“So, what is the point of all this, exactly?” Rainbow stared down at the gun which had been set up on a large plank of wood overlooking the area outside the castle. Celestia and Luna had set me up with a proper firing position that would allow me to put the full potential of the rifle to use. Splayed out around the gun was the paperwork that I’d use to calculate the shot with makeshift graphs provided by Twilight and some royal scientists or something.

“I’m going to fire a shot at a target that’s no bigger than a pony over two kilometers away. There is a lot of math that goes into the shot, thus the paperwork.” I explained and looked through the scope again in order to try and gauge distances.

“I get that, don’t understand any of that, but I get that. I want to know why the Princesses want to see you make such a shot in the first place.” Rainbow replied as she hopped up onto my back and settled down between my shoulder blades to watch what I was doing over my shoulder.

“It’s because they want to see a weapon make an impossible shot at what they consider to be impossible distances.”

“Right… Only ranged weapons we have are bows and crossbows. Don’t really have anything that can take down a target from over a kilometer away.” Dash sighed and set her head down on her crossed hooves. “What I want to know is how does it work? I can’t imagine anything being able to sling an arrow or bolt across that kind of distance without destroying the ammunition.”

Picking up a bullet from a nearby pile that had been recreated perfectly from the ammunition that had appeared with the rifle, I lifted it up to the pegasus on my back to show off. “This is no bolt or arrow. The brown tip is the bullet, the part that gets fired from the gun. The rest of it packs the explosive charge needed for sending the round.”

“What’s it made of?”

“Composite materials, some of which is lead, copper and other metals.”

“Oh. Isn’t lead toxic to ponies?”

“Lead is toxic to most biological matter if you come into direct contact with it with your skin. It’s why it’s coated with another non-toxic metal or material.” I explained and looked back over my shoulder at the pony on my back. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a couple shots to take.”

“Right, sure.” Rainbow stood herself up to take to wing in order to leave me in peace. “Good luck!” she shouted back, making me arch an eyebrow for a moment. She was replaced by Princess Luna who stood nearby and behind me in safety.

“What do you wish me to do to help?” she requested, standing proud as indicated by her shadow.

“After I make the shots, go retrieve what remains of the targets for me once I’ve cleared you to do so. I don’t want to accidentally kill you by mistake if you suddenly appear in the path of the bullet.” I requested, earning confirmation from the princess before she too took wing and left me in peace.

Once the assembled (the princesses, Twilight and friends minus Fluttershy, the Guard who were all making bets on whether I could actually make the shot, as well as assorted nobles who’d been invited to the display) had gathered and were finally silenced upon my turning onto my back to shush them, I flipped back over onto my stomach and set myself up behind the gun.

Chambering a round and clicking the safety off, I took a few moments to steady my breathing and lower my heartrate. With finger on trigger, sitting calm and ready to go, I entered my own little world and focused on the rate at which my lungs filled and emptied, timing each breath with when I’d pull the trigger with ease of practice.

“I still doubt his words. There is simply no possible method at which one could hit a target so far away!” I heard a stallion sneer to his compatriots, unaware that I could hear him perfectly. Putting the comment aside and relying on my skills, I lined up the shot with exactly where it should be and pulled the trigger.

The gun fired, the explosion had everypony duck for cover and the barrel pushed back against me with the recoil to load in the next round for me. I watched through the scope as the wake left behind by the bullet spun in ever increasing spirals until it disappeared from my range of view. My only indication that I’d hit anything was the target exploding into shrapnel and the subsequent splash when the bullet struck dirt.

Lining up the second shot with a smirk received by whispers of incredulity, I pulled the trigger again and set the round down range. This time, the least skittish ponies remained only cowering behind the railings, with the Princesses standing tall over everypony else, while the rest all ducked below for cover again.

Again, watching the shot on its travel with a practiced eye showed that the bullet had been affected somehow and touched down into the very leftmost side of the target; essentially taking an arm off an invisible human enemy. Even if I had only taken off an arm, the wound itself would prove fatal if the enemy didn’t receive immediate medical help.

Adjusting myself slightly, I turned to the third and final target and set my reticule up for the shot. This one seemed different, almost vaguely human in shape with a green camouflage pattern about it’s body. A glint in my scope fired off automatic warnings in my mind and I reacted first, putting a shot down range just as I saw the face of the man I was about to kill.

“Jeramy?” I mumbled to myself in shock before realizing that I’d already put the bullet down range and was about to take the life of one of my greatest friends. A second glint and I reacted almost as quickly as the first, firing a fourth shot down range, then a fifth and finally a sixth.

By the time I had engaged the safety, pulled the bolt back and dropped the magazine to clear the weapon, there was nothing left of the third target save for splinters and fragmentations.

Dropping my head to my firing platform and shutting my eyes as tight as I could, I willed the image of the enemy out of my mind with as much force as I could muster while the sound of wings alerted me to somepony approaching.

“Is it safe now?” Luna inquired, hovering nearby to my platform waiting for instruction. I merely nodded back and let the Princess disappear in a sphere of blue light. Collecting myself and keeping my hand away from the trigger I stared down through the scope to watch the blue form of Princess Luna shake her head and collect the targets remains with her magic; keeping each target and it’s splinters separated with a magical bubble.

With a pair of bubbles appearing, one in my scope and the other next to me, Luna made the instant transmission between locations which told me it was time to get up and properly address the audience.

“What are you carrying? Did you just pick up whatever garbage you could find?” A random noble demanded with a smirk while the other nobles all giggled at the poke at the princess. “Did the human just miss and asked you to grab whatever you could find in order to protect his poor excuse for dignity?”

“Silence!” Luna boomed, her voice causing a shockwave that toppled most of the nobles over all at once. Had she directed the word at me, I probably would have been sent over the firing platform to another death. “These are the remains of the targets that Master Soren struck with his weapon!” she announced, dropping the piles of debris on the platform near to me.

The entire audience was silent as they looked over the shrapnel between us and judged that due to the colour, material and vague shape of the straw target remains against the second target that I had nearly missed, Luna wasn’t lying and I was a force to be reckoned.

“That’s not even remotely possible! All we heard was a massive explosion! We didn’t even see anything in the air!” A noble sitting above the rest, a golden mane and glaring blue eyes shouted back furiously.

“That’s because the bullet gets fired faster than the speed of sound and is only thirteen millimeters in diameter.” I explained calmly and staring daggers back at the obnoxious noble. Even his voice was grating on my skin. “If you’d like more proof, why doesn’t Princess Luna transport you to the target location and I’ll put a couple rounds down at you? See if you’re still so willing to accuse me after you’re dead.”

“You dare to speak to me that way?” The noble puffed himself up haughtily while the rest of the audience merely watched in shocked silence. “I will have your head for that!”

“Go for it, if you’ve got the balls for it.” I challenged, standing in place and inadvertently scattering my equations.

“Are you declaring a challenge, human?” the noble grinned and a quick look from everyone told me that this was a bad idea. Even a glance at Luna, who’s eyes were quite wide warned me not to further provoke the white stallion.

I was never very good at backing down.

“Yes! I will challenge you!” I shouted back with an ever-increasingly malicious grin. The pony grinned back, matching my intent with his own before I held a finger up to add another point, “But, I don’t fight unless it’s to the death.”

“Agreed.” the unicorn stood from where he stood and trotted down the balcony towards the stairs while I leapt from the shooting platform and halted my fall with a burst of magic to land safely. Wouldn’t want to give away the trick up my sleeve just yet, would I? “The human has declared a challenge with me, a fight to the death! I, Prince Blueblood, accept and will take the life of this lowly specimen!”

Keeping to the nature of his words, “I, ex-military Captain Soren Mercer, have issued a challenge, a fight to the death.” I announced as a simplistic straight sword appearing on my hip by Luna’s providence. “I will take the life of this pathetic excuse of a Prince and by doing so, secure my display of power!” I held two fingers up to Luna, making her raise an eyebrow but complied and strapped a second straight sword to my other hip before retreating to the royal stands to sit with her sister.

“Princess Celestia, I can’t believe you’re allowing this!” I heard Twilight protest and with a quick glance, showed that Twilight was up on all four trying to plead with the eldest Alicorn. “This is barbaric!”

“But it is, unfortunately, tradition. A challenge against a member of Nobility has been issued and both parties have agreed to the terms and conditions of the fight.” Celestia groaned back with a look of mild disappointment. I was pretty sure she knew I was going to use my undeath to kind of cheat the fight, which meant that she was going to lose a Prince.

“If you wish to back out now, you may get down on and grovel at my hooves. Maybe I’ll let you live as my personal servant.” Blueblood sneered, drawing a rapier from his side with his magic and gave it a simple flourish.

“I’ll give you the same chance to surrender. At the cost of your horn, and your nobility.” I remarked, shifting the sneering grin into more of an instantly fuelled rage.

“I would never back down from a challenge!” Blueblood roared and charged at me. I remained where I stood, both swords remaining undrawn and hoped that wherever he’d run me through wouldn’t put me down for the fifteen minute break. “En Garde!”

Then he stabbed me. And by that, I mean I had about 37 inches of steel pushed into my body and penetrated out the back, miraculously just between my ribs and alongside my heart.

“Didn’t even draw his swords.” Blueblood mumbled and went to try and draw the sword from my body, however I held the sword in by the hilt with one hand and brought the second down on his horn in a tightly packed fist.

The pony’s head snapped sideways and his body followed after, ending up in the dirt and spinning away from me with the telekinetically amplified strike looking dazed and confused but alive. Granted, his horn was fizzling with sparks of magical power but refused to recover to form any sort of real spell.

“What… what manner of interloper struck me? I will have…” Blueblood tried to shout but in his daze, only managed to fumble his words. “I will have their head!”

“Oh, but we’re not done yet!” I called back, drawing the tiny pinpricks of his eyes to stare at me in horror as I slowly pulled the sword from my chest and tossed it aside. “You think it’s so easy to kill me?”

“But, I ran you through the chest! You should be dead!” The stallion screamed out in fear as I drew both my weapons with flair and placed both edges against either side of his neck, as though I were using a large pair of scissors.

“Should be, but I’m not. I guess your aim isn’t very good.” I mumbled back despite that a river of blood was running down both my chest and back and was soaking me through my clothes. “You lose.”

“Then kill me!” Blueblood hissed back, challenging me. I’ll admit, I was seriously considering the idea but with a glance upwards at the stands, judged I had a better idea.

“Okay, fine.” I turned back to the pony and raised one of the swords from his neck before bringing it back down on the pony.

The pony let out the least manly shriek I had ever heard in my life as the aim of the sword changed so that instead of cutting through the neck, it instead chopped through the horn on his head and gave him a fairly straight forward haircut all at once. The shriek shifted to an all-out scream of agony as I set both my blades on the ground to place my lips near to his ear.

“You're not worth the effort of cleaning your blood off these blades, let alone keeping you alive. You may do whatever you want, but remember this: You. Belong. To. Me.” I whispered hoarsely, putting as much malice as I could into my words before standing with both of my weapons in hand in order to sheath them for safekeeping. “Don’t go dying without my permission, understand?”

“Y-yes…” Blueblood whimpered back, staring up at me through watery eyes as his hooves cradled the nub of his horn and paramedics descended upon us both. “I understand.”

“Good.” I grinned back and allowed the medics to tear my shirt off with their magic before pouring as much of their healing spells as they could into both sides of the wound. “By the way, you’re surrendering your nobility.”

“But I-” Blueblood began to protest, but shut himself up with a glance from me. “Very well…” I had to admit, I was feeling great. Celestia and Luna both flew down with Twilight hitching a ride from Rainbow Dash and I was soon basking in the glow of both alicorns to the effect of my wounds closing up almost instantly.

“You realize that by challenging him to the death,” Celestia began in a tiny whisper directly to me over my shoulder while she worked on my back. Luna looked to be giving me a similar scowl as Celestia probably was, even while slowly waving her horn over my sealing wound. “You technically cheated. He will find out, and he will want vengeance.”

“I technically did, yes, and I technically didn’t. If he had taken off my head or done something to put me in the fifteen minute break, he would’ve won. Until I rose back up from the dead.” I whispered back by way of looking over my shoulder at the white princess. “By all means, this was a… kind of official and totally legit victory.” I smirked and turned where I stood to place a random peck on Celestia’s nose, making her flinch back before her eyes went narrow and Luna gave me a solid smack on my back with a hoof.

Aiming back towards the firing platform at a leisurely walk, “Besides, if he tries anything, I’ll just kill him!” I shouted back mostly to the princesses, but also to remind Blueblood of his current predicament, as I spun while I walked then burst myself into the air to land on the platform to gather my things.

As I gathered up the papers into my arms, Twilight appeared next to me in a bubble. Working quickly, she too gathered up the remains of my equations and handed them to me in silence.

“What?” I broke the silence, the skin on the back of my neck foretelling words would be shared between us; words that Twilight didn’t want to talk about.

“Why’d you kiss Princess Celestia?” the little unicorn fidgeted around with the remaining pages in her magical grasp, refusing to look at me. You know, I had a feeling it’d come around to that sooner than later.

“Stall out the conversation, that’s it. I was losing so I used the suddenness in order to make my escape.” I smirked though I hid doing so behind an uncaring shrug. Taking the pages from Twilight and rolling all the work up into a single unit, I lit the entire thing on fire with the jet engine spell and let it all crumble to ash. “If you think I'm some kind of player hoping to get in with Royalty in order to achieve power, position or wealth, then you’re wrong.”

“So, there isn’t anything you actually feel towards Princess Celestia?” Twilight looked up at me in some strange cross between hope and deep suspicion.

“Nah, nothing. I’m sure she’s a great person but I don’t know her enough.” I shrugged back and retrieved the rifle to hold onto it by the handle and awkwardly glide down with one hand centerline to my body at my waist line. Landing with only an uneasy landing, I carried the rifle at my side and approach the Princess sisters who were busy chattering amongst themselves.

Noticing our approach, Celestia turned to me with a reddened face but maintained composure as best she could. “Mister Mercer,” she began but I held her up with a hand.

“I apologize for my actions earlier, both the duel with Blueblood and the event that followed you healing me. It was inappropriate given our lack of proper relationship and I request that you not only take Blueblood into service in the castle as well that you might forgive me.” I announced, standing straight up and at attention with the Light Fifty at hand.

Clearly having had her stride destroyed a second time, Celestia’s mouth hung open and flapped wordlessly a few times before she let out a cough and returned to propriety.

“Yes, of course. I just request that you don’t make a habit out of either event, for both our sakes.” Celestia requested, standing up straight like nothing had happened whatsoever. “And what would you do with Blueblood? His life is yours, after all.”

With a groaning shrug, “I don’t know, maybe get him working with the servants. Teach him some humility working for his fellow ponies.” I suggested, looking off towards the sight of Blueblood being carted off on a stretcher with his horn resting on his chest. “After he recovers from having his horn taken.”

“Why,” Twilight began softly, staring after the stallion with me. “Why did you have to take his horn? It’s like taking a limb from a unicorn.”

“My reasons are few but important.” I began, turning back to Twilight while the Princesses went about their own way and returned to whatever affairs they had while Rainbow and friends all descended from the stands to join in on the visitation. Already they were chatting about what had transpired in the last fifteen minutes or so, so I paid them no real attention. “One: Blueblood was a prick who probably has never worked a day in his life. Two: Unicorns rely so heavily on their magic that even just putting him into servitude would’ve have much of an impact if he doesn’t get his hooves dirty.”

“Ah can totally get behind that there statement, Soren.” AJ remarked, giving me an acknowledging nod. “Nopony really learns their lessons ‘til they get their hooves dirty. Can’t achieve the same thing with their magics.”

“Right. Reason number three: I wasn’t going to let him get off without some kind of lasting injury after everything he said about me, which leads me to reason number four. I’m a vengeful being, most humans are to some degree. He pissed me off, I kicked his ass.” I announced and with rifle resting against my shoulder, was lead back into the castle by Twilight whose destination was the vaults once more.

“But still, to remove one’s horn… Seems much too cruel a punishment. I think I’d have rather accepted death.” Rarity gave a heavy breath, her voice sounding concerned. What that concern was aimed towards was beyond me. Second thought, maybe it wasn’t concern but empathy…

“Either way, he won’t be forgetting this for a long time.” As our group approached the hallway leading to the vault, Twilight and I took the leading positions over Twilight and Pinkie. Which reminded me: “Pinkie, a moment, please?” I requested and stepped out of line from the other ponies. Pinkie turned and shrugged back before bouncing on her hooves to along the wall with me while Twilight and group continued on.

“Sure, what’s up?” Pinkie’s voice was much to enthusiastic for my liking…

“I want to apologize for walking out on your party last night. It’s not your fault whatsoever.” I began, kneeling down to get closer to the pony and set the rifle to rest against the wall. “I had told Twilight the day before that I had wanted absolutely no event for congratulating me for my duties in saving Fluttershy and the rest at the bank fire. Fluttershy and Amethyst Star should have said something ahead of time.”

“I totally get it.” Pinkie waved off the apology like it was nothing. Ouch. “You were just doing what you thought was right during that rescue, right?” I nodded. “So you don’t really consider yourself a hero. Thing is though, everypony else does.”

“I don’t deserve their thanks or admiration. Two ponies lost their lives in that fire and I had to tell their families that they were dead. Scootaloo was orphaned because of it.”

“Those ponies gave their lives doing their job: protecting ponies. Their families knew the risks long ago.” Pinkie’s voice seemed to have come down a notch and ended up being more apathetic than I had expected. “Besides, there could have been a lot more lives lost if you hadn’t stepped in and saved everypony.”

I remained in silence, taking in the pink one’s words before standing with a bowed head and gave Pinkie a quick scratch behind the ears. “Thanks.” I took off again once I'd retrieved my weapon with Pinkie cheerfully bouncing alongside me till I stood in front of the group of ponies looking at the large vault that Celestia and Luna waited at.

“All due respect, Princesses,” I began, addressing the pair of alicorns as they went for the door lock mechanisms. “I think the rifle will be safest with someone who knows how to operate it. If it helps, I’ll disarm it and give you the missing piece.”

“I think it will be fine if you hold onto the weapon, as long as you do make it inoperable. You may hold onto whatever missing piece you remove.” Celestia replied with a warm smile and stepped away from the door. “Thank you for coming and clarifying things with the rifle. I entrust it to you implicitly.”

“Then if I may make one request?” I remained rooted where I stood but shifted my weight around a tad. “I’d like a sling made for the rifle, in order to make it easier to carry and fly back to Ponyville.”

“Of course, if you’ll provide an accurate drawing of the sling, then we’d be more than happy to conjure one up for you.” Luna nodded back and swept her hoof down towards the hall to indicate for me to follow her. “I will loan you some stationery, if you wish.”

“Thank you.” I nodded back and turned towards Twilight. “I’ll see you back home?”

“Sure, don’t be out late.” Twilight called back and took off in the opposite direction from Luna and I.

Author's Note

Quick, non-spoilery warning: The next chapter (Or chapter after, haven't decided yet) will be a kind of rehash of the show's second season finale. It's not going to be a complete transcription of the show's script, nor is Soren going to be the one to finally bring down Chrysalis, but he will have some play in the events.