Power Pony Adventures: El Taco Loco vs. The Red Menaceby CoffeeMinionChaptersI: Off With a BangII: Rising ActionIII: Grand FinaleEpilogueI: Off With a BangA brief flash lit the night above a city full of skyscrapers, and Starlight Glimmer tumbled out into the sky, screaming and flailing her limbs as she sought a floor that was no longer underhoof. A curious observation intruded through her terror, and she slowed her movements—though not her descent—as she eyed the crimson military-style coat and pants that she unexpectedly found herself wearing. She blinked and looked closer, studying their yellow piping and polished, star-shaped buttons. She also felt an unusual sensation on her face and pressed her hooves up into what felt very much like a beard. “Zdravstvuyte, comrade,” the beard said. Starlight shrieked. “Nyet,” the beard said. “Such fear does not befit the greatest hero of the East! Is bad enough to let these Power Ponies joke about you as ‘The Red Menace.’” “Where am I?! Why do I have a talking beard?!” Starlight paused, digested the latter piece of information, and scowled. “Seriously, ‘Red Menace?’ I imposed one collectivist economic system, in one village, one time…” The beard sighed. “You know it is super hero name, and this is Maretropolis, and I am inoplanetnyy simbiont from Horsehead Nebula… now, shall we stop you splatting like nasekomoye on pavement?” Starlight focused on the ground with rising panic. “Y… yes, please!” Her head jerked forward as the beard formed long prehensile limbs that lashed out toward the nearest pair of buildings. The beard also snaked down around her neck and wrapped it in a strong brace. Moments later, the limbs gripped the buildings and snapped taut. Starlight’s teeth clenched, and her body juddered, but she soon came to a halt, suspended hundreds of cart-lengths above the bustling streets below. As Starlight’s adrenaline receded, her mind began working to make sense of her situation. “Spike’s comics,” she said aloud. “He showed me one he said I shouldn’t touch…” “Comrade,” the beard said, angling Starlight’s head toward an alley far below. She watched a thin pony with some kind of cart back slowly into the light cast by a streetlamp. A figure advanced on him, its features indistinct but menacing. “He looks like he needs help,” Starlight said. The beard responded by pulling her forward and down. Starlight cried out with surprise at the sudden motion, but soon she was overwhelmed by exhilaration as the beard swung her through the forest of skyscrapers at speed, forming new limbs and absorbing old ones as it went. The beard dropped her down to street level as they came around the final building separating them from the pony. Starlight hit the pavement at a full run, flaring her horn with magic and charging toward the bulky silhouette. “The Red Menace… er, strikes again!” she shouted, closing in on it. It turned on her, and the light of her horn revealed a predominantly aqua-colored creature whose pony-sized torso and head looked grotesque above its spindly forelegs and long tail. It had no hind legs, but somehow moved by floating just above the ground. It sported a large crest upon its back, as well as an orange mask with bright outlines of yellow that was pulled tight across its head. “Save me!” the pony with the cart shouted, retreating further. The figure threw itself to the ground in front of Starlight. “No, save me!” Starlight slid to a halt right in front of it. “Wait… what?” It raised a hoof toward her, but then doubled over and clutched at its face. “I don’t know where I am, or how I got this mask, but I can’t get it off! It talks to me… makes me want… need…” With a howl, the figure whirled around and charged the pony with the cart. He screamed and tried to back away faster, but the cart’s wheel fell into a crack in the pavement and held him fast. “Nyet!” shouted both Starlight and the beard as they gave chase. Starlight blinked, considering the oddity of feeling compelled to speak in a language she didn’t actually know. But then the figure leapt toward the pony with the cart, and Starlight cast the thought aside, willing the beard to lash out and stop it. The beard aimed in the direction of the pony— —But the figure hurled itself upon the cart instead. The force of its impact crushed one of the wheels. It threw back its head in a roar, showing jaws slick with saliva, before thrusting its head into the cart’s contents and beginning to feast. Starlight slowed and stopped, watching the strange creature gorge itself on whatever had been in the cart. After a moment she gave a small shake of her head and looked at the pony still attached to the cart, who was huddled, shaking, on the ground. She reached out with a tendril of beard, undid the pony’s harness, and gently pulled him free from it. As she did so, she glanced at his cutie mark: three tacos. “Hold on a minute,” Starlight said aloud. “U nas gosti, comrade,” the beard said. “Okay, seriously, I don’t know what you’re saying!” Starlight shouted. “Would you please just speak plainly if you want me to understand?!” From behind her, a loud, clear voice called out: “I’d like nothing more than that, Red Menace! “How does ‘both of you are under arrest’ sound?” Starlight turned. Her eyes went wide. Six ponies stood before her, dressed in costumes that she recognized from— Suddenly there were only five costumed ponies and a blur heading elsewhere. Starlight startled at the sudden motion. Then the sixth pony was back, holding the shivering cart-pony in her forehooves. “Power Ponies!” Starlight shouted, smiling. “Oh, this is great! I could totally use a hoof here. I’ve been sucked into the comic world, like your versions from the other world were one time!” She glanced back at the figure that was still busily feeding from the cart. “And… apparently the villain here… needs help and is really into tacos? …But I figure that if we arrest her, we can get this figured out and should all be able to go home soon. Right?” Starlight’s smile withered under six steely gazes. “Nice try, Red Menace,” said the Masked Matter-Horn. “We thought you might finally be on our side after the last time we ran into each other… but now we catch you aiding a known criminal in their terroristic spree against the brave street-taco vendors of our fair city?!” “I just want to point out that that feels like an oddly specific form of terrorism,” Starlight said. Mistress Mare-velous raised her glowing lasso. “Don’t try any fancy mind-games on us,” she said. “Yeah,” Filli-Second added. “It’s not like you speak the language well enough to pull it off, anyway!” Saddle Rager frowned at her. “Um, that’s pretty rude, don’t you think?” Zapp rolled her eyes. “Can we just focus on arresting these two?” “Wait,” Starlight said, raising her forehooves. “You don’t understand; I’m not from this world. I’ve been stuck here, and I need help getting home!” “I do… too…” the creature said, raising its taco-stuffed mouth from the cart. “Me and my sisters… were just trying to get out of another world we were stuck in…” “Another world…” Starlight frowned, and took a closer look at the creature’s shape and features. “No… no, you can’t be…” The figure rose up from the wreckage of the cart and wrung its forehooves. “I’m alone… I’m lost… and this mask… please, can any of you help me, before the mask takes control again?” “Oh, we’ll help you,” the Masked Matter-Horn said. “Help you go to jail!” shouted Mistress Mare-velous. Starlight took a dozen heavy blows before she could cry out in pain, much less before she registered that any of the Power Ponies had moved. The beard cursed, and then fanned itself out into a dizzying array of long, snaking tendrils that covered a wide sphere around them. One of the tendrils made contact with something, and the rest converged, clamping down upon a shrieking Filli-Second. She turned her eyes back toward the rest of the Power Ponies, and saw Mistress Mare-velous charging in at her. Starlight planted her hooves and used the beard to whirl Filli-Second around, thus clobbering one hero with the other, and leaving both flat on the ground. But then a massive pillow-shaped construct of energy bore down on her, forcing Starlight to her knees. The beard strained against it, pushing both upward and down to brace itself, but there seemed to be no gaining ground. That was when the creature—or the Siren, as Starlight had guessed—leapt headlong into the fray. The pillow dissipated as the Siren plowed into Radiance. She whipped her long aquatic tail around, slamming Saddle Rager’s head into a wall, and leaving her unconscious on the ground. The two remaining Power Ponies scattered, showering mixed bolts of ice and lightning down upon the Siren. Starlight stayed down, feigning injury, but watched and waited as the Masked Matter-Horn’s zig-zagging run brought her closer to where she lay. With another muttered curse from the beard, Starlight lashed out, sweeping the Masked Matter-Horn’s hooves out from underneath her. Zapp yelled in anger, but before she could do more, the Siren leapt up and grappled with her, pulling them both down to street-level. Starlight rose. Her heart pounded, her breathing was fast… and a sick sensation gnawed at her stomach as she looked around the alley, studying the fallen Power Ponies. All but Zapp were unconscious. None seemed badly injured. And yet… “These are the heroes,” Starlight whispered. “But that would make us… stop! Siren, stop hitting her, now!” The Siren looked back at Starlight, holding its forehoof mere inches from Zapp’s face. “We have to get out of here,” Starlight said. “Come on… you wanted help, right? Let’s go figure out how we can both get us some help!” “Dis idn’t ober,” Zapp mumbled through a swollen lip. “Come on, let’s get out of here!” Starlight shouted. The Siren snarled, but dropped Zapp, turned, and followed Starlight down the alley. II: Rising ActionStarlight galloped down alleys and across streets, casting furtive glances behind her as she went and keeping an eye on the Siren floating next to her. Somehow the Siren moved through the air gracefully and seemed to barely be breaking a sweat. Eventually, Starlight slowed, then stopped. She leaned against a wall and tried to catch her breath. “We…” she panted. “Should get… out of sight.” The Siren looked at the building next to them, then floated up to the level of its windows. “Looks empty,” she called down. Starlight eyed the heavy padlock on the building’s door. The beard reached out and inserted a tendril into the keyhole. Starlight blinked as she could feel it reaching in, questing around for the various tumblers… She heard a click. The beard lifted the lock up and off the door, then reached out again and pulled it open. “Neat trick,” the Siren said, returning to ground level. “Something like that,” Starlight said. Dust stirred underhoof as they made their way into the building. Starlight’s eyes struggled to adjust to the low light inside, but she soon gained the sense that it was a large, open warehouse that was vacant save for a few unoccupied wooden pallets littering the ground. Starlight sat on the ground and rubbed at her face with a hoof. Meanwhile, the beard pulled the door shut behind them, snaked a tendril of itself underneath the door, then reached up and replaced the padlock. “What are we going to do?” she muttered. “Stuck in a comic book with a beard, a Siren, and a bunch of heroes who don’t seem to care…” “Sonata,” the Siren interjected. Starlight looked up at her. “Come again?” “My name’s Sonata Dusk,” she said, smiling. Her tone of voice was sweet, but the effect was diminished somewhat by her maw full of pointy teeth. Starlight shook forehooves with her. “Starlight Glimmer. Nice to meet you.” She frowned. “I don’t know how we’re supposed to get out of here. My friends once told me about getting trapped in a comic book like this one, but they managed to get out by defeating a bad guy. They even had a hint from the comic itself about what they were supposed to do.” She paused, glancing at both herself and Sonata. “But this time, I don’t know what we’re supposed to do… and I think we might be the bad guys!” Sonata’s shoulders sagged. “I’m kinda sick of being the bad guy, y’know? Like, me and my sisters used to be into that sort of thing, but then we got our butts kicked, and we lost our powers, and…” She shrugged. “Besides, it’s not me; it’s this mask! It calls itself ‘El Taco Loco,’ and I can’t control the thing when it gets going.” “I guess I know what you mean,” Starlight said. “About both things. I didn’t used to care what ponies thought of me, as long as they obeyed… and now I don’t know how much I really trust this beard.” They met eyes. “The beard’s alive. It calls me ‘The Red Menace.’ And, like, it can talk to me.” “I can also feel udruchennyy at your distrust, comrade,” the beard said, sounding hurt. “Can you hear that?” Starlight asked, pointing at the beard. Sonata floated a few hoofspans backward and shook her head. “I’m not crazy,” Starlight said, gesturing with her hooves. “I—” “Tikho,” the beard hissed at her. Starlight went silent and cocked her head, listening. The only sounds were of hers and Sonata’s breathing, and the faint click of her own hooves as she repositioned them on the warehouse floor. But soon she heard the voices. They were quiet—probably whispered—and coming from outside the building. But they were close. “What is it?” Sonata asked loudly. Starlight shushed her and went back to listening. After a few moments of nothing but silence, she felt sweat begin to bead at her forehead. “I think they’re outside,” Starlight mouthed. “What?” Starlight facehooved, then spoke in a loud whisper: “I said, I think the Power Ponies might be out there!” Sonata grimaced. “I don’t want them to take me,” she whimpered. “I just want to get this mask off and get out of here.” After several moments that were thick with hoof-biting and consideration, Starlight strode toward the Siren and took one of her forehooves. “Sonata, I’m not going to let that happen. Twilight wouldn’t let that happen. You and I are getting out of here together—” “Did you say Twilight?” Sonata asked, scowling. “Do you mean that purple girl who helped take our powers away?” “I… yes,” Starlight admitted. “She’s kind of my… teacher, these days. But I’m sure she wouldn’t leave you here, no matter what. She’d figure something out.” Sonata’s hesitation seemed to melt. “Yeah, I guess she would. Honestly, it’d be kinda good to have someone like her around. She didn’t teach you any mask-unsticking spells, did she?” “No, but…” Starlight’s horn glowed, and a circle of dim light appeared in front of her. On its swirling surface they could make out the sight of Power Ponies circling the building they were holed up in. “They’re gonna find us,” Sonata whimpered. “What are we gonna do?” Starlight leaned closer, watching Zapp and Mistress Mare-Velous lugging something heavy between them. “What’s that?” Sonata floated down, looked, blinked, then started screaming. “No! No, they can’t! They… Starlight, run!” “I don’t understand, what are they—” On the magical surface, she saw the pair swing the large, heavy object back and forth in their hooves, then launch it upward. Zapp stayed with it, helping aim it toward the building’s upper windows. Starlight looked up just as the glass burst inward. She lifted a hoof, shielding her face from the showering shards. There was a heavy, crunching impact next to her. It brought the thick smell of hot, Central 'Mareican spices. Starlight took only a brief glance at the wrecked taco cart before turning her eyes on Sonata, who was shrieking, backing away, and hoofing at her face. “Get out,” she roared. “The mask… it’s taking over!” Starlight took another quick look through her spell before letting it lapse. The Power Ponies had positioned themselves near the door they’d entered through. Starlight looked around the dark warehouse, then muttered a curse and conjured small globes of light, which she hurled toward the four corners of the structure. She set off galloping toward one of them, chosen at random, but kept her gaze switching toward all the others as she ran. Sonata continued roaring, the sound soon becoming unearthly and animalistic. Then Starlight spotted it: there, toward the opposite corner of where she’d run, across a tangle of fallen and discarded shelving and on the other side of where Sonata was in the throes of having the mask take over, was an emergency exit. She changed direction, trying to avoid Sonata by skirting around some old, broken-looking machinery near the wall. “Why… don’t I work out more…” she huffed as her breathing grew heavier. “I have been asking you this for some time,” the beard chimed in. “Not helping,” Starlight hissed. A pause. And then: “Comrade, you are facing this alone. You remember, in the party there is strength, da?” Sonata’s shrieking reached a climax, then abated. Starlight glanced over— The Siren bellowed and leapt toward her. Starlight froze, panicked. The beard cursed as it shot tendrils out toward the floor and wall behind her, pushing her up into an awkward jump toward, but at an angle to, Sonata’s flight path. They passed within mere hoof-lengths of each other. Starlight yelled with surprise as the beard reached out and gripped her hind legs, pulling her down into a tuck-and-roll maneuver. She hit the floor, first feeling the impact in the middle of her back, then feeling disoriented as the beard guided her through the roll. Then the beard brought her back up again, helping to brace her. “Tell me if you’re going to do that again!” she shouted. “Da, comrade.” Starlight watched as Sonata plowed headfirst into the wall. She came up slowly, looking somewhat unsteady. “Idti,” the beard urged. “You don’t have to tell me twice!” Starlight took off galloping again. She dodged between the fallen bits of shelving, and she smiled, seeing the emergency exit get closer. “Here we go,” she breathed. “Come on, Starlight. Almost there, almost…” She threw her shoulder against the pressbar in the middle of the door. It swung open effortlessly. A lone pony stood on the other side, heavily shadowed by the dim illumination of a distant streetlight. Starlight barely managed to avoid plowing into her, then paused, noticing the mare’s slight build. She would look unassuming, save for her tight green bodysuit and small domino mask. But then the pony met her eyes, and Starlight’s breath caught as she saw the rage that boiled in them. “I’m sorry about what happened,” Starlight said automatically. “Please, you should know that this is all a big misunderstanding, and I’m trying to find a way—” “I don’t like excuses,” Saddle Rager said. Her face began to twitch. “Excuses make me really, really…” Starlight pressed a hoof to the mare’s lips. “Hold that thought,” she said, turning left and taking off at a full gallop again. From behind her came the sounds of crunching blacktop and a thunderous, bloodcurdling roar. It was soon joined by the telltale bellowing of Sonata as she exited the building. Starlight stole a glance behind her and caught the beginnings of a struggle between Sonata and a massively over-muscled Saddle Rager. “Okay,” Starlight panted as she strove to keep her legs pumping. “Now… beard… need ideas!” She came around the corner of the building. But before the beard could answer, and before Starlight could process what was happening, the ground in front of her was overtaken by a sheet of ice. Her legs slid out from under her, and she landed hard on her side. Starlight skidded to a halt at the Masked Matter-Horn’s hooves. The two locked eyes, and Starlight swallowed as she studied the other mare’s glowering face, unable to shake the thought that this was the pony whose identity Twilight had claimed when she was in the comic. “It’s over,” the Masked Matter-Horn said. “I’ll spare you the indignity of icing over your beard, but don’t try anything.” Starlight took a long, deep breath. Moments passed, and the two continued staring. The only sounds came from the nearby struggle between Saddle Rager and Sonata, which, admittedly, were loud, full-throated, and seemed to involve an inordinate amount of shattering masonry. Starlight fully expected the other Power Ponies to join the Masked Matter-Horn, but it didn’t happen. At length, Starlight’s legs relaxed, perhaps for the first time since she’d arrived in the comic world. “Okay,” she said. “I just want things to work out for everyone.” The Masked Matter-Horn scoffed. “Spoken like a true Commie.” “Why do you all keep saying things like that?! I mean, why wouldn’t you want us to work out something that suits everypony’s interests? Isn’t enlightened self-interest one of the pillars of Capitalism?” “Don’t try your verbal gymnastics on me,” the Masked Matter-Horn said, dropping into a ready crouch. “But I’m not!” Starlight groaned. “How can I persuade you that there’s more going on here than you might think at first? I mean… do you remember Twilight… being you?” “Let me tell you how this is going to go down. You’re going to stop talking, and then we’re taking you to jail. No questions, no discussion.” Starlight swallowed. “And Sonata? The…” She jerked her head toward the ongoing sounds of struggle. “El Taco Loco?” “Same for her,” the Masked Matter-Horn said. “Just maybe with a few more bruises first.” “But all she wants is to get the mask off,” Starlight pleaded. “You must have access to resources that could help her!” Starlight watched the look on the Masked Matter-Horn’s face harden. “You aren’t listening to a word I say,” Starlight said, shaking her head. “None of the reasons matter for you, do they? All you care about is ‘getting the bad guys,’ and all you can see when you look at us is ‘bad guys’ who need to be ‘gotten.’” The Masked Matter-Horn grinned. “That’s right, Red Menace. You think this is all so complex, but you saw what she did to that poor taco-cart owner. And he wasn’t the first, you know.” Starlight scoffed. “You mean the owner of the cart—which you knew would set her off again, didn’t you? And which you just put through a window, which I think now puts you up to two counts of property destruction?” “I’m not on trial here.” “Well, neither am I!” Starlight gradually rolled herself over and rose to her hooves. “And neither is Sonata. It would be a joke to call this a trial. It certainly isn’t justice.” “It’s all the justice you deserve,” The Masked Matter-Horn said. Each word was slow, rich, and heavy with condemnation. The beard sighed. “Don’t waste time with this Capitalist bolonka. I can get us free again.” “No, let me keep trying her,” Starlight said aloud. She focused on the furrowed brow of the Masked Matter-Horn. “It’s… sorry, the beard talks to me.” “Now she’s gone mad, on top of all of it,” the Masked Matter-Horn breathed. Starlight sighed. “I’m not crazy. Or maybe I am. I’m talking to a comic book hero who… isn’t really acting like one.” She blinked. “You know, that reminds me… where are your friends?” The Masked Matter-Horn grinned. “Taking up position. Listen. Tell me, what do you hear?” “Nothing.” Starlight’s breath caught. “Nothing at all. Sonata and Saddle Rager… “ She froze at the feeling of a heavy, spindly foreleg pressing on her shoulder, followed by: “¿Hola cariño, cómo estás?” “You turned her.” Starlight squeezed her eyes shut. “The mask…” Sonata said weakly. Then her voice suddenly dropped at least an octave, and grew loud and vibrant. “!Me prometieron tacos ilimitados!” “It seems you should have joined the party before it ended,” the beard said. Starlight rolled her eyes. “Oh great, so now you finally grow a sense of humor, and all it has is puns?” III: Grand FinaleStarlight backed up against the nearest wall and watched the others approaching her. Zapp covered the air, Mistress Mare-Velous looked down from atop the building across the way, Filli-Second kept bolting from one side of the group to the other, Radiance took up a standing position next to the Masked Matter-Horn, and both Sonata and a fully powered Saddle Rager flanked the latter two, their combined bulk blocking out most of the light from the streetlamps above. “Now would be a really good time for a brilliant plan,” Starlight hissed. “In the party is strength, comrade. Is as true for us as for these Capitalists.” She pursed her lips. “That’s not a bad point…” Starlight pointed at Sonata. “I want to challenge El Taco Loco to single combat. She wins, I go with you without any further struggle. I win, you set me free.” Mistress Mare-Velous scoffed. “That isn’t how this works, criminal scum.” “Yeah, well she was on the other side until a minute ago, so clearly you’re more willing to make compromises than you like to advertise.” “This is a trick,” Zapp said. “A bald-faced one at that,” Radiance said. The Masked Matter-Horn looked at the ground for a moment. “We can’t just let you go, Red Menace. But go on, fight her if you both want.” “Me encantaría,” Sonata said, drifting forward and stretching her shoulders. Starlight looked Sonata in the eye as she approached. “Sonata, listen to me, we can get out of here together, I promise. Besides, you can’t have seriously wanted to trade your future, and your freedom, for tacos.” Sonata flinched. “I'm so sick of eating them,” she whispered, “but the mask…” Then her voice took on a deeper, fuller tone: “Eso es suficiente, cariño. ¡Hagámoslo!” Starlight ducked to one side as Sonata sailed forward with a powerful blow that shattered a hole in the brick building behind them. She lashed out with the beard, scoring a trio of small hits on Sonata’s side. The Siren roared at her and leapt again, this time catching Starlight in a crushing hug around the neck. The beard immediately went to work on infiltrating its tendrils down between Sonata’s forelegs and Starlight’s coat, pushing outward with all its might. The gap it created was just large enough for Starlight to wriggle herself out. Then Sonata brought a foreleg around and clocked Starlight in the side of the head. She went down like a pile of limp rags. Disorientation and a faint ringing sound soon pressed out all the other details of her world, though she had the vague impression that the beard was using itself to push and keep her upright, while also holding up a pair of thick tendrils in the style of hoofticuffs. “I think… she might’ve hit me,” Starlight slurred. “Bez shutok, comrade.” Starlight’s world lurched again as the beard threw her into a dodge. Cool wind whispered past her face, possibly due to another flying leap from Sonata. “I don’t think we’re going to win,” she said, her disorientation so great that the emotion only hit her as an afterthought. “I think… we’re going to be stuck here forever. Possibly in jail…” “Where is your fire?” the beard said, condemnation in its tone. “The Red Menace that I know would not be so quick to bow to these Capitalist sobaki.” It pulled her to the side again, then back the other way, then up and down, all while dodging heavy blows from Sonata’s forelegs. At length, the beard shot back, catching Sonata hard upon the jaw. “She would at least try, even if she knew the enemy’s party was stronger, better-equipped…” “I don’t actually believe in Communism,” Starlight blurted. The beard sighed. “Da, comrade. I know of your misgivings. But even you know that the strength of many ponies cannot be equaled by the strength of one alone.” “Twilight is one pony.” Starlight sighed sadly, missing that the beard was moving her into another series of lurching evasions. “One pony who knows… so much. I just wish that I could ask her what to do here.” “Comrade, look at me.” The beard extended out a portion of itself and formed the head of an aged, balding stallion with heavy eyebrows, and—of course—a very thick, full beard. “Perhaps you wish to make this ‘Twilight’ proud, but there is no ‘Twilight’ here to save you from the burdens that you face. But you do not need to face them alone. The party is strength, da?” Starlight watched, half-dazed, as the beard unwound the stallion’s head into a dizzying array of tendrils that caught, turned, and returned a series of blows from Sonata. Even as she missed the action’s finer details, she felt her head begin to clear, and a sense of purpose reassert itself, and maybe—finally—she had an idea. She narrowed her eyes, braced her own hooves against the ground, and lit her horn. “Da,” she said, grinning. Sonata launched herself at Starlight again, but this time she asserted control of the beard, using it to grapple the Siren’s forelegs and pull her head close to her own. Her horn flared and she clenched her teeth as she began casting a spell. “¡No puedes ganar!” “I don’t have to,” Starlight said. “I just have to do this…” A spark jumped from her horn to Sonata’s mask. The Siren pressed her forelegs to her face and started screaming: “¡Abajo el capitalismo! ¡Igualdad para siempre!” “What did you just do?” the beard asked, sounding amused. “Oh, just a teensy bit of mind control… or, well, suggestibility,” Starlight said through a grin. “Directed at the mask, not at Sonata.” The beard chuckled. “Bringing your strengths to the party, as I do mine?” “Da,” she answered. “Now, El Taco Loco, those ponies would have you adhere to a system of strict costs and payment for your tacos. They may say the tacos will be limitless, but somewhere, somehow, someone will be paying for them. That means there are limits… always limits, even if they hide them from you!” “¡Esos animales!” Sonata bellowed, whirling on the Power Ponies. “Tú, que me mantendría alejado de mis tacos ... ¡Prepárate para morir!” They may not have understood Sonata’s words, but the Power Ponies leaned forward in their stances, readying themselves for combat. “You are one psikh daughter of equality, comrade,” the beard said. “Hush now,” Starlight said. “We have work to do.” “And that is…?” Starlight grinned. “We’re teaming up against the bad guys. The real bad guys: the Power Ponies.” She knew Sonata would launch herself bodily at the group, and she figured Filli-Second would take that as the signal to attack her… so she waited for it to happen. When the first blow fell on her from the super-fast pony, Starlight let the beard flare out again, distracting Filli-Second and eventually landing a hit that knocked her aside. But Starlight kept her eyes focused on the rest of the Power Ponies, who watched as Saddle Rager leapt to meet Sonata in midair. The two grapplers slammed into each other, but Saddle Rager’s mass was superior, and they ended up continuing along her trajectory, eventually plowing through the hard brick edifice of an apartment building along its path. Starlight grinned at the Power Ponies. “Catch me if you can!” she called, before she broke into a gallop toward the shattered building. “You have plan, yes, comrade?” the beard asked, nudging her to the side of a blast of energy from Radiance. “You seem very much like you have plan.” “Did Trotsky have a plan during the siege of Stalliongrad?” The beard was silent for a moment before pushing her the other direction. One of Mistress Mare-Velous’ enchanted horseshoes clattered to the ground in front of her. “Comrade Trotsky was not a contemporary of that battle, comrade.” “Details! Just keep covering me while I get to Sonata. I think I can—” A bolt of ice from the Masked Matter-Horn exploded on the ground before her. She tripped, but the beard caught her in a mass of snaking tendrils and hoisted her back upright, all while keeping her moving at the same speed. “Just a little farther,” Starlight said through gritted teeth. She heard sounds of roaring and destruction from up ahead and watched as the two muscular creatures hurled chunks of metal and stone—and occasionally each other—about the ruined space. Something gripped hard at her hind legs, causing her to stagger. Starlight brought her head around, but the beard fanned out a set of tendrils, blocking her view of the pink blur trying to hit her. Starlight looked up instead, spotting Zapp moving into position above, and with roiling black clouds brewing just behind her. “Hold Filli-Second,” Starlight ordered. “Do it now…” The beard levered Filli-Second up and off the ground just as a massive bolt of lightning discharged from the clouds. Starlight’s coat stood up straight beneath the military outfit, and her heart skipped a beat or two, but the beard insulated her from the worst of it. The effect on Filli-Second was much more pronounced, though; the mare jerked back, up and out of the beard’s grasp, shaking and juddering in midair. Starlight cursed under her breath; it would have been comical if it didn’t look so bloody painful. “Idti,” the beard urged. “Going!” Starlight vaulted across the distance to the broken building and danced into the wake of the two titans clashing in the midst of it. She ducked as Saddle Rager aimed a forehoof at her, and her heart skipped another beat amid the thought that it would have taken her head off if the blow had connected. Saddle Rager howled with anger, grabbed a mass of broken bricks with her other forehoof, and came back around with a hail of deadly missiles. Starlight’s horn flared again, sending out a wave of force that deflected most of them. “Sonata, are you alright?!” Starlight called. “I’m here!” she shouted from somewhere out of sight. Starlight grinned as she dodged another blow. “Listen, please… I realized something just a minute ago. This comic… I don’t think it’s a traditional one! The good guys aren’t acting good, and the bad guys…” She ducked behind the free-standing remnants of wall, then squeaked as Saddle Rager threw a punch that leveled it. “I think it’s kind of showing like what Karl Mare-ecks said when a society is organized for the benefit of those in charge of it, rather than those whose labor makes it work!” “Chertovski verno,” the beard said, its approval bubbly and pervasive. Saddle Rager bore down on Starlight, who did a quick fake to one side, then hurled herself the other way, using the beard to break her fall and bring her back to her hooves again. “I… I don’t understand,” Sonata said, still unseen. “I thought people helped to shape and influence society through their individual actions, rather than it being, like, some big conspiracy…” Starlight shrieked as both of Saddle Rager’s forehooves came down, straight at her. The beard flared out and formed a rigid cone that caused the hooves to impact on either side of Starlight. Starlight shrunk toward the ground, seeking to evade Saddle Rager's gnashing teeth as much as anything. “It’s… not a conspiracy!” she shouted. “It’s a metaphor! Look: the Power Ponies have all the power, but they aren’t listening to us, even though all we want is to get out of here!” The beard pushed, both backwards into the floor beneath her, and upwards into the huge pony bearing down on her. Saddle Rager roared, and Starlight used her magic to project a shield to defend against the pony’s hot, spittle-flecked breath. “And that’s it!” Starlight shouted. “You and me… and both of our symbiotic entities that give us power… we just need to work together, and to find the strength of our shared… labor!” “Slava Kommunizma!” the beard cheered. Then it really pushed. The force of its thrust pressed Starlight’s head backwards uncomfortably, but she smiled, realizing that her plan was working. She came up just as Saddle Rager took a few steps back, then swung a hoof at her again. But Starlight held fast, trusting in the beard to— She staggered from the sheer force of the blow’s impact, but it didn’t kill her, and she was prepared to call that a win. The beard roared back, bringing Starlight’s whole body around as it formed itself into a gigantic club, which slammed itself into Saddle Rager’s head with a satisfying whack. The massive pony lurched to the side. Then Starlight spotted Sonata coming through the thick dust of the broken tenement building. The Siren moved slowly, but with purpose. She turned her eyes on Starlight and smiled. “The mask and I can both agree that what we’re up against here is just mean and unfair,” she said. Starlight smiled back. “Da, comrade,” she said. “Hey, that’s moya liniya, comrade,” the beard protested. “Deal with it,” Starlight teased. Then she focused on Sonata. “Are you ready?” “For what?” “Follow me!” Starlight turned back toward Saddle Rager. “Hey greenie-weenie, your mother was a minotaur, and your father was… exploitative of the means of production!” Saddle Rager brought her head around with a grimace and a roar, but Starlight was already moving, vaulting over broken stone and shattered furniture, making back toward the hole in the side of the building… ...back toward the Power Ponies. She glanced over, making sure Sonata was floating right by her side. Then she grinned and threw her head back with a battle cry: “For Communism!” “For Communism!” Sonata echoed. “Y tacos gratis!” she said a moment later, her voice deepening a bit for the occasion. They passed by the fallen form of Filli-Second, who still lay twitching. Radiance stood beside her, leaning over with an array of hard-light medical apparatus… and they just passed by, letting her work on healing her comrade. But up ahead, Zapp, Mistress Mare-Velous, and the Masked Matter-Horn all turned from what looked like a close, heated argument, to watch the pair of incoming “villains.” Sounds of thundering hooves behind her told Starlight that Saddle Rager was in hot pursuit. The trio of heroes before them dropped into battle-ready positions. Mistress Mare-Velous readied her lasso, Zapp lifted her necklace, and the Masked Matter-Horn lowered her head, bringing her horn down to the ready. The sound of hooves and snarling grew closer from behind. “Now, go left!” Starlight shouted, dodging to the right. As the “villains” dashed to either side of the trio of heroes, Starlight turned her head back. The three at first looked confused, but then brought their gazes back around to watch as Saddle Rager tried and failed to come skidding to a stop. They shrieked as the insanely muscular pony plowed straight through their midst, scattering the group like bowling pins. Each bounced off the walls and ground a few times before rolling to their respective stops. Saddle Rager herself paused, looking about in horror at the sight of her fallen comrades. She raised a hoof toward one of them, then started tearing up and sniffling, and started to deflate before their eyes. “What have I done?” moaned Saddle Rager. “Nothing permanent, I’m guessing,” Starlight said. She turned to where Radiance was still bent over and working on Filli-Second. “I trust you’ll look at them as well?” Radiance looked up and huffed. “Well, yes, assuming I can trust you not to jump me while the rest of my team is down, of course!” Starlight grinned. “Don’t worry; ‘From each according to her ability, to each according to her needs.’ And right now, what they need is care.” She paused. “And if I could just say one more thing, it’s that I take no pleasure in this victory, and all this could have been prevented if you’d just listened to us.” “For realzies,” Sonata added. “I just wanna go home!” Radiance looked at both of them in turn, then at her fallen comrades, and then nodded. “You’re right. I’m sorry for the trouble. Please… just go.” Starlight and Sonata turned back to each other, both smiling. “Did we do it?” Sonata asked. “Or, wait… whoa…” She held her forelegs out before her, and a bright flash overtook her, and for a moment her figure twisted… but then she was gone, leaving nothing but the mask behind. “She made it,” Starlight said, grinning from ear to ear. “We did it, comrade! We—” “I am proud of you, comrade,” the beard said, sounding sad. “In the face of great uncertainty and trial, you looked past your own hero—this Twilight that you speak of—and you found the strength in party, and equality, against the unheeding forces of Capitalism.” The beard made a sound akin to sniffling away tears. “You were the finest Communist I ever knew. Now… Dasvidanya.” Starlight’s heart softened. “And you were the best beard I could’ve ever ho… oh—oh!” Starlight felt her world pinch, and stretch, and soon she vanished in a mighty flash. “Oof!” The impact of cold crystal on her face made Starlight wish she still had a living beard. That same chill quickly permeated her coat as she lay there, groaning. “It’s her!” called a familiar, youthful voice. Starlight forced her eyes open and saw Spike kneeling down by her head. His eyes were wide with concern, and the nails upon his outstretched claw before her had been chewed. “Are you okay? I’m sorry… I tried to tell you about that comic… here, the others are just in the other room! Let me go get them!” Spike bolted from the room, shouting fit to raise Tartarus. Starlight’s eyes searched around, eventually landing on a nearby comic. “Dasvidanya, to you, too, comrade” she said with a smile. EpilogueA world away, a cool midday breeze blew past a strip mall not too far from Canterlot High School, stirring the voluminous hair of two girls perched upon a picnic table, and rustling the small plastic bag that lay between them. “I guess this’ll do,” Aria Blaze said. Next to her, Adagio Dazzle sighed and started digging through the bag. “Here,” she said, handing a trio of wrapped packages to Aria. “You had the double-deckers?” “I had two double-deckers and one regular… but what’s this other one?” Adagio scowled, looked down, and teased the wrapping open. She let her expression sink into a deep frown, and then threw the package back into the bag. “I can’t believe this; they messed up our order! If only we still had access to our magic, we could make these worms beg for sweet release from the suffering that we could mete out to them.” Aria gave her a flat look. “Or if Sonata was still here, you could just make her take it back. Or she probably would have noticed to start with. She wasn’t bright, but there were one or two things that she…” A chill silence fell over them. Adagio fidgeted with the small package in her hands, but then eventually raised it, gave it an experimental sniff, and took a bite of it. A burst of hot spices suspended in a tomatoey delivery system assailed her taste buds. “Ugh.” She set it down on the table, then fished around in the bag for a napkin. “I hate to say this, but we really do need to come up with some more ideas for how to get her out of that thing.” Aria reached back around herself and pulled the rolled-up and half-squished comic book out of her rear pants pocket. “Yeah. Leave it to Sonata to get herself sucked into a comic.” “I told her that merchant she bought it from looked sketchy.” Adagio shook her head and picked back up the… whatever it was she’d been eating. She eyed it, trying to decide if she was hungry enough to take another bite, or if she'd rather throw it at a passerby. All at once, the gentle wind around them began to pick up. “Hey, Adagio,” Aria said, sounding alarmed. Adagio looked at her just in time to see the comic fly up and out of Aria’s hand. There was a flash of light, and then a shape came falling out of it, face-first onto the ground next to the table. “S… Sonata!” Adagio said, jumping down off the table. And indeed, there on the ground lay their blue-skinned sister, groaning and trying to raise herself on shaky arms. “Give me a hand,” Adagio said to the unmoving, wide-eyed Aria. “Come on, Sonata, sit down… there… now what happened to you?!” Sonata’s mouth worked itself open and closed and she turned her mildly concussed gaze between her two sisters. A moment later, that gaze landed on the bag. “W... what’s that?” Adagio gave her a small, quick, rare smile, then reached in and produced one of the wrapped packages. “We were… thinking about you, and so we got some of your favorites for our lunch.” She started to unwrap it. “Here, this one’s a—” Sonata’s eyes focused with crystal clarity on the item before them. She drew in a lungful of breath, then started screaming. She went over backwards in her seat, scrambled back to her feet, took another look at it, and set off running away, continuing to scream at full volume. “What is it?” Adagio called, setting off after her. “Sonata, come back; what’s going on?!” Aria sat staring incredulously for a moment, but then shrugged, reached over, and retrieved the taco that Adagio had tried to offer Sonata.
I: Off With a BangA brief flash lit the night above a city full of skyscrapers, and Starlight Glimmer tumbled out into the sky, screaming and flailing her limbs as she sought a floor that was no longer underhoof. A curious observation intruded through her terror, and she slowed her movements—though not her descent—as she eyed the crimson military-style coat and pants that she unexpectedly found herself wearing. She blinked and looked closer, studying their yellow piping and polished, star-shaped buttons. She also felt an unusual sensation on her face and pressed her hooves up into what felt very much like a beard. “Zdravstvuyte, comrade,” the beard said. Starlight shrieked. “Nyet,” the beard said. “Such fear does not befit the greatest hero of the East! Is bad enough to let these Power Ponies joke about you as ‘The Red Menace.’” “Where am I?! Why do I have a talking beard?!” Starlight paused, digested the latter piece of information, and scowled. “Seriously, ‘Red Menace?’ I imposed one collectivist economic system, in one village, one time…” The beard sighed. “You know it is super hero name, and this is Maretropolis, and I am inoplanetnyy simbiont from Horsehead Nebula… now, shall we stop you splatting like nasekomoye on pavement?” Starlight focused on the ground with rising panic. “Y… yes, please!” Her head jerked forward as the beard formed long prehensile limbs that lashed out toward the nearest pair of buildings. The beard also snaked down around her neck and wrapped it in a strong brace. Moments later, the limbs gripped the buildings and snapped taut. Starlight’s teeth clenched, and her body juddered, but she soon came to a halt, suspended hundreds of cart-lengths above the bustling streets below. As Starlight’s adrenaline receded, her mind began working to make sense of her situation. “Spike’s comics,” she said aloud. “He showed me one he said I shouldn’t touch…” “Comrade,” the beard said, angling Starlight’s head toward an alley far below. She watched a thin pony with some kind of cart back slowly into the light cast by a streetlamp. A figure advanced on him, its features indistinct but menacing. “He looks like he needs help,” Starlight said. The beard responded by pulling her forward and down. Starlight cried out with surprise at the sudden motion, but soon she was overwhelmed by exhilaration as the beard swung her through the forest of skyscrapers at speed, forming new limbs and absorbing old ones as it went. The beard dropped her down to street level as they came around the final building separating them from the pony. Starlight hit the pavement at a full run, flaring her horn with magic and charging toward the bulky silhouette. “The Red Menace… er, strikes again!” she shouted, closing in on it. It turned on her, and the light of her horn revealed a predominantly aqua-colored creature whose pony-sized torso and head looked grotesque above its spindly forelegs and long tail. It had no hind legs, but somehow moved by floating just above the ground. It sported a large crest upon its back, as well as an orange mask with bright outlines of yellow that was pulled tight across its head. “Save me!” the pony with the cart shouted, retreating further. The figure threw itself to the ground in front of Starlight. “No, save me!” Starlight slid to a halt right in front of it. “Wait… what?” It raised a hoof toward her, but then doubled over and clutched at its face. “I don’t know where I am, or how I got this mask, but I can’t get it off! It talks to me… makes me want… need…” With a howl, the figure whirled around and charged the pony with the cart. He screamed and tried to back away faster, but the cart’s wheel fell into a crack in the pavement and held him fast. “Nyet!” shouted both Starlight and the beard as they gave chase. Starlight blinked, considering the oddity of feeling compelled to speak in a language she didn’t actually know. But then the figure leapt toward the pony with the cart, and Starlight cast the thought aside, willing the beard to lash out and stop it. The beard aimed in the direction of the pony— —But the figure hurled itself upon the cart instead. The force of its impact crushed one of the wheels. It threw back its head in a roar, showing jaws slick with saliva, before thrusting its head into the cart’s contents and beginning to feast. Starlight slowed and stopped, watching the strange creature gorge itself on whatever had been in the cart. After a moment she gave a small shake of her head and looked at the pony still attached to the cart, who was huddled, shaking, on the ground. She reached out with a tendril of beard, undid the pony’s harness, and gently pulled him free from it. As she did so, she glanced at his cutie mark: three tacos. “Hold on a minute,” Starlight said aloud. “U nas gosti, comrade,” the beard said. “Okay, seriously, I don’t know what you’re saying!” Starlight shouted. “Would you please just speak plainly if you want me to understand?!” From behind her, a loud, clear voice called out: “I’d like nothing more than that, Red Menace! “How does ‘both of you are under arrest’ sound?” Starlight turned. Her eyes went wide. Six ponies stood before her, dressed in costumes that she recognized from— Suddenly there were only five costumed ponies and a blur heading elsewhere. Starlight startled at the sudden motion. Then the sixth pony was back, holding the shivering cart-pony in her forehooves. “Power Ponies!” Starlight shouted, smiling. “Oh, this is great! I could totally use a hoof here. I’ve been sucked into the comic world, like your versions from the other world were one time!” She glanced back at the figure that was still busily feeding from the cart. “And… apparently the villain here… needs help and is really into tacos? …But I figure that if we arrest her, we can get this figured out and should all be able to go home soon. Right?” Starlight’s smile withered under six steely gazes. “Nice try, Red Menace,” said the Masked Matter-Horn. “We thought you might finally be on our side after the last time we ran into each other… but now we catch you aiding a known criminal in their terroristic spree against the brave street-taco vendors of our fair city?!” “I just want to point out that that feels like an oddly specific form of terrorism,” Starlight said. Mistress Mare-velous raised her glowing lasso. “Don’t try any fancy mind-games on us,” she said. “Yeah,” Filli-Second added. “It’s not like you speak the language well enough to pull it off, anyway!” Saddle Rager frowned at her. “Um, that’s pretty rude, don’t you think?” Zapp rolled her eyes. “Can we just focus on arresting these two?” “Wait,” Starlight said, raising her forehooves. “You don’t understand; I’m not from this world. I’ve been stuck here, and I need help getting home!” “I do… too…” the creature said, raising its taco-stuffed mouth from the cart. “Me and my sisters… were just trying to get out of another world we were stuck in…” “Another world…” Starlight frowned, and took a closer look at the creature’s shape and features. “No… no, you can’t be…” The figure rose up from the wreckage of the cart and wrung its forehooves. “I’m alone… I’m lost… and this mask… please, can any of you help me, before the mask takes control again?” “Oh, we’ll help you,” the Masked Matter-Horn said. “Help you go to jail!” shouted Mistress Mare-velous. Starlight took a dozen heavy blows before she could cry out in pain, much less before she registered that any of the Power Ponies had moved. The beard cursed, and then fanned itself out into a dizzying array of long, snaking tendrils that covered a wide sphere around them. One of the tendrils made contact with something, and the rest converged, clamping down upon a shrieking Filli-Second. She turned her eyes back toward the rest of the Power Ponies, and saw Mistress Mare-velous charging in at her. Starlight planted her hooves and used the beard to whirl Filli-Second around, thus clobbering one hero with the other, and leaving both flat on the ground. But then a massive pillow-shaped construct of energy bore down on her, forcing Starlight to her knees. The beard strained against it, pushing both upward and down to brace itself, but there seemed to be no gaining ground. That was when the creature—or the Siren, as Starlight had guessed—leapt headlong into the fray. The pillow dissipated as the Siren plowed into Radiance. She whipped her long aquatic tail around, slamming Saddle Rager’s head into a wall, and leaving her unconscious on the ground. The two remaining Power Ponies scattered, showering mixed bolts of ice and lightning down upon the Siren. Starlight stayed down, feigning injury, but watched and waited as the Masked Matter-Horn’s zig-zagging run brought her closer to where she lay. With another muttered curse from the beard, Starlight lashed out, sweeping the Masked Matter-Horn’s hooves out from underneath her. Zapp yelled in anger, but before she could do more, the Siren leapt up and grappled with her, pulling them both down to street-level. Starlight rose. Her heart pounded, her breathing was fast… and a sick sensation gnawed at her stomach as she looked around the alley, studying the fallen Power Ponies. All but Zapp were unconscious. None seemed badly injured. And yet… “These are the heroes,” Starlight whispered. “But that would make us… stop! Siren, stop hitting her, now!” The Siren looked back at Starlight, holding its forehoof mere inches from Zapp’s face. “We have to get out of here,” Starlight said. “Come on… you wanted help, right? Let’s go figure out how we can both get us some help!” “Dis idn’t ober,” Zapp mumbled through a swollen lip. “Come on, let’s get out of here!” Starlight shouted. The Siren snarled, but dropped Zapp, turned, and followed Starlight down the alley.
II: Rising ActionStarlight galloped down alleys and across streets, casting furtive glances behind her as she went and keeping an eye on the Siren floating next to her. Somehow the Siren moved through the air gracefully and seemed to barely be breaking a sweat. Eventually, Starlight slowed, then stopped. She leaned against a wall and tried to catch her breath. “We…” she panted. “Should get… out of sight.” The Siren looked at the building next to them, then floated up to the level of its windows. “Looks empty,” she called down. Starlight eyed the heavy padlock on the building’s door. The beard reached out and inserted a tendril into the keyhole. Starlight blinked as she could feel it reaching in, questing around for the various tumblers… She heard a click. The beard lifted the lock up and off the door, then reached out again and pulled it open. “Neat trick,” the Siren said, returning to ground level. “Something like that,” Starlight said. Dust stirred underhoof as they made their way into the building. Starlight’s eyes struggled to adjust to the low light inside, but she soon gained the sense that it was a large, open warehouse that was vacant save for a few unoccupied wooden pallets littering the ground. Starlight sat on the ground and rubbed at her face with a hoof. Meanwhile, the beard pulled the door shut behind them, snaked a tendril of itself underneath the door, then reached up and replaced the padlock. “What are we going to do?” she muttered. “Stuck in a comic book with a beard, a Siren, and a bunch of heroes who don’t seem to care…” “Sonata,” the Siren interjected. Starlight looked up at her. “Come again?” “My name’s Sonata Dusk,” she said, smiling. Her tone of voice was sweet, but the effect was diminished somewhat by her maw full of pointy teeth. Starlight shook forehooves with her. “Starlight Glimmer. Nice to meet you.” She frowned. “I don’t know how we’re supposed to get out of here. My friends once told me about getting trapped in a comic book like this one, but they managed to get out by defeating a bad guy. They even had a hint from the comic itself about what they were supposed to do.” She paused, glancing at both herself and Sonata. “But this time, I don’t know what we’re supposed to do… and I think we might be the bad guys!” Sonata’s shoulders sagged. “I’m kinda sick of being the bad guy, y’know? Like, me and my sisters used to be into that sort of thing, but then we got our butts kicked, and we lost our powers, and…” She shrugged. “Besides, it’s not me; it’s this mask! It calls itself ‘El Taco Loco,’ and I can’t control the thing when it gets going.” “I guess I know what you mean,” Starlight said. “About both things. I didn’t used to care what ponies thought of me, as long as they obeyed… and now I don’t know how much I really trust this beard.” They met eyes. “The beard’s alive. It calls me ‘The Red Menace.’ And, like, it can talk to me.” “I can also feel udruchennyy at your distrust, comrade,” the beard said, sounding hurt. “Can you hear that?” Starlight asked, pointing at the beard. Sonata floated a few hoofspans backward and shook her head. “I’m not crazy,” Starlight said, gesturing with her hooves. “I—” “Tikho,” the beard hissed at her. Starlight went silent and cocked her head, listening. The only sounds were of hers and Sonata’s breathing, and the faint click of her own hooves as she repositioned them on the warehouse floor. But soon she heard the voices. They were quiet—probably whispered—and coming from outside the building. But they were close. “What is it?” Sonata asked loudly. Starlight shushed her and went back to listening. After a few moments of nothing but silence, she felt sweat begin to bead at her forehead. “I think they’re outside,” Starlight mouthed. “What?” Starlight facehooved, then spoke in a loud whisper: “I said, I think the Power Ponies might be out there!” Sonata grimaced. “I don’t want them to take me,” she whimpered. “I just want to get this mask off and get out of here.” After several moments that were thick with hoof-biting and consideration, Starlight strode toward the Siren and took one of her forehooves. “Sonata, I’m not going to let that happen. Twilight wouldn’t let that happen. You and I are getting out of here together—” “Did you say Twilight?” Sonata asked, scowling. “Do you mean that purple girl who helped take our powers away?” “I… yes,” Starlight admitted. “She’s kind of my… teacher, these days. But I’m sure she wouldn’t leave you here, no matter what. She’d figure something out.” Sonata’s hesitation seemed to melt. “Yeah, I guess she would. Honestly, it’d be kinda good to have someone like her around. She didn’t teach you any mask-unsticking spells, did she?” “No, but…” Starlight’s horn glowed, and a circle of dim light appeared in front of her. On its swirling surface they could make out the sight of Power Ponies circling the building they were holed up in. “They’re gonna find us,” Sonata whimpered. “What are we gonna do?” Starlight leaned closer, watching Zapp and Mistress Mare-Velous lugging something heavy between them. “What’s that?” Sonata floated down, looked, blinked, then started screaming. “No! No, they can’t! They… Starlight, run!” “I don’t understand, what are they—” On the magical surface, she saw the pair swing the large, heavy object back and forth in their hooves, then launch it upward. Zapp stayed with it, helping aim it toward the building’s upper windows. Starlight looked up just as the glass burst inward. She lifted a hoof, shielding her face from the showering shards. There was a heavy, crunching impact next to her. It brought the thick smell of hot, Central 'Mareican spices. Starlight took only a brief glance at the wrecked taco cart before turning her eyes on Sonata, who was shrieking, backing away, and hoofing at her face. “Get out,” she roared. “The mask… it’s taking over!” Starlight took another quick look through her spell before letting it lapse. The Power Ponies had positioned themselves near the door they’d entered through. Starlight looked around the dark warehouse, then muttered a curse and conjured small globes of light, which she hurled toward the four corners of the structure. She set off galloping toward one of them, chosen at random, but kept her gaze switching toward all the others as she ran. Sonata continued roaring, the sound soon becoming unearthly and animalistic. Then Starlight spotted it: there, toward the opposite corner of where she’d run, across a tangle of fallen and discarded shelving and on the other side of where Sonata was in the throes of having the mask take over, was an emergency exit. She changed direction, trying to avoid Sonata by skirting around some old, broken-looking machinery near the wall. “Why… don’t I work out more…” she huffed as her breathing grew heavier. “I have been asking you this for some time,” the beard chimed in. “Not helping,” Starlight hissed. A pause. And then: “Comrade, you are facing this alone. You remember, in the party there is strength, da?” Sonata’s shrieking reached a climax, then abated. Starlight glanced over— The Siren bellowed and leapt toward her. Starlight froze, panicked. The beard cursed as it shot tendrils out toward the floor and wall behind her, pushing her up into an awkward jump toward, but at an angle to, Sonata’s flight path. They passed within mere hoof-lengths of each other. Starlight yelled with surprise as the beard reached out and gripped her hind legs, pulling her down into a tuck-and-roll maneuver. She hit the floor, first feeling the impact in the middle of her back, then feeling disoriented as the beard guided her through the roll. Then the beard brought her back up again, helping to brace her. “Tell me if you’re going to do that again!” she shouted. “Da, comrade.” Starlight watched as Sonata plowed headfirst into the wall. She came up slowly, looking somewhat unsteady. “Idti,” the beard urged. “You don’t have to tell me twice!” Starlight took off galloping again. She dodged between the fallen bits of shelving, and she smiled, seeing the emergency exit get closer. “Here we go,” she breathed. “Come on, Starlight. Almost there, almost…” She threw her shoulder against the pressbar in the middle of the door. It swung open effortlessly. A lone pony stood on the other side, heavily shadowed by the dim illumination of a distant streetlight. Starlight barely managed to avoid plowing into her, then paused, noticing the mare’s slight build. She would look unassuming, save for her tight green bodysuit and small domino mask. But then the pony met her eyes, and Starlight’s breath caught as she saw the rage that boiled in them. “I’m sorry about what happened,” Starlight said automatically. “Please, you should know that this is all a big misunderstanding, and I’m trying to find a way—” “I don’t like excuses,” Saddle Rager said. Her face began to twitch. “Excuses make me really, really…” Starlight pressed a hoof to the mare’s lips. “Hold that thought,” she said, turning left and taking off at a full gallop again. From behind her came the sounds of crunching blacktop and a thunderous, bloodcurdling roar. It was soon joined by the telltale bellowing of Sonata as she exited the building. Starlight stole a glance behind her and caught the beginnings of a struggle between Sonata and a massively over-muscled Saddle Rager. “Okay,” Starlight panted as she strove to keep her legs pumping. “Now… beard… need ideas!” She came around the corner of the building. But before the beard could answer, and before Starlight could process what was happening, the ground in front of her was overtaken by a sheet of ice. Her legs slid out from under her, and she landed hard on her side. Starlight skidded to a halt at the Masked Matter-Horn’s hooves. The two locked eyes, and Starlight swallowed as she studied the other mare’s glowering face, unable to shake the thought that this was the pony whose identity Twilight had claimed when she was in the comic. “It’s over,” the Masked Matter-Horn said. “I’ll spare you the indignity of icing over your beard, but don’t try anything.” Starlight took a long, deep breath. Moments passed, and the two continued staring. The only sounds came from the nearby struggle between Saddle Rager and Sonata, which, admittedly, were loud, full-throated, and seemed to involve an inordinate amount of shattering masonry. Starlight fully expected the other Power Ponies to join the Masked Matter-Horn, but it didn’t happen. At length, Starlight’s legs relaxed, perhaps for the first time since she’d arrived in the comic world. “Okay,” she said. “I just want things to work out for everyone.” The Masked Matter-Horn scoffed. “Spoken like a true Commie.” “Why do you all keep saying things like that?! I mean, why wouldn’t you want us to work out something that suits everypony’s interests? Isn’t enlightened self-interest one of the pillars of Capitalism?” “Don’t try your verbal gymnastics on me,” the Masked Matter-Horn said, dropping into a ready crouch. “But I’m not!” Starlight groaned. “How can I persuade you that there’s more going on here than you might think at first? I mean… do you remember Twilight… being you?” “Let me tell you how this is going to go down. You’re going to stop talking, and then we’re taking you to jail. No questions, no discussion.” Starlight swallowed. “And Sonata? The…” She jerked her head toward the ongoing sounds of struggle. “El Taco Loco?” “Same for her,” the Masked Matter-Horn said. “Just maybe with a few more bruises first.” “But all she wants is to get the mask off,” Starlight pleaded. “You must have access to resources that could help her!” Starlight watched the look on the Masked Matter-Horn’s face harden. “You aren’t listening to a word I say,” Starlight said, shaking her head. “None of the reasons matter for you, do they? All you care about is ‘getting the bad guys,’ and all you can see when you look at us is ‘bad guys’ who need to be ‘gotten.’” The Masked Matter-Horn grinned. “That’s right, Red Menace. You think this is all so complex, but you saw what she did to that poor taco-cart owner. And he wasn’t the first, you know.” Starlight scoffed. “You mean the owner of the cart—which you knew would set her off again, didn’t you? And which you just put through a window, which I think now puts you up to two counts of property destruction?” “I’m not on trial here.” “Well, neither am I!” Starlight gradually rolled herself over and rose to her hooves. “And neither is Sonata. It would be a joke to call this a trial. It certainly isn’t justice.” “It’s all the justice you deserve,” The Masked Matter-Horn said. Each word was slow, rich, and heavy with condemnation. The beard sighed. “Don’t waste time with this Capitalist bolonka. I can get us free again.” “No, let me keep trying her,” Starlight said aloud. She focused on the furrowed brow of the Masked Matter-Horn. “It’s… sorry, the beard talks to me.” “Now she’s gone mad, on top of all of it,” the Masked Matter-Horn breathed. Starlight sighed. “I’m not crazy. Or maybe I am. I’m talking to a comic book hero who… isn’t really acting like one.” She blinked. “You know, that reminds me… where are your friends?” The Masked Matter-Horn grinned. “Taking up position. Listen. Tell me, what do you hear?” “Nothing.” Starlight’s breath caught. “Nothing at all. Sonata and Saddle Rager… “ She froze at the feeling of a heavy, spindly foreleg pressing on her shoulder, followed by: “¿Hola cariño, cómo estás?” “You turned her.” Starlight squeezed her eyes shut. “The mask…” Sonata said weakly. Then her voice suddenly dropped at least an octave, and grew loud and vibrant. “!Me prometieron tacos ilimitados!” “It seems you should have joined the party before it ended,” the beard said. Starlight rolled her eyes. “Oh great, so now you finally grow a sense of humor, and all it has is puns?”
III: Grand FinaleStarlight backed up against the nearest wall and watched the others approaching her. Zapp covered the air, Mistress Mare-Velous looked down from atop the building across the way, Filli-Second kept bolting from one side of the group to the other, Radiance took up a standing position next to the Masked Matter-Horn, and both Sonata and a fully powered Saddle Rager flanked the latter two, their combined bulk blocking out most of the light from the streetlamps above. “Now would be a really good time for a brilliant plan,” Starlight hissed. “In the party is strength, comrade. Is as true for us as for these Capitalists.” She pursed her lips. “That’s not a bad point…” Starlight pointed at Sonata. “I want to challenge El Taco Loco to single combat. She wins, I go with you without any further struggle. I win, you set me free.” Mistress Mare-Velous scoffed. “That isn’t how this works, criminal scum.” “Yeah, well she was on the other side until a minute ago, so clearly you’re more willing to make compromises than you like to advertise.” “This is a trick,” Zapp said. “A bald-faced one at that,” Radiance said. The Masked Matter-Horn looked at the ground for a moment. “We can’t just let you go, Red Menace. But go on, fight her if you both want.” “Me encantaría,” Sonata said, drifting forward and stretching her shoulders. Starlight looked Sonata in the eye as she approached. “Sonata, listen to me, we can get out of here together, I promise. Besides, you can’t have seriously wanted to trade your future, and your freedom, for tacos.” Sonata flinched. “I'm so sick of eating them,” she whispered, “but the mask…” Then her voice took on a deeper, fuller tone: “Eso es suficiente, cariño. ¡Hagámoslo!” Starlight ducked to one side as Sonata sailed forward with a powerful blow that shattered a hole in the brick building behind them. She lashed out with the beard, scoring a trio of small hits on Sonata’s side. The Siren roared at her and leapt again, this time catching Starlight in a crushing hug around the neck. The beard immediately went to work on infiltrating its tendrils down between Sonata’s forelegs and Starlight’s coat, pushing outward with all its might. The gap it created was just large enough for Starlight to wriggle herself out. Then Sonata brought a foreleg around and clocked Starlight in the side of the head. She went down like a pile of limp rags. Disorientation and a faint ringing sound soon pressed out all the other details of her world, though she had the vague impression that the beard was using itself to push and keep her upright, while also holding up a pair of thick tendrils in the style of hoofticuffs. “I think… she might’ve hit me,” Starlight slurred. “Bez shutok, comrade.” Starlight’s world lurched again as the beard threw her into a dodge. Cool wind whispered past her face, possibly due to another flying leap from Sonata. “I don’t think we’re going to win,” she said, her disorientation so great that the emotion only hit her as an afterthought. “I think… we’re going to be stuck here forever. Possibly in jail…” “Where is your fire?” the beard said, condemnation in its tone. “The Red Menace that I know would not be so quick to bow to these Capitalist sobaki.” It pulled her to the side again, then back the other way, then up and down, all while dodging heavy blows from Sonata’s forelegs. At length, the beard shot back, catching Sonata hard upon the jaw. “She would at least try, even if she knew the enemy’s party was stronger, better-equipped…” “I don’t actually believe in Communism,” Starlight blurted. The beard sighed. “Da, comrade. I know of your misgivings. But even you know that the strength of many ponies cannot be equaled by the strength of one alone.” “Twilight is one pony.” Starlight sighed sadly, missing that the beard was moving her into another series of lurching evasions. “One pony who knows… so much. I just wish that I could ask her what to do here.” “Comrade, look at me.” The beard extended out a portion of itself and formed the head of an aged, balding stallion with heavy eyebrows, and—of course—a very thick, full beard. “Perhaps you wish to make this ‘Twilight’ proud, but there is no ‘Twilight’ here to save you from the burdens that you face. But you do not need to face them alone. The party is strength, da?” Starlight watched, half-dazed, as the beard unwound the stallion’s head into a dizzying array of tendrils that caught, turned, and returned a series of blows from Sonata. Even as she missed the action’s finer details, she felt her head begin to clear, and a sense of purpose reassert itself, and maybe—finally—she had an idea. She narrowed her eyes, braced her own hooves against the ground, and lit her horn. “Da,” she said, grinning. Sonata launched herself at Starlight again, but this time she asserted control of the beard, using it to grapple the Siren’s forelegs and pull her head close to her own. Her horn flared and she clenched her teeth as she began casting a spell. “¡No puedes ganar!” “I don’t have to,” Starlight said. “I just have to do this…” A spark jumped from her horn to Sonata’s mask. The Siren pressed her forelegs to her face and started screaming: “¡Abajo el capitalismo! ¡Igualdad para siempre!” “What did you just do?” the beard asked, sounding amused. “Oh, just a teensy bit of mind control… or, well, suggestibility,” Starlight said through a grin. “Directed at the mask, not at Sonata.” The beard chuckled. “Bringing your strengths to the party, as I do mine?” “Da,” she answered. “Now, El Taco Loco, those ponies would have you adhere to a system of strict costs and payment for your tacos. They may say the tacos will be limitless, but somewhere, somehow, someone will be paying for them. That means there are limits… always limits, even if they hide them from you!” “¡Esos animales!” Sonata bellowed, whirling on the Power Ponies. “Tú, que me mantendría alejado de mis tacos ... ¡Prepárate para morir!” They may not have understood Sonata’s words, but the Power Ponies leaned forward in their stances, readying themselves for combat. “You are one psikh daughter of equality, comrade,” the beard said. “Hush now,” Starlight said. “We have work to do.” “And that is…?” Starlight grinned. “We’re teaming up against the bad guys. The real bad guys: the Power Ponies.” She knew Sonata would launch herself bodily at the group, and she figured Filli-Second would take that as the signal to attack her… so she waited for it to happen. When the first blow fell on her from the super-fast pony, Starlight let the beard flare out again, distracting Filli-Second and eventually landing a hit that knocked her aside. But Starlight kept her eyes focused on the rest of the Power Ponies, who watched as Saddle Rager leapt to meet Sonata in midair. The two grapplers slammed into each other, but Saddle Rager’s mass was superior, and they ended up continuing along her trajectory, eventually plowing through the hard brick edifice of an apartment building along its path. Starlight grinned at the Power Ponies. “Catch me if you can!” she called, before she broke into a gallop toward the shattered building. “You have plan, yes, comrade?” the beard asked, nudging her to the side of a blast of energy from Radiance. “You seem very much like you have plan.” “Did Trotsky have a plan during the siege of Stalliongrad?” The beard was silent for a moment before pushing her the other direction. One of Mistress Mare-Velous’ enchanted horseshoes clattered to the ground in front of her. “Comrade Trotsky was not a contemporary of that battle, comrade.” “Details! Just keep covering me while I get to Sonata. I think I can—” A bolt of ice from the Masked Matter-Horn exploded on the ground before her. She tripped, but the beard caught her in a mass of snaking tendrils and hoisted her back upright, all while keeping her moving at the same speed. “Just a little farther,” Starlight said through gritted teeth. She heard sounds of roaring and destruction from up ahead and watched as the two muscular creatures hurled chunks of metal and stone—and occasionally each other—about the ruined space. Something gripped hard at her hind legs, causing her to stagger. Starlight brought her head around, but the beard fanned out a set of tendrils, blocking her view of the pink blur trying to hit her. Starlight looked up instead, spotting Zapp moving into position above, and with roiling black clouds brewing just behind her. “Hold Filli-Second,” Starlight ordered. “Do it now…” The beard levered Filli-Second up and off the ground just as a massive bolt of lightning discharged from the clouds. Starlight’s coat stood up straight beneath the military outfit, and her heart skipped a beat or two, but the beard insulated her from the worst of it. The effect on Filli-Second was much more pronounced, though; the mare jerked back, up and out of the beard’s grasp, shaking and juddering in midair. Starlight cursed under her breath; it would have been comical if it didn’t look so bloody painful. “Idti,” the beard urged. “Going!” Starlight vaulted across the distance to the broken building and danced into the wake of the two titans clashing in the midst of it. She ducked as Saddle Rager aimed a forehoof at her, and her heart skipped another beat amid the thought that it would have taken her head off if the blow had connected. Saddle Rager howled with anger, grabbed a mass of broken bricks with her other forehoof, and came back around with a hail of deadly missiles. Starlight’s horn flared again, sending out a wave of force that deflected most of them. “Sonata, are you alright?!” Starlight called. “I’m here!” she shouted from somewhere out of sight. Starlight grinned as she dodged another blow. “Listen, please… I realized something just a minute ago. This comic… I don’t think it’s a traditional one! The good guys aren’t acting good, and the bad guys…” She ducked behind the free-standing remnants of wall, then squeaked as Saddle Rager threw a punch that leveled it. “I think it’s kind of showing like what Karl Mare-ecks said when a society is organized for the benefit of those in charge of it, rather than those whose labor makes it work!” “Chertovski verno,” the beard said, its approval bubbly and pervasive. Saddle Rager bore down on Starlight, who did a quick fake to one side, then hurled herself the other way, using the beard to break her fall and bring her back to her hooves again. “I… I don’t understand,” Sonata said, still unseen. “I thought people helped to shape and influence society through their individual actions, rather than it being, like, some big conspiracy…” Starlight shrieked as both of Saddle Rager’s forehooves came down, straight at her. The beard flared out and formed a rigid cone that caused the hooves to impact on either side of Starlight. Starlight shrunk toward the ground, seeking to evade Saddle Rager's gnashing teeth as much as anything. “It’s… not a conspiracy!” she shouted. “It’s a metaphor! Look: the Power Ponies have all the power, but they aren’t listening to us, even though all we want is to get out of here!” The beard pushed, both backwards into the floor beneath her, and upwards into the huge pony bearing down on her. Saddle Rager roared, and Starlight used her magic to project a shield to defend against the pony’s hot, spittle-flecked breath. “And that’s it!” Starlight shouted. “You and me… and both of our symbiotic entities that give us power… we just need to work together, and to find the strength of our shared… labor!” “Slava Kommunizma!” the beard cheered. Then it really pushed. The force of its thrust pressed Starlight’s head backwards uncomfortably, but she smiled, realizing that her plan was working. She came up just as Saddle Rager took a few steps back, then swung a hoof at her again. But Starlight held fast, trusting in the beard to— She staggered from the sheer force of the blow’s impact, but it didn’t kill her, and she was prepared to call that a win. The beard roared back, bringing Starlight’s whole body around as it formed itself into a gigantic club, which slammed itself into Saddle Rager’s head with a satisfying whack. The massive pony lurched to the side. Then Starlight spotted Sonata coming through the thick dust of the broken tenement building. The Siren moved slowly, but with purpose. She turned her eyes on Starlight and smiled. “The mask and I can both agree that what we’re up against here is just mean and unfair,” she said. Starlight smiled back. “Da, comrade,” she said. “Hey, that’s moya liniya, comrade,” the beard protested. “Deal with it,” Starlight teased. Then she focused on Sonata. “Are you ready?” “For what?” “Follow me!” Starlight turned back toward Saddle Rager. “Hey greenie-weenie, your mother was a minotaur, and your father was… exploitative of the means of production!” Saddle Rager brought her head around with a grimace and a roar, but Starlight was already moving, vaulting over broken stone and shattered furniture, making back toward the hole in the side of the building… ...back toward the Power Ponies. She glanced over, making sure Sonata was floating right by her side. Then she grinned and threw her head back with a battle cry: “For Communism!” “For Communism!” Sonata echoed. “Y tacos gratis!” she said a moment later, her voice deepening a bit for the occasion. They passed by the fallen form of Filli-Second, who still lay twitching. Radiance stood beside her, leaning over with an array of hard-light medical apparatus… and they just passed by, letting her work on healing her comrade. But up ahead, Zapp, Mistress Mare-Velous, and the Masked Matter-Horn all turned from what looked like a close, heated argument, to watch the pair of incoming “villains.” Sounds of thundering hooves behind her told Starlight that Saddle Rager was in hot pursuit. The trio of heroes before them dropped into battle-ready positions. Mistress Mare-Velous readied her lasso, Zapp lifted her necklace, and the Masked Matter-Horn lowered her head, bringing her horn down to the ready. The sound of hooves and snarling grew closer from behind. “Now, go left!” Starlight shouted, dodging to the right. As the “villains” dashed to either side of the trio of heroes, Starlight turned her head back. The three at first looked confused, but then brought their gazes back around to watch as Saddle Rager tried and failed to come skidding to a stop. They shrieked as the insanely muscular pony plowed straight through their midst, scattering the group like bowling pins. Each bounced off the walls and ground a few times before rolling to their respective stops. Saddle Rager herself paused, looking about in horror at the sight of her fallen comrades. She raised a hoof toward one of them, then started tearing up and sniffling, and started to deflate before their eyes. “What have I done?” moaned Saddle Rager. “Nothing permanent, I’m guessing,” Starlight said. She turned to where Radiance was still bent over and working on Filli-Second. “I trust you’ll look at them as well?” Radiance looked up and huffed. “Well, yes, assuming I can trust you not to jump me while the rest of my team is down, of course!” Starlight grinned. “Don’t worry; ‘From each according to her ability, to each according to her needs.’ And right now, what they need is care.” She paused. “And if I could just say one more thing, it’s that I take no pleasure in this victory, and all this could have been prevented if you’d just listened to us.” “For realzies,” Sonata added. “I just wanna go home!” Radiance looked at both of them in turn, then at her fallen comrades, and then nodded. “You’re right. I’m sorry for the trouble. Please… just go.” Starlight and Sonata turned back to each other, both smiling. “Did we do it?” Sonata asked. “Or, wait… whoa…” She held her forelegs out before her, and a bright flash overtook her, and for a moment her figure twisted… but then she was gone, leaving nothing but the mask behind. “She made it,” Starlight said, grinning from ear to ear. “We did it, comrade! We—” “I am proud of you, comrade,” the beard said, sounding sad. “In the face of great uncertainty and trial, you looked past your own hero—this Twilight that you speak of—and you found the strength in party, and equality, against the unheeding forces of Capitalism.” The beard made a sound akin to sniffling away tears. “You were the finest Communist I ever knew. Now… Dasvidanya.” Starlight’s heart softened. “And you were the best beard I could’ve ever ho… oh—oh!” Starlight felt her world pinch, and stretch, and soon she vanished in a mighty flash. “Oof!” The impact of cold crystal on her face made Starlight wish she still had a living beard. That same chill quickly permeated her coat as she lay there, groaning. “It’s her!” called a familiar, youthful voice. Starlight forced her eyes open and saw Spike kneeling down by her head. His eyes were wide with concern, and the nails upon his outstretched claw before her had been chewed. “Are you okay? I’m sorry… I tried to tell you about that comic… here, the others are just in the other room! Let me go get them!” Spike bolted from the room, shouting fit to raise Tartarus. Starlight’s eyes searched around, eventually landing on a nearby comic. “Dasvidanya, to you, too, comrade” she said with a smile.
EpilogueA world away, a cool midday breeze blew past a strip mall not too far from Canterlot High School, stirring the voluminous hair of two girls perched upon a picnic table, and rustling the small plastic bag that lay between them. “I guess this’ll do,” Aria Blaze said. Next to her, Adagio Dazzle sighed and started digging through the bag. “Here,” she said, handing a trio of wrapped packages to Aria. “You had the double-deckers?” “I had two double-deckers and one regular… but what’s this other one?” Adagio scowled, looked down, and teased the wrapping open. She let her expression sink into a deep frown, and then threw the package back into the bag. “I can’t believe this; they messed up our order! If only we still had access to our magic, we could make these worms beg for sweet release from the suffering that we could mete out to them.” Aria gave her a flat look. “Or if Sonata was still here, you could just make her take it back. Or she probably would have noticed to start with. She wasn’t bright, but there were one or two things that she…” A chill silence fell over them. Adagio fidgeted with the small package in her hands, but then eventually raised it, gave it an experimental sniff, and took a bite of it. A burst of hot spices suspended in a tomatoey delivery system assailed her taste buds. “Ugh.” She set it down on the table, then fished around in the bag for a napkin. “I hate to say this, but we really do need to come up with some more ideas for how to get her out of that thing.” Aria reached back around herself and pulled the rolled-up and half-squished comic book out of her rear pants pocket. “Yeah. Leave it to Sonata to get herself sucked into a comic.” “I told her that merchant she bought it from looked sketchy.” Adagio shook her head and picked back up the… whatever it was she’d been eating. She eyed it, trying to decide if she was hungry enough to take another bite, or if she'd rather throw it at a passerby. All at once, the gentle wind around them began to pick up. “Hey, Adagio,” Aria said, sounding alarmed. Adagio looked at her just in time to see the comic fly up and out of Aria’s hand. There was a flash of light, and then a shape came falling out of it, face-first onto the ground next to the table. “S… Sonata!” Adagio said, jumping down off the table. And indeed, there on the ground lay their blue-skinned sister, groaning and trying to raise herself on shaky arms. “Give me a hand,” Adagio said to the unmoving, wide-eyed Aria. “Come on, Sonata, sit down… there… now what happened to you?!” Sonata’s mouth worked itself open and closed and she turned her mildly concussed gaze between her two sisters. A moment later, that gaze landed on the bag. “W... what’s that?” Adagio gave her a small, quick, rare smile, then reached in and produced one of the wrapped packages. “We were… thinking about you, and so we got some of your favorites for our lunch.” She started to unwrap it. “Here, this one’s a—” Sonata’s eyes focused with crystal clarity on the item before them. She drew in a lungful of breath, then started screaming. She went over backwards in her seat, scrambled back to her feet, took another look at it, and set off running away, continuing to scream at full volume. “What is it?” Adagio called, setting off after her. “Sonata, come back; what’s going on?!” Aria sat staring incredulously for a moment, but then shrugged, reached over, and retrieved the taco that Adagio had tried to offer Sonata.
