Ponies have always been one of the many races of Ravnica. Some familiar ponies happen to be members of guilds. These are their stories.
Ravnica. City of guilds. Sprawling ecumenopolis. The lovechild of Ankh-Morpork and Coruscant. If Dominaria is the heart of the Multiverse, then Ravnica is its liver, a place with a thousand purposes, none of them particularly appetizing.
The plane is already home to humans, goblins, vedalken, elves, merfolk, and more besides. Who's to say ponies weren't there the whole time? The ponies certainly aren't. Versatile as humans, colorful as rainbows, and innocent as any other Ravnican, they've found their way into each and every guild. But even when the guilds would separate them into distinct factions, the magic of friendship connects them. This is the story of those connections and how they encircle Ravnica as much as any magical path across the plane.
The last seat had been filled several minutes ago. The curtains were closed, stained with the legacy of dozens of past performances and audiences. Behind them, the opening act and several roustabouts—a blend of stagehand and helpful squatter—made sure everything was in place. Meanwhile, in her dressing room, the hostess was doing something similar.
"Costume, check." The costume designers loved working with ponies. The innate illusion that hid all of the interesting bits gave them much more leeway in making outfits that were as provocative as possible while still technically obeying decency laws. It was like walking a tightrope, but with more fabric and less pig's blood. The emcee's outfit for this evening wasn't clothing as much as it was as a collection of studded leather straps and black-and-red checkered cloth that happened to fulfill similar roles for its wearer. It didn't blur the line between jester and dominatrix; it wholly discarded the idea that the two were distinct roles. It also did nothing to hide her cutie mark, a grinning demon skull flanked by balloons.
"Awesome hat, check." Given the emcee's mane, it was really more of a headband, reinforced so it could support the weight of the curving demon horns, but as far as she was concerned, it was her awesome hat. There were many like it, but this one was hers.
"Opening act?"
"Schkk," gurgled a stagehand that had entered the room to tell her just that. The ickspitter was certainly an odd sight, keeping the clipboard in its claw away from the caustic slime that dribbled out of its face and chest, but it was part of the club's hallmark eccentricity.
The pony beamed at the drooling thrull. "Great! Thanks, Glrkt!" With that, she bounced her way behind the stage, where the opening act, a pair of half-demons, was finishing the first musical number.
A half-woman, half-goat, half-frog sang with surprising, haunting beauty:
So when you wish to figure out Exactly what to screw Just let this word into your head And you'll know what to do But better use it carefully Or it might change your life—
The other, looking like an overmuscled centaur with the back end cut off, concluded, "One day I did it to this frog and now that frog's me wife!"
The emcee couldn't restrain herself anymore, bursting on stage alongside them to much enthusiasm from the audience and wide grins from the performers. After the last ribbit-bleat, the theater erupted in applause, cheers, and the occasional knife thrown out of sheer exuberance.
The earth mare looked at the couple with pride. "You two have the voices of angels," she gushed, projecting her praise out to the audience. "Just don't tell me where you got 'em."
Her attention returned to the onlookers. "Ladies, gentlemen, and otherwise, welcome to the Pinkie Revue, where you may not survive this monologue!" She stomped, prompting the stagehands to fire warning shots of their caustic contents. One patron flinched in just the wrong way, getting a blob of acid to the scalp for his troubles. Pinkie shrugged. "I warned you!" The laughter redoubled.
"In any case, the Zahaks, ladies and gentlemen! Five years of happy marriage and they still haven't killed each other!" Pinkie Pie led the applause as the half-demons bowed. As they left the stage, she continued, "But we're here to celebrate a different milestone. I am pleased to announce that this is the Pinkie Revue's one hundredth performance!"
Pinkie pulled out a set of spiked juggling balls and killed a little time as she waited for the cheers to die down. When they did, she tossed her balls into the air, did a half-flip, and bucked them into the ceiling. Tottering about the stage on her forehooves, she continued, "We've got a great show for you tonight, featuring the comedy stylings of Perjaxinorz, Exava and her Amazing Dancing Cadavers, and our very special guest, reminding us that you can't spell 'slaughter' without 'laughter,' Massacre Girl!"
As the audience nearly shouted themselves hoarse, Pinkie triple-flipped her way back onto all fours. "But first, fresh from performing for the Lord of Riots himself, it's time for Shirtless Zeb and his famous fire dance!"
The sun was rising by the time Pinkie dragged herself back to her dressing room. She was exhausted, but it was a good exhaustion. The sort you got from adding some much needed excitement and hilarity to humdrum lives. Well, excitement, hilarity, and the occasional death, but really, what most people did wasn't living. It was barely even existing. Juggling flaming zombie rats, now that was living! And a good idea for a future opener.
Fully disrobed and somewhat decontaminated, Pinkie made her way up to her modest bedroom above the stage. There, she grabbed the pencil she kept on her nightstand. "Juggle... flaming... zombie rats..." she muttered around it, getting the idea down on the notepad she always kept close at hoof, in case of sudden inspiration. Pleased with herself, she collapsed onto her mattress, asleep before she made contact.
It felt like only moments later when there was a knock on the door. "Miss Pinkie?" called an echoing batrachian alto soprano.
"Urgh..." At some point, the mare had gotten her sheets on top of her, so only a sullen lump was visible on the bed. "Is it noon yet?"
"No, but—"
"You know the policy, Batara. Pinkie sleeps 'til the afternoon." The lump slumped back down, the matter settled.
"Rainbow Dash is here to see you, Ma'am."
"Dashie?" Pinkie kicked off her covers and opened the door, her smile wide despite the bags under her eyes. "That's a horse of several different colors! Tell her I'll be down in five!"
Batara curtsied, careful not to snag her horns on anything on the way up. "Of course, Ma'am."
Three minutes later, a little carefully applied red mana had Pinkie up to her usual levels of bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. She threw open the door, cried "Dashie!", paused for just long enough to confirm Rainbow Dash was unarmored and therefore hug-compatible, and hugged her. Then, with her prey defenseless, she pouted mere inches from her face. "I can't believe you missed the big centennial!"
Dash offered a nervous grin, unable to make eye contact. "Yeah, I, uh, had a patrol."
"All night? You know we always accept latecomers!"
"Well, um..." Dash sighed. "Look, Pinkie, could you let go of me? We need to talk."
Pinkie released her friend without any of her earlier animation. Her pout intensified to heart-rending levels. "You're not breaking up with me, are you?"
This got a double take. "Wha— We're not in a relationship! I don't even like mares!"
"And neither do I, but it sure lightened the mood, didn't it?" Pinkie proved her point with a giggle.
Dash facehoofed. "Ugh. Pinkie, this is genuinely serious."
"Oh, Dashie, everything's serious with you." Pinkie stiffened, assuming an exaggerated pose of military vigilance. She bellowed bombastically, "Criminals are mugging innocent civilians! Evildoers walk the streets! Candy is being taken from babies!" She shook her head. "You really need to learn to stop and smell the greasepaint. Or armor polish, I guess."
"Pinkie, my superiors want me to stop coming to see you."
The earth mare was silent for some time. Finally, very quietly, she asked, "Why?"
Dash pawed at the floor. "Well, it's about appearances, you know? Can't have the people's favorite skyjek going to a Rakdos club at night. Sends mixed signals."
"The Pinkie Revue does not condone criminal acts performed on the premises." Pinkie rattled off the legalese like she'd memorized it, which, of course, she had. "Any such acts will be immediately reported to the proper authorities and are grounds for loss of membership, immediate expulsion, and a lifetime ban. The Pinkie Revue is a subsidiary of the Cult of Rakdos. All rights reserved. Some restrictions apply. Cash value: One one-hundredth of a zib."
Dash rolled her eyes. "Come on, Pinks, you don't think that fools anyone, do you?"
Pinkie shrugged. "It's good enough for the lawmages."
"Well, it's not good enough for the Theater of Order. You're on Commander Grozdan's short list, Pinkie, and he doesn't care how much advokist crap you throw in his way." Dash hadn't wanted to name-drop the minotaur, who'd been targeting every Rakdos establishment he could pin down long enough to raid. Still... "I don't want the next time I see you to be on a list of arrests, or worse, executions. Please, Pinkie."
The other pony gave her a sad, knowing look. "Rainbow Dash, if you do as your higher-ups tell you, there won't be a next time you see me."
"...I know."
"So, the Boros Legion is ignoring the letter of the law, threatening a legitimate business and trying to tear apart a friendship." A scab-colored aura manifested around Pinkie. "That cannot stand. This aggression cannot stand!"
"They also put a bounty out on you."
"They what!?" The aura vanished in Pinkie's incredulity. "You're kidding!"
Dash produced a sheet of paper from under a wing. Holding it in her mouth, she mumbled, "See f'r y'rself."
It wasn't a bad likeness of Pinkie. They'd certainly gotten the mane right. The expression was close, too. She was smiling, but it wasn't a happy smile. More like a demon's smile, the sort that said, "I'm going to have fun. You aren't." Pinkie read the text beneath it. "Ten thousand zino reward for Pinkamena Diane Pie, alias 'Pinkie,'" owner and operator of unauthorized diversion club "The Pinkie Revue." She frowned. "I am so authorized!"
"Kee' readin'."
"Suspect charged with assault with a deadly weapon, assault without a deadly weapon, baking proscribed cultural artifacts without approval, operating a mizzium omnicannon without a license, possession of illegal narcotics, possession of illegal psychogenics, possession of illegal teleportatives, unnecessary tossing of the citizenry, and tax evasion." Pinkie scowled. "I never tossed anyone in my life!"
Dash let the notice drop. "Pinkie, please calm down."
"Calm down? How can I calm down? These charges are outrageous! Ludicrous! Flattering, even!" Pinkie grabbed the notice and balled it up, but had the restraint not to set it on fire. "You know what I'm gonna do?"
"Don't do anything, Pinkie," Dash groaned. "You're in deep enough already."
The pink mare shook her head. "Oh, no. I thought it was bad enough, but now they've gone too far. You know what I'm gonna do? I'll tell you what I'm gonna do!"
"Hello, I'd like to register a complaint, please?" Pinkie smiled up at the wojek behind the desk. She'd spent the better part of an hour waiting in line at the garrison, but hopefully it would all soon be worth it.
The man behind the desk sighed and produced a new blank form. "Name and occupation?"
"Pinkamena Diane Pie, proprietress."
"And what is..." The Boros trailed off as his mind registered what he was writing. He glanced beyond the complaint form. A pink pony, no horn or wings, with a ridiculously frizzy mane, a much more respectable dress than he'd expected, and a manic grin that was on wanted posters throughout the ten districts. "Excuse me for a moment. I need to speak with my supervisor."
"Okey dokey!" Pinkie hummed to herself as the good little soldier moved away from her, careful not to make any sudden movements.
A few minutes later, still humming, she was apprehended by every able-bodied guild member in the base.
Pinkie was practicing her juggling when the interrogator came up to her cell. To her disappointment, it was a grey-bearded human and not the viashino she'd been hoping for. She'd had so many "gator" puns lined up! Oh well. "Hi!" Pinkie caught the pebbles she'd been practicing with and set them down in a little pile by the slab that was currently her bed. "I was really impressed by your restraint, you know. Not only did it take several whole minutes before I got dogpiled, I wasn't even crushed under the weight!"
"Despite any personal feelings we may have about you, Miss Pie, we must still observe the law, or we are no better than you."
"Me?" Pinkie echoed innocently. "I'm making people smile and laugh and dance. You're all just looming over them, with all your pointy swords and pointy shields and pointy helmets and pointy, pointy, pointy laws."
The human shook his head. "You kill people, Miss Pie."
"Members only."
"And that's supposed to make it acceptable?"
Pinkie's smile stayed, but a bit of cunning slipped into her eyes. "No, it's supposed to make it legally protected religious expression. You see, membership at the Pinkie Revue comes with membership to the Cult of Rakdos, and any cultist killing another is considered a religious sacrifice according to Article 4, Section iii, Paragraph 6 of the revised Guildpact. Or, as Rakdos himself put it, 'Why should the other guilds care how we have our fun?'" The mare shrugged. "Call that murder, and I can think of some pig-worshippers in the Rubblebelt you can pin animal cruelty onto."
Pinkie's smile widened as she took in the old soldier's dumbfounded expression. "You know, just because I'm a Rakdos doesn't make me brainless. I'm not some crazed spiker, I'm a comedian and a businessmare. I'd never have gotten where I am today without thinking ahead." She considered the cell. "Okay, maybe not where I am this very moment, but I'd have never climbed the corporate ladder from Hell."
"I see." The interrogator straightened himself, trying to salvage some dignity. "In any case, aside from those crimes we know you committed, you are also a major suspect in approximately thirty-five others. I am far from the last interrogator you will be seeing today."
"Yeah, about that." Pinkie swung her head from side to side. "Have you and your friends taken a look at the ol' battlements lately?"
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Um, Sir?" A trembling boy, probably still in his teens, had crept towards the older man. His only armor was a vest of light rings emblazoned with the guild sigil. Pinkie couldn't help but think of her ickspitters. "Th-the lieutenant said we may have a situation."
"What?"
The messenger cowered as the veteran's full attention was focused on him. "Um, you see, it's possible that we may be kind of... surrounded."
"By who?"
"By whom," Pinkie noted. "'By whom are we being surrounded?' Just because you've got a popular uprising doesn't mean you should ignore proper grammar."
"You shut up, demon-nag!" the runner squealed. "You'll get yours soon enough!"
Pinkie nodded. "Sure will."
The boy wasn't sure how to respond to this. "Are... are they allowed to agree with you on that sort of thing, Sir?"
"You will find," huffed the interrogator, "that attempting to predict the actions of Rakdos and his minions is often an exercise in futility." He leaned in close to the bars, staying just out of hoof's reach. "What did you do, Pie?"
"No 'miss'?" Pinkie pouted. "Aww, and here you were making me feel all special."
"What did you do!?"
The mare chuckled. It was no different from any of her earlier laughter, yet something there chilled the humans' blood. "You boys really could learn a lesson from Dashie. She's not afraid to broaden her horizons, and as a pegasus, they're pretty broad as it is. That's why she went to the Revue in the first place. Refused to become a full member, conflict of interest, she said, but she still has a roaring good time whenever she comes by. Never got her up on stage on Audience Participation Night, though not for lack of trying. Really, the idea that I could twist Rainbow Dash's loyalties. That's comedy.
"But I digress. No, you two need to get out more because you don't appreciate the kind of quiet power running a club can give someone. You see, you guys allegedly provide law and justice, which sounds good in theory. In practice, it often consists of bullying defenseless folks you don't like. People may admire you in theory, but, again, once they see what they're actually getting, down goes public sentiment.
"Now, compare me. At first, anyone with a hint of sanity would stay as far away from me as possible. I mean, I even have demon skulls on my butt! Sure, they're smiling, but if that doesn't scream bad news, I don't know what does! But over time, they learn that while you offer 'justice,' whatever that is, I offer fun. Fun is hard to come by for the guildless. Always has been. May always will be, though I hope not. Point is, when justice threatens to take away fun, which do you think the people will support?"
The interrogator paled. "You told your regulars what you were doing."
Pinkie shook her head, still smiling. "Oh, I did more than that."
Three in the morning, the previous day
"Thank you! Thank you! You've been a wonderful audience!" Pinkie felt like she was going to die on her hooves, but she betrayed not a jot of it to the cheering crowd. "Before I let you all stagger back to your homes and explain those ogre-shaped lipstick stains to your wives, I've got a very important announcement! Dashie?"
Rainbow Dash climbed up to the stage, cringing at the disreputable crowd and their catcalls, wolf whistles, and pony proverbs. At least she was out of uniform. She didn't want to imagine what they'd do to someone in full Boros armor.
Pinkie threw a foreleg over her shoulders and drew her close. "Folks, this is Rainbow Dash, and she's one of my very best friends."
"I bet she is!" shouted a plump imp. A knife planted itself between his stubby legs, and the peanut gallery fell silent.
"Guys," Pinkie sighed, letting her scraps of costume fall back to conceal the knives in her garterbelts. "I love you all, but sometimes you're a bunch of screaming jackasses. No offense."
The donkey on drums did a rim shot. "None taken."
"Anyway, she's in trouble with THE LAW."
The crowd hit their cue. "LAW!" It was an audience-participation running gag, one of Pinkie's more popular comedic innovations.
"So, I'm going to the garrison to see if we can't sort this out like calm, rational sapients."
This got a few lukewarm claps.
"And if that doesn't work, we can try it Pinkie Pie style!"
The response was much better this time. Someone started up a chant of "PIN-KIE! PIN-KIE!" and soon the entire club was shaking with it.
Pinkie beamed. She knew she didn't need to ask them for help. If anything, she'd have to beg them to stay away.
"And so they told their friends, and they told their friends, and so on, and so on, until we got ourselves a good, old-fashioned unruly mob. And that's how Ravnica was made!"
"Hmmph." The interrogator's expression had barely shifted, seeming more annoyed than concerned. "Well, we can add inciting a riot to your rap sheet, then."
Pinkie giggled at this. "Oh, they're not rioters. They're concerned citizens protesting the wrongful imprisonment of a pillar of the community by cruel, overbearing authority figures."
"The courts will never buy that!" cried the runner.
The mare shook her head. "Adorable." She turned to his senior. "Do they come that naive, or do you have to polish their minds to get that kind of happy, shiny idealism?"
The young soldier drew his short sword and levelled it at the pony. "I should just kill you here. It'll leave them no reason to attack."
Pinkie stared at the blade for a moment. She began to shake. Any pride the runner might have gotten from this was spoiled moments later, as she burst into laughter. "Oh, Celestia!" she cried, pounding the floor. "Oh, Rakdos's flaming scythe! You're the worst peacekeeper ever!"
Blushing and sputtering, the youth surged towards the pony, only to be held back by an arm strong and steady as a newly laid foundation. "She's a bit right, lad. You'll just make a martyr of her. Besides, sometimes the Rakdos have nasty surprises for whoever kills 'em."
Pinkie shrugged. "Why should we have all the fun?"
"S...so, what do we do, sir?"
"...You said you wanted to file a complaint?"
"Coming down on Rainbow Dash just for visiting me isn't going to help anything and will lose you one of the most talented and ferociously loyal guild members you've had since Agrus Kos himself."
"Kos worked for three different guilds."
"And never stopped acting like a wojek." Pinkie contemplated the other end of her cell. It was blank, stuccoed wall, since the jail was underground. Still, it did lead outside the garrison. "Now, if I were you, I'd take that advice into account, let the nice pony go, let her defuse the crowd before it explodes, and not raze her club to the ground. That's probably the course of action that will minimize the risk of current and future criminal incidents in the local area. But, you know, that's just the demon-nag talking."
"How the hell do you know so much about law and order?" the runner blurted.
"Hell is how, young fella-me-lad." Pinkie nodded her thanks as the interrogator unlocked her cell, his stiff motions betraying his resentment. "They've got all the best tutors down there."
Dash contemplated her cider. "So, you're sure I can go back to your club?"
Pinkie knocked back her mug and slammed it down on the bar with a satisfied gasp before replying, "Is lava hot?"
"Wow. And you swear you didn't hurt anyone to do it? Not even where it doesn't show?"
"Cross my heart and hope to fry, stick an imp claw in my eye!"
"Good enough for me. Thanks, Pinkie."
They toasted one another. "Oh, don't thank me. Thank Rarity!"
Rakdos Guildpony BR Creature — Pony Warrior Unleash Whenever Rakdos Guildpony or another Pony, Pegasus, or Unicorn you control dies, Rakdos Guildpony deals 1 damage to each opponent. "A guild is like a herd. We'll mow you down before you can even blink." 1/1
Pinkie, Pony of Pandemonium 1BR Legendary Creature — Pony Shaman Unleash (br)(br)(br), T: Other creatures you control get +X/+X until end of turn and attack this turn if able, where X is Pinkie, Pony of Pandemonium's power. Activate this ability only during your turn, before attackers are declared. She wants you to have the time of your death. 2/1
If there was one thing Rainbow Dash knew, it was that evil was everywhere. There were big evils, little evils, ambiguous ones that could almost be justified, and obvious ones that could never be forgiven. A more cynical person might list the guilds themselves as the worst evils in the world, inflicting untold harm to the unguilded masses even while supporting them.
But the foulest, most loathsome evils of all were necessary evils, the ones that, as bad as they were, couldn't be done without. Dash was doing battle with one at this very moment. Though she wielded pen rather than sword, she still stabbed and slashed at the menace with martial fervor.
A faint sound made her look up from the paperwork. "You say something, Flake?"
The overmuscled stallion smiled and wheezed, "You don't have to do this, Dash."
"I wish. Still got three or four more forms to fill out." Dash shifted in her seat, working out some of the stiffness that was setting in. The damned forms were on a clipboard that was resting on her lap. In order to have a lap, she had to sit like a biped, and that was making the hard hospital chair even less comfortable than usual. She'd just sit on the floor, but then she couldn't make eye contact with Snowflake, and that was unacceptable.
"Stay with me, I mean."
Dash nudged her partner's shoulder. "Hey, you know me. I couldn't leave you hanging if I wanted to. Besides, I've been in your greaves here. Nearly went crazy with boredom."
"Yeah." Snowflake gave a chuckle that soon devolved into a coughing fit. "No kidding."
"Well, hopefully this'll teach you to think before you charge at a giant smog monster."
"Yeah," croaked the stallion.
"Um, Sergeant?"
"Yes?" Both pegasi spoke at once, then glanced at one another and grinned. Dash turned to the speaker, an amber pegasus colt. Well, stallion, she supposed, but anyone who looked that uncomfortable in uniform was a kid in her book. "You may want to be more specific."
"Er, yes. Sergeant Dash?"
"That's me."
The colt shifted from hoof to hoof. "Um, I was told to report to you. I'm Constable Boundless Zeal."
"Of course he is," Snowflake whispered, actually trying to be quiet. Dash held back a laugh. Some families had been churning out legionnaires for generations, and they all had hilariously overblown names.
Zeal continued, "I'm to be your partner during Sergeant Westwind's convalescence."
That killed Dash's amusement quite nicely. She fixed her best angry stare at the constable. "I'm sorry, I must have had something stupid in my ear. Run that by me again?"
To his credit, Zeal stood his ground. Sure, he trembled a bit, but he didn't back away. "I-I'm sorry, Ma'am, but those are Lieutenant Thrissk's orders."
"I'll be fine, Dash," rasped Snowflake. "Leave the forms here."
Dash chewed her lip as she weighed her options. Finally, she bit the clipboard and placed it on the nightstand by her once and future partner's sickbed. "Don't strain yourself, Flake."
"Mother hen."
"Not in front of the rookie. Speaking of..." Dash nodded at the other stallion. "Come on, Constable Zeal. If we've been paired up, that means you've managed to impress someone enough to get promoted, and that means I'm training you on how to do something other than stand in one place and look pretty."
"Yes, Ma'am!"
Dash rolled her eyes as she led her new charge out of the room. This had officially become one of those days. "It also means Thrissk told you our assignment for today. Where we headed?"
"Nimbus Court, Ma'am."
"And another thing. I know the drill sergeants probably jammed it down your throat, but you don't have to call me 'Ma'am.' Dash, or Sarge, or RD, or... you get the idea." She nodded at a passing unicorn medic. "Watch out for my bulkier half for me, Braveheart. I got babysitting duty."
"So I see." The white stallion gave the drooping Zeal a nod. "Don't feel bad, son. She's like this to everyone."
Dash smirked. "Just my natural charisma."
The younger pegasus managed a weak smile. "A-as you say, Sir." He flinched. Something had just touched his rump. Abruptly. It took him a moment to process that Rainbow Dash, hero of the people, top of her class at the Horizon Academy, the Spearhead of Justice, just slapped him on the ass.
"You go wait outside, rookie. I gotta go slip into something a little less comfortable. Back in a flash!"
After a few seconds, Zeal found himself able to move again. Doctor Braveheart was still there, maintaining his understanding grin. "Is..." Zeal took a breath to steady himself. "Is she always so—"
"Irreverent? Casual? Crass?"
Boundless Zeal could only nod.
Braveheart chuckled. "Actually, I think she's on better behavior than usual for your sake. Go on now, you do not want to keep Rainbow Dash waiting."
The younger stallion gave a stiff, almost mechanical nod. He made for the hospital's lobby with similarly jerky motions. This may have officially become one of those days.
Pegasi came in two varieties on Ravnica. The larger ones were basically horses with wings in both form and intelligence. The smaller ones were ponies with wings, with all the color diversity, intelligence, and magic that implied. They also made a point of emphasizing all the distinguishing traits between them and their larger, stupider, uglier, clumsier, less magical, and generally inferior counterparts.
One thing the two had in common, though, was that both had lived in the clouds since time immemorial. While there were still a few storm herds of the larger pegasi wandering the world, most pegasus ponies had integrated with the other thinking races in the city below. However, in a place like Ravnica, no one can pass up the opportunity for exclusive real estate. Thus, Nimbus Court and other cloud neighborhoods came to be. Only pegasus ponies and those who could afford the necessary enchantments could live there. Given how the areas generally catered to the former, the latter were few and far between.
Of course, this exclusivity didn't exempt such places from the law or the guilds that enforced it. The two skyjeks winging their way up to Nimbus Court demonstrated that.
"So," Dash concluded, "that's how Flake ended up in the tender care of the medmages."
Zeal frowned. "I still don't understand why he couldn't just use a teardrop."
"'Drops don't heal, they just make the body heal faster. That stuff he breathed in basically scarred his lungs, and his body can't take care of that on its own. Hence the medmages." Dash touched down on the stratocumulus streets. "Come on. We've got a job to do."
Several minutes passed as the pair patrolled. Dash traded nods and pleasantries as she passed by ponies she recognized, but never changed her steady pace. Her hooves moved automatically, retracing a route etched into muscle memory. More than once, Zeal had to trot back to her side after she turned without any warning.
As they passed by what could only be a cathedral crafted from clouds, a greying stallion in a yellow robe looked up from sweeping scraps of cirrus off the steps and nodded. "Rainbow Dash. May Celestia's sun find you well."
"And Luna's moon keep you safe, Father."
It took all of Boundless Zeal's carefully honed military discipline not to double take at the respect and reverence that had suddenly found its way into Dash's voice. Once they had moved past the temple, he asked, "You're an Alicornist?"
Dash wingshrugged. "Eh. Go on enough patrols, you pick up a few things here and there. Besides, Father Sunrise is way more respectable than the average Orzhov pontiff."
"But you—"
Dash rolled her eyes, stopped, and faced Zeal. "Do I think Celestia and Luna move the sun and moon? No. Do I think they created ponies? Probably not. Did they ever exist? Eh, maybe. Not my problem." The mare ran through the questions at a speed that made it clear she was used to them. "The point is, the good father's on this beat, and he's a good person. If I can make his day by saying a few words to him, then why not?"
She turned so her side was in view, then lifted the chain mail over her flank with a wing, revealing an image of a sword, point down, its serpentine blade striped in red, orange, and yellow. "Y'see this, kid?"
Zeal bit his lip and nodded. He could feel his face heat up. "Y-yes, Ma'am."
Dash sighed. Cutie marks were as personal as the pony wanted them to be. Some kept them in plain view, others wouldn't show them if their lives depended on it. Apparently the Zeals were more on the modest side. She let the armor fall and resumed her patrol. "What do you think it means?"
The stallion followed, allowing himself a relieved smile. "You're a soldier, Ma'am."
"Wrong."
"But you—"
All the humor left Rainbow Dash's voice. "A wojek must be many things: investigator, role model, keeper of the peace, defender of the people, and countless others. But he is not nor should he ever be a soldier. The Legion has enough soldiers for all of Ravnica. Soldiers exist to form armies. Armies exist to fight wars. The League of Wojek exists for those awkward resting periods between wars known as 'peace,' when killing others is not only illegal but also frowned upon."
It sounded like a quotation. "What is that from?"
Reverence began to slip back into Dash's tone. "War, Peace, and the Boros Legion's Place in Both, by Pierakor az Vinrenn D'rav."
Zeal nearly stumbled. "Y-you mean—"
Dash looked up into the endless blue above, her face unreadable. "Yeah. Feather, our disgraced ex-guildmaster. 'Cause Celestia forbid our glorious leader ever be allowed to make a mistake at any point in her life." She shook her head. "Anyway, that sword on my butt's pointed down because I don't start fights. I end them. Preferably before anyone gets hurt. That's what being a wojek is about. The Legion fights against injustice. The Azorius hussars fight against unlawfulness. We fight against fighting."
The stallion pondered this. He was still worrying at the idea a few minutes later, as the pair had gone airborne again to begin patrolling one of Nimbus Court's higher levels. His ruminations were only interrupted by a scream.
Dash cursed and dove for the building where the scream came from. "Come on!"
"Right!" Zeal cleared his head and followed at her tail.
One of Dash's favorite things about cloud houses was that, when necessary, doors were strictly optional. She willed herself through the ceiling and hovered, shouting, "League of Wojek! Everyone freeze!" Only then did she realize she wasn't the first one to take advantage of that particular shortcut.
Half of the human body was sticking through the ceiling, head pointing down and looking for all the world like a surreal chandelier. Once her initial shock passed, Dash began examining the find.
"I was just sitting here! I was about to go prepare lunch! It appeared out of nowhere! I've never seen it before in my life!"
Dash revised her plan. Calm the panicking housemare, then examine the find. "I believe you, ma'am," she assured her. "I'm here to find out who this is and why he's jammed in your house."
"Sergeant Dash, is this really oh my that is a human body."
The senior wojek smiled, half to reassure the civilian, half because it was funny. "Brilliant deduction so far, Constable Zeal. What else can you tell me? Start with the obvious, you'd be amazed how much you can miss if you don't."
Zeal circled the torso. "Well, it appears male in build. Athletic, probably. Dressed in leather armor, lacquered black, very closely tailored to his body shape. Skull mask guarding the face. Let's attend to that." He leaned close, then flinched back.
Dash let the joke go by unsaid. Too easy, and she was doing the whole "air of authority" thing to keep Miss Panickyflank calm. "Something wrong, Constable?"
"He's still breathing, Ma'am."
"Ah, good. He'll be able to tell us what he was doing here. Head back to the guildhall. We're going to need a containment team."
Zeal frowned, confused. "Ma'am?"
"The little ridges on the elbows." Dash pointed a hoof at them. "See how there's three of them on each, over top of one another? This isn't just any random human. He's Dimir."
"Dimir!?" Uh oh. That set off the civvy. "Miss Wojek, I assure you, I have absolutely nothing to do with those, those..."
"I'm sure you don't, ma'am. Please remain calm. What's your name?"
"D-Dizzy Twister. Please, I—"
"Dizzy, I suggest you go for a walk or a fly or a bit of both."
"I... Okay."
"Good. Constable, what are you still doing here?"
"Sorry, Ma'am. Be right back!"
Dash winced as he left through the hole she punched in the wall. Probably best not to draw any more attention to that than necessary. "I'll get that fixed up personally, ma'am."
Dizzy nodded, clearly eager to get out while she thought the getting good. She opened the front door, only to slump in shock. "Oh, now what?"
The unicorn offered an apologetic smile. "Sorry, ma'am. This will all be over shortly, I assure you."
The housewife sighed and stood aside. Come on in."
He did just that. "Sergeant Rainbow Dash?"
"That's me," answered Dash, hovering at the Dimir agent's eye level, her eyes fixed on his. Let him sleep. She had all the time in the world for him once he woke up. "Rookie's faster than I thought if you got here already."
"I'll be taking over from here."
"What?" Dash spun and took in the bulky, restrictive armor, the blue cape, the bit of dry, no, desiccated expression she could see behind the helmet. It told her everything she needed to know. She snarled and dove down to press her muzzle against the helm. "No way! This is my case, and no glorified Azorius paper-pusher is taking it from me!"
Said paper-pusher backed up a few a steps and floated a scroll much longer than Dash cared to read out from somewhere under all that steel. "I'm afraid you don't have the option of saying no, Sergeant. I have authorization from the district's Arbitration Council and your section commander. This investigation is now firmly under Azorius jurisdiction, and there's nothing that you can do about it." He didn't say it maliciously. That was the worst part. She could at least respect him if there was a hint of a sneer, a sense that he was rubbing her nose in the red tape, but it all came out clear, calm, and matter-of-fact.
"The guy literally came out of nowhere a minute ago! You expect me to believe you got all however-many subcommittees you answer to to sign off on this so fast?"
"No." The bureaucrat rerolled the scroll and returned it to wherever he'd secreted it. "I expect you to believe that this man is my best lead in tracking down the incredibly dangerous character I've been pursuing for months now. Mainly because that's the truth."
Dash was silent, struggling for a rebuttal. The unicorn seemed to take this as consent and approached the body. She zipped back in front of him and blurted, "Why?"
This actually got him to pause for a moment. "I don't have to tell you that."
"Don't you at least want to know what I've found out?"
He tried to move around her, but all that heavy armor made it foal's play to keep obstructing him. Dash savored the irony. After a few attempts, the unicorn grumbled, "Look, you can file your findings at your local chancery. They'll find their way to me. Now, if you'll excuse me—"
Dash went eye-to-eye with the stallion, very nearly headbutting him. "Only if you agree to let me help you."
She was close enough to see him glare. "I will do no such thing. Now get out of my way or—"
"Or what? You'll file a complaint? Yeah, in two to four weeks, I'll be shaking in my—" A magenta bubble formed around Dash. The bubble rose, pulling her out of the Azorius pony's way. "Hey!"
"Pursuant to Isperia's Edict, provision III.558.4, an arrester is authorized to use any nonlethal force necessary to remove an unavoidable physical obstruction that impedes his ability to perform his duty, up to and including other sapients." The barest hint of humor entered his voice. "I can't say I didn't enjoy that." He walked underneath her.
Dash struggled, but it was like being buried in custard. All her movements were heavy and thick, and floating as she was, she couldn't get any leverage. "You're gonna pay for this, whoever you are!"
The stallion paused. "Tsk. You're right. Sorry about that."
"Yeah, you'd better apologize! Now get me out of this thing!"
He chuckled. What kind of arrester chuckled? "Oh, not that. And the detainment sphere will dissipate soon enough. No, I forgot to identify myself. Senior Arrester Shining Armor. Trust me, this investigation is in good hooves." His horn lit up again. "Have a pleasant day, Sergeant."
As Dash's prison drifted out through the hole in the wall, she couldn't hear Armor beginning to question Dizzy Twister. Her own furious vulgarities drowned them out.
Boros Guildpony RW Creature — Pegasus Soldier Flying Whenever another Pony, Pegasus, or Unicorn you control attacks, Boros Guildpony gets +1/+0 until end of turn. "A guild is like a herd. You fight better when a dozen friends have your back." 1/1
Rainbow Dash, the Spearhead 3RW Legendary Creature — Pegasus Soldier Flying, haste Battalion — Whenever Rainbow Dash, the Spearhead and at least two other creatures attack, attacking creatures gain hexproof and intimidate until end of turn. Her battle cry routs the unrighteous and their magics alike. 3/2
Shining Armor paced outside of the interrogation room, the sound of his hooves on the stone floor as a regular as a heartbeat. Normally, he would have been content to sit still and wait, perhaps review some minor piece of new legislature or a subordinate's field report. But not now. Not when he was so close...
His ears pricked up at the sound of the opening door. He spun and trotted the three steps to the elocutor. "Well?"
The vedalken merely stared at him.
Shining Armor cleared his throat. Such haste was unbecoming from an Azorius arrester, doubly so for one as accomplished as he. In a much more measured tone, he asked, "Your findings, Elocutor Zalvis?"
Zalvis shook his head. "Nothing."
"Wh– Nothing?" Shining sputtered for a moment. "What do you mean 'nothing'? There can't be nothing. You're the best elocutor I know. You could get someone to confess to stealing a slice of cake at the age of three."
This got a shrug. "What can I say? He's tabula rasa."
"You know my Vedalken is horrible."
Zalvis exhaled with just enough volume to make it clear he was sighing while maintaining plausible deniability. "I mean he's a blank slate. He knows his name, the common tongue, and some minor but vital information like what food is. Beyond that, he literally knows nothing."
Shining sighed much more obviously. He floated out a scroll. "Take a look at the forensic report. Skip to the mana spectroscopy."
Zalvis scrolled through the scroll. He lowered it, registering faint confusion. "That can't be right."
"The analysts triple-checked it, using three different detectors. Same results every time."
"But that doesn't make any sense." Zalvis closed the scroll. "This is pure blue mana. Dimir mind magic always shows at least residual traces of black. Much the same could be said of any guild's magic. Any mage with this kind of capability would be snapped up the moment he demonstrated it... and yet."
Shining quirked an eyebrow. "And yet?"
"This was not the usual Dimir modus operandi." Zalvis paused. "That is to say—"
"That I understood. How do you mean?"
The elocutor took a deep breath, wrinkling his brow. "Bear in mind that this is all... theoretical." He shuddered, forcing out the words. "What little concrete information we can gather about Dimir operations is almost inevitably out of date."
Shining smirked. "I'm the last person who needs to be told that, Zalvis. Go on."
"As far as we can tell, when the Dimir decommission an operative, they remove all the incriminating memories, but they replace them with an innocuous life. It never matches up precisely, and thus a very good elocutor can find the cracks."
"Someone like you."
A straight edge might indicate a slight upward curve to Zalvis's mouth. "I wasn't going to say that. In any case, this is too obvious for Dimir. They would have covered their tracks. Leaving him like this just isn't done."
"And it can't be one of the other guilds," Shining added. "There are none of the telltale signs of Izzet or Simic involvement."
Zalvis was definitely smirking. "Electrical burns, foul-smelling slime, that sort of thing?"
"Exactly."
"So why can't it be a member of the Senate?"
Shining was stunned for a few seconds. "What?"
"Four guilds make use of blue mana," Zalvis observed. "Three have been eliminated as potential suspects. By process of elimination, that leaves either a member of our guild or some anonymous unguilded archmage."
"Well it can't be one of us."
"Why not?"
Shining bit back his first response. "It just can't" would not go over well with a vedalken, especially not one trained to wield logic like a sword and a scalpel. He gave a defeated sigh. "I admit, I just don't want to consider the possibility."
Zalvis shrugged. "You must. It is there."
"No white mana residue, though."
"There is that, but that leaves only the 'unguilded archmage' hypothesis."
"Then that's who we're looking for."
Zalvis frowned. "But that's... well, it isn't impossible; it's one of the two possibilities we have left. Still, it's objectively improbable."
"Not as much as you'd think." Shining nodded to the vedalken. "Thank you for your services, Elocutor."
"Of course." Zalvis essayed a shallow bow. "Do tell me of any further developments."
Shining smirked as he began the walk to his office. "When I finally catch him, you'll be interrogating him yourself."
Shining Armor liked to think of himself as a patient pony. Really, he had to be. One couldn't rise as far, submit as many applications for promotion, attend as many hearings and evaluations pursuant to those applications as he had without considerable patience. But patience didn't make a stallion rise in the first place. That took motivation. And while the importance of the law, the drive to protect and serve, and the honor of being one of the defenders of sanity and civilization were all as much a part of Shining Armor as his horn, they were not why he had come so far.
When he went home that night to his modest apartment not far from New Prahv, he was met again by the force that had impelled him ever upward. His cause. His inspiration.
"Welcome home, dear."
His love. "Hey, Cadence," he said with a smile. The couple nuzzled one another. "How was your day?"
The unicorn mare returned the grin. "Oh, the usual. Play with Skyla, listen to the neighbors argue, get them to actually listen to one another, demonstrate why there's a pair of hearts on my flank. You?"
Shining groaned as he walked further inside. "Could've been better. A lot better." He began magically unlatching his armor. Cadence helped him remove the heavy barding, lingering ever so slightly at his cutie mark, admiring the shield with its row of three triangles above the nested runic circles.
Once he had disrobed, Shining managed a smile. "I'll tell you about it later." He moved towards one of a pair of low couches that faced one another. "At the moment, there's a filly who's hardly seen her daddy all day, and I need to fix that right about... now!" With that, he pounced on his pegasus daughter, who'd been hiding behind the couch.
Skyla, barely out of diapers, screamed with laughter and fluttered her little wings helplessly as her daddy relentlessly assaulted her with tickles and zerberts.
Cadence smiled. Soon, Shining would describe his trying day and she would help him find the best course of action. But for now, her love was home, her child was happy, and her heart was full. All was right with the world.
Once dinner was served and Skyla was put to bed, her parents lay on the couches in the entry room as Shining ran through the day's frustrations.
"So," Cadence reviewed, "you've got a case that's taken more than twice as long than any you've ever investigated. Did you ever consider that you can't do this alone?"
Shining snorted. "And who would help me? I'm the second best arrester in the district. I can't just ask the Lavinia of the Tenth to help out on some wild moa hunt, and anyone else would just slow me down."
Cadence shook her head. Celestia preserve her from stubborn stallions and their pride. "Did you ever think that maybe, just maybe, you could get someone from outside of your guild to help you?"
"Don't make me laugh. Who would bother to help some Azorius busybody?"
"Hmm." Cadence put a hoof to her lips. "Well, there was that pegasus mare you ran into in Nimbus Court. She seemed very eager to help."
Shining grimaced. "She won't be now. Not after the way I treated her."
"And whose fault is that?"
"Supreme Judge Isperia and every grand arbiter before her," Shining immediately replied. "They wrote the regulations. I just follow them."
Cadence didn't bury her head in a cushion and scream. Oh, she was tempted, but once she started, she might never stop. "Perhaps an apology is in order?"
Shining's frown slowly shifted from frustration to regret. "I... yeah, that would probably be the right thing to do." Ears flat, he asked, "You think she'll accept one?"
His wife giggled. "Dear, a woman is always willing to see a man admit fault. If you can do that, you'll certainly have a chance." Cadence went from smile to glower in an eyeblink. "But I know you. Don't you dare imply any of it was her fault."
"But—"
"No. It doesn't matter what she did, you were in the wrong."
Shining brought his gaze to the floor. "Yes, dear."
Cadence's smile returned, the sun back from behind a cloud. "Good! And there's one other mare I can think of who'd be happy to help."
"Who do you..." Shining's eyes widened as he tried to press himself into his seat. "Oh, no. Not her."
"Her. You may as well call in the big guns, honey."
"Yeah," Shining allowed, "but guns that are just as likely to fire on me?"
"Just be nice, like with the skyjek," Cadence assured him. "What's the worst that could happen?"
Her husband quirked an eyebrow. "Do you really want me to answer that question? Because I could speak from experience."
Cadence, like every Azorius spouse whose marriage lasted longer than a week, was a fairly patient pony herself. Still, she had her limits. "Do it or you'll be sleeping in the street."
"Yes, dear."
Shining sighed. Swallowing his pride hasn't been easy or pleasant, but he'd managed to do it. Now if only Rainbow Dash could return the favor.
Instead, the skyjek was hovering above him with a wide grin on her muzzle. "I'm sorry, I just want to make sure I heard you right. Could you say that again?"
Shining rolled his eyes. "I'm sorry."
Dash nodded. "Uh huh."
"I was wrong."
The pegasus rolled a forehoof. "Keep going."
Shining finished through gritted teeth, feeling like every roundcake guzzler in the garrison was watching. "I need your help."
Dash shook a little, hardly able to contain herself. "Can I get that in writing? It's not that I don't trust you, I just want to frame it and hang it in the barracks. Maybe get it notarized first or whatever."
Shining took a deep breath before answering her. "Are you going to help me or not, Sergeant?"
Dash stared at him like he'd grown a second head. She landed, her smile softening into something more apologetic. "Of course I am. It's just, come on, when's the next time I'm going to get an actual apology out of one of you paper-pushers?" She offered a hoof. "No hard feelings?"
Shining accepted the hoofbump. "No hard feelings."
"Great, 'cause I've found your man, and I know where he'll be tomorrow evening."
"Wha–" Shining gaped. "That... You... How!?"
Dash made a show of examining the polish on one of her front greaves. "Yeah, turns out when you don't have to fill out like a dozen forms for every step of the investigation, you can actually get stuff done."
"Well, good to know. I'll ask my other contact for aid and we can reconnoiter tomorrow morning."
"Cool. See you at the Frog and Chestnut." Dash flew off without another word.
Shining just stood there for a moment. "...The what?"
Shining Armor hated the lab. He hated Izzet architecture in general, all pipes and valves and random instruments thrown wherever the builder felt like at the time. No polish, no planning, no logic. None he could see, anyway. That the place was only lit by flasks full of luminescent liquid only made it worse, layering ominous shadows over the haphazard construction.
"Hello?" The word didn't echo as he'd expected it to, sounding more like he'd shouted in an amphitheater than a small repurposed warehouse.
The smells were almost as bad, Shining thought as he waited. Molten metals, strange acids, magical reagents, and the ever-present burnt tang of ozone, all coming together to punch him in the snout. He didn't know how anyone could tolerate it, not even humans. "Hello?"
This time, there was a distant reply. "Just a second!"
A low hum made itself known, rapidly rising in pitch soon after Shining noticed it. Past experience had him shut his eyes and threw his forehooves over them. Even so, he could see the flash of light. And his own bones.
"Oh, it's you." The voice was polite but detached. Listening to it, one wouldn't have been able to tell if its owner had last seen Shining Armor a day, a year, or a decade ago. "What brings you to my little corner of paradise?"
Shining got to his hooves, trying to blink away the spots swimming before his eyes. "Does your teleportation really need to be that bright?"
"You ask that every time, you know." Again, the tone was merely observational. "And to answer your question – again – the energy manifestation's increased luminosity is a side effect of several mana flow techniques that increase the effective range of my spacial winks by eighty-four point seven percent."
"Weren't you just going from one end of your lab to the other?"
"It's bigger on the inside. So, is this a social call or what?"
Shining sighed, his vision finally clear again. "I need your help apprehending someone."
This broke the other's neutrality. Incredulously, she blurted, "Me? Seriously?"
"I'm desperate."
"Clearly."
"And, in the interest of full disclosure, Cadence made me."
This got a chuckle. "Yeah, I figured as much."
Shining stifled a grumble. "So, can I count on you?"
Lightning crackled somewhere amongst the amassed scientific apparatuses, briefly illuminating the figure and her smile. "Why, B-cubed-F-squared, I'm hurt. You think I've forgotten the importance of family?"
The Frog and Chestnut, according to Twilight, was a pub. A fairly popular one, actually, but close enough to Rakdos territory that Shining had avoided the area out of prudence. Were he single, he might have braved the thrill-killers to bring order to the area, but not when there were ponies who waited for him at home every night.
Twilight had assured him that the pub itself was safe, but he still entered the building warily, mundane and magical senses all alert for any sort of disturbance.
"Hey there."
"AHH!"
"Whoa, whoa! Easy there, pal!"
Shining blinked. Bit by bit, he took in the situation. He was on his hind legs, his front hooves slammed down on the bar. Behind it, a brown earth stallion was backing away from him. Oh, and his horn was aglow with a half-cast incapacitation incantation. The arrester cleared his throat, doused his horn, and eased himself back from the hapless bartender. "Sorry about that. Kind of on edge."
The stallion quirked an eyebrow at him. "You don't say?"
Shining felt his ears flatten and his face heat up. "Um, I'm actually supposed to meet someone here. A unicorn and a pegasus?"
The barkeep shrugged. "Well, I just opened the place, so you'll have to wait. Go grab a table and try not to scream at any of the regulars." He smiled. "Anything I can get you in the meantime?"
Shining picked out one of several tables clearly designed for ponies, lower to the ground and without chairs. He sat on the floor, positioning himself so he had a good view of the whole room, especially the entrance. "Tea will be fine."
Twilight arrived a few minutes after her brother. An hour, a pot of tea, and several amusing anecdotes about Skyla later, Rainbow Dash swooped in. She paused at the door, boggling at the pair. After a moment, she trotted up and blurted, "You two know each other?"
Shining and Twilight looked at one another, then back to Dash. "We're siblings," they said simultaneously.
Dash shuddered a bit. Too creepy. Once she recovered, she continued loud enough to draw the morning crowd's notice. "So, let me get this straight: Twilight Sparkle, the mare who basically redefined the awesomeness of explosions, and Shining Armor, the stallion so uptight he's got Vitu-freaking-Ghazi up his ass, are brother and sister?"
"Yes," said the siblings, again in sync.
"Stop doing that!"
The two looked at one another and smirked. Turning back to Dash, they asked, "What?"
Dash scowled, her wings flaring. "Oh, come on! I'm not stupid, I saw that little look you guys did. You want my help or not?"
"Sorry, Rainbow," Twilight said with a chuckle. "It's all in good fun."
This got a snort. "Yeah, for you, maybe."
"You have our apologies," Shining assured the pegasus. "Please, Miss Dash, sit. We've got a lot to discuss."
"Fine," grumbled a slouching, scowling Dash, "but don't call me 'Miss.' Makes me feel old." She straightened up, her expression hardening from petulance to professionalism as she pulled papers out of her saddlebags. "Now, here's what I've got on this guy..."
The young man walked down the street just like anyone else, almost totally unremarkable under his blue cloak. No one noticed him duck down an alley, and even those who might have would've ignored it, assuming he either could handle himself or had a death wish. Not their business in either case.
Whatever the man had expected to find in the alley, the armored unicorn definitely came as a surprise. "Jace Beleren," Shining Armor intoned, "by the authority granted to me by Isperia's Edicts and the Revised Guildpact, you are under arrest for mental assault and conspiracy to undermine the city's peace. You have fifteen seconds to surrender peacefully before you will be forcibly detained."
Jace sighed. "Hello again, Shining."
"You have five seconds to surrender."
"What, no incredulity?" Jace casually negated the paralytic spell the moment Shining cast it. "How about now? You never cope well when we go off script."
Shining took a step back before realizing it. "How did you–?"
"The spell? Don't worry, it happens to every mage sooner or later."
The stallion snorted, lowering his horn. "You know what I mean!"
Jace nodded. "Of course. I know your name because this is the eighth time you've confronted me in the past four months."
This shocked Shining out of his fighting stance. "What?" he managed, staring at his quarry.
"You pursue me, you confront me, I throw you off-balance, I erase your memories, rinse and repeat." Jace shrugged. "It's gotten rather predictable, really. Though you did surprise me a bit; I wasn't expecting you for some time yet."
Shining smirked. "Well I've got a few more surprises for you."
Jace raised his eyebrows. "Really?" He glowered, his eyes aglow with mind magic. "Then we'll have to cut this short. See you next—"
Discontinuity. When Jace regained his bearings, he found himself on a rooftop. Shining Armor was casting another inaction injunction; Jace countered it with less than a second to spare. "Okay, I admit, that was surprising."
Shining said nothing. He just glowered, dug in his hooves, and launched a burst of light from his horn.
Jace let the harmless flare go off, keeping his gaze on the arrester. "If you're trying to distract me, you're going to have to do better than that."
"Who said anything about distracting you?"
For a moment, indecision consumed Jace. A bluff? A warning? He risked a glance skyward.
Rainbow Dash couldn't say how, but she knew the moment the human looked up. She wasn't close enough to see his expression, not yet, but she was sure it was priceless.
From Jace's perspective, the skyjek was a notably motionless dot amongst the city's air traffic. Well, mostly motionless. It was slowly getting larger. The mind mage threw together a bit of quick and dirty æthercraft that would toss the dive bomber back to wherever it came from.
Shining Armor, of course, wasn't going to just stand there and let that happen. His horn ignited, runes forming a circle within a triangle around its base as he fired his own counterspell.
Jace saw the light show out of the corner of his eye and pivoted, one hand pointed up, the other raised against the antimagic, palm facing out, aglow with a dispel effect. Scarcely a moment later, the light swirled out of his left palm just before Shining's spell struck it, shorting out the unsummoning and paralyzing the man's tongue.
A ripple of distorted light behind Shining Armor revealed a smirking Twilight Sparkle layered in contraptions of brass and glass. "Don't worry, it happens to every mage sooner or later."
Jace smiled. Yeah, he deserved that. But he wasn't sticking around to admit it.
By the time Dash hit the roof, she did just that: hit the roof. Some mist swirled about her hooves, evaporating as she watched. She twirled about her landing spot, looking for her target. "What happened? Did he get away?"
Head down, Shining reluctantly replied, "It would appear so."
"How? There was that light show a few seconds before impact, but..." Dash spun to face the stallion. "You said that spell of yours would keep him from casting anything!"
"It did!" he cried. "At least, it should have!"
"Fascinating." A series of lenses unfolded from Twilight's equipment, snapping into place in front of her eyes. "Technically speaking, that wasn't a spell."
"What?" Dash spun from brother to sister. "You're telling me that that... that mind rapist literally got away on a technicality!?"
Twilight either didn't notice Dash's fury or didn't care. "Yup. It was some sort of intrinsic ability. The sort of magic you're born with rather than the kind you can learn." She sighed. "I admit, I'm jealous."
"Well where in Ravnica did he go?" Dash demanded.
"I can't say." The lenses retracted as Twilight mulled over the data. "I was able to track his æther trail, but the destination coordinates are totally nonsensical. As far as I can tell, he simultaneously travelled several times the circumference of the planet and less than a nanomizzet."
Shining stared at the spot where Beleren vanished. "Well, wherever he is, he didn't wipe my mind. And next time he shows his face in this town, he'll find it on wanted posters."
The Academy at Tolaria West wasn't quite at the level of its predecessor, but when that predecessor had been built by a nigh-omnipotent mad genius as part of a millennia-spanning plot to thwart an even longer-term plot to conquer the Multiverse... well, it got by.
It certainly suited Jace's purposes as a rest spot, especially after such an abrupt jump into the Blind Eternities. He spent some time just watching the waves lap against one of the island academy's beaches, letting the adrenaline drain out of him. "That," he muttered to himself, "could've gone better."
Crunching sand signaled someone's approach. "Want to talk about it?"
The mind mage flinched, a spring into action stopped by recognition. "I didn't know you were here."
"Everyone's got to be somewhere."
Jace chuckled. "True. Thanks, but right now, I just need to collect my thoughts and return to Ravnica as soon as possible. Something massive is coming."
"Really?" Ditzy Doo began the mental preparations for a proper planeswalk. "Well, then I'll go on ahead."
Azorius Guildpony WU Creature — Unicorn Wizard Whenever one or more Ponies, Pegasi, and/or Unicorns you control become the target or targets of a spell or ability an opponent controls, counter that spell or ability unless its controller pays 1. "A guild is like a herd. We protect one another from the chaos that lurks beyond us." 1/2
Shining Armor, Lyev Elite 4WU Legendary Creature — Unicorn Soldier Hexproof, vigilance Whenever a permanent an opponent controls deals damage to you, detain that permanent at the beginning of your next upkeep. "The law does not act immediately. Time must be taken to ensure justice is served. If the guilty think that delay means that they have escaped unpunished, they are sorely mistaken." 2/5
The sun rose on the Tenth District of Ravnica. For the fortunate, it was a sight so taken for granted that most slept right through it. For the have-nots, it was barely noticed, countless buildings blocking their view of all but the topmost patch of sky. For those who dwelt in the undercity, it wasn't even acknowledged, their lives governed by cycles long divorced from the star.
For Twilight Sparkle, it meant the photovoltaic cells atop her warehouse laboratory could resume generating much-needed electricity. Like any Izzet magewright, her countless experiments were collectively an enormous energy sink. Since most of the plane had no use for "tame lightning," a power grid was not one of the utilities the League of Izzet maintained, so she was expected to supply what she needed. For most, this meant a cadre of loyal electromancers from the goblin tribe the guild had wholly owned for more than ten millennia, but Twilight strove for self-sufficiency whenever possible. Besides, goblins always gave her the creeps.
The sunrise had nothing to do with her sleep patterns. Indeed, describing Twilight's slumber with words like "patterns" or "habits" would be a criminal misuse of language. She slept when she slept, which was usually every few days, when her body could no longer sustain itself on chemical and magical stimulants. There was simply too much to do to sacrifice multihour stretches of time to sustained inactivity on a regular basis, especially for the personal student of the ancient dragon Niv-Mizzet.
Niv-Mizzet was often called "The Last Dragon." It wasn't strictly true, but giant magical reptiles weren't exactly popping up like mushrooms in a rot farm. Besides, almost all of them were mindless beasts compared to the Firemind, primitive brutes little better than animals.
Young dragons were even harder to find; there were few secure places in hyperurbanized Ravnica where something as large as a dragon could nest, and security was a must. Even the most bestial dragon was made almost entirely of magical reagents, and there were those who would pay more zinos than most of the guildless would see in a lifetime for an intact dragon egg. The risk was outweighed only by the reward.
There were even rumors that Niv-Mizzet intentionally maintained the status quo, both ego and prudence urging him to ensure that no other could challenge his position as the paragon of draconic excellence. Some whispered that he even commissioned assassins to eliminate potential competitors before they could rise to power.
Twilight, however, knew that these rumors were absolute bunk. She had but one counterargument, but it was a very persuasive one. "Spike!"
Her number-one assistant raced to her side. "Yeah, Twilight?"
Twilight took a moment to consider her ward. He was unusual, that could not be denied. Most hatchlings were gangly things, all tail and neck and wing. Spike had been squat and chubby, more like a human baby than a wyrmling. Even now, his form spoke more of baby fat than burning power, resembling nothing more than that same human grown into a toddler, save for his stubby tail, slit pupils, and thick scales. Purple and green, thought the unicorn, hardly the hues that come to mind when one hears the word "dragon."
Spike squirmed a bit under her scrutiny. "Uh, Twilight? You there?"
She shook herself. "Sorry, Spike."
He shrugged. "Hey, I know how it is. Mind going a million miles an hour while the body just sits there."
This got a chuckle. "Yeah. Kind of an occupational hazard." Twilight cleared her throat. "Anyway, I wanted to submit a report."
"Right." Spike pulled a blank scroll and an inkpen from the satchel he habitually wore. When acting as Twilight Sparkle's assistant, it was always a good idea to have writing supplies on claw. Inspiration could strike at any time, without warning. It was kind of a jerk like that. "Ready."
Twilight closed her eyes and dictated the missive, "Dear Lord Niv-Mizzet,
"Today I learned that while infusing raw mizzium with molten bronze and frozen mercury doesn't offset its somewhat delicate crystalline nature, it does make for pretty colors both before and after the explosion.
"Your faithful student, "Twilight Sparkle"
"Twi-light... Spar-kle. Okay!" With a breath of green flame, the scroll was incinerated, its ashes en route to the Firemind himself.
Twilight beamed. "Great. Now, go warm up the ablutorium. I'd like to get all this soot off before I regrow my coat."
Spike chuckled as he raced off to the main boiler. Eyebrows were something of an unofficial entry fee for the Izzet. For ponies, that cost was a bit heavier.
Some hours, a shower, and a casting of Ferric Oxide's Follicle Stimulator later, there was a knock at the front door. As Spike jogged to the entrance, he called, "Twilight, you have a visitor!"
Her response echoed oddly across the dimensionally distorted space. "If it's my future self again, tell her not to bother me until I'm her!"
The dragon opened the door, offered the visitor a brief wave, and answered, "It's not!"
"Is it Thought Bubble? I was serious when I told him what I'd do to him if he kept trying to convince me that time is cylindrical!"
Spike rolled his eyes. "No, it's your brother!" He gave Shining Armor a put-upon, "see what I have to put with?" expression.
"Really? That was quick. Cover your eyes, guys!"
Twilight appeared in a burst of actinic light, a rather confused smile on her face. "Hey, B-cubed-F-squared. I wasn't expecting you for another month. What brings you here?"
Shining seemed less pleased. "Noise complaints."
"But those are the sounds of progress!" the mare cried. "Of the walls of ignorance falling from the blows of the sledgehammer of inquiry!"
Her brother gave her a flat look. "You may want to use a quieter metaphor, then."
Twilight blinked. "What metaphor? Spike, fetch the sledgehammer of inquiry."
This got a bemused expression. "You mean that club you took with you after you accidentally teleported into that Gruul camp?"
"Sledgehammer of inquiry!"
Spike rolled his eyes, but raced off. As he did so, Twilight turned back to Shining. "So, what, I don't get a warning first? They have to send in one of the district's top arresters?"
Shining sighed and offered a quick, silent prayer for patience. "This is your fifth warning, Twily. The other four times, the arresters were found at random points in a twenty-mile radius of here. And in one case, the day before."
"You still sent him, right? Of course you did; the plane didn't explode."
"Twilight..." Shining groaned.
"What? Sometimes you can't make an omelette without risking a catastrophic paradox," the mare reasoned.
"Remind me to never have breakfast here, then."
Twilight scowled. "That was a metaphor."
"Do you remember what Mom, Dad, and I asked you to promise us before you joined the Izzet?"
Twilight rifled through her long-term memory. Tibor's Laws of Seismic Propogation? No. The average air speed of an unladen Seventh District swallow? No. The Firemind's favorite dromad recipe? No. Potential salvation came into view, dragging a length of petrified wood. "Spike?"
"He hadn't hatched yet, Twily." Shining sighed. "We made you promise not to blow up the planet."
"Oh yeah... I thought you were joking."
Shining facehoofed. Wearily, he said, "At the time, so did I."
"I tell you what; I've been getting behind on my reading. If I focus on that for a few days, will that be enough to get the hoverpopes off my back?"
Shining didn't move his hoof. Slightly muffled, he moaned, "I wish you wouldn't call the Council of the Absolute that."
Spike leaned on the sledgehammer of inquiry. "This is as good an offer as you're gonna get, bro."
"I know..." The stallion lowered his hoof, giving his sister a long, appraising look. "You really promise to just read? Not explode anything?"
"Cross my heart and hope to fry, stick an imp claw in—"
"Stop. Just stop. I don't need to hear my baby sister make a..." Shining shuddered. "A Pinkie Promise of all things. They're debating whether or not that counts as a demonic pact. I'm still going to hold you to this, Twilight."
"I know." Twilight grew serious, almost solemn. "I know. I... I don't want to embarrass you, Shining."
The stallion embraced her. "You could never embarrass me, Twily. Surprise me, sure. Scare the horseapples out of me, far too easily. But never embarrass."
Twilight nuzzled her brother, then called out, "Spike, start assembling the backlog. I have reading to do."
Spike, unlike his mistress/ward/sister figure, did keep a relatively regular sleep schedule.
"SPIKE!"
Unfortunately, that meant interruptions to that schedule were all too frequent.
"Ugh..." The young dragon crawled out from his lair, a lovely little creche surrounded and heated by several steam pipes, manacoils, and dimensional distorters. Twilight was bouncing on her hooves barely five feet away. He gave her a baleful glare that came naturally to all awoken dragons. "What now?"
Twilight floated a scroll and quill into his claws. "Take a letter. This is absolutely vital."
"What, you forgot how to write?" Spike grumbled.
"No! This is a matter too urgent to leave to any medium short of dragon fire."
The hatchling slumped, but rested the quill at the top of the page. "Fine..."
"To the Most August Guildmaster Niv-Mizzet, Paragon of Intellect, Pinnacle of Insight, Crux of the Firemind—"
Spike quirked an eye ridge and looked up from the paper. "Laying it on a little thick, don't you think?"
"This is serious, Spike! I can't risk him glancing at it then leaving it for one of the Nivmagi to file away. And the best way to get a dragon's attention is to stroke his ego." Twilight smirked. "Isn't that right, my number-one assistant?"
"That or wake him up." Still, he chuckled. "Though I guess you have a point. Any other titles you want to tack on after 'Crux of the Firemind'?"
Twilight considered this. "No, better leave it at three. There is such a thing as too much praise, even for Lord Niv-Mizzet. Now:
"My continuing studies of metamagic have led me to discover that we lie on the razor's edge between unfathomable glory and utter disaster. For you see, a magic slipped into the old Guildpact has been triggered, having lain dormant until the document's power was broken. Now ultimate power over the destiny of all of Ravnica is freely available to anyone who deciphers the ancient ritual. Something must be done to ensure the welfare of the Izzet League and of the world itself. I await your quick response.
"Your faithful student, "Twilight Sparkle"
Spike finished the signature and sent the message. Watching the ashes, he asked, "You really think this is that big?"
"That's what the text suggests." One of Twilight's hind legs began twitching. "I hope he isn't busy. I don't know if I can handle the suspense! Maybe I should get started with something. Spike, go get—"
Spike interrupted the command with a fiery belch, producing the dracogenius's response. He opened the scroll immediately. "Ahem:"
"Give it here!" Twilight's telekinesis tore the text out of his talons. "Speech is too slow for this!"
Spike rolled his eyes and hopped up on the unicorn's back, reading over her shoulder.
Magewright Twilight Sparkle,
I always welcome your counsel, and your contributions to the advancement of knowledge are far greater than you have ever permitted yourself to recognize. However, there are finite limits to how much can be accomplished through purely scholastic research, and I believe you have reached them. There is more to metamancy than reading the works of others. As such, you are to engage in practical field study beginning immediately. Your task is simple: establish mutually positive interpersonal bonds and build upon those you already possess. Report to me your findings on these endeavors in two weeks.
Your mentor, Niv-Mizzet Parun and Guildmaster of the League of Izzet
Twilight let the scroll fall to the floor. "Is… is the Firemind telling me to make some friends?"
Spike grabbed the document and read the last few lines, having been interrupted midsentence. "Sounds like it."
Both pondered this for a stretch. Finally, Twilight said, "He already knew, didn't he?"
"Wouldn't surprise me," Spike said with a shrug, already clambering his way back to his sleeping nook.
Ral Zarek stood atop Nivix. As befit the home of Niv-Mizzet and the Izzet guildhall, it offered a most impressive view. Smokestacks and sky reservoirs marked the area as the beating heart of Ravnica's utility infrastructure. Subsonic thrums and faintly vibrating leylines marked it as the research capital of the plane. But for all the glory presented by the vista, it wasn't why Ral stood atop the spire.
The reason manifested above him in a short-lived hypersphere of blue mana. Ditzy dropped for a few feet before her wings instinctually caught her and flapped into a hover.
As the pegasus gathered her bearings, Ral called out to her. "Ditzy."
Ditzy looked down. "Ral." She brought herself down to his eye level, keeping her expression neutral.
"You haven't been home in a while," Ral noted.
"I've had more important things to worry about than guild politics."
"Hmm. So, what brings you back?"
A hint of a smirk snuck its way onto Ditzy's face. "Guild politics," she admitted, "though from the sound of it, they've gotten fairly important."
"There's an understatement." Ral grinned a sly grin as he strode down the steep slope of the spire, electrotraction boots of his own design keeping his footing as sure as if he were walking down a cement path. "I suppose I could get you an audience with the Nivmagus Council, but I certainly won't be able to arrange anything with the Firemind himself. At least, not when there's nothing in it for me..."
Ditzy rolled her eyes as she followed the magewright down the tower. "I have no intention of joining the League of Izzet, Ral."
He paused at this, body nearly horizontal. "Oh? Don't tell me you're going to those fuddy-duddies at New Prahv."
The pegasus sighed. "Look, you do what you do best, and that's crazy lightning science."
"True," Ral conceded.
"I'm going to do what I do best, and that's observe. I'm just here to see how this all plays out. If I have to take a side, I will, but I don't plan on it."
Ral shook his head, clicking his tongue in disapproval as he continued his vertiginous descent. "Oh, Ditzy. You've been away too long. I don't have all the details, but neutrality is most definitely not an option. No, you're going to need to pick a side and do it soon.
"If you don't..." He gave her a mad sideways grin. "Well, there may not be any sides left."
Izzet Guildpony UR Creature — Unicorn Wizard Whenever you cast an instant or sorcery spell, untap target Pony, Pegasus, or Unicorn you control. "A guild is like a herd. Plenty of peer review available the moment you ask." 2/1
Twilight Sparkle, Izzet Prodigy 3UR Legendary Creature — Unicorn Wizard Overload costs you pay cost 1 less for each Wizard you control. X: Copy target instant or sorcery spell you control with converted mana cost X. You may choose new targets for the copy. "Don't be impressed. I am but a flickering candle compared to the brilliance of the Firemind." 1/3
I'm bored. Everyone's talking. Why? Talking's dumb. We should be doing something. Somewhere. I don't know. I'm bored.
I look at me, 'cause I'm lying down and bored. Sky-color hair. Cloud-color tail. Hammer on my butt. A good hammer, a branch grown around a big rock, not a dumb one made of metal. Though even a good hammer is kind of dumb. I don't need a hammer. I have hooves. Hooves are better than a hammer, 'cause you can't drop them, and they smash stuff just as good. My hooves smash stuff really good. The hammer was there after my first raid, when I smashed more stuff than even Zorg, and he's an ogre! Was an ogre. Shouldn't have tried to take my food, Zorg. Mmm, food.
Hey, I smell food. Where? There! Yay, food! I wag my tail and lick the human who gave me the food. He laughs and scratches me behind the ears and says something. Words don't matter 'cause they're dumb, but he sounded nice, so that's nice.
Om nom nom yum yay food.
Mmm. Good food. Sweet stuff and green stuff and dry crunchy stuff and dry not-crunchy stuff and a little meat. Meat's okay. Not as yum, but it keeps you strong, and not keeping yourself strong is dumb.
Are we still sitting around? Really? Who talks this much? Why? I whine a little and frown. This is so duuuumb. This is worse than the purple horn-pony!
Ugh, the purple horn-pony. I growl a little as I remember her. We'd just chased off another clan and made camp, and she just showed up right in the middle! How dare she? This was our territory! If she going to just show up before we could even get a cookfire going, then she should've challenged us properly, with lots of shouting and running at the camp from outside.
Though cookfires are kind of dumb. I don't get why humans like burning food. Humans are weird sometimes, even clanmates.
Not as weird as the purple horn-pony, with all her weird, dumb shiny clothes and her weird, dumb burnt smell and her weird, dumb words that were even dumber than normal words. And she didn't even stay and fight! She just left as quick as she came! Hopped in and out of our territory quick as she pleased! Spat in our faces!
If I find her again, I'm gonna find her and stomp her and stomp her again. And maybe another time for good measure.
"Screw Loose!"
Oh, hey, my name! Names are weird, but good-weird. They're words, but they're not dumb. Can't remember many others, though.
Oh, but it's Rutvi! Rutvi's my friend, and friends are great, even when they're humans. I trot up to him and look up to him and wag my tail and smile.
Rutvi smiles, too. Smiles! Yay! He talks, and I listen, 'cause we're friends, and friend-words are less dumb than most words. "Wanna go for a raid?"
A raid? A raid! Woohoo! No more talking! No more sitting around! Just running and shouting and stomping and fun! I jump and bark and pant and bark again.
Rutvi laughs. "Great! Come on." Then he runs off.
I follow, 'cause why wouldn't I? Raid! Fun!
I run and Rutvi runs and everyone in the clan who isn't too young or pregnant or guarding them runs. Glad I'm not pregnant. I'm the only pony-wolf in the clan. Rutvi says I'm the only pony-wolf ever. No pony-not-wolves in the clan either, though. Sometimes that makes me sad, but I have friends and food and fun and that's good so I don't need other ponies. It'd be nice when I get hot, but then I'd get pregnant and couldn't raid which would be dumb and boring and dumb. Extra dumb. And boring.
We're running over dead buildings. There's rock and fake rock and metal and shinies everywhere. I'm raiding, so I can't stop and look at shinies. Every time my hooves hit fake rock, it gets smashed. When they hit real rock, it doesn't. Some clanmates say I ruin the fake rock, but they shouldn't be making weapons out of it anyway. It's dumb and weak. You're already a little weak if you need a weapon. Don't make a weak weapon! That's dumb. Use real rock. My clanmates are kind of dumb sometimes, but not as dumb as not-clanmates, so I don't have to stomp them. Except sometimes I do, but they start it. Trying to take my food is starting it. Dumb Zorg.
Everyone's starting to shout. We're almost there!
...
Um, where's there? I don't see anything. No, I see a hole. We're raiding a hole? How do you raid a hole?
Everyone's charging into the hole. I guess I'll find out.
This hole is weird!
Everything's wet and smells weird and doesn't smash right. I stomp it and it goes squish and then I have squish all over my hoof and I have to scrape it off and then my hoof smells weird. Or I stomp it and it goes less squish and it's not smashed. Or I stomp it and nothing happens. At all. I'm the best at smashing! Why won't this dumb hole smash!?
I wipe my eyes with the hoof with less squish on it. I'm not crying. Crying's dumb and weak and for babies that are dumb and weak. I walk further down into the dumb, squishy, weird-smelling hole, down the ledge that goes around and around and down and down. My clan is still here. I can hear the shouts and screams as they smash people. Smashing people isn't as fun as smashing buildings or things, but I guess it'll be better than no smashing at all.
Hey, what's that? Is that food? There's a hole in the wall here, a cave, I guess. There's food in the cave! I trot in. Green food everywhere! I look around. There's no dirt, just water and squish. Weird. This food is weird. But it's still food. Hmm...
As I look at all the food, some of it starts to look back! Well, it doesn't have eyes, but it's definitely pointing bits at me! Take this! Nom!
I chew the pointing bit a few times before I realize I just ate weird food. It doesn't taste weird, though. It actually tastes good. I eat a few more pointing bits.
By the time I swallow, the bits have grown back! Could... could it be? Endless food? This is the best weird hole ever!
Hey, what's that smell?
I take a deep sniff. It smells like pony. Huh. Any ponies here will be weird, but they'll still be ponies. Ponies are kind of a clan, so we're kind of clanmates, so we could be friends. Friends are great, and the weird pointy food was yum, so maybe weird friends won't be too bad.
I track the scent. It's coming from in a big, dangly pile of food. This smells weird, so I don't eat any. I just nose it aside and find the pony.
Aw, it's a horn-pony. Horn-ponies are always weird. But it is a mare, so she can't get me pregnant, which is good, 'cause I'm on a raid now, and if I don't know what to do if I get pregnant during a raid. She's almost the same color as the dangle-food, but her mane and tail are closer to my mane and tail. Her eyes are pretty and coin-colored. Coins are extra-super-dumb, but her eyes aren't.
I smile and bark and wag my tail.
She just stares at me and says words. I listen, 'cause I want to be friends. "Luna above, what are you?"
I don't get it. I bark and wag my tail again.
She seems scared. Well, I am strong and fast and the best at smashing, but I'm being nice!
I wrinkle my nose. Ugh, she wet herself. Yeah, she's scared. I whine, 'cause I didn't want her to be this scared. Or scared at all.
She curls up in a little ball and starts shaking and whimpering. I try nudging her a few times, but she won't uncurl, and I can't get her to roll very well. I whine again, 'cause this wasn't what I wanted, but I leave the food cave. Poor horn-pony. Too weak to even make friends with a strong pony like me. Must be because she lives in this hole. Dumb hole.
Ah! A roar! What roared? Our clan doesn't have anything that roars!
I see moving things lower down. A lot of them look like my clanmates. One doesn't. It really doesn't. There are eyes and legs and claws and tails and teeth and scales and...
Yeah, I'm just going to run now.
Camp is quiet. The weird, strong thing didn't follow us when we left the hole, but now it's guarding it. We all still ran for the camp as fast as we could.
Rutvi says we're not going to raid the hole again. Fine by me. I still smell like squish. I just wish I could've made friends with the horn-pony.
Rutvi scratches me behind the ears. Ahh. He rests his head against my side, and we both fall asleep under the stars.
Ditzy circled above the Simic zonot, considering the curious structure. The Gruul raid had left the sinkhole of science confused and weakened, yes, but the enormous krasis patrolling the perimeter, a medley of crocodile, octopus, hydra, and a hint of whale, would need quite a bit of magic to slip past.
Time, she thought, a funny thing. A day is a laughably brief time for some things, a second an eternity for others. For Ditzy's purposes, a week was plenty of time to get a hoofhold on Ravnica's general status, but nowhere near enough for anything specific. She was only just getting to that stage of her reconnaissance now.
Before Ditzy could begin layering on don't-notice-me spells, she noted a presence in her slipstream. It was a curious feeling: a little motion in her peripheral vision, a tiny bit of turbulent feedback in the wind, a hint of blue in a spectrum few others could see. She turned and hovered, letting the interloper come to her.
It was somewhat familiar, an illusory being crafted from memory and magic, shaped like a many-tailed manta ray, modeled after the magics of the Iquati, a lost civilization of a plane where the line between thought and substance blurred beyond distinction. Lost, but not forgotten. The narcomoebae made sure of that.
Ditzy smiled. She knew who had begun with those living memories and ended with the creature before her. "Jace sent you to find me, didn't he?"
The phantasm said nothing, but then, it had no lungs.
"Well, hope he doesn't mind my hitching a ride." The pegasus touched a blue-glowing hoof to the entity, and both streamed away.
Ditzy understood precisely why ætherworking was a form of blue magic. To her eyes, an unsummoning dissolved a creature like salt in a river, sending it back along currents of magic and memory to its summoner's surface thoughts. Knowing that, it was surprisingly easy to combine mana bonds and pegasus magic to ride that current like a jet stream.
Of course, just because the spell was easy to make didn't make it an enjoyable experience. When the æther flow wound its way back to Jace Beleren, what materialized was a thoroughly disoriented pegasus, eyes even more askew than normal.
The human considered himself lucky he was in his personal apartments. A pony manifesting before him on the street or worse, in front of Niv-Mizzet, would've raised all sorts of unpleasant attention and awkward questions. Especially given the whole "wanted poster" thing, disguises or no. Still, no reason to be impolite. "I wasn't expecting you this quickly, Ditzy. How—"
The mare held up a forehoof, staggering as she did so. "H-hold that thought. Just… I gotta…" She blinked several times, each one putting her eyes in an even more improbable arrangement. After about a minute, she finally got her bearings. "Okay. I'm okay. Sorry."
"Not a problem. What happened?"
Ditzy half-collapsed into a sitting position, still not fully composed. "Imagine synesthesia with a sense of touch evolved to sense the tiniest wind current, the hearing and smell of a prey species, and sight that… well, is my sense of sight." That certainly explained why her eyes were closed and her ears flat.
"Oh my." Jace knelt by his friend and student. "Are you going to be alright?"
"Yeah. Yeah, I'll be fine. Just never went that far with that spell before. Must've been a quarter of the way around the world. Should've thought of that." Ditzy opened her eyes and turned her gaze to the human. "So, why'd you call me?"
Jace shrugged. "It's been a week. I thought we should compare notes. Do you feel up to going first?"
Ditzy shook off the last vestiges of disorientation. "Shouldn't be a problem." She shifted into a rather more composed position, gathered her thoughts, and took a deep breath. "Okay, so, my probes and I have been giving as much of the city a once-over as we can. It's clear that the plane is in a state of political transition again."
"Again?"
"When my Spark ignited, we'd all been realizing just how much we depended on the guilds. Ten thousand years is a long time; after all that time, we needed the structure the ten – and it is ten; the Dimir will never get that djinn back in the bottle – had provided.
"Still, the new Guildpact wasn't going to be another superspell that would make us all serfs of the guilds again. Teysa Karlov herself was writing it up; of course it would be fair. An agreement, a contract, nothing more. It would keep the guilds from growing out of control once more. For once, they would work for the people of Ravnica, not the other way around."
Ditzy shook her head and barked out a laugh. "No surprise how that panned out.
"Now, the plane isn't moving away from the brink of collapse. It's racing towards utter pandemonium. The Izzet are abandoning utility maintenance in favor of whatever ultra-macro-meta-plan the dragon's cooked up. The other guilds are all noticing and gearing up accordingly: Selesnya and Golgari are literally growing armies, Azorius and Boros are recruiting at unprecedented rates, Gruul and Rakdos are just waiting for the first sign of weakness…" Ditzy frowned. "And Orzhov, Dimir, and Simic are all taking a turn for the insular. No word on the street on whatever they're doing, but they've never been the most open guilds. I was working on that when your pet showed up." The pegasus sighed. "So, how's your week been?"
"I believe I understand what Niv-Mizzet is planning," Jace answered, "and I could use some help."
Any lingering dizziness was forgotten. Ditzy's expression was all business. "Tell me."
Gruul Guildpony RG Creature — Pony Warrior Whenever a Pony, Pegasus, or Unicorn you control deals combat damage to an opponent, untap target land you control. "A guild is like a herd. Together we thrive where alone we would die." 2/2
Screw Loose, Wolf with Hooves 1RG Legendary Creature — Pony Whenever Screw Loose, Wolf with Hooves attacks, destroy target artifact defending player controls. X, Discard a red or green creature card with converted mana cost X or less: Until end of turn, Screw Loose gets +Y/+Z and gains the discarded card's abilities, where Y is that card's power and Z is its toughness. Activate this ability only if Screw Loose is attacking. 2/2
The Council of Speakers did not meet often. The highest members of the Simic Combine took a stance that wasn't so much laissez faire as it was "don't contaminate the experiment." Most of the time, they met to decide the future course of the Combine. Sometimes, the activities of another guild necessitated a decision from the top. And on occasion, when a guild member showed symptoms of the excesses of the past, they met to prevent the spread of the disease.
The Speakers' Chamber, like the rest of the Simic guildhall, the Zameck, was a plain, almost cavelike structure just beneath the surface of the Tenth District. Algae thrived on the corners of walls. Skylights covered in plax, an æther-infused ooze, gave the light a dreamy, underwater quality. Seated around a crescent-shaped table were all nine speakers of all nine zonots: merfolk, sea trolls, vedalken, and even a rather algal root-kin. The creature who sat in the crescent's curve was none of these. She wasn't easily classified as anything, even by the guild's taxonomy-twisting standards.
The defendant's arms were humanoid standard to a very brief glance. After that, one noticed the translucent skin over the biceps, revealing the musculature underneath. The peculiar, wet-looking pustules along the forearms and on the backs of the hands. The four-fingered hands. The fingertips wholly covered in keratin.
Her legs were unlike those of any unmodified species. They started fairly human, then became progressively more equine at each joint, from knee to ankle to fetlock, ending in hooves half again as big as her hands. More pustules dotted the limbs amidst the short coat of mint-green hair. On each thigh was an image of a double helix within a golden bulb shaped like the tip of a baby bottle.
Her body was concealed beneath a cotton shift. The way the fabric folded suggested a slim form and modest breasts on her chest. The clothing's shoulders were already dark with moisture from the vesicles beneath.
Her face was largely human, but the details hinted at her species of origin. The nose was unusually flat and broad, the jaw a bit protrusive. Her golden eyes were slightly larger and a touch further apart than average, her ears pointed more like a cat's than an elf's. Her scalp extended down her neck, her white and seafoam locks still forming a mane. Oh, and the horn. The horn sprouting from the middle of her forehead was something of a tipoff. Her head was clear of the moist growths, though small ones laid on her neck. Her expression was firm, lips set, eyes narrowed, nostrils flared.
Prime Speaker Zegana opened the proceedings. "State your name, base species, and role in the Combine."
The answer came loud and proud. "Lyra Heartstrings, unicorn pony, journeyman biomancer of the Tentacle Clade."
"Do you understand why you have been brought before us today, Miss Heartstrings?"
Lyra smirked. "Would the speakers like my opinion on the matter, or simply a recitation of the charges?"
A slight frown marred the merwoman's neutral demeanor. "This is a serious matter, Miss Heartstrings."
"I agree wholeheartsedly, Prime Speaker."
The frown deepened. "I beg your pardon?"
"As I beg yours. What delightful symmetry." Zegana's scowl made it clear that Lyra's humor would not be appreciated here. "I neologize for the sake of accuracy, Prime Speaker. I have installed redundant backups of several of my once-unique vital organs, including the heart. Hence, if I am to do anything wholeheartedly, I must speak in the cardiac plural."
Zegana sighed. "Miss Heartstrings, you are not helping your case with these attempts at levity."
"You know who also didn't have a sense of humor? Momir Vig."
In most courtrooms, the resulting commotion would be quieted through the aggressive use of a gavel. Instead, Zegana squeezed a puffy, boneless creature that had elements of anemone, hamster, and indrik. The resulting ultrasonic squeal quieted the courtroom almost instantly even as it provided some much needed stress relief. The prime speaker waited a moment in case the hubbub needed further suppression. Once it was clear that it did not, she declared, "If it were not for your sterling reputation prior to the incident in question, Miss Heartstrings, I would hold you in contempt of court. If I were a more malicious person, I would sentence you to be eaten by waspcrabs. One more flippant remark, and I will disregard both of those conditions. Do I make myself clear?"
Lyra shrugged, her words unapologetic. "I merely sought to illustrate a point, Prime Speaker."
"And what point could that possibly be?" boomed the sea-troll at Zegana's left. Trifon, speaker of Zonot Four, glowered at the unicorn. "That you have no respect whatsoever for your guild? That you completely fail to appreciate how close Vig and his thrice-damned cytoplasts brought the Combine to complete destruction? Well?"
"That this entire guild has an irrational phobia—"
Trifon pounced on her words like a hungry shambleshark. "Irrational!?"
Zegana raised a hand. "Let her speak."
"Zegana, you can't possibly—"
"This may very well be an upwelling, Trifon. An unwelcome one, perhaps, but that does not mean we should scorn it." The troll grumbled at this, but quietly. Zegana gave Lyra a nod. "Continue, Miss Heartstrings, but know that you touch on a sensitive issue."
"Understood, Prime Speaker." The altered pony took a deep breath to steady her nerves. Trifon did that to people. "As I was saying, the Combine as it is has an irrational phobia of anything to do with Momir Vig. I do not claim that it was wrong to turn from the path he sought to travel, but it was wrong to discard virtually all of the progress made under his leadership."
Zegana gave a sad shake of her head. "What you call 'progress,' child, the rest of us call 'madness.'"
The hardness left Lyra's eyes as she brought them to the floor. "Do you know what convinced me otherwise?" Instead of blasting out the question with stentorian pride as she had before, she barely managed conversational volume.
A hint of gentleness slipped into Zegana's reply. "I confess that I do not."
"I was at Zonot Three during the attack." Several of the speakers murmured at this. More than a month ago, there had been an attack by the Gruul on the remote base of Simic operations. "Given Zonot Three's focus on botanical and fungal studies, we were ill-equipped to handle a sudden assault of vandals and berserkers. I was hiding amid my then-current research – attempts at an amphibious phytohydra – when I saw her."
"Her?"
Lyra nodded. "An earth pony mare, though were it not for her blue coat, I'd have thought her a mindless beast. She was streaked in blood, at least three different shades, but she had apparently decided to stop for lunch." She chuckled for a moment before choking herself off. "I... I'm sorry." She forced back a sob. "Times like this, y-you have to laugh so you don't cry..."
"Take as long as you need, Miss Heartstrings."
"Thank you, ma'am." Lyra took a few deep breaths. "In any case, there she was, idly grazing heads off of my most promising specimen. Of course, they grew right back. At first, all I could think was that if nothing else, I'd made a new snack food for the pony market.
"But then she trotted away, nude but for her accidental war paint, not a spark of thought in her eyes, and I wondered, 'what difference is there between us?' Pony genetics being what they are, we could be sisters. Me, sister to a savage creature scarcely different from a wild horse."
She scowled. "I couldn't accept that. We were able to repel the Gruul in time, no zonot is defenseless, but from that day on I couldn't look at myself without seeing that... that animal. I needed to distance myself from her by any means necessary, distinguish myself from that beast in every way that I could."
"You became disgusted by your own nature and sought to change it." Zegana shook her head. "It is no surprise that you went adrift."
Lyra leapt to her hooves. "I tried! Luna damn it, I tried! Every permitted form of biomancy, every sanctioned hybridization, every procedure that didn't put my self-awareness at risk! And it wasn't enough! For all the bells and whistles I could sprout, underneath it all, I'd still be the same damned horse as before!"
"And so we return to your crimes."
"They are crimes only because the Combine proscribes anything with a hint of Vig's influence out of fear of what he did!"
"And we are better for it." A hint of steel slipped into Zegana's voice.
Lyra sneered. "Are we? My mother told me of the cytoplast treatments that helped the lame and crippled walk again. The work by people like Dr. Nebun to cure diseases when the other guilds could suppress the symptoms at best. The days when seeing the Simic signet meant that here was something designed to make life worth living. Experiment Kraj was disastrous, no one is denying that, but it cannot erase the benefits that the old Combine brought to the masses! Benefits we cannot provide so long as we follow hermetic policies like the Holdfast Principle!"
"And so you use yourself as a demonstration of the good we could do if we were to return to Vig's methods," concluded Zegana, her words slick with sarcasm.
Lyra shook her head. "No, not Vig's methods. The methods that were in place for decades, centuries before Vig came to power."
Zegana waved a hand dismissively. "Regardless, we have been sidetracked long enough. This is neither the time nor the place for such discussion—"
"Then when, Prime Speaker?" Lyra pressed. "When do we look at ourselves, at our actions, and ask if we're acting for the good of all, or merely for what we spawn in our laboratories?"
"With what you have said today, Miss Heartstrings, I can only assume that day will be very soon." Zegana glanced at the papers before her. "Now, while we have deviated from the normal procedures for this sort of hearing, we can certainly be flexible. Miss Heartstrings, in addition to violating the Holdfast Principle and using forbidden biomancy, you have also performed self-experimentation without permission from a master biomancer, have confessed to elective bio-augmentation without a license, and have failed to document a new krasis once it proved viable. Is there anything you would like to add?"
"That hat looks stupid and you should feel stupid for thinking otherwise."
Zegana shook her head. "And add poor taste to the list of offenses." She folded her hands, thinking for a moment. "I would like to note that we are willing to lessen your punishment if you tell us where you managed to find living cytoplasts." More gently, she added, "Please take the offer, Lyra. We need your compassion as much as you need our better judgement."
"I'm getting judgement no matter what I do," huffed Lyra. "Besides, you'll just kill them as you did all the others."
"There were no others, Miss Heartstrings. Until we learned of your experiments, we had assumed that the Kraj project had absorbed every cytoplast in Ravnica, and thus they were all destroyed with its death." Zegana paused for a moment before nodding to herself. "If you were to point us in the right direction, we might consider preserving one, if only so that future generations would not forget the lessons taught to us by Vig's folly."
Lyra said nothing for nearly a minute, but her shifting expression betrayed the battle that was raging in her mind. Finally, she sighed, shook her head, and smirked. "You know, it'd be obvious if you came out of your holes a bit more often. I was looking for something that supposedly didn't exist anymore. Who do you think I asked?"
The librarian was updating the encoded orders in a copy of Meditations on the Nature of Truth when he heard a cough. "Just a moment, please." Didn't want to send old Circu after the wrong fellow, after all. The lobotomist was pushing ninety, and his eyesight was getting iffy when it came to anything that wasn't pinkish-grey and wrinkled.
Once he finished double-checking the cipher in the text, he looked up and put on his best "people face." "Hello, welcome to the Ismeri Library. How may I Prime Speaker Zegana!?" What was the fish woman doing here? Shouldn't she be off feeding squidflies to eelhawks or something?
"Shh." Zegana smiled as she murmured, "This is a library."
The librarian, who just knew his days were numbered, gave a nervous chuckle. "S-so it is. How may I be of assistance, ma'am?"
The guildmistress maintained that maddeningly opaque grin. "I'm here to see a horse about a man."
Ditzy came to a landing among the gargoyles of an Orzhov cathedral and sighed.
One of the sculptures turned its head and opened its mouth wider than stone should've allowed. A bubble manifested around its head and shook as it absorbed the piercing scream.
Ditzy watched as the gargoyle examined its new headgear. Got to appreciate the little things, she thought to herself, or the big ones will grind you down.
A luminous, blue humanoid walked to the side of the cathedral, then kept walking up the wall. Ditzy watched this as well. As the figure approached, the details in the light indicated that she was looking at an invisibility spell. She waited until Jace reached the top and dropped the illusion before asking, "Having fun?"
He glanced at the gargoyle, who was now bouncing its head against the roof. "You seem to be."
Ditzy wingshrugged. "Hey, if you want to rack up a hundred years of posthumous servitude, go ahead, break the thing."
"Point." Jace leaned against an inanimate grotesque. "So, the Implicit Maze."
"Yup." Ditzy looked out across the crowded skyline. "Should be interesting."
Jace looked at her like she'd sprouted a third wing. "It's going to throw the entire plane into chaos."
"Right. Interesting."
"Don't you care? This is your home."
Ditzy sighed, rose, and stretched. "Jace, I've spent the past several weeks circumnavigating this world, looking for some way to defuse this thing before it got started." She turned to him, resignation clear in her eyes and drooping ears. "You know what I found?"
He could guess. "Nothing?"
She shook her head. "Worse. I found someone else looking for the same thing. And he's joined up with the Boros!" This got a humorless bark of laughter. "How crazy is that? Someone joins the army looking for a peaceful solution! It just makes you wanna..." Ditzy dipped her head, unable to hold back the tears anymore. "M-makes you wanna..."
Jace hesitated for a moment before kneeling and awkwardly tousling the pegasus's mane. "Um, there, there?"
Ditzy sniffled and glared up at him. "My home's about to tear itself apart, you idiot." Her voice cracked even as she held the glower. "This situation calls for a hug."
The human complied, mechanically wrapping his arms around his friend. "Please don't get snot on the cloak."
Ditzy giggled a bit. "You are the worst at cheering people up, you know that?"
"You laughed, didn't you?"
"Only because you're so pathetic." One last sniff, and Ditzy smiled, wiping her eyes with a pastern. "Okay. I'm okay."
"Ready to go fix this?"
"Ready to minimize the damage." Ditzy's wings started to shine with brilliant white light. "Get on."
"Um, couldn't I just—"
"Jace." The mare locked both eyes on him. "Get. On."
After a helpless shake of his head, Jace complied. "Could you at least tell me where we're headed?"
Ditzy grunted a bit under the added weight, but with the magic bolstering her strength, it was nothing she couldn't handle. "Sunhome. We've got a friend we need."
Simic Guildpony GU Creature — Unicorn Pegasus Wizard Flying If one or more +1/+1 counters would be placed on a Pony, Pegasus, or Unicorn creature you control, that many plus one +1/+1 counters are put on it instead. "A guild is like a herd. Countless strengths brought together by singular purpose." 0/1
Lyra, Genetic Engineer 2GU Legendary Creature — Unicorn Human Creatures you control have evolve. (Whenever a creature enters the battlefield under your control, put a +1/+1 counter on each creature you control with less power or toughness than that creature. If a creature has multiple instances of evolve, each triggers seperately.) "The rest of the Combine calls me a radical, but no one born with thumbs could ever understand my motives." 1/1
A glamorous mare swanned her way down the streets of Ravnica, reveling in her own grace and poise. Her alabaster coat caught the little light that made it through the constructed canyons, making her seem to glow from within. The silken pink locks on either end of her swayed hypnotically as she moved, leaving a trail of boggling onlookers in her wake, not all of them ponies. Eventually, she arrived at her destination, the Ismeri Library, one of the standouts of House Dimir's public face.
That the Tenth Guild even had a public face spoke volumes about what had happened since the fall of the Old Guildpact. No longer was Dimir a guild that skulked in the shadows, denying even its own existence. Now it was devoted not to concealing information but revealing it, an assembly of couriers, archivists, and investigators. Yes, that last one involved some shadow skulking, but entirely at the behest of others. Those who didn't want their secrets revealed could hire counterespionage specialists. And everyone knew the Dimir were about, so it wasn't like they could pull their old tricks even if they wanted to. Which they didn't. Really.
The unicorn couldn't completely stifle a throaty chuckle as she entered the library. If anything, allowing a bit of scrutiny allowed the Dimir to get away with more, so long as the occasional arrest kept the other guilds convinced that they were under control.
She broke her internal monologue to wave a hoof at a pale human seated at one of the reading tables near the entrance. "Dovri! Good morning!"
He looked up from his weighty tome and gave a small smile. "Fleur. Always good to see you. How's the family?"
"Oh, the same as always." Fleur rolled her eyes. "Ravenous. I swear, it feels like I'm the only one who even tries to put bread on the table."
Dovri nodded knowingly. "Ah, family. Can't live with them, can't afford that many assassinations."
"Too true. Have a nice day." With that, Fleur let the man go back to his book, while she made her way to the employees' lounge.
She hated the employees' lounge.
It wasn't that the few pieces of furniture made for ponies weren't built with her statuesque build in mind. It wasn't that the other librarians couldn't make a decent pot of coffee if their lives (or undeaths) depended on it. It wasn't even that she rarely had enough time to properly appreciate just how much she hated the place. No, Fleur's key gripe with with the employees' lounge was how her illusion was disrupted every time she entered.
Chrysalis sighed as her magic hiccuped under the room's security measures, black carapace replacing white hair. She removed her saddlebags and hung them on one of the skeletal hands that lined one wall of the room. It closed into a fist and would not open again for any but her. Macabre, but effective. She levitated a mug out of the sink and cleaned it out with a bit of toned-down death magic. She braced herself as her field took hold of the coffee pot, not least because the hot plate was Izzet-made and thus had a nonzero chance of exploding without warning. Thankfully, the worst thing that happened was the coffee itself, and Chrysalis briefly did away with her tongue before the brew did it for her.
A cup of caffeinated acid, a deep breath, and a recast disguise, and Fleur de Lis was ready for the day ahead. Thankfully, the dispel effect of the lounge only triggered on entering it, not leaving. She began taking reports from her swarm as she made her way to the front desk.
She couldn't help but glance at Dovri for a moment as her drones gave their status reports. The library didn't have anything so gauche as visible guards. Instead, telepaths like Dovri – which, needless to say, was no more his real name than Fleur de Lis was hers – rotated throughout the day, keeping a third eye on those who came and went. As he once told her, a stream of consciousness's undercurrents were made of half-formed word-images and sensory impressions, but surface thoughts were much more comprehensible, translated for the benefit of the conscious mind. Telepathic signals were even easier, the thoughts of one mind magically clarified so that another mind would be guaranteed to understand them.
At least, that was the case for most sapients, but changelings were different. The equinoid creatures had developed telepathy before true sapience. As such, a hive's psychic communication wasn't so much mind-to-mind as synapse-to-synapse; translated, yes, but into a form that was less intelligible to telepaths. Fleur and Dovri had both learned that early in her career, when an idle scan had left the human reeling.
Such psychic inscrutability was incredibly valuable for the guild of secrets. Szadek, Dimir's vampiric parun, had thought the love-eaters too valuable to risk any on the side of his enemies, and thus had dominated the hives for all of his millennia-spanning unlife. When his ghost was finally destroyed, the changelings found themselves independent after more than ten thousand years of control. They had stayed true to Dimir, knowing no other life.
One of the first free-born queens got tapped on the withers, breaking her introspective fugue. "Fleur? Hello? Come on, we've got a real situation here."
Fleur shook her head. "Huh?" It was one of her fellow librarians, Rislav, another human male barely out of his teens. He seemed distinctly uncomfortable, shifting from foot to foot. "What is it?"
"Someone wants to see you. Now."
The mare could think of two reasons for her coworker's discomfort, and the anxiety emanating from him was rather much for a full bladder. "VIP?"
"Very very much so."
"Who?"
"That would be me," answered a blue-skinned woman on the other end of the counter.
Fleur blinked. The emergence of the merfolk from Ravnica's buried oceans was an even more recent development than the changelings' liberation, so few could qualify for even one "very." The fish-head helmet narrowed that field to one possibility. "Prime Speaker Zegana?"
The Simic guildmistress's lips quirked into a thin, inscrutable grin. "Well, good to see some people know how to behave in a library. Is there somewhere where we could speak privately?"
Fleur pushed her confusion and shock onto some idle drones, along with some apologies. She needed to be focused, not flummoxed. "Certainly. Rislav, which reading rooms are available at the moment?"
"Huh?" Sadly, the human didn't have a hive mind through which he could export his discombobulation. "I, I, um..."
Merfolk and changeling shared a look, the sort that all women can, regardless of species, when men are being silly. Fleur tried again. "Is Reading Room Three currently free?"
Rislav perked up and grabbed at the conversational life preserver. "Y-yes!" A moment later, he drooped back down. "Er, at least, it should be."
"Well, if it isn't, I'm sure the occupant will be willing to make room for a guildmaster." Fleur made her way out from behind the front desk. "This way, Prime Speaker."
Reading Room Three was a cozy alcove with a quartet of comfortable chairs, several large cushions, and square tables light enough to reconfigure into a single surface or separate desks.
It was also laced with enough scrying sensors to count the hairs on a fly's eye, but that was only to be expected.
The two occupants sat on either side of one of the tables. "I am not angry, Miss de Lis," said Zegana. "I am, if anything, curious."
"Some would say that's more dangerous than anger among the Simic," Fleur noted.
The merwoman's expression betrayed nothing, but she couldn't hide the brief flash of mirth that came and went like a thunderbolt in her emotional aura. "Some, perhaps. Yourself?"
"Certainly not." Fleur smirked. "Not where one such as yourself could hear me, in any case."
"Hmm." Zegana stirred her tea. There had been a pot waiting for them, along with cups, saucers, and other sundries. Tea was always made available when very important persons showed up, no matter how unexpectedly. It was invariably better than the lounge coffee, but the Prime Speaker seemed unwilling to find out. An understandable precaution, really. Accepting Dimir refreshments was usually a good way to encounter all sorts of novel poisons.
Fleur drank hers as quickly as etiquette let her. She had no idea where they kept the stuff, and she would enjoy it while she had the chance. "How may I satisfy your curiosity, Your Primacy?"
"Zegana is fine. Recently, a gifted young biomancer violated one of the principle taboos of the Combine."
"Oh?
"She made use of cytoplasts." Zegana's gaze was firmly fixed on her teacup. "The strange thing is, every cytoplast on Ravnica should've died with Experiment Kraj. When Novijen awakened, every cytoplastic graft in the world was summoned to it. So how could a single unicorn have tracked down a substance whose synthesis has been forbidden for decades?"
"Seems to me like you should ask her."
"I did. Her answer was eminently logical: to find what should no longer exist, ask the ones who hid their own existence for so long."
"Ah." Fleur emptied her teacup. She had a hunch that she'd need it. "So you came to us."
"Indeed."
"Interesting that you came here and not the Public Offices. Officially, the Ismeri isn't affiliated with any guild."
Zegana rolled her eyes, but they never made contact with Fleur's. "It's a bit difficult to maintain such neutrality when all employees belong to a single guild."
Fleur shrugged. "Close enough for government work."
"In any case, Miss Heartstrings specifically mentioned asking a unicorn mare who worked here for aid."
"Did she?" The "unicorn" bit back a curse. She should've extracted the memories of her interactions with Lyra, not just obscured them. The self-loathing little mare must've tinkered with her own brain in some way that disrupted the mind magic.
"She did. Which, of course, leads me to you, Miss de Lis." Zegana pursed her fingers. "Our guilds have worked well together in the past. Embarrassingly so, one might say. I would ask for a peek behind the curtain, a chance to set an old wrong right."
Fleur hesitated and chewed on her lower lip for a moment. "You do not understand what it is you ask for, Zegana. The Combine uses information. House Dimir is information. A 'peek behind the curtain,' as you call it, would be like you giving away your most promising krasis to a butcher."
The Prime Speaker sighed and rubbed her temples. By the time Fleur realized magic was at work, Zegana finally made eye contact. Her irises swam with color like soap film. "Miss de Lis – and I am well aware that that is not your real name – you do not understand what it is you deny me. Cytoplasts are a fossil technology, a relic of a paradigm we are well rid of. They are not a secret to keep or a treasure to horde. They are a menace that must be eliminated for the good of the world."
Fleur had braced her mental defenses through all of the little speech, only to realize there was no magical suggestion underlying the merwoman's words. Whatever spell Zegana had worked on her eyes was probably defensive, then. It could be a bluff, but calling it could leave the mare in the always awkward situation of getting caught trying to hypnotize someone. Better to play it safe for now. "Then we appear to have reached an impasse."
Not quite.
Whatever Zegana's response, Fleur didn't catch it. It was all she could do not to leap to attention. There was no mistaking that mental voice. The only non-changeling who could tap into the hive. The shapeshifter who beat her at her own game. The master of her guild.
Lazav.
Give the fishwoman what she wants. There is no harm in it.
Chrysalis didn't know where Lazav was, or whose form he was wearing, or why he'd chosen now to command her, but she could still reply along the same feed. Desperation, confusion, and recent memories raced to the mastermind at he speed of thought, their message clear: I just told her why I can't do that. How do I explain such a sudden reversal?
She is listing all that she fears will befall Ravnica if we do not accede. Let her think she's convinced you.
Lazav's presence left Fleur's mind as suddenly as it had come, leaving a clinging sense of intrusion. She resisted the impulse to shake her head.
True to the other shapeshifter's word, Zegana was in mid-rant. "...in which case the entire district's food supply will be tainted with putrescent biomantic byproducts, which will—"
Fleur held up her hooves. "Alright, alright! You've made your point!"
"Ah. Excellent. So, where are the cytoplasts?"
"It took some work to find them, but in retrospect, it was fairly obvious." Fleur's tongue was largely working on automatic, her thoughts still scattered by Lazav's intervention. She needed a bit of time to collect them. Maieutics to the rescue! "I assume you know how low-level Simic guild members were treated during Momir Vig's tenure?"
Zegana nodded with a sigh. "Yes. Experimental fodder. Unsatisfactory results were..." Her ensorcelled eyes widened as realization dawned. "They were flushed to the undersewers."
"Precisely. Usually after their cytoplasts had been removed, but not always. Given the sheer utility of the substance, both we and the Golgari treated such finds as windfalls."
"The Golgari as well?" Zegana finally raised her cup to her lips. "I suppose that comes as little surprise. Scavengers in action." She barely tilted the teacup, then held what little liquid she'd allowed for almost a minute.
Her emotions were strangely obscured, like a fog over her heart. "Well?" Fleur prompted.
The speaker shrugged. "Boiling water and I rarely get along. Still, it is good to know that there is nothing other than tea in the tea. So, how much cytoplastic material do you still have?"
"I'm just a librarian, ma'am. I was able to find where and why, but the higher-ups aren't going to tell someone like me how much."
"Hmm." Zegana's gaze drifted to the gaze, turning distant. "A shame. I cannot deny that great progress was made in that era, though it came at an even greater cost. And flushing undesirables into the undersewers was only one of many terribly foolish habits, even if it did remind those of us beneath them of the world above. Entire avenues of research were discarded at the whim of a single mad elf. Telempathy, for example."
"Oh?" Fleur was happy to encourage the merwoman. The longer Zegana stayed in a conversational mood, the longer the mare could spend not dealing with customers.
"Yes. A fascinating concept. A form of mind-to-mind communication as far beyond normal telepathy as that is beyond spoken conversation. A direct link into the unfiltered sensorium of another living creature. Alas, most brains could not handle such an experience. A species that could was found, but alas, the moment it was discovered, the word came down from on high: cease all research." Zegana rose from her seat. "Such wondrous creatures, changelings. Thank you for your time, Miss de Lis."
Fleur stared, slackjawed, as the merwoman left the reading room. Then she emptied the teapot directly into her mouth. She deserved it.
Several hours passed, filled mostly with encoding orders to the covert operatives of House Dimir, recording the hive's intelligence reports, and explaining how the card catalog worked. The second was the most interesting by far. Chrysalis wasn't terribly high in the Dimir hierarchy, but as a changeling queen, she had direct access to more than a thousand street-level spies. Collating their experiences gave her an excellent impression of the goings-on of the Tenth District, which had been getting ever more intense in recent weeks.
The Izzet were working at a fever pitch for reasons that probably only made sense to Niv-Mizzet himself. The Golgari found themselves fighting to keep magewrights out of their tunnels as the dragon's flunkies developed an inexplicable interest in archeology. Both Azorius and Boros were recruiting just about anyone who walked in the door. Attendance at religious ceremonies was higher than Fleur had ever seen, be they Selesnya, Orzhov, Rakdos, or unguilded. The Gruul were getting more restless than usual. And now the head of the Simic Combine came to Fleur in person. Everything was racing towards a climax, though what it was, the mare could not guess.
Trouble strutted through the door like it was demonstrating this conclusion. Dovri's shift had ended, so it was a petite young woman named Velda who darted up from an enormous codex, hands clasped together as she squeaked, "Mister Vosk!"
Mister Vosk was a pale man with trailing raven locks, an athlete's build, and rather more leather than any polite outfit should contain. If his canines were rather prominent or his eyes had yellow irises and black sclera, well, it took all kinds to make a world, didn't it? In any case, he scooped up Velda in a fierce embrace and twirled her about, eliciting delighted shrieks. "Darling, darling Velda!" he purred once he set her down. "Always so good to see you. We must catch up some time soon."
She nodded eagerly. "I'm sure you're very busy, though."
"Ah, you know me. Places to meet, things to go, people to do." Vosk gave the girl a roguish wink as he continued towards the front desk.
Fleur was rather less enamored with him. "You're disgusting, you know that?"
The vampire shrugged as he laid a novel-sized tome on the counter. "And you're dreadfully dull. What's your point?"
The mare's horn flared brighter than was strictly necessary as she took hold of the book. She flipped through it, eyes narrowed and ears flat. "Well, Mirko, it seems you managed to return one intact for once." She reached the inside back cover and quirked an eyebrow. "And on time, no less. What's the occasion?"
Mirko tried his most charming grin. "Would it really be so hard to believe I'm trying to be more conscientious?"
Fleur's response was drowned out by a half-felt, half-heard rumble. The doors of the library flew open, admitting an orange equinoid mass of fury. Faint tremors could be felt as the mare marched into the library. If looks could kill... well, in certain cases they could. The one on the earth pony's face certainly seemed worthy of a gorgon. "Ah got a bone t' pick with you, missy," she snarled, rage thick as her Fifth District accent.
Velda didn't bolt upright this time. She didn't even lift her head. What she did do was direct a pulse of thought-disrupting magic at the irate pony as she passed by.
Applejack flinched for a moment, then jabbed a hoof into the young woman's chair. The wood decayed and collapsed in less than a second, dropping Velda on her rump. The earth mare glared at her. "Y' jus' stay there in that pile o' punk, punk." She swept her gaze across the room. "Same goes fer anyone else. Ah may be angry, but Ah ain't stupid. Ah'm jus' here t' have a word with mah business associate. Don't go messin' with mah head, and Ah won't go messin' with yer bodies. Sound fair?"
Without waiting for a response, she continued to the front desk, reared up, and planted her forehooves on the counter. Glaring at Fleur, she snapped, "You. Me. Now."
The unicorn quirked an eyebrow. "I'm pretty sure I'm not allowed to do that kind of thing when I'm on the clock." She turned away demurely. "Besides, you usually buy me dinner first."
Mirko chuckled huskily. "Well, now. If you had just told me you had a paramour, I wouldn't have wasted our time with my own advances."
Applejack's glare only deepened. Her hooves pressed into the polished black marble as though it were soft cheese, sand squeezing out behind her frogs. "Mah patience is hangin' by one thread, 'Fleur.'" She spat out the name with so much disgust that Fleur herself had to stifle a gag. "Ah wouldn't be jokin' if Ah were you."
The disguised mare bowed her head. "Very well. You have my apologies, Applejack. Come on, we can talk in the lounge. Mirko, you're in charge."
Vosk went from smug to shocked in an eyeblink. "What!?"
Fleur shrugged. "This is a library. We can't just leave the front desk unattended, and the others are on their lunch break."
"I don't even work here!"
"Not anymore."
Mirko grumbled for a moment before slumping and sighing. "Fine. But you owe me a favor."
Fleur did a little grumbling of her own. "Favors" for Mirko Vosk only ever meant one thing. "Fine. This way, Applejack."
She led the other mare into the loathed lounge. The last thing she needed was someone overhearing the details of her second role in the guild. She immediately regretted this decision. While Chrysalis took on her true appearance as she entered the room, Applejack took on her true odor. The changeling gagged, her eyes squinting shut. "Ugh! Reapply your deodorant, quick!"
"Hmph. Figgers y' can't stand th' smell of an honest day's work."
"An honest day's work on a rot farm!"
Chrysalis's eyes were beginning to tear up, but given the exasperation she sensed, Applejack was probably rolling her eyes. Mercifully, the stench's intensity plunged soon afterwards.
The changeling heaved a sigh of relief, then settled herself on the floor, waving Applejack towards one of the cushions. "Now," Chrysalis said once they were settled, "what seems to be the problem?"
Applejack gritted her teeth. "Th' problem is that yesterday there was one o' yer li'l critters tryin' ta talk up mah sister. Y' know our deal, Chrys—"
"Fleur while I'm on duty, please."
"Ah don't care if y' call yerself Princess Luna. The point is Ah ain't havin' no changelin' sniff around mah li'l sister while she don't know no better!" Applejack took a deep breath before she went on. "Now look, Chry– Fleur. Ah'm a farmer. It's mah duty an' mah pleasure t' see folks with food in their bellies. An' if Bloom falls in love with one o' yers when she can tell 'em fer what they are, well, that'll be her business. But Ah ain't gonna let no buggy bastard siphon that sweet li'l filly's love when she can't tell 'im from Pony Joe! Not when Winona an' her kin can give ya all th' love y' could ask fer."
Chrysalis nodded. She could certainly understand the rot farmer's position. Still, how could she explain how the mindless affection of a beast simply couldn't compare to the innocent first love of a child just starting to notice the opposite sex? Love was love to Applejack, much as fungus was fungus to Chrysalis herself. "I'll remind them, Jack. Just remember, they do have free will. You can't punish my whole hive for the indiscretions of a few."
Applejack huffed out a snort, but there was a hint of a grin on her muzzle. "Fleur, Ah wouldn't be a Golgari if Ah didn't believe in second chances." Her expression hardened. "But that's it. That drone o' yers done killed mah trust in you, but Ah got it back on its feet anyhow. Next time, it's stayin' dead, an' so's whatever bug's dumb enough to try an' have an Apple fer lunch. Y' hear me?"
"I hear you."
"Good. Ah gotta get back t' th' farm." The earth mare rose and stretched before fixing a hard stare on Chrysalis. "Next time, Ah won't come alone."
"There won't be a next time."
"Best not be."
The rest of Fleur's day passed by in a vague haze. After dealing with the head of one guild and her chief contact in another, anything else seemed dull in comparison. Even feeding the sanity-rending horror that lived in the basement just felt like part of the daily grind.
Finding a smiling Mirko Vosk sitting in the employees' lounge at the end of her shift was not an encouraging sign for the evening to come. "What are you even doing here?" asked the changeling.
Mirko sank a bit further into the armchair. "Well, given how you conscripted me, I figured I should take advantage of what perks there are while I can."
"Don't you have a job to do? I know you got new orders; I gave them to you."
"Not until midnight." The vampire's smile widened to a predatory rictus. "Besides, I want to call in my favor."
Chrysalis sighed, face in hoof. "Seriously?"
Mirko shrugged. "Why wait?"
"I swear, you only ever think about one thing."
"You know you love it."
Chrysalis glowered at that. "Don't talk to me about love, Vosk."
"A poor choice of words," Mirko conceded. "Still, you do owe me a favor. Would you rather I get a bit more creative?"
Chrysalis rolled her eyes and restored her disguise. "Fine. Come on."
In the dusky hours that evening, there was a bizarre sight for any who knew how and where to look. Hidden beneath a magical shroud, a porous-hooved creature flitted through the night sky, a pale humanoid astride her and whooping to the heavens.
"This is awesome!"
"Can't you fly yourself?" Chrysalis grumbled.
"Not like this," Mirko countered. "Do a barrel roll!"
"It's an aileron roll, you child." She did one anyway.
Dimir Guildpony UB Creature — Pony Rogue Whenever another Pony, Pegasus, or Unicorn enters the battlefield under your control, look at the top card of your library. You may put that card on the bottom of your library or into your graveyard. "A guild is like a herd. Don't assume you can see every member." 1/2
Chrysalis, Information Gatherer 4UB Legendary Creature — Shapeshifter Rogue Flying, hexproof Whenever Chrysalis, Information Gatherer deals combat damage to a player, that player reveals his or her hand. You may exile an instant or sorcery card from that hand encoded onto Chrysalis. If that card doesn't have cipher, it gains cipher. (Whenever Chrysalis deals combat damage to a player, its controller may cast a copy of that card without paying its mana cost.) 2/4
Ditzy sighed. "In hindsight," she reflected, "streaking towards Sunhome at ludicrous speed with a known criminal on my back probably wasn't the wisest thing I've ever done."
Jace rolled his eyes. "Really? You don't say."
The pegasus kept her gaze on the cell door. "You never said you were on wanted posters."
"Why did you think I was keeping myself invisible?"
"Because you're the head of a powerful multiplanar syndicate and have more enemies than I have feathers?"
Jace considered this. "Point." He considered his manacles. They were what passed for humor among the Boros; they restrained both his wrists and his magic. Ditzy bore a set of wing restraints that worked similarly. "Any ideas how to get out of this?"
Ditzy probably tried to wingshrug, given how the muscles in her barrel shifted. "Honestly, I was going to work the 'well-meaning but uninformed' angle. How many posters could they have put up in the cloud neighborhoods?"
The human shook his head. "Two words: Rainbow Dash."
"Oh. Right." Ditzy's gaze drooped to the floor. "I'm still used to thinking of her as the hero of the playground."
"Besides, the Boros take aiding and abetting far too seriously for that to work."
The mare snorted. "Great. So we're both doomed, is that what we've concluded?"
"Not quite," answered a third voice.
Both prisoners turned to the source. It was a human male, broad-shouldered and clean-shaven. Clearly a skilled fighter, given his body and poise, but his eyes seemed oddly weary. He wore a curious item on his right wrist, three lengths of wire wrapped around a gauntlet.
Ditzy considered him. Not a Boros, those shoulder-length locks definitely weren't regulation. Furthermore, suns, fists, and combinations thereof were all absent from his armor. "And you are?"
"Gideon Jura. I believe you were looking for me?"
The pegasus smiled. All according to plan. If she had one. "I'm Ditzy Doo. Jace and I want to keep this plane from exploding into all-out war. I have reason to believe we share that interest."
Applejack awoke to the rooster's call, as usual. There was no sunlight in the undercity, but zombifying a rooster gave it an impeccable internal clock. It also made the bird give a cock-a-doodle-doo every twenty-four hours on the dot, like it or not, rain or shine... not that anyone down here would be able to tell the difference.
In any case, the earth mare slipped on a thick coverall, a sort of canvas bodysock. Most of the crops knew her by sight, scent, or magic, but no rot farmer, not even a pony, went out into the fields unprotected. She also donned her father's hat — and to her, it would always be her father's hat — feeling the weight of the various pouches and fetishes worked into the headgear. Her mane, like her tail, was kept short enough not to tangle in anything.
Satisfied, she headed downstairs, the aged timbers creaking under her hooves.
"Mornin', Sis!" came a cry from the kitchen.
Applejack allowed herself a small smile. "Mornin', Bloom."
As the mare entered the kitchen, she saw her sister finishing up breakfast for two. The centerpiece was a bowl piled high with malucoids, the Apple family's pride and joy. Though they were fungi, generations of cultivation and earth pony magic had made them as sweet and juicy as any apple. Applejack proudly bore a trio of the mottled, irregular lumps on each flank. Breadshrooms, corpseberries, and other undercity staples, all grown on Sunken Apple Acres, rounded out the repast.
The sisters sat and began serving themselves. "Good t' see yer up an' at 'em," noted Applejack. "Ah was worried y'd be tuckered out after that no-good, connivin', overgrown tick got at ya."
Bloom rolled her eyes. "Ah told ya Ah'd be fine. He was cute 'n' all, but Ah got better things t' do than make googoo eyes at colts."
"Cain't hardly blame me fer worryin', can ya?" Applejack bit into a malucoid, savoring the juices and the chewy flesh. Swallowing, she added, "Way Ah remember it, y' were awful eager t' impress that colt."
The filly blushed and filled her mouth with half a breadshroom. She chewed as ponderously as she could.
Applejack just chuckled and sipped her aphid milk. "Now, y' got plenty t' do t'day, an' Ah don' wanna catch ya slackin' off with anyone else, pony 'r no. Y' hear me?"
Apple Bloom ducked her head and finally swallowed. "Yes'm," she murmured.
"Yer gonna want all yer chores done 'fore we get back t' yer magic lessons."
That perked the filly right up. "Yes, ma'am!" Apple Bloom bolted down her food, just about galloped to the porch, and made more of a commotion than seemed equinely possible putting on her work stilts.
Applejack shook her head and smiled. No harm in that much enthusiasm if the chores still got done. She finished breakfast at a more sedate pace, cleaned the breakfast dishes, and proceeded to the porch herself.
The vista before her always took her breath away. Dim phosphorescent growths lit up a vast field of flourishing, occasionally twitching crops emerging from rot and filth. The interplay of life and death resonated in her magical senses, the rhythms of the world writ small.
Applejack wiped a tear from her eye and centered herself. She had chores of her own, and she wasn't going to get so caught up in admiring her hard work that she didn't do any. She started strapping on her own stilts. They were very much necessary; the layers of fungi and decomposing biomass were feet deep in most areas. Once she was equipped, she almost flew through her property, navigating the quagmire with long-practiced ease. Each person she encountered, living or undead, was met with a nod and a few friendly words.
It wasn't long before the booming barks echoed across the farm.
Dorguz, a zombified ogre, gave a chuckle like a hacking cough. "'Bout that time, huh, Boss?"
"Careful now," Applejack shot back, "or Ah'll make sure yer between me 'n' her." She shut her eyes and braced herself. Her stilts, sunk deep in the loam, sprouted roots. Verdant energy flooded her muscles and hardened her bones.
When Winona tackled her, it was barely enough to keep her upright.
"Alright, alright!" Applejack cried. The mossdog licked her smiling face, front paws resting on her withers. "Enough, ya heap o' mulch!" She pushed her forehead against Winona's muzzle.
The vegetable creature eventually calmed down enough to get off of her, returning to all fours, the crops only coming up to her belly. Her tail still wagged and her tongue lolled out of her mouth, but at least spore breath wasn't blasting into Applejack's face.
"Ain't got time t' play t'day, Winona." Applejack withdrew the magic keeping her stable. "Too much t' do."
Winona whined and tried her best sad puppy eyes. Which weren't that good, since she didn't have eyes to begin with.
"May have to reschedule, Boss," noted Dorguz. "Don't think she'll take 'no' for an answer. Pets and their owners, eh?"
Applejack smirked. "Winona, go love Dorguz."
"Wait, wha—" The ogre's stilts snapped as he was buried under several hundred pounds of affectionate bryophyte.
"Ya'll have fun now!" Applejack strode on, unconcerned. Enthusiasm aside, Winona was actually well-trained. She'd carry Dorguz to the farm's workshop for a spare set of stilts when she was satisfied. Whenever that was.
After a few acres, the thick morass of rot and fungus began to thin out. Soon enough, the layers of compost were reduced to a sort of mulch for a curious sight this far beneath the surface: a grove of trees.
They certainly weren't the sort of trees one would find in a Selesnyan garden. Branches writhed out of trunks like a gorgon's serpentine hair. The sparse leaves were pitch-black. Purplish sap, thick with the magic of death and rebirth, oozed out of the trunks.
Applejack removed her stilts. Here, the decay barely came up to her fetlocks. She made a beeline for the heart of the wood, where there was a tree twice as tall as the others, which were themselves four times as tall as her. Moss and lichens flourished on the titan's trunk, and a curious pattern in the simpler vegetation suggested a sleeping pony's face.
The orange mare tapped the tremendous trunk a few times near the face. "Wakey wakey, Granny Smith!"
"Ugh... wuzzat?" The face stirred and blinked. With a sound like tearing burlap, the front half of an ancient earth mare pulled itself away from the trunk, taking a considerable amount of the surface flora with it. A few more seconds to gather her wits, and the ancient pony smiled at her descendant. "Well, mornin', Applejack. What brings ya t' ol' Granny?"
"We got ourselves a bit of a problem, Granny. Y' see—"
"Apple Bloom, am Ah right?"
Applejack halted, her mouth hanging open for a moment. She cleared her throat. "Er, yes, ma'am."
Granny Smith gave a wise nod. "An' a colt, 'less Ah miss mah guess."
"Not exactly. A changelin'. Only she didn' know it."
Granny clicked her tongue in disapproval, making a sound like a slapped, saturated sponge. "Shameful is what that is. Had a deal with them bugs an' their minders fer as long as Ah kin remember."
Applejack's eyes widened at that. From what she'd heard, Granny Smith was Svogthir's little pony. She'd been the right-hand mare of the Golgari parun, who'd taught her everything she knew about necromancy. Of course, that was according to Granny herself, and maggots had gotten at the old girl's brain more than once. Still, she was centuries old at the minimum.
Applejack shook her head. That was neither here nor there. "Ah went t' talk with Chrysalis — that's th' queen nowadays —"
"Ah know, ah know." Granny Smith swept the aside aside with a wizened leg. "Y' told me more 'n once, Jackie. What'd she say?"
"'Tain't her fault," answered the younger mare. She rolled her eyes. "Says she cain't be held responsible fer every single one o' her kids, or however them things work."
Granny Smith snorted at this and spat out a wad of matter best left undescribed. "Put th' fear o' Luna in 'er?"
"Did one better. Fear o' the Apples."
The matriarch nodded. "Just like Ah taught ya. Good girl, Jackie. What then?"
"She said she'd remind 'em all, an' Ah said she wouldn't get no third chance." Applejack shrugged. "That was all yesterday, so we'll see how it goes."
"Very well, I should think."
Applejack spun to her left. The voice was as moist as Granny's, but clearly male, and totally unmistakable. "M-Master Jarad!"
Jarad, guildmaster of the Golgari Swarm, dropped to ground level from his perch on one of the grove's lesser trees. As he rose to a standing position, his motion spoke of elven grace undiminished by his self-reanimation, despite the physical decay of his body and the living mantle of fungi on his shoulders. He nodded to Applejack. "Miss Apple." He repeated the motion at her ancestor with a lipless smile. "Miss Apple."
Granny laughed at this. "Boy, Ah had eight foals b'fore ol' Svogthir's first death. Yer more of a miss than Ah am."
"Old wreck, then."
"Now that's more like it."
Applejack shifted on her hooves. "Uh, can we help ya with anythin', sir?"
"Yes, actually. I was here for your report on the Dimir, but another guild concerns me at the moment."
"Them no-good Rakdos again, Ah'll bet." Granny Smith shook a hoof at the thought of the demon's guild.
Jarad shook his head. "The Izzet."
"That bunch o' high-falutin', dragon-lovin', trouble-causin' busybodies?" Granny asked. "Since when d' they give two hoots 'bout down here?"
"Precisely what I would like to know. For whatever reason, the undercity has caught their attention of late." Jarad turned his dead gaze to Applejack. "I believe you have a friend in the guild, Miss Apple?"
The orange mare swallowed. "Y-yessir." The words started tumbling out before she could even think to stop them. "Twilight Sparkle. Unicorn, real bright girl, never said nothin' 'bout the undercity, always cleans up after 'er explosions. That ain't a problem, is it?"
Another narrow smile. "Not at all. Please, keep in touch with her. And be sure to share anything especially notable."
Applejack nodded frantically. "Yessir. Right away, sir. Anythin' else, sir?"
Jarad returned his attention to the elder Apple. "Sugar Smith and I have some catching up to do. I'm sure you have something more important to do than listen to a pair of corpses."
Applejack fled the copse like all her lives depended on it. She didn't even remember reattaching her work stilts, but she soon found herself on the opposite end of the farm.
A nearby farmhand waved and called, "You okay, Boss?"
"Fine, Grell!" Applejack just focused on her breathing for a bit, listening to her racing heart settle down to its usual rhythm. Life was going to be so much easier once the damn thing stopped.
The mare's eyes snapped open. "Sugar Smith?"
A few hours later, Applejack was back at the ranch, steeping a pot of tea. The leaves weren't easy to come by down here, but it was her guest who supplied them.
A familiar life sign approached, and the farmer made her way to the front porch to greet that guest. She couldn't help but snicker. It was quite a sight.
Big Macintosh strode through the fields with his usual stoic dignity. He was a few inches taller than Winona, and so had no need for stilts. Besides, there was enough wood in his legs as it was. He'd taken to zombification unusually well, the plants and fungi that infused his body thriving off of his undiminished earth pony magic and boosting it in turn.
Riding him like an Orzhov dignitary atop an alms beast was a blushing pegasus. Fluttershy knew better than to fly over a rot farm; there were more than a few crops that would spear anything bigger than a dragonfly out of the sky, and she'd be the first to admit that she wasn't agile enough to avoid them. Still, the solution, while incredibly less dangerous, made her stand out even more than she usually did. The vestments of the Selesnya Conclave were as rare a sight in the undercity as a pegasus. One wearing the other was almost unheard of.
Big Mac knelt at the lip of the porch, and Fluttershy fluttered onto it. She turned, face still redder than than her escort's coat, and nodded. "Thank you, Big Macintosh."
He smiled. "Any time." His voice was as big as the rest of him, deep and resonant, even his whispers filling space like an actor's monologue. Strange undertones hinted at the wooden replacement for most of his windpipe.
If Fluttershy's knees quivered a bit, Applejack certainly wasn't going to say anything. "Good t' see ya, Shy. C'mon in, tea should be just about ready."
After the first cups were poured and pleasantries exchanged, Applejack went to business. "Say, Shy, y' heard from Twilight lately?"
The pegasus nodded. "Quite a lot, actually. She says Niv-Mizzet actually told her to spend more time with her friends."
"Really." Applejack considered this. "Huh. Ain't heard from 'er down here."
"Well... could I suggest something?"
Applejack smiled. "Any time, Saprolin'. Y've listened t' me jawin' so much y' prob'ly know me better 'n Ah know mahself."
"You could go and see her. I know you feel the farm needs your supervision, but none of your crops will be producing for the next few weeks. It's pretty much just dull, repetitive field work until then, and you've always said that's what zombies do best." Fluttershy noted the other mare's slack-jawed, dumbfounded expression. "Like you said, I'm a good listener."
Once Applejack gathered her wits, she chuckled. "Well coat me in chitin an' call me a kraul, Ah guess y' got a point." She looked up at the ceiling and the buildings beyond. "S'pose Ah could do with a day in th' city."
"Um, actually, if you have the time..." Fluttershy trailed off and freshened her tea.
"Shy, y' only just convinced me. Don't got no schedule planned out or nothin'."
"Oh. Well, I was just hoping you'd come help me with something in Vitu-Ghazi."
Applejack scowled. "Y' ain't tryin' t' convert me again, are ya? 'Cause th' Shattergang brothers still owe me a favor, an'—"
"No!" The shout nearly reached conversational volume. Fluttershy composed herself and continued, "Anything but, I assure you. I respect your right to choose your own beliefs. And after last time..."
"They ever fix that wall?"
"Well," and here Fluttershy's voice developed an edge sharp enough to cut soft butter, "it was part of the tree, so it's still growing in."
"Huh. Figgered someone'd speed it up."
"I... think Mat'Selesnya is trying to make a point."
Applejack paused. "Ah... see." As far as shit lists went, that of a quasidivine superdryad seemed like a bad one to occupy. "Y' sure Ah should come?"
Fluttershy gave her a Look. It wasn't quite a Stare, but the sheer conviction certainly merited the capital letter. "I'm also trying to make a point. And you being there would help. A lot, actually."
"Then Ah'll be there."
Applejack was mending a broken stilt when she felt the changeling. They were curious creatures. They clearly weren't dead, but that emotion-based metabolism of theirs meant they didn't quite register as life either. Without looking up, she called, "Howdy, there."
"Hello, ma'am."
She turned. The creature was undisguised, and going by its flat ears and ground-pawing hoof, it was quite uncomfortable. "Yer proper respectful," Applejack said soothingly. She sat, trying to keep herself as nonthreatening as she dared. "Ah like that. What can Ah do ya for?"
The changeling chewed at its lower lip, or carapace, or whatever it had. "I..."
"Yer the changelin' Ah caught tryin' t' feed of my dear, sweet, innocent baby sister." Diplomacy or not, Applejack wasn't going to spare the parasite what it was due.
It winced at that, and kept the scowl after it recovered. "The sister who was showing off how good she was getting at death and decay magic?"
Applejack grinned. It wasn't just going to roll over. Good. "Th' same. Now, y' ain't told me why yer here, 'specially as y' are."
The changeling bowed its head. "My queen has passed her judgement. For trespassing against you and yours and violating the agreement between the Apples and the Tenth Hive, I am yours to command."
The earth mare blinked. "Huh. Well. Always happy t' have another set o' hooves around. Y' gotta name?"
"You know that feeling when you enter a room and forget why you went there in the first place?"
Applejack considered the apparent non sequitur for a moment. "Okay, y' gotta name Ah can pronounce?"
"Oh. Right." That-Feeling-When-You-Enter-a-Room-and-Forget-Why-You-Went-There-in-the-First-Place gave a nervous chuckle that sounded rather like an enormous cicada. "Well, I was using the name 'Mosswort' when I was... most recently assuming a pony identity."
"Mosswort." Applejack nodded. "Good as any. Now, there's just one li'l problems we gotta take care of."
"And that would be?"
Applejack stood and approached her new subordinate. "Well, Ah know y' can't help what y' are, but..."
"My being a changeling is an issue?" Mosswort gave his (her?) boss a flat look. "I thought the Golgari didn't discriminate."
"Don' get me wrong, if y' were just a pony with a shell, Ah'd be fine with ya lendin' a hoof. It's more... well, y' can bow an' scrape all y' like, but yer still Chryssy's..." Applejack frowned. "You a mare or a stallion, anyway? Can never tell with y'all."
"If you need me to pick one, then female, but we don't really have a gender per se." Mosswort scrunched up her muzzle. "I know it's what love originated from, but the whole sex thing is kind of... ew."
The boss mare rolled her eyes. "Saprolin', yer gonna be facin' a lotta 'ew' on a rot farm."
"Decay I don't mind. It's just the..." For a short while Mosswort just waved her hooves in... ways. Ways that this narrator refuses to describe further, and frankly didn't think were possible.
Thankfully, Applejack put a stop to it. "Ah think we're gettin' off-track. Point is, yer still Chryssy's mare, an' Ah ain't givin' 'er a free peek at mah farm whenever she wants." She began to circle the changeling. "Good news is, Ah know a surefire way to fix it."
Something wasn't right here. Mosswort could feel it in her nectar. As she craned her neck to keep the earth mare in sight, she asked, "And that would be?"
Applejack completed her circuit around the changeling and smiled. "Close yer eyes. Won't take more 'n a second."
It was a warm, open, nearly edible smile. One even a drone who'd lived her entire life as a low-level Dimir operative could trust. Mosswort closed her eyes.
In less than a second, Applejack turned, shifted her weight forward, charged her rear hooves with mix of vital and lethal energies, and bucked the living crap out of the changeling. More or less literally.
Mosswort's body went flying for nearly a mile into the fields. Applejack got there as soon as she could. Sure, the drone wasn't going anywhere, but some of the other workers got a mite peckish around now. Fortunately, the only damage on the body was that that Applejack herself had dealt, a shattered chest plate oozing green slime.
The orange mare couldn't help but smile at that. Black and green. "Yer gonna fit right in, Saprolin'." With a careful toss of her head, she sent a single black seed flying out of a pouch on her hat and into the new hire's gaping wound. Then she sent her will and magic into the husk.
Fine tendrils sprouted immediately. A few were visible, but most threaded their way through their new home. It was a strange one, far more fluid than what they were accustomed to and with far fewer organs, but also a wealth of energy that the host wasn't going to need anymore.
The vines thickened, each wave further building upon and reinforcing the previous one. Soon enough, Mosswort rose, her new vegetable muscles dragging her up. The newly grown necrocluster flourished in her chest cavity, part peeking out like a surreal corsage. Thin lengths of the plant weaved through the holes in her hooves. Finally, the balance between life and death tilted just far enough in the right direction, and the changeling's eyes lit up again, now as orange as Applejack's coat.
Mosswort blinked a few times, swaying back and forth. Once her thoughts were back in order, she hovered a bit above the fungi, which were already recovering from her impact. She noticed Applejack. "You killed me."
"Eeyup."
The changeling considered this. "Shouldn't I be angry about that?"
Applejack shrugged. "Up t' you."
Further consideration. Finally, Mosswort asked, "Why?"
"When a problem's been there since birth, th' best way t' take care of it's death." Applejack favored the zombified changeling with a nod. "Y' got th' rest o' th' day off fer gettin' yer head sorted out. Least Ah can do." She strode back towards the ranch.
Mosswort — and suddenly that name seemed preferable to the emotional state with which she'd always associated herself — took stock of herself. Her mind was silent, save for her own thoughts. Yet she wasn't afraid. She wasn't hungry. That was such a singular state for a changeling that it bore repeating. She wasn't hungry.
She chose to be happy. "I can live with this," said the zombie.
Golgari Guildpony BG Creature — Pony Shaman Whenever a Pony, Pegasus, or Unicorn card is put into your graveyard from anywhere, you gain 1 life. "A guild is like a herd. We do not forget our fallen." 2/2
Applejack, Golgari Granger 3BG Legendary Creature — Pony Druid Creature cards in your graveyard get +1/+0. T, Exile a creature card from your graveyard: Add X mana in any combination of B and/or G to your mana pool, where X is the exiled card's power. Sunken Apple Acres is always hiring. 3/3
Fluttershy had never wanted to be a living saint of Mat'Selesnya. She had been perfectly happy running the little all-species clinic on Skyshade Landing. Just beneath Nimbus Court, so she could still see Rainbow Dash regularly, but on solid material, so she wouldn't have to personally support every creature she had to care for. It had been a good life, a peaceful life. She'd made other friends, usually soon after Dash made them. She'd done good work, helping just about every kind of creature in the Tenth District.
It wasn't totally uneventful, of course, but while Fluttershy was gentle, she wasn't helpless. Like the butterflies on her flank, she seemed fragile, but she'd adapted perfectly to her environment. She didn't need a strong body; she had strong friendships. When Orzhov busybodies had tried to get her to sign off on loans that they assured her had very favorable terms, she referred them to Rarity and never saw them again. When Krenko's henchgoblins had burst in, intent on Celestia only knew what, they'd recognized the pony who'd saved their boss's life, apologized, and even tried to rebuild the front door. (Not very well, but it was sweet of them to try.) When that dragon had torn the roof off, looking for anything shiny enough to add to its hoard, she... actually Fluttershy didn't remember what she had done. One moment, she was watching a dromad yearling breathe its last. The next, the hellkite was flying away at top speed, more than a dozen magical devices were littering her floor, and representatives from several guilds were arguing on her front step, each claiming the right to go in first.
It was that last event that had gotten the Conclave's attention, and nothing Fluttershy had tried could shake it. According to the evangels, her graciousness was second only to her humility. Her "all customers welcome" policy and boundless care were signs that she was doing the Worldsoul's work without even knowing it. But, they insisted, she was like a beautiful flower growing wild. She needed to be tended, trimmed, trained, and most importantly, transplanted.
Fluttershy's attempts to deny her holiness were seen as more of her saintly humility. Outright refusal was met every time with "But you must!" Finally, one day, she had screwed up her courage and declared, "You know what? Fine. I'm a saint. I'm the saintliest saint that ever sanctified a sanctum. What do you think of that?"
As it turned out, they thought it was cause for celebration and parading her through the streets, discretely securing her to a howdah atop a ceratok. As they passed through the milling masses, some cheered when they heard a new living saint had been canonized. Some cheered because it was a parade and that was the sort of thing you did at parades. Some cheered because this parade wasn't being done by the Rakdos, and thus had much lower odds of someone exploding.
As they approached Vitu-Ghazi, the enormous tree that served as the Selesnya guildhall, more and more joined the merry march. Fluttershy heard them at first, more and more voices at constant volume and feet and hooves in motion. Eventually, unable to escape, she'd dared to peek out from behind her hooves, and was astonished. Humans and elves practically leapt with ecstasy. Loxodon trumpeted their joy to the sky. Centaurs and ponies pranced like it was a dressage competition. Somehow, her procession of one had swelled to dozens, and it was all for her.
And, she realized, she wasn't afraid.
You should not be. You are welcome.
Fluttershy's ears perked, but she knew they had nothing to do with hearing that voice. It had been... odd. Regular. The words had been chanted as though the rhythm was more important than what was actually said.
Heh. Yeah, she's like that. But still, ♪ welcome to the family ♪ !
That one was almost like Pinkie Pie on a good day. Fluttershy knew she would normally be afraid right now. In fact, she could feel that fear, not as an emotion but a... she didn't have words for it. It was like the heat of a fireplace, but cold, and in her head, only kept separate from it...
In time, you will learn to better understand this.
What's to understand? It's the Worldsong! Well, her first sample of it. One for all when all are one.
You no doubt have many questions. Don't worry, Fluttershy. You'll be seeing us shortly. All will be made clear.
The third voice in her head made Fluttershy forget the fear somehow being kept out of it. The only word for it was motherly. Gentle and comforting and...
She smiled. Maybe this wouldn't be so bad.
It hadn't been. But then, the first and last time Fluttershy had been before Trostani, she hadn't brought a Golgari guildpony with her. She took a deep breath and turned to Applejack. "Now, remember. Trostani is—"
"Ah know, Ah know. Three dryads, one mind. Snooty one's on th' right, happy one's on th' left, an' mama's in th' middle." More than a few of the myriad Selesnyans they passed as they moved up the City-Tree scowled at Applejack's flippant attitude.
"Order, Life, and Harmony, yes. But you must treat them with more respect, Applejack. They're the avatars of Mat'Selesnya herself."
"An' she's plenty mad at me as it is." Applejack's smirk grew rather sheepish. "Don' worry, 'Shy. Ah'll be on mah best behavior. Ah already got an earful from Master Jarad."
"Applejack on her best behavior?" The pair turned and saw a white unicorn trotting towards them. "Well, and to think I specifically picked out something stain-resistant." There seemed to be more gold brocade than anything else in her outfit. Indeed, she bore a faint glow — not sweat, a lady never sweated — that suggested just that.
"Huh. Ah'm surprised." Applejack smiled, small but sincere. "Didn't think ya'd make it."
"Oh, my mistress insisted I take the opportunity." Rarity fluttered her lashes at the rot farmer. "I trust that isn't a problem?"
Jack rolled her eyes, but held her smile. "Always happy t' see ya, Rare. Even if Ah'm still hearin' from that fella who wouldn't gimme a moment o' peace fer a good week."
"Trenderhoof acted according to his cartel's whims, darling, not mine." Rarity's tired tone told of the argument's age. Neither party really cared anymore, but it was still a sticking point. "I cannot be blamed for every action the Syndicate takes, no more than you can the Swarm."
"Girls?"
"Yeah, well don't go tellin' 'Shy that. We ain't gonna make good representatives if we ain't responsible fer nothin'."
"Girls."
"By the same token, we cannot afford to emphasize the negative. A good impression is key he—"
Girls.
The bickering mares stopped in their tracks and, as one, turned to Fluttershy. Applejack scowled. "Y'know Ah hate it when y' do that."
Fluttershy pawed at the floor, but managed to hold her friend's gaze. "We're here."
Applejack and Rarity blinked and looked. Sure enough, a massive set of double doors, bearing bas-relief motifs of growth and unity that were not carved but coaxed into the wood's grain, stood before them. They shared an "Oh."
Fluttershy swallowed her nerves as best she could. Her still-fluttering wings showed how well that worked. "Ready?"
"Of course."
"As Ah'll ever be."
And with that, the doors swung open. Beyond was a carefully tended grove, open to the sky and sunshine. The artful arrangement of branch and leaf made two of the ponies pause in awe.
Applejack looked around with a more professional eye. She kept her thoughts to herself.
Welcome.
Fluttershy and Rarity flinched for a moment, their attention brought to the others in attendance. A dozen dryads, willowy humanoids with the features of female elves and curtains of ivy for hair, were arrayed before them. They were the Chorus of the Conclave, the only centralized leadership Selesnya allowed itself. At their center was Trostani themself.
The triune entity had been transformed from their communion with Mat'Selesnya. Like the nature spirit, they had formed from dryads joining together to form a greater whole, the ultimate expression of Selesnyan philosophy. From the waist up, they resembled their sisters, but below that, their lower bodies were twining trunks that came together and joined with Vitu-Ghazi itself.
Fluttershy bowed her head, and her friends followed suit.
Rise.
They did so. "Thank you, ma'am," Fluttershy murmured.
So, what brings you here?
Rarity and Applejack stepped forward. "At Saint Fluttershy's request," Rarity began, "we have come to offer a proposal."
"Ah'm sure y'all've seen Niv-Mizzet's flunkies gettin' everywhere they don't belong." Applejack scowled. "Had t' pick more brass 'n' glass outta th' fields in th' past few months'n th' five years b'fore 'em."
"And you have no doubt noticed those same intrusive fellows have been retreating of late. While this would normally be welcome, it has taken a turn for the distressing in light of the dragon's announcement regarding this 'Implicit Maze' of his."
"They've been mappin' out th' Maze this whole time. That ain't fair." Applejack smirked. "So, we figgered we'd even the odds."
The dryads murmured to each other over this. Order silenced them.
You are proposing an alliance.
Rarity nodded. "Each of our guilds offers no real resistance to the others' maze runners. Enough for plausible deniability, but not enough to actually hinder anyone."
"This way, we all got seven guilds t' worry 'bout 'stead o' nine. And when one o' ours wins, we all share th' prize."
More hushed discussion followed until Life voiced a thought.
Fluttershy, what do you think?
Unicorn and earth pony looked behind them with building dread. Fluttershy being asked to speak before her parun. This did not look good.
A stare that spoke of a will of iron looked back. Fluttershy strode forward with astonishing confidence, nary a feather in motion. "There are many ways this could go," she said, her voice strong and clear. "The specter of betrayal hangs over this proposal. While I trust that we would not initiate such a thing," and here her gaze went diamond-hard for a moment, "the other guilds have not earned such trust. Orzhov follows its deals to the letter, but is too skilled in manipulating spirits, contractual or otherwise. Golgari has learned the potential cost of treachery from its history, but all that means is that it only carries out such acts when it knows they will succeed."
She paused for a breath. All eyes were on her, most minds wondering what she was thinking.
"But," and now the hard stare melted into a soft smile, "I trust my friends." Fluttershy spread a wing over each other pony. "I asked them to extend the offer to their superiors, to join me today only if they truly believed that this would work as I envisioned. They would not be here if their leaders weren't willing to put group success over personal gain, and to ensure the guilds as wholes followed suit. And... well, they're here, aren't they?" Her smile widened. Something squeaked.
The dryads on either side of Trostani brought their attention to the nearer outsider. The parun themself kept their eyes on Fluttershy, thinking. After the better part of a minute, Harmony broke the silence.
Are you certain?
Two eyes met six. "I would bet my life on it."
Any of the Selesnyans present would object to the term "staredown." That implied a disharmonious clash of egos, not the communal unity of purpose that obviously existed between living saint and Mat'Selesnya's voice.
Applejack and Rarity, unenlightened as they were, were just trying to avoid a disharmonious clash with their bladders.
Finally, Trostani turned their attention inward.
This... this is heavy.
We have much to discuss.
We're going to have to ask you three to step out while we come to a decision.
Fluttershy nodded. "Yes, ma'am. Thank you for the consideration." She led her friends out of the chamber.
Once the doors shut behind them, Applejack released a long breath. "Damn, 'Shy. That was..." She shook her head. "Damn."
"I agree." Rarity perked up. "Oh, but I'm so proud of you, darling! Such strength of purpose! I always knew you could do it."
Fluttershy said nothing, her eyes closed.
Applejack nudged her. "C'mon, Saprolin'. Y' did real good there. Like Rarity said, Ah'm proud of ya, an' y' oughtta be proud o' yerself."
Fluttershy remained silent. And motionless.
Applejack nudged her again "Uh, Shy?" The farmer couldn't help but think of gorgons and the victims thereof.
The pegasus tipped over, her serene expression not shifting in the least.
"Oh dear. Is she breathing?"
"Usual split if she ain't?"
Rarity scowled. "This is hardly the time for jokes, Applejack."
Applejack quirked an eyebrow. "D' you really think Ah'd be crackin' one if she weren't fine?"
"Ah. Of course." Rarity cleared her throat. "Well, in that case, I'm fairly certain her body and soul are both spoken for." She looked back at the doors into the chorus chamber. "What do you think they'll decide?"
This got a shrug. "Just 'cause Ah'm a farmer don't mean Ah can read dryads' minds."
"They'll say yes."
Both turned to Fluttershy, who was getting her hooves. "Are you certain?" Rarity asked.
"I know they felt how nervous I was. How every eye made my heart leap into my throat." Fluttershy turned, sat before the doors, and smiled. "And how my faith in you was what kept me pushing ahead regardless. They'll say yes, girls. To do otherwise would be to betray everything they stand for."
Selesnya Guildpony GW Creature — Pony Shaman Whenever another nontoken Pony, Pegasus, or Unicorn enters the battlefield under your control, put a 0/1 green Plant creature token onto the battlefield. "A guild is like a herd. United, we not only strive to make the world a better place, we truly can." 2/2
Fluttershy, Saint of the Meek 3GW Legendary Creature — Pegasus Cleric Defender, flying, protection from creatures Other creatures you control with power 2 or less have hexproof. "All creatures great and small comprise the Worldsoul. What some forget is that there's much more small than great." 0/5
A lady does not sweat; she glows. But when she glows, certain undesirable residues are still left behind. Similarly, a lady does not show haste, especially not when those residues might discolor her fine linen traveling robe. Thus, Rarity did not gallop. She did, however, move with exactly as much speed as her station allowed her, because she was late. Very, very late. Far too late for it to be brushed off as fashionable. No, this lateness had long since gone out of style, though if she slowed down, she might be able to arrive when it became retro.
The worst part was that she was late for an event she herself had planned, a much-needed show of interguild solidarity in these troubled times. She'd extended invitations to all her friends and a guest each, and they were all no doubt already there at the Maze's End, rolling their eyes and shaking their heads at silly little Rarity, who was so high and so low, whose plans never went as she intended, and wasn't that the story of her life? All too literally at that, for—
Rarity cut off that thought before it could go any further. The spires of the old forum were in sight, and so she slowed down. She still wanted to be there as soon as she could, but a shape rushing towards the End would draw attention from everyone there. Everyone would assume she was a maze runner. With the Orzhov pavilion next to the Gruul one (for some reason that had been forgotten in the past ten thousand years and change,) that attention would be anything but positive.
As it was, a few of the savages still approached her: two humans, a goblin, and an earth pony Rarity would swear was growling at her. She gave them as a wide a berth as possible, which fortunately put her near the Selesnya pavilion on the other side of her own guild's. The Selesnyans were very happy with Rarity at the moment.
Thankfully, it seemed she didn't need to cash in any of her goodwill today; the Gruul were content with intimidating her. For now, at least.
So, with a few quick nods and pleasant words to passing Conclave members, Rarity finally arrived at her party. Wonderfully familiar faces happily conversed with one another, resting on the soft cushions and low tables Rarity's subordinates had prepared for them. Thrulls shuffled back and forth, refilling teacups and offering trifles.
Had Rarity been on time, she would've announced herself. Instead, she chose to slip into the pleasantries as though she had always been here. The admittedly implausible deniability would still allow her to save a bit of face and avoid interrupting her friends' conversations. Rarity was sure some of them hadn't seen each other in months.
"Well, whip my withers! Hey, everyone, Rarity's finally here!"
Or Applejack could announce her to the world. Face flushed from embarrassment and exertion alike, Rarity waved a hoof at her guests. "Hello, all. My apologies for being so late, but a client—"
A fragrant leg didn't whip her withers, but it did stretch over them. "Aw, don't worry none, Saprolin'," Applejack assured her. "We all know yer workin' harder'n Ah am come the harvest. Jus' takin' time t' get us all together is treat enough." Sundry nods and encouragements confirmed this.
"Ah. Well." Rarity smiled, suddenly feeling much more like a shy filly she'd thought she'd left behind long ago. "Thank you all. Please, don't let me disturb you. As Applejack said, I know many of you don't get to see one another often." When they refused to stop being disturbed, she laughed and tossed her mane. "Then I must insist. Mingle, everyone, mingle!"
Rarity put deeds to words, moving to Applejack's table, nodding at the other pony present. "Rainbow Dash."
The skyjek waved a wing. "Hey, Rares. Someone tryin' to get out of a debt?"
"I appreciate the effort, darling, but you needn't feign interest."
"Oh, cool. Thanks." Rarity blinked at this as Dash turned back to Applejack. "So I go to the witness's house to make sure the Forties fixed the place up, and it turns out her daughter's, like, my biggest fan ever."
Applejack tapped her chin. "She named Scootaloo?"
"Yeah, how'd you know?"
"She's one o' Apple Bloom's pen pals." Applejack nodded at Rarity. "Rare's li'l sis is th' other. Small world, ain't it?"
Rarity pondered this for a moment. "You know, I've always wondered how you got mail in Sunken Apple Acres. I imagine any hawks would become a quick snack."
"Zombie couriers. Neither rain nor sleet nor not breathin' no more."
"Well, they're unquestionably effective, given what Sweetie Belle says about her little pen pals in our letters."
Dash scowled. "Still can't believe you have to ask just to—"
"We have had this discussion, Rainbow Dash. I am content, for my sister will have opportunities I did not." Rarity rose and nodded. "Ladies."
"C'mon, Rarity," Rainbow moaned, "don't be like this. I didn't—"
"I am not mad at you, Rainbow. I simply wish to give my regards to everyone. I've kept them all waiting long enough." With that, Rarity made for another group.
Dash slumped and plopped her head on the table. "AJ, you knew what I meant, right?"
Applejack nodded. "'Course Ah did. And Ah know Rarity agrees. But that don't mean she c'n do nothin' 'bout it."
"Hi, Rarity."
"Hello, Twilight. Where's Spike?"
"He's with the Firemind. Something about 'official dragon business.'" Twilight shook her head. "I want to believe that it's a discussion of some incredible concept my equine mind can't begin to grasp, but I can't help but suspect that it's..." she trailed off and blushed, "well, not."
"Even Niv-Mizzet has instinctual drives," noted the other unicorn, a mint-green mare in the organic garb of the Simic. Judging by her oddly thin coat and the edges of scars Rarity could make out through it, it wasn't an entirely cosmetic choice. She dipped her horn to Rarity. "I don't believe we've met. I'm Lyra Heartstrings." Suddenly, the fur trim on her cushion unwrapped itself, and Rarity realized it was actually a ludicrously long tail topped with a humanoid hand. The hand was directly in front of her, open for a shake. "A pleasure."
"Ah, yes." Rarity hesitantly took the hand in hoof. It had a surprisingly firm grip. "Rarity Belle-of-Karlov. And may I say that's certainly a... novel appendage you have."
Lyra smirked. "It's a compromise."
Twilight beamed, almost bouncing in place. "Lyra was just telling me about the modifications she'd installed before the Combine had her... how did you put it?"
"Reverted to baseline." Lyra grabbed her teacup with her tail-hand. "Mostly."
"I never knew biomancy could be so fascinating! Thank you again for accepting my invitation."
"I've been trying to get more equine contact, after..." Lyra's teacup shook for a moment. "Well, let's just say 'after.' Plus, it's nice to get some variety. You can only talk about kelp telomeres so long before it starts blending together, you know?"
"Eh heh, yes, I'm sure..." Rarity cleared her throat. "Well, you two seem to be having a wonderful time, so I'll just leave you to it."
"Cadence, so good to see you. But wherever is dear Skyla?"
"Oh, she's keeping her father company while he sulks. He was so sure Lavinia would be too busy being the best arrester in the District to run the Maze." Cadence rolled her eyes. "Stallions."
The unicorn sitting next to her nodded. "Can't live with 'em."
Cadence quirked an eyebrow. "There's another part to that saying."
"Not that I've noticed." Fleur de Lis saluted the latecomer with her teacup. "Rarity."
"Fleur." The unicorn and the "unicorn" shared a smile. "How's the family?" Rarity asked.
Fleur rolled her eyes. "Yeah, that one never gets old."
"What brings you here, if I may ask?"
The svelte mare tilted her horn at Cadence. "A light snack."
"If you can call it a snack," Cadence observed. "You've had nothing but tea. And what's this about your family?"
"You don't want to know, Cady. Aunts, uncles, cousins, siblings, nieces, nephews..." Fleur shook her head. "It is a mess, pure and simple. I'm lucky I'm not Orzhovist. Taxmass cards would bankrupt me on an annual basis." She smirked, glancing at Rarity. "Of course, that's the idea."
Rarity put her muzzle in the air and huffed, but there was a smile there. "I'd love to stay and chat, but I'm afraid I have two more dear friends waiting for me, as opposed to one dear friend and a not unwelcome nuisance."
She walked off, but kept her ears pointed at the pair. She wasn't disappointed. "Wow. Hear that, Cady? You're 'not unwelcome.' A few more years, and she might consider you worth fleecing."
"Hello, darlings." Rarity seated herself on a cushion, magically pushed her teacup out of the way, and slammed her face down on the table, all without disrupting her smile.
"Six out of ten," Pinkie proclaimed. "Good enthusiasm, but the technique needs work."
"Not. Now. Pinkie." The words were slightly muffled by the furniture, but volume overcame that.
Fluttershy scooted over and spread a wing over her friend. "Rough day?"
Rarity shifted her head. She was still in danger of scoring the table with her horn, but now she could speak more clearly. "You know how I like to say I'm in the business of selling dreams? Sometimes it seems like all I have in stock are nightmares."
"Please, we've done such excellent work together in the past, if you could just—"
"The answer is 'no,' Mr. Rich." Rarity's tone was scrubbed of all emotion. She had always been good at cleaning.
"But Ah know you have Miss Karlov's ear and—"
"Yes, and I retain that ear by not bothering her with trivial—"
Filthy cut her off with a stomp. "This isn't trivial, Ms. Belle, this is mah daughter!"
"I know." A glance downward, breaking eye contact, cracking the mask. "And I am sorry." Head back up, glasses adjusted, the past moment seemingly forgotten. "But the contract clearly states—"
"That if Ah cannot pay back the loan in cash, Ah can do so with mah firstborn son. Mah son." Filthy leaned in over the desk. "Now Ah know that contracts can be interpreted flexibly, but you cannot tell me my precious Diamond qualifies as a colt."
Rarity sighed. "No. I cannot. What I can tell you is that if you had read the fine print, you would have seen that in the event that the debtor has no sons, his oldest daughter can and will be accepted instead."
Filthy Rich was taken aback, physically and emotionally. "Wha... But, but..." His accent slipped out of the carefully cultivated "Fourth District gentlesapient" affectation. "Ah nevah saw anythin'—"
"Yes. I know. Few do. You were offered a lawmage to help you look through the contract for a reason, Filthy, and it wasn't so the Syndicate could milk you for a few more zinos." A small, sad smile. "Well, not entirely."
Both ponies were silent for some time. Finally, the stallion asked, "Is... is there any other way?"
"Filthy, I'm going to be honest here. You don't have a hoof to stand on. Diamond Tiara isn't just your firstborn daughter, she's your only daughter. Your only child. Given how you were aware of the basic collateral contingency but not of the nondiscriminatory primogeniture clause..." Rarity shook her head. "I'm not a suspicious pony, but you have to know how it looks."
"Please, Rarity." Filthy was leaning across the desk again, this time with hooves together in front of him, pleading, praying. "Is there any other way?"
Rarity made a show of looking over the contract, as though she hadn't already hunted for every loophole better syndics than she might have forgotten to close. "Well, you specifically excluded the possibility of postmortem indentures when making the contract, so that's the usual answer out. You could offer the Syndicate three appendages of our choice." Rarity held up a hoof. "And because we have had such excellent dealings with you in the past, I will tell you before you agree to that offer that for its purposes, the head is considered an appendage."
"Ah..." Filthy gulped. "Please, is there anything Ah can do... under the table? Ah know you have an in with Miss Karlov, you could—"
"No."
"Please, Ah—"
Rarity removed her glasses and shook her head. "Mr. Rich, I'm afraid you misunderstand my relationship with Teysa Karlov. I am her majordomo, her advisor, and to my continuing amazement and perplexity, her friend. But first and foremost, as I have been from before the day I was born, I am her servant. I am a debt-foal, Mr. Rich, literally born to serve one of the Orzhov elite. I can observe, I can advise, I can offer, but I can not make Miss Karlov do anything any more than I can sprout wings and fly." She took a deep breath. "At best, I can try to make Diamond Tiara part of Miss Karlov's staff, and even then, I offer no guarantee. Beyond that, my hooves are tied, and you're the one who bound them."
Fluttershy nuzzled her friend. "Oh, Rarity..."
Even Pinkie drooped a little. "Poor Filthy."
"The worst part is that with Miss Karlov running the Maze, I have more agency than I've ever had before, and I still couldn't do anything." Rarity drained her tea and found herself wanting something stronger.
Pinkie scrunched up her muzzle in thought. "But isn't this what you're supposed to do?"
Rarity gave the entertainer a look so utterly incredulous that neither spoke for several seconds. Pinkie was quite familiar with this situation. Finally, Rarity managed to process enough to speak again. "No! Firstly, the last thing a bank wants is for its customers to default on their loans, as that's capital it will never see again. Even if I wasn't tearing that filly from her home to pay for her father's foolishness, she's still a resource sink; it will take years before she starts returning on the investment."
"Oh. I guess that makes sense." Pinkie offered an awkward smile. "Sorry, Batara's better at baking the books than I am."
"'Cooking the books,' and you shouldn't be..." Rarity scowled. "You're trying to distract me."
Pinkie shrugged. "Well, yeah, but this is clearly hitting close to home for you. Would you rather focus on how you were never given the chance to choose your own fate, or on the silly pink horse?" She crossed her eyes and stuck out her tongue to emphasize the point.
The unicorn's expression softened, but not by much. "I'd rather focus on you misunderstanding what my job is meant to be."
"Nah, that sounds boring. C'mon, silly pink horse!"
"I think not." Rarity's gaze moved down as she shifted the back of her robe away from her hindquarters. "Consider my cutie mark."
Her friends did so. "White pearl, gold pearl, black pearl," said Pinkie, describing the nacre triangle from left to right. "Which is weird, 'cause I'm pretty sure you've never wanted to have anything to do with oyster snot in your life."
"And I've never seen you tie balloons to demon skulls," Rarity countered.
"Only because you never come to the club on the Nephilversary. There's ooze wrestling and everything!"
"My point," huffed Rarity, "is that my talent is more figurative than pearl farming. Otherwise, I'd be managing some of the Syndicate-owned sky reservoirs. Instead, I take adverse circumstances, situations like little pieces of grit, and I turn them into something beautiful, something anyone would want."
Softly, Fluttershy asked, "Something that can't hurt you anymore?"
"Well, that is..." Rarity coughed into a fetlock. "That might be overextending the metaphor a touch. In any case, I offer other people the same opportunity. I give them a chance to make their dreams come true, but it comes with a challenge."
Pinkie nodded. "Pay back the loan or off with your head."
"In some cases, yes. But I am not some loan shark preying on the gullible. I want them to succeed. I want to give them what they need to become better than they already are." Rarity wilted. "But it seems few people know what that actually is."
Pinkie rocked back and forth as she considered this. "Well, I can't argue with wanting to make people happy, but you're the one Orzhov who does."
Rarity scowled. "Miss Karlov taught me everything I know. I cannot even hope to usher in as much positive change as she has. She has been my life's inspiration, my mentor, my patroness—"
"Your mother."
Unicorn and earth pony both turned to face the speaker. "I... I beg your pardon, Fluttershy?"
"Last I checked, Teysa-Teysa Bo-Beysa wasn't a unicorn."
"She doesn't need to be," said Fluttershy, smiling with enviable serenity. "Rarity, she raised you from birth, brought you into the family business, and as you said, taught you everything you know. Every day, you try to repay the debt you feel you owe her, even when you're a living repayment of a debt yourself." She gently shook her head. "But you received a gift. A wonderful, wonderful gift given out of the goodness of Miss Karlov's heart. And you don't pay back gifts."
The others considered this for some time. Finally, Rarity spoke. "Fluttershy, darling, that was a beautiful sentiment, but it was also the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. I was raised by nursemaids and nannies until I was old enough to carry an adult conversation. Furthermore, I can assure you that my life was anything but a gift, because every zib in excess of what my parents owed was tabulated and repaid in full."
"Oh." Fluttershy's ears flattened as she toyed with her empty teacup. "Never mind, then."
"That being said, she has done much for me, and I hope to do the same for others." Rarity sighed. "But some people just can't be helped, it seems."
"Maybe not by gold," said Fluttershy, "but sometimes that's not what people need."
Pinkie nodded. "There are some things money can't buy. Like happiness."
Rarity rolled her eyes. "In my experience, even if money can't buy happiness, then it can certainly rent it."
"Luxuries don't bring happiness," answered Fluttershy. "They make you forget unhappiness. True happiness comes from doing what you were meant to do."
"Fluttershy, sweetness, a stallion with bags of money on his flanks came to me for a loan. It didn't make him happy. And that's just ponies. How am I supposed to know what someone without a cutie mark is 'meant to do'?"
Pinkie shrugged. "Well, I'd tell you 'give the people what they want,' but most folks want money. And it's not like you can follow all of them around to make sure they're using it wisely." She paused and brought a hoof to her chin. "Or can you?"
"No, I can't." The table beckoned. Rarity resisted the urge to return to its comforting embrace, but it was a hard fight. "Girls, I really do appreciate the consideration, but you just don't have the right perspective. I'm just going to have to hope that Miss Karlov finishes this dreadful Maze soon."
Her friends wrapped her in a three-pony hug. The moment was broken only when Pinkie gasped and leapt back. "Whoa, what's that!?" She pointed towards the sky, and the others' gazes followed.
A streak approached the pavilion, occasionally juking around a slower flier. "That can't be Rainbow Dash," noted Rarity. She glanced at the skyjek, who was just noticing the new arrival. "Besides, the colors are all wrong." Rather than the bold spectrum Dash displayed as she took off, this was a three-striped contrail, two of silver bordering one of gold.
"It's definitely a pegasus, though," Fluttershy noted. "But I don't know anypony else who can..." She faded off, her mouth hanging open.
Pinkie nudged her. "Uh, Flutters? You okay?"
"RUN!" By the time the other mares were able to process that Fluttershy had just bellowed something, she had a respectable head start.
Pinkie shrugged. "Well, you heard her." Rarity and she got going just as the racing pegasus passed them by.
And then everything went mad.
Orzhov Guildpony WB Creature — Unicorn Cleric Whenever a source an opponent controls deals damage to one or more Ponies, Pegasi, and/or Unicorns you control, that player loses 1 life. "A guild is like a herd. The lines of enemy and ally are clearly drawn for all to see." 1/2
Rarity, Syndicate Diva 2WB Legendary Creature — Unicorn Advisor Extort Rarity, Syndicate Diva has protection from converted mana cost X or less, where X is your life total minus your starting life total. "I appreciate the finer things in life: jewels, rare fabrics, souls..." 2/3
Ditzy streaked through the air, milking every drop of speed she could from pegasus and planeswalker magic both. It had come to this. Niv-Mizzet was putting the fate of the world up for grabs like some kind of festival prize, and every guild was in on it. They were all so blinded by the prospect of victory that they couldn't see that no matter who won, everyone would lose. Ravnica had barely survived the last time the balance of power was disrupted, and only because all of the guilds were hit hard. Some neighborhoods were still rebuilding. But did the guilds care? Of course not.
That left only one option: an eleventh maze runner. A runner for the guildless. She wasn't the fastest flier in Ravnica, but she was certainly swifter than Jace or Gideon, and so the duty fell on her.
The Maze's End came into view, an elevated, roughly conic center platform surrounded by a ring supported by... nine spires. Pegasus eyes, off kilter or not, picked out the guild symbols on each, and Ditzy smirked. Of course Dimir wouldn't be represented. This was one of the oldest structures in Ravnica. They would remain boogeymen for millennia after it was finished.
She nearly swept past it, caught up in her own thoughts. Regardless, even if she knew nothing else about the Implicit Maze, she knew what everyone on the plane now did: the Maze's End was also its beginning. She swooped down, heedless of the murmurs of the guild members lounging about, the first warning signs of spells, and the curses of a narrowly avoided skyjek. With any luck, her mana sight would allow her to follow the tracery of leylines that circumnavigated the globe. The other runners might have a head start, but she'd have a map.
With that thought, she touched down on the central podium.
The world erupted in intertwined light and darkness.
Ditzy was vaguely aware of shouts from outside the display, of magic launched at her that was swept away in the unfathomable surge of mana. Memories ran through her head, not remembered but pulled to the fore by something ancient. Flying from district to district. Turning here to avoid a zeppelid, diving there because of a freak cold front. The past few months rolled out before her, from present to past.
Finally, she saw something she didn't recall, and not from her eyes. From four perspectives at once — the most intact spires of the End, something thought for her — she watched herself approaching this very spot in the dead of night. Her eyes were closed, her breathing even. She was sleepwalking. Astonished, Ditzy watched herself flap onto the podium, then begin the walk back to whatever cloud she'd been sleeping in that night.
The replay ceased, and Ditzy found herself on her back. Two pegasi, black and white, were circling one another overhead. They also had horns. Normally, Ditzy would've found that equal parts alarming and fascinating, but the way they went around and around was almost hypnotic...
Excellent. Thank you. And if you don't know why I'm thanking you, go back a chapter and read the author's note.
Now, while I have your attention, there's a tale I wish to tell, and it will go well with the one you're reading. How will not be immediately clear to some of you, but I'm sure the cleverest have already figured it out. In any case, let us begin:
Once upon a time, there was a faerie kingdom that had no king. It did have a queen, though, and like any self-respecting fairy tale queen, she bore that particular blend of self-interest and casual malice that simple minds refer to as "evil." She didn't trust the wheel of sun and moon, and thus stretched out the cycle of day and night until neither could see the other, but not so far that she couldn't keep an eye on both. Thus, in time, only she remembered that the two had anything to do with one another.
Or so she thought.
There were other thinking creatures aside from the queen and her subjects in the kingdom, many of whom had the understandable but mistaken belief that they and their concerns were in any way important. Elves, the wardens and judges of beauty; kithkin, who wove their very thoughts together for better and worse; giants, ponderous beings for whom the other fleshy races were as mayflies in size, longevity, and—depending on the giant—relevance; and so on and so forth. There was a notable lack of humans, but the rest of the Multiverse has enough of them as it is.
All of this, however, is little more than stage decoration for our true tale. For though the queen and the land are one, both were young once, and this story begins when the queen was more of a princess. Sun and moon still kept in touch, and of the many races that were to come, only the patient treefolk had even begun walking the path to sapience. Even then, that meant little more than saplings with unusually active dreams.
Still, dreams are powerful things. The princess knew this, and in time, dreams would come to define her and her subjects. But it is her own dreams that we focus on here. As I said earlier, the princess and the land were one, and what the land knew, the princess knew as well. But there were things that the land either didn't or couldn't notice, and chief among them were the princess's dreams.
As you know, remembering dreams is iffy at best. (For most, at least. You may be a lucid dreamer, but rest assured, the princess wasn't.) The princess was fascinated by something she couldn't remember, knowledge that escaped her, information that denied her until-then unchallenged omniscience. It was the world's first mystery.
And then something amazing happened.
Such is the nature of dreams that what the princess forgot could have been anything. All the infinite possibilities, far too many even for the princess's waking imagination, came together as one and asserted their existence outside of her head. They could be anything, and thus took their appearance from everything: animals, plants, emotions, ideas, and even things that by all rights wouldn't, couldn't, or shouldn't exist. And then this great horde of notions began to explore the strange physical world in which it found itself.
Of course, the world noticed that, and thus so did the princess. And this unexpected development introduced her to several novel experiences: surprise, uncertainty, and worst of all, fear. She didn't like any of these one bit, but she still felt them, and when someone so powerful felt something so strong just after one idea made itself known to the world… well, is it any surprise what happened next?
The second creature forged from elemental concepts, wrought in the primal beyond that the princess would learn of only after birthing several more of the creatures, was quite a sight. The menagerie appearance of the first left quite the impression on the princess, and so the second exaggerated that to an astonishing degree. No two limbs the same, the tail different from the body, horns unlike anything else, and a mouth full of teeth that could barely agree with themselves, much less each other.
Ah. I see those of you in the back of the class may have finally realized just who I am.
For a not inconsiderable number of centuries, this slapdash mishmash wandered the world as most of the concept elementals did, sparing little attention to the young queen's gambit of spacing out night and day. The state of the sky mattered little in perpetuating the confusion, shock, and havoc that defined the creature.
But one day, as befit an incarnation of elemental chaos, something unexpected happened. It asked itself, "Why?"
Perhaps the question was the key to an invisible lock. Perhaps it was the land's duty to respond, as the creature was, in a sense, a child of the queen, and thus technically a prince. Perhaps the world simply wanted to be rid of it before it asked "Why not?" Whatever the case, the creature got its answer. It planeswalked.
You might think the creature would have enjoyed the eternal, endless chaos of the Bastard Plane. You would be wrong. It was forged from the chaos of life, the blend of drive and passion and instinct that spurs anything with a pulse to make tomorrow different from today. The space between planes permitted no such complexity. It reduced anything not like it into more of itself, a chaos so profound that it had become a sort of order.
Needless to say, this made something of an impact on the creature. There could, in fact, be too much of a good thing. Thus cautioned, it resumed its peregrinations, though on a much greater scale and with rather more purpose. It was not enough to merely spread chaos. A chaotic state was unstable by definition. Left to its own devices, such a state would eventually settle into some form of order, possibly that of the Blind Eternities.
The newly ignited planeswalker soon learned the proper term for this state of affairs: it wouldn't be fun.
To maximize fun, chaos had to be maintained. Sustained. Nudged here and there to keep it going. Fed a twig now and again. Seeing the reaction proceed was more than enough of a reward for such ministrations.
And so, amidst wars between flesh and spirit and between flesh and blood, from the days of legends to those of the modern masters, through the Mending and beyond (which didn't really change much for me,) I have wound my way about the Multiverse, not spreading havoc so much as seeding it. The seeds sleep, sometimes for longer than I spent mindless. But they always sprout. And I am a very good gardener.
Hmm. Looking back, there seems to be something of a lack of proper nouns in this little autobiography. Well, I'm sure you've all figured it out by now, but I have been known to overestimate at times. I may as well spell it out, just to be sure.
Hello. As Oona dubbed me in the time before the sundering of Lorwyn and Shadowmoor, I am Discord. The pleasure is mine, as is usually the case.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled horsewords.
Ditzy broke from her reverie, scrambled to her hooves, and turned to the speaker behind her, all while shaking off an odd feeling of deja vu. Then she looked up. And kept going.
Given that she'd just accidentally done something that would probably forever change the plane's balance of power, she'd actually been expecting an unspeakably ancient and powerful planeswalker who formed plots that spanned centuries as a matter of course. A sadistic, twisted individual who could destroy minds with a touch. One who did not so much walk the planes as he tore open the fabric of space-time to make room for his immensity.
She just wasn't expecting this one. "Discord?"
The embodiment of chaos bowed. "Indeed. And I must say, Ditzy, you did better than I dared hope."
"At what?"
Discord tapped a talon against his lips. "I suppose you're due an explanation." He coiled himself around her and shrank down to about half usual scale, where his head has the size of hers. "So, where would you like me to begin?"
The alarm bells going off in Ditzy's head were making it hard to think. She was literally surrounded by one of the most dangerous beings in the Multiverse. "The beginning?"
Discord clicked his tongue. "So predictable. But you did do such a good job, I suppose I can let it slide." A push of his cloven hoof, and they went skidding off of the podium like a curling stone on well-swept ice, keeping the same altitude once they went over the lip.
Ditzy tried her best to stay cool and calm, even when they passed directly through one of the pillars circling the Maze's End. "Is this actually happening right now?"
The incarnation grinned. "Well, that's hardly a question about the beginning. But if you'd rather get into a philosophical debate about whether anything can be said to be 'actually happening,' to say nothing of the illusory nature of time that makes the phrase 'right now' so deliciously pernicious, then—"
"Forget I asked."
"Forget you asked what?" Discord winked and patted Ditzy on the head. "Do relax, my little pony. You've done a great good this day. I may have nudged you once or twice—a passing thought here, a chance encounter there, and yes, that little somnambulist episode to get you started—but make no mistake, this was at least ninety percent you. I am not just grateful to you, Ditzy Doo, I am proud of you, and there are very few beings in this Multiverse who can claim that."
Ditzy did relax. A little. Discord seemed in a playful mood, which was always preferable to the alternative. "So, what did I do that was so impressive?"
Discord looked up at the pair of impossible ponies circling overhead. Ditzy realized they were back on the center podium. "Do you know who they are?"
"A pair of nephilim that slept through the Decamillennial?"
"Close, but not quite, though they have been asleep for a long, long time, and they are quite like those delightful creatures that were suplexed, detonated, and Rakdosed to death a few decades ago. Quite like them, but not identical."
Ditzy recognized verbal bait when she heard it. "What's the difference?"
Discord smiled. He loved a good audience. "The difference lies in their minds. The nephilim had mentalities rather like my own, prior to my true awakening. Raw and primordial, more like forces of nature than actual beings. But Celestia and Luna—"
"What!?" Ditzy's head whipped back up. "Th-those are... the Sisters, they're..."
"Real? Very much so." Discord stroked his beard. "Mind you, not all the legends are true. Luna never gobbled up bad little foals. Celestia did not 'invent' the estrus cycle. Honestly, neither had much of a hoof in your species's development, civilized or otherwise. But they were there, the first and greatest of the ponies, whose special talents made them as ageless and mighty as the sun and moon themselves." He shrugged. "Granted, that's not saying much, compared to some suns and moons out there."
"So, they were sealed here? Why?"
"It all comes down to the hazard of early adoption," explained Discord. "Sure, they got all the fancy new gimmicks that came with sapience first, but they also got all the bugs and teething problems. The sisters were and still are wild horses in certain ways, and as the city consumed the plane, they had to be corralled." He glowered. "Like Ciszarim, they were too chaotic for an ecumenopolis. Or so thought Azor."
Ditzy reeled as she tried to take it all in. "So... they were the prize? Whoever completed the maze won a pair of alicorns for her guild?"
Discord's glower only deepened, affecting his appearance further than just a frown. The whimsical caricature grew more realistic, more extant, more terrifying. "Oh, anything but. The power of the sisters would be released, yes, but they themselves would not. Even if a guildpony ran the maze, the power would go to his guildmaster, to use at his, her, its, or their discretion." His ire passed a threshold, and the living incarnation of chaos, the elemental roil of emotion and instinct and ambition that made times interesting, entwined itself around Ditzy Doo in all its horrific majesty.
Rectangular pupils, a part of Ditzy noted. Discord has goat eyes. The rest of her was terrified beyond the capacity for rational thought.
Discord caught a hint of Ditzy about to befoul herself from the future, noticed his appearance, and promptly settled down. "Sorry about that. Never was a fan of Azor. Or any of the Grand Arbiters, for that matter."
Ditzy had folded in herself. "I got that," she muttered, trembling.
The draconequus looked genuinely contrite. Thankfully, no one saw it. He had a reputation to maintain, after all. "My apologies, Ditzy. This should be a time of celebration and here I am, falling back on old habits." He brushed her back with his eagle talon, literally combing the stress out of her. "Freeing the sisters isn't the only reason I'm proud of you, you know."
She looked up, grateful not to see goat eyes staring back. Those were bad enough on goats. "Why else?"
He smiled. "Think about it. As I said, the sisters' power would go to the head of the winning guild. What do you think their being freed means?"
"Well, unless there's some secret, forgotten eleventh guild—"
"Which there isn't."
"In that case..." Ditzy's eyes went wide. "The unguilded won."
"The Gateless win!" Discord echoed, suddenly wearing pinstripes. He raised his torso and flailed his arms. "Theeeeeeee Gateless win!" He settled himself, his shirt as gone as suddenly as it had appeared. "And with that, the balance of power is not only maintained, but enhanced.
"Now, I'm not a fan of status quo, but also not of letting go and the world being torn apart. Not this world, certainly. Ravnica is one of the best sources of sustainable chaos I've ever found. Thanks to you, one of the biggest threats to that chaos has been expended in bolstering it, before Gruff the Tragic Dragon could make use of it. Now everyone has a chance in this world. What was a ten-player game with billions of pawns has grown to either eleven players or several billion and ten, depending on how you look at it."
Ditzy actually felt a glow of pride at that... for all of a second. Then one of the asides she understood fully registered. "What was that about Bolas?"
"Hmm?" Discord paused in his seven-dimensional victory dance. "Oh, that. Well, you know Nicky. Plans within plans within plans, and that's just for deciding who to have for breakfast. He was probably going to make use of the Maze at some point, and now he can't. It's not quite killing him, but there is a chance you managed to get on his 'kill everything you ever loved' list."
All the chaotic curry combing in the world wouldn't remove the pit in Ditzy's stomach. "What."
"On that note," continued the draconequus, "I'm on my way to Theros for an experiment in disorganized religion." He manifested a sunhat and a ridiculous shirt that was half starlight and fifty-seven percent cotton candy. "Care to come along? You'll love the place. Well, as long as you like olives."
Everything came together in Ditzy's mind. "You've got me in a corner. If Bolas is angry at me, then the only place that's even remotely safe is by your side."
"If-slash-when he finds out what happened, what you did, and that it was you who did it," noted Discord, rummaging through a drawer he'd pulled out of thin air. "Where did I put that SPF Heliod?"
"That's all virtually guaranteed. There's no way creatures as powerful as the Sisters will escape his notice." Ditzy gasped. "The Sisters! He could—"
"Oh, don't worry. They have long memories, those two. Nicky may have brought the occasional god to its knees, but they know what they're dealing with. Besides, open confrontation isn't his style. Not with three witnesses every square yard." Discord snapped his suitcases shut. To Ditzy's eyes, they glowed in ways far beyond the electromagnetic spectrum's capabilities. "So, you coming?"
The pegasus quirked an eyebrow. "You're giving me a choice?"
"Oh, you always have a choice. You just don't always have a good choice."
"One more question?"
Discord leaned back as if on an invisible recliner. "Ask as many as you like, my dear."
"Why me?"
He blinked, then beamed. "You really don't know?"
"Do you think I'd be asking if I did?" Ditzy noted.
"Hmm. You've got a point." Discord flicked Ditzy's horn. By the time her hooves clapped over her forehead, it was gone. "Well, it's the same reason I decided to make you my catspaw in this little endeavor."
Ditzy noticed a sudden perspective shift. She looked down and saw her waist merged into Discord's right shoulder. "Ah!"
"Oh. Sorry, poor choice of words." Despite his words, the draconequus wore an expression of mild amusement. A blink, and she was back in his lap. "Where was I? Oh, yes. You see, Ditzy, things just haven't been the same since the Mending. Back in the day, planeswalkers knew how to have fun. Teferi, Bo Levar, Commodore Guff... by the Horde, I miss Guff. Even if he took away my library card."
Discord shook himself out of his nostalgia. "In any case, you kids these days. So terribly serious all the time. 'Justice' this and 'moral dilemma' that and 'killing archdemonic loansharks' the other. Nowadays, I can count the 'walkers who don't take themselves seriously on one paw." He held up the arm that Ditzy had briefly replaced. "Me, Sorin, the delightful Miss Nalaar, and you." With every name, he extended a claw. Once all four were deployed, he waggled his fingers. "That's it. Everyone else, from Ajani to Xenagos, seems utterly incapable of having a good time without some kind of pathos. Especially Xenagos, poor soul."
"I, um..." Ditzy took her time with her response. "I'm flattered?" If she sounded unsure, that's because she was.
"You should be." Discord checked the wristwatch that hadn't been there a second ago. "Now, the little hand is on morningtide, the big hand is on the third arm of the time spiral, and the shoe is on the other foot. Are you coming or not?"
Ditzy sighed and gestured forward with a wing. "Lead the way, Captain Chaos."
Discord grinned and adjusted his domino mask. "See, that's an advantage to working for me rather than unjolly old Saint Nic. I have a much more lax attitude towards insubordination." He wrapped his scaly tail around Ditzy, headbutted the planar firmament, tore open a portal in time-space with his snaggletooth, and somersaulted through it wings first, pony in tow.
Celestia and Luna circled one another, collecting their thoughts. For more than ten thousand years, they had slept as the dead, dreamless and buried. The sudden onset of light, sound, and magic threatened to overwhelm them, and each supported and was supported by her sister, taking comfort in the familiar presence.
The beating of great leathery wings pierced through the meaningless noise and struck both in the hindbrain. The instinct to flee was strong, but their will was stronger. Together, the sisters whirled to face the dragon, horns alight. However long they had slept, the beasts had clearly forgotten the lessons of old; it would be high time to refresh their memory.
Both blinked, almost in synch. Together, they doused their horns. A shared glance, and Celestia spoke for both. "You?"
"Me." Niv-Mizzet grinned and spread his arms. "Welcome, dear ones. I have been expecting you. There is much to discuss."
The sisters looked about them. City. City as far as the eye could see, without a care for leylines or biomes or... wasn't there supposed to be an ocean there?
Luna swallowed. "So there is." A dot of purple caught her eye; a dragon riding the dragon. She pointed a hoof. "Who...?"
Niv-Mizzet's grin widened. "As I said, much to discuss." He gestured downward. "The old forum is available, and this time it is not trapped. The other paruns' successors and representatives are on their way. Business will begin soon enough, and once it does, it may never end. Let us enjoy what time we have."
Celestia, World Lantern RGWU Legendary Creature — Avatar Alicorn (This card is a Pony Pegasus Unicorn.) Flying Whenever Celestia, World Lantern attacks, tap all lands defending player controls and untap all lands you control. When she awoke, she outshone the sun to remind it of its old mistress. 2/2
Luna, Dream Walker UBRG Legendary Creature — Avatar Alicorn (This card is a Pony Pegasus Unicorn.) Flying Whenever another player draws a card, you may draw a card unless that player puts a card from his or her hand on the bottom of his or her library. When she awoke, her dreams sought out new minds to host them. 2/2
Discord 3BRG Planeswalker — Discord +2: Discard up to two cards at random, then draw that many cards. -2: Target player chooses a nonland, non-Discord permanent he or she controls at random and sacrifices it. -8: You get an emblem with "Whenever a spell or ability you don't control is put on the stack, reselect its targets at random." 5
