Do Immortal Ponies Bleed Red?

Chapters

Chapter One: How Do I Leave?
Chapter Two: What Are They Building?
Chapter Three: Why Not Celebrate?
Prologue: Is There Rest For The Wicked?

Chapter One: How Do I Leave?

I stuck my nose out the door and into the stuffy outside air. I could feel the humidity in my mane as I stepped out the door of my shop and onto the pier. My hoofsteps echoed hollowly across the murky swamp water. Something deep in the trees stirred, and I stopped to stare across the water into the dark foliage.

Celestia, everything wants a piece of me, I thought and rolled my eyes as I continued down the pier toward the center of town.

It became decidedly less dark the closer to the town center I got, and when I turned onto the Orange Pier – named this because of the orange lanterns lighting it – it almost felt like the town owned up to its name. Sunny Valley. I hadn’t seen the sun since before I had moved to the town, and I felt myself failing to conjure up an image of that bright orb in the sky.

“I have to get out of here soon,” I said under my breath, stepping around a clump of vines that had fallen from the tree canopy. “I almost have enough bits to.” A filly walking by me looked up at me. I grinned down at her, and she immediately turned the other direction and trotted away. My beauty was clearly not meant for everypony’s eyes. Those who couldn’t appreciate me didn’t deserve to even look at me anyway.

After another row of residences, the Mother Tree came into view. A large crowd of ponies was gathered on the circular pier around it. Everypony from town is here, I thought. The meeting couldn’t possibly start without me, so I kept my leisurely pace to the town’s center. As the undertaker, I was one of the most important ponies in town. It was just pure dumb luck that the previous undertaker croaked a day before I arrived. If I had been any later, the townsponies would have been doomed! What would they have done without an undertaker?

I stopped to stare at a window planter in somepony’s home tree. The flowers were wilted and dying, but somepony had painted over their petals to make them look alive. Clearly the ponies of Not-Sunny, Not-A-Valley would not have survived without me. Too bad I would be leaving. Maybe if I gave a two weeks’ notice, they would let me train somepony else for the job, or maybe I would just leave and they would be stuck putting decaying bodies into the swamp.

I continued walking and arrived at the gathering a minute or two later. Just as I had predicted, the meeting had yet to begin. I was a key player in the meeting. The townsponies were murmuring amongst themselves, but they began to grow quiet as I shoved past them.

“BB, thank goodness!” Spelling Bee, the mayor of town, said as I emerged from the crowd. “I was worried you’d never show up!”

“Spelling Bee, Spelling Bee,” I said, shaking my head. The mayor flinched at each utterance at her name; evidently, she had yet to get used to my renaming of her. Spelling Bee was so much more fitting than Honey Splash. What the fuck kind of name was that? “You know you needn’t worry about me not showing up. I am fashionable and reliable.”

Spelling Bee rolled her great, honey-colored eyes. Several ponies in the crowd sighed. I’m too fucking good for you backwoods assholes. Not a single one of them deserved to be in my presence. I would be leaving soon enough, though, away from Equestria and the damned “Sunny Valley” ponies. I tossed my head and came to stand beside her, facing the crowd.

Spelling Bee’s horn glowed orange with a speech amplifying spell and she said, “Ponies of Sunny Valley, as many of you know a recent accident has taken the life of Firefly. This was entirely unforeseen, and we mourn his loss. We are going to go to extra lengths to ensure that everything on the construction zone is up to code and safe for our workers.”

A pony in the crowd was crying loudly. Spelling Bee continued, “Firefly’s visitation will be tomorrow at noon, and his funeral will follow afterward, fully paid for by BB’s shop and the town.” A stack of papers appeared before her with a loud pop, and she held them there with her telekinesis. A few ponies in the crowd started murmuring while she shuffled through them.

This isn’t part of the meeting, I thought, glancing over my glasses at Spelling Bee. She found the page she was looking for and cleared her throat. The talking ponies shut up.

“On a good note, one of the townsponies has come of age and is ready to be assigned a position,” Spelling Bee said. “She is a very quiet pony, but I know she’ll be an excellent addition to Sunny Valley’s workforce! Porcelain Sunshine, please come forward!”

The pony crowd parted, and a short, plump white earth pony mare walked to Spelling Bee. Her mane was gigantic, but even with her mane, she was only barely taller than my shoulder. She didn’t smile when she looked at Spelling Bee; instead, she had a dead look in her brown eyes. Maybe she was anxious. Maybe she just didn’t care. Maybe she was realizing how utterly fucked she was to live in Sunny Valley.

“You will be mentored by, uhm,” Spelling Bee paused, then coughed. Porcelain Sunshine didn’t bat an eyelash. “You’ll be working under, uh, Brokenbones.” She flinched when she said my name, like it was the most vulgar thing a pony could say. The townsponies politely stomped against the pier, sending a tuneless melody across the swamp.

Porcelain Sunshine turned her hollow gaze to me. I felt my heart leap in my chest, into my throat, and a giant smile spreading across my face. In an instant, I jumped forward and enveloped the smaller pony into an awkward kind-of-a-hug and hopped up and down on my hooves. My own apprentice! One that I could pass all my knowledge to! It was better than foals, certainly. Porcelain Sunshine was smart, young, and… had a terrible name.

I stopped, then squinted my eyes at her. She had on a heart necklace, purple legwarmers and a matching purple bow on her messy tail.

Legwarmers? That didn’t seem quite right. She still looked at me with those dead eyes even when I shoved her mane to the side to see her flank. Her butt tattoo was a ragdoll. Interesting.

“Ragdoll.” I said, then nodded. “You’re Ragdoll. It’s wonderful to meet you! I cannot wait to teach you all the undertaking ways! Oh my Celestia, oh, Ragdoll! We’re going to have so much fun, me and you!”

She didn’t say anything. I messed up her mane with my hoof, and she tossed it back into place. Spelling Bee coughed, and I returned to my position beside her. Surprisingly, Ragdoll trotted up next to me.

Perfect. She didn’t say anything, she didn’t run away from me, she was perfect. Truly a pony meant to look upon me and learn. Spelling Bee had done well. A grin was still plastered on my face, and my insides felt light, almost like somepony had pumped me full of helium.

An apprentice! A great apprentice! Smart, quiet, excellent Ragdoll!

Damn. I loved her already.

“That concludes our meeting today.” Spelling Bee said. “Firefly’s family, please meet me in the town hall.” Spelling Bee’s horn stopped glowing for a fraction of a second as she ended her amplification spell, but she caught her papers in her telekinetic spell before they could hit the ground.

The ponies on the pier dispersed, with the exception of a young red pegasus and an older, much older gray earth pony. I reached out and poked Ragdoll with a hoof. Still unresponsive.

“Shh, Ragdoll, it’s okay! I’m the best mentor in Equestria.” Please Celestia, don’t let her be mute. I needed to talk to her to do things. Or maybe I didn’t. If she was mute, it probably wouldn’t be impossible to teach her, but what if she had questions? Could she write?

We would figure it out. As the best damn mentor in Equestria, there would be no fucking this up! I squirmed happily and squatted down enough to put my chin on her mane. It was coarse and stiff. She had to use manespray to get it as big as it was.

“BB,” Spelling Bee said. I stood upright and looked at her. “I’ll need you and Porcelain Sunshine to be waiting for me here in an hour or so to go –“ she paused, leaned in, and whispered, “—retrieve the body.” She looked over at Firefly’s family, who were entering Mother Tree through a door a few paces behind us, then spoke up again, “Until then, help Porcelain with her things and show her to your shop.” She turned to Ragdoll and said, “Welcome to the workforce.”

“We’ll be here,” I said, then turned to Ragdoll. “Hey, do you have anything you want to bring with you?”

“Yes,” She said. Her voice was hollow, just like her eyes, but surprisingly high-pitched. I leaned forward, anticipating more, but the blank face and eyes signaled that she was done talking.

“Alright, well?” I said, then frowned, then smiled and leaned in again. “Let’s go get it, huh? Lead the way!”

Ragdoll nodded and began walking toward Red Pier. I trotted after her, my insides swelling with joy with every hoofstep. My face ached from how I was grinning. An apprentice. Perhaps the ponies of Not-Sunny, Not-a-Valley weren’t quite so terrible. Too bad I was leaving anyway; of course, only after I trained Ragdoll. The zebras and ponies would just have to slow down their war progress in the meantime.

The trees and shacks were getting scarcer the farther down Red Pier we went, and eventually the lanterns stopped lighting the pier all together. Ragdoll continued trotting down the way, though, and I had no choice but to follow. Eventually, the pier turned into a dirt path on an island a ways from Mother Tree. I paused a moment to look behind me, and I could only see the dim glow of lanterns past the twisted silhouettes of trees. I ran to catch up with Ragdoll’s hoofsteps.

“Yeesh, you live all the way out here?” I asked. It was incredibly dark, and I heard sloshing up ahead. I ended up hoof-deep in a puddle of goo, and was quick to slog out of it.

“Yes,” Ragdoll said.

She wasn’t very talkative.

The house soon came into view. Ragdoll lived in a rather large, twisted and incredibly gnarled tree in the middle of the muddy island. A few ramshackle structures were built around it. It might have once been a farm, but anypony who tried to grow crops in the shadowy heart of the Everfree was doomed to fail. A few lanterns were hung on metal poles, emanating a strange green-blue light. Animals shuffled in the shadows of the forest around us. Nothing I couldn’t handle, but I trotted closer to Ragdoll just in case they were her animals. I didn’t want to kill anything that was hers.

We reached the front door with nothing attacking us, and Ragdoll opened it by pulling on a string with her mouth. So that’s how earth ponies do it! I followed her inside, and immediately stopped in my tracks.

Her house was like a castle. Expensive rugs, tapestries and curtains were at every turn. The blonde walls of her tree had carved and painted art on them, and the foyer was lit dimly by a giant, golden chandelier. There were no windows, but the house didn’t need them.

“Holy shit,” I said. Ragdoll trotted past the grandiose décor without a second glance. I wondered for a moment if it was appropriate to follow her throughout her mansion of a tree, but then I realized that I didn’t really care. What was hers was mine now.

I followed up a grand, honey-colored staircase after her. Pictures of pale earth ponies hung on the wall with golden nametags underneath, all dressed up extravagantly with monocles and small librarian glasses plastered to their faces. At the top of the stairs was another giant chandelier and an elaborate railing. Our hoofsteps were quieted by a blood red rug that was as long as the hall that we were walking in. Ragdoll turned to the room at the end of the hall and opened the door with another pull rope, and I followed in after her.

“Ragdoll, this has gotta stop,” I said, narrowing my eyes at the display of elaborateness around me. Her room was gigantic, but at least in a style similar to the rooms over at my shop.

“Soon,” she replied, walking to a vanity and grabbing a dark gray ragdoll that matched her ass picture. She placed it carefully on her back, then nodded at me. “Missus Legwarmers is ready.”

Missus Legwarmers? Seriously? What the fuck? My eyebrows clenched down.

“Is that all you need?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“Okay, well, nice doll.” Ragdoll gave a half-smile at the compliment. “I think I know the way back out, so let’s go! I can’t wait for you to meet Boner!”

Boner was the previous undertaker of the town, and he was incredibly grumpy, just like most penises were. Ragdoll cocked her head to the side at his name, and I leaned in slightly, waiting for her to say something. When she didn’t, I sighed and trotted out the room, past the glorious décor and back to town. I had perfect memory, so we were able to trot down the trail through Ragdoll’s woods and back to town with no problems. We arrived on Purple Pier in front of my shop in no time.

“Coffins ‘N Stuff!” I said, grinning up at the coffin sign hanging above my door. “Home sweet home, Ragdoll.”

My bright green magic enveloped the door and it creaked open. Purple lanterns lit up the ebony-colored wood walls, and floors, and everything, of the inside of the shop. Boner sat at the bar to the left in the foyer, reading a magazine. Ragdoll trotted in behind me, and he turned to stare at me.

“She’s not dead,” he remarked, glaring at Ragdoll.

“No duh, Boner,” I said, rolling my eyes. “You penises are all the same, damn. This is Ragdoll, she’s my new apprentice!” I slung a hoof over Ragdoll’s shoulders, making sure not to knock Missus Legwarmers off her back. Ragdoll bit her bottom lip.

“Apprentice!?” He asked, hopping down from his stool and trotting over to us. “What the hell, BB? I never got an apprentice.” He groaned, then looked at Ragdoll. “Hi, I’m Epitaph. What’s your real name?”

Ragdoll didn’t respond. She turned her big, brown eyes up at me.

“You can see ghosts, right?” I asked. Ragdoll shook her head. Boner made an incredibly loud, yelling noise. I couldn’t help but grin.

“Okay, well, he said that his real name is Epitaph – it’s not, don’t call him that – and that he wanted to know your ‘real’ name. As if Ragdoll isn’t your real name! Dumb Boner!” I trotted through Boner and to the back of the room, where I levitated a picture off the wall and over to Ragdoll.

“Here’s a picture of him,” I said, dusting it off with my magic so my apprentice could see the picture better. “He was really old and crinkly when he died, but he evidently got younger when he died? I don’t even think Luna would understand it.”

The picture showed Boner, a small, gray earth pony stallion with a black pompadour and three graves for a cutie mark, standing by a larger white stallion with the same haircut. The taller one had on golden sunglasses and a shimmering suit. It was signed, “E. Hoofstley – Thank you very much. To Epitaph.”

“Why’d you have to show her that picture?” Boner asked.

“I think it’s flattering that you look like whoever E. Hoofstley is,” I said. “I mean, man, what was your obsession with this guy?” I gasped, dropping the picture out of my magic grasp. “You’re gay, aren’t you!? That explains everything! Ragdoll, Ragdoll! Boner is gay! Gay for E. Hoofstley!” I laughed.

“BB if you ever become a ghost, I am going to kill you.”

“I’d like to see you try. I have magic and you don’t.”

Boner sighed, and proceeded to walk out of the room through the door to the morgue. Maybe he wanted to go see if he could find some other ghost friends or something. I rolled my eyes, then turned to Ragdoll. The door was still open, so I shut it.

“Alright, I know just the room for you,” I said to her. She looked up at me, then nodded. I grinned, then walked through a hallway to the left. Coffins ‘N Stuff was drab in comparison to Ragdoll’s extravagant home, and I found myself spotting every cobweb that stuck to the ceiling or corners of previous shop owners’ pictures and every imperfection in the perfectly-black walls.

My staircase was undoubtedly better than anything in Ragdoll’s tree, though. It spiraled upwards, and a chandelier made of antlers hung from a tin ceiling, lighting everything up with a purple glow. We walked up the stairs to the second floor, and we headed past doors labelled things like: “How to take over Canterda”, “Shaving Cream” and “Balloons” until we hit doors labelled with actual numbers.

I stopped at a random door, then shoved it open.

“Room 222! All yours!” I said, standing on my hind hooves and motioning to the grandeur of Room 222. It was spacious, comfortable and had a circular bed just like Ragdoll had at her old room. A picture of Celestia hung above her headboard. There was a bathroom off to the side, an armoire, a vanity and a radio on one of the nightstands by her bed.

“Nice.” Ragdoll replied. She walked into the room, then very gingerly placed her doll onto her bed.

“You can decorate it however you want,” I said. “I sleep in Room 273 just down the hall if you need me for some reason at night.” There was a pause. Ragdoll was placing her doll’s legs meticulously. “Don’t go in the shaving cream room, by the way. Boner had that before he died and it is freaky.”

Ragdoll nodded. I continued, “The kitchen is downstairs in the hall before the stairs. I make the best food in Equestria, so be down for dinner! Oh yeah, and we have a body to go pick up soon! Just, uh, get settled in and come find me when you’re ready, I guess. I’ll be downstairs.”

She nodded again. I watched her carefully move her doll around the bed, like she was playing some kind of game, then slowly backed out of the room and shut the door. She was definitely special, and I liked her! We would get along wonderfully, me and her, we’d be the best apprentice and mentor in all of Equestria! They’d see.

Chapter Two: What Are They Building?

Ragdoll’s sagging, doll-like eyes looked up at me.

“Are you sure you want Missus Legwarmers to come along?” I asked.

She nodded with all the autonomy of a doll.

“Alright, but if she gets muddy, I’m not the one who’s going to clean her.” I really would get the mud stains out of my apprentice’s beloved doll, but I wanted to try to drill some good habits into her. I opened the front door of Coffins ‘N Stuff with my magic. Ragdoll’s hoofsteps echoed behind me, along with the door shutting behind us. Boner floated up beside me, his hooves trailing limply underneath him.

“Do you know how Firefly died?” He asked. I rock my head from side to side in beat with my hoofsteps.

“Nope.”

He scoffed. I started to hum a song to drown out the creaking and groaning noises of our hooves on the pier. My body fell into the rhythm, my steps synchronizing to the beat of the beautiful melody erupting from my vocal chords. I swung my head from side to side.

“For Celestia’s sake,” Boner said. “BB, this isn’t even a song!”

I may have been humming the same five notes in a slightly different sequence. Music, though, is pretty relative. I was making a song. Ragdoll thought I was making a song – I made sure! Her steps had fallen into sync with my own, which meant that my song had a beat, that it had notes, and it had pizzazz. That made it a song.

“You penises don’t know nothing,” I said. Boner sighed and started grumbling, falling out of my peripheral as we neared the Mother Tree. The tree homes grew progressively nicer the closer we got to the center of town, and soon we were all standing outside of the mayor’s office. The blinds were drawn and no other ponies were around. Mine and Ragdoll’s shadows danced on the pier from the irregular lights of the lanterns. The musty, sticky smell of the swamp stuck to the insides of my nostrils.

We stood outside the door for what felt like a small eternity; the only noises were the echoing chirrups of birds high up in the canopy which were distorted by distance. The faint noise of drills and hammers could also be picked up in the silence of Not-Sunny, Not-a-Valley.

Come on, Spelling Bee, I thought. I glanced over at Ragdoll. Her doll was slung across her back, her great, brown eyes seeming to frown up at me. Not a glimmer of emotion showed on her face; she was completely blank.

My skin started to twitch. I tapped my front hoof against the dock for a minute. Spelling Bee said to wait for her, but she was taking way too long. I trotted up to the door and opened it with my magic.

The inside of the town hall was bright. Everything was built from a blonde wood that almost seemed luminescent on its own. Spelling Bee sat behind a desk, stamping scrolls with her magic. Her golden eyes rolled up, then widened when they settled on me. Her eyebrows furrowed and she sat down her stamp.

“You’re over an hour late!” She said. She stood up from her desk and trotted over to me. She stopped a few inches in front of me and took in a breath; the action seemed to make her puff up slightly like a bird. “When I give you a deadline, I mean it, BB. We have other options for an undertaker. We don’t need to have an outsider like you to take care of the town’s business.”

“Spelling Bee,” I said, taking a step back and leveling my head with hers. I looked into her eyes over my glasses and grinned. “I’m the best undertaker in all of Equestria. You couldn’t do better than me even if you tried.”

“You? The best undertaker in Equestria?” She laughed, but it sounded nervous, like she didn’t believe she was asking such a question about me. “Pond Frog could easily do your job just as well as you can.”

“That penis!? Absolutely not. He can only catch half-dead fish.” I rolled my eyes and straightened up. “Stop joking around, Spelling Bee. Now show BB and Ragdoll here to this dead body of yours.”

I stepped out of her way. She hesitated for a moment, glaring up at me, grinding her teeth, then she shrugged past me and started walking away without looking back. I trotted behind her, then called for Ragdoll to follow me. She caught up and walked beside me, taking two steps for every one of mine.

Spelling Bee led us down Blue Pier which was largely commercial. We walked past the local dress shop, the bar and the grocer, then we took another turn down Green Pier. The green part of town was the smallest part, and I only rarely visited. There was a small factory that cranked out bullets for the war effort that had overran all the other businesses and left Green Pier largely abandoned. The pier seemed to sag under our weight, and the canopy almost seemed to be thicker over the industrial part of town. Shuffling hoofsteps could be heard coming from the insides of the various trees that the bullet factory used and there were the soft pings of metal hitting metal that sounded all around us. A heavy wind picked up and my mane pulled against the stitches holding it in place. It itched. Spelling Bee kept moving forward, unfazed by the wind.

We passed the factory and our hooves met the soft ground of the far shore. A narrow trail wound into the dense foliage and Spelling Bee began following it.

“Where are we even going?” I asked.

“Have you not heard about the stable that is being built?” Spelling Bee asked. She slowed down the darkness grew thicker. I closed my eyes and imagined a big, green light, then imagined pushing the light orb out through my horn. I peeked open one eye. My spell – a small, luminescent green orb – hung in the air above us, lighting up the forest around us. Spelling Bee stopped and turned around, looking at me as if she were taken aback by my fantastic magical abilities.

“What the heck is a stable?” I asked. Spelling Bee cocked her head to the side, then turned away from me again to continue leading the way.

“Did no one from Stable-Tec come by your shop asking if you wanted to sign up for residency?”

“Uh, no, Spelling Bee.”

“That’s strange.” She trailed off. A twig snapped from deep in the forest and she quickened her pace. I sped up but made sure that Ragdoll was still able to keep stride with me. With every step, the drilling and hammering sounds that could be faintly heard from the town became more and more pronounced.

“Well,” she continued, “it’s just in case something would happen. The zebras might have some kind of weapon that could destroy the entirety of Equestria. The stables are being built just in case something terrible might happen.”

“If the zebras wanted to kill us all, they probably would have already tried.”

“If they get their hooves on megaspells, they’ll probably find a way to weaponize them.”

The trees thinned ahead of us. The hammering was much more clear – metal on metal.

“I was in Stalliongrad when the megaspell was cast. It was just to heal everypony on the battlefield. It was a good thing, even though it ruined business.”

“Yes, well, the stripes have a habit of ruining everything they touch.”

We emerged from the forest onto a shore where the majority of the trees had been cut down. Beams of metal were the bones of a vaguely rectangular shape that sat in a wooden frame on the shore. Some ponies were working on attaching metal plates to the bottom of the massive structure. Scaffolding wrapped around the entirety of the thing. Pegasi were adding onto the metal and wooden structures at the top of the stable’s skeleton.

Spelling Bee led us up to the foot of the structure, then started walking up the haphazard wooden stairs that wrapped around the structure. I let Ragdoll in front of me, then followed behind. The stairs seemed to sag under each of my hooves. There was no railing on either side, just an ever-increasing drop to the muddy ground below.

“How have more ponies not died here?” I mumbled.

We stopped about halfway up the structure. Spelling Bee walked over to a large, dark red stallion and introduced Ragdoll and I, explaining who we were and what we were there to do. Then, she excused herself and left.

“I’m Brick,” he said. “So you’re here for Firefly?”

“Yeah, Spelling Bee already said that,” I said. Penises. He huffed.

“Well, follow me.”

He lumbered past us and back down the stairs, flicking his gray-ish tail in my face as he passed. Brick was a fitting name for him – he was much larger than me, tough-looking and he also looked as dumb as his namesake. Regardless of how stupid he was in most matters, I was going to assume that he knew what the hay a stable was since he was getting paid to build one. Spelling Bee’s explanation hadn’t been good enough for me.

“So what exactly is a stable?” I asked him. He grunted, then looked back at me.

“It’s a place to live if the stripes manage to ruin the world,” he said. “This one will go under the water here.”

“Why not underground?”

“The swamp water is just like ground.”

That was the single stupidest thing I had ever heard. If the ponies above Brick seriously thought swamp water was as good as dirt, I knew that I wouldn’t be trusting them with my life if the apocalypse would come raining from the sky. We stepped off the stairs and Brick led us into the labyrinth of wood and metal. Pieces of corridors had been finished, along with some rooms and cabinets. He pushed open one door with his head and motioned with his hoof for us to enter.

The body was positioned underneath a massive slab of steel that had fallen from the ceiling. Firefly had once been a dark red pegasus like Brick, but now he was flatter than a pancake. His skin burst from his center and peeled off of his legs. His skull was left uncrushed, but pieces of ribs and organs poked through his hide. His mouth was open in a scream; his teeth were bloody and a puddle of thick, old blood was gathered around his head.

Ragdoll walked from beside me and stood over Firefly’s head, then put her hoof in his black mane. She didn’t seem bothered from the amount of gore around her, which only solidified the fact that she was the perfect apprentice.

“Could nopony lift the metal slab?” I asked as I walked over to Ragdoll. I was careful to avoid the blood as I examined the scene closer. Blood had oozed out of his nose and eye sockets and now it had dried on his hair, which was slightly lighter than dried blood.

“Not since we finished the floor above it,” Brick said. “There isn’t enough room for the pegasi to lift it and we don’t have enough unicorns.”

I look up through the hole that the slab had left. Above, there was another corridor. If the floor and ceiling of the damn stable was falling in, I certainly wouldn’t be signing in to live in one. Stable-Tec was clearly selling very ramshackle places to live.

“It’s a good thing you’ve got me!” I said with a grin.

“Nopony can move this alone,” he said.

“Brick, Brick, Brick,” I said, chuckling. “You have one of the best magic users in Equestria here on your side. Besides, I’m not going to move it.”

He huffed. Maybe he didn’t believe me (which was unlikely), but I was about to show him what Brokenbones’ magical finesse was like. I enveloped the slab in my magic, lighting up the entire room with a bright green glow. I imagined that I could feel my magic encasing the slab, then I pretended to apply pressure to the metal. In my mind’s eye, I could see the metal warping and twisting until it was small, and, with enough focus, the slab began to obey my imagination. It groaned and cracked as it was bent and twisted into a smaller and smaller shape until it was shrunk and crumpled into a ball of metal about the size of my hoof. I tossed it aside, and it hit the ground with a thud.

Firefly’s entire body was now exposed. His hind legs and back half had been completely crushed. Little pieces of bone were stuck in the coagulated blood that settled around his flattened body. His organs were like a paste that stuck to his ripped fur and floated in the pool of thick blood. His tail was covered in blood and whatever had been in his bowels at the time he was smashed.

“Looks like we have our work cut out for us, Ragdoll,” I said.

“Sewing?” She asked.

“Yes, lots of sewing. Are you good at that?”

“Yes.”

I enveloped the corpse in my magic and used a teleportation spell to send it to the morgue. It disappeared with a fizzle and a pop, leaving the pool of blood, bone fragments and organ paste behind. I turned around. Brick had his wings limp at his sides and his mouth slightly open. My shrinking spell must have truly moved him.

“You guys get the rest,” I said to him. “Come on, Ragdoll, we need to start putting Pony Pancake back together for his big day. You’re going to learn so much!”

Chapter Three: Why Not Celebrate?

“Another successful funeral!” I said, shoving through the front doors of the funeral home. Ragdoll was beside me, with Boner floating off to the side. A few mourning ponies stood outside, the unicorns floating white handkerchiefs to their faces while earth ponies and pegasi wore veils to hide their crying. They all turned to stare at us after I yelled out about our success. They murmured among themselves – probably about the wonderful pony who paid for the entire funeral: me.

“Your sewing really paid off, Ragdoll,” I said. Pancake Pony had been quite a mess, and, honestly, without Ragdoll’s help, he wouldn’t have looked half as good as he ended up looking. Sure, there were some seams that were still obvious, but we had managed to give him an open casket funeral thanks to a little thread and some undertaking magic.

“Thanks,” Ragdoll said. She trotted up next to me, then turned her head sideways and up. Her hair bobbed with the movement. “BB, do you want to go to the bar?”

That was probably the longest string of words I had heard out of her mouth. I gasped, then knelt down to her height. I touched my nose to hers, opened my mouth and drawled out, “Yes.”

She blinked her giant, innocent eyes at me, then took a step back. I fell forward, hitting my jaw against the pier. I quickly picked myself up.

“What a perfect way to celebrate! I was just thinking the same thing!”

I grabbed Ragdoll in my magic until we were out of the small crowd of mourners, then allowed her to trot along beside me. The Bar on Blue was just a hop, skip and a jump away from the funeral home. We were already close to where Blue Pier and Orange Pier intersected. Where the two piers met, I stopped and looked at where the town began.

It seemed like only the day before that I had walked into the town from that path. I had been bruised, dehydrated and beat up by the Everfree Forest, but I had made it. The Blue Pier and its ghostly lanterns made me feel vaguely nauseous with nostalgia, but I was grinning too. Ragdoll stood patiently beside me.

“Why don’t you order me spirits this time?” Boner asked, ruining the moment. I turned and looked up at him. I guess it did make sense, giving spirits to a ghost. But did he really deserve it? No. But I am kindly.

“Sure,” I said, even though it was against my best interest. I really needed to save bits, but there was a call for celebration. I could spend a little money and easily make it back. I would have had enough if I hadn’t been roped into paying for Pancake Pony’s funeral (but most of that money came from Boner’s stash).

I started walking again, and Ragdoll’s hoofsteps soon joined mine. Boner floated lazily beside me. The bar was in sight as soon as we turned onto Blue Pier. The sign was shaped like a tankard and had three blue lanterns hanging below it. We reached the large door and I opened it up with my magic. Only the bartender was inside, and he was leaning against the bar listening to the radio.

“There’s still a battle waging around Stalliongrad,” the radio said. I walked up to the counter, Ragdoll and Boner at my sides. “The death count is in the tens of thousands.”

“Man, am I glad that I am outta there,” I said while positioning myself on top of a bar stool. The bartender rolled his eyes over at me, his head slowly following.

“What’ll it be, BB?” He asked in his slow, drawling way. Then, his blue eyes settled on Ragdoll. “Hey Porcelain. What will you be having?”

“Scotch,” Ragdoll said. She was too short to get up onto a stool, so she stood with her chin on the bar. I frowned and enveloped her in my magic, carefully lifting her to sit on the stool next to mine. The green glow remained around her until she positioned her hooves to sit correctly, then I let her go.

“Thanks,” she said.

I turned back to the bartender. His orange mane was bobbing as he used his magic to grab a bottle of scotch off the top shelf. He poured a small amount into a glass with ice and sat it and the bottle next to Ragdoll. She grabbed the glass with her teeth and tilted her head back, drinking it all in one gulp. With some fascination, I watched her put the glass down and grab the neck of the bottle with her teeth, pouring until the glass was half full. Earth ponies were so inventive!

“I’ll have a horse’s neck,” I said, then paused, mulling over what to get Boner. An idea struck me and I said, “I also want a shot of bottom shelf vodka. Just one shot.”

Boner had settled down on the stool to my left. When he heard that I bought him cheap vodka, he sighed loudly. I waited for him to say something while the bartender was mixing my drink, but he, unfortunately, stayed silent. Ragdoll poured another glass of scotch; the bottle’s top clinked against the glass. The bartender sat my drink in front of me, along with the vodka shot. I pushed the vodka down the table to be in front of Boner. He looked at it, stuck his tongue out and stuck it inside the shot glass.

“I can drink it!” He exclaimed, then went to furiously sipping the alcohol out of the glass. I grasped my drink with my magic and took a long drink. The bartender was looking at me. I know I’m gorgeous, and he seemed almost mad at how drop-dead fabulous I am. He cleared his throat.

“You need to pay for those,” he said.

“Ohh,” I drawled out. Then, I focused on my change purse and teleported it to the bar. The small leather bag landed with a plop in front of me. I had made it myself, out of some ponyhide from Stalliongrad. Sometimes, we had ponies that no one would claim. In those cases, nopony cared what happened to them, so I would take bits and pieces of their hide (from their backs, so nopony would know) and tan them in my spare time. The change purse I had was just one of the many things I made from my old pastime.

I poured out a few bits onto the table and pushed them over to him. “Keep the change,” I said. It was a day of celebration. I could spend a little extra, spread the love around. I drank my drink again and finished it off after a few long gulps. Warmth spread throughout me from the sweet beverage, and I ordered another.

“Ragdoll, slow down!” I tell her, looking over as she poured herself another glass of the liquor. Boner lapped up his vodka like a dog, using his ghostly abilities to sip up everything down to the very bottom of the glass. The bartender floated another amber-colored drink in front of me.

The radio crackled from commercials back to the program it had been on.

“Twilight Sparkle,” a deep, male voice asked, “did you help develop the megaspell used on the battlefield at Stalliongrad?”

“I have no comment,” came the reply from a din of noise. It sounded like cameras were clicking pictures and a hundred ponies were shouting questions.

“There you heard it, folks,” the deep voice said again. “Twilight Sparkle refuses to comment on the megaspell. We have in the station today Doctor Arctic Breeze, who literally wrote the book on the controversy surrounding the megaspell. What do you make of this, Doctor?”

“Well,” Arctic Breeze’s voice was nearly indistinguishable from the other stallion speaking, “I believe that Twilight Sparkle refuses to comment because she knows the truth behind what happened on that Stalliongrad battlefield. The Ministry of Arcane Sciences had a hoof in making this megaspell! How else would the Ministry of Peace come up with such powerful magic?”

I crunched on the ice at the bottom of my drink and ordered some whiskey. Ragdoll had downed about half of the bottle of scotch and was sitting back, looking over at me. She almost looked contemplative behind her blank face.

“Ragdoll, what did you really want to be?” I asked. The whiskey was placed in front of me, and I took a shot.

“I don’t know,” she said.

“You really didn’t know? No idea? Nothing?”

“Nope.”

“Wow. I always wanted to be a lion tamer.”

She didn’t reply. I poured another shot. Boner tapped me on the shoulder and motioned at the whiskey bottle.

“Sure, sure,” I said, pouring some of the whiskey into his shot glass. He laughed a little as he slurped the whiskey out of his glass. How long had he been a ghost? It had to have been a little over two months. The fact we hadn’t tried the spirit thing yet was amazing. I mean, it’s such a great idea. I must have thought of it before and decided that it wasn’t time for Boner to try it yet.

The radio droned on about conspiracy theories surrounding the megaspell and the public’s opinion on them. Many ponies believed the megaspells were immoral since they dealt with necromancy, while others believed they were simply futile since those who had fallen would have rose again and fought, just like they did on the “Immortal Battle” of Stalliongrad. Arctic Breeze even went on to say that Fluttershy probably leaked information to the zebras about the megaspells.

With those bold of words coming out of his mouth, the Ministry of Morale would probably be waiting on him right after his broadcast. His words could be considered treason, and with the Ministry of Morale, there was no telling what they would do to him. Horror stories floated around about that.

Why didn’t I get a Ministry? I am so much better than those Elements of Harmony. I was probably the Element of the Elements and no one had figured it out yet!

I frowned and poured another shot. It was good that I didn’t have a Ministry, though; I would have had to leave for home, and that would have labelled me a traitor. If it weren’t for my clever disguise, I would already be in the clutches of the Ministry of Morale.

“BB,” Ragdoll said. I looked over at her, my eyes crossing behind my sunglasses, making the world purple-tinted.

“Yeah?” I said.

“Are you afraid to die?”

If that wasn’t a morbid question on a happy day, I didn’t know what was! I lean my head in farther, my ears perked, ready for her to laugh and say it was a joke. I ended up just relishing in how unbelievable it was that she asked. It wasn’t bad that she did or anything, it was just… Strange.

“Not really,” I say. “I think that there will be a way to be immortal in the future, like maybe being uploaded into robot bodies or drinking a potion that makes you an alicorn. I’m not going to die, so I’m not really worried about it.”

Ragdoll’s face really showed some emotion in response. Her brows drew in, and a hint of a frown caressed her lips.

“I’m not afraid either,” she said after a pause. Her scotch glass was empty, the ice cubes from before long gone. She picked up the bottle again and poured more alcohol into the cup.

“Have you even touched this glass?” The bartender asked, pointing toward Boner’s glass which was, of course, empty.

“No. Don’t you believe in ghosts?”

He looked disappointed, his lips pursed and brows drawn down.

“Ghosts can drink spirits. My ghost friend, Boner, is here. We’re all celebrating a funeral well done.”

“Fine, don’t tell me that you just drink from it when I’m not looking,” he said. He turned up the radio with his magic and went to clearing off the empty glasses in front of us. He hesitated at Boner’s glass, then eventually picked it up too. Boner sighed loudly and put his hooves on the table. He usually glowed dimly, but he seemed to lose all of his luster when his glass was taken from him. He tossed his mane and floated down through the chair to the floor.

“See you back at the shop, BB,” Boner said, waving a hoof at me as he exited the bar.

Sometimes, I wonder what it would be like if he could manipulate things. He’d probably make me great gifts for being such a great pony! When he wasn’t doing that, maybe he would be helping us do our job. As far as I knew, his talent was literally undertaking. How he got his butt mark in that was beyond me. Which, speaking of cutie marks!

“Ragdoll, how did you get your cutie mark?” I asked. She seemed taken a little off guard – she was in the middle of tilting her head back to drink her beverage. She sat it down before she could get the last drops of scotch and nodded her head.

“Playing dolls,” she said. Then, “Where’s yours?”

I glance down at my flank. It’s as gray as it ever was.

“I don’t have one! I don’t really need one though, I mean, I don’t need a butt tattoo to tell me that I’m special. I’m so good at everything that it couldn’t all be included in one mark. It’s okay, I forgive the cutie mark magic for not being able to come up with something that fits all of my wonderful talents.”

There was silence for a time. I took another shot of whiskey and heard Ragdoll pouring herself another glass of scotch. My insides were nice and warm, and my thoughts raced all around my head. I did have a faint stomach ache, but it was nothing that a couple more shots of alcohol couldn’t cure.

“Want scotch?” Ragdoll asked.

“I’d love some!” She pushed the glass over to me. “Thanks, Ragdoll!”

I drank the entire thing and floated the glass back to her. I assumed that she finished drinking all her alcohol, because she didn’t immediately refill her glass. I went back to my whiskey and offered her some, but she wasn’t interested. More for me!

A few more ponies entered the bar. They were all mourners from the funeral, and the bartender actually moved from behind his bar to go greet them and probably offer his condolences. My head started to spin, probably from too much alcohol. It was a good indicator to stop, so I did.

“Hey, Ragdoll, will ya help me walk ‘ome?” I slurred. She looked over at me and nodded. She hopped down from her stool and I nearly fell out of mine, but managed to stay upright. I grabbed my change purse and hid it inside my hair until we made it back home.

Ragdoll took me on a long, winding route that was evidently the long way back to Purple Pier. We made it to Green Pier, and walked down an alleyway between buildings, across a bridge to a small island with a single shed on it.

“Ragdoll, let me tell you something,” I said. “You… are the best apprentice a pony could ask for. Your sewing skills really helped to save that funeral! I also love your leg warmers and, damn, Missus Legwarmers is pretty cool too.” We paused in the middle of the bridge and I leaned heavily against Ragdoll. “I really wanna’ted to let you know that I really appreciate you and all you do.”

“Thank you,” she said.

We turned around and headed away from the shed, away from the Green Pier, and back to the short way to home.

Prologue: Is There Rest For The Wicked?

“Patchwork.”

Her fur is white, and her short mane is like a candy cane.

“Brokenbones,” I say, correcting her, “or BB. Everyone calls me BB.”

She gnaws on the metal part of the pencil in her mouth. The tip bobs up and down.

“Right,” she says, drawling out the word. “BB, we’ve done an extensive number of psychological evaluations and tests, but we still don’t have an answer for your motive.”

I’m sitting down like a dog on the other side of the clear, plastic wall between us. I lean forward and press my nose against it. It instantly fogs up.

“And?” I ask. Her fur is so incredibly white, it’s almost like it’s luminescent. In a way, she doesn’t seem like she’s real. Everything is so sterile. The walls around my cell are white, the hallway that Candy Cane is sitting in is white, the floor is white, the ceiling is white, even the bed frame of my cot is white. They say that I’m crazy, I’m not, but I will be if there isn’t a change in scenery.

Candy Cane chews on the end of her pencil again. She taps her legal pad with the tip. Her eyebrows draw down and her red eyes narrow.

“What I mean to ask is: Why did you do it?”

I exhale and the plastic fogs up until she disappears behind it. I stand up and trot around my cell. They’re always asking questions, always wanting to get something out of me. I don’t know what it is that they want. Every week it’s, Why did you do it? And every week, I have the same answer. I walk back to the plastic pane and stand a few inches away from it. Candy Cane looks up at me, and I stare down into her eyes.

“Do immortal ponies bleed red?” I ask. “Because I’ve always wanted to know.”

Author's Note

this is my first fanfiction ever, so i hope this went okay! thanks to my friends for helping me out with it. <3