Equestria: The Afterlife

by Timzocker201

Ch53: Fishing With a Live Bait

Celestia’s sun still sat low on the horizon as Markus and his newly assigned guard arrived at the Marketplace. The smell of freshly caught fish and cooking meat wafted through his nostrils, while his ears picked up the sound of different stand owners trying to get the peoples’s attention, be that by voice, playing music or simply by making some noise, everything was used. However, these impressions didn’t concern him much at the time, but rather the numbers floating over everyone’s head.

He first came to notice them the moment he opened his eyes again, after his second resurrection. Luna and Celestia both had a white bar floating over their heads, though apparently not in reality, but only for him to see. The nature of this bar became a little clearer, when he left Celestia’s Royal Chambers for the first time and saw the Guards outside having something similar atop their heads. Only it wasn’t a bar this time, but a set of numbers slowly ticking down.

From there, it didn’t take long for him to figure out what these numbers meant. There were seven sets of these numbers, out of which the rightmost was ticking down one count every second, starting from 59 and going to 00. Every time it reached zero, the second set would count one down, starting from 59 and going to 00 as well. Thus, the most likely conclusion was that these numbers represented their bearer’s remaining lifetime.

While certainly something macabre to think about at first, it only made sense for him to see them. After all, he was now the Alicorn of Life AND Death and seeing the remaining lifetime of those around him could actually be attributed to both.

Still, while watching those several hundred numbers slowly tick down, he could not help but compare Pony and Gryphon lifetimes. Gryphons seemed to live far shorter lives than ponies, albeit their theoretical lifespan almost doubled that of the equines and when checking for the deaths fate held ready for them, the reason for that became clear almost immediately.

Most of the deaths these Gryphons were to experience were unnatural. Most appeared to die of disease, while murder was a very close second. Third was death by losing a duel, fourth a deadly work accident, fifth would be being sold into slavery and then worked to death and only then, in sixth place, would finally come the natural death.

Markus found himself momentarily shocked, albeit not by the things he had just ‘read’ through so easily. Rather, it was the lack of shock that had him shocked now. Normally, he would have felt pity for these poor creatures. He would have wanted to help them, to show them better ways to live life and make sure that these new ways would stay secured. That was why he became a soldier, after all. To help others, to save others, to protect and guide others.

Now, however, he couldn’t even bring forth a minimum of motivation to follow his old morality, at least not in this case. Was it because he had fought a war against them? But he found it within himself to help rebuild Afghanistan after he had fought and won there, so no, that couldn’t be it.

Was it maybe because they weren’t human? That somehow he couldn’t show the same kinds of emotion towards the creatures of this world? Possible, but very unlikely. After all, he had already planted his seed into two mares and he knew that the feelings he held towards them were indeed real.

The last possibility that sprang to mind was that it may be because of his ascension. That somehow, through becoming the Alicorn of Life and Death, his view on these two might have changed. That now, instead of putting everyone else’s lives over his, he now represented death and as such wasn’t as inclined to interfere with the course of fate as he was before.

He decided that thinking about such things could come later, since he had something else to do that was far more important. After all, he hadn’t just come to the market to compare lifespans.

Markus had to find out, who was behind his predecessor’s demise, but whoever it was, was clever. They hadn’t left a single clue behind. Sure, the Chancellor had pointed at some group that was apparently known for being a bit extreme in their mindset, but Markus quickly dismissed them as the potential assailants, as, during his service in the Army, he had come to learn that those who were so open about their motives were rather harmless. In actuality it were those, who remained hidden and who kept their motives only to themselves that were truly dangerous.

Unfortunately, this mindset of staying behind closed curtains also meant that these groups were immeasurably hard to track down, which in turn meant that Markus was about to face a whole load of work.

Or maybe he wouldn’t?

What if the killers could be lured out to show themselves out of their own free will? It was an idea that came to Markus’s mind when the sergeant had her outburst, that the group that had attacked and killed Governor Sweet Talk would likely also go for his replacement. All he would have to do is make his presence known to the public, interacting with them as much and as long as possible, while at the same time appearing to be as careless as he could force himself to be. In short, he would use himself as bait to lure in a predator… and then make that predator meet an even bigger predator.

However, this plan meant that he first needed to grab the attention of the local population. Something that Markus found to be quite difficult, given that he was now only a little Pegasus in a sea of Gryphons, who were all busy with bartering and talking and sometimes even arguing over prices.

Suddenly, though, while he was trying to figure out, how to get the right Gryphon’s attention, he suddenly found his muzzle firmly embed itself into a mass of slightly rough feathers. His guard behind him had to stifle a laugh, when Markus ran head-first into an elderly Gryphon, having his head disappear almost completely within his wings. However, the Gryphon in question didn’t seem to find it just as amusing as she did, as, as soon as Markus had freed his head from his wings, he suddenly shot around and began shouting at the two.

“Who in the name of the King-?!” He suddenly stopped when he laid eyes on
Markus and within moments, what before seemed to just be annoyance morphed into white hot anger and fury.

“Oh, of course, another Pony that comes to defile this land of ours! Haven’t you already done enough damage as it is? No, of course you have to send governors over here to keep an eye on us! And what do you do after we show you that we don’t want your governors?! Of course, you just send a new one! Oh, just you wait until this evening, when the boys--!” He suddenly cut himself off after noticing the glare the guardhen was giving him. It was not one that was to show him his place, but rather one that was warning him to not reveal the secrets that were about to slip his tongue.

This did not go unnoticed by Markus, but he pretended that it did. When the older Gryphon said nothing anymore for a few more seconds, he put on his best service-center-smile and spoke to the Gryphon in question.

“I apologize for the inconvenience, sir. I have taken note of your dissatisfaction with the current situation and I will do my best to fix the issues that currently seem to bother you.”

“Pff, yeah, sure, you try that…” The Gryphon grumbled, before busying himself with the Marketstalls around him again. Markus, meanwhile, decided that it was time to head back. After all, he now had what he wanted…

---

When the sun slowly began its descent, Markus was sitting behind his new workdesk and sorted through all kinds of papers that had come in over the day. Mostly it was just reports and a few forms he had to fill out to finalize his takeover. It was all important work that had to be done, though not nearly as important as what was yet to come.

While truly important, the forms were far from due. Markus had only picked them up in order to appear busy while he was waiting for the main event of the day. Through his little encounter on the Marketplace, he now knew that he likely was to be eliminated that same evening, though he sadly didn’t know the exact time.

Time ticked by and evening morphed into night and Markus was still waiting.

‘Maybe I read too much into his words?’ he thought to himself. ‘I mean, did he really mean that I was about to be killed or was he going to say something else? I was pretty focused on finding the killers, so I could very well have just assumed that he meant what I needed…’

Markus looked out the window, watching as the last little rays of light finally joined the rest beyond the horizon. The landscape around the City went dark and within it, one could see lights spring to life within almost every house.

“I think it is time to go to bed.” Markus stated, deciding that he should really call it a day for now.

“Of course. Your chambers are this way, sir.” Bloodfeather replied, gesturing to a smaller set of double-doors to the side of the office.

Markus nodded his thanks and opened the doors… only to find an empty room behind them. He made a few steps forward into it to confirm that it indeed was entirely empty. The steps he then heard from behind him were the last piece needed to make it click.

“Oh, let me guess: You wanted me to ask ‘Hey, where’s my bed?’, so you could then answer something along the lines of ‘Oh, don’t worry, you won’t need one.’, am I right?” Markus said, spinning around and smirking at the, now three Gryphons standing in front of him.

“Oh come on, you can’t do that! I’ve been working a whole week on this joke and you’ve ruined it!” One of the new arrivals whined.

“Don’t get distracted, we have a job to do!” Bloodfeather hushed the other hen.

“Ah, so I take it, you were the ones who killed Sweet Talk? Huh, should have guessed so from the beginning, actually.” Markus remarked.

“Indeed, you should have, but don’t worry: You’ll soon have plenty of time apologizing to him.” With that said, all three hens suddenly lunged forward, with their claws outstretched to slice their prey into pieces.

Markus was prepared. With his wings already tensed, he used his previous experience in fighting to quickly retreat himself out of his enemies’s reach.

And that exactly was his mistake…

All his experience stemmed from his time as a human. However, he was currently in the shape of a Pony, a Pegasus at that. With this outward change came the fact the he now had not two, but four legs and two wings, while also being a lot lighter than before. Thus, when he used his full force to propel himself backwards, he massively miscalculated his flight path and hit the wall behind him before he had time to react.

Using their advantage, his three assailants quickly caught up. Two of them pinned him to the ground, while the third, Bloodfeather, positioned herself directly in front of him and drew her sword.

“Nice try, sir, but it wasn’t good enough.” She said, swinging her sword down upon Markus.

‘Oh no, not again…’ He thought, as the sword connected with his head… and passed right through it.

“What?!” The three hens shouted in unison.

“What?” Markus wondered aloud, as a small puff of black smoke that had been split off from his body quickly reattached itself to where it belonged.

‘Oh, yeah… I forgot.’ Markus thought to himself, as he remembered, what his true form was now. With a grin, he quickly de- and re-materialized himself between the three hens, making the two that were holding him down fall to the floor.

“What, Magic?! But I thought only Unicorns could use magic!” Bloodfeather shouted in panic.

“Unicorns and Alicorns, yes.” Markus replied, before he quickly slit the throats of the two nameless hens and kicked Bloodfeather away faster than any eye could have picked up his movements.

She was flung away backwards and slammed into the wall right beside the door. She plopped down onto the floor and the last thing her now fading consciousness picked up was a set of slowly approaching red hooves…

When she woke up a few hours later, she found herself tied to a chair, with the Governor sitting across from her behind his workdesk and in his chair, idly spinning back and forth.

“Oh, you’re finally awake. Took you long enough.” He remarked, jumping off his chair and standing right in front of it.

“What?! Where am I?! What have you done to me?... What are you?” Bloodfeather asked in a panic, trugging at her ties and finding them to sit tight on her, only allowing her barely enough room to breathe.

“Slowly, slowly there. Don’t worry, I haven’t brought you anywhere, you are still in my office and apart from tying you up, I haven’t even touched you. As for what I am… well, maybe I’ll tell you another time.” Markus told her, while slowly making his way around the table.

“What?! What is that supposed to mean?! Tell me who—“

“Cut it now, hen. I don’t have time for you futile attempts to buy time. After all…” Markus said, stopping when he stood right beside his captive and showing her a sadistical grin. “… I still have some questions of my own.”

Bloodfeather gulped while she looked at the stallion beside her, in what could have almost been fear. Up until that point, she would have never thought that she would find a PONY to be intimidating.

And the show was only starting…

Comments

[Tale Enjoyed]

Can't wait another week to see how this turns out. I need more patience. Good chapter.

[Munro]

WHOPSIE I VORGOT MY OWN POWER AND FORM XD

[Wapish]

I the griffin’s mind: chuckles “I’m in danger.”

[Fireeaters]

F in chat

[Foxtrot315]

You cut my my head off hoe time to pay the toll!