Thus Always to Tyrants
A MLP FiM fanfiction by MegaColt
Canterlot: October 27, 2013
Princess Celestia stared at the bill before her, her quill trembling just inches above the dotted line.This bill was a controversial one, limiting many of the freedoms that her subjects took for granted. As the alicorn weighed her options, a guard lay an elixir on her desk. She took a brisk swig of the concoction and shivered as the familiar relaxing sensation set in. “Is this the only way?” She asked the soldier. He only nodded before trotting away.
Ever since Discord’s defeat at the hooves of the Elements of Harmony, Celestia had been steadily losing her power and influence. The ponies of Equestria seemed to have begun questioning their goddess princess’s power. It only helped to worsen the political climate when Queen Chrysalis invaded Canterlot. Despite fighting the vile monarch with all of her might, Celestia proved powerless once again. Throughout Equestria, radicals and dissidents were gathering, plotting to usurp her from the throne. If she couldn’t stop Discord, or even a changeling queen by herself, then how could she stop a full scale rebellion? Twice already, with a mere week between each incident, two renegades had been able to sneak into the palace with the goal of assassinating the princess and overthrowing the Monarchy. The Royal Guard had easily apprehended these knife wielding assassins, but even her once loyal and unquestioning soldiers seemed to hesitate before following orders.
If she was to maintain her power, things would have to change. She could no longer count on her subjects simply accepting her rule under the age old principles exemplified by the elements of harmony. She had lost their respect. Every small town politician that she met with seemed to doubt her ability to protect the citizens and the country. “What are you going to do if something else big happens?” They demanded. “You seemed powerless against Nightmare Moon and Discord.” Every journalist who came to interview the princess regularly criticized her in the papers. Celestia couldn’t tolerate this sort of disrespect from her subjects for much longer. It all had to stop. Order had to be reestablished and the ponies reminded of their place in society. The bill before her would accomplish just that. All it needed was her signature.
If the citizens could no longer love their alicorn goddess, then they would fear her.
===
Ponyville: December 24, 2013
Carrot Cake was startled awake by the screams of his wife. He jerked himself upright with his hooves in the air, ready to defend his family, only to be blinded by a half dozen flashlights shining directly into his face. Realizing that he was outnumbered by the intruders, his adrenaline quickly subsided as he slid deeper underneath the covers. “W-w-what’s the meaning of this?” The confectioner inquired in a stupor.
A tall and gaunt unicorn stepped forward, his eyes flicking back and forth, surveying the room as a wide grin spread across his face. He was dressed in a long khaki duster that seemed to have an endless number of pockets. “Mr. and Mrs. Cake,” he said nonchalantly as if this were part of his daily routine. “I have here in my coat warrants for your arrests. You both have been accused of subversion. Any resistance on your part while you are taken into custody will result in your immediate executions. However, if you comply with our orders you will receive a fair and speedy trial conducted by the Monarchy.” The stallion boredly watched as the couple were chained together and lead out of the room. He shook his head as he patted one of the guards on the shoulder. “I think it’s a shame that two citizens of such seemingly high moral conduct committed such an unthinkable crime,” he said in a sarcastic tone.
The agent walked into the room across the hallway where several of his deputies were waiting. There was a pink earth pony slumped against a wall with two young foals clutched closely to her chest. Her dark pink mane was perfectly straight, slicked down on one side. She seemed to be incredibly depressed. “I am agent Dreamer,” the duster wearing colt said, sticking his hoof out in greeting. The mare didn’t budge from the wall. “You’ve done a great service for your country, Pinkie Pie,” the agent reassured, laying his hoof gently on her shoulder. There was a moment of silence as the agent struggled to think of anything else reassuring to say. He couldn’t, so he continued with his normal procedure. “How old are you?” The stallion had asked this question dozens of times since being transfered from the Royal Guard into his current position as the chief of the new police force. Most of the ponies lied, saying that they were eighteen when they were obviously much younger. Those ponies were sent to the prison camps in the North. Nopony lies to an officer of the Monarchy and gets away with it.
Instead of answering, Pinkie Pie pulled out an identification card and a few folded up papers. The unicorn snatched the papers from her hooves and quickly examined them. “19 years old...” he mumbled to himself as he handed the papers back to the pink mare. “You are good to go miss, but the foals must come with me.”
“Why?” The melancholy mare cried, tears starting to stream down her face.
Agent Dreamer didn’t have time for questions. He turned to the deputies who immediately grabbed the now screaming foals and hustled out of the room. He followed the officers towards the door, but stopped in the doorframe, his back to the sobbing pink mare. “The state can not trust the lives of babies to somepony who has only recently achieved the legal age of maturity. Besides you’re not even a legal guardian. Do not worry though. They will be cared for by the Monarchy. Rest assured that they will wind up becoming productive members of our society while under our watchful eyes.” The unicorn slammed the door behind himself leaving Pinkie Pie alone. He triumphantly trotted towards the paddy wagon that had been waiting outside. So far, everything had gone smoothly. Maybe he wouldn’t have to kill anypony. That would be a disappointment. There was no fun in a simple arrest.
When the agent arrived outside chaos erupted. Carrot Cake had managed to break free from the officers restraining him and was now comically rushing towards his two children, a ball and chain dragging behind him. “Where are you taking them?” He asked in hysterics.
The head agent tackled the prisoner, simultaneously withdrawing his new weapon from its holster. The weapons specialist who had designed the weapon called it a pistol in the briefing room and with it one could kill a pony without even touching them. All they had to do was pull a lever on the bottom of the weapon and a projectile would sail towards its target. It made an execution less personal, which made the agent a little disappointed that it would be replacing his sword, but he had to admit that it was an efficient little device.
The confectioner was still struggling despite the new killing tool that was being pointed at his head. “Let go of my babies you monster!” He begged with a frantic sense of urgency, his parental instincts driving his every action. “They’ve done nothing wrong!”
Dreamer smiled as he casually pulled the trigger. He was still slightly surprised by the deafening sound and powerful kick of the weapon despite having used it several times before. Still, the contraption had immediately shut the stallion up. “Now this is a weapon!” He chuckled, gesturing for his comrades to join in. They all laughed half-heartedly, grimacing at the gory scene before them. The agent cantered to his two deputies who were allowing Mrs. Cake to see her children for the last time. She didn’t pay any attention to her children. She was too busy staring at her husband’s dead body. Her complexion was one like stone, completely emotionless. The agent tapped on the wagon’s bars trying to get a reaction out of her, but the blue mare didn’t even blink. It was obvious that her mind had been broken. It had been overloaded with grief.
Dreamer decided that she wasn’t worth the effort so he left her alone the agent swaggered towards his deputies and grabbed the two foals in stride. He examined them both closely, twisting and turning the babies like one would inspect an antique. He handed Pumpkin Cake back to a deputy. “Send this one to the orphanage in Canterlot. She isn’t what I’m looking for.” The unicorn stuffed Pound Cake into a large pocket on his duster and hopped into the driver’s seat of the paddy wagon. “I’ll take the pegasus with me back to the military academy. He shall become my new project.”
===
Ponyville Regional ESB Headquarters: December 26, 2033
Paperwork and its monotony was the most hated part of Agent Cake’s job, but it was vastly important. After all, the families of the suspects he’d shot had to be notified of their loved one’s death. It disgusted him. Their relative had refused to respect the authority of the Monarchy. Why did they deserve the Monarchy’s sympathy? Despite his thoughts on the subject, Pound Cake was a loyal officer of the Equestrian Security Bureau. It was his duty to the Monarchy to fill out the forms associated with his position. It would be as dangerous to insult the princess as it was for an officer to ignore his duties. So there the cream colored pegasus sat, praying for an assignment to drag him away from his desk.
Pound Cake was practically bored to tears when a royal guard came bursting into his office, rudely interrupting the agent’s paperwork. “Agent Cake sir, you’re wanted immediately at the police station in Ponyville!” The guard hollered out urgently as he turned to run to another office.
The pegasus grabbed the guard by the neck and sneered. “Stand at attention you pathetic excuse for a soldier.” He took the liberty of roughing the guard up, smacking him around like a ragdoll, just for the sake of intimidation. That was the bread and butter of his trade. If he was to be a success as an agent then he would have to cultivate fear in both his peers and the citizenry. Without intimidation he was nothing more than a trigger happy stallion with a badge. It wasn’t hard to get the desired reaction out of his subordinates. After all, the seeds of fear had been planted some twenty years prior. All Agent Cake had to do was cast a quick glance or a frown towards his victim of choice and they were instantly trembling.
The guard was a muscular pegasus stallion roughly the same age as Agent Cake. He had a black eye and blood was pouring from his nose. Despite his injuries he did as he was told and stood firmly at attention, wheezing through his broken nose. “Yesah! Wuddya wan, sah?”
“Nothing more than your obedience. Now get out of my sight before I lose my patience!” The cream colored pegasus commanded as he pointed to the door. He realized that he was being condescending, but that was another desired trait in an ESB officer. He smiled proudly as the indignant guard stormed out of Cake’s office muttering to himself.
Pound Cake threw on his trench coat and slid his pistol into its leg holster. This assignment was apparently of great importance, so he couldn’t afford to waste the time it took to walk out the front door. He threw open the tiny window in his office and squeezed himself through. At last he was out of that cursed work space and into the sky. This was the second best part of the job. One of the agent’s earliest memories was watching the Wonderbolts at a flight show being held for cadets at the military academy where he was raised. Years later he would be trained by the very same team of pegasi that had thrilled him as a foal. Before his training was complete, Pound Cake was considered one of the fastest fliers in Equestria. Immediately after his graduation he was offered a spot in the Wonderbolts, but he turned them down and joined the Equestrian Security Bureau as an interceptor instead. His dream was to become the ESB’s most successful agent and he was very close to achieving that goal. As an interceptor all he had to do was chase down a suspect and execute them. Once a suspect ran from the law they had practically condemned themselves to death. It was easy work for an athlete like Pound Cake and he quickly ascended from the lowly job of an interceptor to the glamorous life of a regional commander; the youngest officer to have held the title.
Agent Cake kicked it into high gear as he neared Ponyville. The pegasus pitched downwards into a spine tingling nose dive, building up speed as he rocketed towards the ground. At the very last moment he pulled up just as he broke the sound barrier. The sleepy little town had seen its fair share of aerial feats so nopony was really all that impressed, but it always made Pound Cake happy to know that he was still one of the most skilled fliers in Equestria.
Pound Cake eased himself down for a smooth landing inside the boundary of yellow tape that surrounded the police station. “What the buck is going on here?” he demanded to know from a quivering police officer.
The officer quickly saluted and answered. “Somepony important has been killed. That’s all we’ve been told out here, sir. I swear.” He cringed when the agent raised his hoof to return the salute.
Pound Cake waited for his subordinate to relax, smiling reassuringly as he entered the building. The cop looked terrified which pleased the agent even more. The agent looked around the empty lobby of the station, taking in the drabness of the room. The stark gray paint was peeling in layers off of the walls and cracks ran like miniature rivers through the concrete floor. The wooden bench where waiting suspects were processed was half-rotten. The entire place was in a state of disrepair. It was a disgrace to the Monarchy for a government building to be in such terrible shape. He would have to bring this to Celestia’s attention as soon as he received an opportunity.
An elderly unicorn poked his head through the coroner’s office and called for the young agent. “Get your flank in here, boy, now! We’ve been waiting on you for half an hour!” The unicorn was none other than the leader of the ESB, General Dreamer, and he was none too pleased with his agent’s tardiness.
Agent cake galloped into the cramped walk-in closet that served as the station’s morgue. It was in far worse condition than the lobby and it barely had enough space in it for an autopsy table let alone three fully grown colts. Pound Cake elbowed his way past the doctor so that he was standing beside the stallion that was his idol, his mentor, and more importantly his superior officer. The general was the closest thing that the agent had to a father. The sad truth being that if it wasn’t for the general than the pegasus would have been raised by his real parents. Pound Cake had no clue what had transpired on that fateful December night twenty years earlier. It was all just a blur to him.
The coroner, a tan earth pony with a brown mane and a white lab coat, grabbed the bed sheet that covered the body. “Now, I warn you gentlecolts that this particular victim’s identity might come as a shock to you despite your prior experiences. The victim was a very high profile target from what I’ve been told. That is why we’ve brought in all of the extra security.” He quickly ripped the sheet away from the cadaver as if he were performing some sort of magic trick. The body on the table was none other than Prince Blueblood.
Neither Dreamer nor Cake were surprised by the victim’s identity. He had far more enemies than friends, but they understood what his death would mean for the Royal Guard and its already poor public image. They had let somepony of nobility die under their watch. The general was the first to speak. “I’m glad you called us here, Doctor. Your station has done the right thing. We can not let the public know that Blueblood was murdered.” Dreamer’s voice was calm and collective. He didn’t seem the least bit worried. After all, if the coroner did decide to tell the truth to the media, he’d be discredited and sent to a prison camp. Coroners were replaceable. The Royal Guard was not.
Agent Cake examined the victim closely. There wasn’t a single mark on the prince’s body with the exception of a red ring around his neck. It was roughly as thick as a ribbon. “Did you find anything of importance on the victim’s body, Doctor?” He was a little embarrassed that he hadn’t asked already. It should have been the first thing he’d done when he entered the room. Still, better late than never.
The coroner reached into his pocket, pulling out a small manila envelope and handing it to Agent Cake. “That’s all we found on him. The murder weapon is in there as well as something else you officers might find interesting.”
The agent pulled a long white ribbon out of the envelope. At first glance it was nothing more than an ordinary ribbon that anypony could get at a craft store, but upon closer inspection there was something very sinister about it. Underneath the hem, in thin black letters, were three words. “Sic Semper Tyrannis.” It sounded like gibberish to Agent Cake, so he handed the ribbon to General Dreamer and pulled the last item out of the envelope. It was a slender white feather, a chicken’s feather. It was an object that had seemingly no relevance to the case. “Coroner! Why is there a chicken feather in the evidence bag?” Cake sneered as he inquired.
The pony in the lab coat zipped up the body bag and started rolling it outside so that it could be transported to a morgue in Canterlot. He cast a glare towards Pound Cake that one would only cast towards an idiot. “Haven’t you heard? I would have figured that the ESB had been notified of this.” He snootily replied with his nose in the air. “There is a serial killer on the loose in Ponyville, preying on unsuspecting members of the government. Guards, politicians, and now royalty, each victim was found with a white chicken feather stuck in their mane.”
The general had a murderous look on his face as he approached the coroner. “How many ponies have you told about these murders? I gave your police chief strict orders not to let news of these murders get outside of this precinct.” He pulled his pistol out of its holster and started playing with the safety. The coroner backed himself into a corner. His only way out was to lie. Could General dreamer really tell if a pony was lying like the officers said he could?
Lucky for the coroner, a haggled looking officer rushed into the morgue with urgent news. “We’ve just got word from Canterlot! Princess Luna has gone missing!” Suddenly Blueblood’s murder wasn’t important anymore.
===
Canterlot: December 27, 2033
Agent Cake could feel the dampness of the early morning breeze as it blew through the open windows of Princess Luna’s bedroom. It was a gigantic room with hundreds of shelves filled with countless volumes of contemporary literature. The princess was still apparently trying to catch up on the times. The few times he had spoken with her since joining the ESB, she seemed perfectly normal. If he didn’t know any better, he wouldn’t have known that she had been banished for a thousand years. This wasn’t surprising though. After all, she had had more than twenty years to improve upon her speech. If anything she was behind on her studies and she was desperately trying to catch up. That would have been a possible reason for the ridiculous number of books in the room, but it wasn’t his job to explain the reasoning behind that.
Pound Cake had been assigned to head up an investigation into the princess’s disappearance and he was to leave no stone unturned. If he overlooked even one piece of potential evidence it would mean his career. This was no punishment. He wasn’t being put under the microscope to pressure him into failing. This treatment was the norm for all ESB officers. General Dreamer wanted only the best working in his organization. Failure of any type, no matter how minor the transgression, resulted in immediate transfer to the Royal Guard or worse.
He wasn’t very impressed with the detachment of detectives that had been sent to him by the Royal Guard. Granted, they were relentlessly thorough in their efforts. They had even turned over the princess’s bed and were cutting into it, searching for any documents that might be hidden on the inside. But what really made Agent Cake unhappy with his subordinates was the fact that they hadn’t bothered to look in plain sight. He could see a white feather with a note taped beside it hanging plainly in the room’s gigantic bay windows. Only an idiot could overlook something as obvious as that, but Cake refused to say anything to the detectives. He was looking forward to the look on their faces when he pointed it out to them.
After a moment of lounging in the windowsill one of the senior detectives cantered up to the agent so that he could give a status report. He was a tall and lanky earth pony with a squeaky voice. “We’ve found nothing of any value in this room sir,” he sighed. “Shall we search elsewhere?”
Agent Cake grabbed the stallion by his mane and jerked the poor stallion off of his hooves. “You’re missing something that’s right in front of your eyes,” the pegasus agent hissed to the detective. He slammed the investigators face into the window, rubbing his snout in the note taped to the window. He flew out of the windowsill with the earth pony still in his clutches. “You’re dismissed, detective.” Pound Cake didn’t bother watching his handiwork when he dropped the detective from seven stories above Canterlot. He merely laughed as he flew back inside. “Let this be a lesson to you all,” the pegasus sneered as he stood in the windowsill, carefully pulling the evidence off of the window frame. “In the future, I expect all of you to look in plain sight before you start ripping things apart. I no longer have any use for failures like you. Get out of my sight before I off all of you!” The entire team stampeded out of the room, tripping and falling over each other as they desperately strived to avoid the agent’s wrath.
Pound Cake relished the feeling of power that came from his position. So long as it benefited the Monarchy he essentially had a license to kill anypony he pleased. That was the extent of the ESB’s power and that is why the bureau’s officers were more feared than Celestia herself. One second you could be calmly minding your own business and the next second you could be dead, simply because of an agent’s wim. Pound Cake wasn’t the kind of agent who killed for the sake of killing, but he didn’t need much of a reason to pull the trigger on somepony he didn’t like.
Needless to say Agent Cake didn’t have many friends, but who needs friends when you’re one of the most powerful equines in Equestria? Pound Cake most certainly did. In reality he was nothing more than the empty shell of a stallion who once had his whole life ahead of him. Now he was nothing more than a killing machine who took out whoever his superiors told him to. He wanted to redeem himself, but how could he? Even the slightest faltering in his loyalty could result in his immediate execution. The last ESB officer who tried to retire early was sent to the dungeons for insubordination and nopony ever heard from him again. What chance did Pound Cake have in actually making amends for the terrible deeds he had committed when you could be killed for merely quitting?
Now wasn’t the time to think about that sort of thing. Now was the time to work on the case at hand. Princess Luna was missing and it was now Cake’s sole responsibility to solve the crime. He smiled as he turned the white feather over in his hooves. Whoever had pulled these feathers were extremely good at their craft. Judging by their size and shape there was no way they could have belonged to a chicken. These feathers belonged to Princess Celestia herself. If the kidnappers could get that close to Celestia, then why would they kidnap Luna instead? It didn’t add up, so the pegasus pulled out his k-bar knife and sliced open the envelope that had been taped to the window. The letter that the agent found inside was short, sweet, and to the point.
“Attention agents of the Equestrian Security Bureau,
If you ever want to see the princess again, we demand that Agent Pound Cake meet with us for negotiations unarmed and alone at the old castle in the Everfree Forest. Sic Semper Tyrannis. -NLR”
He didn’t understand what “Sic Semper Tyrannis meant, but he definitely knew what the NLR was. NLR was the acronym that the terrorist group A New Lunar Rebellion used in their propaganda. They called themselves revolutionaries, but in reality they were nothing more than scum. How the Royal Guard and the ESB could let that ragtag group of villains do something like this to Princess Luna was beyond Agent Cake. They had taken the bait of Blueblood’s murder and were caught hook, line, and sinker. Somepony would have to pay for this disgrace and it most certainly wasn’t going to be him. He’d go to the castle alone, just as the paper instructed, and rescue the princess himself. He’d fix this mess that the guards had gotten the ESB into and become a hero. He would rescue Princess Luna and he’d be damned if anything stopped him.
As he shut the bedroom windows he noticed something out of the ordinary. Hovering roughly a hundred yards away, a yellow pegasus with a fiery mane was staring directly at the agent. He leaned out of the window, yelling for the mysterious mare to come towards him, but instead of complying she bolted away into the night sky. Pound Cake darted from the bedroom in hot pursuit, trying with all his might to catch up to the fleeing suspect, but incredibly she was pulling away from the former Wonderbolt prospect. Granted, it had been almost half a decade since the agent was in his athletic prime, there was still no reason for him to have lost this much speed.
If he was to have any hope of bringing the suspect in for questioning he’d have to request an intercept. It hurt his pride when he hit the communicator button on his earpiece, but anything was better than a potential court martial. “This is Agent Cake calling Royal Guard Dispatch. I am currently in pursuit of a pony of interest in the skies between Ponyville and Canterlot,” the cream colored pegasus paused as he let out a sigh of frustration. “The suspect is proving difficult to apprehend and I am in need of an interceptor. Is anypony available for tasking?”
For a moment nothing but static could be heard over the radio. The suspect was now more than two-hundred yards ahead of the pursuing agent who was beginning to run out of steam. Wheezing for breath by the time he’d reached Ponyville, Pound Cake had almost given up hope. But, it was quickly restored when he heard a cool, calm, and professional voice come over the radio. “This is Intercept Sergeant Hotshot, callsign Lightning. I have your position on my portable radar. I am now commencing intercept. Do you copy, Agent Cake?”
Pound Cake scanned the ground below for any incoming pegasi. Much to his surprise a much older pegasus had sortied and was quickly catching up to the target, a mixture of smoke and lightning trailing behind him. “Roger Lightning, I have a visual on you. The suspect’s all yours.” Happy to give up the pursuit, the nearly exhausted agent landed in the town below and rushed to the town’s Royal Guard barracks so that he could commandeer a long range radio.
The guards sleeping in the base didn’t dare question the badge flashing pegasus as he rushed to the control room. Even when groggy, they knew better than to delay a Bureau agent. Pound Cake rushed into the bases control room and wrestled the radio’s control panel away from a half-asleep private. The guard, having realized what he had done covered his face and galloped out of the room, but it was too late. The frustrated agent had already made a mental note to have the stubborn guard punished when the mission at hand was complete. Frantically, the brown maned pegasus punched the broadcast button. “This is Agent Cake calling Lightning. Are you still in pursuit of the target?”
The once confident pursuer’s voice was now ragged and weary. “Roger Agent Cake. I am on her tail, but she’s really fast. She might actually get away. Requesting permission to shoot her out of the sky.”
Pound Cake could faintly hear a pistol being cocked over the radio. How dare this brash flyer not wait for his orders. This kind of behavior was unacceptable and it most certainly wasn’t going to be tolerated. The agent was shaking with rage as he tiraded against the bedraggled interceptor. “I want her alive, Lightning! If you shoot her I’ll have you shot!”
The radio went silent for a minute as Cake waited for a reply, but this silence was soon broken by the frantic screaming of the pegasus interceptor. “Celestia, it’s an Ambush! Another pegasus is shooting at me from the clouds above.” The sound of gunfire could be heard over the airwaves as the three pegasi engaged in aerial combat. It didn’t last long however as the interceptor soon gave a status report. His voice seemed devoid of all hope. He sounded like he was in pain, but no words came out. Pound Cake could only listen to the distressed grunts and heavy gurgling of the interceptor as he fell through the canopy of the Everfree Forest. The radio turned to static.
Agent Cake was horrified by the sudden turn of events. Not only had he failed at bringing in the mysterious pegasus mare for questioning, but he had also gotten a Royal Guard killed, or worse: the interceptor could have been captured. He had to meet the terrorists in the Everfree Forest and not only rescue the princess, but also see if there was any connection between the ambush and the New Lunar Rebellion. Pound Cake couldn’t be sure, but if he failed to return from the Everfree Forest with Princess Luna then his execution was all but guaranteed. Failure was not an option.
===
Ponyville Royal Guard Barracks: December 28, 2033
Pound Cake venomously stared at the quivering guard lying on the ground before him, the same guard who had delayed him the night before. Was it possible that he could have succeeded if this guard hadn’t delayed him? As far as the agent was concerned the guard’s ignorance was the reason for Cake’s failure. The soldier would pay for his meddling dearly. Normally Cake would take a few hours to take his frustrations out on the unlucky private, but time was of the essence here. He slid a new magazine into his pistol and put it against the private’s head. The guard started to cry and whimper. “Please don’t kill me!” He begged, snot and tears dripping down his nose. “I was only trying to do my job!”
A sick smile came over Agent Cake’s face as he contemplated pulling the trigger. The power of having a pony’s life in his hooves and his alone. That was the kind of thing that he lived for. The guard started to smile in unison with the agent, hoping that this would convince his executor to spare him his life. That was all the motivation that Pound Cake needed to shove the pistol into the guard’s mouth and pull the trigger. All of the stress from the night before seemed to melt away as he watched the guard’s body convulse, twisting and turning in ways that the body was never meant to bend as the life drained away. It almost made up for the night before - almost. Satisfied with his revenge, the agent holstered his weapon and turned to leave the barracks. Much to his surprise, a familiar face was standing in the doorway, the last pony that Pound Cake wanted to see.
General Dreamer beamed as he watched his protege stand over the carcass on the floor. The scene reminded the unicorn of himself as a struggling young officer; ruthless and uncaring for those around him. Those traits had propelled him to the second highest position in the land. He was thrilled to see that these values had been instilled in his young apprentice. It was a shame that he’d become a failure. “I’m glad to see that you aren’t taking out last night’s fiasco on yourself. From what I’ve heard you did everything according to textbook and those that you’d sent to do the job failed. Clearly, you are not the only one to blame. But, seeing as the only two ponies I could have punished otherwise are now dead, I’ll have to take my frustrations out on you.”
In a fatherly manner, the general wrapped his hooves around Cake’s neck and escorted the pegasus outside. When the pair had walked far enough away from the barracks so that he was sure nopony was listening, Dreamer leaned into Agent Cake’s ear. “The only reason I’m not court marshalling you today is because I’ve been tempted to make you an offer,” he whispered . “Since you’re crazy enough to walk right into this trap that the NLR has set up, I’m going to let you go through with it. If you succeed then you’ll get to keep your position without any fear of punishment or demotion.”
“What’s the catch?” Pound Cake asked with a growl; something that no other ESB officer would dare even considering. Pound Cake didn’t care. He knew that Dreamer had always admired him because of his willingness to bend the rules. He knew that the general had been grooming him for years to become his successor. Still, there was the previous night’s ugly fiasco, looming over his head. No matter how much he liked his officers, Agent Cake knew that Dreamer always had a knack for finding interesting ways to get rid of those that weren’t worthy of wearing the ESB badge.
The unicorn chuckled at how well his student knew him, his toothy grin giving him a false look of friendliness. “The catch is that you’ve only got twenty four hours to bring back Luna or I’ll have to assume that you defected to the NLR.” The general’s smile turned into a threatening grimace as he began to throttle the pegasu, bending him over backwards. “In other words,” he hissed as he pushed Cake onto the ground. “Either bring the princess back to me or don’t come back at all. Now leave before I change my mind and execute you on the spot.” Dreamer couldn’t have been prouder of himself as he watched Pound Cake scamble to his hooves and take off towards the Everfree Forest. He had taken care of the threat that Cake posed to his power before it even had a chance to develop. With the idealistic young pegasus out of the way he could now focus on concentrating his power and bringing order to Equestria.
===
The Everfree Forest: December 27, 2033
As Pound Cake soared above the forest’s canopy, he couldn’t help but think about his current predicament. General Dreamer, the closest thing the pegasus had to a father, had given the young agent one last chance to prove himself. The sad thing about this chance at redemption was that Dreamer expected the agent to die. He hadn’t explicitly stated this, but Pound Cake had a gut feeling that this was the case. If the pegasus was truly in the clear than Dreamer wouldn’t have given him such a hopeless ultimatum. What was being asked of him was nearly impossible for an entire army. What hope was there for a single agent? Something was being planned against him. As much as he hated to admit it, Pound Cake knew that the general wanted him dead.
That didn’t change the facts of the matter. Even if Pound Cake changed course and went into hiding, there was very little chance that he could avoid being captured and executed as a traitor by the ESB. He knew this better than anybody. He’d spent his entire career hunting down traitors, rebels, and subverts in the name of the Monarchy. His only hope was the slim chance that he could complete the mission at hand, but even if the agent was successful there was still no guarantee of his survival. If General Dreamer truly wanted him dead there would be other suicide missions or maybe he’d be executed on the spot over something petty. All Dreamer needed to pull the trigger was an excuse.
All of these thoughts were mere speculation and now wasn’t the time to dwell on the implications of his predicament. Agent Cake had less than a day to rescue the princess from a ruthless band of renegades who were his sworn enemies. To make things even worse he had no weapons and no backup. This would have been a death trap for any ordinary pony, but Pound Cake wasn’t your average colt. He had spent almost his entire life training for missions like this. He was a certified black belt in kung fu and could fly faster than almost any other pegasi. This mission was going to be easy. He only needed to relax and formulate a plan. He knew that he could do this, otherwise the general wouldn’t have let him go. He was Dreamer’s right-hand stallion after all. With this in mind, Pound Cake allowed himself to relax and slip into a trance-like state as he neared the rendezvous point.
Before he knew what hit him three pegasi in full flight suits had taken ahold of him and had sent the agent plummeting towards the ground. Cake quickly recovered, turning sharply into a climb, which caught the trio completely off guard. He launched himself at the middle attacker, a wiry, but well built stallion. The other pegasi dove into the forest as Pound Cake started wailing on the assailant’s face. The stallion was knocked out by the second punch, but the agent kept beating on the stallion’s head until the flight suit’s mask gave away. He instantly stopped, his jaw dropping in shock as if he had seen a ghost. He held the stallion’s limp body in his hooves as he hovered, bewildered. Even as he felt on the unconscious face of the pegasus he felt as if he was in an incredibly vivid dream. The colt that he was holding was supposed to be dead. He had to be hallucinating. The altitude must have been getting to him so he dropped the stallion, letting the attacker’s body plummet, and started to land. He had only begun his descent when he felt a sharp pain in his side. The world faded into infinite darkness.
When he regained consciousness Pound Cake could have sworn he was looking at the Wonderbolts, but this was impossible. They had all died several years ago after a horrifying accident at an airshow. He had watched his idols die on live television. Apparently somepony had gotten the blanks mixed up with live ammunition on that fateful night. What was supposed to be a tribute to the Royal Guard became a tragedy. He watched as his one hope of escape from a career in the ESB was shot to pieces. But now here he was staring the trio in the face. Only something was different about them. Instead of their usual sky blue uniforms with yellow trim they now wore purple and black flight suits; an awkward looking skull positioned where the Wonderbolts logo should have been.
“So kid, you thought you’d never see us again?” Spitfire asked as she grinned that famous cocky grin of hers. “I bet that you thought that we’d all been shot to pieces and were rotting in the grave.”
Pound Cake gave a nervous nod, not knowing whether he was dreaming or if he had finally gone insane. He picked himself off of the ground, surveying the area. He seemed to be in the ancient castle’s ballroom surrounded by a dozen or more bustling ponies who were busy punching keys on giant computers.
Echo smiled at the bewildered agent. “Don’t be worried, you’re defintely not dreaming. We had to fake our own deaths to defect. You know how the ESB reacts to so called traitors.”
“You weren’t followed were you?” Soarin inquired with a serious glare. “The last thing we need is a platoon of Royal Guards busting down the doors to the castle.”
“Not that I’m aware of.” answered the agent as he wrapped his hoof across the other stallion’s shoulder. This was done partly out of respect, but it was also done as one last check to make sure this was all really happening.
Soarin gave his admirer a goofy, almost toothless, grin and pointed towards the throne room. “Okay great, Princess Luna would like to see you now.”
The agent was surprised at how truly easy this mission had turned out to be. “So you guys aren’t going to try and keep me from rescuing the princess? I’m actually kind of disappointed. I thought that I was going to have to go hoof to hoof with the Wonderbolts.”
Spitfire chuckled as she opened the door to the throne room. “The Wonderbolts are dead, kid. You’re talking to the Shadowbolts now.” The orange flyer gestured for Pound Cake to enter, but the agent stopped in his tracks. “What about the mare and Lightning? That was you and Soarin wasn’t it? This was all a bucking set up! Princess Luna wasn’t really kidnapped! She’s the leader of the damned NLR! You guys want me to defect!”
Everypony in the room pulled out their pistols and pointed them at the agent, daring him to do something brash as he came to the realization that this was all a trap.
Spitfire pulled the hammer back on her pistol and waved it around, taunting the defenseless pegasus. “I’m afraid that you either listen to what Princess Luna has to say or else you don’t leave here alive.” she smirked. “I mean what did you expect? A party? Those times are gone because of murderous ESB agents like you.”
If Pound Cake would have had his pistol on him then he would have chosen to end it all then and there in a blaze of glory. It would have been an honorable and heroic death. He might have even received a posthumous medal for his bravery. Instead he reluctantly trudged into the throne room to hear the worthless words of a filthy traitor. As he approached the seated princess the doors to the throne room slammed shut and a contingent heavily armed rebels surrounded the alicorn. “You wanted to see me, Your Highness?” He mockingly sneered and spat on the stone floor. The alicorn goddess didn’t deserve the privilege of speaking down to a loyal agent of the Monarchy. She had betrayed her kingdom for the second time in yet another hopeless bid for power. He had no respect for such scum.
Luna spread her wings and descended gracefully from the crumbling throne she had sat in more than 1000 years before. “I am sorry for having to put you in this kind of predicament, dear Pound Cake, but it was the only way to ensure that you would hear the truth of things.”
Agent Cake glared at the princess of the night with contempt and defiance. “I won’t be swayed by your lies, Princess. I know that you’ll say anything to get me to defect. You’re nothing but a traitor. You’re pure evil. Celestia will defeat you and your so called rebels just as easily now as she had a millenium ago.”
Instead of getting angry Luna smiled at the pegasus in the same way that a mother might smile at a foal who has a made a cute little mistake. “It is sad that you don’t realize you’re the one on the side of the traitors. Of course I’m not surprised. You’ve lived your entire life upholding the lie that is the new monarchy. I simply can’t expect you to change your ways in an instant after living twenty years of your life honestly believing that you were creating a better world, but you must listen to me. General Dreamer is the real villain here. He’s tricked everypony into believing that we’ve created this evil empire. He is the one that tricked my sister into signing that wretched bill.”
Pound Cake remained firm on his stance. He couldn’t allow himself to buy into the enemy’s lies. “How could Dreamer possibly trick Celestia? She is an all-knowing goddess and he is a soldier. She signed that bill on her own accord so that we can all live in a more peaceful world. Every good citizen knows that to be the truth.”
The moon goddess frowned, obviously disheartened by the stubbornness of the officer, but she had something up her sleeve. One last revelation that could not fail to sway the pegasus to her side. The alicorn started advancing menacingly towards her guest. Luna decided to hold nothing back. Even though it could jeopardize the planned uprising she believed that this information might be just powerful enough to convince the stubborn agent to join her cause. “Celestia and I have organized the NLR as a way to put things right. What you’re being offered here is a chance at redemption. It is a way for you to make up for all of the innocent ponies that you sent to the death camps in the north. All of the ponies that you shot just so that you could watch them die. I can’t force you to take my offer, but I can’t allow you to leave this place if you don’t.”
Pound Cake hung his head, enticing the princess to come closer. With a smirk on his face he spat in the traitor’s face. “That is your answer. I will die before I betray my country. I’ll never fall for your lies you demon, you fiend!”
Much to the agent’s surprise Luna starting giggling. She had reacted in exactly the opposite way than he had expected her to. After everything that he’d done in his life, after all of the arrests and executions that he’d made and been witness to, Luna’s giggle unnerved him more than any of that. “Scootaloo!” she called towards the shadows. “Would you please be a dear and come down here with those papers I asked you to retrieve?”
Seemingly out of the blue an orange pegasus with a cropped purple mane emerged from the shadows. She wore a black combat jacket, a bandolero slung across her chest, and a black beret which she wore cocked at an angle, a white feather sticking out of the brim. This harmless looking mare was the very definition of femme fatale. Pound Cake could see it in her eyes. She had done horrible things in her lifetime. This mare had the eyes of a killer. As he studied her, he became mesmerized by her beauty. She was by far the most beautiful mare that he had seen in a long time. He looked her up and down until his eyes fell back onto the feather in her cap. That’s when it hit him. As realization set in, he began to connect the dots. The feather in her beret was the same kind that had been found at the scene of Blueblood’s murder.
“Here are the documents you requested, Your Highness. Was there ever any doubt that I’d get these for you?” the mare asked with a smug grin across her face as she delivered a thin manilla envelope to the princess.
“Of course there wasn’t” Luna answered with an equal amount of smugness. “You’ve done far more difficult things for me before. This job was probably a breeze for you.”
Scootaloo bowed deeply and retreated back into the shadows of the castle as Luna tossed the package to Agent Cake who stared at it as if it were poison. “What’s in there?” He asked earnestly.
“Finally a breakthrough!” Thought Luna. She had finally found something that interested the stubborn pegasus. Perhaps there really was some hope in turning him into an ally. One that knew all of the ESB’s secrets. An ally that knew everything she needed to know in order to overthrow the oligarchy that had taken control of her kingdom. “ All that’s in that envelope is the truth in writing. I knew that you wouldn’t believe anything that I told you so I had one my mercenaries obtain these documents. It’s tangible proof that your entire life has been stolen from you. Evidence that you’ve been forced to live a lie.”
Pound Cake voraciously tore through the envelope, wanting to see for himself if these so called papers were the real deal. Normally he’d have immediately dismissed the papers as fakes, but judging from the looks of the mercenary there was a very good chance that they’d come from Dreamer’s own desk. She seemed to be capable of anything. He held the first paper up to his face. It was the cover to a report on a military study, “PROJECT EQ SOLDIER”. The objective of the study was to take an infant pegasus foal, training it as soon as it could stand so that it would become the perfect agent. Athletic, calculating, and ruthless, these were the qualities that were to be instilled in this foal. These were the qualities that described Pound Cake. The report was signed by General Dreamer. He had seen the signature a million times. It was all the proof he needed. These papers were real.
Afraid of what he might discover next, Pound Cake turned to the first page of the report. It was an arrest record for somepony named Carrot Cake. The paper stated that the suspect had been arrested for subversion against the Monarchy and was summarily executed. The profile photo showed an earth pony whose facial features were uncannily similar to Pound Cake’s own. There was definitely some sort of family relation there.
He continued to search through the report, finding another arrest record for a Mrs. Cup Cake who had been charged with subversion and sent to a labor camp where she died in sick bay. There was even more of a resemblance between the earth pony in the arrest photo and the agent. He looked up at Luna bewildered by the revelations that were in this report, his entire understanding of the world having been turned upside down. “These were my parents, weren’t they?”
The princess nodded her affirmation solemnly. “Dreamer saw that you might have been a possible candidate for his ‘research project’, so he arranged for your parents’ arrests. They had never done anything wrong, but such details mattered not to Dreamer. Your parents were expendable to him, as was everypony else that he murdered during his rise to power. The only thing that mattered to him at the time was the project that you’re holding in your hoofs.”
Pound Cake pulled out one last file, studying the pages carefully, praying for a sign of forgery, but there was nothing fake about this document. They were adoption papers. Two sets for two different foals. He threw his own papers to the floor, knowing good and well that he had been adopted by the Monarchy. He wanted to know about the other foal. She was a light orange unicorn with dull orange hair. The paper said that her new name was Pumpkin Pie, but her birth name was Pumpkin Cake. The foal in the picture was his sister; a sister that he didn’t know of until today. What other secrets had Dreamer kept from him for all of these years? How many other families had he and his benefactor destroyed? His heart torn between revenge and redemption , Pound Cake knew what he had to do. “Your Highness, when do I begin?”
===
Outside of Canterlot: December 27, 2033
The Shadowbolts had been able to escort Luna and Cake to Ponyville, but once the group cleared the dangerous skies above the Everfree Forest, Luna ordered the flight team back to the castle. Ever since the pair had been alone. They had made the majority of the trip in silence, but the closer they got to Canterlot the more Pound Cake felt the need to inquire upon the princess. “That mare Scootaloo, she’s more than a thief isn’t she? I’m fairly sure that she’s killed somepony before.”
Luna smiled at the intuitiveness of the former agent. “You’re the first outsider I’ve had come to that conclusion. How can you be so sure?”
Pound Cake gave the princess a slight smirk. “Because of her eyes. They are the eyes of a killer.” He paused for a second, staring at the ground, his face now emotionless. “I should know. I look at a pair exactly like them whenever I look into a mirror.”
Luna titled the pegasus’s head back up, gesturing for him to cheer up. “I have noticed this too. I believe it is because Scootaloo is a mercenary. For the right price she will kill anypony. In an underground organization like the NLR ruthless ponies like her are indispensable. While most of the Rebellion’s members are more than willing to die for our freedom, they are reluctant to kill for it. Most of them are intellectuals, not soldiers. This is why I need ponies like you and her.”
The alicorn and the pegasus continued to fly into the night. Pound Cake had never been so confused in his life. Less than an hour ago he was on his way to rescue the princess and win back Dreamer’s favor. Now he was on his way to kill the general who had once been his sole patron. What he needed most was to hear that ponies like him, who were willing to take the life of another, were vital in a peaceful world. He needed to know that he wasn’t just a cold-blooded killer. All he had ever needed was a justifiable cause and now he had one. He would kill his former mentor and win back Equestria’s freedom. He was going to redeem himself and stop all of the innocent bloodshed by shedding more blood, but somehow the irony of the situation eluded him even as made his landing in front of the Royal Palace.
Something was odd. The usually crowded castle gates were deserted and only a handful of guards were on duty at the entrance. Cautiously the pair started towards General Dreamer’s office. The corridors of the palace were devoid of visitors, the only exception being a single guard posted here and there. This was the middle of the day. Usually there were dozens of tourists wandering through the hallways, admiring the beauty of the palace. Instead there were only the stony faces of the guardians, watching their every move. Pound Cake opened the door to General Dreamer’s office and strode in with Luna by his side. The room was decorated in a minimalist style. The dull gray walls were completely barren except for a couple of filing cabinets and a single monitor. The general sat at his simple black desk, his back to Cake, peering out of the office’s windows. Pound Cake could have easily snuck up behind the general and broke his neck, but that wasn’t the plan. “I’m back with the princess, sir.” he said as dutifully as possible. All the while he shook with nervousness.
The general spun around in his chair and crossed his hooves.“I’m glad to see you’re back. I don’t know what we would have done if you hadn’t returned.” Pound Cake smiled for a moment, having been lured into believing that his plan was working, but suddenly the door to the office slammed shut and locked from the outside. Agents swarmed into the office, rappelling themselves in through open windows. It was a trap.
Dreamer punched a button on his desk causing an audio recording to play repeatedly throughout the room. “When do I begin?” Pound Cake looked up in shock as he recognized the voice as his own. “You bastard! When did you bug me?” In a blind rage he began advancing menacingly towards the unicorn. Even without a weapon he made an imposing figure, but he was no match for a room full of ESB officers. Several of them rushed up and buried the back of their rifles into Pound Cake’s head, sinking him to his knees.
The general stood up and clapped, mocking his old protege. “Did you really think that you could even place a hoof on me with all of these agents in the room? You’re too cute.” He sauntered over to the pegasus and stroked on Cake’s mane as if his victim were a pet. He pulled a tiny metal disc out of Cake’s hair and held it up to the pegasus’s face. He waved it around like a lottery ticket. “This little thing is the latest in surveillance technology. Not only does it record everything you say, but it also functions as a tracking device. I placed it in your mane when I ‘visited’ you in Ponyville. So now not only are you out of my hair for good, but thanks to you I know the location of the NLR’s base of operations. You of all ponies should have known that I’d never grace a place with my presence just to make idle threats.”
Pound Cake stared at the general, hatred pouring from his eyes. “I know that you’ve been using me for twenty years as a bucking project that could be scrapped like any other, so let me guess. You knew that Luna was forming a rebel cell. You merely used her to gather all of your enemies together in one place so that you could wipe them out in one fell swoop. Tell me Dreamer, how are you going to do it?”
The general swaggered back to his desk and pushed another button. The monitor sprung to life, showing an image of a single satellite descending from space. “You always were a natural detective, but you’re not quite right. You see I didn’t use Luna at all. No, she’s cooperated with me this whole time. You see I used to use mind control potions, but those don’t work forever. Over time the princesses started to become immune to my concoctions so I had to find another way to force them to doing my bidding. That’s why I had this beauty built.” With a smirk on his face the unicorn cheerfully swung his arms towards the monitor like a salesman. “That, my dearest Pound Cake, is Project Phoenix and it can make an entire city plus its inhabitants disappear in mere seconds. Of course its nuclear missiles have trouble making it through the atmosphere in one piece, so it must descend from orbit in order to fire. The satellite is lost after each use, but just like the phoenix it will be born anew. I have replacements already prepared for launch so I can continue raining fire upon my enemies exactly like a phoenix would. The damage it wreaks on its victims is unimaginable, even to somepony like you. It is how I’ve maintained an iron grip on this Monarchy for the past decade. It’s how I convinced Princess Luna to organize the NLR and lure you into betraying your country.”
Pound Cake staggered back onto all fours, stumbling towards Luna. He grabbed her by the shoulders, looking her in the eyes. “This can’t be true? You knew that he was going to kill the dissidents and me all along and you never did anything to try and prevent it. You followed his orders like a puppet.”
The alicorn jerked herself away from Pound Cake, tears streaming down her cheeks. “Everything I do, I do for the wellbeing of my subjects. The lives of a few dozen dissidents is a small price to pay for the safety of the masses.” She turned away from the pegasus, sobbing in shame.
General Dreamer made a motion with his hooves that Cake had seen many times before. He dragged his hoof across his neck in a slicing motion. This was the end for the agent. Any second now a pistol would be placed against the back of his head and his brains blown out. But the gun never came. Instead he was to suffer a much crueler fate. An earth pony stepped forward, inserting a needle into Cake’s neck as two guards held the pegasus down. The agent’s limbs began to contort violently and his eyes rolled into the back of his head as he foamed from the mouth. Only when the jerking stop did the guards pick the comatose pony up and carry him out of Dreamer’s office. The unconscious stallion was destined for the infamous dungeon number two.
===
The Royal Palace, Canterlot: December 28, 2033
Dungeon number two was not a dungeon in the conventional sense of the word. It was located on the palace’s third floor in a previously unused office. Needless to say it was a far cry from the stone walls and subterranean caverns of the castle’s original dungeon. Instead of the usual room filled with locks and chains this room was barren except for an industrial cleaning sink and a set of shackles bolted to the floor. This was the ESB’s secret weapons testing and development room. For Dreamer, there was no substitute for real victims in his testing facilities and why would he need a substitute? He had an endless supply of political prisoners at his disposal.
Pound Cake knew what was going to happen the second he opened his eyes. He had once been a tester in this room. This was the room where he had racked up the majority of his executions throughout his career. He could still remember the first test he had conducted for the Monarchy. The victim on that particular day was an innocent looking white unicorn with fluffy purple hair. She didn’t seem very threatening, her green eyes wet with tears, but according to his superior officers this mare was a danger to the state. She had to be disposed of and what better way to do so than with a weapons test? On that particular day Cake had been assigned some sort of handheld laser tool that had been designed for the mining of gems. He was to test the devices effectiveness in slicing through solid materials. It was simple enough for him to slice off the test subject’s ears as he peeled back her skin. Her screaming sounded nearly like music to the agent, but there was something that bothered him at the time. He had to end the test. The device had worked perfectly up to this point, it’s concentrated beam of light cutting easily through the mare’s soft flesh. He hesitated as he held the device to her temple, waiting for her to beg for her life, but instead she spat at him defiantly. That was all the motivation Cake needed. He quickly slid the laser’s power switch on to the maximum power setting, causing the mare to collapse on the floor. There was a gaping hole in the unicorn’s head at the spot where the laser had been held. Pound cake wrote the weapon an excellent review and punched out for the day.
Up until this point he had never given that killing nor any other execution a second thought, but now that he was in their shoes he felt nothing but regret. The state had made him into the ruthless monster he was, but was it entirely their fault? The truth of the matter was that when it came right down to it he was the one who pulled the trigger. On the flip side if he’d refused to do as he was told he would have wound up on the wrong side of a gun barrel. Not that all of those years of obedience had served him well in the end. He was going to die in the same manner that he’d lived; as a test subject.
Cake tried testing his restraints, but the shackles were tightened to the point that they cut into the pegasus’s skin whenever he moved. There was absolutely no chance of escaping from them. The situation was hopeless. He was going to die, but there was no need to panic. Why would he? It would have only served to the satisfaction of Dreamer. He could easily imagine the smile on his old master’s face when the unicorn heard that his project had died begging and pleading. He would give the general no such satisfaction so instead he calmly stood in chains, waiting for death’s embrace.
As the condemned waited, the dungeon’s door swung open, revealing the same stallion who had sedated Cake earlier. “Well traitor,” he snorted as he slammed the door shut, “the time has come to begin our tests. I’ve been ordered to find out the maximum dosage for my latest truth serum so I’ll be administering it to you via an IV until you overdose.” Pound Cake recognized the stallion as the same doctor who administered drugs during interrogations. The doctor opened up a briefcase filled with a wide assortment of medical equipment. He selected and set up a collapsible IV stand, hooking a bag filled with strange orange serum to it. “Honestly, I think this punishment is too lenient for a traitor like you, but I’m not the one who comes up with punishments around here. I just administer them.” he smirked as he inserted the IV into his victim’s arm.
Cake winced as the foreign chemicals flowed through his veins. It was the strangest sensation he had ever experienced. Slowly his body relaxed until it became zombie like. Even his brain started to feel like a pile of mush. This was all in the design of the drug. The subject was to respond only to the questions asked. There were no thoughts going on in the victim’s mind otherwise. It was the perfect interrogation drug, simultaneously acting as a sedative and a truth serum. Cake admirably resisted the drug’s effects, but it was no use. However, before his mind completely caved he noticed that the dungeon’s door now stood wide open. Perhaps there was some hope of escape after all.
===
Scootaloo slowly creeped up on the doctor who was busy reading questions off a clipboard. The questions were fairly generic; ones that anypony with a basic knowledge of Pound Cake could answer. “What is your name?” The doctor asked his subject.
Cake slowly tilted his head and murmured, “Pound Cake” to the doctor. The earth pony marked on his clipboard and started reading another question from the clipboard, but before he finished the sentence the doctor paused. Scootaloo was now breathing down his neck, a knife held high above her head, ready to end the evil stallion’s life.
The doctor whirled around, making a move for something in his lab coat, but the assassin was quicker. She plunged the blade into the side of his neck, blood gushing from the wound. Mortally wounded, the earth pony’s scream was blood curdling and desperate. Scootaloo, rapidly shoved her hoof in his mouth, lowering the dying doctor gently to the floor. “Shhh,” she cooed, “it’s time to lay your sleepy head.” The pegasus used her other hoof to shut his eyes, and like magic the doctor’s body went limp.
Scootaloo dropped the body on the floor with a thud as she galloped to Cake. Skidding to a stop beside him, she jerked the needle out of his arm. In the short time he had been hooked to the IV the former agent had been given three times the normally recommended dosage of serum. If Scootaloo was going to save Cake, she’d have to find an antidote. Even if she could find a bottle of the cure it would be at least another hour before Cake had his wits about himself and an entire day before the side effects of the serum disappeared.
Frantically Scootaloo rifled through the doctor’s briefcase, but since only a handful of the bottles were clearly labeled and none of them were labeled “antidote” there was no way of knowing if any of the chemicals inside were the right ones to use. Frustrated, she pulled a hip flask out of her combat jacket and took a swig of water. It was every bit as cold, refreshing, and cleansing as she had hoped it would be. Maybe it would help her think of a way to save Cake. In concentration, she scratched her head with the flask, the water swishing back and forth inside. That’s when it hit her. It was a long shot, but there was a slim chance that if she could give Cake enough water, she could neutralize the effects of the serum.
Scootaloo peered at Cake who was now drifting in and out of consciousness. It was now a race against time. The orange pegasus flipped open her knife and sliced into the serum filled bag, draining it of its contents. Sprinting to the sink, she rinsed the bag clean of any chemicals and refilled it with water. When she returned Pound Cake was sprawled out on the floor gasping for air. He was barely clinging onto life. She had to hurry. She slid the bag back into its hook on the stand and jammed the IV into Cake’s arm.
The pegasus stallion started drifting in and out of consciousness again. Scootaloo was playing a dangerous waiting game where there was no time to wait. There was a bomb loaded satellite preparing to drop its payload on Equestria’s last hope for a free society. So in an attempt to speed up the process, Scootaloo squeezed on the top of the bag, siphoning the water into the colt’s veins at an alarmingly fast rate. While she had meant well, Scootaloo had forgotten the fact that Cake wouldn’t survive if his blood became overly saturated. When she finally did realize this she quickly stopped and checked on her patient. Pound Cake had stopped breathing entirely, but his heart was still beating. There was still a chance at resuscitation, but there was no way she could revive him as long as he was on his stomach and in shackles. She needed him on his back.
Doggedly, Scootaloo ran back to the doctor and turned out the pockets of his jacket in search of a key. She found a watch, a pistol, and an ID card, but the shackle keys were nowhere to be found. There was only one last place to look; the briefcase. Just as she had before, she tore away at the contents of the case, even going so far as to rip out its inner lining, but there was nothing in there but chemicals; nothing but acids and bases. While inspecting a bottle of highly concentrated sulfuric acid, she hatched yet another ingenious plot. With great care and precision she poured a tiny amount of the volatile liquid onto the chains. The acid was so powerful that the chains melted like snow in the desert and continued burning into the floor. Scootaloo dragged Cakes’ body away from the acid soaked parts of the floor and turned him over. Placing her hoof in the center of the stallion’s chest, she pushed down repeatedly, performing textbook compressions. When that didn’t work she turned to mouth to mouth. Placing her lips against his, she tried her hardest to breath life back into the pegasus, but even her best efforts failed to bring Cake back to life.
Gasping for breath, Scootaloo checked on the status of her patient. At this point Cake was showing no signs of life. His breathing had long since ceased, his heart had stopped beating, and his body was now icy cold. It was too late. She had failed. The stallion she had been sent to rescue was dead. Hyperventilating with grief, Scootaloo placed her head against the dead body, using it like a pillow. “Why is it that my only failed mission had to be the mission where all of my friend’s lives were on the line?” She asked herself through choked tears. “I can’t pull this off by myself. I can’t fly.” Out of frustration, she started beating her hooves against the corpse in a tantrum. “It can’t end this way! There has to be something I can do!” In one last attempt to resurrect the pegasus she drew her hoof back, coming down on Cake’s stomach as hard as she could.
===
Vomit spewed everywhere as the stallion jolted back to life. “Celestia,” he sputtered as he wallowed in his own puke, “I’m alive.” Hesitantly he pulled himself upright, surveying his surroundings. The dungeon had undergone a few changes since he’d gone under. Bottles of chemicals were strewn across the floor and the doctor’s body laid motionless near a set of burned chains. That beautiful orange pegasus from the NLR was staring at him in shock. “Yo, buddy, still alive?” She half giggled, half cried.
“I think so.” Cake stuttered as he dragged himself back onto all fours, ecomposing himself. “Pinch me if I’m dreaming, but it’s not everyday that you’re rescued by an angel.”
Scootaloo reared back and slapped the taste out of Cake’s mouth. “What the hay is wrong with you?” she demanded as she grabbed his face and pushed his cheeks together. “Less than a minute ago you were as dead as that doctor over there. Now you’re hitting on me.” She couldn’t help but giggle briefly at the absurdity of the situation, but her old demeanor quickly returned. “In case you’ve forgotten we have a super weapon to destroy.” she sneered as she turned loose of the colt.
Realizing that his flirting was a waste of time, Pound Cake quickly dropped the subject and moved on. “Okay mercenary, how are we going to stop the Phoenix? Surely you’ve got something planned.”
Scootaloo raised an eyebrow. “How did you know that I’m a private military contractor? I don’t recall ever telling you.”
“Luna told me, but why do you care?” Cake asked in earnest. “Do you think that I’d think any less of you for being a paid soldier? For being a killer? What do you think I’ve been doing for the past twenty years, baking cakes? Because I should have been. The state has taken what should have been my life from me. I think what you’ve done with the NLR is justified if anything.”
Scootaloo indignantly marched up to the former agent and bucked up to him. “Do you think I’d care if you thought highly of me? Because you’d be wrong if you did. The horrors I’ve committed during my career as a mercenary pale in comparison to what you and your comrades have done to the citizens of Equestria.”
Caught off guard, Pound Cake took a step back. No one had ever spoken to him like this before. For the first time in his life he was being condemned rather than praised or punished. She was telling him the truth and it scared him. “Look Scotaloo, I know what I’ve done in the past was wrong,” he stammered, “And I can never forgive myself for those actions, but I’m on your side now. I want to see an end to this tyranny as much as you.”
“You don’t care about the end of tyranny. You’ve never cared about it. You only care about revenge.” Scootaloo scoffed. “Well that’s the only thing we have in common; revenge. I fight for the lives lost, for the friendships and families that you helped to destroy. One of my best friends was sent to her death by Dreamer and his so called courts. She was executed in this very room.” The mare shed a single tear, but she did her best not to let her sadness show. Wiping the tear away, her eyes burned with a fiery determination. “Believe me, I want him dead as much as you do, so don’t think I hold that against you.”
“Can we please drop this?” Pound Cake pleaded. “You said it yourself. We have a super weapon to destroy. We don’t exactly have a lot of time to spare.”
Handing Pound Cake an outdated ESB communicator watch, the mercenary backed away from the stallion and turned towards the door. “Right then!” She smirked. “I’ll contact you on that communicator if anything goes wrong. I’m off to the satellite’s control room. Hopefully I can sabotage it from there, and you won’t have to attempt your part of the mission. You’ll find everything you need in the closet next door. Good luck.”
Cake’s face scrunched up in confusion. “What do you mean my part of the mission? I figured that you would take care of Phoenix and I’d kill Dreamer. That was going to be the end of it.”
Annoyed, Scootaloo wheeled around and hissed, “And what if I fail? Who’s going to stop the Phoenix from killing my comrades? You’re going to have to fly up there and blow it up. Do you think you can handle that?”
The pegasus stallion stuck his chest out as if he were the only pony capable of the task at hand. “Of course I can! I’d hate to brag, but I’m one of the best flyers in Equestria. What you’re asking of me is a piece of cake.”
Scootaloo nodded her understanding and galloped out of the room. Pound Cake followed her out of the door, but when he rounded the doorframe she was gone. His rescuer had disappeared just as mysteriously as she had arrived; a true mercenary. He was glad to have somepony like her on his side, even if she was a tad condescending at times. As he shut the testing room’s door there was no doubt in his mind that he’d see her again.
Cake cantered to the next door closet and tried the doorknob. It was unlocked. Pleasantly surprised, he stepped into the room and shut the door behind him. It was nearly as cold and dark as the real dungeon. Letting his eyes adjust to the light, he noted that the room was completely barren except for a single box placed neatly in the center of the room. Surely that wasn’t what he was meant to retrieve. He’d need some sort of rocket launcher to take out the super weapon. Whatever was in that box wasn’t enough. Hoping to find something else, he scooted to the center of the room, turning on a small dim light bulb. He discovered that indeed the only thing in the room was the box. Cake sighed as he picked it up and flipped open the lid. “No way. This is suicide.” he gaffed. “A rubber tie strap and some home made explosives? That’s all they could get for me? I can’t blow up the Phoenix with this. This crap probably won’t even scratch the paint.” Frustrated he started digging deeper into the box where he found a short note and a white feather.
“I know what you’re thinking, but rest assured this little bag has more than enough firepower to finish the job. I fixed these explosives myself. Just strap the bag onto one of the nukes with the strap I left in the box and get the hay away so you can pull the plunger and watch the fireworks in one piece.
-Scoot”
“I’ll have to take your word for it when the time comes.” Cake grumbled to the note as if it were the orange mare. “But right now, there’s somepony who needs to die.” he grinned wickedly as he pulled the chain on the light bulb and started for Dreamer’s office. Finally, the time for vengeance had come.
===
Pound Cake hovered upside down on the ceiling above the door to Dreamer’s office, stalking the lone guard patrolling this section of hallway. Something about the motion felt so simple and natural to the pegasus. It was if he were born to hover this way. The hallway’s guardian was the most well built pegasus Pound Cake had ever seen. The soldier’s body was so beefed up that his wings and hooves didn’t seem to belong on his body. It was going to be a challenge, stealthily killing him, but it was a challenge Cake looked forward to.
Spreading out his wings, he glided onto the back of the bulky guard below. With a quick flick of his hoofs he twisted the guard’s tree trunk of a neck as hard as he could, but the muscular pegasus merely chuckled.
Lunging forward and jolting his head forward, the guard easily flipped Cake off of his back, sending the slimmer pony tumbling against Dreamer’s office door. “Nice try little colt.” he spat with a smirk, his voice deep and slow. “I’m going to enjoy breaking you before I deliver you to the boss.”
Now that he quite literally had his back against a wall, Cake had to think quickly to save his skin. He had little hope of overpowering the guard and he had no weapons to even the odds with. With the hulking pegasus drawing his hoof back, Pound Cake racked his brain for a way to keep his head from getting smashed like a watermelon. In the split second it took for the guard to draw back, Cake ran a million ideas through his head, but he felt that none of them would work. That is until he remembered the ultimate rule in fighting. There are no rules. It was during times like this when honor should take a backseat to survival.
Cake started moving just as the brutish guard came forward with his punch. The guard put everything he had into the punch, but the former agent could tell that there was no control behind it. Even so Pound Cake barely managed to dodge it. He could feel the guard’s fur brush across his nose as the soldier’s hoof crashed through the door. Rolling away from his opponent, Cake wound up his hind legs so he could give his opponent a devastating buck to the groin.
The muscle bound pegasus struggled to free himself from the door’s clutches. He was stuck and he was panicking. He knew that he was about to get his testes kicked in. He knew that this was one battle that he couldn’t win on his own. In desperation he yelled at the top of his lungs, praying that his precious genatalia would be saved in the nick of time. “Boss! It’s Agent Cake! He’s here!”
Cake was about to deliver the final blow when he heard a distinct clicking sound coming from within the office. It was the sound of the deadliest hand-held weapon in the ESB’s arsenal. The former agent uncocked his legs, spread his wings, and rocketed up towards the ceiling just as the soft thud of a firing grenade launcher echoed into the hallway. Kaboom! Blood and shrapnel sprayed onto the walls. Cake’s jaw dropped at the sheer and utter carnage before him.
A single cadet from the Royal Guard academy casually emerged from Dreamer’s office with a grenade launcher strapped to his back. Beaming at his accomplishment, he wiped some of the blood from the floor and ran it across his tongue, tasting it as if it were some sort of juice. “The general is going to be so proud of me. I’ve gotten my first kill today.” The boyish way he said this made Cake sick to his stomach. It was like looking into a mirror. He once acted like this colt, his obvious replacement, always eager to please dear old Dreamer. They both thought nothing of killing another so long as it made their father figure happy.
Cake couldn’t bare to watch the corruption of this foal. Swooping down from the ceiling as he had with the guard before he landed on the younger colt’s back. Instead of going for the kill Cake wrapped his forelegs around his replacement’s neck in a chokehold. This kid didn’t have to die. He still had a chance at a normal life. “Listen kid,” Cake whispered, “I’m not going to kill you, but the more you struggle the more this is going to hurt so just let yourself go on to sleep. Dreamer, won’t be around to punish you when you come to. I swear.”
At the mere hint that his mentor was in danger the young pegasus bucked for all that he was worth. Despite being thrown around like somepony competing at a rodeo, Cake managed to hang on to, and even tighten his grip. Eventually, the colt ran out of steam and collapsed to the floor. “Out like a light.” the former agent quipped to himself as he dragged the foal into the office.
The office was empty, just as Cake expected it to be. Dreamer or some other agent would have emerged and attacked Cake as he choked out the cadet otherwise. He smacked himself in the head as he realized that the decision to attack his replacement in front of a doorless office was incredibly stupid and should have gotten him killed. It hadn’t though and for that he was thankful. He swore to himself that he wouldn’t make that type of mistake again.
“Bravo, Agent Cake.” The general spoke through the office’s video screen. Despite his attempt at sounding amused, Cake could tell that the general was unimpressed.“You’ve survived my trap. Congratulations. You should be proud of yourself.”
Cake looked at the screen in disgust. “You’re going to meet your maker.”
The unicorn busted out laughing, angering Cake even more so than before. “Do you really think you can hurt me?” Dreamer asked between exasperated breaths. “Honestly I hope you do so I can see the look of disbelief on your face when I kill you. Besides, if I were you I wouldn’t make such idle threats. Not when your marefriend is my hostage.”
Cake couldn’t hide his shock. Surely this wasn’t the same mercenary who had saved his skin. She was too skilled at her craft to be captured. Unless the real trap had been set up for her. Cake stomped his hoof on the ground. “Where’s Scootaloo? I demand to know!”
The general calmly lit a cigar as he pointed out of frame. Slowly, the camera panned towards the orange mare. She had been tied to a chair, her mouth stuffed with rags, and she was flanked on either side by an ESB agent. She still had that fiery look of determination burning in her eyes. The camera returned to its original position just in time to catch the unicorn nonchalantly blowing a few smoke rings into the air. “As you can see you’re in no position to make demands, but seeing as you’ve made it this far I believe it’s only fair to let you know what you’re up against. We’ll be waiting for you in research and development tower number three. Don’t expect much resistance. I want to take care of you personally.” He raised a remote as if to shut off the camera, but hesitated. “I’m going to enjoy watching you die.” he hissed as the screen faded to black.
Pound Cake had never felt so much anger before in his life. As an agent he had always been known for his ability to stay cool and calm in even the most intense situations, but this was different. All of the prior killings and arrests had been committed as part of his career. He had no true stake in the conflicts, but this; this was personal. Taking a few deep breaths, he focused his anger, letting it burn deep inside him. With his motivation restored the former agent furiously dug deep into the pockets of the young colt’s cadet jacket in search of weapons, but the only things of any use to Cake in the jacket were an ESB standard issue pistol and a small k-bar knife. He grinned in satisfaction at what he had found. They were all the tools he’d need to carry out his final act of revenge.
===
Cake pushed his body to the limit as he rocketed up the R&D tower’s spiral staircase. His time was almost up. It was only a matter of minutes before the Phoenix released its payload onto the helpless dissidents. If he were to have any chance of saving the rebels, rescuing Scootaloo, and killing Dreamer he’d have to refrain from his usual witty banter. He’d have to shoot first and ask questions later. But even as he neared the door at the top of the tower he doubted he could restrain himself. There were so many things he wanted to tell Dreamer before he put a bullet between his eyes. As a compromise he’d decided to say one single word to his old master. One word that would tell the evil unicorn why he deserved to die.
It was time. With his pistol in hoof and the door inches from his face, he burst through the ancient wooden door without a clue as to what lay on the other side. The two agents who were guarding Scootaloo quickly drew aim with their rifles, but Cake was faster. Squeezing off two rounds in lightning quick succession he dropped the two guards. With Scootaloo out of immediate danger Cake’s eyes darted back and forth in search of Dreamer. When his eyes finally did come upon the general, he was shocked to see the unicorn’s outline, illuminated by a thin ray of light from a skylight above, casually leaning against a wall in the corner of the room as if there were no danger to his life whatsoever. He wore his legendary trenchcoat and a fedora low over his face as if the sun were in his eyes. Cake found it fitting that the general had chosen to wear this outfit on the day he would die. It was the image that every ESB agent had when they thought of Dreamer; a cool, calm, and confident leader. Maybe he had thought that Cake wouldn’t shoot when he saw this stallion. Maybe he thought that his old protege couldn’t go through with pulling the trigger. He was dead wrong.
Without a moment’s hesitation Pound Cake passionately pumped four more shots into the general’s stomach. Dreamer staggered a few steps forward, his arms behind his back as if he were drunkenly strolling along, but as the blood started gushing from the wounds his legs buckled and he fell to his knees. This is the moment where Cake’s payback would finally come. At this point he could have cared less about the rebels. He only cared about his own self-glorified vengeance. With particular malice he shoved the general onto his back and pulled out the k-bar. He was going to savor the moment he plunged the knife into the unicorn’s throat.
Cake pulled off Dreamer’s fedora so that he could see the look on the unicorn’s face as he was butchered. Cake’s mouth dropped open when he laid eyes on the pony’s face. It wasn’t Dreamer at all. Instead, the pony in the trenchcoat was Scootaloo, still bound and gagged. Cake ripped the blood soaked gag out of her mouth. The blood poured freely from her wounds. “I’m so sorry!” He wailed. “I could have sworn you were Dreamer! Please forgive me, I never wanted to hurt you!” In a panicked frenzy he ripped up the gag and stuffed the bits of cloth into the bullet wounds to try and stop the bloodflow. “I’ve got to save you! You can’t die!”
Scootaloo gasped for breath as her once orange fur turned to crimson. “Forget about me, I’m a goner. Just take out the Phoenix. The NLR is counting on you.”
With a determined look in his eyes Cake hoisted the mercenary onto his back. “I won’t leave you behind!” he declared as he clenched the knife in his teeth and started moving towards the room’s exit.
Scootaloo squirmed to get off of her would be savior’s back. “Dammit, Cake! There’s nothing you can do for me! Finish the mission without me!” She pleaded. “I’ve accepted my fate.”
Cake hustled with all his might while attempting to save his partner, but stopped in his tracks as the room began to echo with the general’s hollow laughter. Dreamer had been in the room the entire time, posing as the captured mercenary. “I must say this beret looks awfully flattering on me.” he pointed out as he adjusted the hat with his pistol. “It must be devastating knowing that you’ve sealed the fate of your comrade. At least you’ll draw some comfort from the knowledge that you’ll enter the afterlife together.”
As the general raised his pistol for a shot, Cake spat out the k-bar and heaved it towards his foe. The knife nailed the general in the shoulder just as the unicorn pulled the trigger. The gun sailed out of Dreamer’s grasp and crashed to the floor. Cake squinted, his face contorted in agony as he waited for the bullet to rip through him, but it never came. The pegasus stallion gave himself a pat down, breathing a heavy sigh of relief when he found no leaking holes in his chest. “Hah, you missed!” He boasted.
The general ripped the knife out of his arm and tossed it to the ground, but instead of grimacing in pain he sneered in contempt. “Who said I was aiming for you?” He gestured towards the orange pegasus on Cake’s back.
Cake let her limp body roll to the floor so he could check her pulse. When he went to place his hoof on her neck he was horrified to discover that part of her skull was missing, torn away by the general’s bullet. Her breathing had stopped, her body stiff and lifeless. There would be no saving her now. “You monster!” Cake screamed “I’ll make you regret the day you were born!”
The general shook his head in disappointment. “You’re going to blame me for her death? If anything I put her out of her misery.” he scoffed. “You were the one who shot her to begin with. You’re the one who decided to start your own personal war against me. What you have to understand is that when it comes to war ponies live and ponies die. That’s all there is to it.”
Dreamer’s horn glistened a shiny black as his magic retrieved the pistol from where it had landed, pointing it at Cake. “In war there is only one ultimate rule and that is to survive. It seems that you’re about to break that rule.” The unicorn squinted in concentration, his stare venomous. *Click* *Click* *Click* “What the hay is wrong with this thing?” he hissed in frustration as he levitated the gun back into his grasp. “The trigger must have broken when it hit the ground. No matter. I’ll just have to off you the old fashioned way.” The general grinned with giddiness as he pulled out his own knife. This would be just like old times.
Out of weapons, out of time, and without his beloved partner, the situation appeared bleak for Cake. Once again, he would have to quickly come up with a plan if he was going to succeed. Reaching into his duster, he fiddled with the explosives and plunger that Scootaloo had made for the Phoenix. As he saw it, there were only two options. He could fly away from the fight and to the looming satellite so that he could destroy it, or he could rush the general, sacrificing himself in some terrific martyrdom so that he could at last gain his vengeance on the vile unicorn who had destroyed his family and raised him into a monster.
Dreamer lunged forward, taking a wild swipe at the pegasus’s neck. Cake ducked and rolled out of the way, springing up gracefully from his roll and into a hover. He had to make a decision now. Reaching back into his jacket, the pegasus whipped out the tie strap.
“What are you going to do with that?” Dreamer snorted. “That thing probably won’t even scratch me.”
Cake dive bombed at Dreamer, swerving and dodging as the general slashed at the charging pegasus. But, the younger stallion was faster. Using the strap like a whip, he sunk one of its hooks into the unicorn’s arm, sending the knife clattering to the ground as the general wailed in pain. Pressing his advantage, Cake yanked the snared unicorn into a choke hold. Everything about this felt so right to the stallion. The way that the life seemed to fade from the struggling unicorn as the breath was squeezed out of his windpipes pleased the betrayed agent, but it still didn’t seem like enough. Dreamer’s death had to be more agonizing than this. It should be bigger than this. The execution of such a tyrant should be conducted where everypony could see their oppressor’s demise.
With this in mind Cake wrapped the tie strap around the general’s neck, forming a crude noose. “This is for Equestria! This is for Scootaloo!” His battle cry echoing throughout the castle, the pegasus swung the other end of the strap over his shoulder and rocketed up into the air. The cool morning air felt so incredibly liberating to Cake as he crashed through the skylight and into the skies above Canterlot with his victim in tow. Cake couldn’t help but sneer as Dreamer struggled to free himself from the rubber noose. “I bet you want down from up here.” he smirked as he soared above the streets of Canterlot. “Don’t worry, General. I’m happy to oblige.” A wicked smile spread across his face from ear to ear as he released his grip on the noose.
The general’s scream was music to the pegasus’s ears and the sickening thump of the unicorn’s body flattening on the street below satisfied Cake more than anything he’d ever done before. Hearing that sound, Cake felt as if a million pounds had been lifted from his shoulders. The stallion who had taken his life from him and turned it into some grand experiment lay dead a thousand feet below. Equestria was free from his tyranny. Cake was at last a free colt, but he was out of time. The satellite was in its final launch stages. He could easily go back to Ponyville and meet the sister he had never known. He could start from scratch and work to rectify his sins. All he had to do was turn around and fly away from the giant satellite that was about to unleash its payload on the rebels below. He couldn’t find it in his heart to do it.
The former agent rocketed through the sky for one last time. He pushed his body to its absolute limit, the sound barrier having long been broken. There was no need to conserve energy now. There was no way he could. He could see the fire of the missiles emanating from the belly of the mighty superweapon. Only seconds were left. He had to go faster. Squinting his eyes, he focused all of his remaining energy for a final push. Flapping his wings at a ridiculous pace, Cake could see the white cone of light forming before him. He was going to be the second pegasus to ever perform a sonic rainboom. “Such a pity I won’t live to tell the tale.” he sighed to himself through gritted teeth as the cone started to turn into a magnificent rainbow. He was only seconds away now. This was his last chance to turn back. His next decision would either be the first of many, or his very last. As he caressed the plunger between his hooves he made his choice.
===
Having been disturbed from her slumber by some sort of explosion, Luna and her personal guards hustled up the stairs of the tower that served as an office for research and development. The carnage she had witnessed so far disgusted her to no end. Outside of General Dreamer’s office she had been the first to lay eyes on the remnants of what had once been one of Dreamer’s agents. There was nothing left of the soldier but a giant blood stain on the hallway’s carpet.
As the princess curiously drew closer to the crimson mess a young ESB cadet rounded the office’s door frame shakily holding a grenade launcher. His eyes were full of tears. They were the eyes of a child who had flirted with death. “I can explain!” he wailed as he dropped his weapon and fell to his knees. “I didn’t mean to kill him! I was only trying to do my duty as a loyal soldier!”
Luna held the cadet in her arms as he wept into her shoulder. “Please calm down.” she cooed in a soothing voice. “Just tell me what happened here and I promise nothing bad will happen to you.” The foal lifted his head, tearing himself away from the alicorn’s embrace. With the princess’s guarantee of safety his tears vanished and the look on his face went from one of despair to one of sheer determination. He turned away and galloped down the hallway, gesturing for the princess and her guards to follow.
The cadet led the group on a wild goose chase that winded through the palace. As the group passed the weapons testing facility they discovered yet another dead agent. It was one of Dreamer’s personal doctors. Instead of stopping to explain, he simply gestured towards the room as if the mere existence of this body explained everything and disappeared around the corner at a full gallop.
With a quick gesture, the commanding guard ordered one of his subordinates to go after the cadet. As the soldier ran down the hallway the officer grabbed the princess by her shoulders, spinning the alicorn around to face him. “Your Highness, it’s not safe here. We need to get you back to your quarters as soon as possible.”
Luna stubbornly stamped her hoof on the floor. “And why is that?” she demanded to know.
The commanding guard glared at the alicorn barking orders at him. “Because we have a murderous traitor on the loose.” he sneered, “One that you yourself double crossed mere hours ago. Doubtless he wants your head as well as the general’s.”
The princess rolled her eyes and sighed. “He wants Dreamer dead far worse than he wants me dead.” she stated plainly as she boredly flipped her mane. “Besides, I’m certain that Cake understands why I did what I did.”
“For your sake, I hope you’re right about that.” he remarked. He had long been used to her naivety. “If I were you I wouldn’t bet my life on that assumption.” the officer advised as he waved for his approaching subordinate and the cadet to head towards the princess. “He’s a dangerous stallion. Probably one of the most dangerous to have ever lived.”
The commander mule kicked the cadet’s knees out from under him as the officer held fast to the young colt’s neck. “Now you listen here, boy!” he hissed as he punched the cadet in the nose causing blood to flow in a crimson tide down the foal’s face. “Either you tell the princess everything you know about the escaped prisoner or I execute you for treason right here on the spot!”
The sniveling colt wiped the blood from his face and spat at the interrogating officer. “Look, I only follow the general’s orders and one of those orders was to keep my mouth shut about this Cake escapade so just go on and shoot me. I have nothing to gain by talking to you.”
The officer whipped out his pistol, pointing it at the cadet’s head. “You had your chance.” he sighed as he pulled the hammer back. “And you decided to blow it.” Luna swiped the gun away from the foal’s skull right as the officer pulled the trigger. The bullet ricocheted off of the floor, finding its final resting place in the wall inches from a startled guard’s rear.
“What the hay do you think you’re doing? The cadet was inches away from cracking and you up and decide to blow his brains out!” Luna screamed as she wrapped her hooves protectively around the foal’s neck. The alicorn turned the young pegasus’s head so that it faced her own, kissing him lightly on the forehead. “Now child,” she cooed. “I don’t think Dreamer would mind if you told me where I can find him now would he?” She asked with a wink. “I want to talk to him myself.”
A sly grin slowly spread across the cadet’s face as he realized the workaround the princess was presenting him with. “You should be able to find the general in the third research and development tower.” he announced in a helpful tone.
“Alright you heard him. Let’s go!” She ordered as she fell in between the ranks of her guards. "Lead the way, Commander!"
===
The sound of shattering glass echoed down the staircase as Luna and her small contingent of Royal Guards approached the entrance to the offices of research and development. As the shattered doorway came into view the soldiers shuffled their leader to the rear of their column and thundered into the room. It was a total disaster area. Littering the floor were the remnants of the shattered skylight. Crimson tinged bullet fragments mixed in with their casings and broken glass, giving the place the appearance of a miniature war zone. In her many years as a ruler, Luna had never seen this much carnage in one place. The three bodies were particularly appalling to the princess.
The soldiers immediately flocked to the aid of their fallen comrades, but the body of the mercenary lay alone and forgotten. The alicorn couldn’t believe her eyes. It was Scootaloo, her body riddled with bullets and covered in blood. Luna rushed towards the pegasus’s corpse, sliding to a stop on her knees as she checked her friend’s neck for a pulse. Her breathing had stopped, but she still had a heartbeat; a very slow and sporadic heartbeat. Part of her skull had been shot off, but her brain hadn’t been touched. There was still a slim chance at saving the downed pegasus.
Luna propped her friend up against her chest as she started barking out orders to her guards. “Get this mare a stretcher and take her to Nurse Redheart. She’s to be designated a top priority patient. Is that understood?”
The soldiers stood frozen beside the dead agents. “But Princess,” the commander finally piped up. “She’s a rebel. If anything she should be put to death, not rescued. As far as we know she was the one who killed our comrades here.” The head stallion gave an awkward smile as he voiced his objection.
“She’s an undercover agent of mine who got herself in a little too deep.” Luna said, stretching the truth so that the guards would jump into action. “She’s a true patriot if there ever was one. The loss to the Monarchy would be immeasurable if we allowed her to die.” As she spoke the volume of her voice rose, becoming more venomous with each word spoken. “If I were you, Commander, I wouldn’t allow that to happen now, would I?”
“You two!” The officer shouted as he randomly pointed out two of his subordinates. “Why haven’t you followed the princess’s orders already?” he hissed as he tried pinning the blame for the delay elsewhere. “Get that mare to Redheart on the double!”
“Sir, I’m getting countless reports of an unauthorized pegasus in the Canterlot airspace.” a skinny, geeky looking guard informed with a worried look on his face. “The Royal Equestrian Air Force is scrambling all available intercept units. I’ve just received confirmation that pegasus has managed to take General Dreamer hostage.”
The commander’s expression turned sullen as he sized up the situation at hand. “Ask Air Traffic Control about the bogey’s location, tech sergeant. If it’s the traitor than we may need to evacuate the princess.”
“That information just came in, sir.” the sergeant dutifully stated. “ATC confirms that the bandit is hovering...” the soldier’s jaw seemed to come off its hinges, his voice now showing trace amounts of fear. “Sir, he’s released the general. He’s flying towards the Phoenix.”
The officer breathed in a sigh of relief. “Good, that’s one less detail we have to worry about.” he declared as he wiped the sweat from his brow.
The sergeant shook his head in disgust as he corrected his superior. “No commander, our intercept units didn’t make it in time. Dreamer is dead.”
Luna nearly jumped for joy at the news of the general’s death, but she was quick to hide her happiness. She was surrounded by soldiers. The majority of whom had a deep respect for the deceased head of the ESB. “I’m flying to the roof, Commander. I want to see what becomes of this traitor with my own eyes.”
Silencing his objections she put her hoof up to her lips as she flew through the hole in the skylight. She could barely make out the form of the fleeing pegasus as a dozen of the Air Force’s best valiantly flew in pursuit. The chances of Cake actually completing the mission were practically none. The deadly satellite was in its final launch preparations. She could already see the smoke of the missiles emanating from the Phoenix’s weapons bay.
The rebels, her dearest friends and most trusted soldiers were going to die. Pound Cake was going to die. On the same night that the general himself had been killed, everypony who had worked to stop his tyranny would die. Dreamer was going to get the last laugh. The tears rolled freely down the alicorn’s cheek. She hadn’t felt this much sorrow in a thousand years.
Having followed the princess onto the roof, the commander placed his hoof onto her shoulder. “I know the general’s death must come as a terrible shock to you,” he said in a comforting voice, “but he can be replaced. Soon our enemies will be destroyed and the Monarchy will be stronger than ever.”
Luna brushed his hoof away as she lay back and cried. Ignoring this, the officer continued his attempts at cheering the alicorn up. “Look at that star below the Phoenix! I’ve never seen such a bright star before! It’s bound to be a sign of good fortune, Your Highness!”
“Indeed it is!” Luna shouted as she bolted upright, her heart surging with hope. The star kept getting bigger and brighter until it exploded into a million rays of rainbow colored light. “It’s a sonic rainboom!”
The pair stared in awe at the majestic phenomenon before them. “Who managed to pull that off?” The general asked with a look of shock. He didn’t have to wait long for his answer as soon the sky was rocked by yet another gigantic explosion. The Phoenix seemed to evaporate as the payload of the nuke’s was unleashed upon the fearsome metallic bird. Like fireworks, fiery debris rained down upon the Everfree Forest.
The tech sergeant appeared at the skylight, shouting for the commander’s attention. “Sir, the surviving interceptors have come under attack by what they claim are the Wonderbolt’s ghosts! The streets are overflowing with rioters demanding freedom! They’re fast approaching the palace! It’s not safe here anymore!”
“Princess, we have to leave!” the officer pleaded as he tugged on her wings.
She refused to budge. Instead she spread her wings as if she were planning on flying into the approaching gaggle of revolutionaries. “I’ll do as I please.” she announced defiantly. “Find my sister and tell her to meet me on the balcony so we can address our subjects. It’s time to set things right.”
===
The Royal Gardens, Canterlot: December 30, 2034
A pony strolled into Canterlot’s newest monument, the Heroes’ Memorial. To her it was one of the most magnificent sights she had ever had the privilege of beholding. It was the perfect place to find that spark inspiration she needed. The lengthy marble wall that surrounded the monument was engraved with the names of the thousands who had lost their lives during the twenty years of terror. She stared in awe at the centerpiece of the memorial. A gigantic bronze statue that towered over the ponies carrying out their daily lives below. The statue was of a flying pegasus, a pegasus named Cake. A pegasus who had made the ultimate sacrifice in the name of freedom. The eyes of the statue seemed to follow the commuters below as they cantered along, but no matter how the mare tilted her head the statue’s eyes always looked to be focused on one pair of ponies in particular.
The pony took a seat on a bench at the edge of the memorial. The sight of the two ponies, a mother and daughter, gazing at the grand sculpture with tears in their eyes captured the mare’s heart. Inspired at last, she pulled out her pen and notepad. She finally knew what she would write.
“Dear Luna,
It’s hard to believe that it’s been a little over a year since that fateful night Equestria reclaimed its freedom. I’ll never forget the look on Redheart’s face when you and Celestia announced on the radio to all of your subjects that you were reforming the councils of old and abdicating the throne. It was the last thing anypony expected for you to do, even if it was the right thing to do. I’m sure you’ll be excited to hear that thanks to the testimony of a few key members of the NLR the council has cleared you of any crimes against Equestria. I’ve even heard a rumor that they’re considering reinstating you and your sister as government figureheads for ‘traditional’ purposes. I know I’ve missed addressing you as a princess.
The address that you gave yesterday at the commencement ceremony for the new Heroes’ Memorial was simply breathtaking. I doubt if I’ll ever hear such elegant use of the Equestrian language again. I’m writing this to you as I sit on a bench, watching two of my friends, Pinkie Pie and Pumpkin Pie, as they admire the Statue of Unsung Heroes. Words can’t even begin to describe the look on Pumpkin’s face as her eyes come to rest on the face of the brother she never knew. It’s one of those solemn moments that’s joyous at the same time. It doesn’t look like Pinkie has stopped crying since she arrived at the monument. She keeps telling Pumpkin not to worry about her, but I know she knew about Cake all along. She’s having trouble forgiving herself for letting Pound Cake go as a baby. I want to remind her that even if he was raised as a villain he died a hero. That’s all Pumpkin needs to know about him. Her brother was a hero and a good stallion. There will probably never be a soldier more skilled than him. I was privileged to have worked with him for as long as I had.
Anyways I wish you the best and don’t worry. I’ve already forgiven you. You did what you thought was best for Equestria.”
===
Pinkie watched through teary eyes as Pumpkin ran her hoof across the engraving of the plaque that read “Pound Cake: Soldier, Hero, and Martyr.” It was a solemn moment; one that broke the pink pony’s heart. “I’m proud that your brother became a hero.” she paused to sniffle and wipe her nose. “I only wish that you could have met him.”
The earth pony hugged her daughter in closer. Pumpkin was finally seeing the face of her brother, Equestria’s newest hero. Pinkie admired the glossy eyes of the grandiose statue, raising her eyebrows in suspicion as she did so. They were being watched. Pinkie whirled around, hoping to catch their stalker on the park bench behind her. There was only a white feather fluttering in the wind.
Author's Note
This story was originally conceived and drafted well before season 3 started. It's been sitting in my fic folder since the beginning of last school year waiting for final edits. I honestly forgot about it and I recently found it and finished it. I hope you've enjoyed it. I know I enjoyed writing it.
