THUMP, THUMP, THUMP…. The pounding beat of a bass line bored it’s way into her skull and made it feel like her brain was rattling around in her head. Tisi-, no she shook her head. as far as she was concerned, Dante remained her name, hated this particular bar. It was well down on the B list of establishments, and the B list in Tacoma encompassed a number of establishments of dubious quality.

It couldn’t be helped, the hunting would be richer elsewhere but she could not afford for the effects of her presence to become obvious from overly frequent visits. Eliminating the establishments with decent magical wards intended to detect creatures such as herself or astral security measures, along with those close to Knight Errant patrol routes further cut down on her options. So here she was, her coat done up in a slightly lurid shade of red, looking all the world like an aging club mare who no longer rated free admission to trendier locales and thus had been forced back on more, economical, venues.

A small part of her still protested at the personas she wore for hunting. The glances most stallions gave her, the way she was treated, and the fact that a few stallions had gotten a touch amorous before she was ready to drop the figurative hammer. None of her suitors had gotten very far, everything after that was invariably altered memories and her other suite of spells. For all that work though she often earned little more than dregs. The quiet voice of dissent thus rarely managed to be heard above the howl of bitter hunger that was only rarely quiet.

A frown crossed her face, the stallion she had been making flirtatious glances at, his mare friend had arrived, and Dante was pretty sure that suckerfish were less clingy. Scratch that one off the menu. Sigh, it felt like she had been subsisting on Micro-Zap EZ Pockets for the last month. She toyed with the straw in her drink and imagined how delicious Silky Sheets would be if she could…

No…, she shook her head again. Silky had been mercifully professional of late, avoiding complications. Not that recently robbing a bunch of Diamond Dogs had been hard, mind you. She wasn’t about to claim they had pulled off a heist worthy of robbing the Royal Canterlot Vault. Still, she was pleased how well it had gone off, even if the rewards were still a bit on the meager side. She was okay with that. It was unlikely that they'd be offered a string of easy victories, and after recent events, she was happy to have a success that hadn't required a last-minute knife-edged scramble.

True, Dante had wavered on whether to double down on edIT when the DJ fixer noted she was running out of work that needed doing. Ultimately she had sided with the DJ over the promise of more lucrative work. Her position was, delicate. Until she was finished changing into the alter ego demanded by an ancient scheme set in motion an eon ago, her full power unlocked, each risk was magnified. The aching throbs of discomfort from her wings, compressed under a sassy looking saddle attested to that. Later, she was going to need help with the legwork on the Alicorn Amulet, and the Nightmare Diamond. A fixer who owed her for their position, and loyal enough to not ask questions were likely to be more valuable than an influx of cash in the short term.

She glanced at the rainbow of light that played off the bottles. A faux crystal bottle caught the light which made points of light seem to focus within the indigo liquid. The simplest solution was also the one that scared her the most. The Magewood Circlet and Songcrest Meridian were not safe. Neither was she as long as her job or residence permitted scrutiny. Even if she mastered her power there were spells that might detect her, her visions of the past had made that abundantly clear. Even beyond that, accidents could (and over a long enough period) almost certainly would occur. One of the drinks offered a week back had a little extra in it. Her sensors had picked up the Bliss it had been spiked with. Dante had played along and left the meathead of a stallion a wreck, though it had taken pitifully little to drain the treacherous fool dry.

A hive and a lair would solve a number of problems, and create new ones. Dante was willing to play the hidden changeling, fate had given her no choice in the matter, but to embrace Queenhood was another thing entirely. Still the stress of being constantly wary, constantly on edge, and constantly paranoid was steadily weighing on the calculus of her decisions.

This couldn’t continue, something was going to have to give way at some point. Things had nearly backfired spectacularly when she had confided in Vixie under the false narrative of the Khan’s regalia to see if the Neighponese kitsune knew of the temple that contained the Heavenly Ocean Star. Vixie had not, but had immediately suggested a trip to investigate. Dante had deferred, she couldn’t risk going through international customs security in her current condition. Even so, Dante wasn’t sure that raising the chance that Vixie might learn what the Heavenly Ocean Star really was would be a good idea.

There were few perfect options, and none at hoof. She glanced through the list of mostly quirky businesses on the periphery of the entertainment industry. Not lucrative enough to warrant a megacorporation's attention, often professional dead ends for the aspiring actors that wound up staffing them.

A list of locations had been considered and discarded. She wasn’t going to wear a rubber dragon suit and reenact campy Neighponese films for Neighponese enthusiasts at The Rubber Suit. Evergreen World Amusement Park licensed popular characters, and an entire theme park to hunt in was attractive but that job would be even more banal than her current one. Her eyes flicked back to the entry that she had already viewed several times. A rugged stallion swung through a jungle ruin, suspended from a whip, a golden idol in hand, as he passed out of frame he reentered into a new scene clad in the ancient armor of the Equestrian guard and sauntered over towards a mare dressed in gauzy fabrics and a headdress that marked her as Cleopontra. They embraced, the camera's point of view swung past a pillar and reemerged with the mare with tears in her eyes as she boarded a skyship from a foggy airfield.

“You may not regret it today, or even tomorrow, but you’ll regret it for the rest of your life if you don’t get on that skyship,” the stallion intoned.

The skyship lifted off and flew away as the stallion turned and looked at the camera. “And you friend will regret not visiting us at Silver Screen Dreams, where you get to be the star.”

Dante thought she might have heard of the place once before in passing. Something of a combo spa/personal fantasy fulfiller as long as one's fantasy was to enjoy or play out scenes from famous entries in cinematic history. There were also rumors that would-be actors and actresses who had hit rock bottom occasionally provided a bit more of a personal touch in the personas of famous characters in exchange for an appropriate surcharge. Dante spared a thought towards wondering if this was not the same concept behind a bunraku doll, except done semi-willingly by those with few other options. Still, she had to admit this setup had advantages

Dante could become quite the star in a place like that. Though it always came back to the issue that full safety would still need Dante to control the other staff and security and that….ughhh.

She debated whether to go home and get back to work on researching the ritual to reach the extra-planar citadel of HARMONY and what objects might serve to create the connection when the bartender drone rolled over and placed a drink in front of her.

“Rainboom Cider, compliments of Mr. Breeze,” the personasoft crackled. Dante turned her head and caught a knowing smile on the face of an aging pegasus stallion. She fell into the practiced routine, took a sip, and licked her lips flirtatiously. Debates over whether the reluctant queen would take her place fell away for the moment, if he was going to be so obliging, it would be rude not to eat him.

Author's Note

Game Events: A relatively simple mission to steal the illicit proceeds from a criminal gang, along with their drug stash goes off without much issue. After the razor-thin success of the previous mission, few are complaining.

In larger events, Glass Darkly/Dante/Tisiphone has almost finished acquiring the core set of changeling powers. A standoff continues between Glass Darkly (PC, POV, Author) and Silky Sheets (PC) over the two Foci acquired much earlier. Glass Darkly knows that these are the Cores of the machines that defeated the Extraplanar invaders in an earlier age and are incredibly powerful artifacts (these again are coming from the prior crossover game). Glass Darkly has instead hinted that these are cursed relics from the Far East in the vein of the Alicorn Amulet (which is in fact one of the set, but it alone is corrupted).

There are six Cores, which have been fashed into relics.
Ruby - Alicorn Amulet, last known to have been stolen by the Couch Mare Club from the Solari Foundation.
Amethyst - Songcrest Meridian, still held by Glass Darkly
Emerald - Magewood Circlet, still held by Glass Darkly
Diamond - Nightmare Regalia, delivered by the team to Golden Lilly (without us knowing what was in the crate)
Topaz - N/A, still within the wrecked extradimensional citadel of HARMONY, where the final battle of the Planar War was fought (end of the prior campaign).
Sapphire - Heavenly Ocean Star, last known to have been at an unknown Neighponese (Japanese) temple that was attacked by a mysterious assailant.