Book 1 - The Behemoth came to Canterlot

by Equimorto

Pape

It was a simple set of instructions that stared down at Twilight from the front wall of the town hall, glowing blue bright enough to be seen clearly in the night even without the torches that had been brought to light the scene. As she stared back at them, she was certain of two things. The timing and placement of the message were thought out decisions. It was on the front of the town hall because that was the most well guarded place in the city, and it had been put there early at night to bother her.

The first was a display of skill, and an implicit threat. The one or ones responsible were bragging, showing how easily they could do things without guards taking notice, how dangerous they could be as a result. The second was something she firmly believed in. While it may have appeared as though she was acting presumptuous and assuming the world revolved around her, the contents of the message itself made it evident that the culprits were indeed meaning to get to her. That accounted for, it made sense that the time had been chosen to have the worst consequences on her. Clearly they were in town, clearly security was no issue, they could have placed it there as soon as she'd arrived or sooner. They had waited. They had waited until it was just a bit too early for her to be asleep, so she wouldn't at all get to sleep for a few hours.

It sounded silly from outside. She couldn't deny that. However, something about the way the message was written, something about the whole thing told her that she was dealing with the kind of creature that really would think things out like that. If she had to trust her gut further, she was against a single unicorn, but that was too far in the realm of speculation and ephemeral intuition. What she was certain of was that her enemy was smart, the results they had attained proof enough of that, and that made it reasonable to think they were the kind of smart that would overplan things like that. The kind that was probably somewhere close by, watching her, thinking they were playing a game with her.

By most means, they were. They had the scales and the means to use them without being caught, they had infiltrated her laboratory and stolen things from under her nose and driven Chrysalis mad, they were the ones with the metaphorical ready to fire horn pointed at her head and much more realistically the heads of at minimum hundreds of ponies across Equestria. Prohibiting every single large gathering was unthinkable, and even if she did a higher power spell could trigger a reaction big enough off a scale to wipe out entire towns. It wasn't a question what the right thing to do was with so many lives at risk. Twilight would need to comply with those demands staring at her.

Comments

[Speckle]

Please tell me Twilight has an ace up her sleeve