Alicorn Song

Alicorn Song

Chapter 3

The hunt begins

The motor of the boat hummed softly while Firestorm went over the maps of Acorn island and the surrounding sea once more. There was no doubt. This was the place her target must have been washed up on the shore. But why had there been no destruction yet? According to the folder that lay next to the maps, this mare was extremely violent and did not care for the lives of anypony but her own.

Her fellow mercenaries and soldiers had laughed at her for suggesting that the mare had been washed up here, but all evidence pointed towards that possibility. The currents around the island on which the containment center was located led directly to Acorn island. All the maps said so. Yet, due to her lack of actual proof, they had only given her a small compliment of soldiers. The rest of the idiots were heading south, towards a similar facility. For some reason they seemed to believe that their target was heading there...

Firestorm stomped her hoof onto the table in frustration, causing the folder that held her targets information to fall to the ground. They had actually dared to laugh at her. HER! Hadn't it been her who had flown through Tartarus and back for her country? Hadn't she proven, more than once, that her instincts rarely ever failed her?

The jet black mare stroke a few of her gray hairs out of her face, as she took several deep breaths to calm herself. She would show them. She would show them all that nopony laughed at her and lived to tell the tale. For the meantime, she had to work with these idiots. After this job was over however, she decided, she would make sure to make each and every one of them pay for the humiliation they had caused her. A bullet to the brain should do the trick. Free of charge for a change though...

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Candy Cane trotted next to Lulu who, without any effort whatsoever, floated almost everything Celest had in her apartment over her head. The big purple mare was even humming a cheery tune as she did so, occasionally breaking out into soft giggles.

The young stallion could only hang his head and smile awkwardly at anypony they met. All of them, without fail, threw them a glance of utter shock. It was no surprise in his eyes. Lulu was, after all, floating a fridge, a bed, a table, six chairs and several boxes which held all the little things his cousin had kept at her place. The fridge alone would have been too much for his own horn.

The sound of stuff falling to the ground, and a cardboard box filled with underwear landing on his head, pulled him out of his thoughts. Lulu had, for no apparent reason, dropped everything she was holding and had darted off into another direction entirely.

        “Oh great... What is it this time? Cake again? Muffins? A cat?” he asked himself, as he did his best to catch up with the mare. That he had to remove one of his cousins panties from his face to do so, did not brighten his mood in the slightest. If he was judging Celest correctly, the white mare would not be too happy about all the dents and scratches her stuff was suffering during this move.

After Candy had finally caught up with his impromptu house guest, he was speechless for a moment. How did Lulu even see this place from where they had been a few minutes ago? Of course, he remembered the old research center at the edge of town. Something had happened here when he was still a kid, and nopony had ever bothered to rebuild it. Now, the gray concrete building was almost completely grown over by thick vines and other greenery. From some distance away, he could hear the voice of Celest, cursing quite colorfully.

        “Lulu? What's the matter? Come on, we gotta get back before...” he began, but almost wet himself when Lulu turned her head to look at him. It lasted only the fraction of a second, but that had been enough. All the playfulness and good nature had been gone from the mares eyes, leaving only utter contempt and hatred for everything alive.

As the Unicorn stallion turned around, he suddenly was muzzle to muzzle with a very pissed off looking white Unicorn mare. Her green eyes were blazing with the fury of a thousand suns, while her usually blond mane and tail looked as if they had transformed into flames.

        “What do you have to say for yourself?” she shouted, making a stallion who was passing them look at the pair in alarm. One quick glance in his general direction, and the quite strong looking Earthpony stallion was running for his life.

Candys fear of Lulu had, for the moment dissipated, and been replaced by fear of his cousins wrath. So he did judge her correctly after all. Saying so in this situation however, was not going to do him any good, so he decided to play dumb.

        “Ehm... I don't know what you mean?”

        “You... You don't know? Then what do you think is this?” Celest shouted at him once more, now thrusting a small piece of fabric into his face. It was the pair of panties he had removed from his face earlier and thrown aside without a second glance. On closer inspection though... it certainly was rather sexy underwear. The red silk and black ribbon at the front...

Candy noticed that he was getting carried away a moment too late. As he looked back up at his cousin again, tears of rage were running down her face.

        “IDIOT!” was the last thing he heard before everything went white.

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        “I'm sorry...” Celest muttered, while wrapping another bandage around her cousins left foreleg. It had been years since she had had a magic surge, and had been quite sure that she had it under control... Until she had seen all of her underwear scattered around the street. Something had snapped inside of her then and there, and she had pursued her cousin to give him a piece of her mind.

What she had actually done, more resembled blowing him up then giving him a stern talking to though...

        “It's alright... My fault for being careless... Just... watch that horn of yours in the future, OK?” Candy mumbled through the bandages on his face. Everything hurt as he lay on a bedroll on the back porch. The sun felt nice, despite his many cuts and bruises. He started, not for the first time, to doubt that it had been a good idea to take Lulu and Celest in. If this went on, he would either spent all of his money on magical healing bandages, or on food. Maybe even both...

Lulu, on her part, had not even suffered a scratch from Celests earlier outburst. As soon as the, in comparison to her, tiny mare had unleashed her magic, a silvery shield spell had sprung into life around the big Unicorn. Hay, how much power did that mare actually have to deflect a full power blow from another Unicorn with a magic surge? She hadn't even broken a sweat doing it!

Right now, the purple mare was laying curled up next to him, sleeping soundly. Candy felt something brush against his back, but as he turned his head to look, there was nothing there...

        “She's a strange one, isn't she?” Celest said, obviously trying to change the topic. Candy nodded softly.

        “Yeah. I mean... usually we would have needed to get a cart to move all of your stuff, but she just carried it all herself. Then there is that shield spell... Just how strong is she?” the young stallion mumbled. The look Lulu had given him earlier had completely slipped his mind by this point, which might have had something to do with the fact that he had hid her shield with his head.

        “So... What should we do with her? Plunger won't be back for another two weeks, and I can't see any change in her condition yet. It's been four days since you found her after all. There should have been at least some kind of improvement.” Celest asked worriedly, as she closed up the first aid kit.

        “We could always take the ferry to the mainland and bring her to the hospital. But... I don't really think that will be necessary. At least she's talking now, isn't she? Doesn't that count for anything?”

Celest had to think about that for a moment, tapping her chin with one of her hooves. Sure, Lulu had begun to speak quite normally over the last few days. It was almost as if she had learned how to speak altogether though. There were times in which the big mare used words even Celest didn't know. Some of those, she actually had to look up to make sure they weren't just gibberish. Other times, she tried to explain what she wanted like a baby with a minimal vocabulary.

        “I guess your right, but whats up with all that archaic Equus shes been using? I can't understand half of what she says when she does that.” Celest frowned.

        “Well... maybe she's some foreign royalty or something? I've heard of kingdoms abroad.” Candy replied, also sinking into deep thought. Just what was Lulus secret? Did she even have one? It was all pretty confusing for the young comic book artist.

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The waves were breaking against the shoreline of Acorn island, as the three trotted along the dark beach. Sunset had been an hour ago, but Celest had been positive that it might be a good idea to bring Lulu back to the place where Candy had found her. Maybe it triggered some kind of memory, which would help them to determine who this strange mare actually was...

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Firestorm was looking at her target through the electronically enhanced scope of her rifle. There was no doubt that this was the mare she had been hired to kill. With her naked eye, the mares wings were invisible, but magic could not fool technology.

After all, an illusion spell was nothing else than a mind trick. A machine had no mind that could be manipulated, therefor illusion magic was quite ineffective against a scope like hers.

        “Ma'am. We're in position. Ready to attack on your mark.” one of her subordinates whispered into his microphone. Firestorm tapped the send button on her radio twice to let the stallion know that she had received his message.

Still... there was something off here. This mare did not have the cold expression on her face. Instead, she looked around curiously, taking in the sight of the beach at night. Almost like a foal, the Pegasus decided.

        “Wait until the two civilians are out of danger. After that, it's fire at will.” Firestorm ordered, not loosing track of her target for even a second as she did so. Several bursts of static filled her ears, informing her that her troops were acknowledging her order.

        “Good. At least something is going according to plan.” she thought to herself as the cross on in her scopes viewfinder stayed on the mares neck. One pull on the trigger, and it'd all be over...

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Lulu looked around curiously. The light of the moon was soft and gentle on her coat, and she enjoyed every second she got to bath in it. She didn't remember anything before waking up in Candy Canes house a few days ago and finding him in the kitchen, preparing breakfast. At first, she had been quite afraid of him for some reason. Just looking at him had filled her with a sense of dread that she couldn't quite explain to herself.

Celest, however, had the opposite effect on her confused mind. Just thinking about the gentle green eyes of the mare had made her insides glow pleasantly.

Since then though, Lulu had remembered at least some basic things. Others, she learned. Speech, for example, had been a great challenge for her at first. She could understand everything Celest and Candy were saying to her, but knew instinctively that they would not understand her.

Slowly, but surely, the knowledge had come to her. Each time she woke up in the morning, she could express herself a little more. It was quite useful, the playful mare decided. Now that she knew the proper words for things, she could tell these two what she wanted or needed after all.

Like that necklace she was wearing now. It was nothing special, or so Candy had said, but for her it was priceless. It was made of fake pearls, with a seashell in the form of a crescent moon at the center.

Candy had bought it from her from a stallion selling his souvenirs to the passing tourists earlier. Lulu did not understand how money worked yet, but she understood that she couldn't just take it, no matter how much she wanted it. Instead, she had pointed at the fake piece of jewelry and asked her two guardians if she could have it. Lulu was a good filly after all, and good fillies got Muffins from time to time...

Then, from one moment to another, Lulus vision went dark as a sense of dread overpowered her very being...

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Firestorm began shaking as the mare she had tracked with her scope for almost twenty minutes now, looked directly at her. The expression on the mares face had changed completely, making her resemble the cold killing machine she had been told about. Even when she had gone a round against the Changeling queen, she had not felt this kind of fear. The sheer presence of this mare promised a horrible death to anypony foolish enough to take a swing at her...