Eye of the Storm

by TheDriderPony

Day 3

"Next order of business." Storm King steepled his fingers and transfixed Derpy with that stormy gaze she loved so much. "An image overhaul for our new Chief Operations Officer."

She waited for a moment for him to continue. When he didn’t, she hesitantly gestured to herself.

“Yes, you,” he clarified. “No matter how competent you are, I can’t have a member of my staff looking so… pony. I think your main problem area is roughly…” He gestured vaguely with a roll of his wrist. “That.”

“That… all of me?”

“Yeah, that.”

She considered it. There wasn’t a lot she could change about herself at large (if she could, she would have already to suit his tastes) but she did have a base to work off. The one other pony she knew he approved of.

Though she didn’t have a horn to splinter, and she definitely wasn’t going to do anything permanent to her wings. Maybe a mohawk, though? She could work a mohawk.

“I could wear an eyepatch?” she offered. It wasn’t like her depth perception could get any worse.

“It’s a start.” He noted it down, but didn’t look satisfied. She needed more than that. This was her chance to start enticing him in. Fashion was a mare’s weapon in romance, or so Rarity always said. What kind of makeover would appeal to him?

“A set of armor might help.” At his interested eyebrow raise, she continued. “Maybe with spikes?”

“I like spikes. Spikes are good. Very on-brand.”

“It’d need to be dark grey and blue, those are the company colors right?” What else did he like? “Chains?”

“Chains?” he echoed.

“Not real big heavy ones” —like she saw the ponies who’d pulled in the table manacled with— “but maybe some thin decorative ones? Linking the different parts of the armor together.” It really wasn’t her style, but she could compromise.

“That’s... a novel idea,” Storm King mused. “Good symbolism there. A sign of subservience even in a position of power. I like it!”

A thrill ran through her at his praise. Chained armor sounded heavy, but it couldn’t be worse than those itchy one-size-fits-none delivery uniforms. Maybe she could get it bespelled to be lighter or more comfortable.

Or maybe it could even be spelled so with a single word the chains could tighten up or even drop off entirely…

Okay. Maybe she was into chains after all. She was learning so many new things about herself lately.

She descended back from her daydream of impractically risque armor and realized he’d kept talking without her. He’d moved past the armor itself to something about wing blades which she was pretty sure were illegal to own without a special license. But rules about licenses could be changed once he was in control.

That thought reminded her of a question that had wormed its way through her mind late the previous night as she’d tried to find a comfortable neck position to sleep on.

"Can I ask a question?"

Storm King looked disgruntled at being interrupted, but thought about it for a moment. "Alright. I do appreciate feedback." His eyes narrowed. "Just don't try and suggest anything cute. I hate cute."

"I know." He brought it up a lot. Her own lack of cuteness was probably half of why he tolerated her presence.

“So I’ve been thinking about all this. Invasion. Capturing. Conquering. And I was wondering, what’s the…”' she fished for a word that would appeal to his vocabulary. “...the brand trajectory in this? What’s the end goal?”

She wasn’t really keen on the whole dictatorship thing herself, but Equestria could do worse than her Aponis of a beau for its iron-fisted ruler.

He gave her a considering look as his eyebrows came together in a picture of deep thought. Finally, he nodded. “Good question. Insightful. I like that. If you’re going to be on the team then you’d better know the mission statement.”

He turned his chair to face her properly and leaned forward, his face set as stern and serious as though he was about to impart some deep secret of the universe.

“It's all about merchandising, see.”

She blinked. “Merchandising?”

“Right. What's the use of a big threatening reputation if you're not making money off it? Build a big brand and slap its name on everything.” He rose suddenly and kicked his chair out from behind as he jumped up on the table, his long limbs gesturing grandly with every word. “Storm King hats! Storm King vests! Storm King souvenir mugs! Storm King action figures! Storm King branded bedsheets and dinette sets. It's an endless well of fame and wealth!”

Derpy nodded eagerly and wished her forelegs were free to clap for his great performance. It made sense to her. She wouldn't mind a set of Storm King pillow cases, herself. Especially if they had his picture printed on either side.

“So that’s the plan? Once you conquer all of Equestria you’re going to sell them your stuff? Or have them make it for you?”

“‘Once I conquer’? It’s already done. You were there, weren't you? You saw my airships come down in their diesel clouds with the whoosh and the bang and the ‘surrender now’.”

"When you took Canterlot, I know. But it’s only been a couple days. When did you have time to take the rest of it?”

Storm King froze mid-pose. He turned slowly—oh so painfully slowly—and pierced her with his serious gaze.

“What do you mean the rest of it?”

Derpy fought to control her breathing. That look, that glare. She thanked the stars her wings were immobilized or they’d have sprung out to full spread in an instant. Luckily, bland geographical trivia (in lieu of buckball statistics or mental math) was exactly the kind of thing she needed to cool her jets. “You know, all the other cities? There's Cloudsdale, Manehattan, Las Pegasus, Fillydelphia, Baltimare, Whinnyapolis, Seaddle. And those are just the ones as big as Canterlot or bigger. There's dozens of little towns and villages all over. Equestria's a big place.”

Storm King was not happy. It showed in the flare of his nostrils. The arch of his back. The crackle of sparks that ran across his crown. He stepped down from the table, calm as anything, before roaring and smashing his fist against the surface.

“There’s more?! There’s not supposed to be more cities! All the hippogriffs lived in the same place! So did the Parrots! And the Abyssians! Tempest never said anything about this! Why are ponies so spread out?”

“Well, it all started over a thousand years ago in the Warring Tribes era—”

“Did I ask for a history lesson?!”

Kind of, yes, but she felt it wasn’t the time to say so. “And beyond Equestria there’s also the Crystal Empire up north. The mail doesn’t run there, so I don’t know much about it but that’s where all the crystal ponies live.” She paused as a thought occurred to her. “I'm kind of surprised they haven't made a move yet since they haven’t heard from their empress in three days.” She nodded towards the spot of the room where Princess Cadence’s statue still stood.

“An Empress?” he balked, “I thought she was a princess?”

“Both, really. She got a promotion but kept the old title.”

“That’s… ugh.” He sank back down and put his face in his claws. When he spoke again it was muffled and muttered. “We are going to go so over budget. This was supposed to be a raid, not an extended campaign. I’m going to need more soldiers, more supplies, a logistics chain. All so expensive. Ugh, this was supposed to be a one-and-done hostile takeover to nab the magic to boost my numbers!”

Derpy’s ears perked up at the new detail. “Magic? What magic?”

Storm King groaned again and took one hand off his face. He reached around blindly before finally finding the staff he always carried around and fiddled with when he got bored. “The plan was to sweep in, blitz the place, and get all the princesses in one spot. Then I was going to use this stick—I forget the name, the Staff of… Sarcasm or whatever— that Tempest stole from some ancient desert hermit to drain the princess' magic and give me control over the elements. Can't exactly be the Storm King if I can't summon storms on command. It’s right there in the name! I gotta be able to back up my claim or else the whole rebrand is pointless!”

There was more to his rant, but Derpy didn’t hear it as she’d collapsed into herself in a black hole of mortification. Storm King wasn't his name, it was a title. The Storm King! Not ‘Mr. King, but my friends call me Storm’. How embarrassing! It was a small mercy he hadn't found out about her mistake before she learned the truth. (Though she made a mental note to adjust her fantasy wedding invitations from “Mrs. Derpy King” to “Storm Queen Derpy”. The latter had a much nicer ring to it anyway.)

Then she latched onto the other important part of what he’d said.

“Wait, that's it?”

He stopped mid-rant to glare. “What’s it?”

“You just need magic to make a storm? You don’t need the princesses for that.”

His eyes narrowed into two twin pinpricks of icy fury. “Explain. Now.”

“A-any pegasus can whip up a storm,” she said, fighting back a wave of heat from his intensity. “Maybe you’d need a team for something bigger, but it’s still something every third pony can do. I don’t think I’ve ever even seen Pri- Celestia use pegasus magic aside from just flying. Lots of unicorn spells, but never anything weather based. She's got- she had staff for that.”

He roared. It was like the most violent parts of a lion and a gorilla rolled into a singular sound. The edges of the table cracked between his claws. “Tempest,” he growled through grinding teeth. “That snake lied to me. Promised me that only the princesses had the magic I needed, that I needed all four of them—”

“Five.”

“What.”

“There's five alicorn princesses,” she corrected. Maybe it was a dangerous game to keep stoking his anger, but stars it was so hot! “Princess Cadence has a daughter she left up north with her daddy. She got the wings and horn and everything. I heard she’s so strong she blasted a hole through the whole palace at only a few days old. There was a big hullabaloo for weeks in all the papers.”

He threw the table. Picked up the whole thing, scattering papers everywhere, and flung it like an empty pizza box. It sailed through one of the stained glass windows and shattered it into a million glimmering pieces. “That self-serving traitor! She was taking me for a ride the whole time! Me! That’s my schtick! Was there anything she wasn't lying about?!” His eyes roved the room, seeking a suitable substitute for his fury. They landed on the staff. “I bet this is just some worthless stick!”

With a heave and a grunt, the Storm King took three steps and launched it through the broken window like an Equestrian Games javelin gold medalist.

Just as it disappeared into the distance with a twinkle, there came a knock at the door.

“What is it NOW!?” he roared

The doors edged open just wide enough for a small, porcupine-like figure to poke his head through. Derpy recognized him. He was the one who’d demanded Canterlot’s surrender back when everything started. He eyed the room with fearful cautiousness, taking in the destruction and the Storm King’s still wrathful looming.

“I… hi. We’re, uh… we’re back. And we got the princess.”

The Storm King stared at him unmovingly before his features slowly settled down into an irritated scowl. “Oh you have, have you?”

“Ah… yes?”

“Well? Bring her in!”

The messenger yelped and scuttled back through the door. A moment later both doors were opened by a pair of yeti guards in their full armor. They stood to the side as a haughty-looking unicorn walked in like she owned the place.

Derpy disliked her immediately, and not just because she’d been the one to trap her in stone in the first place.

She ignored the destruction as she stepped over the detritus and lowered herself into a bow as she approached.

“Your highness,” she announced with the most insufferable arrogance. “As promised, I’ve brought you the runaway princess.” Behind her came a cart pulled by two chained stallions and bearing a cage that held the unmistakable form of Princess Twilight, looking more downcast than Derpy had ever seen her. “She put up a fight, but now she’s all alone.”

Tempest rose and, for the first time, finally noticed she had company aside from her boss. Her eyes widened, then narrowed, then tried to force themselves to fit a look of casual indifference.

“And who… is this?”

“Well.” The Storm King snapped. Gone complete was his hot-burning rage from before. Now there was just a cold seething fury. (Fury that was directed on her behalf, Derpy smugly noted). “I was going to introduce her as your new boss, but that’s going to be difficult now that I'm starting to rethink your future in my ranks entirely.”

That clearly threw her for a loop. Her stone-cold facade cracked as she stepped back in shock. “What? ‘Rethink my future’? I’m your second-in-command!”

“Were my second-in-command. And descending the ladder like it’s on fire.”

Anger ignited in the mare’s eyes. A wrath Depry had rarely seen in a pony. “I’ve… I've been nothing but loyal! I captured Twilight Sparkle! And the rest of the princesses!”

“Well, news flash Buster Brown!” the Storm King hollered, “You missed one!”

He closed the distance between them like a jungle cat on the hunt. “And that's the least of your deceptions I’ve discovered! I know all of your lies, Tempest Shadow!”

“Lies!? You can’t imagine the amount of effort I’ve—”

“Don’t you talk to me about effort! I built this brand from the ground up!”

“Derpy?” Twilight whispered. Derpy turned to her, but kept her eyes on the growing confrontation. Seeing her stallion fight for her was too good to miss. “Derpy, is that you? What are you doing here?”

“Hi Twilight, but shhh,” she murmured, “Don’t interrupt hubby when he’s getting fired up.”

“Hubby?!”

“And another thing!” The Storm King bellowed, steam flaring from his nostrils in short furious bursts. “This whole invasion was your idea in the first place! A secret plot to bankrupt me by withholding information about the enemy! You’ve done nothing but use me to get your own petty revenge against Equestria. The petty revenge part earned you points, but trying to manipulate me was your biggest mistake!” He pointed across the room to Derpy and smiled for the first time in minutes, though it was a smug and leering thing. “Dursley here has shown me the truth!”

“Derpy.”

“Whatever!”

“This pony,” Tempest hissed, “has fed you lies. She’s turned you against me, your most loyal follower—”

“Oh come off it,” he scoffed, “We both know you’re just in this for the hornjob. Get with the program!” He leaned in close enough that he was shouting right in her face. “You are never! Getting! Your horn back! It’s gone! Kaput! If all the doctors in Equestria couldn’t fix it, what utter insanity made you think I could? You were a useful tool, and now you’re getting traded in for a better model.”

Tempest’s horn… exploded. That was what it looked like as raw magic burst from the cracked base like fireworks made of sunlight that filled the room with searing light.

While she was still blinking away black afterimages, Derpy felt herself be surrounded by a magic aura and yanked across the room. “You!” Tempest’s voice screeched right in her ear. “This is all your fault! You turned him against me! You ruined everything!”

In that moment of blindness and panic, Derpy knew one thing to be certain and she said it without even thinking. “I was right. I’m a much better match for him than you were.”

The next thing Derpy knew, she was sailing through the window at high speed. Trailing off into the distance, she barely heard Twilight scream out her name but she didn’t miss the familiar tingle of a featherweight spell being cast on her, the same kind they used in flight school.

As she sailed over the city, she closed her eyes. This was going to hurt. Not a lot, thanks to the spell, but still. Her heart hurt more than anything. Twilight had arrived, which meant her beloved was going to be defeated. It didn’t matter that she was in a cage; once Twilight showed up, a victory for Equestria was pretty much certain.

She was going to have to get used to addressing letters to Tartarus. Then again, maybe she could leverage this into convincing the Postmaster to give the Tartarus delivery route? It’d hardly be long-distance if she could still see him every day. Yes, that would work.

That last thing two things that passed through Derpy’s mind before collision was an idle confusion over why she smelt a giant cake and a pondering if she could track down the baker to cater her wedding.

It smelled like victory over incredible odds.

Also raspberry.

Comments

[Venerable Ro]

Huh, there's a new one, ol' Stormy genuinely being unaware of Equestria's real scale. I wonder how that redefinition of circumstances affected the fallout with Tempest.