Lesser heroes would have a mental breakdown if they found out their lover worked for the enemy. Radiance is not one of those heroes.
Rarity, otherwise known as Radiance, is one of Maretropolis’s top heroes in a society built around superpowers and amazing deeds.
Coco Pommel, otherwise known as Thorny Rose, is a mare with a terrifying power and an even more terrifying situation—the only work she can find is as a henchmare to the notorious Knitpicker.
In an attempt to thwart Radiance for good, Knitpicker orders Coco to charm the heroine and break her heart like nopony else could. But Radiance’s unwavering faith and generosity might just be Coco’s salvation...
My final love letter to FiMFiction, featuring superheroes, redemption arcs, and two of my all-time favorite mares. Coverart by TheTarkaana.
Coco Pommel was not a good mare, and she hadn’t been one since she got her cutie mark. With the type of powers she had, nopony would be. That was what she told herself whenever she tried to escape the sorry existence she lived.
That was just the way of the superpowered world and the heroes and villains that came with it. She’d learned young that good and evil had nothing to do with the way you were, and everything to do with what your cutie mark gave you. For some ponies, it gave them powers beyond anypony’s wildest dreams; for others, it gave them nothing but a talent and a purpose. For Coco, it injected darkness into her heart, because that was the only way ponies like her could survive.
These days, every job had superpower screenings, and for many ponies in Maretropolis’s dark underbelly, it had been a choice between going hungry or joining with a villain. Coco had resisted it with everything she had, swore she would be the one to break the trend, but in the end, none of it had worked. The answer was always going to be that simple: she had a destructive power, and destruction only breeds more of itself.
Her particular villain went by Knitpicker, a pink earth pony that could fuse objects together and who was currently trying to figure out a way to tear them apart. For what ends, Coco barely even knew--the relationship between a villain and her hired musclemare was rarely that intimate. Knitpicker had simply given her a salary, the power-canceling collar on her neck, and a plan.
“Find the hero Radiance and collect as much information on her as you can.”
Finding her hadn’t been the hard part--there had been speculation for ages that the famous fashion designer Rarity was really the Power Pony Radiance. And really, all Coco had needed to do to get her where she wanted her was to go to a few sewing classes at the community center and feed her a sob story about how her powers had made her homeless. From there, Rarity’s legendary generosity had kicked right in, and before she knew it, the two were living together. Dating. Doing everything that heroes and villains should never do.
As Coco geared up for another late night robbery, Rarity lay sprawled on the couple’s couch, her eyes blissfully ignorant to the deception her marefriend was putting on. Just like always.
“Hey,” whispered Coco. “I’ve got another night shift at my parents’ grocery store, so I’m heading out. You look like you’ve had a rough day, so get some rest, okay? I better not see you awake by the time I come back.”
I better not see Radiance at the crime scene, she translated internally. Because Knitpicker doesn’t want you to know the truth yet.
The final plan would be coming to fruition in a couple of days. All Coco would need to do is drop her guard at the right time, reveal her identity, and wait for Radiance to fall off her game. It was harsh, really, far harsher than anything Knitpicker had ever had her do before, but they couldn’t have Radiance interfering anymore. Learning that her marefriend played for the other team, hopefully, would keep her from doing just that.
Coco stole a final glance at her sleeping marefriend, wishing that this happy dream didn’t have to end, before stealing away into the night. With a single tug at her tie, Coco let her true form come out, a vaguely equine being with shaggy fur and needles running down her back. The most infamous henchmare in Maretropolis.
More than a few ponies had wondered about her other form. The current theory was that Knitpicker had fused her with a porcupine in some sort of failed experiment, though radioactive mutation was still a popular one as well. Nopony wanted to believe that such a thing could be the result of a cutie mark, that it could have happened to any of Maretropolis’s foremost designers.
Thorny Rose didn’t care if anypony saw her as a monster, because Coco Pommel had admitted to that reality long, long ago.
****
If the plan had been to wear Radiance out even before the revelation, it had certainly worked. Thanks to Maretropolis’s popular Fashion Week, the hero hadn’t been out on a single case, and even the other Power Ponies hadn’t been able to stop Knitpicker’s latest raids. As a result, Coco found herself on the front page of the paper for the third day in a row, a personal record that she only pretended to be proud of.
“I keep telling you, my supervisors simply have to be in bed with her,” Rarity muttered, flinging the paper across the dining room table. “Everypony at my agency knows I’m a superhero, so why in Celestia’s good name wouldn’t they alert me when things like this happen? They know I’d fling myself straight off the award show stage if my citizens were in the balance. So why would they care if somepony else had to present my latest designs?”
You’re so far off the mark it hurts, Coco thought to herself. Knitpicker had briefed her that Radiance was considered to be the dumbest of all the Power Ponies, but hearing it in person was almost physically painful. Though lately, Coco wasn’t sure if that was out of annoyance or sympathy for just how hard Rarity was about to be hit.
“Well, everypony does say Knitpicker had a job in the fashion industry before she went bad,” said Coco. “It does seem like the sort of thing she’d plan for if she knew your identity.”
“See, that’s what I’ll just never understand about her. Why would you ever want to be a villain when you were already at your prime? From the undercover work I’ve done, I know that she was Prim Hemline’s own protege, and she was even about to get her own fashion line. I was even in line to get one of her limited edition Buttonbelle cashmere sweaters!”
“Oh-ho, I suppose that’s why you’ve been fighting her all this time,” teased Coco.
Rarity simply puffed her cheeks in response, and Coco allowed herself one last laugh before she set her plan into action. The sooner she did it, the sooner the bandage would come off, and the fewer regrets she’d have.
When did she start having regrets, anyway? A month ago? Two? Perhaps even the very minute she’d seen Rarity open that community center door, with her gorgeous white fur and luscious mane?
No, Coco thought, slapping herself on the face at that shampoo commercial image. I have to do this, no matter what.
“Of course not, darling. While I am a tiny bit peeved at the cancellation, saving the city always comes first. I do have to keep up the image of the perfect romantic hero, after all. But on a more important topic, are you all right, dear? You look as pale as powder!”
For a slight second, Coco was taken off guard by Rarity’s question and the way the other mare looked at her now-reddened cheek. But once she saw her opening, she knew she had to take it. From the way Knitpicker had heckled her at work today, she knew she couldn’t let this go on much longer.
“I probably just caught something from one of the customers, but do you mind if I lay down? I just can’t seem to stay awake today.”
“Of course, dear.”
Rarity huddled in close and leaned on Coco’s shoulder, pushing her towards the pure white bed. Coco let out a few half-hearted fake coughs before her marefriend laid her on the mattress and tucked her in. For a brief second, she wasn’t sure if Rarity was going to take the bait, but eventually the designer noticed that her collar was still on.
“I hope you don’t mind me asking, but why do you always wear that? Don’t get me wrong, it does give your eyes a lovely pop, but sometimes I swear you sleep with it on.”
“I have a pretty nasty scar on my neck,” replied Coco. “I had to have major surgery as a foal. The last pony I was with screamed when he saw it. He was never able to look at me the same way again.”
As expected, Rarity stared at her with horror in her eyes, a feeling Coco knew would only amplify in the coming minutes.
“What a dreadful stallion, if I do say so myself! Nopony should ever make you feel that way, and I’ll be there to make sure nopony does. You shouldn’t have to fear anything when you’re around me.”
“Are you really sure about that?” Coco asked, putting on her best innocent, kicked-puppy look.
In response, Rarity simply took the collar off Coco’s neck, untying the cord that allowed her to hold her civilian form. As it unraveled, Coco remembered when Knitpicker had first given it to her, given her what had seemed like the first chance she’d ever had in her life.
“This is just the beginning,” Knitpicker had said then. “If everything goes right between the two of us, you’ll never have to hide again. Nopony will.”
Back then, she’d wondered how a pony like that could ever be considered a villain, when heroes had never bothered to help ponies like her. Now, she realized that being a villain was all she was ever meant to be, and that was why help never came. In any universe, the damage was done by the time the heroes decided to pay attention to the truly troubled ponies.
Those were the words she wove around her heart as the spikes appeared across her body, as she imagined Rarity facing her time and time again in battle. Those were the words that, right or wrong, gave her strength to face a forever uncertain future.
As expected, Rarity was dangerously close to one of her standard fainting fits, one of the few things that she was able to control only in her hero form. She instinctively reared away from Thorny Rose’s formidable needles, only to back into a battle stance. WIth her grace, it almost looked like a yoga pose, but Rarity’s eyes told Thorny everything she needed to know.
“I might have known,” muttered Rarity, letting out a rather undignified snort. “I don’t know how you gained access to my flat, but I won’t tolerate this any longer! Hand over my marefriend at once, or there will be consequences!”
For the slightest of moments, the Coco personality that Thorny had built up around Rarity almost came back, wanting more than anything to convince her marefriend that this was all a setup, that Coco really had been foalnapped. Just hearing that word from somepony, anypony, was almost enough to break this whole charade for good. She could feel the warmth of hope emanating from Rarity’s heart, and she wasn’t sure how she could possibly live without it.
Pull yourself together, she told herself. This is the way things have to be. You can’t just let a mare come between you and the plan. You can’t hide from reality anymore.
With poise that betrayed her size, Thorny stepped off the bed and let out a single cynical snort to match Rarity’s.
“That’s some devotion you’ve got there,” she said, running her tail along Rarity’s side as she gloated. “Always willing to assume the best from your marefriend, even when those beliefs should be disappearing before your very eyes. You get involved with a random mare you barely even know, and you don’t think this was part of the plan all along?”
The other mare’s eyes drifted towards a picture of her and Coco together, and then another and another. They had been the sort of couple to document everything they’d ever done together, even if they had only been together for a few months. It was times like this that Thorny was grateful Radiance had been the first one to oppose her, since none of the other Power Ponies could have possibly fallen as hard for her as she did.
“Coco would never get herself involved with those ruffians, and I’m insulted that you’d even imply such a thing! Bring her to me at once, and nopony gets hurt!”
Thorny shoved her collar towards Rarity with a look of defiance that hid something even deeper, a feeling that not even the henchmare herself understood. Somehow, defeating a heroine for good wasn’t anywhere near as satisfying as Knitpicker told her it would be, but then again, few things in her life were.
“Your creation power allows you to analyze the magical structure of any object in Equestria. It’s the only way you can possibly duplicate so many objects. So I’d like you to look at this thing and then tell me what you just said again.”
She’d always expected Radiance’s famous appraisal process to take hours, but somehow, the superhero had already figured out the collar’s structure in a matter of minutes. And just then, instead of the pupilless laser eyes Thorny had come to expect from heroes, she saw only normal dilated eyes.
Radiance was no hero after all, as she’d always suspected. Putting up a fight was outside of her level of expertise.
“It’s a magical cloaking device,” Rarity spoke. “Similar to changeling magic, it can transform somepony into a different form, or hide their powers entirely. Exquisitely designed, too, might I add. If it was a little tackier, I would have assumed that a wizard had made it, but we all know that Knitpicker has quite the fashion sense.”
While most ponies assumed raised eyebrows were a Mistress Marevelous trademark, Radiance pulled them off quite well, too. It might have been trademark hero swagger rather than her true feelings, but watching Rarity as she stood now, Thorny was beginning to get the idea that her companion had been in far worse situations before, and that she wasn’t about to let this one graze her. Even if it really did.
“So, if the Coco I know would never get involved with Knitpicker, was it all a lie...or are you being set up? Is this collar why you’re with her now? Are you really that desperate to hide your powers?”
Her voice was soft as silk, in spite of the situation she found herself in. It wasn’t the normal tone she took with Thorny, and for a second, the henchmare thought this was yet another trick. Nopony reasonable would act like this, but Thorny figured she’d carry this plan out to the end, as any good henchmare would.
If she couldn’t break Rarity apart from her in the expected way, she’d just have to try another technique. One that hit far closer to her heart.
“Don’t pretend you understand. You’re creation, and I’m destruction. That’s as simple as it gets.”
She turned her head towards the small army of needles along her back, pointing to each one as she explained her powers to Rarity.
“These needles don’t just prick ponies. Some can paralyze you, some can poison you, sedate you...a few even emit acid. Not all fashion ponies get the same powers as you, you see. You were just one of the lucky ones who could get anything you wanted, but for ponies like me...sometimes getting involved with ponies like Knitpicker is the only thing we can do. Sorry if the truth bruises your fragile view of the world, but that’s how it really is, Radiance.”
With that, she picked up her collar and tugged it back on, as if to nail in the disturbing reality one last time. But really, this was how the plan was always meant to end. The encounter between her and Rarity was always meant to be short--just long enough to devastate her, but not long enough to get too attached. Ideally, it would have come far sooner, rather than the months long cat-and-mouse game they’d unwittingly played together, but Knitpicker had always needed more time to carry out her own plan. Even if it meant things had to end like this, far longer and far more tedious than Thorny Rose would have liked.
She took one last glance at the situation in front of her--the bed that had been ruined by her needles, the hero who’d been ruined by far more--before reaching for the door. Looking back on her lover, no, her mark, would only delay things further. Knitpicker had prepared a room at her own place, so it wasn’t like Coco was really giving up that much.
So why did it feel like she was?
Rarity’s doors were trimmed with golden locks of all sorts, the type any secret superhero would have. They were never the sorts to think such threats could ever come from within. With a small scoff at that thought, Coco undid every one, hoping Rarity was wallowing too much in her grief to notice.
Just as Coco was about to open the door, though, an awkward thumping sound came from the other side. Seconds later, she realized that she had forgotten to undo one of the locks, and unfortunately for her, it happened to be of the particularly loud variety. If Rarity hadn’t noticed before, Coco thought to herself as she saw the unicorn mare trotting towards her, she certainly did now.
“Isn’t that just the most wonderful innovation?” said Rarity, her voice echoing with a strange confidence. “My dear friend Filli-Second calls them ‘ganoush bars.’ If you try to open a door and forget to undo one of these babies, it makes a delightful ‘ganooooush’ sound and alerts everypony in the premises to your presence. They’re the bane of hotel ponies’ existence, I’m sure, but I find them quite useful for tracking villains.”
As much as Coco wanted to undo her tie for once in her life, the size increase she got as Thorny Rose meant she’d easily impale a wall or two from where she stood now. From the way Rarity had her cornered, she was sure the heroine had already planned for this, but she stood in battle stance anyway. Her own bad luck might have made her a villain, but there was no way she would ever give her boss up this early in the game.
Coco stood with her back arched in place for what felt like forever, ready to take on any attack that came. However, as the seconds passed into minutes, she wondered if Rarity really wanted to take her on at all.
“Honestly,” Coco muttered, “what gives?! Isn’t this the part where you’re supposed to, I don’t know, kick me in the face or something? Have a no superpowers, no holds barred beatdown?”
She’d expected it to sound every bit as threatening as the sorts of things Thorny Rose always said, but instead, Rarity must have just thought it was a sign of genuine confusion. She got in closer to Coco and shook her head.
“Of course not,” she said, “because I believe you. You might say the pony you showed me before was a fake, but even if it was, I still don’t see an enemy. I see somepony ruined by their circumstances, and somepony who still has a chance. As a superhero, I’d always figured I’d run into somepony like this, and I always told myself I’d guide them to the light to the best of my ability!”
Okay, it’s official, Coco said to herself, this mare’s hero persona never turns off. She probably sits around with the Masked Matterhorn as they quiz each other on superhero cliches.
“Doesn’t that still involve beating me up, though?” she asked Rarity. “Fighting the evil out of somepony and all?”
Rarity simply laughed at the thought, and Coco couldn’t help but feel a strange sense of relief at hearing the mare smile. It went against everything she felt--everything she should have felt--but for some reason, seeing Rarity break down into nothing more than a shell of a pony would have been a nightmare to Coco.
Did that mean her mission was one, too? And if it was, what did that really mean for her?
“That is how some heroes would handle situations like this,” Rarity admitted. “I’ve heard it has quite a high success rate, on top of that. But even after your recent admission, I still can’t fathom hurting you like that anymore, even if it turned out to be worth it in the end. No, I have quite another offer for you. One I’m making for you both as a hero and as your marefriend.”
Rarity gripped Coco’s hoof with more compassion and warmth than Coco had ever felt, even from her parents. Everypony in her life had treated her power as a sad fact, but from the way it seemed now, Rarity was a mare that could face any challenge, even ones that fate had handed other ponies.
“Please go back to Knitpicker and try to delay her plans. Tell her I’m in denial about your true identity, and that you need more time with me to prove it. In the meantime, I’d like to prove to you that you’re more than just your power. I want you to believe that there are ponies who would accept you outside of the darkness you’ve been veiling yourself in.”
“And how do you intend to do that?” Coco asked, with more curiosity than skepticism in her voice.
“I don’t know what part of Maretropolis you grew up in, but in mine, there are plenty of programs to help ponies learn to accept their powers. I’d like you to at least see some of them and get support from others before choosing to go back to Knitpicker for good. If you don’t believe you’re more than your power in a week, you can go back to her if you like. But I’d like you to at least think about the good you can do.”
If it had been any other mare, Coco would have surely thought this was a ruse, a way for the heroes to beat Knitpicker with her own weapon. But, even after everything, every complication, Rarity had always been an easy mare to read. At the very least, she could humor Rarity, learn more about her, and report back to Knitpicker if the plan wasn’t successful.
At the very most...Coco had no idea what mare she could become after this, and that thought was nowhere near as scary as it should have been.
“A lot of heroes would have let me go by now,” she said simply, taking one last look to the other side of the door. The side that would have brought her all the certainty in the world without comfort, set against the side that could let her defy destiny itself.
“I’d like to change that.”
I’d like you to at least think about the good you can do.
As Coco let herself get swept into Rarity’s arms, she let herself indulge in the hope she’d always been denied. The hope that, even if there was only a one percent chance this project would change her, was far stronger than anything she’d ever felt.
Even stronger than the deadly needles along her spine.
Coco Pommel remembered the last time she’d let her hopes run away from her. It had been a year ago almost to the day, the day she’d first run into the mare who called herself Knitpicker.
She’d just left an interview with a famous fashion company, only to receive more of the same treatment as always. “We don’t want your kind here,” the interviewer had told her the minute she trotted in, echoing the constant refrain that ran through Coco’s life. She had been so humiliated by the whole incident, by the way the company had feigned interest in her only to throw her away, that she didn’t even care that it was raining. If nothing else, her needles were her personal umbrella.
Sometimes, she’d wondered if that was the only good thing about her power.
She’d ran as fast as she could go, not paying any mind to where the road was taking her. By the time she’d realized that somepony had been following her from the fashion house, she’d already backed her way into a dead end.
The mare standing before her was slender and pink, an earth pony who didn’t seem to have an ounce of menace in her body. By all means, a member of the typical Manehattan elite. But she held her head high as she strode towards Coco, and with a single touch, the two dumpsters behind her began to fuse together. The brown eyes that had seemed so beautiful and soulful during the interview now gleamed with a devilish glow, and they were turned straight towards her.
Not with fear, but with interest.
“Interviews can be a real drag, can’t they?” the pink mare said with a bubbly voice that didn’t match her expression. “I bet those powers make it even worse. Wouldn’t it be nice if you could get rid of things like that for good?”
“What do you want from me?” Coco spat, wanting nothing more than to leave this mare and go back to her shabby home. There was only one thing mares like this wanted from her, and it was never good.
“You’re not really from the fashion house, are you? You’re a villain, and you want to recruit me.”
“I used to be, but that’s not important now, mmkay? The second one’s closer to the mark, but that’s not all I want. I’m not just some scumbag looking for grunts. I saw the way they treated you in the interview, and I’ve seen it too many times. I wanna unite the dregs of Equestria under a common purpose. Dregs like us.”
Only now did Coco notice her designer saddlebag, something somepony like her could only dream of having. With the utmost grace, the pink mare set it down and removed a small object from it--a collar with a tie, the sort of thing a well-off working pony would wear.
“The way I see it is, if you’ll let me borrow your power for awhile, I’ll pay you back with interest. Since I can already fuse things together, I’ve always wondered if I could separate things, too.”
Sure enough, with another touch, Knitpicker was able to undo the bonds that had fused the two dumpsters together.
“I don’t intend to stop there. A lot of ponies have powers they don’t want. Even more have powers they don’t deserve. Once I reach full power, I can make your needles fall off just...like...that.”
Knitpicker tapped on one of Coco’s needles, and unlike all the other times ponies had touched her, it simply fell off like a feather in the wind.
Just like the offer Rarity had made her a year later, Knitpicker’s made all sorts of possibilities move through Coco’s mind. Possibilities that clouded her judgement like nothing else could, ones that had formed a new identity around her before she’d even gotten the chance to blink.
Knitpicker may have been crazy, or idiotic, or any of the other things ponies whispered about her. But her words were as hypnotic as a siren’s. The second Coco found out about the collar that could cancel her powers, she’d jumped on the offer without considering the consequences.
“I’m the only one who can understand you,” Knitpicker had said when Coco first put it on. “Everypony else in this city is only out for themselves. Remember that.”
Was Rarity really the same way? Or had the whole thing been a setup from the start?
Had the collar been her freedom, or just another restraint?
Either way, for the first time, Coco felt as though she couldn’t risk being wrong. Because next time, she knew a pony like Knitpicker or Radiance wouldn’t come along.
By then, her second chance--towards heroism or villainy--would be exhausted for good.
****
Coco had spent the whole morning snagging over the plan, but Rarity was raring to go. It’d been less than twelve hours since Coco had revealed her connection to Thorny Rose, but her marefriend had already collected all sorts of materials from support groups. The ones Coco had been involved in when she was young had been less than sincere, but Rarity assured her that these would be different.
Coco kept a close grip on her collar anyway, not wanting to risk the wind or anything else blowing it away.
The two were heading towards one of Manehattan’s community centers, and while the weather was delightful, the sun had just barely risen in the sky. Apparently, therapy programs for ponies with superpower-related depression couldn’t be scheduled at a decent time, something that almost made Coco resent this whole thing more. Still, if it worked, it would probably be the first time any regular ponies had talked to her without her collar in awhile.
But, on the other hoof, the very possibility of taking it off scared her to her core.
By the time they reached the community center, which was much more modestly decorated than some of the extravagant ones Coco had seen in other parts of Manehattan, only a single pony had even bothered to show up. Coco wasn’t sure what part of this was the least encouraging--the fact that the therapy session was held in a shabby basement, that it was held so early in the morning, or that the other sign of life to be found there was only half of one.
An unattended foal sat on one of the chairs, idly moving her legs back and forth as she waited for other guests to arrive. She already had her cutie mark and her powers, but she likely hadn’t had them for long, Coco deduced. Little bits of baby fat still layered her brown body, and even though she likely had devastating powers, she whistled a little tune as she waited.
At least this kid’s parents figured it out early, Coco thought wistfully.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Rarity said. “‘What kind of therapy group is this, Miss Rarity?’ Well, the answer is that this isn’t the only one. They’re scheduled throughout the day, but some power sets take longer for ponies to get acclimated to--”
“So this is the reject group of the reject group?” replied Coco, barely hiding the resentment in her voice.
“That’s not quite right. Some ponies aren’t as comfortable with showing their powers in front of a crowd, or haven’t learned to control them yet. But that isn’t quite why I brought you to this particular group.”
The filly began to trot towards Rarity, as if on cue. Though it’d never occurred to Coco that Rarity could have been involved with programs like this from the start, it at least helped her make sense of why the unicorn seemed so willing to forgive her. After all, trying to fix a messed-up mare like her was practically every romantic’s fantasy, and there was no way Rarity could be any different.
Right?
“Now, I’m trusting you with this knowledge, maybe a little too much,” Rarity continued. “Whether you go back to Knitpicker or not, I won’t judge. But if you use what I’m about to tell you to put this filly’s family in danger, I certainly will.”
For once, Rarity’s normally gentle gaze was nothing but ferocity, the type Coco always associated with Radiance rather than her counterpart. She almost swore she saw her nostrils flail, even.
“I--I won’t tell,” she said, cursing her sudden wave of fear. “Not even Knitpicker’s in the business of hurting kids.”
The minute she answered, an understanding smile came onto Rarity’s face, as if she’d expected Coco’s reply all along.
“This is Barbara Seed, Mistress Marevelous’ cousin. She was orphaned in an accident a while back, so she’s been staying with my teammate’s family. Needless to say, though, the hero community was speculating about her powerset ever since they found out Mistress Marevelous adopted her.”
Just as Rarity was about to continue her explanation, the brown foal cuffed the hero in the leg. Unlike what Coco might have expected from somepony placed in a program like this, the younger pony’s composure seemed far more playful than malicious.
“I told you, the name’s Babs now! No great superhero has somethin’ like Barbara as their civilian name! C’mon!”
“I know, I know, but are you really sure about how that name sounds? It’s a little too much like--”
“Duh, that’s what makes it sound cool. Everypony will make me out to be a real bad seed with powers like mine, but I’ll really be out savin’ lives as the Jersneigh Angel. It’s a rock solid alibi!”
Babs puffed out her chest in pride before turning to Coco. Coco still wasn’t sure if the foal was in on this whole scheme, but even if she was, she seemed like the type who’d talk her off even if she wasn’t. No wonder she had a hairstylist cutie mark.
“You...already have a hero name planned and everything?” Coco asked, trying her best to play along.
“Of course! I’m gonna stick it to all the ponies who’ve told me I can’t be one with the power I have. And from what I hear, you’ve got a different name, too. I saw it on the sign-up sheet. It’s not too often we get an actual villain here!”
Strangely enough, Babs almost seemed more excited than scared about that fact. Her eyes practically shone with curiosity, as if Coco were just a figure from a comic book instead of a real, and dangerous, pony.
“But I don’t see anything wrong with that. I’m sure I would’ve gone all kinds of crazy if I hadn’t found a group like this early on. Ponies aren’t exactly wild about a hero whose entire power is, well, this.”
When Coco raised an eyebrow, Babs fished a pair of scissors out of what looked to be a miniature junk heap. For some reason or another, somepony had felt the need to store random objects in a pile, many of them in various states of disrepair. Just when Coco started to wonder why such an odd thing was there in the first place, Babs closed her eyes and began to focus. By the time her hooves touched the scissors, they had already begun to move on their own, taking themselves apart into blades and nails. The next object she fished out, a pen, ended up much the same way, separated into parts.
“Even before I got these, I liked taking pens apart. Guess I shoulda known this would be my power, right? Mistress Marevelous took me to get my powers inspected as soon as I got my mark, and I can do this with any non-living thing. Except one time, I saw a dead frog out by a pond, and it still worked. I think you can probably guess why I ended up here.”
“She might seem fine now, but when she first came here, she was terrified,” Rarity explained. “That was how Mistress Marevelous and I ended up working on these sessions. Some of our fellow Power Ponies are still skeptical, but we’re of the belief that everypony’s power can be used for good.”
No matter how much she wanted to believe it, Coco knew that couldn’t possibly be true. Even off the top of her head, she could imagine situations where powers like Babs’ could be used for good, but she couldn’t do the same with her own. However, when she tried voicing it to the other two ponies, they simply continued talking.
It’s almost like they actually believe this bull, she thought to herself. Sure wish I could.
Already, this whole reformation quest was beginning to grate on her nerves, even if she wasn’t necessarily opposed to the idea. If there really was method to their madness, she figured, she might actually be tempted to leave Knitpicker behind, but that sure wasn’t how it seemed at the moment.
“Oh, right,” Rarity chipped in. “Coco, what exactly are your powers? I always used mine in our battles, but you always insisted on hoof-to-hoof combat. I don’t think I’ve ever seen one of those needles leave your body once.”
Of course she had to, Coco told herself. They were a weapon with many applications, and taking a cocky hero down a few pegs was just one of them. Any henchmare worth her salt wouldn’t have held back, especially since Radiance always seemed to be the only Power Pony on the scene when Knitpicker attacked.
So why did she? Was it because she knew Knitpicker wanted her alive, so that Coco could play with her heart more? Or was it because Radiance always fought so brilliantly, so gracefully, that sometimes, even Coco couldn’t keep herself from staring?
She could practically imagine the hero summoning weapon after weapon without breaking a sweat, the way she flipped her mane behind her as if battles were photo shoots. The way bantering seemed to come so easy between the two of them, even though Coco struggled for words when she wasn’t in her Thorny Rose form. The way she could practically see sparkles forming around Radiance the first time she’d asked her monstrous form what a beautiful mare was doing in a place like this.
You’re not used to compliments, she’d told herself after that battle. The sparkles are just some dumb superpower Radiance has. It means nothing.
“Um, Coco? I just asked about your powers. There’s no need to freeze up.”
Coco shook herself out of her reverie, only to find that she could practically feel her cheeks heating up. Had she really been fantasizing about Radiance this whole time? Her enemy?
“Oh, right! Um, what’s a beautiful mare like you doing in a place like this?”
Judging by the looks on Rarity and Babs’ faces, she probably had been. And she’d likely made a complete and utter fool of herself on top of that.
“If you’re done acting like a lovesick fool, you can go ahead and answer Rarity’s question,” Babs snarked.
Coco didn’t even dare to dignify that with a response. Instead, she took her tie off and let the needles form on her back. Somehow, for once, even that wasn’t as scary as the thoughts she’d just had.
Reformed or unreformed, Radiance doesn’t deserve somepony like me, she reminded herself. No amount of work will ever change that, so it’s best to just let these feelings go. The charade’s over, so there’s no point in thinking this way anymore.
“Each of these needles has a different effect on ponies,” Thorny began, trying her best to hide the shakiness in her voice. “Most of them are coated in some sort of chemical, though--when they were trying to figure out my powers, my doctors did tests on what they were made of, since they’d never seen anything like it. Anyway, some of them are explosive when shot, others have acid tips, and a few are even poisonous. I mainly use the sedative ones when I’m out on a job, since I’m mostly called out for heists and bodyguard work. Sleeping spells are common enough, so the police are less likely to trace anything back to Knitpicker. Occasionally, I use the acidic ones to create a distraction, but the damage they dish out can give us away real easy. They’re basically a last resort.”
“And what about the explosives and poisons?” Rarity asked, barely even flinching at the display of power.
“Henchmares and assassins tend not to do the same jobs. You want both, you hire both. And we don’t blow up the places we hold up, in case we need to go back for something else.”
As hard as Thorny tried to keep everything as vague as possible, she still couldn’t shake the feeling that Rarity was invested in far more than just helping her with her powers. She knew that Rarity would try to ask more, try to turn this into something it wasn’t. But she stood her ground and said nothing more until the rest of the meeting started.
After all, whether these feelings she had for Rarity were love or not, keeping Knitpicker’s secrets would always be the most important thing.
But she wasn’t so sure anymore about why that was.
****
For the next couple of days, life with Rarity was routine--go to the community center, talk with Babs, try with all your might not to cooperate too much with the questioning, and report back to Knitpicker. But on the fifth day of support group visits, Rarity finally decided to ask the question Coco knew had been trapped in her mind, even as she dreamed.
“Are you sure you want to do all this?” questioned Rarity as the two sat in a cafe booth a few blocks away from the community center. True to Rarity’s wealth and fame, the mare had been able to reserve the entire restaurant for a half hour, to ensure nopony else could hear what she was about to say. “You don’t seem very motivated in your sessions.”
“You mean I don’t tell you everything you want to hear,” Coco replied. “I know you’ve got good intentions, but if all you see in this is a way to beat Knitpicker, then I won’t have it. I actually thought you wanted me to change, but for all I know, you just want me to be your spy!”
Rarity’s eyes went wide with a mix of shock and sadness, and the minute Coco saw her face, she knew she’d misspoke. More than anything, she wanted to run away from this whole situation, to another end of Equestria if need be. Villain or not, all she seemed to do these days was make ponies uncomfortable, and they’d surely be better off without her--
“I’m very sorry if I ever gave you that impression,” Rarity spoke, interrupting Coco’s stream of thoughts. “I absolutely understand why you’d think such things, but I want you to know that you can trust me with anything. There’s no way we can get through any of this if you don’t tell me.”
We. Every once in a while, even after all this betrayal, Rarity still slipped into that word. She should have known better than anypony what Coco had really wanted from her, and yet she refused to accept that possibility. Was it really that obvious that Coco had always, always wanted more from her, even if it was just somepony to fill her flat at night? Or was it just simple, naive denial?
“I can’t believe you can still say that after everything. I mean, I was flat-out sent to spy on you, and here you are, actually talking about us like we’re a real couple.”
“Love is a very difficult thing to fake, darling,” replied Rarity. “And no offense, but I would have known straight away if you trying to do that. You might work for a villain, but that still doesn’t change the fact that you’re a very easy mare to read. You always make your feelings known, like that little slip of the tongue you had a couple days ago.”
Coco could practically feel her temperature rising with every word from Rarity’s mouth. Was she really that terrible at deceiving ponies?
“C-can we please go back to talking about Knitpicker? Even that’s better than, well--”
Even though she was trying to do it under the table, Coco sensed that Rarity could see the way she fidgeted with her front hooves. Sure enough, the white unicorn broke out into laughter--not the elegant chuckles she normally let out, but rather the sort of boisterous racket she’d expect of a burly stallion.
“All right, all right, I’ll stop. It’s just easy to forget how cute you can be while we’re fighting each other. Though I have been wondering why you got involved with somepony like Knitpicker in the first place. What brought you to her, anyway?”
“This,” Coco answered, pointing to her collar. “She gave this to me in exchange for my loyalty. Back then, working with a villain was the last thing I wanted, but I knew the minute I saw it that it was one of a kind. So far, it’s the only thing that’s been able to conceal my powers and the only way I’m able to get by in Equestria without looking like a freak. The only way I’m able to get a job and function as a normal pony. Looking back on it, if Knitpicker would have asked me to kill a pony to get it, I would have.”
Rarity took a single sip of tea, and Coco couldn’t help but wonder if she’d scared her a little with that last statement. However, if she was frightened, she didn’t show it, and instead seemed rather intrigued by the whole matter.
“Well, that sounds simple enough,” she said. “All we have to do is recreate it with my powers, and--”
“Don’t! Knitpicker put a spell on it to keep you from replicating it. It was one of the first things she told me when I accepted the mission with you. The spell will let you examine the material, but if you try to replicate it, Knitpicker will know. Both of us will be in danger.”
Somehow, the fact that her own employer could put her in danger should have shocked her, but it didn’t. That was just the way villains operated, the way things were in Maretropolis. It wouldn’t matter if Rarity had just grabbed the collar without Coco’s permission and tried to duplicate it--she would be implicated no matter what. A good villain could never be too careful.
“That’s...disturbing. So essentially, since ponies like you are cast out from society, she controls you by offering you a way out, only for her to yank it away if you choose to leave. And if you do find your way out, everypony will recognize you as a villain’s accomplice and cast you out even more.”
Coco had never particularly thought about it that way, but she nodded in agreement. Rarity seemed so indignant about the situation that she almost hoped her marefriend was right. That Radiance could beat Knitpicker, figure out how she had created superpower-cancelling clothing, and run off into the sunset with Coco. But, then again, Coco knew better than anypony else what Knitpicker’s real plans were, and why Rarity’s trusting face wounded her more than anything else she could possible imagine.
She and Rarity could never last together after what she’d done. After what she was about to do.
“Knitpicker has something bigger in mind, though. She’s been stealing technology that would allow her to strip powers straight from ponies for good. That’s why she wanted me to get close to you. She wanted me to lure you into her lair so that she could fire up her power-cancelling ray and end Radiance for good. Then, when the other Power Ponies intervened, she’d do the same to them.”
“If you were so concerned with me spying on you, why did you tell me all of this? You surely would have won if--”
“I don’t want to win anymore,” interrupted Coco. “I don’t want to be a hero, or a villain, or anything! And if somepony out in the world actually loves me for who I am, the last thing I’d want to do is keep them from what they love. It just took me a little bit to remember how you really felt about me...that’s all…”
Tears crept down Coco’s face, the one thing about her that wasn’t made of poison. Her needles might have been coated with the stuff, but she could cry like everypony else. Even then, that didn’t mean she had to like it, especially not in a place like this.
Especially with what she was about to do.
“It’ll be all right, Coco. We’ll beat Knitpicker together, and you can finally have peace. You can work in my fashion house, and if anypony has a problem with that, I’ll talk some sense into them! There’s no way I’m losing you to that terrible mare.”
“I’m not losing you to her, either,” Coco whispered. “That’s why I’m going to use the ray on myself before taking it down from the inside. Then I’ll be able to come back to you for good.”
As she expected, Rarity’s entire body froze as she said this. She’d never seen such fear cross the mare’s face, not even in the worst of battles. But no matter how hard Rarity tried to speak, only mumbling came out.
“You can’t. It’s not safe! If you’re the first pony to test it out, then you could--”
“I won’t. Knitpicker always wanted me to be the first. This was the plan from the beginning.”
“Why do you still believe her?! What’s stopping her from killing you and replacing you with somepony else?! Once your powers are gone, you’ll be useless to her!”
Rarity grabbed onto Coco’s leg with every bit of strength she had, but unfortunately for her, that wasn’t much. If it had been another hero, it would have stopped Coco in her tracks, but Radiance’s lack of super strength meant that a few strategic movements were enough to make her let Coco go.
“It’s a risk I’m willing to take for you. If you cross Knitpicker again, she’ll wipe your powers for good!”
With a few final tears, Rarity stared Coco straight in the eye, knowing full well it could be the last time she laid eyes on the mare.
“How can you say that when that’s a risk I’d be willing to take for you? Please, Coco, think about what you’re doing!”
“I have.”
After a single prolonged glance, Coco strode away from the cafe, towards Knitpicker’s lair and the one thing that could end all this for good. The one thing that could even end her and Rarity for good.
