There's a darkness in Saddle Arabia, one that was concealed from the world...but one young mare fully aware of this choses to escape to the land of Equestria, with the aid of a strange, bipedal creature. Crossover with Sin City and Bioshock.
In Saddle Arabia, there lives a young mare named Mawa Sihr, who lives under the tyranny of an oppressive father who treats her like a commodity, and is currently wishing to increase his standing as a noblecolt by forcing her into an arranged marriage with the incredibly misogynistic son of the king.
Mawa, not wanting any part of this, chooses to enact her long thought out plan to escape to the free land of Equestria, using a dark magical spell to conjure up a servant to help her.
Said servant happens to be a human, a man by the name of Marv who was finally ready to die after avenging the death of a prostitute who showed him a kindness, but now thanks to Mawa’s spell has been resurrected in Saddle Arabia (not as a pony though) and now has been bonded to her, and is hunted by the authorities as a monster.
Together, this team of man and mare must go up against an army of soldiers, griffin bounty hunters, diamond dog bandits, and a shadowy group of terrorists in order to reach Equestria, where they might finally find peace. Along the way finding out more about themselves than they’d knew before in one of the most unconventional Bioshock crossovers ever written
I spat, I couldn’t believe these wimps, they couldn’t get it done in just one jolt? A smirk grew on my face “Is that the best you can do, you pussies?” Another jolt shot through my system as they tried to finish the job. It worked this time, I could feel my body shut down. Goldie…I’m coming. I could feel my body falling, is this what death feels like? No…I couldn’t understand it. Something was wrong, I couldn’t put my finger on it, it felt like I was being pulled by something. I looked down, there was a light, not one of fire, it just looked like light. Was this Hell? It didn’t matter anymore. A grin rose up on my face “Bring it” I growled as I fell into the light. I might not know where I’m going…but somebody’s gonna get a nasty surprise when they see me coming, I know that.
THIRD PONY PERSPECTIVE
~
Mawa Sihr stood before the summoning circle she’d made in the basement of the palace. Saddle Arabia didn’t seem like too bad a place to some, an exotic country with beautiful architecture, but anyone who actually read about rights for women in the place would see it as it truly is…though given the terrorist attack on Manehattan years ago, Equestria’s eyes have begun to be opened to the truth about this country. But any hope of an army being sent in to remove some of the more corrupt officials had died when Celestia was assured that the architect of the plan had been killed a few years back, and now she was out of time. In Saddle Arabia, women didn’t generally the kind of rights most women in many of the other countries, in fact they had almost none. Virtually all marriages were arranged, and even then most of them were done purely to gain power and higher standings than the family had before. These would often lead to abusive relationships and unhappy marriages. The noble families were often like something out of the A Song of Fire and Ice books* (how she got those past her father she never knew) and were continually backstabbing and assassinating eachother just to get ahead, unfortunately her asshole of a father never got killed because he actually was paranoid to take precautions to prevent anypony from getting the chance. Which brought her to her current situation. About five hours earlier, she’d been informed by the bastard himself that she was to be married to the son of the king, a deal that a power hungry lunatic like him would never ignore. And she’d heard horror stories about him from the servants, this creep liked to pretend he was a good colt but in truth was more a misogynic, asshole that would no doubt abuse and beat her. He himself didn’t want to marry her and was just doing it so he’d be eligible to rule the kingdom one day. He reminded her a lot of a certain prince from the aforementioned series of books. And Mawa didn’t want anything to do with him. She’d tried multiple times in years past to escape the palace her father had kept her trapped up in, but never truly succeeded as whenever she did get out, she was dragged back in soon enough. She’d only stopped doing it for the past couple of years because she’d decided on a more thought out plan, and while it was a couple of years early, at this point she had no choice. It was time to enact it. In front of her hooves lay the Neighcronomicon, a tome of forbidden knowledge that contained spells which were illegal for use by Unicorns. And currently, one of these spells was her last hope of escaping this Hell on Earth. “Klaatu” she began, the seal she’d etched onto the wall glowed a little brighter. “Barada!” She continued, the lights growing lower. “Nikto!” She shouted out, a blinding light filled the entire room, where it stayed for several minutes. And just like that, it’d gone, she could feel like something had happened, but- “MAWA! You idiotic little girl! Get over here!” The unicorn was sweating now, her father had found her. Mawa turned and saw the cellar’s stairs flooded with about twelve burly Earth Pony guards, with the angry bearded face of her Pegasus father glaring at her from the front. His frail body structure was deceiving in nature, as he was still quite intimidating besides it, as his own pools of pure hatred and absolute xenophobia, he looked quite old, had a long beard, and wore a grey turban. Her father also happened to be a very important noblecolt, and he had plans for her that she’d prefer not to be involved in. “What are you doing?! Wretched girl.” “Reading isn’t a sin” she snidely remarked, trying to save face in front of her enemy. “When a woman does it is, did you honestly think you were going to escape this time?!” She finally lost it “And do you think I care about what you want?! All you want is a tool, something you can only use to further your goals, I will not sacrifice my life for you, and I sure as buck won’t marry that prince!” “You’ll do as I say you immoral brat! Guards! Take her to her room, wipe away this symbol, and for the love of all that is holy, keep books or anything with words away from her!” This was it, she couldn’t escape now, revealing the true extent of her magic now would play her trump card too soon, but the wedding was tomorrow…she had to escape this somehow. As her mind wondered just how to escape the fate of the arranged marriage/Hell on Earth her father planned to put her in, there was something to show her fate could be avoided after all, nopony noticed it, not even Mawa herself. But when the light filled the room, she’d gained a Cutie Mark…one of a portal with a hand reaching out through it…
Mawa grumbled to herself “Great. Now what am I going to do?” The unicorn was currently locked up in one of the towers of her father’s palace, wearing a bridal outfit that looked like it cost a king’s ransom. It was the day of her arranged marriage, and she was far from happy, if she didn’t do something quick, her whole life was over. She’d considered a levitation spell, or the “Butterfly wings” spell, but her father had thought ahead and placed a lot of pegasi guards on duty in the castle. She could try the “Wave Motion Blast” spell, but there were still some good servants in the palace, and she didn’t want to risk killing them…plus, she didn’t even know if she could pull the spell off successfully, she might get herself killed or worse, knock herself out and get put under ridiculously heavy restraint. Her father had covered up as many escape routes as he possibly could, and while she’d found a few spells not even he could have suspected to have known, she wasn’t about to use them until the right time…and this wasn’t it. Even suicide wasn’t an option, he’d barred the windows and put anything she could have possibly used out of it…but not that eager. She’d considered ending her own misery a couple of times, but she was too scared to try. There had to be something, there- ‘What the Hell is this?’ She stopped pacing, she could hear a voice in her head, she never had any signs of insanity but could she finally be snapping? What could be happening? Suddenly her eyes opened up in surprise and shock, then turning back to her flank, and finally noticing her Cutie Mark. “H-holy Celestia” she muttered, her voice getting very low, so she wouldn’t alert the guard outside to her renewed hope “The spell worked after all…”
MARV’S POV
My eyes squinted, I was alive…I don’t know how it was possible, I just didn’t feel like a stiff. Where I was…seemed different, the air was cleaner than anything in Sin City, but I could still smell the stink of something. Probably just trash, that wasn’t important though, I had to think about what was going on. Last thing I remembered was dying, I was ready to die…but someone thought I’d be better off alive. I looked up to the ceiling “Haven’t had enough blood huh?” As I started to try and look around, I heard something in my head ‘I could care less what you do in your personal life.’ That was a surprise…usually I didn’t have voices that quick, especially not ones like this. The voice sounded like a young dame, she had an accent that sounded like it belonged in a ‘stan nation, and was calm. “Heh, I must not have had my medicine for weeks or something, never heard voices before.” ‘Well you’re certainly not deaf’ the voice dryly remarked ‘Now get up, we don’t have much time.’ I crossed my arms, this dame, voice, whatever it was, she was awfully pushy…or frantic, she needed some kind of help. “What’s the big deal? I just got here, and I didn’t even get an in-flight movie or dinner. But then again, I already ate, so-” ‘Look, we can argue later, my life and yours are in danger, everypony in this castle-’ “Heh, everyone.” ‘What?’ “You mean everyone.” ‘Everyon-…Raise your left arm.’ I did as she asked, what could it hurt? The moment I lifted one of my mitts up, the voice in my head gasped loudly. ‘Oh my Celestia! You’re a human!’ “Aren’t you?” I quipped. ‘Me?! Human?! Hardly…oh hay, this is going to be impossible, I just know it. Oh why couldn’t I have gotten a damn cave troll?’ “If it’s a cave troll you want, then just wait a few days for my hair to grow back.” ‘Look, I don’t have time for this, I was hoping for something much tougher but you’ll have to do, mister…’ “Marv.” ‘Uh…Marv. Look, this castle is filled with guards, and they’re all very xenophobic, they will no doubt try to kill you on sight purely because of how you likely look-” A grin began to rise up on my face, now this was going to be fun “Is it my birthday already?” The voice quieted down, probably confused, or in shock or something ‘I-I don’t know. Look, I need you to get up here quickly and quietly, we don’t have much time before it’s too late.’ I reached into my coat (didn’t bother thinking where it came from, it was only now that I realized my clothes had somehow appeared on me) to pull out my smokes (which were also there for some reason) “What’s the rush darlin’? You trying to escape the boogeyman or something?” ‘My dad pretty much is the boogeyman, so yeah, you could say that. Listen, I will explain everything when you get to me, just-” All of a sudden I heard a new noise, there were these stairs in the room and I could hear the sound of a door opening, and then I heard something like a horse walking down the stairs. And when I looked up to the stairs, that was exactly what I saw coming at me, a green furred horse in armor, with nobody riding it and a weird contraption on its back that looked like a pair of wings mixed with some metal and a pair of carved blades that wouldn’t look out of place in an Aladdin film. “What the hay?!!” And it talked…something told me there was a good reason that girl was surprised to hear I was human. “Heh, what’s the matter kid, you see a vampire or something?” The horse didn’t respond to my lighthearted jab and instead ran towards me, I could see the blood and fire in his eyes even several feet away. Whoever that voice was, she was right, these guys would try to kill me. The horse charged down the stairs, snorting air fiercely, and while I’d never been in a bullfight, I could figure out how to handle this. As the horse charged at me, I sidestepped the creep at the last second, then grabbed him by the neck with both hands. “Alley-Oop!” I tossed the horse several feet away, intending to finish him off while he was dazed…problem was, the horse didn’t seem to agree with that idea. The little cretin suddenly twisted around in midair and flipped around so it was standing on its hind legs, not on four like before. The horse spread out a pair of wings, which were likely for balance, though judging by how well it handled its short trip through the air, somehow it was able to fly despite the fact those wings should have been longer. No sooner did it get on its hooves, the contraption on his back (which in hindsight was made purely with metal and folded up with its wings) activated and the pair of long, curved blades were pointed right at me. The horse charged right at me, intent on taking my head, but I decided to return the favor. I quickly threw a solid punch right to his face; I could feel his nose shatter easily as he crumpled to the floor, still breathing but not for long. I drew my foot up before he could react and hurriedly slammed it right down on his neck, shattering it instantly. The horse died quickly, he didn’t have any idea what he was getting into…funnily enough, I felt a little sorry for the guy, sure he was trying to kill me, but he was still a horse, and I always did prefer animals to people. Plus, the guy looked like he came outta some kinda girl’s cartoon, the sword carrying thingy didn’t but a fur that green was just mind-boggling…where the fuck was I? The voice in my head had been silent during the whole fight, likely in shock, and who could blame her? She finally spoke ‘Oh…my’ Another pause ‘You killed him without getting a scratch on you.’ “What’d you expect? You didn’t want me dead did you?” ‘No…I’m just surprised, but then again, humans have a knack for adapting to any environment.’ “That’s one way to put it.” ‘If you could kill one guard this easily…maybe I still have a chance.’ “At escape?” ‘H-how did you know that?’ “Didn’t need to…I wondered what you’d want a lug like me for, and if you wanted just a killer, you’d have gotten somebody much better than me.” ‘Huh…you’re smarter than I thought.’ “Well thinking ain’t my strong suit, but I can figure things out if I gotta.” ‘Regardless, we should get back to the task at hoof. Despite how well you performed, I don’t think you can fight everypony here with just your fists…rip out one of the blades, they’re sort of like the weapons used by Griffins and Diamond Dogs, swords I believe they’re called.’ “Griffins?” I chuckled “Where’ve I landed in? Narnia?” “If that’s a reference to some human story or religion, please quiet down and focus on the matter at hoof. Are you strong enough to remove the blade?” I reached down to the broken horse’s contraption, carefully taking hold of one of the swords, I snapped it right out. The blade was long and curved, and I’d snapped off most the arm, but I could see it was rather just a holder for an actual sword. Freeing the blade from its confines, I looked at the handle, for a bunch of horses, they knew how to carve things pretty well, though it was probably made by one of these griffins. The voice in my head returned, dryly remarking ‘When you’re done looking at the sword, check that guy’s pockets, he might have something of value inside. And since I have a suspicion getting out of this city alone is going to be a nightmare, we’ll need everything we can get, even if it’s just pocket change.’ I’d have made a joke but I knew she was right, now I wasn’t scared of death, never have been but something smelled off about all this, and I had to stay alive long enough to figure out what. I rifled through the bag quickly, didn’t find much, just a key, a few dollar bills that didn’t look like any buck I’ve ever seen (probably the currency of this world or something), a journal, a small dagger, some kind of holy book…and a medium sized light blue bottle that looked like some kind of hootch container. I studied it, at the top there was a metal cap that looked like an ice cube and was shaped like a thermos, on the front there was a label, “Permafrost Oasis.” Damn strange name for a drink, but I haven’t had a brew since…well a little bit before my execution, but a drink’s a drink no matter how you slice it. The voice seemed to agree with me ‘Permafrost Oasis? Quick, drink that!’ “Now we’re talking” I removed the cap and pulled the thing up to my lips. It didn’t taste like any drink I’ve ever tasted, the hootch tasted like frozen raspberries mixed with pure ice, but I could feel like it had a Hell of a kick to it. I suddenly felt a large tremor coming over my very body, like a volcano about to erupt. I fell to the ground, coughing. Curiously, I lifted up one of my mitts and couldn’t believe my eyes, I saw my left mitt turning right into ice, confused I lifted up the right one and saw the same. Suddenly a burst of light filled the air, and when it went away, my mitts were back to normal. I’ve seen a lot of weird things in my time…but this beat all, was that real? Or did I do…something, to myself? ‘Interesting…so that thing actually does have empowering qualities.’ “You know what the Hell that was?” ‘If I didn’t know I’d have had you just hold onto it. That drink is Permafrost Oasis, one of the increasingly popular series of potions known as ‘Souldrives’, reportedly, those who drink them gain extraordinary powers…This one, I believe grants the ability to toss ‘ice grenades’ that shoot out freezing icicles and ice shrapnel when they explode.’ I’d dropped the bottle during this ‘trip’ or whatever the Hell you call it and looked at it “Heh, well I’ve had some cold brews in my time, but none of ‘em have anything on that. “You wouldn’t have guns or anything here would you? It’d probably be easier to get you outta here if I had something to blast faces apart with.” ‘Guns? The griffins have those loud things as well…my father received one of their ‘pistols’ as a gift from a griffin merchant he’s done business with. He keeps it mounted on the wall of a nearby dining room. There might also be some ammunition nearby as well.’ “Whoever your father is, he must be pretty stupid to leave a gun and ammunition out like that.” ‘Unicorns aren’t too commonplace here, nor are really any other species with opposable thumbs. They’re more common elsewhere in Saddle Arabia, but not in this city.’ “Funny. Why’s that?” ‘Long story. Let’s just say my father doesn’t too much approve of non-ponies’ “I gathered…what about the guards?” ‘Most of them are busy outside the palace making sure I can’t escape. My father has about…two dozen guards around here to keep any would be assassins from endangering the special guests he has, and to keep me from roaming about the building. They’re mostly around the upper levels, at best I’d guess about a dozen or two down near where you are, but they’ll be scattered.’ “Well that’s a damn shame, I could handle them all as a whole frigging squad.” ‘A brave colt, huh? Well don’t be too cocky, these men are highly trained killers.’ “You’d be surprised how many ‘highly trained killers’ I’ve killed.” ‘Fair point. Now the dining room is nearby the basement, there’s a hallway just outside of the door and just down it you’ll find a grand dining room, where the gun is held. There might be guards in the hall, so be careful.’ I stretched my arms and began to walk up to the stairs “Baby, I’m an ox in human flesh when I’m not sticking a hatchet in a hitman’s neck. But I can be careful when I need to.” ‘And when you aren’t?’ “If I’m not…then your father’s gonna need a new house.” The voice quieted down, no doubt so I could be left to my work. Nice enough of her, I needed to focus on the task at hand anyway. Creeping up the stairs silently, I cracked the door open and looked into the hall. Down the hall I could see two other guards talking, but I could hear the sound of another horse clopping down through the hall, outside of my range of sight. I didn’t hear any noise made to alarm the others, so either he didn’t notice or he just thought another guard had opened it up. The guards must have been crazier than some of the freaks in Basin City, but that was something to think about later. Normally I would wait to figure out whether or not a guy deserved to die before killing him, but given that one of them just tried to kill me as soon as he saw me… “Yep” I muttered, “They probably have it coming.” I waited until the horse was right in front of me, and just as he went past me… “Get over here” I hissed, grabbing the startled guard and pulling him in. The weight of the horse wasn’t that much greater than a human’s, and pulling him in…not a hard feat at all. Before the horse could scream out for help, I placed a hand around its mouth and used my sword to slit its throat. The horse struggled and kicked for a half-minute, but soon enough he died, and when he did, I removed my hand and let him slide down the stairs. As the horse quietly slid down to the floor, I walked right back up to the door and opened it up a crack. I might have been a little noticed when I dragged that horse in; the other two guards had suspicious looks on their muzzles and were carefully trotting right towards this door. I had to take them out quick, before they had a chance to get out a cry for help. “Hey lady” I whispered “How the hell do I use this…ice thingy?” ‘I’ve never used it myself, but I think you just need to concentrate on it, it’s supposed to come right out of your left forehoof.’ Considering the positioning of the limb in that statement, that would mean it came right out of my left hand, I focused hard in my brain, trying to bring it right out…and much to my surprise, I could feel it work. I looked down at my left hand and noticed it looked like it was frostbitten, but it felt like it was…natural. Like just another piece of flesh. The guards were right at the door now, I decided to give them a little surprise, bet they never saw this coming. I burst right out of the door “How you boys doin’?” I asked them, quickly pitching a surprisingly big iceball right outta my hand. The ball landed right between them and exploded in a white flash and a blast of ice that froze the two of them in a layer of what looked like thick ice, but left me completely untouched. “Heh, never killed a goddamn ice sculpture before.” I walked right up to them, balling up my right mitt in a solid fist, then drawing it up and delivering a punch to the one on the right so hard it shattered him, bits of ice and frozen horse corpse flying everywhere. The other horse was too frozen to speak, but I could see the terror in its eyes, but that didn’t stop me from drawing back my leg and delivering a solid kick that similarly smashed it apart. There was more noise this time and I could tell that somebody heard it. A cry of “What the hay was that?” came from a door down the hall, the same one that the voice said held the gun I was looking for. Suddenly, another guard walked right out of it, and when he saw the scene before him, his eyes grew huge. “Monster!” It yelled out, drawing to its hindlegs and rushing right at me. I tried to throw another icebomb, but the horse nimbly ducked under it, and the ball rolled to the end of the hallway, freezing up an open window. The horse had some moves, I’ll give him that, but he probably wasn’t walking on his hindlegs his whole life. And I’ve walked on them ever since I was old enough to stand. The horse charged towards me like a bull, with a drawn sword and a willingness to cut the everloving shit out of me. At the last minute, I quickly leapt right out of the way, the horse moving right past me, and giving me a perfect opportunity to end this. I quickly stabbed the guard right in the back, a short cry of pain rang out as I pierced his heart and killed him. The sucker dropped pretty quick afterwards, but I’m sure somebody might have heard that. Remembering what the voice said, I quickly rifled through his pockets, didn’t find much but a few coins and some sort of small clockwork figure, decided to pocket it in case this voice in my head could find a use for it. I pulled the sword right out of his carcass and ran back down the hall to the room where the gun was held. I burst open through the doors with my bloodstained sword in hand, inside I saw about three of those guard horses, and a female horse who looked like a scullery maid. The guards looked pretty startled, and the maid trotted off through another door screaming bloody murder. But on the wall opposite me lay the gun and its lead slugs, and all that currently stood between me and it were three sword wielding horses and one long table. ‘You sure you can handle that?’ the voice said, returning to me. “Heh, babe, this is just an appetizer.” One of the horses quickly charged off at me with fire in its eyes, gotta give the kid credit for the balls he’d need to do something like that. I waited until he was within striking distance to make my move, quickly rising up the sword to parry a blow that could have easily taken my head, then taking advantage of his disorientation by delivering a solid blow to his face. “Don’t go to sleep on me know” I taunted, quickly grabbing the horse’s neck “I haven’t even finished yet.” I threw the horse down to the ground and quickly smashed my foot down on his neck, breaking it. The other horses decided to take the initiative and charge me as well, coming from opposite sides of the table. I pulled my right arm back and I hurled my sword like a boomerang at the guy on the left, completely severing his left wing, contraption and all. “Aiieeee!” A screech of pure pain came from the winged horse as my blade impaled itself on the door the maid fled through and he tumbled to the ground, the horse on the right wavered a bit in his charge, which was a very stupid move on his part. I swiftly leapt onto the table and charged towards him, and when I got in range of him… “Goal!” I punted him right in his Goddamn snout, the horse flipped right onto the ground and landed flat on his back. Not giving him a chance to recover, I leapt down to him and took hold of his own swords before I ripped them clean out of the contraption. Then I swiftly plunged them right into his chest, killing him in an instant. Getting up from the cadaver, I quickly ran to the gun, it looked a lot like a revolver that was made over a damn century ago. It also was placed behind glass and shared that glass with two boxes of bullets that contained roughly twenty shells each in them. Drawing my fist back I shattered the glass and grabbed the gun and the shells. Whipping it open, it seems this joker was really cocky here; he didn’t remove any bullets from the spinner at all. “What a jackass.” I turned around and walked over to the guard who was currently missing a wing “Trust me pal, I’m doing you a favor” I said just before shooting him point blank in the head. I moved back to the door and pulled out my sword, this was beginning to become one Hell of a day. I wonder now…what else was going on here? “Halt monster!” Rang out a new voice. I turned around again and saw about ten angry looking guards storming right into the room. It was like one man fighting an army…but then again, I’ve been outnumbered most of the time anyways, so this didn’t bother me at all. With the gun in my left hand and the sword in my right, I smirked right at them “Now didn’t your mommies teach you it’s rude to gang up on people?”
Mawa used the link she’d formed with the human to continue monitoring his progress. He’d torn through the guards who’d went into the kitchen to check out the noise pretty quickly, she was disturbed at how easily he did it but she couldn’t argue with the results, he would be getting to her in no time and she’d be free as a bird. But in this case, it seems like she’d thought too soon, as she could hear the tramping of a massive amount of hooves coming right up the staircase. She gulped; she might need to give Marv a heads up…
*Marv’s POV*
I didn’t know whether or not I’d died on Earth but regardless of what really happened…I was having a Hell of a time. I generally don’t go for killing animals unless I got no option, but given that not only were these horses trying to kill me but were obviously sentient and didn’t seem to find a problem with ripping my head off. So yeah, I was enjoying making these guys into hamburger meat. I’d fought my way right out of the dining room, and went right into some kind of great hall with a staircase, and I was facing off against four of the horse guards with my sword, icy mitt…and my other mitt, couldn’t use the gun just yet, had to find more ammo. There were two on my right, one on my left, and the last one was right behind me. They were especially determined to see me dead and were a bit scared. Already killing about twenty other guys and leaving them to rot on the ground might have had something to do with it. A smirk grew on my face, they think that’s something? This is just a light workout. “Well?” I said “Are you gonna try something already or are you planning to waste my time with the thousand yard stares?” That set them off, the horse on my right and the horse behind me attempted to charge me with those wing contraptions. I quickly stepped to the side of the one behind me, grabbed his neck and in a swift motion, hurled him right into the path of the other horse…and his sword. The blade laden horse was shocked to see his buddy impaled on his own sword, so shocked he didn’t even get up to react before I swiftly beheaded him. The other two were even stupider as they just tried to charge on me, they didn’t think that maybe this job wasn’t worth the trouble of going up against me. Not like I minded, I love a good fight. As the horses ran right for me, I quickly used my reflexes to parry the blow of one sword while punching the other horse right in the snout. I let go of my own sword after parrying the blow and grabbed the heads of both the guards, smashing them together like a hammer on an anvil. “Bet that’s gotta be a hell of a headache” I quipped as they fell right to the ground, I couldn’t have put out the lights better if I’d smashed a lamp onto the ground. I suddenly heard the voice again ‘Marv, there’s a problem.’ “You say problem, I say all you can eat buffet.” ‘Cute, but put your psychotic tendencies on hold for now. I think my father suspects I have something to do with you, he’s put most of the remaining guards on the stairs, and they’ve blocked them up. And it’s the only real way up to the tower he’s locked me up in.’ “Well what the Hell you want me to do with it? Invite them to Old Town?” ‘Old Town? If that’s some kind of human night club-’ “Well that’s one way to put it.” ‘-spare me the references. I still need to get out of here, and though you’ve handled yourself very well so far, you wouldn’t be able to stand up to these killers, not with the numbers they have. I need you to sneak up here and break me out.’ “Well how hard could that be?” ‘Damned impossible if you were a pony, but you humans are supposed to have thumbs like a griffin, so maybe you could do what would be too hard for just a pony to do. Head to the second floor, I believe there’s some rope in one of the closets there.’ “And just what’s the rope for? Bondage?” ‘You’ll see.’ The voice cut out, and I was alone again, I had to get up there eventually. I had to give these guys credit for trying to kill me, but seriously, locking a girl who was some kind of princess up in a tower? How cliché can you get? I began to walk towards my destination, moving carefully but firmly as I made my way up the stairs. There was a hallway that was mostly empty, there might have been a few horses behind doors but I could clearly hear two horses having sex in some room. They were keeping themselves busy for me, lucky break. With my eyesight, it was easy to find the closet the voice had told me about, there was a decently sized number of cleaning supplies and a surprisingly large amount of rope. “What the hell is rope doing in here?” ‘It’s for the gallows in the backyard. We go through a lot of it.’ “Horsehanging? From the look of all the swords around here I’d have thought your old man was more keen on chopping off heads.” ‘He’s a maniac, trust me on that.’ “Hey, I’m not going to complain. I didn’t even need the damn rope, I’ve scaled tougher buildings than this.” ‘You haven’t been outside of it yet and even if you were sure, I’d still need you to use the rope, you’re my only way out of here and I’m not taking any chances.’ “If you say so toots, I’ll just-” “What was that?” said a female voice from one of the nearby rooms, the same room I’d heard sex coming from earlier. “Hold your tongue woman” a gruff sounding male voice grumbled “I’ll see what’s there.” Two doors down, a horse came out of the room, he looked very much like a guard, but he didn’t have any armor or weapons on. His loss, I came prepared. I hurled my sword right into his leg, the guard let out a cry of pain and I heard the woman gasp inside the room. A chuckle came out of my throat as I menacingly advanced towards the stallion who was doing a very poor job. “Hey bub, you do realize how bad this’ll look on your resume right?” The horse tried to get up in order to run off, but I was quick enough to grab him by the neck and toss him into the room. It looked a bit like a guest bedroom, and in side was the guard’s armor, contraption…and a quivering female horse with peach colored fur who was attempting to hide behind the bed where she and the jackass were screwing, judging by the servant outfit I found on the ground, she was one of the maids or something. After throwing this mook in, I felt like his teeth needed some loosening. My foot solved that. As the colt coughed up some molars and forcibly went to sleep I looked the woman right in the eyes. “You’ll probably want to clean this up.” The mare screamed and galloped past me in a panic, sure there were a bunch of horses trying to kill me, but I still don’t hit women, and she’d probably get killed if she didn’t move it, the guard wouldn’t be so lucky…but I couldn’t give a fuck. I’d wasted enough time; it was time to get back to business. “Alright voice, just what the Hell am I going to do with this rope?” ‘At the end of the hallway, there’s another room with a balcony, on the outside wall there’s several other balconies…including one just outside my tower.’ “So I use this rope to climb up the building’s walls.” ‘Exactly, now if you gather some of the swords from ponies you’ve already killed and/or maimed, you can tie them together to create a grappling hook, it’s not a perfect solution, but I can walk you through-’ I laughed, this wasn’t the first time I had to build something like this on the fly. “Relax kid, I know how to do this, I’ll get to work now.” I got the swords I needed and managed to make the hook in about four minutes, a bit longer than I’d hoped but who knows when some other guards would show up. I took a look at it, the damn thing was uglier than me, but it held together and that was more important. Moving over to the door the voice mentioned, I carefully snuck out onto the balcony, and was a bit surprised at what I saw. Outside this building, I saw a courtyard that was all set up for some very lavish wedding, the sort of thing fit for a king. Suddenly some things began to make sense; this whole place looked just like some twisted ‘Arabian Nights’ story, her father running a place this big… “Arranged marriage” I muttered aloud. ‘What?’ the voice replied, in a tone that implied she was suddenly quite scared. “Your father is trying to put you into an arranged marriage isn’t he? That’s why you’re trying to escape.” ‘I- he…Oh Celestia. Look-’ “No need to explain yourself…I’m still coming to break you out.” ‘…You are?’ “My city is an absolute shithole, and that’s on a good day, why do you think I’ve turned out the way I did? “Back when I was there, I was just a local thug, but I had a bit more scruples than most of the losers in my town, I even helped people out by…dealing with problems.” ‘In a violent way?’ “Like you wouldn’t believe, I especially hate it when people hurt children and women, and with a few exceptions, I don’t hit women.” ‘What exceptions are you talking about?’ “Once there was this girl who was helping me avenge the death of someone I cared about, who also was her sister. “But before I killed the asshole who murdered my Goldie, I knocked her sister out…what I was about to do the killer was so horrific she’d get nightmares for life. “The other time was when this broad was running a child prostitution ring…she wasn’t a woman anymore, she might have had breasts, but she was so evil she deserved to be killed anyway. “You’re acting like this is the end of your life, and I don’t like the idea of this arranged marriage, your hatred of the idea just screams of sex slavery. Is your father trying to make you marry an older horse?” ‘No, the king’s son is about my age…but I’d sooner die than marry him, he’s like the prince from ‘A Whinny of Fire and Ice’, he’s a sadistic bastard who is extremely misogynistic, racist, and homophobic. My father would kill to have connections with the king, and I’m his only child.’ Genocidal, ridiculously xenophobic, and willing to force his daughter to marry an absolute asshole like this…I couldn’t wait for a chance to rip this fucker’s throat open. “Don’t you worry none, I’ll be up there soon…I guess the balcony on the top of the wall is yours?” ‘I-it is.’ “Alright, I’ll be there in a minute…oh and kid, talking with you’d be easier if I knew your name. You got one?” ‘It’s Mawa…Mawa Sihr.’ “Right, I’ll see you in a bit.” The voice of Mawa left my head; I needed to concentrate about scaling this wall after all. There were six floors above me, all but one of them, the Seventh floor, just below the final balcony that led to Mawa. I was about to throw the hook and start my climb, when Mawa’s voice returned ‘Uh, there’s just one more thing Marv, my room is on the sixth floor, accessible by the balcony. I have some emergency supplies, a few reference books and an atlas. If we’re going to escape this country, or even the city, we’ll need them.’ “None of these supplies are makeup are they?” ‘What?! Don’t be ridiculous, what use would makeup be in an escape like this? I mean food I’d been storing from past attempts, a carrying bag, some clothes, stuff like that.’ “Just checking.” Mawa’s voice quit talking, and I was free to focus on my work again. I took a look right up to the other balconies and carefully tossed the hook up to the third balcony. The climbing wasn’t too hard, not the first time I’ve scaled a building, I generally didn’t use ropes for it but this wasn’t too hard at all. I moved up quickly but careful enough to try and keep myself from getting attention drawn to me, there was a Goddamn party down below and I was dead meat if they saw me. The rope gave me access to the third balcony, I threw it up pretty good but when I got off, I couldn’t waste time. My next throw put it right at the fifth balcony, right where the horse-girl wanted me to go. I’d gotten into the rhythm of this, making this climb took even less time; I knew this thing wouldn’t just fall apart now, and I wasn’t going to stop at this point. As soon as I lifted myself right over the edge, Mawa’s voice returned “Alright, now open the door, it shouldn’t be unlocked.” The balcony looked like some sorta patio, and there was a glass door leading into Mawa’s bathroom, I tried the doorknob…and found it was locked. “I don’t know what horses think ‘unlocked’ means, but this door doesn’t want me coming in.” ‘Crap’ Mawa grumbled ‘My father is even more paranoid than I thought, I’m afraid you’ll have to wait for me then, I could probably get in there with little-’ “No problem” I cut her off “I know my way around a lock.” ‘No!’ she hurriedly said ‘The lock is magic, my father had every lock here be magically affected, and you really can’t crack it without the key, a skeleton key or a lock-picking spell. I know one, and I can do it when I’m down there.’ I muttered something foul under my breath, once I had Mawa things would probably get fucked up so badly the whole scheme would turn into the biggest game of chase ever, with the stakes being our lives. Smashing that door would be easy, but even I knew that this’d be so loud I might as well have painted myself in white paint and yelled at the top of my lungs. Everybody would know I was there. However, since this was a doorknob, and I could clearly see where the screws were, I knew just how to handle this. “Does magic affect the doorknob itself? It’s just unable to be unlocked without the key, right?” ‘Uh, yeah. Why do you ask?’ “Well, there’s always a way to get around this kind of problem…and while this tree is pretty big, it’ll make a nice screwdriver.’ Carefully, I began to turn the sword so I could get one of the screws out, I’d slipped a couple of times but very soon, I removed it. ‘That…that’s amazing’ Mawa commented in an amazed tone ‘Why the hay didn’t I think about that?’ “Don’t let it bother you. I had to figure out something to get this lock broke, struck me that the screws would be more interested in moving away.” After the first screw fell out, removing the others were easyand as the doorknob fell, the lock was right in front of me. “Almost done” I said to reassure Mawa, I thrust the sword right into the lock to smash the lock, crushing it quickly and breaking out the other doorknob. I stuck my fingers through it and forced the door open. The bedroom looked fancy but not overtly so, with a large bed, a table, and a chair, there didn’t seem to be too much in it though, but I did see a dish used to eat off of. “Alright, where’s the emergency goods?” ‘My emergency supplies are hidden in the floor; go to the right of my bed, there’s some carpet that’ll feel hollow and if you feel around it, there should be a crack. When you find it, carefully remove the cover.” I moved over to the carpet and found the panel of floor easily. Lifting it out of the ground, I saw a black duel-backpack that looked like it’d fit a horse well enough, even if it’d just be awkward on a human, right beside a book that looked very much like a magic spellbook and another book entitled “Saddle Arabian Atlas.” ‘That’s it!” Mawa exclaimed ‘Grab them and get up here, I can hear music down in the courtyard…I think they want to start the marriage.’ “Not on my watch…you got anything in that room?” ‘Not much, but I have a dresser and a few tables.’ “Good, barricade the door with those, that should slow them down just a little, maybe not long enough to cover our whole escape, but part of it at least.” ‘Got it.’ As Mawa’s voice cut out again, I ran to the balcony and grabbed the grappling hook. My throw was still accurate, if a bit rushed. I couldn’t afford to take my time now. When I got over the balcony, I looked right into another glass door and saw what I knew was Mawa. I’d previously seen talking horses and a whole bunch of winged horses…but never once did I ever consider I’d run into a frigging unicorn. She had a tan coat of fur with a black mane, on her left flank I could see some kinda portal with a human hand sticking out of it, a tattoo maybe? I didn’t know. She also was wearing some sort of wedding dress built for horses, a damned expensive one too. She was standing in the center of the room with a tan glow coming right from the horn on her head, and the very things she described were being moved right to the door, like some kinda telekinesis. As she finished, she turned around and gasped when she saw me, a smirk rose on my lips, was she expecting some kind of knight in shining armor? The surprise didn’t last long though, her snout soon turned into a look of relief and slight irritation. There was a tanish glow around the handles for the door and it opened up for me, the unicorn then trotted over to me “Finally” she spoke, actually speaking to me with her actual voice instead of a voice in my head “Had to wait until the last minute to get here, huh?” “Well I’d have taken the elevator, but it was out of order.” The clothes the unicorn wore began to glow “As much as I’d prefer to banter” Mawa began “We have to get out of here, watch the door while I get this off.” I looked at her questionably “Look, I’m no local, but are you sure it’s a good idea to go around naked?” She chuckled as the dress came off “I’m a pony” she said “Going around naked isn’t exactly a taboo like it is among goblins.” She had a point, what use would horses have for clothes anyway? “Besides” she continued “If I keep this on it’ll be harder to get around, plus it’d draw too much attention when we go out the window.” Soon she’d removed her dress and was moving towards me “Alright, now hand me the pack, I’ll need to-” Suddenly I heard a knock at the door “Mawa you bitch!” Roared the voice of an old Arabian guy “Get out here! I know you summoned the monster wreaking havoc in my castle! Do you know how bad this is?!” Mawa had began to growl and a snarl was present on her face, I put a mitt on her snout “Cool it, just put the pack on, I’ll handle this.” The horse begrudgingly nodded and started to put it on, while I turned right to the door and said… “Hey geezer! I might be scarred up more than a Yankees fan in Jersey, but I still got feelings!” There was silence behind the door for a minute before the voice returned “It’s in there! Kill him!” Suddenly the door began to get smashed with something heavy, it didn’t break immediately, but it wouldn’t stay that way for long. I turned to Mawa “Alright kid, I think we’ve loitered around here long enough. How are we going to escape?” The unicorn gulped as she saw the door begin to bulge “There’s a way out in the basement, I’ve never used it to try and escape but I know it leads into the sewers, and if we use it, we can get out.” “Same basement I was in?” “Uh, yeah.” “Well that’s convenient” I quickly grabbed the kid underneath one of my arms “What the Hay?!” She yelled “Why’re you doing this?!” “Sorry, but if we try to shimmy down the rope, they’ll catch up to us too quick. So if we’re going to escape…” I quickly ran over to the rope, unicorn in hand as I grabbed the rope “We’re going to have to pull a Tarzan.” “What’s a Tarzaaaaaaan?!” The unicorn screamed out as I quickly swung out from the balcony with the rope. “Hang on kid; I’ve only got one shot at this!” Swinging like one of those pendulum things my old pal Dwight kept in his office, I used the momentum to swing the two of us through the air and onto the fifth balcony. The Unicorn sighed with relief as I landed…right before I leapt off and aimed for the fourth floor balcony. Setting the horse down quickly, I drew my sword and smashed the glass door and demolished it. I quickly turned to the unicorn as I put the sword away and pulled out my gun “Kid. You want your freedom right?” “More than you could ever imagine.” “Then run, run like Hell!” We bolted right through the door like a pair of missiles, the actual door out of the bedroom getting reduced to a bunch of toothpicks when my foot smashed it open. I could see a clear shot to the stairway right in front, the broken door didn’t faze me at all, and both of us continued sprinting. I could also hear the distant sound of an assload of hooves trampling down the stairs…and a pair of hooves coming up the stairs. The pair of Pegasus guards who showed up from the stairs were about to charge us, but when I raised my gun, the thunderclap of a gunshot rang twice and they fell over dead. “C’mon. Unless you know some magic that can turn air into bullets, I won’t have enough for everybody!” Mawa was about to say something but I could tell she’d had a change of mind after deciding to just concentrate on running. Smart move. We ran down the stairs as quick as we could, making it to the ground floor fast. Only way we could have done it even faster is if we jumped out of the window. It took even less time to make it back to the door to the basement. As soon as we entered, the unicorn quickly gestured to the door, immensely worried. “Freeze the door! I have to find the entrance.” Turning back to the door, I could hear the loud clopping of what sounded like a thousand hooves. I hurled an icebomb at the door, concentrating on freezing it up. I managed to barricade it with what looked like an iceberg…after the seventh try, I just couldn’t hurl them right. As I turned I saw Mawa was standing right next to a round metal door with a valve on it, the sign above it said ‘Sewer’, there were several boxes around her, which she probably moved, and were keeping me from seeing it earlier. “Come on!” She yelled out “I still don’t know a matter creation spell.” I didn’t know what she meant by that, but I knew I couldn’t hold the rest of these guys off, however fun trying to kill ‘em all would have been, Mawa’d end up as a Goddamn sex slave. I ran over to the door, ducking in like a weasel trying to break into a henhouse. The tunnel barely had enough room for the two of us, but we could fit in well enough. When I got in, Mawa used her magic to make the door close. As it closed, a beam of heat came out of her horn and welded it shut. She let out a sigh of relief “Oh thank Celestia…we might actually make it, they won’t be able to follow us through this.” “Worst guards I’ve ever killed.” “Well to be fair it’ll be more like they’ll just try to send ponies into the sewers to find us, but hopefully we can leave them before we go. “Now we can talk more later, but if we stay here too long, we’re dead.” She had a point, we’ve escaped for now, but we still had a city to get the Hell out of…but that wouldn’t be too hard. “Alright then Mawa…you lead the way.”
Mawa couldn’t believe it, after years of captivity, she was finally free! She was trapped up in a sewer but she was still free. “Hallelujah! I might finally be able to leave!” “Never got this far, huh?” said her human stallionservant (well that’s one thing to call him), trudging along behind her at a moderate pace. She shot a look behind to him that had a bit of a glare “No, no I haven’t.” When she first saw him, she was quite surprised to see the ridiculous amount of scars on his face, which made him look like some old warrior who had waged war for years, he looked quite ugly and a bit scary but given that her escape was possible only due to his own homicidal tendencies, and the fact the guards were provoking him to kill as many of them as he could…she didn’t care. The human shrugged “Well I didn’t know. Anyways, how much longer are we going to walk this way?” Mawa stopped “Hang on” she said “There’s a map of the city somewhere in the atlas.” The unicorn lifted the atlas out of her satchel with her telekinesis: as her horn lit up, Marv whistled “Hey, you wouldn’t have any spells that summoned a cold one do you?” Mawa was trying to read the book but halted as Marv confused her “A…cold one?” “You know, a beer.” “Oh, those? My father doesn’t exactly like those, so he kinda…outlawed them.” The human groaned “What a waste. What about bootleggers though? They’ve gotta make them.” Mawa’s eyebrow rose in curiosity as she continued to flip through the book’s pages “How’d you know about the illegal liquor business?” “Same thing happened in my country in the 20s, when some yahoos made it illegal to sell alcohol, criminals saw an opportunity to make money by making the booze anyway and selling it to whoever wanted it.” “Wow. How much money was in the business anyway?” “A lot, my friend Dwight knew more about it, but given the amount of people who died in gang wars…” Mawa turned back to the book, her eyes a bit wider “Good to know.” As she looked at the atlas, she’d finally found the page she was looking for, and now knew how far to go. “Alright, I’d like to have us move around until I’ve gotten to the outside of the walls, but we have to get some extra supplies first, we’re surrounded by a desert.” “Yeah, the accents kinda gave that away.” “We also need to get out soon before somepony finds us, if the guards cut off every possible exit, we won’t make it, so getting above ground before they’ve done this is essential.” “Better not do it too close to the palace though. They’d find us too soon.” “…Good point. Sorry, I’m just so excited about finally getting out of there, I-” “Relax kid. We’re not out of this shithole yet.” “Don’t talk to me like that…pretty much any other attempt I’ve made to escape has been an exercise in failure.” “Hard to see how you can do that, failing ain’t exactly a skill anyone’ll try to practice.” Mawa groaned “Are you always like this?” “Yep.”
MARV’S POV
I sniffed the air, it smelled like shit…but since we were in the sewer, even I knew that’d be inevitable, but strangely enough it was almost comforting…the smell reminded me of home. Before me was trotting a Unicorn who wanted me to help her to escape her tyrannical father and prevent an arranged marriage between her and an absolute asshole. She was focusing on the path ahead of her, no doubt trying to figure out where to go next. We had to go find supplies but needed to find a way to get them without anyone catching us, I’d killed two dozen of those maniacs easily, but a whole city full of them was a different story altogether. I’d gotten this weird Souldrive, a gun, and a sword strong enough to hack a horse’s head off in one swing, there was also my own strength and fighting skills to add to the mix. I was well armed, but I didn’t think I could take a whole army on. As I began to try and think of what to ask, about what kind of world I was in, I suddenly stepped on something hard. Looking down I noticed a small flier of some kind, it was pretty much unreadable, drenched with so much water the ink had just dried away and was smudging up the whole thing. It also looked pretty soggy, but there just seemed to be something funny about it. Reaching down, I lifted off the flier and noticed a small clockwork statue that had the likeness of some horse that was in authority, or at least it seemed like that. I could notice that his eyes were foul and harsh, as if he was permanently glaring; he had a long beard and wore a robe over his head. The statue looked like it was on top of a tiny pedestal with a keyhole and some small holes that looked like they were speakers. I studied the statue, what exactly was this? It didn’t look like anything valuable was inside, and yet it felt pretty solid and hard to open. Mawa had moved about ten feet away and realized that I wasn’t following “Hey Marv, could you hurry along…” Her voice trailed off as she noticed what I was doing. The unicorn clopped her hooves as she approached to get a look at the statue I held, she examined it for a moment, only to recoil with realization. “You know what this is?” I asked her. “That’s a Secret Holder, one of my father’s!” My eyes widened a bit and took another look at the statue, or ‘Secret Holder’ as Mawa called it. I could see a genuine likeness between the two. “And just what’s this supposed to be?” “A Secret Holder is a clockwork device, supposedly based after some statues made by a brilliant inventor thousands of years ago. They’re widely used by ponies all over Saddle Arabia to record voices as a sort of diary. Though due to their limited size, most ponies buy multiple ones.” “And the lock‘s here to keep people from the diary” I remarked to myself. “Correct, and don’t bother trying to un-” I ignored the horse and reached in my pockets, I kept a lockpick on hand just for situations where I needed to break into a joint. I was pretty good at it too, there were better lockpickers in Sin City but when I need to I’m very good at the work. I sat down and inserted the pick, concentrating on the job; it should have been quick, but somehow…I couldn’t even turn it. “Son of a bitch” I muttered, was this really a lock? It felt more like some kind of sculpture, it might as well have been painted on. “Uh, Marv” Mawa interrupted, looking right over my shoulder and at the statue “That isn’t going to work.” “You’re telling me. You sure these things are held by locks?” “No, I mean the locks are magic. Lockpicking won’t do any good.” I blinked, magic locks? That was a new one “Damn…what does open this thing then?” “Well, most ponies can just get magic keys that work specifically for them, and my father carries the only key for his Secret Holders, or…” Her horn glowed again, and I watched her focus on the lock and make it click open “You can learn a lockpicking spell like this one.” I had to admit I was impressed with this “If you know spells like that, why would you still be captive?” “There were some servants who were a bit more…sympathetic; to my plight I requested some magic books so I could try to learn more about magic, one of the books contained a lockpicking spell by pure chance.” “Huh, so your Dad wasn’t too keen about you learning magic, huh?” “Nah, he wanted me to learn a couple of spells but those were supposed to be used as a way to make me more desirable to stallions.” “Such as?” “Well, I don’t think I need to tell you the purpose of a penis enlarging spell, or a spell meant to increase the size of my flank…” I cringed “Alright, I get the picture.” “And thank you too; I really don’t like focusing on this stuff.” She turned back to the statue “Ah, it’s finally open now let’s see what it says.” I looked back to the statue, and its mouth began to move, with a tinny version of her father’s Arabic sounding voice. “This is impossible. How can I create a pure Saddle Arabia if the other noblestallions will actually let these…filthy creatures into their cities? I can’t understand it at all, Griffins and Diamond Dogs are nothing but freaks. “Yes they refused my proposal again, they wouldn’t hear a word of trying to purge all of the…impure creatures from Saddle Arabia, all because they want the revenue they bring. “But I won’t stop; somepony has to end these mongrels before it’s too late. I will have a pure world! I will purge this dissidents befo-” It suddenly cut off “Huh” Mawa remarked “I think he got too short of a reel. His rants generally tend to be longer than that.” I looked back at the secret holder; I was dealing with some real whackos this time. Reminded me a bit too much of Nazis. And if I was right, I think I realized just why there were just ponies here. “Your father…what did he do to all the non-horses?” Mawa sighed “He had them all murdered. And those he didn’t murder fled the province. “About ten years ago he started up on some sort of ‘religious crusade’, he brought most his citizens into this fervor as well, and they joined in.” She shuddered in horror as she remembered hearing about the event, it was pretty clear that she didn’t share her father’s views. She continued after getting over it “After this, he banned the other races from entering. Because he was the ruler here, he was able to get away with it, and the other noblecolts can’t do anything about it because this province is a tad influential due to the presence of a large gold mine and the fact that it’s also essential to several shipping routes. They literally can’t do anything to stop him and as long as he keeps this business within the province, they won’t interfere with him.” “But he wants to perform ‘aggressive expansion’ doesn’t he?” “Not exactly, he wishes to get the rest of Saddle Arabia to follow his murderous creed, but so far he hasn’t gotten any of the nobles to agree with him on it. “It hasn’t stopped him from attacking other countries though. A decade ago in the country of Equestria there was a terrorist attack done on the city of Manehattan, a pair of Pegasi with bombs strapped all over themselves just flew right into a pair of skyscrapers, killing dozens of ponies. This country’s views on…just about everything, are much more progressive than Saddle Arabia’s and the terrorists responsible for it came from here. “The ruler of Equestria, Princess Celestia, was going to have a military force go into there and grab the mastermind behind the attack, Sandstorm Blazesoul, and his organization, but shortly after the attack, he was reportedly killed trying to sneak over the border into this province. “But he wasn’t killed. My father was, unfortunately enough, sympathetic to his cause and had his death faked, even using a skilled unicorn to make the fake corpse look real. “I saw him only once, but I could tell that he was just as evil and foul as my father. I’d heard a little about what he was doing, and didn’t think much of it at the time. But a servant once showed me a newspaper from Equestria that a friend had smuggled in for her, and I realized just what kind of a pony my father truly was. “To make matters worse, when my father made Sandstorm a new identity, he set him up as one of the main religious leaders in this city. He even wanted him to preside over my wedding!” My own eyes widened, I remembered something about the courtyard. At the spot where I saw what was definitely the altar, I saw (in addition to the prince she mentioned) a horse in robes who looked an awful lot like Osama Bin Laden. “Holy shit” I muttered “They have him here too.” “Who?” she asked, wondering what I was talking about. I stopped moving and explained the events of 9/11 to her, and how it was very similar to what she just described here, when I got to the real reason America invaded, she scoffed in disgust. “So their countrymen die, and your country responds by using this to invade your…Middle East? What the hay kind of world do you live in?” “A bad one. And trust me, that cowboy was nothing compared to the people running my hometown.” “Why? What happened there?” “That’s a story too long to tell. Let’s just say that as bad as your country is, my city has much worse government. It’s corrupt to the core, has been for years. All because of the Goddamn Roark family.” “Are they the reigning nobles?” “Not really but I guess you could call them that, since I doubt you have a democracy anywhere on this mudball.” “Well Equestria’s got a democratic system for some of the smaller government bodies, like mayors and city governments.” “No president?” “Nah, they got a Princess though, she’s immortal too.” “Heh, would she lose it if her head got chopped off?” Mawa’s jaw dropped “Wh-why the the hay would you want that? Who’d raise the sun?” “Easy kid, it was just a joke, there was this movie on my world about immortals who were obsessed with cutting each others heads off. It was part of a weird game they had.” “That sounds…disturbing.” “It actually ain’t, not even as violent as my head on a Saturday night. Trust me on that.” “I can…what did you do back on your world?” “You saw what I did back there, right? What does that tell you?” “That you’re a violent stallion with some serious issues, were you some kind of hitcolt?” I growled a little, she didn’t call me a hitman but I could tell what she meant “No, no I’m not. But please don’t compare me to that scum. “I never really had a steady job, been walking my way through dozens of dozens of them all my life, never could hold one, except for one consistent one. “There was this bar, Katie’s, I was friends with the owner and she gave me a job as a bouncer, pay was enough to get by, and I was pretty good at it, because really, a big ugly lug like me” I pointed up at my scarred face “Looks real spooky, nobody’d ever fuck with someone like me unless they were real drunk or real stupid. “My reputation as a local bruiser helped too, I often helped my friends and neighbors out with problems brought on by the other scumbags in the city. I only kill people who I feel have it coming. Like these jackasses who were setting fire to homeless people, and then there’s my view on womanbeaters…” I stopped myself before I continued, if I continued going off on that, I’d be talking about stuff I really didn’t want Mawa to hear. “Let’s just say I’d prefer to keep my past to myself.” “And you can consider my curiosity satisfied…anyway, we have to get out of this sewer soon. We need to get supplies and find a way out.” I reached back into my pocket and pulled out a cigarette, along with my lighter, and began to light it up. “Well, I guess we’d better get to work…”