ago.
****
If the plan had been to wear Radiance out even before the revelation, it had certainly worked. Thanks to Maretropolis’s popular Fashion Week, the hero hadn’t been out on a single case, and even the other Power Ponies hadn’t been able to stop Knitpicker’s latest raids. As a result, Coco found herself on the front page of the paper for the third day in a row, a personal record that she only pretended to be proud of.
“I keep telling you, my supervisors simply have to be in bed with her,” Rarity muttered, flinging the paper across the dining room table. “Everypony at my agency knows I’m a superhero, so why in Celestia’s good name wouldn’t they alert me when things like this happen? They know I’d fling myself straight off the award show stage if my citizens were in the balance. So why would they care if somepony else had to present my latest designs?”
You’re so far off the mark it hurts, Coco thought to herself. Knitpicker had briefed her that Radiance was considered to be the dumbest of all the Power Ponies, but hearing it in person was almost physically painful. Though lately, Coco wasn’t sure if that was out of annoyance or sympathy for just how hard Rarity was about to be hit.
“Well, everypony does say Knitpicker had a job in the fashion industry before she went bad,” said Coco. “It does seem like the sort of thing she’d plan for if she knew your identity.”
“See, that’s what I’ll just never understand about her. Why would you ever want to be a villain when you were already at your prime? From the undercover work I’ve done, I know that she was Prim Hemline’s own protege, and she was even about to get her own fashion line. I was even in line to get one of her limited edition Buttonbelle cashmere sweaters!”
“Oh-ho, I suppose that’s why you’ve been fighting her all this time,” teased Coco.
Rarity simply puffed her cheeks in response, and Coco allowed herself one last laugh before she set her plan into action. The sooner she did it, the sooner the bandage would come off, and the fewer regrets she’d have.
When did she start having regrets, anyway? A month ago? Two? Perhaps even the very minute she’d seen Rarity open that community center door, with her gorgeous white fur and luscious mane?
No, Coco thought, slapping herself on the face at that shampoo commercial image. I have to do this, no matter what.
“Of course not, darling. While I am a tiny bit peeved at the cancellation, saving the city always comes first. I do have to keep up the image of the perfect romantic hero, after all. But on a more important topic, are you all right, dear? You look as pale as powder!”
For a slight second, Coco was taken off guard by Rarity’s question and the way the other mare looked at her now-reddened cheek. But once she saw her opening, she knew she had to take it. From the way Knitpicker had heckled her at work today, she knew she couldn’t let this go on much longer.
“I probably just caught something from one of the customers, but do you mind if I lay down? I just can’t seem to stay awake today.”
“Of course, dear.”
Rarity huddled in close and leaned on Coco’s shoulder, pushing her towards the pure white bed. Coco let out a few half-hearted fake coughs before her marefriend laid her on the mattress and tucked her in. For a brief second, she wasn’t sure if Rarity was going to take the bait, but eventually the designer noticed that her collar was still on.
“I hope you don’t mind me asking, but why do you always wear that? Don’t get me wrong, it does give your eyes a lovely pop, but sometimes I swear you sleep with it on.”
“I have a pretty nasty scar on my neck,” replied Coco. “I had to have major surgery as a foal. The last pony I was with screamed when he saw it. He was never able to look at me the same way again.”
As expected, Rarity stared at her with horror in her eyes, a feeling Coco knew would only amplify in the coming minutes.
“What a dreadful stallion, if I do say so myself! Nopony should ever make you feel that way, and I’ll be there to make sure nopony does. You shouldn’t have to fear anything when you’re around me.”
“Are you really sure about that?” Coco asked, putting on her best innocent, kicked-puppy look.
In response, Rarity simply took the collar off Coco’s neck, untying the cord that allowed her to hold her civilian form. As it unraveled, Coco remembered when Knitpicker had first given it to her, given her what had seemed like the first chance she’d ever had in her life.
“This is just the beginning,” Knitpicker had said then. “If everything goes right between the two of us, you’ll never have to hide again. Nopony will.”
Back then, she’d wondered how a pony like that could ever be considered a villain, when heroes had never bothered to help ponies like her. Now, she realized that being a villain was all she was ever meant to be, and that was why help never came. In any universe, the damage was done by the time the heroes decided to pay attention to the truly troubled ponies.
Those were the words she wove around her heart as the spikes appeared across her body, as she imagined Rarity facing her time and time again in battle. Those were the words that, right or wrong, gave her strength to face a forever uncertain future.
As expected, Rarity was dangerously close to one of her standard fainting fits, one of the few things that she was able to control only in her hero form. She instinctively reared away from Thorny Rose’s formidable needles, only to back into a battle stance. WIth her grace, it almost looked like a yoga pose, but Rarity’s eyes told Thorny everything she needed to know.
“I might have known,” muttered Rarity, letting out a rather undignified snort. “I don’t know how you gained access to my flat, but I won’t tolerate this any longer! Hand over my marefriend at once, or there will be consequences!”
For the slightest of moments, the Coco personality that Thorny had built up around Rarity almost came back, wanting more than anything to convince her marefriend that this was all a setup, that Coco really had been foalnapped. Just hearing that word from somepony, anypony, was almost enough to break this whole charade for good. She could feel the warmth of hope emanating from Rarity’s heart, and she wasn’t sure how she could possibly live without it.
Pull yourself together, she told herself. This is the way things have to be. You can’t just let a mare come between you and the plan. You can’t hide from reality anymore.
With poise that betrayed her size, Thorny stepped off the bed and let out a single cynical snort to match Rarity’s.
“That’s some devotion you’ve got there,” she said, running her tail along Rarity’s side as she gloated. “Always willing to assume the best from your marefriend, even when those beliefs should be disappearing before your very eyes. You get involved with a random mare you barely even know, and you don’t think this was part of the plan all along?”
The other mare’s eyes drifted towards a picture of her and Coco together, and then another and another. They had been the sort of couple to document everything they’d ever done together, even if they had only been together for a few months. It was times like this that Thorny was grateful Radiance had been the first one to oppose her, since none of the other Power Ponies could have possibly fallen as hard for her as she did.
“Coco would never get herself involved with those ruffians, and I’m insulted that you’d even imply such a thing! Bring her to me at once, and nopony gets hurt!”
Thorny shoved her collar towards Rarity with a look of defiance that hid something even deeper, a feeling that not even the henchmare herself understood. Somehow, defeating a heroine for good wasn’t anywhere near as satisfying as Knitpicker told her it would be, but then again, few things in her life were.
“Your creation power allows you to analyze the magical structure of any object in Equestria. It’s the only way you can possibly duplicate so many objects. So I’d like you to look at this thing and then tell me what you just said again.”
She’d always expected Radiance’s famous appraisal process to take hours, but somehow, the superhero had already figured out the collar’s structure in a matter of minutes. And just then, instead of the pupilless laser eyes Thorny had come to expect from heroes, she saw only normal dilated eyes.
Radiance was no hero after all, as she’d always suspected. Putting up a fight was outside of her level of expertise.
“It’s a magical cloaking device,” Rarity spoke. “Similar to changeling magic, it can transform somepony into a different form, or hide their powers entirely. Exquisitely designed, too, might I add. If it was a little tackier, I would have assumed that a wizard had made it, but we all know that Knitpicker has quite the fashion sense.”
While most ponies assumed raised eyebrows were a Mistress Marevelous trademark, Radiance pulled them off quite well, too. It might have been trademark hero swagger rather than her true feelings, but watching Rarity as she stood now, Thorny was beginning to get the idea that her companion had been in far worse situations before, and that she wasn’t about to let this one graze her. Even if it really did.
“So, if the Coco I know would never get involved with Knitpicker, was it all a lie...or are you being set up? Is this collar why you’re with her now? Are you really that desperate to hide your powers?”
Her voice was soft as silk, in spite of the situation she found herself in. It wasn’t the normal tone she took with Thorny, and for a second, the henchmare thought this was yet another trick. Nopony reasonable would act like this, but Thorny figured she’d carry this plan out to the end, as any good henchmare would.
If she couldn’t break Rarity apart from her in the expected way, she’d just have to try another technique. One that hit far closer to her heart.
“Don’t pretend you understand. You’re creation, and I’m destruction. That’s as simple as it gets.”
She turned her head towards the small army of needles along her back, pointing to each one as she explained her powers to Rarity.
“These needles don’t just prick ponies. Some can paralyze you, some can poison you, sedate you...a few even emit acid. Not all fashion ponies get the same powers as you, you see. You were just one of the lucky ones who could get anything you wanted, but for ponies like me...sometimes getting involved with ponies like Knitpicker is the only thing we can do. Sorry if the truth bruises your fragile view of the world, but that’s how it really is, Radiance.”
With that, she picked up her collar and tugged it back on, as if to nail in the disturbing reality one last time. But really, this was how the plan was always meant to end. The encounter between her and Rarity was always meant to be short--just long enough to devastate her, but not long enough to get too attached. Ideally, it would have come far sooner, rather than the months long cat-and-mouse game they’d unwittingly played together, but Knitpicker had always needed more time to carry out her own plan. Even if it meant things had to end like this, far longer and far more tedious than Thorny Rose would have liked.
She took one last glance at the situation in front of her--the bed that had been ruined by her needles, the hero who’d been ruined by far more--before reaching for the door. Looking back on her lover, no, her mark, would only delay things further. Knitpicker had prepared a room at her own place, so it wasn’t like Coco was really giving up that much.
So why did it feel like she was?
Rarity’s doors were trimmed with golden locks of all sorts, the type any secret superhero would have. They were never the sorts to think such threats could ever come from within. With a small scoff at that thought, Coco undid every one, hoping Rarity was wallowing too much in her grief to notice.
Just as Coco was about to open the door, though, an awkward thumping sound came from the other side. Seconds later, she realized that she had forgotten to undo one of the locks, and unfortunately for her, it happened to be of the particularly loud variety. If Rarity hadn’t noticed before, Coco thought to herself as she saw the unicorn mare trotting towards her, she certainly did now.
“Isn’t that just the most wonderful innovation?” said Rarity, her voice echoing with a strange confidence. “My dear friend Filli-Second calls them ‘ganoush bars.’ If you try to open a door and forget to undo one of these babies, it makes a delightful ‘ganooooush’ sound and alerts everypony in the premises to your presence. They’re the bane of hotel ponies’ existence, I’m sure, but I find them quite useful for tracking villains.”
As much as Coco wanted to undo her tie for once in her life, the size increase she got as Thorny Rose meant she’d easily impale a wall or two from where she stood now. From the way Rarity had her cornered, she was sure the heroine had already planned for this, but she stood in battle stance anyway. Her own bad luck might have made her a villain, but there was no way she would ever give her boss up this early in the game.
Coco stood with her back arched in place for what felt like forever, ready to take on any attack that came. However, as the seconds passed into minutes, she wondered if Rarity really wanted to take her on at all.
“Honestly,” Coco muttered, “what gives?! Isn’t this the part where you’re supposed to, I don’t know, kick me in the face or something? Have a no superpowers, no holds barred beatdown?”
She’d expected it to sound every bit as threatening as the sorts of things Thorny Rose always said, but instead, Rarity must have just thought it was a sign of genuine confusion. She got in closer to Coco and shook her head.
“Of course not,” she said, “because I believe you. You might say the pony you showed me before was a fake, but even if it was, I still don’t see an enemy. I see somepony ruined by their circumstances, and somepony who still has a chance. As a superhero, I’d always figured I’d run into somepony like this, and I always told myself I’d guide them to the light to the best of my ability!”
Okay, it’s official, Coco said to herself, this mare’s hero persona never turns off. She probably sits around with the Masked Matterhorn as they quiz each other on superhero cliches.
“Doesn’t that still involve beating me up, though?” she asked Rarity. “Fighting the evil out of somepony and all?”
Rarity simply laughed at the thought, and Coco couldn’t help but feel a strange sense of relief at hearing the mare smile. It went against everything she felt--everything she should have felt--but for some reason, seeing Rarity break down into nothing more than a shell of a pony would have been a nightmare to Coco.
Did that mean her mission was one, too? And if it was, what did that really mean for her?
“That is how some heroes would handle situations like this,” Rarity admitted. “I’ve heard it has quite a high success rate, on top of that. But even after your recent admission, I still can’t fathom hurting you like that anymore, even if it turned out to be worth it in the end. No, I have quite another offer for you. One I’m making for you both as a hero and as your marefriend.”
Rarity gripped Coco’s hoof with more compassion and warmth than Coco had ever felt, even from her parents. Everypony in her life had treated her power as a sad fact, but from the way it seemed now, Rarity was a mare that could face any challenge, even ones that fate had handed other ponies.
“Please go back to Knitpicker and try to delay her plans. Tell her I’m in denial about your true identity, and that you need more time with me to prove it. In the meantime, I’d like to prove to you that you’re more than just your power. I want you to believe that there are ponies who would accept you outside of the darkness you’ve been veiling yourself in.”
“And how do you intend to do that?” Coco asked, with more curiosity than skepticism in her voice.
“I don’t know what part of Maretropolis you grew up in, but in mine, there are plenty of programs to help ponies learn to accept their powers. I’d like you to at least see some of them and get support from others before choosing to go back to Knitpicker for good. If you don’t believe you’re more than your power in a week, you can go back to her if you like. But I’d like you to at least think about the good you can do.”
If it had been any other mare, Coco would have surely thought this was a ruse, a way for the heroes to beat Knitpicker with her own weapon. But, even after everything, every complication, Rarity had always been an easy mare to read. At the very least, she could humor Rarity, learn more about her, and report back to Knitpicker if the plan wasn’t successful.
At the very most...Coco had no idea what mare she could become after this, and that thought was nowhere near as scary as it should have been.
“A lot of heroes would have let me go by now,” she said simply, taking one last look to the other side of the door. The side that would have brought her all the certainty in the world without comfort, set against the side that could let her defy destiny itself.
“I’d like to change that.”
I’d like you to at least think about the good you can do.
As Coco let herself get swept into Rarity’s arms, she let herself indulge in the hope she’d always been denied. The hope that, even if there was only a one percent chance this project would change her, was far stronger than anything she’d ever felt.
Even stronger than the deadly needles along her spine.
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This is so good you have me hooked
9512797
What you said
9512930
Why do we keep running into each other
9512976
Idk but thanks for the follow
Interesting premise. I like it!
Oh, the number of quill-related comebacks I'm avoiding...
Hmm, interesting idea. Personally, I'd have preferred a bit more buildup - actually showing Coco/Thorny and Rarity starting their relationship and Coco developing some genuine feelings for her rather than jumping in at the tail end of Thorny's plan. I get the impression you wanted to get straight to the meat of the story - Coco's reformation - but I think taking a bit more time to establish both the relationship and Coco's mindset and fatalism would give that a bit more impact.
Still, this way works well enough and I'm certainly intrigued as to where you'll go with it.
Loose.
i.kym-cdn.com/entries/icons/original/000/017/204/CaptainAmerica1_zps8c295f96.JPG
9514505
They're all gonna be references to recent superhero media! "It's a Leap of Faith" from Into the Spiderverse will be one of them, too!
This one sounds incredibly interesting. I'll wait for a few chapters to come out before reading it.
9514900
It’s a short series (about 3 parts) that should be finished by the end of this month.
I too would have liked to see the build-up for Coco and Rarity's romance, but that's just because I'm a sucker for slow burning romances. I'm interested to see where this goes.
Aw, this is your last series?
But it's super awesome so far, so I can't complain too much...I really like this!