The thing he lacked

by WiseFireCracker

The unicorn that makes the stupidest decisions (no kidding)

“Why do you tolerate these so-called nobles, sister? I can understand the need for ponies to be invested in their own affairs in one way or another, but these are simply too arrogant. The worst of all seems to be this ‘Prince Blueblood’. I hear he was less than charming to one of the bearer of the Elements of Harmony.”

“I know, sister…”

“What makes him think he is of so great standings? IT IS REVOLTING!”

To that, the goddess of the sun did not reply. She was lost in her memory of a peculiar little colt.

“Hey, you have wings and a horn… Who are you?” The adorable little unicorn had asked, head tilted to the side.

“I am Princess Celestia... your aunt.” She had smiled tenderly.

“Whoa! You’re my aunt?” He had jumped up and down at that.

The alicorn had nodded, amused by his enthusiasm. “I am.”

“This is so great! I have a special pretty aunt.” The young prince had tackled her leg, hugging her with the biggest grin she had seen on a young foal like him.

It had warmed her heart in a way that would not happen again until the very first success of her prized pupil, Twilight Sparkle, and the thousand times blessed return of her sister.

The chariot was uncomfortable. Its wooden planks were hard, unimpressive and crackled. The noble dared not move too much for fear splinters would get incrusted into his delicate skin, but it was not so easy. It kept jumping from bumps in the road.

Truly, Prince Blueblood had been in a darkening mood ever since their procession had left Canterlot.

What was his aunt thinking? For all his qualities, he was not a pony for search parties!

Unfortunately, her reasons made great sense and went hooves in hooves with his pride.

‘We need to show to our subjects that we are invested in their problems, do you understand?’ She had told him.

And considering he was one of the highest dignitaries in all of Equestria, the message it sent was all that much stronger. Simple and elegant, he only had to show himself among the soldiers searching for the missing ponies and the scouts looking out for the griffons.

Yet this was taking far too long for his taste. If he was to take this treatment much longer, he’d go mad.

“How much longer until we arrive?! This chariot is simply dreadful!” The prince made his displeasure known.

“Shouldn’t be too long, your highness,” an earth pony replied simply. “We can see the outlines of the Frozen Mountains.”

At that, Prince Blueblood barely suppressed a grunt of anger. To add insult to the injury, their search had to start near one of the most hostile part of Equestria where weather was harder to control and the griffons were more numerous. It would make sense to go there, as the processions intents were to visit one village where the disappearances had reach a very worrying level.

It did not mean that he would take this ordeal gracefully.

He would have sworn he heard a soldier laugh at his grumpiness, though he had to have been dreaming. No pony would be so foolish as to mock one of the three royal heirs. Deciding that any laugher must have been the results of one crude joke or another unrefined funny story, Prince Blueblood ignored everypony else superbly until they reached town.

“By her incandescent mane…” the stallion muttered, horrified at the sight before him. “Auntie does not truly wish for me to spend weeks here, does she?”

“Ah, well, it all depends on our investigations, your highness,” a muscular Pegasus next to him replied.

Captain Cloudy Sky was a stallion of great reputations amongst the nobility for his long career as defender of the borders between the griffons’ territory and Equestria. Even a unicorn such as Prince Blueblood might feel a twinge of nervousness when conversing with such a grand figure.

That was not to say the unicorn did. To him, Cloudy Sky was a great soldier, but nothing more. In fact, there were precious few distinctions between generals and soldier in his mind. Brutes you aimed at your enemies, unrefined commoners that had the honor to defend the princesses and the royal family.

“If we find out what’s going on, then I reckon you will not need to stay long. If things stay calm though, we’ll have to search somewhere else.”

“Then I suggest we get started right away, Captain.” The unicorn waved dismissively, trying his best not to detail the town.

A charitable soul like Fancy Pants would have described it as “charmingly rustic”.

“I can’t believe she would ask me to spend time in this mud hole,” the unicorn muttered darkly under his breath.

Hoofywood was a village not completely unlike a certain town of pony harboring six very important mares. The extravagance of the most modest house in Canterlot would have humbled every single one of the ponies residing there.

Prince Blueblood hated it.

Still, he put on his most charming smile for the journalists, of the insulting number of two. The unicorn mare holding her notebook let her concentration falter and accidentally dropped it as her blush spread. Internally, he smirked. His physique certainly warranted such a reaction.

The insufferably friendly and unsophisticated mayor put his nerves to the test though, but the prince managed to stay coolly polite to the green stallion.

It would not do to offend the community. After all, his presence was a political move by his aunt and he would never do anything to disappoint her.

Next to him, the armored pegasus started shouting his order. “Alright men, spread out and interrogate the townsfolk. I want all squads to give me a full report by sunset!”

“Captain, why would you waste your time in town instead of searching outside? No house in this town could hold so much as a tenth of the missing ponies.”

To the noble’s indignation, something akin to annoyance danced in the captain’s eyes. “With all due respect, your highness, Princess Celestia put you in charge of the public relationships and me in charge of the actual work. Kindly let me do my job… sir.”

Then, as if he had not performed an act of utter treason – who dared talked back to the heir of the unicorn royal family?! –, Cloudy Sky left with his second-in-command, a bulky earth pony by the name of Grey Bark.

What followed was a moment of complete and total silence as Blueblood blinked slowly with utter fury while the town’s mayor awkwardly danced on his hooves and tried not to aggravate the noble any further.

“Hum… there was a small dinner organized at the town hall to celebrate your arrival, your highness.” The aging stallion attempted to be perfectly nonchalant and ignore the horrible timing of all this. “My cousin has even brought his finest wine, straight from our fields, for the occasion.”

‘Well, perhaps this trip will not be so bad after all’, the prince thought.

Hours later, with a considerable amount of alcohol in his system, the unicorn stumbled outside the town hall.

As offensive as it was, Prince Blueblood had taken the good natured closeness of the commoners in stride once a few glasses of unrefined wine had been ingested. The food had been completely plain, but after a few days of eating military meals with the rest of the search party, its homely quality had won the noble over.

Now, nopony could rightfully accuse him of refusing to mingle with the lower masses.

Of course, he had rejected the advances of that young mare nonetheless. As charming as she was, their different status made any relationship impossible.

No, his task required him to be perfect in the eyes of his aunt’s subjects. A royal scandal in this timeframe would be disastrous. If he was only seen honoring their mayor with his company and even indulged in their regional specialties, then they could not fault him.

This thought process did need for him to appear presentable the next morning however and for that to happen as well, he would need his beauty sleep. Unfortunately, moving in a straight line was unbecomingly difficult at the moment, the cheap wine dulling his senses. Fortunately, there were little to no peasants abound this late in the evening. The only ponies in sights were the pegasi that sometimes flew over the village.

Slowly, the drunken stallion made his way through half the town, vaguely cursing the fact that the only suitable inn had been so far away from the town hall.

His lack of common sense combined with his arrogance and his inebriated state gave him the ill advice to just cut up on the way to trot by going through one of the lesser illuminated streets. If one was to be more charitable, they could say he had stumbled in and got lost.

Prince Blueblood almost tripped on his own hooves at the turn of a corner and harshly collided, shoulder first, into a stone wall and let out an undignified yelp.

A curse nearly escaped his lips, when he heard some scrambling noises and whispers. In seconds, they had quieted, but it left a strong impression on him. A wise stallion would have turned back, reasoning that a longer but less occupied street in the middle of the night was a small price to get his peace of mind back. A noble stallion, on the other hoof, would simply brisk through, comfortable in their knowledge of their own status and the protection it granted them. Who would dare harm the nephew of Princess Celestia herself?

With each hoof he put in front of the other, his hardiness returned more strongly, until he had gotten back his arrogant demeanor, if only slightly worse with the alcohol getting to his head. Oh no, the noble unicorn was not afraid of some stupid noise in a dark alley; those were tales for little fillies a nanny needed to send them to bed. None of the shadows held any power over his mind, even as their claws gripped at the walls and created illusionary monsters waiting to strike…

Prince Blueblood nearly jumped out of his skin when a brief shriek of surprise echoed in the night.

Suddenly, his bravado lost a lot of its intensity.

Shaking like a leaf, the stallion took a few more uneasy steps, shooting terrified glances at his surroundings. He was alone, all alone… in the dark…

He had to be imagining those muffled noises, as if somepony was being restrained… or worse…

This was all the brave prince could take, before running off in a blind panic.

And bumped head first into a deserted stall with a very loud crash. In a combination of luck and misfortune, the pain was dulled by the alcohol in his system, somewhat, though there would have been no need for that without him being drunk in the first place.

Sompony – something – hissed in the dark, nearby. It was not loud, not at all, but in the deep silence of Princess Luna’s night, Blueblood distinctively understood the words.

“You heard that?”

“You think I’m deaf?!” Another voice, raspy and grating, replied. “Of course I did.”

The white unicorn’s heart jumped in his chest, fighting to get himself disentangled from the destroyed mess he had charged into. In his panic, he barely realized he was digging himself deeper.

His thoughts were centered around the soldiers that should have been escorting him right now and what a blatant display of incompetence it was for them to allow him to get into this kind of dangerous situation. He was royalty, for the love of Celestia! Where were they anyway?!

His breathing itched in his throat and an unnatural amount of sheer terror whipped the last reminders of his drunken stupor as a large frame emerged from the shadows of a back alley, one just a few meters away from the white stallion.

Frozen, the noble stared as more dark figures seemed to gather near it, just outside the range of the torches’ light. All he could see were the outlines of their bodies and at least one of those monsters was bipedal.

“It came from around here…” One of them said with a raspy voice.

The larger one shifted on its hooves – paws? – and the top of its body turned in the prince’s direction.

Prince Blueblood shut down altogether, terrified out of his mind.

A second later, a hoof came down on his face and all went black. 

Comments

[Havenoname]

Some how I knew Blueblood was going to be a victim too after being involved in a search party. I kind of hope for a good horror story staring Blueblood since you do have that 'dark' tag put up. If not, I still hope for a good story anyway. So far, your story is flowing nicely. We can only hope Blueblood can survive whatever fate throws him. At least... I hope so.

[WiseFireCracker]

1755087 Well, Celestia's idea was not bad by any means, but this is Blueblood. It was bound to end as a disaster. (He certainly will think so too.)

I'm fairly certain that the story won't qualify as horror though. If anything, I'll keep the gore to a minimum. I just want to go with Dark themes, it's what Blueblood needs as a good wake-up call.

[L4]