> Twilight, Mare of Power
>  by Banops
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Mother of Equestria
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Some say that the only real way to face the unknown is headfirst.

I couldn’t believe the magical power I felt emanating from the mare before me. I hadn’t seen this much raw magic energy since the same mare had exploded with it years ago. She had proven, even as a young pony, that she was a competent magical unicorn. The only problem was she didn’t know how to tap into this enormous basin of energy. Until now. 

All the fruits of our labors were about to be picked. I almost could taste the success. If we were to succeed, nopony would go hungry again, nopony would ever be in poverty again. Hell, even overpopulation could probably be considered a non-issue were it ever to be one. A way to clone time and space. Do you understand what that implies!? No lack of food, No shortage of anything… ever again. Everypony would be happy. 

And she was the key.

And I was the mistake.

***

Wait, let’s start at the beginning.

Stress, stress, and more stress. Being the Princess of the day has its perks, I make important decisions and I have control over everypony, but eventually even I, the most powerful being in all Equestria need to take breaks. Of course I never show the effects of stress, after all, I need to show my loyal subjects that I can handle anything (The whole Discord and Chrysalis fiascos were just complete flukes, or tests for my loyal subjects, which ever is easier to believe. I don’t need to defend myself.) It is important for me to serve as the mother figure my ponies so desperately need.

This week had been quite a busy one. Political tension between some of my fair cities had been heavy. And on top of that, I had agreed to co-lead a promising research project into some multi-dimensional magic, which had recently hit a dead end.

Through all of ponies needing my ear every damned second of the day, solving their petty disputes, and our research going nowhere, I had enough of it. I needed to get some fresh air. I took a walk through my fine city.

I was trotting by the school of magic when suddenly I heard an explosion in the distance, over near Cloudsdale. After seeing the rainbow colored ring expand outward covering the sky and sending a slight magical pulse shooting through everything, which I could feel at the tip of my horn, I heard a crashing noise come from the school of magic. I glanced over to see what looked like a purple and green dragon burst out of the roof of the school.

The rainbow ring hadn’t been what surprised me, no, I knew what that was. It was a sonic rainboom. It was impressive yes, there hadn’t been a pegasus capable of pulling off one of those in… well… a very long time, but I had seen it before, even studied them, learning that they could stimulate the horn of unicorns allowing for easy access to their magical reservoirs.

No, what caught my attention was that dragon. I knew what kind of tests they gave to the little fillies and colts in that school. Sometimes the teachers, or judges, would have them try and teleport themselves around the room, or hatch an egg of some random animal. These tests were impossible for the young ponies and were actually pretty difficult for most grown unicorns. They usually just passed who ever was taking the test anyway. It looks like they were doing the egg hatch test this time. And somepony actually completed it, not just hatching the egg but also growing it (apparently a wingless dragon) to a monstrous size.

In addition to the big dragon head shooting from the roof, bolts of raw magic shot out of the windows. Whoever was causing this was powerful…

My hopes raised, I may finally have another lead on my research, what luck. I check out the source of the energy.

The room wasn’t hard at all to find, all I had to do was follow the blinding pulses of light. The magic energy being sent through the air was phenomenal. I opened the door to the classroom dodging a bolt of magic that hurled towards me the second the door was open.

Looking into the room, my mouth went agape. In the center of the room there was a little purple filly barely old enough to take the magic school entrance exam. She was suspended in the air, magic coursing through her body, shooting out of her horn in many directions. She was the source of this unfiltered, untamed magic. I loathe to admit it, but she was potentially more powerful than even me.

She was young; she was powerful and full of potential.

She was perfect.

She was Twilight Sparkle.

I put on my famous motherly smile and went in the room.


Over the next few years, I taught my most faithful student, Twilight Sparkle. I even let myself grow attached to her (as a birthday gift, I gave her the dragon she’d hatched during her exam which I had been nurturing. She named the little dragon Spike and immediately made him her “number one assistant.”) She was a quick learner to say the least. It took her little time to learn spells that would take most unicorns years to perfect. Better yet, she had zealous passion for the learning. Not a moment went by when I could catch her doing anything besides studying. She really was the best apprentice a princess like me could ask for. And seeing her face every time I praised her for her talents was precious. 

Unfortunately she was never able to tap into her full potential like she had been the day I found her taking the exam.

Then my brilliant mind hatched another idea. The Elements of Harmony. There was one for magic wasn’t there? Possessing that power could be just what we, no, I needed to finish the multi-dimensional magic. And I could use somepony to help me take care of my sister, who was scheduled to return from her imprisonment in a few days. Luna, er, Nightmare Moon was NOT going to be happy when she returned. I would definitely need the help of a group of ponies to wield the elements. This way I could kill two birds with one stone.

And so I set my plan into motion, ordering twilight, who had already read about my sister’s return in some old book about legends, to move to Ponyville and make some friends.

***

Now back to the present.

What Twilight had learned over the years finally paid off. She was finally able to access her raw power via the EoM (Element of Magic.) It had taken two years for her to finally figure out how to properly use her element, especially when not in the presence of the other five elements.

I felt nothing but pride in my apprentice, and I was more than happy that she was here now unlocking the key to peace and perfection in all of Equestria.

So now before me hovered this Mare of untold power. This unmatchable sorceress, hadn’t even needed transportation to my Canterlot Laboratory. She simply teleported here, all the way from her library home in Ponyville.

She materialized in front of me. She got my message quickly, taking only minutes after I sent the letter through spike, which told her that I needed help right away, and to come to my magic lab in Canterlot.

“Whatever can I help you with Princess?” Spoke Twilight, she idolized me, I could see it in her expression. She had a blank smile on her face, almost like a mindless drone willing to go to the ends of the earth for me.

I dawned my motherly smile and replied “follow me, my faithful student, there is something I must show you.” She nodded her head and I led her to a large white walled test chamber located deep with in my research lab.

As we entered I saw her otherwise content expression change to awe. She had never seen this part of my lab before.

“This is where we discover new spells.” I tell her. “New magical abilities, ways to make everypony’s life easier. And” I add “this is where miracles happen.” She maintained her look of awe and wonder. She looked ready for anything. Then she turned towards me.

“How could I possibly help with that?” she asked me. After all these years she was still the most humble pony I had ever met. I seriously doubt that she fully understood the extent of her own magical prowess.

“Do you trust me, Twilight?”

She looked confused by that question, “Ummmm yes...”

“Do you trust me?” I repeated.

“Yes, of course I trust you, how could you even ask that ques…”

“Do you trust me?!”

“YES I TRUST YOU PRINCESS…”

“That’s three times you said you trust me.” She looked at me with her big studious eyes almost looking offended. She had no clue what was about to happen. And to some extent, neither did I. All I knew was that we would be helping out all pony kind.

“What we do here today, Twilight, will be the most important thing you or anypony could ever be a part of.”

I took her to the center of the chamber. There sat a metal chair where I sat twilight down.

She remained silent while I strapped her into the chair. I ran my hoof through her mane. “I am so proud of you, please know that.” A tear welled up in my eye, I really was proud of her. I was proud of her like a mother would be of her own daughter.

She gave me a smile.

“Thank you,” she responded cheerfully back to me “but what is it we are doing here.” 

“Please just trust me.”

And with that, I walked to the end of the room opposite of the way we came in. I opened a door and went into a room full of magic powered computers. Several monitors in the room showed Twilight at different angles. The room was covered with buttons and layered with levers. There was a microphone in the middle of everything shooting out of the mess of buttons, which I grasped firmly with my right forehoof.

I spoke into the microphone hearing the sound of my own muffled voice echo in the room next to me, “Look up Twilight. See the rod above you?” I saw her on the monitors as she tilted her head upwards. There was a brief moment of silence and then I spoke into the microphone again. “Twilight, its ok, I can hear you, you can still talk to me.”

“Ok, yes I see the rod but what…”

“Good, now when I say ‘now’, concentrate as much of your magic energy into the rod as possible, and I mean as much as you can. Do you understand?”

“Yes I do, but what is it we are doing here!”

I paused for a moment thinking of what to say.

“You are about to become a god.” I say into the receiver.

I wrapped my left forehoof around a large switch sitting near the microphone’s receiver.

“NOW!” I yelled and I pull the lever down… 
> Convergence
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ponies always ask me if I know Princess Celestia.

I am Twilight Sparkle. I’m not much to look at, I’m not really that good with magic either. But for some reason my teacher seems to think I am the best thing ever. My mentor, my beautiful, majestic, intelligent, all knowing, all seeing mentor, believes in me, just one individual. I’m just a regular bookworm Unicorn, yet she sees something in me that I’ve never seen in myself. And do you know what the best part is? My mentor just so happens to be the princess of the day. That’s right, Princess Celestia the most powerful being ever to live is my mentor. She is the kindest, most loving pony I’ve ever met, and she chose ME. She’s been like a second mother to me (although I haven’t talked to my real parents much since I moved to Ponyville.)

I can just remember the day we became attatched. The day She took me under her figurative wing.

***

I was just about to blow it. I’ve never shown my incompetence as a unicorn as much as I had the day I took my magical entrance exam.

I’d been studying so hard. That didn’t matter. That dragon egg they used for the exam must have been a fake. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get the darned thing to hatch. I had read a book before the test telling me exactly how to hatch eggs that were ready to be hatched, but that didn’t help at all. I can still feel the judgmental eyes of those teachers. It felt horrible! Here was the most important day in my life and I was on the verge of mucking all of it up. And these jerks were just gonna sit there throwing their disapproving stares at me, as they gave me a hooves down.

After straining myself for several minutes I had just about given up. I gave the egg one last heave of my horn’s magic. Then there was an explosion. After a brief moment I felt something rack my whole body. It felt intense, like all of my magic was exiting my body at one time. Everything went white. I felt… I felt… Powerful, for the first time in my life. Not only that, but it was pleasure, pure complete pleasure, completely different from the straining sensation I got when trying to cast spells. The whole experience seemed so… wrong, but yet it felt so good.

I don’t know how long this surge of power lasted, but I was snapped out of it by a warm smile. I could feel her hoof on my back, I turned my head and there she was, her lips curved into the maternal looking smile she was famous for. It was as if her very presence was enough to ebb away the blinding whiteness that had taken over my vision.

I could barely take my eyes off my princess she was so welcoming and so beautiful. But what I done had felt so wrong, I felt ashamed. And felt as if she knew I had done something wrong.

I had been about to apologize for destroying the room, but she cut me off.

“Twilight sparkle,” she began “you have a very special gift.”

A compliment paid by Princes Celestia herself. My jaw dropped.

She continued, “I don’t think I’ve ever come across a unicorn with your raw abilities…”

“Wha huh.” I didn’t know how to respond. I was in awe.

Again she continued, “…but you need to learn to tame these abilities through focused study.”

“HUH!” my mouth went even wider in awe.

“Twilight Sparkle, I’d like to make you my own personal protégé.”

I lost it, my whole life I had dreamed of something similar to this. She was my idol. I adored her. I worshipped her.

“YES!” I screamed not able to hide any of my excitement.

That day had changed my life.

***

Spike approached me with another letter from the princess. This was the second letter she’d sent me this week. Even after these long few years, I still loved getting letters from her. Even though I was usually the one sending her my findings on friendship, every once and a while she would update me on how things were going.

Earlier this week, she had sent me a letter questioning my progress in my studies of my element. She asked if I was confident in using it without being around the rest of my best friends.

She hadn’t checked on the progress of that in a while so I found it a bit strange. I gave it some thought and decided that I was, so I had Spike send a letter back to her telling her just that.

Then I received the second letter. She wanted me to come, immediately, to her lab in Canterlot. Another great honor to befall me, I prided myself knowing that the Princess trusted me with things she didn’t even trust her sister to do.

I thanked spike for handing me her message then I braced for teleportation. I hurled my self through the familiar time vortex that I created whenever I cast the warp spell. In only a few seconds, I saw Celestia’s lab waver into view. My beloved tutor was standing there in front of me waiting. Once she saw that I had arrived she put on her motherly smile. Seeing that smile made my heart swell with joy. Oh my Princess, my kind Princess.

We exchanged a few welcoming words than she led me deeper into her lab. We came to a large part of the building I had never been to before. This part of the lab, to be honest, was kinda creepy. Everything was blank white with white-lit stones lining the ceiling. The whole layout of the area was set up in long narrow hallways, with small test rooms on the sides. Most of the test rooms had glass windows that faced us as we strolled towards the end of the corridor. Looking in some of the rooms I could see what looked like large animal cages, all of which were empty. In the middle of other rooms there appeared to be hospital beds except they had constraints fastened to them. All I could do was think about what went on down here, and better yet what did my princess need of me here.

She took me to the end of a hallway, which had a large sliding metal door, hissing as it opened up. We went in and I stood in awe, gawking at the massive chamber, easily the size of three or four of the apple family’s barns.

Princess told me that this was the place where miracles happened. What did that mean, what was she doing here?

Then she asked me, not once, not twice, but three times if I trusted her. I was a little hurt by this. She knows that I would do anything for her. Do I really have to tell her that.

She took me to the center of the room and strapped me into a chair, which I did not protest. After all I did just say THREE TIMES that I trusted her. But still, what in the hay were we going to do in here. I smiled at her as she ran her hoof affectionately down my mane. Then she told me how proud of me she was, and my smile widened, heart swelling with joy again and I said thank you to her.

I tried asking her what was going on but before I could finish she cut me off and told me to trust her again. She then left me there, entering another room, which I presumed was an observation room or maybe control deck.

After a few moments, I heard her voice, which seemed to crackle throughout the room, telling me to look up at a strange metal rod that hung above me, protruding out of the high ceiling, coming all the way down to be just barely out of my reach. She told me to cast my magic, as much of it as possible, at that rod when she said ‘now.’

I tried one last time to ask Celestia what we were doing.

There was a short pause, than she said something that I didn’t quite catch.

“You… out to… god.” I was going to ask her what she said but then she quickly followed it up with, “NOW!”

I pointed my horn at the metal rod and let flow my magic. Strangely there was no sound caused by any of the machines or release of magic. I pushed harder and harder. It was easier than I expected, almost as if the rod was sucking up on my horn.  It felt like I was being drained of my life, but it didn’t hurt and for some reason it almost was relaxing...

Then, as suddenly as it began, the process reversed itself, sending the magical energy back into my horn. It was ecstasy. For minutes, my body exploded with pleasure, a pleasure I had only felt once before. It seemed like it would never end. And I didn’t want it to. Until the pleasure slowly started changing into something else, something… hostile. No. No, no, no it was pain. It started in my forehead. Quickly it spread through to the rest of my body. It burned. Everything burned. The amount of pleasure I had been feeling a moment ago had been surpassed only by the searing pain that now replaced it.

My mouth opened. I think I screamed. I couldn’t tell. All I could do was try not to think of the words ‘searing’ and ‘flesh.’

The restraints holding me down must have broke as I felt myself being hoisted towards the rod. Up and up I went, hoisted by the magical force now blinding my vision with pure white magical light. I reached the tip of the rod and…

And then nothing, I felt nothing. The light slowly faded away and I was left suspended in the air. I heard the door Celestia had entered burst open. I managed to crane my head in the direction to see Celestia walking towards the chair I had been in. Then she picked up her pace until she was in full tilt. She was saying something… no she was screaming something… Twilight, she, she was screaming my name. As she drew closer to the chair, not bothering to look up at me, I saw her face. She looked terrified. 

“TWILIGHT,” She screamed over and over. “NO… NO DAMMIT NO, TWILIGHT!!!!!!”

I watched in horror as she slid the rest of the few feet to the chair, the chair that my body was still in.

I had no idea what in the hay happened. I could see what was happening but I didn’t want to accept it. I didn’t know what it was. My body in the chair looked quite literally like the life had been sucked out its mouth and eyes. My mouth unhinged at the jaw to be sickeningly wide open. My eyes were blank white, no trace of life to be found anywhere in them. My body lay there, motionless, not even breathing.

But I was here, floating above myself, and the rest of the room.

I watched as my poor Princess wailed over my lifeless corpse.

“Wake up damn you,” she pounded on my chest, “I’m sorry, just wake up, I promise you… I PROMISE YOU I will NEVER ask you for anything again!” her words became less and less intelligible as she lost herself in the moment. Her horn started glowing, and she encased my dead body in a healing spell, causing my limbs to twitch. She tried so hard with the spell but to no avail. I was dead. It was her fault.

And then I called out to her, “Princess, can’t you see, I’m right here, right above you?!” I kept trying to get her attention, but she just couldn't hear me.

I hear a voice come from somewhere near me, startling me. I jerk my head towards the sound seeing a most peculiar image.

“She can’t hear you.” the entity spoke, its voice was deep and booming. Strangely I couldn’t open my mouth anymore, I couldn’t say anything. It continued on and I listened

“No one can hear you, even I can’t here you, as you are dead. Its almost curious how you managed reach this state of being though. You must have had quite a lot of magic in that head of yours. Well I guess now’s the time to start it. Prepare for convergence.” The last few words sounded ominous.

The image exploded into a phantom of black light sending my floating body hurling towards Celestia who didn’t seem to notice anything. I crashed into her with force. I was sucked into her. She went stiff as my projection stuffed itself inside of her body. She couldn’t seem to handle the cramped space and she passed out still laying over my dead body. As she passed out so did I.	
> Lucy
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	I drifted into consciousness. My eyes fluttered open, white tile floor coming into view. Where was I? Let me think, last thing I can remember… oh… no. I remembered what had just happened. I felt the burden of it wash over me. My student, my faithful student, Twilight Sparkle, she’s… I felt my throat grow sore and tears form in my eyes.

“Its all my fault…” I said to her body lying in the chair. Except her body wasn’t in the chair. No, she was sitting on the floor next to me, facing away. She was breathing. She was alive!

How could this be possible? A moment ago, her body didn’t contain a trace of life.

I didn’t care though, and I jumped up on all fours and pounced at twilight, trying to embrace her in a protective hug.

“YOUR ALIVE!” I screamed soaring through the air, tears of mourning immediately replaced by tears of joy.


It didn’t last long though. Instead of crashing into twilight in an embrace I was picked up by a force, similar to a magical force but yet somehow different. I saw Twilights entire body glowing, encased in a red sheen. This was unlike any power I had seen. It didn’t stem from her horn; rather it seemed to flow out from every inch of her skin.

The force that picked me up out of the air then slammed me into the ground and kept me pinned there. Twilight turned her head around to face me… with out moving her body!!! Her head sat on her body twisted 180 degrees. She stared at me for a moment.

Her face still looked as dead as it had been before I lost consciousness. What happened to you Twi?

“You can let me go Twi, everything’s alright now.” I manage to roll out of my mouth. 

She didn’t open her mouth but yet a voice came out of her, an unnatural voice that sounded like it used to be Twilight’s but with several other pitches blended in. This gave it a very sinister sound.

“Twi? You pathetic three dimensional creature.” The voice of nightmares spoke. “If you are referring to your friend whose body I’ve commandeered than you are sorely mistaken. Ah it’s too bad she took her magic with her when she died, she had quite a bit of it. And I kinda like your kinds magic. Guess I’ll just have to use my own magic.” She said pushing my head into the ground harder.

“oo are oo en?” with my head pressed against the floor I spoke only in vowels.

She eased up on my head just enough so that I could speak. I repeated my question.

“Who are you then?” I said, this time I was able to annunciate each word.

“Ah, a curious question. And I don’t get many questions. Hmm, yes a name… what is my name?” she said pondering her own question. “I guess technically my name is” she said something for her name but it was like my mind wouldn’t register the noise that came out of her. “Oh but the last species I dealt with usually just called me Lucy” She gave a large grin, and the rest of her body twisted around to face me as well. She trotted over towards me half clumsily. “Blast! How do all of you manage to get around without feet? I prefer the bodies of the dumb hairless talking monkeys to your horse like body. Oh well.”

Her expression changed to one of excitement. She had a maniacal look on her face.

“Well if you don’t mind, I have your species to terminate…”

I could see long tentacles poking their way through twilights back.

“What the hell are you.” I asked in terror.

She didn’t answer me; instead she appeared over me resting a black leathery tentacle on my back.

“Ooh very curious indeed.” She said. She seemed to be struggling with something. “Something pure still lives in you. Blast! I was really going to enjoy consuming you. Looks like you get a free pass for now.” She looked disgusted after she said that.

And then… She was gone. Twi’s body just vanished. She didn’t leave a trace of magic, she didn’t explode into a magical time rift, just gone. The grip that had been holding me down disappeared as well. I staggered to my feet.

After a bit of time and some contemplation I felt a new sensation. It was as if part of my mind had been asleep and then woken up. This part of me felt alien. What could it be? And then I knew, somehow I knew with out anypony telling me. It was Twilight Sparkle. She was in my mind.

Except that wasn’t quite right either. She wasn’t IN my mind she was PART of it.

> At Redberry Farm
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Wooohie, boy that was a tough day’s work.” I said aloud after I finished hauling the last box of strawberries onto a wooden cart.

“Ya bet it was.” Replied the other workpony “Ya’ll have a good night ya hear!”

“Oh and say hello to the Mrs. for me, Mr. Redberry.” He added turning around.

“Will do.” I half chuckled.

And with that, he was off to town, his cart, crammed full of sweet berries and other vine ripened treats, hitched to his back.

There we go, an honest day of pickin’ and shippin’ berries. Ah, time to finally get home to my wife n’ kids. And to my wife’s home cookin’, she was makin’ sweet cherry pie tonight. My mouth watered at the thought of her delicious cherry pie. Cherrie had won prizes with that pie of hers. 

The walk to my farmhouse only took me a couple a’ minutes. The work pony had come almost all the way to the farm to pick up the shipments. I stopped right outside the front gate to admire the farm. Ah, my little plot of heaven, here near the borders of Equestria. The Redberry farm looked mighty beautiful in the orange light of the sunset. But the only thing better then coming home after a hard days work was coming home to a hot dinner and family.

My little colts would be so happy to see me and tell me about their day at school. I pictured my unicorn twins running to me yelling “daddy” their gray, unmarked flanks in the air as they tackled me and tried to wrestle me. They looked just like me really, the had the same color coat, the same brown mane, but they had horns on their heads, a trait they got from their mother. The thought of seeing them pushed me on to the house. So I opened the gate to my farm, passed it, and locked it shut. Nopony would be coming or going ‘till tomorrow so I figured we might as well stay locked up for the night. Then I trotted over to the front door of my house, tired from work but not completely exhausted, and opened it. Home sweet home.

I drew a deep breath and smelled the wonderful smell of stew. The smell mixed with the sweet smell of cherry pie made my stomach growl. “Im HOOOOMME!!!” I hollered, extending the word ‘home’ so that my kids could hear it in their room. I heard a loud thud come from the back of the house where the kids’ room was, followed by the furious sound of hoofsteps. In my anticipation, a content smile formed on my mouth as I waited for my kids to come jump into my embrace.


There they came, my two little colts Ellis and Wheaty. They sprinted into my embrace, almost knocking over some furniture.

“Daddy, daddy, daddy, YOUR HOME!” Oh they sounded so excited to see me. It made my heart swell. I stroked their short, soft little manes with my hooves.

“Well you look happy, dear.” The voice came from my beautiful smiling Unicorn wife who walked out of the door to the kitchen. She really was beautiful, with her pale pink coat, long red mane and tail that had a hint of gold in it. She had nice flanks (and I do mean nice), which held her cutie mark, a little cherry tree. Her soft face was complimented by two sky blue eyes and graced by a red purebred unicorn horn, which hardly imposed. We were both starting to age a bit, but she still looked as beautiful as the day I met her.

And I thought how lucky I was to have her as my wife. A rough lookin’ earth stallion like me. I prided myself on how it used to make all my friends jealous back in the day. Hah who knew that I, John Redberry, would have the best lookin’ wife of all my friends.

“That’s cause it’s cherry pie night.” I laughed, “You know I love your cherry pie.” True it was strange for me to be this happy, I was usually a more stoic pony, but I just got caught up in the moment.

She blushed a little and shot me a dirty smile. I knew what she was thinking. Then she remembered that the foals were still hugging me so she tilted her head, trying to point at them with her horn.

“Boys, its time to eat, would you be dears and set the table for us?” Cherrie asked our children.

They did as they were told. They ran into the dining room where they began pulling out eating utensils.

Cherrie walked over to me and we shared a brief but passionate kiss. She smelled of cherries. It was a delicious smell that made me even hungrier.

“How was your day honey?” Cherrie asked curiously.

“Long,” I said, “but good, I’m just happy to see you.”

She shot a big smile at me. “Well I’m glad to hear ya had a good’n.”

We walked next to each other to the dining room, where the colts were. They had just finished setting up the table.

The boys and I sat down at the table while Cherrie went into the kitchen. She came back out a moment later levitating the stew pot out of the kitchen. Before long each of us had a bowl of bean n’ veggie stew sitting in front of us.

After giving thanks to our dear princesses I took a spoonful of stew and pushed it into my mouth. As I had expected, it tasted even better then it smelled. Boy Cherrie sure could cook a good meal.

After several spoonfuls of bean stew I looked over at my colts, who were sitting at the end of the table opposite me. They were enjoying the meal just as much as I was.

I opened my mouth to speak. “So, boys, what did y’all learn at school today.”

Ellis was the first to speak, having just swallowed his last bite of food.

“Oh nothing, Ms. Jubilee wasn’t here today so we had a substitute.” He said

“Oh? Where was she today.” I said acting interested.

“She said she was going to visit her cousin in Ponyville.”

“Oh so anything happen today?”

This time Wheaty cut in, “You bet!” He said loudly, casting a devious look at his twin brother, who returned the look with one of contempt.

“Oh really, what happened?” I asked amused by their coltish innocence. I looked over at Cherrie and she looked just as amused as I did.

“Ellie has a crush on the subswmf.” He was cut off when Ellis levitated a napkin into his brother’s mouth.

“DO NOT!” protested Ellis

“DO TOO!”

They repeated that argument for bit, then I chimed in. “So tell me about this substitute you had, she sounds like an interesting young mare.” I bit my lip so to prevent a chuckle.

“I don’t have a crush ON ANYPONY!” Ellis yelled

My boys were so adorable I hardly was able to sound serious when I told Ellis to use his inside voice.

All Ellis wanted to do was change the subject, “Can we have pie now?” He said trying to get us to forget about his supposed crush on Ms. whoever.

I looked again at Cherrie who was watching our colts intently, her whole face in a smile. Again she appeared to share the same feelings about how adorable they were. Then she looked at me and saw that I was looking at her.

“Oh yes, the pie.” She said after a second.

She got up from the table to fetch the delicious dessert.

My mouth was watering again. I was already almost full from the stew, but the thought of her famous cherry pie was enough to make the princesses themselves sing. Oh the flakey crust, the delicious cherry fillin’ uh god that sounded sooo good…

Then she re-entered the room levitating the pie above her head and that shut everypony up. The three of us watched intently as she cut the pie with a knife, and lift a piece of it onto each of our plates. In only minutes, the pie Cherrie made was consumed. 

My sweet Celestia that pie was buckin’ good. Each of us sat there after we finished the pie resting our bellies and then a bit later Cherrie took the boys to get ready for bed.

I took a moment to step out on the porch and get some fresh night air. I inhaled deeply letting the cool night air fill my lungs. This week was one of the many perfect ones. At this point in my life, I realized with pride, I had been living many stallions’ dreams. I had a wife (a darn fine one at that), and she loved me as much as I loved her. We had two beautiful foals, and we planned on having another soon. Our farm, my farm, which had been in my family for countless generations, was profiting exceedingly well. We were on no shortage of money.

And life had been like this since we married. I remembered that after we married, I decided that it was best to pick back up the family farm. The demand for the various sweet berries hadn’t declined in the past few years, and it didn’t look like it would in the future. I was indeed content with life.

I went back inside. It was time for bed and Cherrie would probably just be getting in bed as well. I walked into the bedroom but Cherrie wasn’t there yet. I could hear her in the other room saying goodnight to the boys, her voice soft and kind. If I didn’t know any better I would’ve thought she was the Mother of Equestria.

I slipped into bed. The covers were warm and inviting. The bed beckoned me to fall asleep. I tried to keep my eyes open so I could say good night to my beautiful wife but it was just too comfortable and I soon lost consciousness.

***

I woke up in the middle of the night to my wife nudging me on the shoulder. Even in this state I could remember what that nudge meant. We WERE planning on having another foal. I rolled over and smiled as my face met hers. She was already smiling.

“The foals should be asleep now.” She whispered putting a forehoof around me. I took the hint. I rolled over on her and stared into her eyes. I was starting to wake up and get excited. I leaned my head in and kissed her.

We enjoyed each other’s company for a bit.

Then…. Then...

Then there was crying, it came from Ellis and Wheaty’s room.

Our alone time was interrupted. I got out of bed, “I’ll go check on them this time.” I told my wife.

I probably should have been more annoyed by having to check on my children instead of enjoying my wife’s company, but I was already in too good of a mood. And she could still be awake when I got back, so I figured we would pick up where we left off. 

I trotted lazily over towards the crying. Pushing the door to my kids’ room open made the noise louder. They were screaming at the top of their lungs now. I guess I must have startled them coming into the room.

“BOYS, BOYS it’s alright… it’s only me” This managed to calm their screaming a bit so that they were just sobbing and shaking in their beds.

“What’s wrong, what happened boys?” I asked them trying to sound patient.

Still shaking, Ellis and Wheaty slowly pointed at the window that rested between their beds. The window looked over the back end of the farm, not that anypony could tell, as it was pitch black outside.

“What? There’s nothing there.” I said straining my eyes to find something in the darkness. 

“But daddy,” said Wheaty, his voice trembling, “there’s a woman out there.”

“Would ya like daddy to take a look and show you that there’s nopony there?” I asked them. Boy did they sure have wild imaginations

So I pretended like I was going to walk around the house. Of course I had no reason to go out there, so I just headed for the front door, leaving them tucked in their beds. I was just going to stand in front of the front door for a minute and then come back and say that I didn’t see anything.

I stepped into the living room, turning on the ceiling light. Woah, the front door was wide open. That made my stomach flop. I know for a fact that I closed and locked that door. This piqued my curiosity, so I decided to go check the front of the house. Maybe there really was somepony out there. I started feeling protective of my family.

I walked out onto the porch.

“Hello!” I shouted “Anypony out here?”

No answer.

I wasn’t about to circle the house; it was black out side, making it dangerous to walk around the house. And it was mighty creepy too.

“Who are you looking for?” said a demonic voice coming from behind me. My heart stopped, I jumped in the air and faced the house.

I looked into the blank white eyes of a grape colored unicorn mare. She was levitating, a reddish glow circling her body. Who was this? what was wrong with her eyes? And most importantly, why was she in my house?

“WHO ARE YOU; GET THE HELL OUT OF MY HOUSE.” I demanded strongly

She ignored my demand, instead she spoke, without moving her mouth, “MMM I can smell magic, who has the magic. Could it be you?” She said, her demonic voice sending chills down my mane. Oh my Celestia, were those tentacles poking out of her back?! They were… five black, leathery tentacles sprouted out of her back.

Then she teleported close to me with out so much as a sound or poof of magic. I was terrified. No I was paralyzed with fear.

With her standing as close as she was, I could smell death on her. It made me gag.

Then she spoke in her hideous demonic voice again. “USELESS, you have no magic!”

I tried to scream but I couldn’t, her tentacles were already grabbing me, holding my mouth shut. What was she going to do?

She pinned me to the wall with her tentacles

And then the rest of my family came into the room, probably wandering where I was, or what the strange noises were.

There was screaming, which was partially stifled when two tentacles, including the one covering my mouth shot through the body of Cherrie. She stopped screaming instantly…

...

…Chuh... Chuh... Cherrie…

Time seemed to stop in that moment.

“There’s the magic,” said the evil purple mare sounding satisfied.

DAMN YOU! I became full of rage, forgetting my fear. I bucked and bucked and bucked… until I finally managed to wrench myself out of the tentacles’ grip. 

“RUN, go, your window, NOW!” I yelled at my colts, which were staring at something they couldn’t comprehend.

They turned and ran for their bedroom window.

After seeing them run, I hurled myself at the monster knocking her off balance. I was ready to rip her… its head off its shoulders. But then it grabbed me with its magical force. It began to squeeze the life out of me. The pain shooting through me caused me to scream.

My life, I could see everything… It was… so… warm… I could just sleep.
> Paternity
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“You are worthless, you are a failure, nothing you do will ever be enough for me. Go. Leave this space at once. You are completely useless. ” 

Why… Why… would he do this to me. I… he…

“But father, I can be powerful, I promise, Just give me a chan…..”

“I said LEAVE THIS SPACE AT ONCE, and do not return. You have no power. You are nothing to me. You are not worthy to be my only son!!!” father said, and then cast me out of the void, and into the universe.

The cold, dark, unforgiving universe.

My father hated me. I was nothing…

… … …

NO! I will prove myself to him. I am not useless,

I am powerful…

I am worthy to be his son.

And I am willing to kill everything else to prove it, because if I wasn’t, then what kind of son would I be. My name is [error] and my dad will cherish me, even if I have to prove myself to him!


***


There were trillions upon trillions of sentient souls, souls waiting to be captured. Waiting to serve their master, waiting to worship, to sing hymns in their master’s glorious name.

There were the winged bat creatures from the Far Reaches, their fangs sharp, their wings enormous in span. They were unintelligent. They would not impress father.

There were the behemoth warlords, the four-legged mammoth like creatures from the Great Expanse. There muscled physique and intimidating presence made them look powerful. They weren’t. They were unintelligent. They would not impress father.

There were many more of these fantastic looking creatures, all of them unique and different from the last, I killed most of them, and those I didn’t kill, I consumed and forced into my army. An army of souls.

And then there were the hairless monkey creatures from the Great White Spiral. These were the real prize. They were easily corruptible, making them easy to consume and force into my slavery, but they were intelligent, far more so than any of the hundreds of thousands of other intelligent life forms I had come into contact with. They proved time consuming, taking just over two and a half cycles to conquer.

They would impress father.

Finally… a chance to win his respect.

I would rip open an entrance to the void and show my self to father. I would scream at him “LOOK FATHER, LOOK AT WHAT I’VE ACCOMPLISHED FOR YOU!!!!” and he would love me, finally, and all would be good.

*** 

I prepared my self for the entry into the dark oblivion. I concentrated all of my power into one focused part of my essence (being an entity with no real body means I don’t have a special place to focus my power.)

I let my power flow forth into a star. The star exploded tearing a gap into the void.

My home…

My home sweet home…

“FATHER!” I shouted into the abyss.

His essence was everywhere in the void. I could sense him.

“I AM HERE TO WIN YOUR AFFECTION!”

There was nothing, no response. Had he left? Where did he go? But that could not be right, as I definitely felt him everywhere in the void.

Yet he did not speak back to me.

“SPEAK! SPEAK TO ME FATHER, FOR I AM YOUR SON!”

Still no reply.

Maybe, I thought to my self with disappointment, maybe these souls aren’t enough. If I could just find the souls of race worthy of his affection.

As if he could read my thought (which I wouldn’t put that past him) he finally spoke up.

“You dare return! What did I tell you before? Do you honestly think you can impress me with these… these three dimensional abominations.”

He wasn’t impressed. I was devastated. If I could just make him see how much I wanted him to be my father, if he could just realize how hard I was trying to earn his respect, his love. I know if I could just do this, then he would accept me. He would allow me to stay by his side. I would be in my rightful place by his side as Son of the Abyss.

“Father, please, just hear me out!” I pleaded

“Silence you insignificant worm, and be gone with ye!!!” he bellowed, and then banished me, a second time, from my home.

Back into the universe, the cold, unforgiving universe.

And so again I set out to conquer a world that would appease my father. But I couldn’t just settle with any world. I had to find one good enough for him.

I so longed to embrace him, and I was going to make it happen. Now just to find the right world to conquer…

*** 

What’s this? I felt a force come over me… a force… it’s… similar to mine. No it was almost identical to mine. And it came from a star not too far away.

The force, it was more powerful than any of the other life forms I had met.

It was power, raw untamed power and it beckoned me. This was it for sure. Finally beings powerful enough to impress my mighty father.


***

The blasted runts weren’t worth the effort, I let them run, and besides I needed to focus on absorbing this unicorn’s power. I took care not to hit anything vital when I impaled her on my essence. She was unconscious. Just how I needed her, too, because with her I could study my new enemy, and figure out why it was so blasted difficult to absorb the creatures in this world.

That was among the many things that seemed strange about this world. First, my colossal power had been severely dampened the second I came with in destruction range, as if this planet generated its own magical force field. Then there was that purple pony who’s body I was currently using, it was almost as if she had enough power to become a higher dimensional being, like me. That’s what they were doing in there, making her into someone like me. Right?

So much confusion, this made my head hurt. It was strange getting headaches, or really just feeling pain, again. It had been so long since I felt anything.

“Run for the window, run for the window, I’m an evil monster." I mocked the dying pony that lay in front of me. Ponies… with magic, the universe sure did have a sense of humor.

I marveled at how easy it was for me to squeeze the last few breaths out of the pathetic pony. I was a little surprised when he managed to break free of my grip for second and rush at me. That didn’t last long though, and now he was dead, the spark of life long gone.

Like I said, sense of humor.
> "It Works Both Ways"
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	You know that saying “you always hurt the one you love” well it works both ways.

Oh the night of the Royal Dinner. It is a time where my sister and I sit down and eat dinner with all of the important ponies in Equestria. All of the mayors from our good cities would be here. We would all talk politics, current events. We would share ideas on expanding the borders into the unknown parts of the world.

Oh and the food would be fantastic, prepared by our royal chefs. Too bad there was going to be earth ponies present, I could really go for some fish, but because they’re vegetarian it would be offensive. Oh well. Our chefs could make even the most mundane foods taste like ambrosia, which I think was actually being served tonight. I like me some ragweed pasta.

Now where was that sister of mine? Everyone would be here in an hour for the dinner and I couldn’t find her.

Now the first place I looked was her bedroom, no one was there. Just books scattered everywhere. Books and pages of notes… I would have been horrified by the state of her room had it not already been like this for years. She had been doing some “important research” trying to discover, well, I really didn’t know. For some reason she didn’t… wouldn’t tell me. And after these few years back together one would think that I’d finally earned back her trust. Guess not.

I looked, quite literally, through the entire royal castle. She was nowhere to be found. But I did have one guess where she could be, that cursed laboratory of hers. Oh yes, that place. It gave me the creeps. Just thinking about it sent shivers down my spine.

She had been spending more and more time pent up in that confounded eyesore. I had no clue what she did in there and I didn’t want to know anyways. Either way she forbade anypony from entering unless they had received her special permission.

If she was in there, than I was just wasting time looking for her, I would just have to trust that she would do the right thing and show up to the dinner. Preferably on time.

She  didn’t…

I was really going to give that sister a piece of my mind.

It was ten at night, she was still not here and everypony else was. There were the leaders of all of the cities from Ponyville to Manehatten. Anypony of political importance made their appearance… except my sister.

They entered the dining hall, each of them filling their assigned seats at the elongated table.

The sound of all the ponies talking filled the room, making it difficult to get every ponies attention.

“Excuse me, if I could have your attention…” yeah of course they didn’t hear me.

“EXCUSE ME…” I said, clanging a spoon to a glass trying again to grab their attention. They didn’t hear me again (though I suspected they had heard me, but were just ignoring me since I wasn’t Celestia)

Oh my Celestia… I put my face in my right hoof.

I looked up at everyone. Yep they were still talking. I guess I wasn’t important enough to speak to these ponies. I sighed.

I let them continue their conversation. It wasn’t worth the effort or frustration to keep trying. I wasn’t about to shout in my royal Canterlot voice, no that would be rude. Eventually, the pony in the seat on my left (who I presumed was the mayor of Trottingham) turned to me and spoke.

I got excited when she began to speak.

“May I inquire where your sister is, dear princess?” she asked, trying to feign an upper class, more sophisticated accent.

My excitement dropped. Now I was annoyed. I mocked her ridiculous fake accent in my head.

“No, I am afraid I am not sure as to her whereabouts.” I stated coldly.

“Oh.” She said then she turned her head and started speaking to another pony.

Oh… OH!!! That’s all you have to say! This was going to be a long night.

*** 

The night droned on and on. I don’t even remember what I had eaten. It could just been some dandelion sandwiches for all I knew. I spent the entire dinner in my own world, staring down the table at the ponies on the other end with my chin in my hoof. I went over in my head countless times how I was going to confront my sister for not being there. At least if she was there, then not everypony would have been ignoring me. She truly was the only pony that seemed to understand me. But she didn’t show up.

I was upset to say the least.

The dinner ended and the many ponies left (good riddance) disappointed at the absence of their most beloved princess. I made my way across the castle to my sisters bedroom. I was going to wait for her and confront her when she got home.

*** 

I lay on my sister’s bed, waiting for her to return. I knew she would return trying not to disturb anypony. 

How dare she not show at dinner, and leave me there all by my self. 

I kept getting angrier and angrier thinking about it.

Sure enough, just before one in the morning, a shimmer appeared near her bedroom door, and out she popped. We locked eyes for a brief moment.

“WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN!?” I demanded of her, rhetorically.

“Listen Luna, now is not the time, I need…” she tried to say before I interrupted.

“Now’s not the time!? Now is the perfect time. Did you not remember the dinner, the royal dinner. We waited for you and waited for you, but you never came.”

“Look Luna I understand that I shouldn’t have missed that but…”

What! How could she possibly understand!

“You don’t understand, no, you have NO idea what its like being there by yourself. You know what,” I said. Now I was trying to fight back tears, “they all ignored me, apparently I’m not as important as my big sister.” By that point my voice shook as I spoke. “Just like old times, right?”

“Luna, I…”

“NO… you were in that lab of yours weren’t you. Oh sure that’s where you always go when you don’t wanna show your face. Luna doesn’t need any help entertaining any guests, no I think I’ll just stay in my lab doing who knows what.” I said bitterly mocking her. “What is so damn important that you must lock yourself away and forget about everyone that needs you?”

She approached me cautiously and sat down on the bed next to me, putting a forehoof in my mane. She stroked my mane for a bit, while I let tears roll down my face. Of all the ponies, she was the only one that truly understood me, yet sometimes I felt sometimes she didn’t.

Her hoof in my mane felt different then it usually did. She seemed unsure about how she stroked it… in fact something about her seemed different. She seemed… scared. I have never seen her like this.

I looked into her eyes, which met mine. They were red and swollen. She had been crying. She had worry written on her face.

“Luna…” She began “It was wrong of me to leave you like that, I know, trust me I do. But, right now, there is something important we must do.”

“What is it, what happened?” I said concern growing in my voice. Now that I got a better look at her, I noticed that her face was bruised. What in the… What was going on?

“A threat, a very serious one, has been made against our people. We must contact Shining Armor at once.”

“Sister, your face, what happened?” I tried to ask

“Yes I know, don’t worry about me, I’ll be fine. We must alert Shining Armor at once. We must arrest the mare, Twilight Sparkle, at once.”

“What Twilight Sparkle, as in your faithful student, as in Shining Armor’s little sister, Twilight Sparkle?!”

She only nodded letting a single tear roll down her face.

But I couldn’t help but feel like she wasn’t telling me something important.

What happened…

> A Detective and a Murder
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The sound of the ticking was starting to get into my head. Why was the clock on the wall so loud? Ugh. Don’t know why we kept the thing anyway, by now somepony shoulda thrown that piece of garbage out and given the room a nice new digital clock.

It read three o’ clock. This clock was broken, its second hand ticking furiously but not moving anywhere, so I pulled out the pocket watch my father gave me out of my coat pocket. It felt smooth in my hoof. I admired its goldish gleam and the little family crest engraved on its face. I opened up the watch and looked at its face, gauging the actual time

Ironically it read three in the morning as well, meaning that, for the first time today, the broken clock was showing the right time. I snapped my precious watch shut then stuffed it back into my coat pocket.

Ah Celestia that ticking… it was driving me nuts.

I spat out a bit of tobacco I had been chewing on into the trash can next to me, then replaced it with another piece, mashing down on it with my back teeth. Then I yawned, almost dropping my new piece. Instead I caught it with my hoof and placed it back in my mouth.

I was more than tired.

Being a detective for eight years, it wasn’t surprising to be called in late at night to question ponies. The chief called me in at about two in the morning to the EEPD (East Equestria Police Department.) Apparently there had been a murder on a small farm just outside of town.

Murder? Really? I personally had never worked a murder case. Hell I don’t think anypony had in several years. Murder in Equestria was so rare, that when I got the call I had to ask several times what Chief was saying, ‘cause the word “murder” was almost unthinkable. I had dealt with literally everything else, but not this.

So here I sat, at the EEPD, waiting outside a questioning room for my chance to interrogate two little colts. I know we didn’t usually put young’ns on the spot like this, but I guess considering the circumstances… and the fact that it was three in the morning and they didn’t have anywhere to go, we had to keep them here.

I swear that clock…

The door to the question room opened up and a brown police pony clad in a blue uniform, motioned for me to come in the room. I obliged him, walking tiredly into the room.

The room was solid manila with a deep red oak table in the center. A florescent ceiling light lit the room with a white light. Being tired, it hurt my eyes and, I could tell when I looked at the rest of the ponies in the room, it hurt everyone else’s eyes too. I squinted a bit to dim the light.

I pulled back a chair and sat at the table. Two little colts sat in front of me across the table. They were two adorable little things. Apparently they were twins, as they looked identical with their gray manes. They kind of reminded me of my grandson actually, they were about the same age.

After I took my seat, the police pony put his mouth near my ear and spoke softly, so that the colts wouldn’t hear what he was saying.

“Just go easy on them ok, I’d stick with basic questions. I don’t even think the poor bastards realize that their father is dead.” Those last few words sent a chill down my spine.

I gave the police pony a nod and he quietly left the room and shut the door.

I looked to the two colts who were looking back at me through half closed eyes. They looked exhausted, both physically and emotionally. Both of them had bloodshot eyes that were barely able to stay open. Oh the little troopers, they were so brave. Again I was reminded of my grandson.

“So,” I began “what are your names?” I tried to sound as kind as I could given that it was past three in the morning.

The one on my right answered the question, “I’m Ellis and he’s Wheaty.”

“Alright, Ellis, Wheaty, what can you tell me about what happened at home?”

*** 

Their description of the event hadn’t been very helpful. They kept talking about a purple monster pony, one with long tentacles. It seemed like they had large imaginations to me, but at least I knew now that we were looking for a purple unicorn mare.

I told the two colts that they would be taken care of until their mom and dad came and picked them up. I didn’t have the heart to tell them the fate of their father.

I left the room, leaving them in the care of the department.

That ticking sound, it was back. I winced every time the infernal clock made a sound.

The chief was waiting for me outside the room, ready to brief me on what to do and where to go next. The chief looked as tired as well… I mean at this time who wouldn’t be. He levitated a hot cup of tea, a bag still hanging from the edge of the cup. He took a sip of his tea and then spoke to me.

“Alright, Hartigan, I’m having you go to Redberry farm. See what you can find there, and you might want to prepare yourself. I hear its pretty ugly in that farm house. We already have several police ponies on scene, nothing will be moved until you get there.” He said “Oh, and your alone on this one.”

Great. I preferred to work alone.

“Alright chief, I’ll go ahead and head out.”

We nodded at each other and parted ways.

I stopped by the restroom on the way out to splash some water on my face. Splashing some cold water on my face helped me wake up a bit. I looked up into the mirror and wasn’t to pleased with the ugly earth stallion replacing me. I was getting old and it showed on my face, which was weathered with wrinkles. I had scars on my face, most of which told stories that I couldn’t even remember. My mane was a mess of orange and red and so was the rest of me but luckily I was covered by a dark brown duster coat, which also covered my cutie mark (a magnifying glass looking over a hoofprint.)

I spat a piece of tobacco in the sink and then reached in my coat pocket for another piece. Ah damn, I was out. I grimaced in annoyance, showing off just how old my face really looked.

At least it reminded me how close to retirement I was.

***

The ride to the farmhouse took twenty minutes, time which I used to look over files and information on the family that lived here. There was a picture of a gray colored stallion and a beautiful pink mare. Mr. and Mrs. Redberry a caption read. It said they lived here on this farm with their two foals, Ellis and Wheaty, the two young’ns I met back at the station. 

The cool night air was refreshing, and the smell of farmland was nice. The cart driver pulled the cart up to the entrance gate and stopped. There were two pony police carts sitting outside gate already, their drivers napping with the carts still hitched to their backs.  I stepped out of the cart and hoofed a few bits to the pony cart driver.

We exchanged nods and he headed off back to town. I would catch a ride back to town later with one of the police ponies.

I made my way towards the farmhouse, which was lit up by artificial lights set up around the house by the police. As I approached the house, I was greeted by one of the blue uniform clad ponies, who I promptly showed my badge.

“Mornin’ detective.” He said groggily.

“Mornin’.” I grunted.

“I’d wouldn’t breathe through my nose if I were you…” he said as I opened the door to the house.

Oh by the Goddesses! The door opened, and with it, a wave of death rolled out that made me gag. The pony wasn’t kidding. The stench was enough to knock somepony out. I was forced to breathe through my mouth.

Immediately inside the house sat the crime scene. The remains of a gray earth pony, probably just younger than a middle-aged stallion, lay quite literally in a pile on the floor. The carcass was difficult to look at.

Geez, what kinda sick bastard does this… gah…

I reached in my coat pocket absently searching for a chunk of tobacco to calm my nerves. Then I remembered I was out and I cursed hard under my breath.

I scanned the room, which had two other police ponies standing around looking busy. The room looked typical, save for a few overturned pieces of furniture, the dead body, and bloodstained floors about ten feet from the body.

I approached the body of one John Redberry.

Yeesh, what a sight.

His body was mangled. His body contorted to into an impossible position, as if a giant claw had picked him up and squeezed him. He was molded into a ball, legs broken and tucked up into his torso. I looked at his face.

“Yeeeesh.” I said aloud.

His eyes were bulging out of his face. Not that his face resembled a face anymore. His jaw had unhinged his mouth was wide open… I’d seen enough. There was no clear cause of death, though it was safe to say he had been crushed to death.

I had no clue what could have caused this stallion’s death, but I was almost certain magic was involved, I could sense the use of it everywhere.

I looked through rest of the house. The only thing of note was an open window in one of the bedrooms. Maybe the kids used it to escape. I doubted the perp would have come in this way, otherwise the dead bodies would have probably been in here. Of course, if the killer was a unicorn, it would be possible that he or she could have just teleported inside.

I went over all the clues I currently had. There was the grisly murder in the other room, the bloodstain on the floor, the missing wife, the open window, and a crude description of a suspect. Based on the description, a purple unicorn monster with tentacles, I found it unlikely that the wife had committed the crime.

But my next course of action was to find the wife. I just wasn’t sure what I’d be looking for or where to look. Who ever this killer was, he or she was really good at leaving a mess but no useable clues.

I pulled out my pocket watch and opened it. It was half past four. Well that’s all the time I needed here so I guess it was time to head back.

> A Detective and a Purple Mare
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

This was her, no doubt… My eyes widened when I realized this was the mare I was looking for. It matched her description perfectly. Purple coat and mane, a cutie mark made up of little stars, I guess that meant something with magic. She lay a few feet in front of me on the ground, not even struggling, which I found strange. The subdue spell that my partner cast seemed to be working.

But how, this felt too easy. Based on the warrant papers, this mare was easily the most dangerous pony in the entire known world. And yet here she lay subdued not even trying to escape. 

She came to me… Cases were never this simple.

I went over in my head the events leading up to this point.

***

I had just arrived at the EEPD. It was about ten in the morning, the same morning I had investigated the murder. At least this time I was able to look a little more presentable. Hay, I even wore my favorite hat, an old-fashioned gray fedora that I’d had since I became a detective, and it matched my freshly pressed gray duster coat. The only thing I needed now was to get some more tobacco, which I hadn’t had a chance to get yet.

The chief, who was waiting for me, approached, levitating a slip of paper. It was a warrant for somepony’s arrest.

The chief spoke, not even bothering with a ‘good morning’. “Alright Hartigan, take a look at this…” He turned the slip of paper around to where I could see it clearly.

It was a picture of a grape purple unicorn mare. She had purple eyes, a purple mane and tail. Beneath the picture sat the name “Twilight Sparkle” which I said out loud as I read it.

The chief nodded. “Familiar? This just came in about a minute ago.” He said.

I shook my head, and was about to say no, but then I remembered something. The foals… she matched the basic description of the murderer they had given, a purple unicorn mare.

Where were those little colts?

“Wait, Chief, where are the boys from earlier this morning?” I asked.

“They should still be in one of the holding cells. We made some calls earlier and their uncle should be here soon.” He said. He seemed to know what I was thinking, giving me the picture of the wanted mare which I promptly stuffed into my coat pocket.

The chief gestured to the area where the holding cells were. The young’ns had slept there for what was left of the night. I trotted to the cells. Only one of them was open currently and that was the one they were in.

I stepped in and saw that both colts were awake. They actually looked even more tired then when I seen them hours earlier despite them having slept since then. Both of their manes were scraggily and unkempt. Their eyes were just as blood shot. They had been crying, I realized. They probably didn’t have a decent sleep after what they had seen, and I felt sorry for them. No foal should ever have to experience something like that.

At least we made an attempt to make them feel at home. There were blankets and pillows scattered all over the room. A few snack cake wrappers littered the ground, and they sat in the middle of all of it. They lounged next to each other half covered in blankets looking adorable.

I drew their attention as I stepped in the cell. They looked as if they were waiting for me to say something or give them some sort of instructions so I spoke to them.

“Hey there kiddos,” I began, “do you think you could help us find somepony?” I wasn’t really sure how to approach them (I mean they had been through hell recently and asking for their help seemed really unfair) and it showed in my voice and presence. I felt awkward standing here in front of them.

One of them began to open his mouth. I think it was Wheaty, not that I could tell by looking at the two since they were identical but Wheaty seemed to be the outspoken one. He closed his mouth, not able to find words, and just nodded his head.

I put my hoof in my coat pocket and slid out the photo of Twilight Sparkle. “Does this pony look familiar to you?” I asked, half expecting the answer I received.

Both of them perked up immediately. “NO!, That’s the monster, that’s her, that’s her, make her go away!”

Yeesh, well I guess we had found our prime suspect.

“That’s all I needed, thank you boys, you have been very helpful.” Now I felt guilty, having disturbed their road to recovery. They now looked terrified, as if at any moment the pony in the picture was going to jump out of the paper and eat them. Their eyes focused on the paper all the way up until I stuffed it back into my coat pocket. After a brief moment of silence and mild tension, I said goodbye.

“Oh, and your uncle should be here in a few minutes to pick you up.” I added. I guess I hadn’t really considered what that implied…

I turned and began to leave the cell when one of the colts asked me something that caught me off guard.

“Did… Is… Is… Daddy and mommy dead?” He asked, his voice cold and distant, as if he had no strength left for crying.

I was taken aback. For some reason I had thought these boys would be too naïve to know what death was. What should I tell them? Should I say, “Yes your dad is dead and your mom is missing?” Could they handle that? Was it really in my place to tell them? UGH in just a few minutes their uncle would be here to explain things so I wouldn’t have to.

I turned my head and looked at them. My eyes met theirs and for a moment we were quiet, then I said, “Thanks again for your help.” I turned my head back towards the door. I put my right hoof on the brim of my fedora and pulled it down so that it covered my face, perhaps to cover the shame and embarrassment of me not being able to say the truth. I walked hurriedly out of the cell, but before I was out of view, one of them said one last thing, something I again did not expect.

“Mister, if you find that monster…” There was a brief pause in which I stopped so I could hear what he had to say, “…kill it.” He said dryly.

Those words out of a child’s mouth, and I completely understood. That family had been something beautiful, and this mare, this monster, this damned monster had destroyed it. Even though it wasn’t my family, I felt sorry for the little colts. I felt like it was my responsibility to carry out retribution, to avenge their father, and perhaps their mother. 

My throat became sore from the emotions I was feeling. Was I really choking up? I usually was capable of maintaining a more apathetic appearance. I’ve worked arson, cases where families lost literally everything in a fire. I’ve worked missing ponies cases, where ponies would run away and leave a family behind. I’ve seen families, decent families, who didn’t deserve what they got, completely destroyed. But this, no… THIS was different. I couldn’t explain why, but it struck home in a way no other case had. It didn’t really make sense either. The only loved ones I had ever lost were my grandparents, and they died peacefully. I’d never been a victim. But seeing these colts, so torn apart, and to have one of them tell me to avenge their parents, it seemed… I had no words.

An image of my grandson formed in my head. I imagined him, Little Bucky his nickname was, telling me that he wanted me to kill somepony else.

…

I looked at the little colts and said one last thing, all of a sudden feeling pride in my line of work. “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of everything.”

***

So we were headed to Ponyville eh. I’d never been myself, though from what I had heard, it was a decent town, good food, good ponies, good climate… just an all around good community. The chief had sent us to Ponyville because as our culprit’s papers said, she was from there, so I guess we could ask around there and search for any leads on where to look for her.

Us…

The chief had found me a partner for this case, even though he knew I preferred to work alone. No ponies to hold me back right? This new meat was a scrawny tan coated unicorn with a greenish blue mane. Chief had said that he graduated top of his class at the police academy, as well as second in police magic self-defense, so I guess he would be helpful. According to this paper, this Twilight Sparkle character was the most dangerous pony in Equestria. Guilty of, get this, treason! TREASON!

I knew how these warrant papers were made. Every type of crime was listed on a machine in the form of a button. When that button was pressed, an ink-covered mallet would strike these pieces of paper forming the appropriate crime on the page. Now all I could do was wonder how long it had been since the “treason” button had been struck.

My partner and I met up in front of the department, where we had a cab with two drivers waiting for us. Seeing him up close I realized how young this kid really was. He was barely even a stallion.

“Heeey partner!” he said extending a leg to shake my hoof, “My name is Rafferty, Jack Rafferty.”

Oh goddesses he was full of pep, must’ve had his grande-latte enema. I could already tell this was going to be a long trip…

“Yeah well, just do as I do rookie.” Who puts a rookie on a murder case? Guess this guy was really good in class.

***

He kept talking and talking and talking. After about an hour on the road to Ponyville, I felt like I had known the pony his whole life. He kept talking about himself and his new family. He told me of his dreams and aspirations. It even so happened that he would hit a sensitive topic… Politics. I put my hoof on my face. I couldn’t believe he was sharing his political views. And boy were they some pretty idealistic stuff.

He managed to start up a heated debate between the driving stallions. Now he’d done it.

We were about twenty minutes outside of Ponyville when the drivers started going at it.

“But that’s not fair the hard workers like us!” said one driver turning his head towards the other who looked back with a dissenting look. “I understand the need to expand our borders, but now’s not the time. I’m barely able to afford my house working as a taxi pony and you think the government should tax us more so that we can fund construction in unknown lands? I’m sorry but you sir are just wrong.”

I really wished they would just watch the damn road.

The other was about to retort but then we hit something in the road. Hard. What ever we had run over tipped over the carriage, which sent my partner and me hoofs up. We rolled out of the carriage and onto the side of the road, luckily unhurt.

I stood up, shaking the dirt off my coat. Dammit! I knew this would happen.

My intense frustration only grew the more I thought about how this could have been prevented.

I turned my head… What in the…

I figured out what we had run over. Or more appropriately, who. Had she been sleeping in the middle of the road or something? There she was, a grape colored mare, she, she looked just like…

She stood up and faced the two driver ponies who were still laying on the ground, trying to get themselves untangled from the carriage and its reigns.

Yeah that was her! Looks like Jack realized this as well. His usually peppy look changed to one of determination.

“That’s her Jack! Take her down!”

And all I could think about was what little Wheaty had said to me…

“…Kill it.” the words kept playing in my head.

> A Weak God
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


I trekked across the countryside aimlessly, looking for a suitable place to take shelter.

Ugh! Utterly useless, utterly and completely USELESS! This body, this blasted equine body was nothing short of terrible. What kind of a god would give such frail bodies to a sentient race like this?

Oh yes, my father. I sighed.

I hadn’t been on this planet for more than twenty-four hours (that’s what unit of time they used right?) and I already felt weak. Hauling the still unconscious body of that pink colored unicorn wasn’t helping either. Maybe… Maybe this race wasn’t worth the time and effort, maybe they were just like all the other life forms I had defeated.

But… they had the power, or magic as it was. The very fact that many of these creatures possessed this ‘magic’ was reason enough to keep going.

And, I considered, I felt this weak, perhaps not because of the frailty of the vessel, but instead because of the strength of it. Maybe it saw me as a parasite, which I admittedly was, and was trying to flush me out. If that were the case, then these creatures would easily be the strongest for me to take over so far. It certainly felt like the body was fighting to take control of itself. I felt clumsy still, as if I didn’t have full control over the brain’s motor controls. And most importantly, the power outlet that this creature had, its ‘horn’ as it was called, was unusable. Originally I had thought that it was because the power left with the disembodied consciousness that I saw back in the white room, but I realized that the power was still here. It was stored in the horn, blocked from my use. And there was plenty of the power. It was giving me a headache.

All of these things to consider, I had so many questions. And that’s why I carried this pink unicorn. I needed to study her. I needed to figure out why I couldn’t consume anything.

I realized that if I didn’t feed soon, than I would continue to weaken, and I could, in time, wither away. Forget the whole domination to please my bastard father, I knew that I had to feed if I wasn’t with him. I would fade into oblivion if I didn’t.

Such is the fate of a being like me who leaves the void, who leaves the infinite presence of the infinite power.

This was the first time I had ever considered my own mortality. This brought about a feeling I had never experienced for myself, though I had instilled this feeling in many creatures. Fear… Fear for my own life. I was suddenly overcome with instincts of self-preservation. I was willing to do anything to stay alive.

And for that moment, I forgot about everything else. I forgot about my father’s hatred of me, I forgot of all the times I killed, all the times I consumed and conquered. All I thought about was what lay ahead, and how to survive.

I forced my mind to focus on my objective, figuring out a way to feed. I had been traveling for a while now, this world’s sun cracking up on the horizon. It cast a dim reddish light that allowed me to see the full area around me. I was, conceivably, in the middle of nowhere. This would be as good a place as any to settle down, at least temporarily.

I had been using my power to carry the equine across the grassy planes. I knew that I needed to conserve my power, but with out hands, claws, are any other form of useable appendage, carrying it manually was out of the question, and I wasn’t about to use my vectors to carry her as that would drain even more of my power. I lay the mare on its side, down in the grass before me. The body remained motionless, save for the breathing, which caused its chest to inflate and deflate. There were two scars on her body from where I impaled her on my vectors. Of course I promptly sealed the wounds before too much blood had left her body.

I… I rather admired this piece. It… er… she was beautiful in her own way. I stood there, my stance awkward from the battered and unkempt vessel that I used, staring at this majestic creature. She brought back memories, old ones, of the lands I had been through and the creatures I had seen. For some reason, the image of one of those hairless monkeys came into my mind. I pondered for a bit as to why I was reminded of them. They didn’t look any thing similar. But yet both had a sort of inherent nobility, at least in the way they looked…

Even through my admiration of the species, I hadn’t forgotten what I was here for. I was here looking for survival...

No, I was here to win my place by my father’s side.

My mind had gotten off track again…

Again I forced myself to concentrate on the matter at hand (or hoof.)

I let a smile creep its way onto my body’s blank-eyed face. I enjoyed experimentation like this, especially when the stakes were high. And they had never been higher for me. After all, my very existence depended on it.

*** 

I really was at a loss at where to start my research. I put a forehoof on the pink pony’s horn and tried to send some of my power through it. The results I yielded didn’t show much. I sent a bit more power, to see if I could stimulate a reaction. This time I could feel something. I felt something pushing back on my power. It was, I was almost certain, the pony’s magic that pushed back. The magic seemed to have a mind of its own. Even though the mare was clearly unconscious, it still fought to protect the body from my intrusion. So, I figured that it wasn’t just the mare whose body I was in that did this. I considered the possibility that all these magical ponies had the same anomaly. Maybe… maybe the reason I was unable to feed was because of the nature of their magic. It acted alive. It had a mind of its own.

This whole idea perplexed me. And it left another question unanswered. If the reason I was unable to feed was because of the magic that these ponies possessed, then why couldn’t I consume the powerless one that I killed earlier? I felt the same push when I tried to consume him, resisting my power’s advances. I hadn’t sensed the magic in him, so if it was magic that was keeping me from feeding, then what was in this powerless creature. For some reason I was reminded of the power damping effect I felt when I had gotten close to this planet.

I started to grow frustrated. I indeed had a problem. I was unable to feed on this planet. And on top of that, there was no way for me to leave, to find some much weaker race to prey on. No, I was too weak at this point to evacuate the body and make it to freedom. In fact, if this body were destroyed, I probably would just dissipate almost instantly. Normally I would have been able to body jump but again the same problem persisted. The only reason I was able to enter this vessel I realized was because of the state I found it in.

To be a weak god among powerful creatures… I sighed

I had thought about dissecting the mare, as it would have provided some insight to the workings of their body. But having conquered so many species, I pretty much knew the anatomy of most beings with out cutting them open.

I was, however, planning on dissecting her horn. But that would have to wait for a later time. I needed to find a more suitable place to hold out. I let my body flow with a bit of my power. I cast the power at the pink mare, encasing her in a red glow. Doing this I was able to will her into the air. Using my power made it rather easy to carry her, but it had the cost of draining my power. But with out any efficient way to carry her otherwise, I was forced to spend my energy on lugging this pony around.

At the rate I was using my energy, I figured that I would have maybe a few weeks before I would fade out and die. (This was another mystery about this place. Normally, in the vacuum of space, I could survive for hundreds of cycles before I needed to feed.)  And while I still had these few days, the body I was in still felt the fatigue of the adventure that we had been on so far. It was another reason to find a decent shelter. That way I could fall unconscious in a safer area.

So I traversed the planes of this world again in the hope of finding some shelter. I didn’t really know what I was looking for; the area I was in was flat for as far as I could see and while I could certainly sense the presence of magic, it was far away. I decided to follow the magic, at least for a bit. I figured that it was probably some sort of settlement or village. Perhaps I could possibly set up my hideout somewhere on the outskirts of the place.

***

Ugh I was getting tired. I strained my vessel’s eyes trying to keep them open. 

The sun had been about halfway through the sky. It beat down pretty hard making the journey quite exhausting. Up to this point the land had been mostly rolling hills of grass, but now off in the distance I could see what looked like some farmland. In addition, I was approaching a road of some sort. It was a dirt path, covered with ‘U’ shaped prints. They were, I realized, hoof prints.

“Ugh…” a voice came from somewhere real close. I had just started following the road making my way closer to what looked like another farmhouse when the voice sounded. It startled me a bit. The pink mare I had been carrying had finally started to wake up. She started moaning. I could tell she was in pain. I may have mended the wounds, but on the inside she would still be feeling the damage I did.

I stared at her for a moment, watching her squirm. She was only half conscious, not at all aware of her situation. Before long I would need to put her in stasis…

I veered off the road levitating the mare with me. There was a small ditch with some brush that I would be able to use to conceal myself while I put the mare into a stasis.

Once we were out of site from the road I lay the pink mare down in the bushes. She started becoming more aware of her surroundings squirming more and more. She began whimpering. The pain of the two holes in her body was starting to grip her. Her half open eyes filled with pained tears. It was hard for me to watch. A growing feeling in my mind told me to quickly put her in stasis so she wouldn’t feel the pain. But I knew that wouldn’t be enough. I had to heal her wounds completely.

This planet is making me go crazy! Just hours earlier I had squeezed the life out of a living creature, and I relished every second of it. So where was this feeling coming from? Why did I all of a sudden care that this poor thing was in pain? Was I really planning on even keeping her alive anyway?

I tried not to think about it too much. I put a hoof on her chest. I conjured up the familiar warmth into the tips of my hooves. After some time had passed, my hooves glowed white with power. Then I released the power into her chest. Her body started to spasm as if she was being shocked. A moment later she went still. I had accomplished what I had intended. I put her into stasis, while some more of my energy worked hard at mending the holes in her chest. There at least she wouldn’t be in that much pain. She may be a little stiff but that would be unavoidable.

I left her stiff in the bushes while I staggered sleepily into the middle of the road. I was going to pass out. Maybe I shouldn’t have tried to heal… the… pony…

I nodded off for a second before I looked back up… I was… too… tired…

The last thing I saw was something heading towards me on the road as I passed out.

> Out of our Hooves
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I was ready to move over to the subdued mare and put her out. I kept having the image of my grandson saying, “kill it.” I knew it wasn’t my family I wanted to avenge, but I couldn’t stand the thought of something corrupting a little colt like that.

I trotted over to the killer not even thinking about what I was about to do. What was I about to do? Was I really going to kill her... Possibly. I wanted to snuff the bitch, for little Wheaty… for little Ellis. I had to make sure this mare would never hurt anyone again. All I’d have to do was walk over to her, turn around, lift my hind legs, and buck her head into the ground. I could buck her head until there was nothing left but splintered bone. It would be easy enough, even with my aged body…

So I stopped in front of this monster, who was pressed against the road under the rookie’s subdue spell. I gritted my teeth when I looked at her.

What a disgusting sight, and not just because I despised her. Maybe she could have been a beautiful mare, had it not been for her misshaped face, her blank white eyes, her disastrous mane and coat. She smelled horrible as well. She smelled like something died. The smell was so strong in fact that I nearly gagged just standing next to her.

I kept looking at her. I kept looking and I kept getting angrier. And the more I watched her the more disgusting she became. The more disgusted I became of her, the more I desired to kill her. It got to the point where I was actually about to pound her face into the ground. I wanted her dead and I didn’t even care to ask her why she destroyed this family. Before I made any rash decisions, I glanced over at Rafferty. He seemed to be focused on maintaining his spell. I stepped closer to the mare and turned around, ready to release my anger. I leaned forward, getting ready to buck Ms. Sparkle in the head.

Was I really about to do this?

…

Yes I was.

And then… I released. I let my muscles push so that I sent my hind legs hurling towards the mare. But… I never connected. No, instead I was pushed over by some force sending me face first into the ground. It was a magical force, I could tell as I hadn’t felt anything touch me.

As I picked myself up off the dirt road, I heard my partner speak at me.

“What in the hell was that about?” He spoke through clenched teeth. Obviously he still trying to concentrate on subduing the mare. “What do you think this is, the Wild West? This isn’t some bounty you can just bring in dead or alive.” The damn rookie was trying to lecture me. “Besides, her papers say specifically to NOT kill her. She must be important.”

“Yeah, well to hell with the papers!” I retorted, “She deserves to die.”

“That’s not for you to decide! So step away from her.” He had said that last part half threateningly. I knew not to mess with a unicorn like this so I complied, trotting away from the mare, who still remained silent… watching us… waiting… It was pretty unnerving.

“Are we going to have any more problems?” He asked as I stepped away.

I responded to him coldly, “No.” Then I added, sighing and letting go of some of my tension. “Sorry about that, I guess I just… I just got caught up in the moment.”

“Are y’all alright?!” called a voice several yards down the road. It was one of the two heads of the taxi we had been taking. The other taxi pony was still by the overturned cart trying to flip it back over. He glanced at the purple mare on the ground looking surprised. He didn’t say anything about her. He seemed to understand that we were cops and that he shouldn’t question us.

“We’re fine.” Grunted the rookie. There was a crashing sound, and, I saw, the other taxi pony had managed to flip the cart back upright.

He called out to the three of us standing here. “We’re in luck, the cart isn’t damaged. Is everyone ready to head out?” He too now noticed the purple mare pressed against the dirt. As he walked over to us he asked about the mare.

“Who’s this? She do something wrong?” This pony was a little more talkative.

“Yeah,” I said “ ‘fraid that’s all I can tell ya though” He seemed to just shrug off the notion that we had a new passenger. He couldn’t complain, since they would be getting more bits for taking three ponies instead of two.

“Hey!” called the rookie trying to get all of our attentions. The two pony cart drivers and I turned our heads to hear what he had to say. “Y’all might wanna cover your eyes for just a sec.”

And I did without question. I knew what he was doing, though I suspected the drivers didn’t because I heard the rookie say, “Suit ya’selves.”

And then there was a flash of bright white light. The light was intense enough for me to see even though had my right foreleg covering my face. Rafferty was forcing the purple mare into unconsciousness. It was spells like these that made somepony like him necessary for these cases.

I opened my eyes as the flash of blinding light came to an end. After my eyes adjusted to the dimmer daylight, I saw that both of the drivers were on the ground rubbing their eyes with their hooves.

“What was that for!?” one of them shouted.

“You should’ve covered your eyes.” Rafferty responded dryly. I chuckled under my breath. Everypony always questioned this spell the first time and everypony always had to learn the hard way.

I looked to the now unconscious mare that lay on the dirt road. The spell had worked and Rafferty had stopped his subdue spell. The mare now lay in a motionless heap on the ground, mouth wide open, eyes shut. Thank Celestia too, her eyes were starting to creep me the hell out. When I looked back up at the rookie I noticed he looked a lot more relaxed then when he did while maintaining his subdue.

So now with the culprit unconscious, we were ready to continue to Ponyville. Only now instead of looking for leads, we were headed to the Ponyville Police Department.

I let out a sigh, reaching for a piece of tobacco in my pocket, a piece that wasn’t there. I cursed. When we got to Ponyville, I was going to pick up some some tobacco.

I had to help the rookie lift the purple mare’s body into the wagon. She really wasn’t that heavy, which was good because I was getting too old to lift things like this…

But hay… I was close to retirement.

*** 

Our little ‘stop’ had only burned about ten minutes so within twenty more minutes we were already in Ponyville. Luckily the town was fairly small so it was easy to find the police department. After hauling the mare’s body off the taxi cart and hoofing an extra thirty bits to the taxi ponies they headed off. Boy would they sure have a story to tell.

It only took another few minutes to get this body into a holding cell. Obviously, I thought, she wouldn’t be here long. She was arrested for treason and again she was arrested for murder. Crimes like that easily would put her in the royal Canterlot dungeon.

Well, I guess it was time to call the chief.

I gave a nod to my partner who, at this point, was just following me around. He gave me a nod back and continued to stay close. I found an old timey telephone laying at an empty desk in the department. For some reason each police station seemed to keep really old equipment and tech.

I wrapped my foreleg around the receiver and put it up to my face.

The calm voice of a mare spoke in my ear, “How may I help you?”

I gave her my name and badge ID and then asked for her to connect me to the EEPD.

“One moment.” Said the voice. There was a long pause and there were some clicking sounds followed by ringing. I took that time to say a word to my partner.

“Hey could you go out to the market and get me some chew?” I asked him quietly hoofing him some bits. “Oh and get something for yourself to eat while your there, I’ll let you know what the chief says.” I added, giving him a few extra bits.

“Sure, make the new guy run errands.” He said sarcastically and then smirked. He accepted the money and headed out.

The ringing stopped and another female voice spoke into my ear.

“Good afternoon Detective Hartigan how can I help you?”

“Could you get me Chief Blueshield?” I responded and was met with another “please wait.” My anticipation started to build. I was getting excited to tell the chief that we had already caught our killer.

After several moments a raspy voice sounded over the receiver, the voice of Chief Blueshield. “Hello detective.”

“Chief!” I spoke excitedly. I always got worked up when I had good news for the chief. “I have good news, we got the killer and…” He cut me off

“Stop, right there, just stop… Hartigan. We’re taking you off the case.”

WHAT! “Wha- what do you mean off the case!” Was this really being taken from me!

“Go ahead and come home, its done, you’re off the case Hartigan” He said, coldly. He wasn’t joking. He never joked.

“You can’t just take me off the case I…” again he cut me off. I slammed my free hoof on the desk.

"It’s already done Hartigan, we’ve been talking to the higher ups… its already out of our hooves. Who ever this Twilight dame is, she’s bad news.” I still couldn’t believe this was happening

“What about the wife, she was never found, what about her?!” I was almost yelling by now and ponies all over the room had turned their head to look at me.

“Don’t worry about finding her, she is going to take the fall for the murder.” He sounded a little disappointed when he said this, so at least, I thought, he wasn’t too happy about this turn of events. But I still couldn’t let this slide.

I paused for a brief moment, an image of my grandson saying “kill it” popped into my head.

“How can we do that, we know she didn’t kill her husband, WE ALREADY HAVE THE KILLER, she’s right here in this cell!” I waved my hoof in the direction of the holding cells where the unconscious mare was kept as if he could see the gesture.

“Look,” he said “I understand how this sounds, but orders are orders. And since when did you care this much about what happened to the victims?”

“Alright,” I said, trying to calm down, though I still was hardly thinking about my next words, “well then, considered this my retirement…” I said bitterly. I slammed the receiver back into its holder.

Goddesses be damned! Well I just quit, so there wasn’t much left for me to do. But at least now I could continue to search for this wife, Cherrie Redberry was her name if I remembered correctly. I just hoped she wasn’t a corpse.

I stomped my way out of the building, causing heads to turn as I passed, and sat down on a bench that rested just outside the station. I put my face in my hooves. I still couldn’t believe I just quit.

After a few minutes, the rookie returned levitating a small box of tobacco and a daisy sandwich, which he took a bite of and then sat down next to me.

He floated the box of chew to me, which I took.

“So,” he sounded full of pep as always, “What’d Blueshield say?”

“Go home kid, we’re through.” I responded harshly, I really didn’t feel like explaining the situation.

“Excuse me?”

“The chief took us off the case. Just go home, take a cab and go home.” I said opening the box of chew and stuffing a piece into my mouth.

Then I frowned. I promised myself I’d quit chewing the stuff the day I retired. I spat the piece out of my mouth and onto the ground.

> Celestia's Conflict Pt 1
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I had a friend indeed. A friend only I could see. She made waiting out the night bearable. So I thanked her for not hating me. Especially after I used her.

Then I had a headache. Only it was incurable by conventional means. My headache had become the bane of my existence. The sad news was that my headache was also my friend, my faithful student, my very own filly. I was almost unwilling to admit to myself that she wasn’t even my actual daughter. I sure loved her as one (I mean I do understand that I’m supposed to be the mother of all ponies but she’s sort of been the closest thing to my own daughter.)

Every second of the hours I had spent after that… what ever it was… had stolen my precious student’s body, had been hell in Equestria. Having a second conscience had proven to be the most pain I had ever experienced. It was a pain that went all the way to my very soul.

I couldn’t place the pain she caused me. Maybe, I thought, it was as if my very essence opened up a tub of ice cream then ate the entire container in one bite. So she was a similar feeling to a brain freeze but still not quite.

Or possibly she was like having a sinus infection. As if there was some sort of pressure built up behind my face, pressure that threatened to burst my face open, pressure that threatened to pop my eyes out of their sockets.

There were other side effects to having my friend with me like this. My nose bled, my ears bled, my eyes were constantly watering, although I had done my fair share of crying, especially with the pain I had been in. My mane, which I thought was a strange side effect, had stopped flowing, and actually just fell limp by my face.

So as I paced around the castle for hours and hours, trying to think of what to do and of what had happened, I spoke, in my head, to my friend Twilight Sparkle. We both agreed that she needed her body back. And above all else we needed to stop the being that had possessed her body.

The amount of magical power it was capable of using had astonished me when I first saw it. I couldn’t understand why it hadn’t crushed me, but it made its intension clear from our first encounter. It planned on, not waging war with us, but exterminating us, and I wasn’t about to underestimate its power.

Shining Armor had a warrant for the arrest of Twilight’s possessed body.

Thinking about that reminded me of how only hours ago, I had to tell Shining Armor what was going on. Being the captain of the Royal Guard, he was responsible for handling any and every transgression of this magnitude; he had helped when Chrysalis threatened my people. So I thought he wouldn’t take the news about his sister well.

My mind jumped back a few hours, remembering how the conversation went.

***

Luna and I crept down a long, narrow hallway at what must have been one in the morning. At the end of the hall there was a door, the door that lead to Cadence and Armor’s sleeping quarters. Luna stayed glued to me the whole walk, pressed to me like my shadow. She kept whispering questions like, “What aren’t you telling me?” “Where were you before this?” and “What has Twilight done?”

As we reached the door, I turned my head to face my sister. “I will explain, sister, but we must bring Shining into it as well so just be patient.” I said in a hushed voice. The thought of telling them what had happened made my stomach churn, but it didn’t look as if I had much choice. And on top of my guilty conscience, I had the conscience of twilight crammed in my skull too. I felt her sense of betrayal, and then I felt her understanding. It was as if she knew that I had used her, but at the same time understood and forgave me.

That idea brought up another unsettling thought, maybe she could read my mind, see my memories, know things that only I knew. I certainly could read hers or at least her emotion, as I hadn’t really spent time testing our situation.

I turned my head to the heavy wooden door that separated us from the slumbering Captain and Princess. Although from the sound of it, they weren’t asleep. I could here voices from the other side. At least I wouldn’t be waking them up.

I extended a forehoof and gently knocked on the door, shifting nervously in place. I felt a cold sweat break out on my forehead and my headache was getting worse. All the stress was making me feel sick to my stomach, which was a bit out of character for me, but I was finding it increasingly hard to maintain a sense of control.

I heard some shuffling around from behind the door followed by the voice of Shining Armor. He muttered something at first, which I didn’t pick up, than he called out to the knocking sound, “Yes… who is it?” I sensed a bit of irritation in his voice.

I leaned closer to the door and spoke to where the couple on the other side could just understand me, “Its Celestia and Luna…” I took a short pause to gather my thoughts. I was about to say more but then Shining spoke again.

“Oh. Its you.” He said losing the sound of irritation. There was another pause and I could hear more movement from behind the door. Then he continued sounding as sincere as he could, “Come in, the door isn’t locked.”

I held my breath for a second, and put my forehoof on the door handle. I let out the breath, trying to prepare myself for what I had to say, and then shouldered the door open.

On the other side of the door lay the married ponies, bodies mostly hidden under the covers of their royalty-sized bed. Both of them were awake, though my niece didn’t seem to notice our intrusion much. Shining Armor had scooted to the back end of his bed so that he sat propped up against it’s backing. Cadence lay next to him, eyes only half open, a foreleg wrapped around her husband, and her face half buried in his chest. They looked… peaceful. This made it even harder to talk to them, to be the barer of bad news. I hated to ruin this intimate moment of theirs.

I must have been zoned out for second. Luna nudged me and gestured to the couple laying in the bed. “Well?” Luna whispered to me.

Oh yeah, the reason I had come here.

I cleared my throat, and then spoke to the stallion that sat up in bed, “Shining Armor I need to speak to you, now, its urgent.”

“Anything you need Princess, what is it?” He responded sounding serious. He didn’t move from the bed.

“Could you please step out here with us. Its about your sister.” At the mention of his sister, he perked up.

“Twilight? What’s wrong, did something happen?” He still didn’t get out of bed, but when his questions were met with silence and grim looks, he scrambled to get up, letting his wife’s hoof slide off his chest and onto the bed. She reached out for him as he got up from the bed and put on a playfully sad face. Shining armor then turned towards his wife and whispered to her. “It’s ok, I’ll be right back.” He said softly to her, and then he brushed back her mane and planted a kiss on her forehead. Shining Armor made his way over towards us. As he approached he noticed my battered face. He started to ask, “Princess, your face what hap…?” but I cut him off.

“I will explain, follow me into the hallway.” I said to him.

The three of us walked hurriedly into the hallway.

Once we were out in the hallway and the door was shut, I took a step back, nervously, from the two ponies I was with. I looked at both of them, with a look of distaste and discomfort, a look that reflected how I felt about what I had done.

“Well?” prodded Luna

I took a deep breath, looking at both the ponies I was about to disappoint.

“I…” I started choking up. My throat grew sore with the anticipation. In the back of my head, I could hear a voice, Twilights voice, pushing me onwards, trying to coax me into telling the truth.

But I didn’t want to. How could I tell them the truth? The truth was hard enough on me as it was.

“I… I messed up. Armor, I messed up.”

And then I told them everything. I told them about my secret lab, my plans to ‘make Equestria a better place.’ Then I told them about what happened to twilight, how her body was stolen. I told them how it was my fault, how I should never have done this.

By the end of my explanation my eyes were closed and fresh tears had found their way on to my already tear stained face. I couldn’t bear to look at their faces. I was sure they would have been mortified by what I had told them.

For several seconds I was met with silence and I slowly opened my eyes to gauge their reactions.

Luna stared at me, her mouth slightly open, completely speechless. Despite all the build up to my story, she couldn’t seem to believe what I had said.

Shining on the other hoof stared at the ground, not saying anything. He maintained a look of contemplation. Or anger, I couldn’t tell. He was Twi’s brother and I felt it necessary to comfort him. I took a step towards him and put a hoof on his back.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…” my voice trailed off and he looked into my eyes. His expression changed. A faint but fake smile curved up on his lips and he spoke to me.

“You act as if Twilight were dead.” He said with a quivery voice. He didn’t follow up with anything else so I tried to speak again.

“Yes, of course, well we need to find her um…” I couldn’t think of a more appropriate word than ‘body.’

He shook my hoof off his back and began to walk in the other direction.

“Yes, Princess, I know.” He said coldly, “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a job to do…” he gave a pause and then added even colder “In Celestia I trust.” He dropped his half smile, then turned around and walked away from us, not towards his bedroom. He was leaving, I knew, to go fix my mess. He said he had a job to do, and a job is what he was doing.

After Luna and I watched him leave, Luna turned to me, a look of disappointment on her face. She came close to me and raised her hoof as if she were going to slap me.

Ah here it came, she was going to give me what I deserved. No I deserved more. Being hit by my sister surely wasn’t enough to pay the price for what I did. I braced for her hoof to come crashing into my face. I closed my eyes again and looked away.

But she didn’t hit me. Instead, she lowered her hoof onto my back and brought me in to a hug.

Then, Luna whispered to me, “It’ll be alright sister, we can fix this…” and after a second of silence she added, “I guess we’re even now.”

What could she have meant by that? Was she referencing her bout as Nightmare Moon or something?

***

It was about five in the evening and I still hadn’t gotten any sleep. This whole time I had been pacing frantically around the hallways. I couldn’t take my mind off the problems I had been facing, not even for a minute.

Luna, my sister, she was so sweet. She offered to perform the sun rising ritual for me. I accepted her offer, not without hesitation.

Eventually, one of my guards approached me levitating a message. He gave me a rolled piece of parchment, which was sealed with some string. After I thanked the guard for giving me the message and sent him on his way, I ripped the string off the paper and unrolled it.

The message read:

"Dear our most blessed Princess Celestia,

We are contacting you to inform you of the capture of the criminal TWILIGHT SPARKLE."

I skipped through most of the letter. Where did it say she was, who was holding her now?

Then I looked at the bottom of the scroll.

"Forever in your service, Ponyville"

She had already been captured?! A sense of relief washed over me and I could feel the feeling in Twilights consciousness as well.

Well, I had many questions for this Lucy, as it called itself.

But I wondered how it was captured so quickly. It was the most powerful magical creature I had ever encountered.

Well I guess I’d never know unless I’d visit Ponyville.

Ponyville? The irony was not lost on me.

Hold on Twi I’ll get your body back.

> Celestia's Conflict Pt 2
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I showed up at the Ponyville Police Department flanked by half a dozen of my royal bodyguards. I was a disaster. My mane had become frazzled, trails of crusty dry blood lined down both sides of my head, and down around the corners of my mouth, proof that my nose and ears had been bleeding, and my entire face looked infected. It had swollen like a balloon. One eye had completely swollen shut, while the other was pushed up to where just a sliver of my eye was exposed. The weight of my enlarged head was causing my neck to be sore. Having Twilight in my head was really taking its toll on me. But I didn’t have time to look presentable (I hadn’t even worn my royal crown.) I needed to find Twilight’s body as soon as I could. At least none of these ponies would have the courage to ask me what was wrong with my face…

As I entered the building, everypony quickly shot up in attention and the building fell silent. Ponies all around the building knelt out of respect, trying to keep their head as close to the ground as they could. I made my way to a brown-coated, red curly-maned secretary who didn’t seem to notice that I had entered. She was buried in paperwork and when my bodyguards and I made our way over towards her, she waved a hoof in the air, not bothering to look up. “How may I help you?” she said in an unenthusiastic voice. She was oblivious to the attentiveness of everypony around her.

I cleared my throat to get her attention. I didn’t want to make a big deal about my arrival even though every other pony already had. She didn’t seem to hear me clear my throat, so I decided to voice my problem.

“Excuse me, ma’am, I am here to see Twilight Sparkle.” After the hearing the name Twilight Sparkle, she dropped what paperwork she had been in the middle of completing and looked up. The shock of being so close to me and not showing respect nearly knocked her out of her chair. She scrambled around trying to bow her head before me as quick as she could.

“Of course my princess, right this way my princess!” She spat out, getting up from her over exaggerated display of submission.

She led us to a set of office rooms where we were left to a maneless, yellow-coated pegasus who I presumed was the chief of the Ponyville Police Department. When he first saw me, I noticed, he looked a little surprised, probably because of the way my face looked, but he gave me a quick bow and motioned for us to follow him. He took us, in silence, to another part of the building where there were several rows of holding cells. Once there, I turned and told my bodyguards to wait for me outside the cell. I entered the cell alone.

Here I was, face to face with the hell-spawn that was at the root of all my problems. The monster that used to be Twilight looked almost as beat up as I did. Twilight’s body had a dirty mane and tail and unwashed coat. The face was covered in nicks and bruises. It… looked defeated.

We stood here in this holding cell. The particular holding cell we were in was completely sealed off from the outside, a heavy metal door covering its entrance. The room was windowless, featureless, unfurnished, and the walls and floor were made of a gray seedy, clay material that left residue on my hooves. It was supposed to deter the use of magic somehow. Not that it would be much use against a being as intense as Lucy, which is why I took precautions. I had the entire cell encased in a warp barrier, which would hopefully force this thing to stay in here with me.

With me… Just me and it… Nopony else in the cell. Nopony could come help me if things went south…

I shifted nervously in place, not daring to take my eyes off Twilight’s possessed body. I feared that at any moment she would materialize right in front of me, and… well… kill me in some disturbing display of power. Maybe it would use those black tentacles and rip me in half. Maybe it would simply just hoist me into the air with its reddish magic and snap my spine. Maybe it would cause my body to burst open with its demon powers…

I started to get lost in all the horrible ways this thing could end me. But even through the morbid fascination with death that I had all of a sudden found, there still was the voice of Twilight Sparkle shining through everything.

How could I forget about where she really was? She was in my head, filling it with more than thoughts and feelings. She filled it with torture. I prided myself in having an unusually high pain tolerance, but let me tell you, this was easily the most pain I had ever been in. The pain had only increased as time went on too. It didn’t show any signs of retreat and at one point I even considered letting the purple pony demon kill me, just to end the pain, but I guess I didn’t deserve the easy way out. I was on painkillers, which helped me deal with a small amount of the pain, but only just enough for me to focus on what I was doing. I hoped twilight couldn’t feel the pain.

But yes, through the pain I could hear Twilight’s voice. She reminded me what I was here for.

So I opened my mouth, not really sure what to say. I ended up saying the first thing to cross my mind, which was in keeping with my sudden fascination with death.

“Why haven’t you killed me yet?” I asked after staring down Lucy for sometime in silence. “And for that matter, why are you letting us keep you in this prison?” It didn’t respond, it just stared at me with its glazed eyes. Its look sent chills down my neck.

“Lucy, wasn’t it?” I asked rhetorically. It seemed more attentive now that I knew its name.

“Ah yes, the regal pony.” It spoke in its multi-layered voice, a voice of nightmares. The sound of its voice didn’t even come from its mouth but rather the air around it. That being said, it spoke casually, “I had a feeling we would meet again sooner or later, sooner rather than later by the looks of it. Based on all this power flowing around this room and the number of guards you have set up outside, I assume you must be very important in your society.”

She could sense the guards? 

I nodded my head, trying to maintain an air of authority. “Yes,” I responded, “I am Princess Celestia. I rule these ponies. I am their leader.”

“Yes well, I guess I could kill you and make my escape if I wanted, couldn’t I. But that would be a waste of my power.” It said.

I swallowed nervously. This monster just told me that at any time she could kill me. I wasn’t even offended to hear that I would be a waste of its power.

Again, I heard the voice of Twilight, but this time instead of just listening to her, I found myself actually voicing her thoughts. This scared me because I realized that it hadn’t been my conscious decision to say the next words that came out of my mouth.

“I want my body back.” I put a hoof over my mouth. I kept staring at the mare in front of me, afraid that what I had said had offended it in some way.

Lucy spoke, sounding interested in what I had just said, “Your body? Hmmm. Let me ask you something?” I nodded my head. Of course I wasn’t going to say no. “Does it seem like you have a second conscience?”

“Y-yes” I said nodding slowly.

I saw Twilight’s… er Lucy’s otherwise blank expression change. A creepy, soulless smile twitched into place until her entire face was grinning from ear to ear.

Lucy’s voice sounded, albeit quietly to itself, “Of all the lucky breaks…” then it spoke up, talking to me. “So it is safe to assume you need something that only I can give you. You need to get rid of this other conscience, am I correct?”

I stared at Lucy for a few seconds, lost in what it had said. Then I shook my head and spoke, “Oh… y-yes. I mean no…” for some reason I had trouble finding the right words to say, “Twilight needs her body back.” I finally managed

“Yes of course.” Lucy mused, not breaking the insane smile. Lucy began to pace around the room. “Well then it looks like we can help each other.”

I hadn’t expected this. I absently checked over my shoulder to see if there was anypony else in the room who could hear what was being said. When I turned my head back around, I was startled to see that Lucy was now standing right in front of me, its blank white eyes staring me down intensely.

“Help each other?” I asked. The notion seemed insane. Why would I help the same pony that said it would try to kill everypony I ruled? And what could somepony of that power need of me?

“Indeed. You see, Celestia, I have run into my own problems since I have been here. You may find it hard to believe, but I have been growing weaker since I’ve been here.” Lucy explained. The more it explained, the less it felt like my enemy and the more it felt like somepony who I could work with. Even though what Lucy said had massive implications about hurting my people, it spoke as if I could trust in what was said.

Lucy started pacing around the room again and continued to explain. “Now normally this wouldn’t be a problem, but since I have been unable to consume any of your people…” Maybe I should have been more surprised to hear that she consumed ponies but by now I really wasn’t. “…I have come to the realization that I may die soon.” Lucy reached the center of the room while it was pacing and stopped. It turned and faced me, the maniacal grin replaced with another expressionless stare. “This is where you come in. I need you to help me find a way to feed. If you do that, then you get your body back, and I will even leave your race alone. How does that sound?”

Then twilight spoke through me. Apparently, she detested this abomination more than I did. “Tell us why we shouldn’t just let you die off and figure the rest out for ourselves.” I was again afraid that Lucy would become irritated and strike me down.

Lucy spoke again, the evil smile returning on its face. “I assume that was the second consciousness speaking. Allow me to sweeten the deal a bit then for you.” It said coldly. “If I die, your body will be destroyed. Oh, still not good enough, well then let me point out that every moment you are crammed in your ruler’s head you are killing her.”

“What?” the question echoed through the room and our heads.

“Let me put it this way,” Lucy explained, “having more than one physical conscience is like inflating a balloon that’s already full. It may stretch a bit further, but when your consciousness has started to fully take over your precious ‘Princess Celestia’s’…” Lucy paused and bent its legs making it look like it was about to pounce at me, “POP!!!” it said, and teleported right in front of me, making me jump back a few feet, nearly crashing into the door behind me.

I felt the overwhelming sense of guilt rush over Twilight’s feelings. She felt like she was now responsible for putting me in danger. I had the same feeling; only I was concerned that I had been the one that had doomed us. We weren’t really left with many options. Looks like we would be working together now. Now to just get Lucy back to Canterlot.

> Apples and Cherries
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I had an awful dream last night:

I had been laying down in my bed, waiting for John to return to me. Then I heard the voice of John come from the other room. He sounded angry.

What was going on? What happened? Did the boys do something?

I heard him say, “Who are you… Get the hell out of my house.”

Someone was in our house? What in the hay…

I quickly shot up out of bed. I made my way out of the room. Once I was in the hallway, I pressed up against the wall and trotted quietly towards the living room.

A loud crashing sound erupted through the hallway. I slammed myself into the wall harder, startled, and then continued on towards the disturbance. As I passed the boys room, their door creaked open. Wheaty poked his head out first, and then Ellis. I whispered their names and ushered them to stay behind me.

There was a strange voice coming from the room we were approaching. It didn’t sound like any voice I had ever heard before. If somepony had asked me to describe it, I wouldn’t really know what to say.

Then we rounded the corner, the full view of the nightmarish scene sprawled out before us.

It was a demon of some kind. Five glossy, black tentacles sprang from the back of the pony demon. It had my John pinned to a wall and looked to be crushing the life out of him.

All I could think of doing was… No wait… I didn’t think. I just screamed.

The demon pony switched its attention to me, throwing two of its dark feelers at me. They struck me in the chest. Strangely I didn’t feel them. I didn’t feel anything. I just went black. And the last thing I heard was “There’s the magic.”

A voice of pure evil…

It was a most terrifying dream indeed.

***

Oddly enough the first sense to come back was my sight. Though to call it sight would be a bit of a stretch. I was lying sprawled out on my back and all I could see, as my eyes painfully fluttered open, was a kaleidoscope of colors and shadows. I could make out the androgynous shapes of other ponies. There were maybe two or three of them circled around my tunnel vision, hovering over me like spirits.

Sound was the next thing to pick back up. As the shapes slowly focused into more definable objects and ponies, muffled voices clouded my head. The ponies’ voices I heard were impossible to understand at first, but after a minute of laying half awake, the voices became more and more intelligible until I could piece together words and sentences.

“Woah nelly! She’s wakin’ up.” Said an orange colored mare, who leaned in to block the view of the other pony. By the end of her statement, the room had come fully into focus. The mare was a tomboyish looking earth pony with a freckled face and a long blond mane pulled into a ponytail.

“Ya’ alright darlin? How ya’ feelin’?” Inquired the orange lady standing over me. I really wasn’t sure how to respond. I couldn’t think of words. I was only marginally aware that I had been asked a question.

It was a simple ‘how are you feeling’ question to which I responded with a moan. My body began to ache, especially my chest.

I felt the orange pony grab my forehoof with hers and she started trying to comfort me. She stroked my foreleg affectionately, which strangely did help me feel a little more comfortable.

“Everything’s gonna be fine ok, I’m right here.” She said. I found her country accent soothing.

A few seconds passed and I realized that my mouth was dry. My tongue had dried up and stuck to the roof of my mouth. It felt like a big ball of cotton.

“Wa… wa-water.” I coughed. Only the mare holding my hoof had understood me. She turned her head and faced somepony else.

“Could ya get some water from the kitchen?” She asked the other pony.

“Eeyup.” Said a soft stallion voice.

I heard the sound of hoof steps and moments later the kind pony holding my hoof took a cup of water and put it up to my lips. She tilted it so that the water flowed into my mouth. It was cold and refreshing. My dry mouth practically soaked up the water. In just a few seconds the cup was empty, and I felt considerably better.

“Thank you…” I managed to cough.

I tried sitting up, but the mare put her hoof on my chest.

“Hold on their sugarcube, not so fast.” She said.

“No, I can sit up, I’m fine now.” I said to her brushing her hoof off me and reaching an upright position.

As I sat up I looked around. I was sitting on a couch. It wasn’t my couch. It wasn’t my house. I didn’t know these ponies…

What…? Where was I?

This was similar to my house. It was an old wood walled living room. In fact it looked like the typical interior of a farmhouse.

“What am I doing here?” I thought aloud.

In response to my question, the mare spoke up. “Big Mac and I here found you unconscious near the edge of our farm. We brought you back to our house.”

That sounded ridiculous, but then again I was just at home sleeping with my husband. And now I woke up here with these ponies…

I put my hoof on my chest feeling desperately for two wounds that might have been there. Images of the frightening dream I had just awoken from flashed through my head. There wasn’t anything there, or at least I thought so at first, but when I actually looked at my chest, I saw two scars.

The mare continued, “Yep, we found you, just laying in a bush out cold as rain. Ya been layin here most the day.”

I had two strange scars on my chest, and I had awoken in some stranger’s home.

But I was dreaming…

…

WHAT’S GOING ON!

“Where am I again? Sorry if I sound a bit clueless here, it’s just that the last thing I can remember was laying in my own bed at home.” I said.

“Really?” asked the mare, she had a puzzled look on her face, “You ain’t got any idea how ya mighta got here?”

I shook my head.

“Hmm well ain’t that strange?” She said with a quizzical look. “Where do you live? Are you on the other side of town?”

“My husband and I live on our cherry farm. You mighta heard of it, the Redberry farm.”

“Redberry farm!” exclaimed the orange mare. “You mean out by the East Equestrian border!?”

“Why yes,” I said, my concern matching her excitement, “where… where are we now?”

The mare stood up and faced the stallion, which I presumed was Big Mac. They shared a look of surprise. Then she turned her head back to me and said, “This is the Apple family farm. The one outsida’ Ponyville.”

An image of my horrible dream came up again and I tried to suppress it like a bad memory, but it kept coming back. The dream had felt so real.

I looked at the mare in disbelief.

***

A few hours had passed. The mare, whose name I had learned to be Applejack, offered to let me stay here for a day while I recovered. She seemed convinced that I had passed out due to heat exhaustion or something similar. I was skeptical, but I had no clue what could have happened myself so I chose to go with that for now. I decided it would be best to figure out what really had happened once I had left in the morning, so for now I would be staying with this family.

It was getting late in the evening and Applejack had fixed dinner for her family and me. We all sat around the dinner table with a bowl of dandelion pasta. I looked around the table at the three other ponies sitting down with me. There was Applejack on my right. She was a pretty young mare, blond hair pulled into a ponytail as was her actual ponytail, and on her face sat large half open emerald eyes. On her flank rested her cutie mark, three red apples.

Then, across from me, there was Big Macintosh, a hansom sturdy looking young stallion. He only looked a bit older than his sister, and I think he was. He too had a blonde mane and tail. His red coat was accented by his cutie mark, a large green, open-faced apple.

Then finally on my left there was Applebloom, a little yellow filly with topaz eyes and a pink tail and mane. She looked to be the same age as my little boys and almost as cute. Almost… I smiled when I thought of them. Just yesterday they were eating dinner with John and me and arguing over whom had a crush on whom. 

I let slip a smile that showed just how content I was once again if only for the moment. Though I had only just met these hospitable ponies, I felt like I had been their friend all along. They had let me feel at home, allowing me to clean myself up in their bathroom. They had let me stay here overnight, which I thought to be too generous, and then they were even feeding me. What good-natured ponies these were.

As we ate, Applejack spoke between bites of food. “So, Cherrie, how’s yer farm doin?”

“Oh we’ve been doin just fine with our berries.” I said.

“That’s good.” She said genuinely, “Ya know, us here in Ponyville get most of our sweet fruits from your farm.”

“Really, what about your farm?” I asked.

“Oh we mainly just grow and sell apples. Although we do sell a lot of apple sweets too.”

“Don’t forget the best pie in Equestria!” Applebloom chimed in, closed-eyed and smiling. 

“Eeyup.” Nodded Big Mac in agreement, sharing the same close-eyed smile.

“Aw shucks guys. Not like it’s my recipe.” Said Applejack growing red.

“You bake pies?” I asked interested.

“Mhmm.” She nodded her head.

“You ever enter them in contests?”

“Every year,” she pointed to a shelf of full of trophies and ribbons most of which saying ‘second place’ “But I’m always beat by this pony who calls herself ‘The Cherry Fairy” she said raising her hooves to make air quotations. After she said that she looked around the table with a face of dejection.

“Oh really.” I mused smugly. That was the name I used for all the competitions I entered (Nopony went by their real name in the competitions as a rule.) I wasn’t about to reveal myself now though. But I did have to admit, if she was second place to me, then she must have made some darn fine pies. It always seemed as if the judges couldn’t decide whether my pie was the best or this runner-up’s was the best. None of the other contestants even came close.

“Yeah but we all know you’re really the best!” Said Applebloom.

She was followed up by an “Eeeyup” from Big Mac.

“Speaking of pie…” Applejack said, sliding back from the table. She got up and walked into the kitchen. When she returned, she had a fresh apple pie sitting on her back and a bucket of homemade vanilla ice cream in her mouth, which she promptly set in the middle of the table. “I thought since we had company, we could have some pie tonight.”

This plastered wide grins on everypony’s faces.

“Oh, Applejack, you really didn’t have to…” I protested, though I relished the thought of tasting my rival’s apple pie.

“Nonsense!” She declared, “It’s like Pinkie says, every new face deserves a celebration!”

I didn’t know this Pinkie character, but hay, this family was the nicest family I had ever met.

We each received a slice of pie and a scoop of ice cream. I levitated a spoon into the ball of ice cream first and then plunged the same bite into the pie. Once the spoon was overflowing with the cold and the warm dessert mixture, I raised it to my face and examined it. The pie was gushing with bits of apple smothered in a cinnamon sauce that drove my senses wild just smelling it.

“Well,” Piped Applejack cheerfully. Apparently she was waiting for me to take a bite so she could see what I thought. “Ya gonna just stare at it like its poison, eat it already.”

I was more than willing to comply. I stuffed the spoon into my mouth and then pulled it out slowly, leaving ice cream and pie in my mouth. The instant the two touched my tongue, there was and explosion of flavor. Besides the amazing mixture of hot and cold, there was the amazing mixture of cinnamon and vanilla. The crust was buttery and rich, which helped magnify all of the flavors that washed over my palate. As I slowly bit down into the chunk of heaven, the apples burst releasing even more sweet flavors. After several precious seconds of absorbing the exquisite flavors, I finally swallowed the piece, which slid down my throat just as gracefully. The Goddesses had graced me.

“Well?” asked Applejack. I slowly pulled my head back up and saw that everypony else had long since finished their pie and were holding their bellies in contentment.

I looked back down into the slice of pie before me. Tears started rolling down my face and into the sweet mess. I cried. It was so good.

“What’s wrong sugarcube?” Applejack asked worriedly.

I quickly waved her away and said with my eyes closed, “It’s the best pie I’ve ever tasted.”

Applejack looked relieved when I had said that.

“Pfft, Mares.” chuckled Big Mac. Hearing him actually say something caught me by surprise.

“What was that?” Applejack said to Big Mac half threateningly.

“Oh nothing.” He replied cheekily.

I took another bite, savoring every bit of crust, every bit of apples, and every bit of ice cream. And then I took another and another, until it was gone.


*** 

Nopony had a real bedtime. We all just decided that we were tired and ready to go to sleep. The three ponies of the house led me back to a room, which I figured was a guest bedroom. Applejack opened the door and welcomed me into the vacant bedroom.

“This actually used to be Granny’s room.” Applebloom said matter-of-factly.

Applejack froze up when she heard her sister say this. I could sense something Applebloom said had upset her. Applejack stared at the ground for second before turning away and saying a quick and cold, “g’night.”

As she walked away, I saw Big Mac lift a forehoof and smack Applebloom in the back of the head.

“OW, Now what in the hay did you do that for?” Applebloom demanded.

A few moments later, Applebloom and Big Mac left for their rooms as well. I stepped hoof into the room looking at all the pictures and decorations. The room was full of framed pictures. Most of them were pictures of the family working in the farm. In all of them, the ponies were smiling. It was rather pleasant to see a family as close as this. In many ways it reminded me of my family.

Then I noticed that several of the pictures depicted another pony that I could immediately tell had been part of the same family. She looked… well… I decided to stop prying. Instead I slipped into the bed that took up the rest of the room.

The bed, warm and inviting as it was, didn’t make it any easier for me to fall asleep. I lay wide-awake for several hours thinking about what had brought me here. But even in the hours I spent going over what could have happened, I was unable to come up with one reasonable explanation. I would eventually fall into a dreamless unconsciousness without ever coming to any conclusion.

> A Detective in Ponyville
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

What a monumental life decision I had made. Quitting the force already! Was I out of my dumb-bucking mind? I knew I was only six years short of retirement and with the salary I had been making I was able to make a decent savings. But money like this had a habit of dwindling when one was unemployed. These next few years would easily test the limits of my savings, especially since I would begin by using it to fuel my single-minded obsession in getting to the bottom of this… this whatever it was.

There were moments when I considered my obsession with this mystery excessive. There were moments when I considered dropping the case altogether. I mean, I shouldn’t concern myself with this. Should I? It wasn’t any of my business, especially now that I wasn’t on the case anymore. I wasn’t even a cop anymore.

But when I thought about the chief saying, “You’re off the case.” I knew why I was ignoring orders. It was the case of my life and it was taken from me. He had been talking to the “higher ups.” Who the hell were the “higher ups?” The royal guard? It had to be. They were the ones who handled treason. But we never dealt with them. Never. So why would they try to cover up a murder like this? Even for our brain dead royal guard, this was a messy cover up, like they didn’t have the time of day to think anything through. There was conclusive evidence pointing to the Twilight broad being the killer. Why couldn’t they just nail her for both treason and murder? That would land her in the dungeons even faster, wouldn’t it? None of this was adding up. This made me wonder what the true nature of the crime was. I wasn’t about to assume anything was true just yet, but from what had happened so far, it seemed as if our esteemed royal guard USED me to capture their criminal and just tossed me aside while they worked to achieve their own ends.

And then of course there was the matter of finding Cherrie. That is, if she was still alive. It seemed unlikely that she would be alive, having been at the hooves of this killer. The Chief er… Blueshield said the guilt would fall on her as the killer. Now whose goddessdamned idea was that? A suspect of convenience if I had ever heard of one. Well who ever thought that was a good idea probably assumed that Cherrie would be dead anyway. I guess if she were dead, then she would make the perfect scapegoat. She wouldn’t be able to defend her case…

But, if I could do anything about it, she wasn’t going to be convicted of this heinous crime. No, I was determined to get the bottom of this clusterbuck.

So what did all of this make me? I wasn’t a detective anymore, so I wasn’t just being insubordinate. Was I a vigilante then? Maybe I was. But, there was one thing I was through and through. I was a loose end, as loose as they came, and I would be the thorn in the side of the government if I had to. I planned on milking any leverage I could out of this situation.

Because I wasn’t a cop anymore, there was no reason to do anything by the book. No reason to do this any way but my way. So I decided on my first course of action. I would find out what I could about Twilight Sparkle. My mind had been made up. I would stay here in Ponyville for several days. This would be a better place than any to start finding out what I could.

*** 

I had spent my first night in a hotel near the center of Ponyville. After that, I had spent most of my second day in Ponyville sight seeing, not that there was much to see here in this small town. Though there was a quaint little spa, which I visited.

As I strolled through the town market late in the afternoon, I took in the fresh air and predictably nice weather. The market was filled with ponies. There were dozens of them, stallion and mare, working stalls, buying and selling produce. I also had the impression that most, if not all of these ponies, knew each other. Everypony chatted away with each other as they moved from stand to stand, carrying on small talk, sharing the latest bit of gossip or talking about their weekend. I rather enjoyed the small town feel of this place. Actually the East Equestrian border town I was from was much smaller than this was, maybe half the size. This place was just large enough to have a well-developed community and small enough to still know everypony that lived here. I had to admit, this was a nice town. All the ponies here seemed friendly enough. 

As I walked, I passed by a particular stall that caught my attention. Nailed to the wood planks that made up the stand were stalks of tobacco among other plants. I walked closer to the stall, enticed by the green that hung before me. I stopped right in front of the stall and scanned through the different herbs and plants for sale. I put my hoof on a stock of tobacco, feeling the smooth lining of the plant. My hoof traced upwards until it reached the large palm leaf. This must have been where the rookie got my chewing tobacco. I removed my hoof from the leaf and searched for a pack of chew.

There it was, sitting on the corner of the stall, a rack of smokeless tobacco tins labeled “6 bits ea.” Just looking at them made my cravings flare up. Honestly, I found it disgusting, but I was still addicted to the stuff. I relished the thought of sticking another hunk of it in my mouth and pressing it against my cheek. That would help ease some tension and it would help me focus. I had been growing rather irritable because of my withdrawal from the stuff.

I unconsciously reached out for the tin rack, hoping to buy my fix. But rather than pick up one of the small containers of chew, I reeled back my hoof.

Damn it! I craved it so bad. But I wasn’t about to break the promise I had made to myself. No I took these self-made promises very seriously. I still needed to be chewing something though… a stick of gum maybe. Yeah that would do. I searched the stall frantically for a pack of gum but to no avail.

“Are you alright sir?” the question came from a mare, which happened to be working this stall. I hadn’t even noticed her through my single-minded fixation on the tobacco. I guess she must’ve been trying to get my attention the whole time I had been at the stall because they way she had asked her question seemed to penetrate my head. 

I threw out my response. “Oh what? Umm. I’m fine. Say umm… Where can I find something sweet?” I had really meant to ask where I could find some gum, but I figured her answer would lead me to the same place.

Instead of getting her answer, another pony spoke up. Her voice trailed off behind me as if she were trotting my way from somewhere else. I turned to see whom had spoken to me.

A vivacious young earthmare skipped towards me as she spoke. She was intensely cute. Not cute in the physically attractive sense, though she was plenty of that. But rather she bounced from side to side as she made her way towards me in a way that I could only describe as a Sunday morning cartoon character would. She was a solid pink mare with clouds of cotton candy for a mane. Her face held two piercing blue eyes. The way her hips bounced from side to side as she moved allowed me to get a look at her cutie mark. Three party balloons, two of them blue, one yellow.

“OH, PICK ME! PICK ME! I KNOW!” She squeaked as she skipped merrily my way. Even when she had stopped in front of me, she continued to bounce in place not knowing how to be still. She seemed to be waiting for me to ask her the question, as she didn’t say anything after that. She just stared at me, bending her legs and straightening them making it look like she was jumping with out actually leaving the ground.

After a second of me fumbling through my words and looking confused, I said to her, “Oh… yes I was just looking for something sweet.”

“Well you won’t find anything like that over here silly.” She said. Her voice, by Celestia, her voice, she sounded so cheerful it made me want to rip off my own ears.

“Um yeah well I’m new in Ponyville.”

“Of course you are! I know everypony here and I don’t know you by the way my name is Pinkie what’s your name?” She said, all in one long run-on sentence. She sure was a lively broad.

“Oh… My name’s Hartigan.” I answered.

“Heart… AGAIN?!” she sounded perplexed by my name, “That’s a funny name! Does that mean you have more than one heart? I guess that’s not as weird as this one pony’s name I once met. Now what was his name?”

“I umm…” I wasn’t sure how to respond to her. She continued to bounce as she spent an uncomfortably long time trying to recall some pony’s name. After giving up she continued trying her best to help me… the crazy mare.

“Follow me, I know where all sweets are. Come on, I’ll get you just what you need to fix that sweet tooth of yours.

I didn’t protest, instead I followed her as she hopped around town. I figured, maybe, I could find out more about Sparkle. Miss Pie did say she knew everypony from here.

As we made our way over to way to… where ever it was she was taking me, Pinkie struck up conversation.

“What brings you to Ponyville, mister?” In any ordinary situation, I would tell somepony like her to mind her own business, but this wasn’t an ordinary situation, and being an ex-detective, I could milk this mare for all she knew about my object of obsession. I felt around my coat pocket to make sure I still had my badge. I felt comforted when my hoof felt over the leathery fold that held my badge, wedged between some bits and my pocket watch. I would only pull it out if I had to, to intimidate her into talking. I was fully aware of the consequences of impersonating a cop, but what did I have to lose besides either a few years of my life, or a hefty number of bits? I’d maybe miss a few sessions with my shrink. So nothing really.

“I’m looking for two friends of mine.” I responded gruffly.

“HEY, I know everypony! Maybe I could help you!” She rolled off cheerfully. I got the impression that she actually wanted to help me. Not just in the way that somepony wants to do a good deed to make them feel better about themselves, but rather, she seemed to genuinely care about helping me. “Who are you looking for?”

“Do you know a Cherrie Redberry?” I asked.

“Nope can’t say I do, and that’s weird ‘cause I know EVERYPONY around here. Who’s the other pony you’re looking for?” I was a little disappointed that she didn’t know who Cherrie was but I wasn’t surprised.

“Twilight Sparkle.” I said. I barely was able to finish the name.

“Oh my gosh! I know her!” She said turning around to look at me. We stopped walking for a moment. She started jumping up and down while she talked. “I KNOW HER I KNOW HER!”

Yeesh, I kinda hoped she’d calm down. I looked around me and saw that we hadn’t drawn anypony’s attention. We started walking again.

This was great. She knew her. My first lead into information perhaps. I would have to pick at her to see what she could tell me.

“Oh but she’s not here in town right now, I think you just missed her. She went to… oh where was it she went to again? Hmmm. Where did Spike say she went?

“Spike?” I thought out loud.

Pinkie Pie gasped. I wasn’t sure why until she spoke again and when she did, she spoke in run-ons again.

“Spike?! You know, Twilight’s cute little assistant although he’s not so little anymore you should see him now he’s like as tall as me…”

She kept talking and talking about how much Spike had grown over the past few years. I had no clue who Spike was. Well, actually, now I knew that this pony was Twilights “assistant” whatever that meant. It probably meant that he was close to Twilight though, which would mean he could tell me all about her. He seemed like the perfect pony to interrogate. I began to fantasize about interrogating whoever this was. Since I wasn’t a cop anymore, I could do it my way. I wouldn’t have to play nice, like we were taught in the academy. I could play bad cop if I wanted to.

“Oh I’m sure Spike can tell you where Twilight is.” She said after we stopped outside what looked like a giant elaborately decorated gingerbread house. Out front hung a sign, which aptly named the building “Sugarcube Corner” which I could guess was the sweets store that miss Pinkie Pie was taking me to. Pinkie and I entered the building.

“Hiya’ Mrs. Cake!” Shouted Pinkie.

A mare with a pink mane and light blue coat stood behind a cash counter, waiting to greet customers as they walked in. “Oh hey Pinkie. Helping out ponies as usual I see, even on your day off.” She said with a smile. Then she turned her head to face me. “Hello sir, what can I get you?”

*** 

I ended up walking out of Sugarcube Corner carrying much more than just a pack of gum. I swear those Cakes were the best sales-ponies. Or it could be that I was hungry and all those cakes and pies looked amazing. I carried a complimentary saddlebag, which I had draped over my back. The bag was crammed full of pie slices and cupcakes, must of which were chocolate, which I was partial to.

Oh, and that crazy pink one told me she would take me to Spike. She told me that she had already promised Spike she would take some ice cream to him. This pony was way too trusting for her own good…

She took me across town again this time with two large tubs of ice cream perched up on her back. I found it strange how they never fell off of her back, even though she seemed to hop around. We eventually reached a large tree house, which Pinkie told me used to be the Ponyville library.

She proceeded to raise a hoof and knock on the door. After gingerly hoofing the door several times she looked at me, still bouncing in place as usual, she asked me a question.

“So how do you know Twilight?” She asked curiously.

What was I to say? What lie should I use? “Oh, I’m an old friend of her parents…” I waited to see if she would buy it. It seemed like a fail proof lie.

She bought it.

“Oh really?! I’ve only met her parents once though, Mr. and Mrs. Sparkle. What absolute gems they are!” she shouted excitedly.

I nodded my head, putting on a fake smile. I hoped she wouldn’t get into any details that might paint me as a phony.

“I can only imagine how proud they are of her!” she continued.

“Oh?”

“You know what with her being Celestia’s very own student and all.”

And just like that, a whopper of a puzzle piece fell on me. Celestia herself actually taught her? I had heard that she had taken on a student in recent years. But this had sounded absolutely crazy. This cold-blooded killer just so happened to be the star pupil of our very own Princess Celestia. I took what Pie had said with mountains of salt, yet I couldn’t shake the feeling she was telling the truth.

What could this possibly mean? I didn’t know what to do with this clue. What did it tell me? Well, for one, it told me that she had a connection with Celestia herself. So, maybe it made more sense why she was being dropped from the murder investigation…

“Oh yeah, that.” I responded as convincingly as I could. Hearing myself say it, I cringed. I would have called anypony out for lying if I had heard them say it like that, but Pinkie didn’t seem to notice.

Through our talking we had barely noticed that it had been taking Spike an unusually long time to answer the door. Before Pinkie could say more, I gestured to the door with a hoof.

“Oh yeah silly me.” She said cutely. She promptly turned her head and knocked on the door harder.

Silence.

She knocked harder yet, “SPIIIIIKE!” she called out, “SPIKEY WIKEY, I got your ice cream!” 

Then I felt it. A strange pulse of energy shot through me. It was very subtle but it was definitely there.

“Oooh woah what was THAT?” chuckled Pinkie Pie. “That wasn’t my Pinkie sense, was it?” She had felt it too.

I somehow recognized that sensation…

Pinkie didn’t seem to pay it much more attention though. Instead, she turned to me and said, half giggling, “Well I guess he must have forgot I was coming. That little silly billy must’ve fallen asleep. I’ll go inside and leave his ice cream there for him.”

She surprised me by opening the door. She just opened it with out permission. The callousness of this pony didn’t cease to astonish me. I facehoofed. I guessed friends like this trusted each other that much.

When I removed my hoof from my face, I looked back up at Pinkie. She wasn’t smiling. This confused me, because I hadn’t once seen her today without a smile plastered on her crazed pony face. Instead she had a look of growing shock. I also noticed that she had ceased to bounce in place. Only now did the two buckets of ice cream fall off her back and onto the ground leaving a mess of vanilla and strawberry ice cream. 

I tilted my head trying to figure out what was wrong. Then I turned my head and realized what was troubling her. It was what she was looking at that drew this almost cartoonishly dramatic response from her. I too shared the shock when I looked inside the tree house.

The one thought that went through my mind: “What in the BUCK happened here!”

> Lies and Laboratories
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Yes, that’s right take the low road. I need you to take the low road. Don’t be better than everyone else. Be afraid of death. Be afraid of your friend’s death.

I hoped that the white pony that stood in front of me, the one who called herself Celestia, would accept my bargain.

After I had made my point clear to her, the pony before me visibly rued her predicament. Of course I was lying to her about this vessel being destroyed, but she was going to have to believe that for now. I needed more to bargain with, and she seemed like the only pony that could be of any help.

“Yes that’s right, you and your precious Twilight will die if you do not help me.”

The princess put a hoof on her forehead. A second or so passed and I could hear her pouting to herself, or maybe her alternate consciousness. Then she removed the hoof from her face and stared calmly at me appearing to have made relative peace with her situation.

She gave a long, exasperated sigh, and then spoke.

“We… need to get you out of here.” She said.

“And…” I added, “…what are we waiting for?”

“We can’t just get up and leave…” 

I could see that she was deep in thought, though I wasn’t sure why.

“You’re the ruler right? Just take me with you. I’m sure your subjects would not dare question your authority.”

She waved a hoof in the air, dismissing my statement.

“It’s not as simple as that. I’m expected to take you to the Canterlot dungeon. That’s not where I need you however.” She stated plainly, then her voice changed to a disappointed tone and she said, “Up until a few years ago, I would have thought I could do anything unquestioned. Oh my ponies, they’ve started questioning my authority. After ruling them for all these years…” her voice trailed off. I could tell she was frustrated.

“Then where do you need me?” I asked in an attempt to get her back on subject. I tried to be patient, but, loathe to admit it, my life really did rest in her, umm, hooves.

“Just hold on let me think. We need to go somewhere where we can safely search for answers.” She paused, eyes going left and right, calculating a plan only she would know. She visibly strained herself in effort to work out what we were doing.

After an uncomfortably long time, I decided that she had been taking too long. I spoke up to her, “Come now, we don’t have that much time. Perhaps maybe the place we met? How about there?”

She shuddered as I said mentioned the white room and said, “What, the Canterlot facility? Yes… Yes, that will do, at least for a few days. And we shouldn’t need more than a few.”

“It very well better not take more than a few days.” I said bitingly “Like I said…” I gave Celestia a cruel little grin and then acted out the balloon-popping image I had put in her head just moments earlier.

“Yes I know!” She replied hurriedly, “How long do you suppose we have.”

“Until what?” I asked dryly. I knew what she meant. I wanted to hear her say it. 

“Well, until… umm well…” She choked on her words.

“Until we DIE?” I stated callously.

“Ugh, don’t say that! Just answer the damn question!”

Ah, now there was the assertiveness I expected from a queen. Up until this point, she had been cowering in fear, relatively speaking of course. She was tough to be sure, but even she had feared me, as she should. But now she was warming up to me. Perhaps it was because we had leverage over each other, perhaps because of our mutual interests, our forced coexistence.

My face dropped all expression and I answered her question as plain as I could. “For you? I do not know. It could, in theory, be in several cycles, or it could be in just a few seconds. It all depends on your mental and physical strength, and several other unknowns.” I paused a bit after letting out the truth. Then I continued. “As for me, I’m afraid I cannot answer that either.” Of course I knew that I had maybe a week or two, but I thought maybe I could press a sense of urgency, to get things going quicker.

She stamped a hoof on the gray seedy cell floor in due frustration. She muttered something under her breath, something I could only assume was a hard swear from her language, “fan-bucking-tastic,” she said.

“Which is exactly why we should make haste, my queen.” I said. I had meant to make the words ‘my queen’ sound ironic and sarcastic, but it didn’t come out that way. It rather came out genuine and sincere.

“Indeed.” She replied. “I don’t suppose you could take us back to the chambers, could you? I know you can teleport.”

I gave it some thought. At this point I had plenty of power to spare so long as I only used it when it was needed. “Yes I can, I’d prefer not to exhaust my power if I can, but yes.”

“Good, good.” She gave a sigh. “‘Cause I don’t think I have the strength to travel myself.” It was only now that I noticed how spent she had looked. She hadn’t exactly come across as healthy when she first came through the door, what with the bloodstained face and pale complexion, but now that I looked at her again, she clearly was paying the price for her high stress state. Based on her demeanor, I could also guess that she hadn’t gotten much sleep since we met either. At least I had the privilege of being unconscious for several hours.

“Well what are we waiting for,” I asked after another few moments of silence, “are you ready?”

“Huh… Oh right, yes let’s go.” She looked about ready to fall over. I, for the first time in my existence, was able to sympathize with someone, knowing how tired Celestia must be.

I began to draw power from my essence, feeling the warmth spread throughout the vessel. I could feel the so-called barrier surrounding the room we were in pushing against the power I conjured. It had been a pathetic attempt at keeping me trapped in here. I merely pulsed my energy, and the barrier shattered. Not that we could see it, it was invisible, but I could feel it break, like a thin glass sheet.

I looked at the queen who was completely unaware that I had been building my essence to transport us. I spoke to her, “Let us get going…”

“Wait hold on.” She said abruptly, “I must notify my guards. I cannot simply disappear without explanation.”

“We do not have time for this! We must go now!” I demanded.

“But…”

“You can worry about your insubordinate subjects later, right now we need to survive. Let us go now!” I said with authority. This time I didn’t wait for her to protest. I sent my energy surging throughout my body, filling the room with my essence. I willed some of my power over towards the princess, enveloping her in the rays of soft red light. Then I focused on our destination, the white room. All it took was its image in my head, and before more than a few seconds could pass, we were there. The white room came into view in all of its familiarity. It was a large, white-tiled box. In the middle of the room rest what looked to be a cross between a bed and a chair. Above the reclined chair-bed hung a large needle-like protrusion, which dangled like a horn from a unicorn’s head.

This was the place I remembered, the place where this journey had begun. How long had it been? Two days? Two days… and my existence had flopped, threatening to go belly up.

Curse this place. 

I curled my vessel’s foreleg and slammed it into the ground in anger. I looked up at the ceiling and raised my cuffed hoof and shouted, “I’m here because of you, you thrice damned bastard! I put my own life on the line for you!” I didn’t know what I was hoping to accomplish with my outburst. I had never felt this way before, but for some reason it felt good to yell my anger away.

Then I looked around the room again and saw Celestia standing clumsily just a few feet away. We caught each other’s line of sight and she quickly averted her eyes. I had, for just one moment, revealed weakness, and she saw the ugly truth it held. She had been about to say something, but my venting had interrupted her. I saw her face, worn and exhausted, fade into an expression of anger when she realized that we weren’t in the holding cell anymore.

“Ah! Wait no take me back! I need to give them an explanation!” She demanded, then she quickly took it back. “Gah… What’s the use? There is no explaining this. I can only get away with so much…” Her otherwise disgusted look faded from existence, replaced by dejection.

“Indeed.” I mocked as I felt my pulsating anger fade. Celestia looked back up at me, eyes defeated and glistening with wetness. I wondered if she was about to shed tears over this. Then I spoke again, dropping my biting sarcasm for a more appropriate serious tone, “So, Celestia, what can we do? Do you have any ideas where to start?”

She only stared at me, face broken, beat, and scarred. She gave no hint that she would say anything, just a blank stare.

I gave a sigh and said, “You obviously need sleep. You will be completely useless as you are now. Do you have any room here where I can do some research, a study perhaps, records, history, any sort of written material that I can read?”

She nodded. Then she turned around and began to walk off. I guessed she had intended for me to follow her so I did.


***

Celestia led me through an elaborate network of hallways. The building we were in impressed me in the way that it was very advanced, at least compared to what I had seen elsewhere on this planet. The light fixtures that lined the ceilings flooded the hallway with a depressingly pale white florescent light. It took me a while to notice that these lights were not actually electric and did not even come from glass bulbs, but rather, the light that they shed was magic based and was cast by small carbon deposits. However, there still existed traces of circuitry connecting these magical stones in the form of exposed wires, which hung from the ceiling. This intrigued me. A race that not only possessed magic, but in-fact used it to better themselves technologically. Truly this was the sign of a potentially hyper-advanced civilization.

I admired various other aspects of the facility on our way to… somewhere. Celestia neglected to mention where she was leading me. She didn’t say anything she just kept walking. Time and time again, we would turn, into yet another long stretch of hallway, indistinguishable from the previous one. At one point I started to get the feeling that Celestia, who had been maybe a few feet ahead of me, had fallen asleep and was actually sleep walking aimlessly, but eventually we reached a door with no visible way to open it. This door was identical to every door preceding it except that it had next to it a panel. The smooth metal panel rested on the wall adjacent to the door, and in the middle of this shiny platform sat a button, a button that Celestia abruptly slammed her hoof into as she fell against the wall it sat on in a display that was about as graceful as a bludgeoned fawn trying to ice-skate on sandpaper. She pushed herself back up right and removed her hoof from the button and I saw that the button had lit up, giving off the same eerily white glow as the magic lighting.

The door slid open almost immediately revealing a box shaped room hardly big enough for several ponies to fit. We stepped in side. I could guess what this kind of room was, though it did look very strange compared to the rooms I had seen that were like it. In keeping with the all-white aesthetic of the hallways I had walked through thus far, this room was solid white also. There was one discrepancy; one of the four walls of this room was slightly different from the others. Instead of being made of one solid slab of the material the other walls were made from, it had been composed of small white tiles that were maybe about as big as a pony’s hoof, a form of button I presumed.

As if she could read my mind, Celestia asked me, “Have you ever been in one of these before?”

I didn’t look her direction, but merely answered, “Yes, I have. Why?” 

She didn’t say anything for a moment, so I turned my head to look at her. She had a puzzled look on her face.

“Really?” She acted surprised. Quite a bit in fact, considering how close she was to passing out. “This is the only room of its kind.” She had, I realized, asked a rhetorical question.

“What do you mean, this is the only elevator you ponies have? Surely you jest.” I shot a wicked smile at the slouching alicorn. She stared into my eyes. After a second, she put a hoof in the air and moved it toward the tiled wall, never breaking her eye contact. As such, I didn’t drop my evil smile either. Her hoof pressed against the wall at about knee height, then she slowly slid her hoof up the wall, leaving a trail of faint magical light. Her hoof traced a line all the way to as high as she could reach, the topmost tile.

“Elevator…?” she said, “Yes… actually… but how…”

“Where do you think I’m am from, dear queen?” I asked, feeling an intense sense of superiority over her.

She stared at me, again, obviously not sure how to answer. I expected this. I’ve seen this same reaction countless times from those whom I said this same thing to.

I felt pressure on my hooves as the lift started to rise.

“The Everfree forest?” She asked with absolutely no certainty in her voice.

“The what?” I blurted out, but then shook my head followed it up with, “No, I’m not.”

“Then where are you from?” She asked, not able to hold back her curiosity.

There was and high-pitched dinging sound and a second later, the elevator door hissed and slid open. We stepped out of the elevator. The room we stepped into was a lavishly decorated reading room, or study room. This room offered a nice break from the bland white washed hallways on the lower level. Instead, almost every inch of the walls were covered with portraits and paintings. Most paintings depicted sophisticated looking ponies, dressed in expensive silky clothing and wearing crowns, and other jewelry. Other paintings depicted Celestia herself and another blue pony who was similar in size and also had both a horn and wings. She too looked to be part of this strange pony royalty. Interestingly enough, almost all depictions of these two ponies related them to a star and a moon. Above, below, on, or behind Celestia consistently sat a sun in every picture, while the other one had the moon. I had the impression that I was looking into two bloated egos. I especially got this feeling by one enormous painting of Celestia hanging over the back of the room. This Celestia gazed maternally over the room as if she were watching, protecting the room like a mother protecting her children. Behind the Celestia in this picture floated an even larger sun that seemed to glow. The painting covered the entire back wall. 

She equated herself to a star? Who did this pony think she was, a goddess? Hah, comedy!

What wall space that wasn’t taken up by these extravagant pictures held bookshelves, quite literally overflowing with books and documents and scrolls and other pieces of parchment. This must be where Celestia wanted me to be to study at my own leisure. I scanned the rest of the room. The floor consisted of a soft carpet like material and was mostly red except for small gold insignias gilded into the pattern, which were spaced evenly through the entire floor. The room was well furnished, a golden-bronze pleather chaise lounge sitting at my left halfway across the room, as well as several other fabric based comfy chairs also golden-bronze scattered evenly throughout. At the end of the room, sitting in front of the massive Celestia portrait rested a dark wooden desk, which I assumed was where Celestia spent most of her time studying the sciences.

I turned my mind back to our conversation.

“Where am I from? Hah! Wouldn’t you like to know! I’m not from here, that I can assure you.” I thought about what I had just said, and then dropped the ‘holier than thou’ voice and said with a release of breath, “We will discuss this, and much more, later. As for now, you need rest.”

She raised a hoof and opened her mouth in an attempt to speak, but she didn’t say anything. Instead she walked on further into the room. She trotted over to the chaise lounge and collapsed on it.

I began to ask where I should start my research, but she was already out cold. I could tell by her lack of response, and her steady breathing.

I gave a sigh, I guess I could flip through these books to see what information I could gather. Now, where to start?

I made my way to a bookshelf.

I ran a hoof along the middle row of books and scrolls, feeling the bindings and paper beneath my vessel’s hoof. Then my hoof stopped on one particularly large book, which I then rested my hoof on top of. I pulled the book out from the shelf sending a small cloud of dust flying into the air. Forgetting that I didn’t have any way to keep the book in the air, the book dropped off the shelf and hit the ground with a deep thud. I looked over at Celestia, who had not been at all disturbed by the noise.

“Curse these impractical bodies.” I muttered to myself in annoyance.

I lifted book up off the ground with nothing but the will of my power, surrounding the book in red translucent coat. I carried myself and the book over to one of the chairs and fell into it, my fall cushioned by the soft fabric pillows of the seat.

I looked at the front of the book, which read, “The Known Intelligent Species of Equestria.”

This would be a good place to start.

*** 

This was incredible! This book claimed that there were over forty hyper-intelligent life forms on this planet. It wasn’t just the ponies. No. The book had information on all sorts of creatures: dragons, griffons, and bulls to name a few. Not once in all of my existence had I ever come across a world with more than one higher intelligence. If this were true, then maybe, just maybe they would be consumable… Maybe I would have no more need to fear death. 

I had nearly finished flipping through the last few pages of the book, when I heard Celestia stir. I looked over at her. She had lifted her head lazily and scanned the room. She looked confused for a second, as if she had forgotten where she was. Then I saw the realization hit her as her half-asleep face jolted with life. She sprang up from her resting place and began to pace around the room.

After a few moments, she made her way warily over towards me.

“Did you find anything useful?” She asked after yawning as she approached me. She stopped just a few feet before the seat I was currently occupying, and then sat on the carpet, waiting for a response.

“Indeed.” I said, mustering up as much confidence as I could.

“Oh, please explain, what have you found?” She asked growing excited.

I began my answer with a question, “You wouldn’t happen to be friends with someone of another species, would you?” 

Her eyes widened even more. Now instead of curiosity, she had a look of deep surprise and contemplation on her face.

“Well I…” she managed after a bit of staring.

“Come on, my dear queen, this is important.” I said.

“Yes but… You…” She was having trouble deciding on what to say, and then she mumbled the words, “Oh Twilight, forgive me.” After that she spoke up again and said, “Y-yes I do, WE do. We know a young dragon.”

“Oh really,” I mused, “and where can we find this young dragon?”

Celestia looked torn.

> Spike
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

I arrived at the tree house, arms full of brown paper bags, each filled to the brim with produce, breads, and other foods. Twilight had asked, or sent me rather, to pick up some food from the market. I was shocked that she would trust me to do the grocery shopping. She had stopped trusting me with that chore a long time ago because I kept using some of her bits to buy my own ice cream.

I thought of the last time I tried to sneak and eat my own bucket of ice cream. It was the first time I had ever had Rocky Road. Oooh, that had become my favorite kind. Sadly Twilight caught me, spoon in claw, digging deep into the bucket of marshmallow and chocolate. Just thinking of the face Twilight made sent a chill through my scales.

I hadn’t even thought to sneak a tub of ice cream while I was in the market, but then I passed Sugarcube Corner and well… I guess I sorta couldn’t resist. I definitely hadn’t learned my lesson… I had only purchased a singles tub this time; I could probably finish it in one sitting. Either way, I kept it hidden at the bottom of one of the large paper bags, below several cucumbers and cracker boxes. With some luck, Twilight wouldn’t notice. 

I was standing in front of the door trying to think of a way to open it without having to set the bags on the ground. I tried arching my back so that I could shift the weight of most the bags onto my chest. I wrapped my left arm as far around the bags as I could, trying to keep them pinned to my chest while I let my right arm slide off so that I could use it to open the door. The position was excruciatingly painful on my back, and it meant that I couldn’t see in front of me. Standing like this, with my back bent, I reached my free arm out in search for the door handle. I found it, gripping hard with my claw and, with some trouble, pushed the door open. I stumbled my way in to the tree house, stepping off the grassy stoop and onto the wooden floor of the living area. Now that I had opened the door and made my way in, I was able to restore my posture and grab hold of the bags with both arms. I kicked the door closed behind me and hobbled my way in the direction of the kitchen, hoping Twilight wouldn’t be there so I could sneak my ice cream into the icebox.

There I was, standing in the kitchen, a film of sweat lining my forehead from hauling these groceries. I set every bag on the ground preparing to unpack the foods and put them in their appropriate place. Before I began unloading, I looked around, scanning the room for Twilight. I ran out into living room, taking a quick look to see if I could spot Twilight close by. She wasn’t. I walked tiredly back into the kitchen, still trying to catch my breath from the long grocery quest, and began putting up the different foods.

I reached into the bag of foods that hid my ice cream first, hoping to stash it before Twilight could catch me red clawed. I began to toss out everything, desperately searching for my most valued possession. Then I felt it at the bottom of the sack, rejecting my touch with its icy coldness. The small tub had condensation all around it, making it hard to grab hold of. Even so, I managed to pull it out of the bag with one claw. I brought the tub of rocky road close to my chest and gripped it firmly with both arms, cradling it like an infant. I kept my back to the entrance of the kitchen and carried the tub to the icebox.

I was in the clear now. All I had to do was open the icebox, and shift some of the other contents around, allowing me to hide the ice cream. I removed one claw from the tub and grabbed the handle on the icebox. I opened the door to the box, feeling the frigid air spill out.

“Oh spike.” Called Twilight’s voice from somewhere behind me sounding mildly amused. I nearly jumped out of my scales. How long had she been here? I turned around trying to hold the ice cream behind my back. “You know you don’t have to hide ice cream from me anymore. That’s why I gave you a few extra bits, so you could get yourself some.”

Twilight stood in the entrance to kitchen, levitating an open book in front her face, eyes half lidded in focus. She also floated a sandwich around her head, which she took a modest bite of as she stepped into the room.

“Oh heeeeey Twilight!” I said apologetically “I didn’t hear you come in…” I gave a nervous laugh. But how did she know?

Woah boy. I felt the tub of ice cream lift out of my grip. Twilight was using her magic to take it. In just a few short seconds, my ice cream hovered out in the middle of the room, exposed to twilight. After staring helplessly at my floating tub of deliciousness, I looked to Twilight. Not once had she looked away from her book. She seemed to be fully aware of everything around her without even looking. She brought her sandwich in with her magic and took another bite. She chewed her bite slowly, and continued reading. I could feel the silence of the room turning into a sour awkwardness. She swallowed her food and then proceeded to fly the ice cream into the icebox, which was still hanging wide open. She closed the icebox, and took one last bite to finish off her sandwich. Only now did she look up from her book, giving me a smile. Then she eyeballed all of the grocery bags sitting on the floor.

“Need help with the groceries?” She asked as I reached for the bag that the ice cream had been in. Her smiling face then went back behind the book. She started reading again.

I didn’t want to sound like I couldn’t handle a simple chore like this.

“No I can get it.” I responded, gripping the bag.

Apparently she hadn’t heard me. As I lifted the bag, she used her magic to yank it out of my grip. I looked to Twilight. That familiar pink magic bubble surrounded her horn, which poked up above the book she had buried her face in. Then I looked around me when I heard the sound of paper bags rustling. All of the bags I had set on the floor began to lift into the air. All of their contents exited and began to fly to their designated place in the kitchen. The entire room swarmed with groceries for the several moments it took twilight to will everything into order. And then it was over. The food was put up, the grocery bags were all disposed of, and everything was right the way it was supposed to be.

“Don’t mention it.” Twilight rolled off cheerfully.

I gawked at the magical feat she just performed. The entire time she hadn’t once looked up from her book. She just kept reading.

Then I gave a chuckle, letting out some of my tension and said, “Hah, and I thought you were against being a show off.” Of course I knew that she was exercising her magic though. She had been honing her magic for days. Ever since she’d gotten that letter from Celestia about… well, what ever it was about, she had taken every opportunity she could to work out her awesome magic tricks.

Twilight dropped her book just enough to reveal two wide eyes. “What! Show off? I didn’t mean to be a show off! I’m sorry Spike…” She sounded so disappointed in herself.

“Hey relax Twilight, I was only joking.” I said trying to comfort her. “Besides, aren’t you studying for your, umm… what was it you were practicing for again?”

“Oh…” She began, her voice quickly losing any trace of anxiety, “Celestia wanted me to make sure my magic was in tip top shape.”

“Oh, what for?” I asked interested.

“That last letter she sent me heavily implied that she’d be needing my help soon. I’ll bet it’s something very important.” She said excitedly, raising the book back up to hide her eyes.

I felt the rest of tension I had built up while trying to sneak my ice dissipate and let my shoulders slouch. In tune with my decrease in posture, I casually leaned against the icebox to more comfortably carry on my conversation with Twilight.

“What do you think she might need your help with?” I asked her.

She began to pace around the kitchen, levitating eating utensils, napkins, sponges, and various other things around in attempt to make everything look neat and orderly. Again, not surprisingly, she did not once lower her book to see what she was doing; rather she just proceeded to clean. I’d complain about her taking my job if cleaning the kitchen wasn’t already one of my least favorite things to do.

“I have no idea, but I can’t wait to find out. Ooooh I hope I get to go visit her lab again.”

“That place gives me the creeps.” I mumbled.

She briefly paused her reading and gave me a scolding look before continuing.

“How would you know what it’s like, Spike, you’ve never even been to her lab before?” She asked.

“It’s the way you describe it, Twi, it sounds like something out of a mad-pony scientist movie.”

“Well I didn’t find that place ‘creepy’ at all. That building is home to some of the most important scientific breakthroughs in all ponykind.” She said, trying to defend the building.

“That’s what makes it creepy.” I replied cheekily. I was only kidding of course, but it didn’t seem like Twilight caught my jokes.

“Spiiiike.” She said. She had finished reordering a bunch of the kitchenware and she again looked up from her book and shot me yet another spiteful look.

“What? I’m just sayin’” I said with a grin. Then I tried to move the subject. “Watchya reading?”

Twilight folded the corner of the page she was on and closed the book. She proceeded to read off the title to me. “Advanced Magic Theory.” She read.
She levitated the book over towards me so I could get a better look at it. I didn’t even have to hold the book myself to guess how heavy it must have been. The book was huge. It was a hard covered book, which looked much like a school textbook. Sure enough, the front of the book read ‘Advanced Magic Theory.’ Immediately below the title sat the words ‘5th edition.‘

“Twilight, are you seriously reading a text book on how to perform magic?” I asked.

“No this doesn’t say anything on actually performing magic. It’s all about how magic works and where it comes from. Its fascinating, really, all of this theory.”

I stared at her for a second before asking very callously, “Why?” 

She brought the book back in close to her face and began reading it again. Then she responded. “Why what? Why am I reading this book you mean? Like I said, I think Celestia might need my help soon, so I’m brushing up on my magic.” She paused for a second and added, “Speaking of which, I think I should continue studying. In peace… I’ll be in my room if you need me.” And with that she left the kitchen for her room. I watched intently as my purple friend trotted slowly out of the room taking the enormous textbook with her.

She was really just brushing up on her magic? By reading a textbook? My Celestia, I had no idea how she did it.

Once I was sure that Twilight was in her room, I quickly turned to face the icebox. I was already craving that sweet ice cream. I gripped the handle of the icebox and ripped the door open, once again spilling out the icy air. In a one swift motion, I was able to scoop up the tub of sweetness and close the freezer. I held it in my arms tenderly.

“Just a bite.” I told myself. I wanted to save some for later, but I knew if I started eating it now, I more than likely wouldn’t be able to stop until it was gone.

“Just a bite.” I said to myself again. I popped the lid off and looked into the swirl of marshmallow and chocolate. I moved over to the silverware drawer and picked out the first spoon to meet my touch.

Oh my gosh, this was going to be so good. I repressed a squeal of excitement as I plunged the spoon into the top layer, carving out a chocolaty mix of marshmallow, almonds, and ice cream. My mouth flooded with moister from the anticipation of the bite as I raised the spoon to my lips.

But rather than open my mouth and devour the tasty treat, I felt a familiar gassy sensation build up in my throat.

Darn it Celestia! Couldn’t your letter wait just a few more seconds? I hadn’t any time to react to the feeling that had built up in my mouth and throat. I almost immediately released the gas build up out my mouth in a startlingly loud belch that seemed to rack my whole body with spasms. This caused me to drop the tub of ice cream and the spoonful I was holding, leading to a mess of dessert splattered all over the floor.

“Well crap!” I cursed aloud as a tan colored scroll hovered briefly in front of me before dropping into the mess of chocolaty goodness already on the floor.

I bent over to pick letter from the melting mush of ice cream. Sadly all of the ice cream had come right out of its container. What a waste. I let out a moan of discontent. Now I was going to have to buy some more.

Well now I had the question of etiquette: Would I clean the mess, or would I take the letter to Twilight first?

*** 

Twilight lay sprawled out on her bed lazily reading her textbook. Or rather, it seemed lazy the moment I entered the bedroom, but then noticed, as I approached her, that she was busy taking notes. A quill hung in a pinkish magenta bubble in the air near Twilight occasionally falling to jot down something on a slip of paper lying next to her.

In contrast to her astuteness, I myself walked idly towards Twilight, gripping the piece of parchment firmly in my claw. I hadn’t made a sound moving but Twilight knew I was here. She looked up just as I had stopped and began to speak, her half closed eyes reflecting her busy but content attitude. 

“Hey, Twilight, I gotta letter for ya.” I said, extending the claw containing the still bound scroll.

Hardly had I finished the sentence when Twilight yanked the letter from outstretched claw with her magic. Her lazed eyes shot open with life, and expelled a squee, which seemed to send ripples of happiness across the room.

“See, what did I tell you Spike. I said Celestia would need my help soon and here she is sending me a letter asking for my help!” By the end of her sentence she, had dropped her book and quill on the bed and stood up on all fours.

I swear, the relationship she carried with her ‘princess’ had become creepy over the last few years. Even though they mostly talked through letters (letters that I had to send and receive, and sometimes write) Twilight’s whole psyche had changed when ever Celestia was brought up. I mean, I understand that one should respect their ruler and all, but Twilights admiration went beyond that. And I could tell, mostly from Twilights words, that the Princess was experiencing the same thing. The relationship had clearly become more than just a teacher-student relationship. Now I’m not the kind of dragon that likes to hurt other people’s reputation with gossip, but if I were, I would assume their relationship had moved beyond just unprofessional. I dare even say it almost appeared un-platonic. But I’m not.

“How do you know she needs your help? You haven’t even read the letter yet.” I said my face andn voice layered with jaded cynicism.

“Well of course she…” She paused and looked at me annoyed. She undid the piece of twine, which bound the letter and let it unroll before her. I saw her lips move as she read the document, mouthing the words as she read them. As she read, her concentrated look faded into a big grin. After a few seconds she opened her mouth to speak but then closed it again, perhaps to think about what she was going to say. Her overjoyed expression once again shifted to a smug look as she held back a ‘I told you so.’

“Well, as it turns out,” she began as she walked towards me, “she is in need of my assistance now.”

“Oh let me guess, she asked you to come to her laboratory.” I said half-heartedly as she approached.

“Mhmm”

“Well,” I said turning to leave the room “I’ll go get your train ticket.”

“No need for that Spike.”

“Huh, well when does she need you to get there?” I asked confused. I stopped and turned to face Twilight, who dawned a confident grin.

“Right. Now.” She said, annunciating each word slowly.

I cocked my head, unsure of what she was getting at. Twilight continued trotting over towards me. Once she had reached me, she stretched a foreleg and brought me into a hug. After an awkward second, I returned the hug, bending my legs just a bit so that I could come down to her height.

“Thanks for bringing me the letter, Spike.” She said to me as she released the hug. “I will only be gone for a few days.”

“But how will you get there?” I tried asking, but then I saw her horn start glowing again. No, surely she wasn’t going to teleport all the way there.

“By teleporting of course.” She replied, spreading her front and back legs into an action stance so that she could keep balanced while she worked up her magic. Her horn began to grow brighter and brighter, until the very air in front of her shimmered with heat and light.

“But Twilight, how can you…” I was cut off by a loud crackling sound as a pink bubble enveloped Twilight. She was gone.

I stood there for several uncomfortable seconds before I realized that I was staring at the space she had been.

I gave a long sigh. Time to clean up the mess I had made.

*** 

Having a few days to myself would be nice, I must admit. I spent most of the first full day, out and about the town. I ventured to the spa, and then later I visited Sugarcube Corner. I didn’t buy anything because Twilight hadn’t left me any spending money. She just kinda left abruptly. No sweat of my scales though. This would give me a nice break from chores and being her assistant.

I did spend most of the rest of the first day helping Pinkie Pie instead. Hah, so much for getting a break. But I wanted ice cream, and Pinkie Pie promised she’d bring me some tomorrow if I helped her. So now I was her assistant. I just hoped she remembered to get me the right kind of ice cream.

My first day eventually came to an end, and so began the next day.

I took my opportunity to sleep in this time. I actually slept in much longer than I had intended. It was just past one in the afternoon by the time I raised my head from my pillow. The only reason I actually didn’t sleep further was due to a knocking at the door downstairs.

Pinkie Pie! She was bringing me my ice cream. I jumped out of bed and stumbled my way to the entrance of the house. Still in a daze, I bumped into one of the bookshelves that lined the living room, sending a cascade of books falling down to the floor. Ugh, another mess to clean up. I would deal with that after I got the ice cream from Pinkie. 

Just thinking of the ice cream seemed to wake me more. Maybe just a bite for breakfast, yeah that sounded pretty good. I licked my lips as I approached the door. Through my lidded eyes and content smile, I opened the door, feeling the fresh air hit my face. Then I opened my mouth to speak with out even looking at who I was talking to.

“Hey there Pinkie…” I began, but as I opened my eyes I realized I wasn’t talking to the lovable pink pony. No quite the opposite. Before me stood a plump turquoise colt with an orange mane. Of course by now he’d be soon leaving his colt years behind.

“Oh…” I said switching to an irritated look. “Hey Snips.”

He raised one of his intensely bushy eyebrows in amusement.

“Expecting someone else?” He asked, voice cracking almost every syllable. By Celestia his voice, he sounded like he had a chew toy stuck in his throat. I had a difficult time holding back a barrage of laughter.

“Yeah, Pinkie’s supposed be bringing me some ice cream today.” I answered thinking of the cotton headed pony bringing me a big bucket of rocky road.

“Hah, nice.” He said with a grin.

I stuck my head out the door and looked around expecting to see another pony shadowing Snips.

“Where’s Snails?” I asked the burly pony.

“Heh, grounded.”

Explains why Snips was at my house.

“Really?” I asked, now even more amused. “Snails grounded?”

“I know, right.” He said.

Let me guess you want to hang out since your friend is grounded.

“You wanna, umm, hangout.” He asked after a small silence. I was right. I didn’t mind hanging out with Snips and Snails usually, they were a bit younger than me and it especially showed now that I had grown in size (I practically towered over them.) Of course they could get a bit annoying sometimes, but they really were the only ponies near my age that I had anything in common with.

I gave him a blank look, silently considering the proposition.

“Yeah sure,” I said after some thought, “come on in.”

Rather than follow me inside, he stood at the doorway and eventually asked, “Well aren’t you gonna go ask your mom?”

He wasn’t being cruel. Well not as cruel as one might think. He was referring to Twilight. He’d been teasing me about Twilight being like a mother to me recently. Lucky for him, his jokes only came across in good fun.

“She’s NOT my mom!” I protested trying to sound like he’d gotten one over me. “Besides, she’s out of town. I’m free for the day.”

His eyes lit up.

“Sweet!” he cracked. I nearly lost it again with his voice. Snips made his way into the house.

*** 

Several hours passed as Snips and I talked about everything from fillies to school and even a little bit of philosophy. Both of us lay in the bedroom on the two beds that rested there. I let Snips lounge across my bed. He barely took up half of it since the bed was specially fitted for a teen sized dragon. I on the other hoof, lay comfortably on Twilight’s bed (she’d kill me if she saw me on it.) We lay there throwing our thoughts across the room to each other.

Snips seemed happy to have me to talk to. I had the impression that he and his long time friend had been growing apart recently. My suspicions were confirmed when Snips told me about how he and Snails never saw eye to eye on anything. I learned that Snails had not in fact been grounded. Rather, Snails had been avoiding Snips.

I admit, I hadn’t actually seen the two together this past few weeks, but the idea that they could have had a falling out of sorts didn’t even occur to me. Frankly, I was kind of surprised that he was opening up to me like this.

“Maybe he found himself a fillyfriend.” I proposed. The idea was pretty farfetched knowing Snails, but certainly not impossible, and actually given their age, it almost made sense.

“Hah! Snails find a fillyfriend? Not likely. He can barely find his way around Ponyville with out me.” He said nervously. I could sense his anxiety. He definitely considered the idea. The notion that a filly could have replaced him terrified him. I felt sorry for Snips. I kinda wished Twi were here to help with his friendship problem, because I didn’t know what to say.

I remained silent.

He tried changing the subject.

“Hey, you got anything to eat?” He asked sitting up.

I was jarred by the sudden change of subject but it made me realize how hungry I was. I hadn’t eaten yet today myself. I jumped up off Twilight’s bed and looked to Snips. He had a sullen look on his face.

“Yeah, sure, what d’ya want?” I asked. As I waited for him to respond I thought of what I wanted to eat.

“I don’t care dude, anything sounds good.” He squeaked.

“Alright,” I said after a sometime of thought, “Let’s go see what we have.”

The two of us made our way to the kitchen. Once we were there, I took the lead in opening various cabinets, rummaging through the different foods that I had purchased just the other day. Snips stood by patiently waiting to see what I could come up with.

I was deep into a cabinet, trying to reach something that looked good for the two of us when I heard Snips’ squeaky little voice call out to me.

“Ummm, Spike.” Snips said.

“Yes?” I called back to him, still buried in the cupboard. He didn’t answer.

“Yes, Snips?” I called back a bit louder so he could here my muffled voice. Still no answer.

“Hey Snips what is it?” I said once more. This time I stuck my head out of the cabinet to see what was up.

Taking in the sight before me, I lost my balance and fell backwards. I scrambled to get up. Once I had regained my footing, I had a chance to see what was going on. 

Snips was nowhere to be seen. But the pony that replaced him made me stand in attention. It was Twilight. She stood awkwardly in the frame of the entrance to the kitchen, blocking the view of the living room. Something about her seemed… well… off… She was somehow uncanny in appearance.

“Oh Twilight! When did you get back? I didn’t even hear you come in.” I said.

She didn’t say anything back, she just stood there staring at me.

I put a claw on the back of my head and scratched it awkwardly looking at Twilight in silence. The more I looked at her the weirder the moment became and the more unsettling her appearance struck me. Her face was expressionless. What struck me as even more odd were her eyes. They maintained a familiar white magical haze. It was the haze that covered her eyes whenever she performed a high intensity spell. What made it even weirder was that her horn wasn’t glowing, meaning she wasn’t using her magic.

“Twilight?” I asked starting to get a little creeped out. “Are you ok? It’s me, Spike.”

After my name came up, her blank expression was a replaced by a large toothy grin, which seemed to twitch into place. The whole movement was quite unsettling.

Then she took a step towards me. I don’t know what it was, but a sort of chill came over me. Maybe it was her unponylike demeanor maybe it was the unnaturally glazed eyes. Perhaps it was the fact that she looked like she had taken a beating and looked partially crippled but yet still moved with ease. Either way, as she took that first step towards me, I impulsively took a step back away from her. She took another step in my direction. By now she had completely left the entrance and was no longer blocking the entire view of the living room. I craned my head to see if I could look past her. 

I found him.

I found Snips.

He lay in a heap in the middle of the living room. He wasn’t moving.

Nothing about this felt right.

Twilight took another step towards me. Something slithering around her body caught my eye. A black snakelike creature wormed its way through Twilights mane. At least I thought it was another creature, until I realized it was coming from her body. Then I saw another one, and another, and another, and another.

Five. Five black snakelike protrusions, slid around her body. My eyes followed them as they lifted into the air and stiffened. Oh. My. Sweet. Celestia.

She took yet another step closer. I took another step back. 

She had me backed into a corner.

“Twilight, you can stop now. You got me. I’m scared.” I managed. My heart seemed ready to burst from my chest.

Another step closer.

I watched as one of the black protrusions arched itself.

I tensed up, getting ready for something to happen. Between glimpses of Snips’ motionless body and Twilight’s strange appearance, along with the strange black, leathery tentacles sprouting from her backside, I felt increasingly as if I was in danger. Something told me that this wasn’t the Twilight I knew and loved. Everything screamed ‘imposter.’

My stunned face changed expression. A wave of grim resolve washed over me.

Another step closer. By now I could smell her. Oh dear merciful Luna, did something crawl in her mane and die?!

“Imposter!” I hissed at her. “You’re not Twilight.”

I lifted a claw, exposing my sharp nails.

She stopped her approach momentarily to give a disturbing multi-layered laugh.

“What do you plan on doing to me?” She… it finally spoke. The voice caught me off guard. I lowered my claw. What was this thing doing? It… was like it was toying with me, scaring me just for the kicks.

“What do you want with me?” I demanded of it.

The arched tentacle shot towards me, gripping my neck.

It didn’t answer me, at least not at first. It eventually spoke.

“What!” It began angrily, “Damn, your body rejects me too.”

I instinctively moved my claws to my neck trying to free my self from the death grip.

It held me here for what seemed like an eternity. Eventually though I felt myself hoisted into the air.

There was a noise. It came from the living room. It was a knocking sound. Twilight’s head twisted to face the door, leaving her head on backwards. Then she returned it to me.

“We should go.” It said.

Twilight’s body began to glow red. I could feel a pressure build up in my head as its grip tightened. I thought my head was going to pop clean off my shoulders. The reddish glow intensified more and more until finally it faded away and all of a sudden we were somewhere else. One moment we were in Twilight’s tree house, the next, we were in some other strange place.

The imposter dropped me on the floor of the room, leaving me coughing and gasping for air. Then I stood up and backed away as fast as I could from… it. Never in my life had I experienced the fear of death so strong then when that tentacle was choking me. The second I recovered from the coughing, I began thanking Celestia that I hadn’t died. After that, I took a moment to observe my new surroundings.

It looked like… a library of sorts. Bookshelves lined the walls of this narrow hallway shaped room. Pictures, or portraits rather, of famous and regal ponies occupied the spaces that weren’t already taken up by shelving. At one end of the room sat a large metal door, at the other a deep, dark oak desk. Behind the desk, on the wall perched a monstrous portrait of Celestia herself.

This was weird. This didn’t look like any part of the royal castle I’d seen.

There was somepony sitting in a chair behind the desk. The chair turned revealing the identity of the pony occupying it. It was the one and only Princess of the Day. Celestia herself stared at me, a mix of shock and joy rushing to her battered face.

“Spike!” Celestia called out. “Y-your… alive…”

I stared at her blankly. Maybe she could tell me what in the heck was going on.