When Night Falls

Chapters

One Bad Day
A Monster I Am
Playing With Armageddon

One Bad Day

WHEN NIGHT FALLS
A My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Short Story
By Sentinel 28A

Agent William Collins was having a bad day.
As a senior agent of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, it was his job to help investigate incidents regarding any of those four items. Usually, this was fairly simple: moonshiners in the backwoods of the South, cigarette smugglers from Europe, gun shops selling illegal automatic weapons, accidents with high explosives. Occasionally, it involved terrorism, especially since the events of September 11. Given that Collins was assigned to the Midwest, the latter was blessedly rare. Most of his duties were, in fact, essentially that of a Federal policeman. He handed out more fines than prison time. It had been over a decade since he had drawn his weapon in anger.
This time, things were different.
He had been awoken from a sound sleep by an emergency call from downstate: an explosion had occurred at a high school. First responders had thought it a gas main explosion, which was terrible in its own right: Canterlot High School was in the middle of its Fall Formal. Since damage to the school was significant, it was feared that there might be several dozen dead and many more wounded. To everyone’s relief, no one was badly injured, let alone dead. That was fortunate. Unfortunately for Bill Collins’ sleep, evidence pointed to an act of domestic terrorism.
A multiagency team was immediately dispatched to Canterlot High, made up of agents from the FBI, ATFB, and Homeland Security, plus state and local police. As he was closest and most senior, Collins took the lead for the ATFB. One look at the school and Collins was stunned that there had been no casualties. Though the other agencies were still investigating, interviews with the student body and teachers present for the Fall Formal pointed towards one suspect: a young woman incongruously named Sunset Shimmer. When agents came to Shimmer’s house, twenty-four hours after the incident, she had surrendered without a fight.
Collins leaned back in his chair, glanced at the pack of cigarettes on his desk, and fought down the urge to smoke. He was trying to quit, but any time he was in a quandary, the nicotine cravings got worse. He threw the pack into a desk drawer and pushed it shut. Then he sat up straight and opened Sunset Shimmer’s file.
Shimmer had invoked her right to remain silent. A cursory investigation into her background turned up nothing suspicious. She had no connections to any foreign terrorist group, showed no tendency towards radical causes foreign or domestic, and had never committed crimes, aside from one instance of shoplifting at a mall a year previously. Her grades were superb and she had been consistently elected to student government, Glee Club, and was princess of the Fall Formal two years running. This was not the psychological profile of someone disgruntled with society, or someone angry with the country’s foreign policy. In short, Sunset Shimmer showed none of the tendencies of a terrorist.
When the FBI had dug deeper, however, then the anomalies started showing up. Shimmer had no friends, and in fact seemed to shun others. She had been disciplined for bullying on several occasions. Flipping through the psychological profile, Collins was struck by the similarity to school shooters: few to no friends, a superiority complex, a hate for authority figures. Not all of those pointed towards a tendency to commit a violent act, but they were part of the classic profile. At first blush to Collins, it was an open-and-shut case: Shimmer was angry about something, and whatever it was pushed her over the edge. She had rigged a bomb—given the size of the crater in front of the high school, probably a car bomb—and attempted a mass casualty attack on her school. A young psychotic, motivated by revenge: sadly, nothing new for the ATFB, though it had never happened to Collins. Shimmer had some background in chemistry and science, not likely to be enough to be able to build something like a car bomb, but as Boston and Oklahoma City had shown, one did not need a great deal of experience or sophistication to pull something like this—and a bomber need only get lucky once. From the bruises, burns and scars on her body, she was by far the worst injured student, which was seen as a smoking gun: it was a botched bombing.
The FBI had dug a little deeper, and instead of the Canterlot Bombing, as it was now known, being a relatively simple case, it had turned into the headache Collins was rapidly acquiring, from a bureaucratic point of view. Sunset Shimmer lived alone, which was unusual for a teenager; records of parents and relatives proved to be forged, though done in a very professional matter: Canterlot High, the school district, even water and power companies were completely unaware that the only occupant of Shimmer’s house was her.
The investigation was far from complete, but it looked very much like a pattern of forgeries and false fronts; attempts to begin a money trail were fruitless so far. It was as if Sunset Shimmer had simply appeared out of nowhere as a teenager five years ago. That was ominous, to say the least. It was something that spy agencies did to insert agents, though it was doubtful that any enemy of the United States would go to the trouble of inserting a spy into a high school at age thirteen. What had the agents assigned to the case worried was that Sunset Shimmer was somehow inserted in deep cover by a terrorist group: she had failed to inflict anything but property damage, but how many more were out there? It was the classic, terrifying dilemma: anyone and everyone could be a suspect.
Collins sighed, took out a stick of gum, and began chewing it. He put down Shimmer’s file and picked up another, this one filled with the interviews of students and teachers at the formal, including the principal, Mary Celestia.
And that was where it got weird.
Every agent worth his or her salt knew that interviews taken immediately after an event were likely to be a little off. Shock would set in and ten people would give ten different versions of the story. Still, it was necessary to get the interviews while memory was still fresh, before news reports and other testimonies colored and changed one’s recollections. Even the tiniest detail could be what blew a case open. So Collins was used to people seeing and hearing things, especially impressionable teenagers…but he had never run into anything like this.
The agents taking testimony were at first stunned, then angered at what the students were saying. The students were given stern warnings to quit trying to be funny, and a few switched their story around. Just as many stuck to their testimony, however. Investigators disbelievingly wrote on notepads and laptops about demons, crowns, magic and seeing six of their fellow students cast spells. The only thing that matched was that all of them had a memory lapse lasting anywhere from three minutes to ten. Agents, Collins included, were ready to call the whole thing a mass hallucination caused by the shock of the explosion, or possibly fumes from ruptured gas lines, or maybe (as one DHS agent had joked), the punch was spiked with LSD. None of this helped Sunset Shimmer’s case any: besides the memory lapse, the only other thing that everyone agreed to was that she was responsible.
He jumped when there was a rapping on his door. “Come in.”
Collins was surprised—pleasantly so—when the door admitted a particularly attractive woman. She was tall, almost at his own six feet, with a long fall of black hair, which he noted in passing was out of regulation for a government employee. She was pleasantly proportioned and filled out the richly-cut women’s business suit and knee-length skirt rather well. Without meaning to, his eyes were drawn immediately to hers: they were a vivid purple, bright, almost luminous.

He realized she had caught him looking at her. She smiled to show she took no offense. “Agent Collins?” She stuck out a well-manicured hand. “My name is Tina Mattson.”
Collins came out from behind his desk and shook hands. “Miss…?” he hesitatingly began. At her nod, he continued, “Miss Mattson. I got your call only an hour ago.”

“Yes; sorry for the short notice. The agency called me in on the Canterlot bombing only this morning, so don’t feel bad.”

He motioned to a chair and resumed his seat. He opened up a small refrigerator. “Coke?”

“Certainly.” The accent was hard to place, Collins thought; there was just the hint of a British accent, but it was more Middle Atlantic. Ivy League schooling, then. She was wearing a security badge, but already had her identification out. He checked it, then her paperwork that she withdrew from an inner pocket of her suit; he noted in passing that she did not carry a firearm, or if she did, it was not in the customary shoulder holster. He whistled softly when he read the paperwork: Agent Mattson had a higher security clearance than he did.
“Washington said you were a specialist,” Collins said, returning the paperwork and shoving the Shimmer files over to her.

“That’s right.” She opened the folders, frowned, withdrew a pair of reading glasses from another pocket, and scanned them.

“In school, um, incidents?”

She looked at him over the top of her glasses, which made her even prettier, Collins decided. “Actually, no.” She took off the glasses. “For lack of a better word, I would say…weird happenings.” She laughed a little. “In fact, my branch of the agency was originally going to be called the Weird Happenings Organization, but it turns out that it’s trademarked. So they settled on Agency Zero.” She rolled her eyes. “Makes us sound very ominous, but really it’s pretty mundane.”
“So what is it that Agency Zero does?”
“Investigates crimes that don’t make sense, basically. Someone reports seeing a UFO, the Air Force can’t or won’t verify that it’s a load of bull, you start getting calls to the mayor or governor or whatever, and someone calls us. A lot of the time it turns out to be nothing: someone saw a military plane over central Nevada and immediately assumed it was aliens.” She shrugged. “If I had a dime for every time I’ve interviewed someone who turned out to be a drunk redneck with too much moonshine on board, I could retire.”
“Ever actually found anything you couldn’t solve?” Collins didn’t expect to get an answer, and was mildly surprised when he did.
“Oh, certainly. I would say a good third of our cases remain unsolved.” She smiled again. “A plane disappears over the Bermuda Triangle. We get called, we can’t prove foul play or anything else, so the case remains unsolved. Anyone with a brain knows that some moron just flew his Cessna 172 into the water on a moonless night, but without a body or evidence, we have to leave it open. Next thing you know, some crank is calling midnight talk radio to say that they were abducted by aliens and saw the missing person. It’s sad and stupid, but there you are.” She replaced her glasses. “If you don’t mind…”

“Right.” He let her read the file in silence. When she was done looking over what little was known of Sunset Shimmer and the interviews, she put her glasses away and sat back, taking a long drink of soda. “What do you think?” he asked.

“I’m not sure, to be honest.” She tapped the folders. “We have the entire façade of a school blown off and a crater fifty feet deep by sixty feet wide, with the leaves blown off the trees and most of the windows shattered. Classic car bomb scenario—except there’s no car, no parts, not even a hint of explosive residue.”

“Which is impossible,” Collins added.

“Exactly. Which means that either the ATFB has missed something…” her voice trailed off, watching his reaction. He shrugged: it was possible. “Well, it’s only been 72 hours. In Sunset Shimmer’s case, we have someone who doesn’t appear to have existed six years ago. We have a birth certificate, but it’s forged. The parents named convienently died in a car wreck ten years ago, and there’s no record of a foster family.”

“The forgeries were professionally done, too.”

“Indeed,” Mattson answered. “Everyone in the city was fooled. It was only because the FBI ended up suspecting forgery that she was even caught.”

“Okay, but did you read the weird stuff?”

“Oh my, yes.” She shook her head in wonder. “Sunset Shimmer became some sort of a winged demon after putting on the Fall Formal crown. She then transformed two other students into demons, tore the front off the school, and did everything in the Cartoon Villain handbook, up to and including the cackling laughter. All we need is thunder and lightning.” She sniffed a laugh. “Then everyone has a massive memory loss. They wake up, as it were, with a crater in front of the school and Shimmer back to normal, curled up in a ball and crying her eyes out. End of testimony.” She sighed. “That’s what about half of them say, anyhow. The others claim seeing Shimmer parking a car out front and setting off a bomb. There’s even one person who insists that Shimmer intended to kill everyone at the formal because she lost out to this…what was the name?”

“Twilight Sparkle,” Collins supplied. “What is it with parents giving their kids weird names? They didn’t do that when I was growing up.” He reached over and pulled the Shimmer file back to him. “It gets freakier. There’s no record of Twilight Sparkle in school files, but the principal, several teachers, and some kid named Flash Sentry insists that she’s a real person. It’s like she showed up out of nowhere too and disappeared just as quickly.”

“You think she was killed?”

“We haven’t found anything like body parts—not even skin. It would take a bomb a lot more powerful than that to vaporize someone. No one’s filed a missing persons report either.” He finished the Coke. “Now according to the kids, she was palling with some other kids…” Collins checked the file. “Your agency interviewed these six, and they don’t know a damn thing about a Twilight Sparkle. They were at the Formal, and their testimony doesn’t match up. Amy Applejack holds to the demon story; in fact, she’s pretty damn detailed about it. Riana Verdunnt claims that she showed up late and missed the whole thing. Fluttershy Everfree—you know her parents were hippies—broke down crying; best we could figure out was that she’s sticking to the demon story. Rainbow Dash, which has got to be a nickname, started screaming about her rights and finally told us she didn’t see a damn thing other than Sunset Shimmer causing trouble. And this Diane Pinkamena…” Collins closed the file. “She talked so fast the agents couldn’t get anything out of her. What they did get made even less sense than anything else.”

They sat in silence for a few minutes. “Is Sunset Shimmer being held here?” Mattson asked.

“Yeah, downstairs. She’s been quiet. We Mirandized her, so she knows her rights. Given the evidence, she’s being charged with a ton of counts of forgery and mail fraud. We’re holding off on any terrorism charges until we get something more concrete, but the paperwork’s already there. She’s going to jail for sure, but the question now is if she goes for ten years for fraud or life for attempted first-degree murder.” He paused. “Or death if it turns out she knocked off this Twilight Sparkle character.”

“Can I see her?”

Collins got up. “Yeah. Let’s go.”

Author's Note

That didn't take long, did it? I actually got the idea for this story right in the middle of working on "Blood On the Moon," thanks to a discussion I had with another fan on Derpibooru. The discussion centered around "What happened to Sunset Shimmer after Twilight Sparkle went back to Equestria?" We agreed that, given the damage done to the high school at the end, you can bet that there would be law enforcement all over the place trying to find what happened. Sooner or later, Sunset Shimmer would find herself in very big trouble. This story explores that.

The story assumes that the world of EQG happens in ours (minus there being a show called "My Little Pony," apparently), and therefore is going to deal a lot with "mundanes" having to deal with magic and humanized talking horses. It's not going to be very long, and there's going to be quite a few twists to the story.

I changed some of the names of the Mane Six, since it's doubtful that there would be anyone with the single name of "Applejack" or "Celestia" running around in the modern world. Old time anime fans might get the Bill Collins reference; indie comic fans might also get the use of the name "Agency Zero," which I'm borrowing from another comic with rather weird happenings...which shall remain unnamed for now, because it's a big clue as to what's really going on. Sort of.

Hope you bronies and pegasisters like it.

A Monster I Am

“Well…she’s definitely unusual,” Tina Mattson said as she and Bill Collins looked through the one-way mirror. Sunset Shimmer sat on the other side, wearing orange prison garb. It blended well with her striking hair: bright red with yellow highlights that flowed through it like waves—Shimmer apparently took her name seriously enough to make her hair reflect it. Her expression was vacant, and she stared into nothing. Her hands were unbound.
“Do you mind if I speak with her alone?” Mattson asked Collins.
“Not at all. I figured you’d want to. She’s not considered violent, but…” He put a hand on his pistol, in its shoulder holster. “Do you want it?”
“I doubt it’ll come to that, Mr. Collins. I can take care of myself.” She winked. “Besides, if I do need you, you’re right here, correct?”
“You bet.” He nodded at her. “Good luck. No one else has had any.”

Mattson closed the door behind her. She carried with her a tray with two water bottles and Shimmer’s file. Using her feet, she scooted out the chair opposite Shimmer, sat down, and pushed a bottle towards the girl. “Go ahead, drink it. You’ve got to be a little thirsty.” According to Collins, Shimmer was eating and drinking, but just enough to keep herself going. She seemed detached from the world around her, but dutifully reached for the bottle, unscrewed it, and took a drink. Mattson set aside one bottle for herself and slid the file between them.
She let the silence stretch for awhile; it was an old interrogator’s trick. If a suspect was chatty at heart, or had a guilty conscience, they might start talking. Shimmer was neither, and said nothing.
“Miss Shimmer,” Mattson finally said, “my name is Tina Mattson. I’m an agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation. I suspect you know why I’m here.” Shimmer nodded slowly. “Good. Now the reason why I’m here is to talk with you. That’s all. I’m a psychologist—“ she left off the criminal part of her title “—and I want to help you.
“As of now, you’ve been charged with several counts of forgery, mail fraud, and some other minor charges. Assuming a jury finds you guilty—and given the amount of evidence the FBI, the ATFE, and DHS has collected on you, they likely will—you will be going to jail. I should also mention that, given that you are eighteen years of age, you will be tried as an adult. The question you face is this: are you going to a minimum-security prison for ten years with eligibility for parole in three years…or are you going to a high-security prison for domestic terrorism and conspiracy to commit mass murder for life with no eligibility for parole?” She watched Shimmer’s face carefully and saw the girl blanch. “There’s also the possibility that you might even be charged with first-degree murder of one Twilight Sparkle.” There was a definite reaction that time, but Mattson could not place if it was rage, regret, or fear. Still, Shimmer did nothing but take another drink of water.
The silence stretched for long moments, then Mattson sighed. She said something softly under her breath and took a drink of water. Some of it splashed on her hands, and she flicked it away, almost in a pattern. Once she was done, she set down the bottle and faced the girl squarely.

“Listen to me very carefully, Sunset Shimmer,” she said quietly. “I know what you are. I know what you did. And I am telling you to be very, very honest with me, or a human prison is the least punishment you face.”

Shimmer blinked. “What?” she finally said.

“Right now, the people behind that mirror—“ Mattson gestured nonchalantly at the one-way window “—are hearing whatever I want them to hear. They can hear a confession of guilt, or complete innocence, or me having a one-sided conversation with you. But I can tell you this: if you don’t tell me the truth, they’re going to hear about how little Sunset Shimmer conspired to kill her fellow students, and did kill Twilight Sparkle. That’s a capital offense in any realm.”

“I don’t understand,” Shimmer replied.

“Let me put it this way: you’re not the only one who can cast magic around here.”

Shimmer’s mouth fell open, and she visibly resisted recoiling in terror. “You’re…your shadow…”

“Yes. Now shall we cut the bullshit?” Mattson opened the file. “Now the mundanes over there don’t know where you came from, but I know very well that you are not human. Not originally. You’re radiating magic all over the damn place.” She took out a sheaf of papers from her suit; they were not the same sheaf of papers she had given Collins. “These are statements from five students whose lives you attempted to ruin, and possibly end: Amy Applejack, Riana ‘Rarity’ Verdunnt, Fluttershy Everfree, ‘Rainbow’ Peggy Dash, and Diane ‘Pinkie Pie’ Pinkamena. All of them had some very interesting stories to tell me; luckily for you I got to them before the FBI or the ATFE. Can you guess at what they said?” When Shimmer hesitated, Mattson’s voice became a snarl. “Answer me!”

“I have rights—“

“Yes, you do. As a human being and a citizen of this nation, you have the right to remain silent. But you’re not human, so you don’t have rights as far as I am concerned.” Mattson’s eyes narrowed. “I can compel you to answer, but I don’t think you really want me to do that.” Shimmer turned very pale. Mattson could see that had sparked a bad memory. “Now talk to me.”
Shimmer looked away and Mattson knew she had won. She did not feel particularly triumphant. At last, Shimmer began to speak. “Sunset Shimmer is my real name.”

“I figured no one would make something like that up.”

Shimmer shakily took another drink. “Um…as you say, I’m not human, though for all intents and purposes I am. But not originally. Originally I am…was…a unicorn pony from the land of Equestria. I was a student of the ruler of Equestria and the greatest sorceress in the land, an alicorn named Princess Celestia. An alicorn is—“

“I know what an alicorn is. I have quite the working knowledge of mythology.”

“Uh, yes. In any case, Celestia held me back. She didn’t want me to learn certain things.” Now Mattson could see the anger rising. Shimmer’s voice lost its tremor. “I wanted to be an equal to her. I wanted respect. She wouldn’t give it to me. She wouldn’t let me learn. I just wanted to be an alicorn, like her. I wanted to rule. I mean, that simpleton Cadance is an alicorn! What makes her so special, just because she’s related to the royal family? What a load of horseapples—“

“Sunset Shimmer.” Mattson’s voice brought her back to the here and now. “Please stick to the point.” Her voice lost some of its edge. “I know what dealing with royalty is like. Go on.”

Shimmer took a breath. “When Celestia wouldn’t let me learn what I wanted to, I got very mad. Angry, I mean. I rebelled, but I was just a student. I didn’t have a chance. She kicked me out, but she didn’t know I’d already decided to leave. So I did. I left Equestria through a magic mirror and came here.”

“It must’ve been rough to learn you were a teenager here.”

“It sure was, but I adapted just fine.” Now Shimmer was on a roll. Mattson had already figured out that Shimmer liked to talk about herself, and let her do so. “I used my magic to forge my identity. I figured out real quick that you can’t get anywhere here without some sort of background. I looked up some people that died a while back in a car crash and took over their identity. The rest was easy, once I had established all of that. I enrolled in middle school, got through that easily, and made my way into high school.”

“Staying under the radar.”

“I knew humans would find me suspicious if I didn’t go to school. I figured this was the easiest way to stay hidden. Occasionally I went back to Equestria to see how things were going and try to figure out how to get back at that bitch Celestia, but I had to be very careful.”

“I can imagine,” Mattson said sympathetically. “This Celestia sounds very frightening.”

“You don’t know the half of it. She exiled her sister to the moon for a thousand years.”

Mattson didn’t have to fake shock. “A thousand years?”

Shimmer nodded emphatically. “See what I mean?”

“Indeed. Please, continue.”

“Well, I found out that after I was unfairly kicked out, Celestia adopted another student, Twilight Sparkle.” Mattson nodded; now they were getting somewhere. “Little Miss Perfect Twilight. Somehow, she finagled her way into Celestia’s trust, and got hold of the Elements of Harmony.” Before Mattson could ask, Shimmer told her. “They’re very powerful magical artifacts. I knew if I got control of those, I could show Celestia a thing or two.

“So I bided my time. When I found out that Twilight got to be an alicorn—“ Shimmer’s fists clenched and she actually ground her teeth “—I knew I had to make my move. I’d already pretty much taken over Canterlot High—“

“Sorry to interrupt, but I noticed the similarities between your world of origin and the name of the high school,” Mattson said.

“Oh yes. Turns out that this city is a reflection of Equestria. Everyone here has a pony counterpart there. They’re very similar. So far I think it’s just this town. Apparently it’s some sort of nexus or something. Even Celestia has an opposite number—Mary Celestia, the principal of my school. Even that dimwit Trixie Lullamoon has someone here just like her. It’s a bit like that one Star Trek episode, the one with the mirror universe.”

“Fascinating,” Mattson deadpanned. “So, you went after these Elements of Harmony to overthrow this tyrannical sun goddess…”

“I stole Twilight’s crown easily enough, and I knew Celestia would send her after me. Celestia can’t come through the portal; her plot is too big or something. Her ass,” Shimmer explained when Mattson raised an eyebrow. “I was ready. I knew Twilight would end up finding her friends’ counterparts here, but I’d already driven them apart so they couldn’t help her. Twilight didn’t have a few months to figure out human customs and such. She made such a fool out of herself!” Shimmer laughed.

“How so?”

“Walking around on all fours, trying to use her fingers like hooves, that sort of thing.”

Mattson snickered. “God, you didn’t introduce her to the internet, did you?”
“No; I imagine she did that herself.”
They shared a laugh at that. “Poor girl.”
“Yeah…” Shimmer abruptly became angry, a slow burning fuse rather than towering rage. “Turns out Twilight managed to get her friends back together. That little bitch. She even got Flash Sentry on her side—Flash Sentry! The most popular boy in school and my former boyfriend!” Shimmer shook her head and tried to calm down, and succeeded. “I underestimated her. I admit that. And she took me by surprise when she was willing to give up her chance to go home to fight me for the crown. She got herself elected princess of the Fall Formal, but I got the crown anyway.”
“And that’s when everything went wrong.” Mattson ran her hands over the file. “Becoming a demon, and all.”
Shimmer sighed. “Do you know what it’s like to have that much power at your fingertips? To realize that you’re more powerful than anyone else, ever? That you can do anything?” She looked down. “I loved it. I wanted more. I wanted Equestria. I wanted to see Celestia begging at my feet for mercy.”
“Do you still?” Mattson asked softly.
“I…don’t know.” Shimmer regarded her reflection in the water bottle. “The crown did something to me. Made me weak while it was making me strong, I guess. I had everything, Agent Mattson. Everything. And somehow…Twilight and her friends stopped me. They didn’t have magical items. She didn’t even have her crown. She just had…friendship.” Tears formed at the edges of Shimmer’s eyes. “I don’t understand how she did it. It’s like she summoned the Elements from Equestria and gave them to her friends. How can she do that? She’s not powerful enough to do that. Not even Celestia’s that powerful…is she?”

Shimmer’s voice trailed off. She had reached the end of her story. Mattson closed the file. “That leaves me with one question, Sunset Shimmer. Why?” Shimmer was obviously confused, so Mattson elaborated. “You were a very powerful demon, with apparently unlimited power. According to Applejack’s testimony, and others, you enslaved the school with a mind-control spell and intended to use them as your army to retake Equestria. Is Celestia’s army so small that a student body of less than a thousand could take the realm?”

Shimmer said nothing for a long moment. “I thought that…if I brought the humans through the portal…Celestia wouldn’t hurt them because she knew they were innocent. That would distract her long enough for me to use the crown against her.”

“If she was the tyrant you say she is, she would kill the humans without a second thought.” Mattson tapped her fingers on the table. “Which is it, Sunset Shimmer? Is this Celestia a genocidal tyrant, or a fair ruler who was merely disciplining a student who had grown selfish, ambitious and foolish?” She let that sink in a moment, then continued, her voice rising. “A student who was so self-centered she was willing to sacrifice a thousand young men and women for her own petty revenge? Young people who might, under certain circumstances, be the friends you wouldn’t allow them to be?”
Mattson felt her own anger swelling, and brought herself under control. “We have words for people like that, Sunset. We call them tyrants.” She stared at Shimmer sadly. “You may not be familiar with the human philosopher Nietzsche, but he once wrote that those who stare into the abyss too long become the abyss themselves. A monster we are, lest monsters we become, and all that. Except you were already a monster, Sunset. You chose that path for yourself willingly and freely. And for that you will pay.”
Shimmer shuddered. “What…what does that mean?”
“I don’t know yet. Human justice and my justice are different, sometimes. If it was me, I would kill you. I still may have to, because you’re not only a threat to Equestria, you’re also a threat to Earth. You’re a threat to the entire timestream. Agency Zero’s job is to eliminate those threats. That’s what I came here for.”

“You’re going to kill me, then?” Shimmer’s eyes were round with fear.

“Perhaps. It depends on what my superiors decide. For now, you’re just going to jail. My suggestion is that whatever deal comes your way, you take it. It’s infinitely better than what I will do to you.” Mattson stood, gathered up the files, papers, and bottles, and regarded Sunset Shimmer. “Maybe, just maybe, you’ll learn what it means to have friends, and what you’ve thrown away. Then maybe you can find hope. I don’t know. I personally think you’re too far gone for that.”

Shimmer looked terrified now, as if she was staring into the open gates of hell. “You hate me?”

“For what you almost did? For what you intended to do?” Mattson bared her teeth. “Yes, I do.”

Collins was waiting for her at the door to the interrogation room. She shut it behind her securely, then looked at him. “You heard all that?”

He nodded. “That girl’s crazy as hell. Talking ponies? Magical crowns? A zombie army?” He whistled. “She’s never going to stand trial now. She’s insane.”

Mattson sighed. “Not exactly my clinical analysis, but close enough. My suggestion is that she be remanded to a mental institution and gets the help she needs for a year or two. Then we’ll see where she’s at. I actually feel sorry for her,” Mattson lied.

Collins blew out his breath. “Same here. And I thought I had it rough in high school.” He grinned at her. “What amazes me is how you kept quiet throughout that whole tirade. Here she’s sounding like a Dungeons and Dragons reject mixed with Hitler, and you’re just nodding. Then you tell her to have a nice day and left like nothing happened. If you don’t mind me saying so, Agent Mattson, you are one cool lady.”

She rubbed her face. “And I could go for a cool one right now. It’s close enough to quitting time, Agent Collins.” She smiled coquettishly. “Join me?”

“Let me get my coat.”

Mattson did not spare Sunset Shimmer a parting glance as she walked away.

Author's Note

When the muse strikes, you can't resist, so here's another chapter. One more after this, probably. (Told you it was short.)

There's a lot of similarities between the way I wrote Trixie and Sunset Shimmer. I tried to stay away from that as much as I could. I like Trixie as a character; I dislike Shimmer. I wanted to leave some hope open (one of the recurring themes in MLP is redemption, after all), but also wanted her to be the monster she was in EQG. She was already a demon long before she took on the form of one. And personally, I don't mind MLP having one villain who refuses to be redeemed. We'll see, I guess.

Again, I altered the names of a few of the Mane Six again, and made some educated guesses as to how Sunset Shimmer got established in the human world and why she was kicked out of Equestria. IDW comics is doing a Shimmer issue, and the sneak peek I saw of that is reflected here.

Playing With Armageddon

It was a nice dinner, Tina Mattson reflected as she looked up at the ceiling in Bill Collins’ bed. There was really no reason to accept Collins’ invitation to a “nightcap,” as he so quaintly put it, when it was obvious what was on the other agent’s mind. She glanced over at him, sleeping soundly, and quietly giggled. It was fun to do this every now and then, and Collins was not bad, not bad at all.
Unfortunately she was still on the clock, as it were. Mattson leaned over and whispered into his ear. “Bill, listen to me very carefully. As far as you’re concerned, it was a car bomb planted by a deranged student, Sunset Shimmer. She botched it, which was why no one was hurt. This is an open-and-shut case, and Shimmer will be remanded to an insane asylum, because she is clearly not fit to take the stand.” He murmured something in his sleep, and Mattson smiled. “And you were great.” She waited for a moment, then got up, dressed, and wrote a quick note. He would understand that this was a one-night stand; he might look for Tina Mattson, but he would never find her. Tina Mattson did not exist.
Mattson walked back to her hotel, which wasn’t far. She checked her watch. By now, other Agency Zero agents would have planted evidence around the crater, evidence which the FBI and ATFE would miraculously “find” the next morning. Poor Sunset Shimmer, Mattson thought, you really had no idea who you were messing with, did you? Mattson briefly considered that the poor girl would commit suicide, then shrugged it off. That was not her problem, and it would solve a number of things. She supposed she should feel bad about that, but her job didn’t allow much for a conscience. Besides, most think that my species doesn’t have a conscience. Mattson rolled her eyes at that, but even she admitted to herself there was some truth in it.
Once her hotel room door was closed and locked behind her, Mattson stripped off her clothes for the second time tonight. This time, however, she allowed the cloaking spell to drop. “Ahh,” she groaned happily, as the wings extended from her back. She stretched them each to their five foot length, wincing as they cracked. “I’m getting old.” Then she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. Skin had turned to scales that shimmered purple and green in the soft light, eyes had turned red, horns grew from her forehead, and her nails had grown to claws. She was still mostly human, aside from that: a hybrid form that would not destroy the hotel, and was much easier to maintain than the wholly human disguise. She gathered her spiked tail around herself and batted her eyes at her reflection. “I wonder if Bill would still find me attractive? Oh well.”
Mattson walked to her suitcase and withdrew a small mirror, about the size of a dinner plate. She set it on the room’s desk, sat carefully in a swievel chair so as to not hurt her tail, and waved a hand over the mirror. It clouded over, swirled, then resolved itself to a well-lit throne room. Sitting on a couch was a pony with wide white-feathered wings, a long narrow horn, and a mane and tail that wavered like aurora borealis. “Greetings, Princess Celestia.”
Celestia dipped her head in respect. “Greetings, Princess Tiamat. You have news?”
“First of all, can we drop the titles, ‘Tia? We’ve known each other far too long for that.”
“Of course, Mattie.” Celestia smiled. “My word…how long has it been now?”
“Over a thousand years, certainly.” Mattson—Tiamat—remembered when she first met the white-haired alicorn before her. It was at the conclusion of a war, one that the ponies won. The dragons accepted their loss with good grace—not hard considering that Celestia and her sister could somehow control the heavens themselves—and, as was the custom, exchanged hostages to ensure the other realm’s good behavior. Tiamat had gone to Equestria and spent many happy years there. Time, distance, and a great deal of strife between their peoples separated Celestia and Tiamat now, but they remained friends. “You know, you’re the only one who ever called me ‘Mattie.’”

“I couldn’t very well call you ‘Tia,’ now could I?” Both laughed. Both knew the reason for the call; neither wanted to be the one who would bring it up.

Finally, though, Tiamat knew she must. Celestia was rather good at talking around a problem when the mood was on her. “’Tia, it’s about Sunset Shimmer.”

Celestia’s smile evaporated like ice before the sun. “Yes, I rather thought it might be. I’ve read Twilight’s report about what happened. I wish I could have taken care of this myself.”

“That would’ve compounded the problem, ‘Tia. There’s the treaty, not to mention the threat of paradox.” For some reason, this city alone had transdimensional counterparts in Equestria. Celestia’s was the principal at Canterlot High School—let the scientists chew on that one, Tiamat thought—and should the two ever meet, it could cause both to die in a rather terrible fashion. She’d heard the stories. Tiamat had already considered the fact that, since no paradox had happened when Sunset Shimmer arrived in this plane, the other Shimmer was already dead—or worse, the pony Shimmer had murdered her human counterpart. It was possible. As far as Twilight Sparkle’s human counterpart, either she no longer existed on this plane, or the Elements of Harmony somehow protected both pony and human from the cruel mistress of Time. Either way, Tiamat decided, it was not her problem now.
The treaty, however, was.
Celestia looked sad. “I suppose so. A shame. Twilight has described a very interesting place.” The other princess sighed. “Not that I could go in any case, for who would raise the sun?”

“You need a vacation, ‘Tia.”

“Perhaps when Twilight’s skilled enough…” She waved that away with a golden-shoed hoof. “I’m sorry, Mattie, I digress. What shall happen to Sunset Shimmer?”

“For now…nothing. She confessed pretty much everything to me, ‘Tia—“

“Did she show remorse?” There was a note of hope in Celestia’s voice.

“Some.” Tiamat left the but not enough unsaid. “She’s being sent to an insane asylum, ‘Tia. No one’s going to believe her story about magical talking horses.” At Celestia’s shocked expression, Tiamat said, “It’s the best thing for her, ‘Tia. If she confessed to the crime of attempted mass murder, the sentence would be death, even by the humans’ rather lenient justice system.”

Celestia looked at the floor. “To think that one of my students would fall so far…I wanted Sunset Shimmer to succeed, Mattie. She had the potential. She had the skill. If she had only shown patience, she would be where Twilight is now.”
“Or she would have attempted to overthrow you, or given the Nightmare Force another way into Equestria,” Tiamat said, harsher than she meant it to. Celestia, for all her incredible power and unmatched skill at magic, was still rather naïve. She wanted to believe the best about anyone or anything; in Tiamat’s experience, it was more sensible to believe the worst. Then again, Celestia wasn’t a dragon. “I’m sorry, ‘Tia.”
“No reason to apologize when you only speak the truth.” Celestia faced her again. “How long will she be in the asylum?”
“I don’t know.” Tiamat did not want to say that it would likely for life, or at least a very long time. Sunset Shimmer would age and die a long way from the realm of her birth. “I will keep an eye on her, of course.”
“Thank you, Mattie.” Celestia visibly made the effort to move onto other matters, and succeeded. “And the humans?”
“When Agency Zero is done, they will think that Shimmer was deranged and attempted to destroy Canterlot High with a bomb. No record of Twilight Sparkle exists, and the friends that she made here…” Tiamat smiled, keeping her lips over her teeth, which were no longer very human at all. “They seem to be a very good group of people. They’ll keep their silence.”

“Yes, Twilight seems to have a knack for finding the very best of friends, no matter what world she is in.”

“Though I suspect one called Pinkamena may know more than she’s letting on.”

Celestia laughed despite herself. “Pinkamena’s counterpart here is much the same. The universe may not survive should they ever meet. Then again, perhaps they have.”

“She’s the least of our worries if someone else finds that portal, ‘Tia.” Tiamat was serious again.

So was Celestia. “The portal only opens once every thirty moons—“

“And now at least five humans know of it.” Tiamat took the edge of her voice. “Listen, 'Tia. Twilight’s friends are only human—and really, it would be much the same if they were pony or even dragon. They might want to visit. True, they might give up if it doesn’t work—I don’t know if they know about the ‘thirty moons’ limitation on it.” Gods of my mother, Tiamat thought, at least it’s not a well. “I wouldn’t bet my realm on it.”

Celestia did not speak for a few moments, then shook her head. “No, Tiamat. The portal’s small enough.”

“The paradox if they come through—“

“I have thirty moons, Mattie. I will find a way.”

Tiamat said no more on the subject; Celestia could also be as mule-headed as, well, a mule when she wanted to be. “The treaty must be upheld, ‘Tia. You know that’s my job.”

“I do. And you will be the first one notified once I have come to a decision.” Celestia gave her a nod. “Again, I will not break the treaty. This was an emergency. I only wish there had been a way to intervene sooner, before all this came to such an end.”

“As do I.” The damned treaty, both wanted to say. The Treaty of Interdimensionality—better known as simply “the Treaty,” had been signed long years ago, and added to as the various realms and planes learned of each other’s existence. All of the realms came to the abrupt realization that the humans outnumbered them all; the population of Equestria, for instance, was less than two million. The humans’ population at last count was over four billion. Should Equestria’s existence, or any other of the realms of magic be known, humanity would overwhelm them by sheer numbers. Moreover, the humans had a technological edge. Celestia was not the only being in the universe to harness the power of the sun.
There were select humans that knew of the Treaty and even signed it, and Agency Zero was their idea, to police the various portals and gates, and ensure that a war would not happen. Celestia was hopeful that first contact would be beneficial to both, but even she was not willing to risk Equestria on the good intentions of both ponies and humans. The treaty also limited who could visit what realm and when, and Celestia, even if Equestria could spare her, was simply too powerful an entity to risk in the realm of humanity.
“We should’ve kept a better eye on that portal,” Tiamat said. “It’s my fault as much as anyone’s.” For which she would get a tongue-lashing from her superiors, she knew.
“Yes,” Celestia replied simply.
There was an uncomfortable silence. “I consider this matter closed, ‘Tia. So does the Agency. We’ll keep a close eye on Shimmer, and Twilight’s human friends, but I think it will be all right.”

“For everyone but Sunset Shimmer.” Celestia held up a hoof. “I know, I know, Mattie. You don’t share my optimism there. Perhaps you’re right. Perhaps I should be…colder.”

Tiamat smiled again. “’Tia, if you were colder, you wouldn’t be Princess of the Sun.” She leaned her head on her hand. “We owe Twilight Sparkle a great debt. Don’t think we’ll forget it. She’ll be a worthy alicorn princess, I think.”

“As do I.” Celestia got to her hooves. “Mattie, I must be going…affairs of state. Are we still on for cards on the full moon?”

“I wouldn’t miss it. Please bring Twilight—I’d like to thank her personally, and that will give Luna someone else to clean out of bits.”

“Certainly.” Celestia inclined her head. “Good night, Princess Tiamat.”

“Good night, Princess Celestia.”

The mirror clouded again, and then Tiamat was staring at her own reflection. She stared at it for quite awhile, judging the dragon hybrid that looked back. She wished she could share Celestia’s optimism. In the history of dragons, first contact had never ended well. It was much the same for humans. Initially, perhaps, ponies and humans might get along, but there would be someone who wanted more, or something one or the other wanted; it might be pony as much as human, as Sombra had taught them. Either way, it would result in a war between magic and technology, with no clear winner but millions of losers. Sunset Shimmer had been playing with armageddon and not even known it. Or worse, she had known it and in fact planned on it. That made her even more of a threat, Tiamat reflected as she replaced the mirror in her suitcase, but for the sake of her friendship with Celestia and the trust of Twilight Sparkle, she would not kill Sunset Shimmer.
Yet.

Author's Note

Short and sweet. Not every story needs to be six chapters long. I know Mattson/Tiamat seems pretty cold in this chapter, but figure what she really is, and what her job is.

Agency Zero, BTW, is based loosely on a similar group in Fred Perry's Gold Digger comic, though that version is more like the Superfriends than the Men in Black. Either way, Sunset Shimmer possibly unleashing an interdimensional war would be something that would grab their interest.

Well, that's two MLP fanfics in the bag, and one still on the launching pad, as it were. I think I need to write something funny after two serious stories. The whole reason I got into MLP was for the humor, after all. So either I'll keep moving with Top Pony (and risk serious downvotes for killing Fluttershy) or I might try something funny with Discord. I like writing him, and there's so much potential to work with. How "good" would Discord really be?

Anyway, thanks again for all the comments (and please add MOAR!) and likes (ditto) this story has gotten. You guys are great!

EDIT: Slightly changed to remove the rather large plot hole (not that kind) regarding Twilight Sparkle.