A Tale of Dusk

CHAPTER 12

Not the worst thing I’ve done for a meal, but this is still humiliating. Chrysalis thought to herself as her adopted form, white-coated and pink-maned, twirled and shimmied up and down a lurid-red pole in an outfit that was little more than strategically-placed latex-black band-aids, all the while a room full of ponies, mostly mares, threw shiny gold and silver bits at her, whistling and cheering.

Lust, while not nearly as nutritious as Love, still helped Chrysalis from having to burn through her stores of energy, and taking up the role of a ‘exotic dancer’ was literally not the worst thing Chrysalis had done during her experiments about infiltrating Pony society. But the constant offers to ‘step around back’ or requests for ‘private sessions’ annoyed her to no end. She’d charmed the manager and her co-workers into ambivalence, just enough magical influence to make her life easier but not enough mental manipulation that her ‘hosts’ would be acting too out of character, and her contract clearly stated she danced, stripped, served drinks and not one damn thing more.

And still the offers came in by the bucket-load. She’d only been ‘performing’ for two days now, but the reaction to her chosen form had been … excessive, to say the least!

Not that I’ll be doing this for longer than a month, two at most. The money is good and I want to get a decent nest-egg to live off of, considering everyone I talk to tells me that Canterlot is ridiculously expensive to live in, but the longer I do this, the greater the chance somebody will try to attack me, and once the Guards get involved, especially if they start investigating who ‘Pearl Chaser’ really is, then I am sunk. Chrysalis thought to herself as she inverted herself around the pole and began spinning around the hard pole with her legs pointed straight out to the sides and her breasts wrapped around the pole … and the crowd went wild as Chrysalis spun around the pole in her new position, a shower of golden coins and a disturbing amount of folded up pieces of paper landing on the floor under the pole. I’ll also need to make sure I’ve memorized the route the cargo-trains take to make it to Canterlot, since I’ll need to get off just before we hit the station, and the guards who will be inspecting the cargo, but I will also need to be able to be close enough to Canterlot that I can safely make it to the main entrances and blend in with the crowd.

Two days of flying nearly non-stop across the Badlands, avoiding the villages and mining towns she’s infiltrated previously to avoid giving any would-be assassins from the Hive an easy time of tracking her down. Though the trip had her burning through a ridiculous amount of Love energy to stay awake and move at the fastest pace her wings could manage, Chrysalis was certain the pace was much faster than any of her sisters’ favourite thugs would have risked mimicking given how hard Love energy was to procure back at the Hive, and her mother’s guards never left the Hive, always on hand to protect the increasingly paranoid old crone from threats both real and imagined.

A full day had been sacrificed to scouting out the small border-town and its inhabitants and then crafting the persona of ‘Pearl Shiner’ as a young mare out on the road to find a place in life and in need of bits after an encounter with con-artists had ended with her losing everything but the clothes she wore … including all forms of identification.

And now this. Just pour on the charm, shake my ass, get the bits and get the hell out of this town before somebody tries to play the Beast with Two Backs with me. Chrysalis repressed the urge to sigh as her dance around the pole became more of a sensual, slinking spin around the pole that doubled the amount of bits being thrown at her feet and caused one of the bouncers to have to bull her way through the crowd and pull a squealing mare back by the hair as the ‘adoring fan’ rushed the stage from a shadowed corner at the back of the strip-club. The DJ raised a blue-furred eyebrow and made a ‘cut’ motion with her free hand, and the deep, thrumming music faded to the usual ‘end of show’ theme song, much to the crowd’s dismay, judging from the boos and complaints.

“And that was Pearl Shiner, ladies and gentlecolts! Give it up, and get yourself some fresh drinks as we get ready for our next entertainer!” The DJ blared at the crowd, trying to overcome the crowd’s displeasure as ‘Pearl Shiner’ disengaged from the pole, bowed deeply to the audience and nodded to the DJ in thanks, while the stage-lights dimmed and the cleaners came hustling up onto the stage and began sweeping the money up as the crowd was gently, or in a few cases firmly, guided to the bar as the cleaners could get to work on the necessary but unseemly task of cleaning the stage of bits, proposition-notes and the occasional piece of moist underwear an over-enthusiastic fan would pitch onto the platform..

A good third of the bits thrown onto the stage would go directly into Chrysalis’s pocket in addition to her ‘wage’, while a third would go into the manager’s pocket to help pay for expenses, and the remaining third would go into a ‘general pool’ of bits that paid out to all the other employees at the end of the month. A rather cunning bit of social engineering from the otherwise unassuming manager, if Chrysalis was being honest, since if all the ‘exotic dancers’ worked hard, then they’d all take a decent chunk of additional money home at the end of the week, and the manager would be able to push the business much further into the black, but if only a handful of dancers were bringing in the bits, then the others could at the very least keep enough money coming in to keep the lights on and the pantry stocked, and it became clear who the real earners in the place were.

And of course, that in-turn motivated the ‘slackers’ to pick up the pace for fear of losing their jobs, and it put the performers who were bringing in the bits on a bit of a pedestal and encouraged everybody to work together to bring up the skills of those who under-performed. That, or those who simply couldn’t keep up the pace or lacked the talent got given duties outside of ‘exotic’ dancing, or were simply asked to leave.

“Faust as my witness, you are either the best performer we’ve ever had, or you’re using some sort of Zebrican witch-craft on my patrons.” Low Craft, the manager and owner of the Gentle Hearts Club, whistled as Chrysalis/Pearl Shiner slipped around the curtains at the end of the stage and into the relative privacy of the staging area.

“I think they just like a Celestia look-alike.” One of the other performers, a tall, lithe Pegasus whose extremely-tight underwear left little to the imagination, said with a great deal of mirth, flicking a finger out to poke at ‘Pearl Shiner’s’ long, candy-pink hair. “If you were a Pegasus, we’d slap a fake horn on your head and have to hire a dozen extra bouncers to keep your groupies in-line.”

“No way. Trying to pull off those stunts around the pole with wings? I’d be in all kinds of trouble with my balance, and I don’t even want to think about the nightmare of keeping all those feathers clean while I’m on the road.” Chrysalis replied in as friendly a tone as she could muster. Pecker, as he was affectionately known to the staff of Gentle Hearts, gave no indication of aggression that the Changeling Queen could read from his body-posture or tone of voice, but there was … something … in his aura, in the spectrum of emotional energy only Changelings could see, that made her skin crawl.

There was something dark in his psyche, something hateful and jealous of others, something that adored being the center of attention, and right now Chrysalis in her ‘Pearl Shiner’ persona was the biggest threat to that in the Club. Ever since she’d started at this job, she’d watched that dark nugget of mental bile growing and spreading dark veins across the stallion’s aura, and realizing she’d unwittingly set up a temporary home with a full-blown narcissistic psychopath-in-waiting hadn’t done much for Chrysalis’s peace of mind.

“Besides, the wing-and-pole routine is your speciality. No way am I going to even think about moving in on that.” Chrysalis added, slapping Pecker lightly on the upper forearm and tried to repress the urge to shudder and run away from the Pegasus as the dark cancer in his aura pulsed hatefully in her direction. Go away. Go aw-aaaaaaaay. I don’t want anything to do with somebody whose aura reads like a gory b-grade slasher flick!

“Speaking of specialities, Pecker, finish your warm-ups and give the rubes a hell of a show, I don’t want the Lonely Hearts Club to start coming across as a lesbian dive. Pearl, I need you to come with me, some of the low-earners need a pointer on how to ride the pole, and you’re all warmed up from your set.”Thank you, Low Craft, for saving me! Chrysalis thought as the small, softly-spoken earth-pony stallion grabbed Chrysalis by the shoulder and gently guided her away from the staging area, where Pecker had already turned his attention to the thick red-velvet drapes that masked the staging area from the stage itself, grinning broadly and stretching sensuously, his already tightly-bound loins swelling in anticipation. Pecker truly got as much out of his shows as the audience did, and then some.

“Thanks, boss, I’m … not sure that Pecker’s taking my shows too well.” Chrysalis whispered once they rounded the corner and headed down the corridor to the group’s changing room, only for the Gentle Hearts Club’s manager to give her a loaded look.

“Yeah, you’re not the only one who noticed our resident show-boat doesn’t take too kindly to competition for the top billing. Look, Pearl, I get you’re trying to show that you’re worth the room and board, but word to the wise from an old hand at this business? Tone down your act, save yourself the grief and do not stand out too much. I know you said you’re all the way from Californeigha, but this is the Badlands.” The smaller stallion said in a low, harsh voice that was very different from the friendly ‘game’ voice he used most of the time. “We might be on Princess Celestia’s side of the border, but there’s a lot of nasty hombres out here who take notice of hot little commodities like you, and the Royal Guards out here weren’t assigned to border-duty because they were the cream of the crop, if you get my meaning …”

Knowing that my mother’s Hive has held on this long by kidnapping small groups from the borders to feed on, yes, I’m well aware … But her persona of Pearl Shiner was a well-meaning but air-headed young mare who’d gotten tricked, robbed and dumped on the border, and that meant she had to play the part to keep her cover and prevent her ‘hosts’ from breaking the low-level charms she’d woven into their surface thoughts to make her insertion into their lives something to take at face value.

“I … I understand. It’s just I need to get a lot of bits back under my belt to get back to Canterlot. I’ve got family there who can put me up for a few days while my parents can wire me the funds to get back to Californeigha, and since I … I can’t really go to the Royal Guards with what happened …”

Sighing, Low Craft nodded and released his grip on Chrysalis’s disguised shoulder. The Changeling Queen felt bad about how strongly the poor stallion emotions screamed he had to protect ‘Pearl Shiner’. He was a good, honest sort of being, despite the career he worked in, and his protective instincts towards his staff was motivated as much by friendship and a familial-kind of love as by the necessity of keeping the business from turning into a dysfunctional mess and keeping the books in the black.

“It’s not like I don’t understand, sweet-heart. It’s a bit hard to make those bone-heads realize that anyone can slip you roofies without your consent, and the last thing anybody needs is to have a case of drug-use on their legal records, especially when they’re like you and trying to get into a decent college.” The stallion snorted with laughter, bitterly, as they got closer to the changing room, where Chrysalis could hear laughter and good-natured bickering coming from under the thick, oak door, where another bouncer, one of the impossibly burly minotaurs this time, stood guard with arms crossed and a professional scowl across her face. “But Pearl, I used to work the floor and ride the pole, same as most everybody here. And just like you, I put my heart and soul into it, went over and above what was expected of me. It wasn’t the Gentle Heart Club, but it was another strip-club, and the boss didn’t take as much care of her staff as I do mine.”

“I don’t …” Chrysalis began, before Low Craft grabbed his own pant’s leg and pulled, lifting the immaculately-pressed slacks up and exposing an elegantly-crafted metal-and-plastic brace around his right leg. She had never noticed Low Craft limping, so despite the slender appearance of the brace, it obviously held enough strength to support a full-grown, if smaller than average, Stallion’s leg.

“The Royal Guards didn’t do much for me, either. A mare assaulting a stallion? Surely it must have been in self-defence, despite the fact she had a good two foot and a hundred pounds on me, despite the fact I had dozens of witnesses in my co-workers and patrons, despite the fact the mare in question had been booked for unlicensed prostitution and possession of illegal narcotics over a dozen times by those same Royal Guards. Surely it was not because she was a jealous bitch, hopped up on mescaline, hard liquor and loco-weed, who decided to eliminate her biggest rival by smashing every bone in my leg between the hip and the ankle with a lead pipe as I was leaving the club to go home after the end of my shift.” Low Craft growled, the hand gripped his pant-leg clenching so tightly his knuckles turned white. “I only just barely avoided getting an sexual assault charge slapped on me because those uniformed idiots could only see the giant tits being shoved in their faces by a mare who made a career out of lying through her teeth and shaking her ass when that didn’t work, and the boss just wanted the trouble to go away so she could get back to making money, so anybody who stood up to give evidence found themselves jobless the next day, which really didn’t help proving my innocence. The truth only came to light when one of Princess Celestia’s Justicars came out this way to investigate complaints of corruption amongst the Royal Guards and happened to overhear what had happened to me. But even today, there’s a good many ponies in this town who still think I tried to rape that rabid bitch and got my comeuppance in the form of a mangled leg.”

“So I make it a point to step up when I see trouble brewing for my people, and you’ve been in town less than two days and there’s a goddamn hurricane forming over you, Pearl. So please, I don’t care how eager you are to get to Canterlot, how much you want to go home, but you will keep your head down, stop putting on quite such a good show and stop drawing such unwanted attention to yourself, and the rest of my staff, or I will cut you loose faster than you can say ‘goodbye’.” The smaller Unicorn’s hand shot out and grabbed Chrysalis’s wrist, spinning the startled Changeling Queen around as Low Craft glared right into her eyes. “Am. I. Clear?”

Chrysalis gulped, no longer needing to force the impression she was some naive young filly, because the sheer force of Low Craft’s emotions, a whirling maelstrom of regret, anger and most importantly, fear, swirled around her like a miasma of spiritual sickness. Low Craft meant every word …

“I got it.” ‘Pearl Shiner’ said in a small, meek voice, and the small owner of the strip club gave her a searching look, sighed, nodded to himself and plastered on his warm, welcoming smile once more, and the minotaur bouncer pushed open the door to the changing room.

“Great. Then, before you cool down too much, let’s get you in there and show the rest of our family how you do that voodoo that you do so well.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Spine, when I said it was fine for you to go hang out with your new friend, I didn’t mean till nearly ten at night!” Dusk looked at the clock, then back at the sheepish-looking drake, and groaned loudly before covering his face with his hand. “I have no way of knowing where you are, who you were with or what you were doing, and we’ve only been in Ponyville a week! We still don’t know who we can really trust in this town, and the only way I can contact you is via a sending spell, and if you’re unconscious or …”

“Whoa there, this isn’t Canterlot, nobody’s going to kidnap me to ransom back to the Princess! That only happened once, and mom pretty much levelled a city block trying to find me when the Royal Guard managed to figure out where I was.” Spine raised both hands to stop Dusk’s paranoid ranting. “Look, I get we should be concerned being this far from Canterlot and all those Royal Guards who used to protect us, and I get this town has it’s … issues …”

“I hear a ‘but’ coming up.” The unicorn growled, but leaned back from Spine and removed the palm from his face, forcing his arms to hang loosely, calmly, by his sides.

“But the ponies here are really nice. Even that blonde amazon who I clotheslined a few days back. Sweetie Belle introduced me to her friends, Applebloom and Scootaloo, and we spent most of the day skinny-dipping in a pond on Applebloom’s farm … or Applejack’s farm … or maybe it’s Big Mac’s farm. Whatever, it’s the Apple orchard that’s way bigger than the campus, and I’ve never had so much fun just swimming or climbing trees, or had friends like these before!” Spine nearly vibrated with excitement as she spoke, and Dusk found it impossible to remain annoyed at the young drake for staying out well past her curfew in the face of such joy.

“Well, if you’re in the company of Applejack, then I suppose its fine. I can’t see that mare allowing anything shady to happen, and I’m assuming her … sister? Applebloom, is of a similar nature?”

“Kinda? She’s a real straight-shooter, if that’s what you mean, but Applebloom’s real shy and doesn’t speak much unless you say something about farming or her family, then she won’t shut up until one of the other girls starts talking about something else. Or you bring up pears. She’s terrified of pears for some reason.” Spine shrugged as she and Dusk moved away from the entrance to the library and up the stairs to the private quarters. “Scootaloo is the dangerous one, if you catch my drift. Nothing is impossible, anything that might make her cutie mark show up is to be pursued full-throttle, that kind of mindset. Her wings are … stunted, I guess? I didn’t ask because we don’t really spend much time around teenage Pegasus, so for all I know wings of that size are normal for a filly her age? She seems kind of tetchy about flying and the other girls kept elbowing me when I started to ask why she had to climb up the trees, rather than flying.”

“Well, Sweetie Belle seems to be rather grounded for her age, and the way you describe the other two makes them seem … endearing, at the very least. And so long as Applejack or this ‘Big Mac’ fellow know where you all are, I don’t mind if you stay out past your curfew.” The purple mage said in defeat, his horn flickering with magic as he remotely teased the heating runes on the library’s hot-water tank, located in the library’s basement, into activity. “The shower should be ready to provide a good long, hot soak in a minute or two, so grab yourself some warm clothes, and I’ll get some supper prepared for you.”

“Thanks.” Spine replied, smiling and yawning, and for a moment Dusk was struck by an overwhelming surge of affection for his ‘assistant’, and leaned over to give her a hug, the Drake freezing for a second in surprise, before returning the hug and smiling up at Dusk, their different positions on the stairs allowing Spine, in her teenage form, to hug Dusk back at eye-level. “I was worried you were going to be massively pissed at me, but you’re being really cool about all of this.”

“I am concerned, Spine, but I also trust you. If you’re willing to vouch for your friends, then I’ll trust them too.” Letting Spine go, Dusk took a backwards step down the stairs and gave his ‘assistant’ his best calm smile, despite the roiling anxiety her lateness had caused him to suffer. “Between the mayor, Cherilee and her students, as well as Applejack and her family, I’d say we’re well on the way to making friends here in Ponyville, if not a home.”

“So we’re still thinking about not going back to Canterlot?” There was a hint of … delight in Spine’s voice that made Dusk’s heart clench. I made her stay in Canterlot because I wanted to study magic and stay close to the Princess. Yet out here … I don’t think I’ve ever seen Spine so happy. She hasn’t even complained about not having her consoles around, and she would spend all day on them back home and not be half as happy as she is right now.

“I am seriously considering making Ponyville our new home, yes. I mean, we’re close enough to visit my parents or your mother whenever we want to, so really there’s no point in going back to my tower except to pick up my research and our stuff and get it shipped out to Ponyville.” Reaching out with a hand to gently shove Spine in the shoulder, and in the direction of the shower, Dusk gave a cheeky grin. “I mean, aside from Officer Rulebook and a handful of mares, I’m practically stalker-free out here, and you’re finally around ponies who look at you as simply different, rather than dangerous.”

“Careful … I can still be dangerous, I just choose not to. It’s more fun this way.” The Drake warned, but the grin on her face stole any malice from her words.

“And that, Spine, is the reason why I choose you, and not the sea of horny idiots chasing after me.” Dusk whispered as he watched Spine saunter off to the shower, waiting until the drake disappeared into the bathroom before taking himself down the stairs and towards the kitchen. “Now … supper. Spine does all the cooking, normally, but surely it can’t be that hard … right?”