Days passed before a train came to pick the exhausted Surgeons, Task Force, Foxfire, and the Destroyers from the Changeling Kingdom station. Thorax and Lance accompanied them, leaving the rest of the Valkyrie Brigade to sort whatever other mess cropped up in the meantime. Once they boarded, they filed into the amenities' cab, finding two things first and foremost right off the bat.

One was Shining Armor sitting at a booth to greet them, and sitting in a baby seat was Princess Flurry Heart who cooed and giggled at the arrivals. The second was that the tables were laden with fresh food whose aromas wafted into the nostrils of the lot, making the less restrained amongst them salivate with anticipation. Silently, they filed into the seats, the groups splitting up to keep to themselves. Foxfire grabbed Trigger with a hoof and nudged him to sit next to Shining. Thorax, curious as to why she was doing this, decided to sit on Shining's other side, very close to Flurry Heart.

The Task Force and Surgeons were watching Trigger intently without touching their food, while the Destroyers already began eating with a slow, controlled pace that belied their hunger. Lance moved to sit next to Trigger, and Foxfire sat after he did, effectively cutting off his only route of escape.

Shining turned to regard Lance with a passive gaze. "Situation was under control?" he asked.

"More or less before I arrived," Lance replied with a nod. "The enemy had four airships of their own, and the Task Force wants extra to clean and keep three of the damned things."

Shining turned to Rekka, who nodded with a knowing smile. "First time piloting aircraft, and the alicorns made it stupidly easy. They had everything labeled," he chirped.

Shining nodded and turned to Trigger before assuming a predatory smirk. "So… I've decided on your punishment for helping one of the four Destroyers bypass probation," he said ominously.

Trigger blanched at that, and his mane almost stood on end. "N-no booze?" he stammered.

Shining's smirk widened. His eyes averted briefly to Charlotte, who turned to face the scene with a roll sticking out of her mouth. He turned back to Trigger and replied lowly, "No, something… worse. But if you do a good job, your pay will be doubled."

Trigger relaxed a little at that. Double the pay meant more booze and smokes, after all. "Wh-what is it?" he asked, sounding hopeful.

Shining's smirk widened still, and began twitching just to stay in place. "Airship cleaning duty," he replied tersely, the utterance causing Trigger's pupils to dilate. "Once we get back to Canterlot, that is. Rest up for now. You'll need it."

Trigger merely sighed and cursed under his breath, making sure Flurry Heart couldn’t hear him before nodding sourly. Shining continued to grin at him, but then shifted it to Charlotte, who whimpered and hastily turned around with flattened ears. "Oh don't think you're off the hook either, miss. But your punishment will be delayed until you can be deployed again," he chided.

Flurry Heart giggled and threw her forelegs into the air. Foxfire turned to her and gave a toothy smile, yet that only made Flurry giggle some more. "So, what shenanigans have you been up to lately?" Foxfire chirped.

"Eating, throwing mashed peas everywhere, playing… you know, the works for a typical baby," Shining replied. "In spite of being an alicorn… and speaking of alicorns…" That caused everyone to immediately turn to him, with the Destroyers having wide, hopeful eyes while the Task Force sported raised brows betraying immediate skepticism. The Surgeons and Thorax maintained straight faces, save the sulking Trigger.

Shining's horn glowed, and within seconds a scroll materialized in a flash of magenta light. He levitated it so it was inches from his muzzle and opened it before clearing his throat. Briefly scanning the contents before nodding in approval, he began to read, "I…"

*********

“... Prince Blueblood, and Princesses Celestia and Luna, would like to congratulate you all for your continued service to Equestria and your continued fight against the red and black menace," Blueblood spoke, with a scroll hovering before him as he was standing before an assembled crowd of various ponies, hippogryphs, and whatever else decided to join the fray in the banquet hall informally known as the Royal Court.

"As it stands, I would like to announce two things first and foremost." Blueblood paused to let that utterance sink into his gathered crowd. He briefly looked up to a hovering projection screen wrought of magic, showing a much bigger crowd gathered outside the castle in every street it could fill.

Blueblood turned back to the scroll before continuing, "Firstly, in light of recent events, we have granted commoner, noble, and royal alike the right to strike at the red and black menace in self-defense, should they be able to do so without the aid of a hit squad given the Royal Seal of Alicorn Bounty Hunting."

Briefly, he turned to his left to look into the crowd before spotting Patchouli, who grinned and nodded before he returned to the scroll. "With that said, there shall be an official notary in every town with a list of approved hit squads and their members. Complete with pictures of the squad members in question, so one can hire them as needed to deal with individual cases of red and black alicorns."

"Which brings me to my second thing." Again, Blueblood let it sink in, spinning around to look at the gathered crowd to take in their tense bodies and unmoving faces. Once he came to a stop and faced the projection, he continued, "Anypony caught housing, helping, or hiring the red and black menace shall be promptly dealt with by the hit squads and them alone. As the hit squads see fit, but we ask for one precaution: to keep whatever dealings done to those caught assisting the red and black menace in supplanting all cultures to be kept out of the prying eyes of foals."

"With exceptions in place, mind you. There are some victimized foals who would like to hurt the red and black menace, after all, and still more ponies who would like to hurt their employers if given the chance. And on that note…"

*********

Another day passed before the train stopped in Canterlot, with all filing out of it. Most trotted alongside Shining and Thorax, leaving Patient, Ember, Tenmei, and Koto at the station. "So… what do you guys want to do?" Patient asked, turning to the other three for their input.

"Spa?" Ember asked.

Patient's brow rose. "Why do you want to hit the spa?" he asked.

Ember donned a grin. "I wanna see if they'll finally let me have a treatment. If Blueblood's in our good graces, then who knows who else could endorse us or something," she pointed out. "Maybe I could relax for once, without worrying about getting the steel-hoofed boot."

"For bad behavior?" Patient asked, garnering a nod from Ember.

"Sut wnaethoch chi yn rheoli hynny?" Tenmei asked, turning to Ember with both brows raised. Ember promptly turned to Patient for a translation.

“He asked how you managed that.”

Ember's grin widened. "Absolutely, positively, buttfuck nothing," she replied.

Patient's eyes widened. "How the…" His mind boggled, struggling to process what he'd just heard. The tentacle monster, doing nothing to become worthy of a boot from an establishment? A red flag went off in his head at the mere notion. "What?" he asked in a high-pitched squeak.

"Exactly. So I'm wanting to try another throw of the dice, if you will," Ember chirped. She turned to Tenmei and Koto and asked, "So… spa?" The two exchanged glances and hesitantly nodded once they faced Ember again.

Patient, seeing he was outnumbered three-to-one, reluctantly nodded. "Lead the way," he grumbled. Ember let out a high-pitched eeeee and cantered along down the street, with Tenmei and Koto following her with hesitant steps. Patient trailed after them, quickly noticing how much his whole body felt like shit from post-battle fatigue.

Well, if it was a spa Ember wanted to hit up for goods and services, then he supposed he had no right to really gripe. If Ember was feeling the fatigue as he did, then maybe this would help her as well as him. Though he wondered what was swimming through Tenmei's head at the moment. Koto, however, he couldn't get a read on; as far as he knew, she only spoke Neighponese. That, and she was looking away every time he tried to look at her face to gauge her expression.

So he decided to ask Tenmei something as he and the rest of his small group rounded a corner to trot down another street. "Beth sydd â'r corn a gwmpesir?”

“What’s with the bandaged horn?”

Tenmei halted for a second, before turning to Patient with widened eyes. “Rydych yn gofyn i'r ferlen anghywir.”

“You’re askin’ the wrong pony.”

*********

The spa was so clean, comparatively to the hive, or even anywhere else in Canterlot for that matter, and packed with ponies to boot. White washed walls held pieces of local painters and potted plants dotted the rooms. Long windows on the roof let in natural light and the light grey carpet was the softest Patient had ever felt in his entire life.

After checking their weapons and armor at the door, the four were escorted to the first part of their treatment; the good ol’ massage. Though Ember had to wrap her tentacles around her rocks, with the exception of the stub-tentacle as it was still healing, if only to make the job of the massage ponies easier.

The Prench masseuses bustled about with their duties, helping the four onto the massage beds that were in one room and getting their backs lotioned up.

“Comment devons-nous travailler avec ces tentacules?” one of the masseuses asked in her native tongue to the other. Another masseuse nodded in understanding.

Koto's ears twitched as the second masseuse stated, “N'est-ce pas? Et la princesse l'approuve.”

Koto sighed and piped up, "Je vais bien avec le monstre du tentacule, et elle se comporte. Je ne vois pas le problème.” Her utterance caused the masseuses to halt briefly, before they resumed their duty.

”I have no problem with the tentacle monster, and she’s behaving. I don’t see what the fuss is over.”

Patient turned to Koto, and he would have blinked if he didn't zucchini slices covering his eyes. "Prenchie?" he asked.

"Oui," Koto answered.

"Apparently, the entire Task Force is bilingual. What second languages do Yuuki and Nagare know?" Ember piped up, grinning widely as a hoof slid onto her withers.

“Siapan ac Rwseigi,” Tenmei responded.

“Chineighse and Hoofgorodian,” Patient parroted.

"Wow. Remind me to take second-language courses one of these days," Ember chirped.

“I could teach you Coltic or Frupish if I thought you wouldn’t get bored and nod off,” Patient chuckled.

"Frupish please. Haven't heard that before," Ember stated in a daring tone.

“En usko, että haluaisit oppia tätä kieltä,” Patient coldly responded in an attempt to confuse Ember.

"How is your jaw not broken right now?" Ember asked sincerely, her third eye blinking.

“Practice.” Patient gave a shit eating grin in response. The massage therapy went in silence after that, save the banter of the masseuses in Prench as they griped about this and that. Several minutes ticked by, before the four were herded into a small sauna, all to themselves. Left to their own devices, the conversation started anew.

“Why’d you drop outta school?” Patient quietly asked Ember as he prodded at the hot coals of the sauna with magic. The door opened before Ember could answer, revealing a fifth pony joining them. Or what would be a pony if not for a heavily-scarred face and a body of stripes. The four turned and found a zebra stallion, who Ember and Patient looked at with blanched faces and widening eyes.

"H-hold the tank… am I dreaming?" Ember asked. The zebra shook his head.

"N-no… you and I…" The zebra blanched. "Please don't hurt me. I'm just here visiting wife, kids, and relaxing…" he murmured.

Ember threw up her forehooves like she was being mugged. "N-no problem. I won't bite," she stammered. The zebra relaxed and trotted in to sit next to Tenmei, and the door behind him closed.

“If, uh...if you don’t mind me askin’. You got a brother or something?” Patient tried to ask as he could swear he saw this zebra’s face before.

“I did; a twin at that. He and I fought in the Pony-Zebra war.” the zebra answered. "My brother… had his face sawed off. Poor bastard got into some nasty deals with red and black alicorns, and… just went nuts. I was dragged in reluctantly." Patient felt his face go numb at the implications. That’s why he recognized this zebra.

He killed his brother. But his brother, according to this lad, made deals with…

"Did you say… red and black alicorns?" Ember asked slowly, her third eye blinking as her brain struggled to process that bit.

The zebra nodded. "Went mad and thought he could become an alicorn himself and take Equestria by storm," he replied, turning to Patient. "His eyes… were blood red when I last saw him seven years ago."

“The same color his eyes were when I saw him,” Patient thought out loud. Some part of him wanted to call shenanigans, but he didn't have the heart to act on it.

“When you saw him…?” the zebra began to ask before something dawned on him.

It became very obvious by Patient’s reaction to his entering that he and his brother were connected somehow. And after a few more seconds of thought, he finally understood.

He was staring into the eyes of his brother’s killer.

"Alas, my brother… while I cannot forgive you for ending his life, I can understand that you likely did it out of your own concerns. Regardless, his suffering is at an end," the zebra muttered slowly and somberly. "The alicorns drove him to madness. It is they I should be enacting retribution upon."

Patient nodded slowly, a knot forming in his stomach. This zebra’s brother was the only living thing he’s killed and felt guilty over. No guilt over the red and black alicorns, obviously, but this stallion’s brother had qualities to him; he had a family, friends, and others who would miss him. And his victim’s sibling was staring him in the same sauna.

Ember leaned over to whisper in Patient's ear, "I'll tell you why I dropped out later."

Even that did little to ease his discomfort.

Author's Note

Beginning of Arc 4