There's a Monster Pony Outside My Window

by Halira

Chapter 41: Hard Bargains

Charles was watching Charlotte and Kristin play. It was soothing, watching them doing something so ordinary and carefree after all the things they had been through over the last week. He wanted to savor this time.

"Hello! Your friendly neighborhood Marshmallow has news!"

It was not to be.

The amorphous white blob with the face appeared in the room, startling the girls and making them scream.

"Hey! I said friendly! Don't run and scream!" the Marshmallow said as it looked at the girls.

He held out his hands to his daughters. "It's okay! It's not going to hurt you. Marshmallow, I know you can change shape. Can you change into something less frightening?"

The face contorted. "What's less frightening than my smiling face? Let me see…Charlotte there is Sunset Blessing, which means she's a cat person. One adorable feline coming up!"

The blob shifted and came down on the floor and now appeared to be a cartoonish, white stuffed cat wearing a spotted dress and a big red bow, no bigger than the girls' stuffed animals.

"Tadda!" the Marshmallow exclaimed, smiling and spreading its arms wide.

"What is it?" Kristin asked, still not moving away from the wall.

The Marshmallow grinned and pointed at itself. "I'm the Marshmallow. I'm most people's friend, almost everyone; there are some meanies that I'm no friend to. I don't want to hurt anybody. I can't touch anything anyway. I'm not all here. I've got news about the baddie-bad guys that harassed you."

"What news?" Charles asked, approaching the creature to prove to the girls it wasn't dangerous.

The Marshmallow turned to face him. "Good news and bad news. We have reached a plea bargain with them! They have agreed they will never come and try to hurt you or your daughters again, well, aside from old Charlotte, Sunset Blessing. We couldn't get them to agree to that, but we got them to agree that family is off limits! I mean, that's just dirty!"

"So the good news is we're safe; the bad news is Sunset Blessing, isn't?" Charles asked.

The Marshmallow shook her kitty-cat head. "Well, part of the bad news and part of the good news. The other bad news is that we didn't get them to agree not to say anything about time travel. The government people will try to label them as crazy if they talk about that. The other part of the good news is they agreed not to rat you out as having come from the past or being related to old SB."

"And how do we know they'll keep their word?" Charles asked, skeptical of the whole thing.

"Nobody breaks a promise to the Dreamwardens, silly," the Marshmallow giggled. "At least, not one of our special promises. We're going to make SB special promise never to do any time traveling again or do anything that could aid someone else in time traveling. She was expecting that, so she isn't upset."

Charles sighed. Special promises? He didn't want to even ask, and he wasn't going to. "They're probably going to jail anyway. So we don't need to worry."

"Oh, they aren't going to jail," the Marshmallow said quickly.

"They aren't? Why?!" Charles demanded.

The Marshmallow shrugged. "It was a bargain. There's give and take in bargains. We're going to send them on their merry way with a small cash compensation for being unlawfully detained, and they aren't going to press charges for that."

"What about them breaking and entering, or for their assault!" Charles fumed.

"We don't charge for that, and they make the special promise," the Marshmallow answered.

"What about time traveling to our time and attacking us!" Charles yelled.

"Never happened on the record. If we acknowledge it happened, then we have to acknowledge time travel is real, then everybody has big problems. I'm here to suppress problems and try to make sure you're safe," the Marshmallow answered.

"What about Andrea! Where's the justice for her?!" Charles bellowed.

The Marshmallow flinched and looked down. "I feel very sorry for saying this because it isn't fair, but there won't be any. You have to understand; I can fight for you to get justice, or I can fight to keep you safe. These ponies want to hurt Sunset Blessing and everything connected to her, including you and your family. I have a bargain in place that will keep you safe, but it came at a cost. I'm sorry, but I can't force them to agree to anything, and you had to give up something for me to negotiate. You're giving up that justice you want."

"You couldn't negotiate a better deal?" Charles asked, gripping his hands into fists.

"They wanted their freedom; that was what they were drawing the line at. I got the best deal I could get," the Marshmallow answered. "If I didn't give them what they wanted, they would not agree to keep their mouths shut about you and not agree to leave you alone. Do you want me to see them punished only to open the floodgates of bad guys coming to your door to do more? You can be angry more wasn't done, and I sympathize and know it doesn't feel fair, but I'm not here to get you vengeance. What's not fair is having more bad guys show up and hurt you. Getting justice for what was done to you and your family isn't worth the price if it means your family has to live in fear to get it."

"But—"

"Hold that thought!" the Marshmallow exclaimed. "Hey kids, look! A dancing monkey!"

The Marshmallow shifted forms and now was a monkey doing the samba.

"This is for your ears only," the Marshmallow's voice whispered in his ear. "I don't like having to be mean, but sometimes I have to spell out hard truths, and there's no nice way to do it. Look at those girls. Do you know what you get for your justice? The chance for them to end up dead. I know the situation Andrea is in, but that is out of our control now. I hope she lives, but whether she lives or dies is not impacted by any deal I could make. I'm ensuring those girls don't wind up with the same fate. I can withdraw the deal with those ponies in the basement still, but your daughters have to live with the consequences. I'm giving you the choice. What will you have me do?"

He closed his eyes and whispered, "This is cruel."

"I know, and I'm sorry. I don't like doing this," the Marshmallow whispered back, sounding legitimately sorry. "What is your choice?"

He swallowed. "Do the damn deal."

The monkey stopped dancing and took a bow to the girls. "That's all the show we have got today. This Marshmallow is needed elsewhere. Have fun, girls!"

The monkey vanished, and nothing took its place.

Kristin continued to stare at where the Marshmallow had been. "Dad, what was that thing?"

He shook his head. "I still don't know. Let's get out of this room for a bit. I want to see how things are progressing with Miss Newman's magic." He wanted assurance that she would be able to save Andrea.

---

Sunset Blessing sat panting, looking across at Wild Growth, who stood as unfazed as ever. It wasn't exhaustion from over-exerting that was tiring her out, but the effort of trying to hold back her power.

"I need a break," Sunset announced.

Wild nodded and walked over to her. "Not bad for the first day. You made good progress. It took me years to get my power under control… back when I could use it."

"I don't have years, and neither does Andrea," Sunset muttered.

"Andrea doesn't; you do. You know this is probably going to slow your aging," Wild replied as she sat down beside her.

"Great, I get to be an old mare for even longer. Such fun," Sunset said with a grimace.

"Should have you living well past a hundred and twenty," Wild said in turn. "I did reach out to Twilight to see if she can come to this, just as a precaution if you fail to get it together."

Sunset looked up in shock. "You risked discussing this through official channels?"

"I know some other methods of reaching out. They could get me in trouble, but…." Wild Growth shrugged.

"Is she or Starlight coming?" Sunset asked, daring to hope.

"Don't know yet. I will tomorrow," Wild Growth answered. "It would have to be Twilight. Starlight has the power, but she lacks the finest, at least to do it correctly in the tiny time-frame we're looking at."

"And I will?" Sunset asked.

"I've never seen a pony who can weave magic as quickly and with as much precision as you, not even Twilight. You've done things that should have been impossible due to the precision and speed they'd have to be done, but you somehow do it. Twilight still knows more than you and is more powerful, but if you can get your power usage under control, you're the ideal person to do this. You still know more about transformation magic than her too. Twilight is the second-best choice."

"Only if I get this under control," Sunset reminded her.

Wild nodded. "Yeah, that's the rub."

"I'd still feel safer no matter what with her doing it. I don't know if I can pull off that precision anymore, not with this power," Sunset said mournfully. "I'm dangerous to myself and others in this state. Triss really screwed me over. Boon my ass!"

"At least you don't have to worry about fanatics beating the crap out of you with magic anymore," Wild reminded her. "We wouldn't even be having the possible option of you saving Andrea either. We don't know if Twilight will be able to come."

"Thirty seconds, that's all I have once it starts," Sunset said, licking her lips. "Thirty seconds until Andrea dies, maybe not even that."

"Which is why Starlight isn't an option. She couldn't do it in that timeframe. Twilight will be a stretch, but I think she can."

"If she can come, she's doing it," Sunset said firmly.

"But until then, even if we get a yes from the reply, we prepare as if you are the only option. I was hesitant to tell you that I reached out because I worried you might take it as a sign you can wait on her to sweep in and save the day. We can't afford for you to think that way. Things happen, ponies get delayed, and Twilight might not make it in time. We don't even know if she can come to begin with. There's a lot of red tape she has to cut through, and she can't afford to cause a diplomatic incident."

Sunset raised an eyebrow at Wild. "You're risking a diplomatic incident reaching out to her."

"I'm a senator, and yeah, that would be bad, but she's a princess of Equestria, and that could be worse. You know politics, Sunset. You used to play them in your sleep."

"And see what came of it?" Sunset asked. "I don't know what I'm even arguing. You're right. I do want her to sweep in and save the day, but I know how dangerous that line of thinking is."

A fluffy blob landed in front of them and turned into an equally chubby pegasus mare. "I have news about my negotiations with the prisoners. Please don't yell at me when I tell you the details! I've already been yelled at enough today!"

Sunset sighed. "Sum it up. Is my human family going to be safe? That's all I need to know or care about. You can leave the other details with Amicus to go over."

The pegasus nodded. "Yeah, they are. The prisoners are going to walk free, and you are going to pay them a financial reparation, but they won't ever touch anyone connected to you again or say who those people are or where they came from."

"Sunset is paying a reparation?! Is this the best deal you could work out?" Wild harshly demanded.

"I asked you not to yell at me!" the pegasus whined.

Sunset shook her head. "I don't care about the money. You got me what I wanted. Thank you, Rebecca."

Rebecca, being the mature, powerful being that she was, stuck her tongue out at Wild. "That's all for me. I'll let the lawyers wrap things up. And… good luck with the kid."

"See ya around, Marshmallow," Wild said with a dismissive wave.

The pegasus simply disappeared as if she was never there. Which, technically, she hadn't been.

Wild stood up. "Time to get back to work."

Sunset stood as well. Time was ticking, and she still felt so far from her goal.

Comments

[Charlie_K]

Sadly justice is often not what we think it is, or should be.

[harts fire]

things are moving foreword be it slowly.
some how i think if Sunset took time and relaxed she cod pull this off easy.

[SirAquila]

After binging this story through the night I can say that took a different turn then expected. But i am curious to see where it ends.