The Equestrian Files & Associated Material

Chapters

1 - An Alley Mare Awakens
2 - Unlucky Break
3 - Mare Triumphant

1 - An Alley Mare Awakens

It was a bright, sunny day in Manehattan. Not a cloud in the sky to hide the shining brilliance of the sun's rays, causing cascading shadows along the various skyrises of dwellings and stores alike. The alleyways between cast into a deep darkness, or so it appeared when standing in the light. As with all things, it was simply a matter of perspective.

Sandwiched between a glitzy three-floor boutique and an upscale apartment block, was one such alley. Its contents a set of dumpsters, a backdoor or two from the neighbouring buildings, and a pony- A unicorn in fact, lying unmoving on the cobblestones. She lies there, slumped on her side with tightly tucked hooves. Her eyes closed as if she's simply sleeping. Though- There's something not quite right with her. Her coat, a shiny black marred with old scars, with a ruby-red underbelly, seems less like a well-groomed coat and more like… Scales. Glinting in the little light filtering in from the street.

The mare lets out a low groan, slowly raising her head from the ground as she opens her eyes. A brilliant gold, the slitted pupils expanding quickly in the alley's shadow. She doesn't move quite yet, her gaze flitting all about the alleyway, eyebrows furrowed as she takes in what little sights there are to see. She finally shifts, pulling out her forehooves from beneath herself. They, much like her eyes, are a glittering gold. Scaled still, but layered over the rest. Looking as if she had simply dipped the pair into a vat of the molten metal. Her hind legs lack such a shine, though the hooves still hold a dimmer, but still golden glint.

This now, this she stares at. Sitting on her hind legs, examining her forelimbs. Twisting her hoof every which way, watching how it bends and moves. She quickly moves onto the rest of her body- Bringing to light her tail, not hair but flesh, a long coiling thing tipped in a rounded arrowhead. This however, seems to not bring her the same alarm as the rest of her. It brings into question: is she even a pony?

~*~

In all of her (few) years working for the Weathervane Bureau (formally the Weathervane Journal) Jasper Heaton had never had a case (or experience) like this. Waking up in a dark alleyway with no memory of how she arrived (perhaps once or twice in her youth), and finding her belongings (once) and form to be missing.

For the limb that she stares at should be her right hand, not her right hoof. It resembles what was once her hand, clad in the golden shine of her past mistakes, but still stubbornly refuses to be her hand. Much like the rest of her, the correct sort of flesh, arranged in entirely the wrong manner. It makes her skin- scales- crawl. Not only is she something else (again), she is somewhere else (also again, though never both at the same time). An alley that is strangely clean of litter, in a city that sounds strange, and smells crisp and fresh- Unlike the smog of London.

She runs a careful set of hooves over her face, grimacing as she feels its new shape. A muzzle, a pair of ears that twist and turn at every noise, and a single horn. She pauses, hoof feeling along the bottom to the tip, brows furrowing further. Right at the edge of her vision she can see it, framed by her curly hair (lacking its usual bun), its tip marbled with red. Like the pair of spiralling ram's horns she should have instead. Her brain, unending in its solving of puzzles and mysteries, tells her what she doesn't want to believe. Forcing her into a quick acceptance, despite her want to drag her feet and give herself the briefest of breakdowns.

Yet still, Jasper’s thoughts linger. How had she arrived here? No matter the amount of forcible acceptance or at least, apathy towards her current form, the question remains. Snaking through her thoughts as she stares at her newly-found hooves. Her memories are hazy, but becoming clearer as she sits and ponders. Dragging her previous moments of existence to light before she was here. Wherever here even was.

She remembers a room- No, a roof. The Weathervane Journal’s roof. Covered in arcane circles and runic symbols, drawn by her own hand in chalk. All intersecting. Layers upon layers of work, research, and hard-found material all combined into one, single ritual. One she hadn’t even thought would work. An attempt, one much like many others of its kind, to remake a line of communication with Hell.

JD and Rory, Milo too- They’d been there too. JD to help with the ritual itself, an anchor of Hell. Maybe, potentially. She still wasn’t sure. But better a child of a Prince who was Earthborn, than bother any actual demon with their shenanigans. (Especially since it had been precisely their fault the connection broke in the first place.) With Rory and Milo for moral support, and note keeping. With how strange this has gone- Why hadn't Milo foreseen it? He was usually such a good beacon for danger...

The symbology… Had Jasper gotten it wrong? The last thing- The last thing she truly remembers, was… Pain. A great deal of pain, and a glaring flash of light- Did it explode? Was this the result of backlash? Had all her failsafes for such an event failed?

Had she managed to transport herself somewhere else? Entirely separate to Hell? (And transport, not even a link for communication. A complete failure, in both respects.) To get home she’d… Have to replicate it. Somehow. But she could barely remember what she’d even drawn, let alone all its complex interweaving. She- She couldn’t get distracted about such an impossibility.

As always, Jasper has a job to do. A mystery to solve, a problem to fix. And, if things turn out well, an article to write- But for now, she needs to learn how to walk.

She finds her legs are strong but uncertain, starting forward with an unfamiliar gait. Leading to an entangled sprawl onto the cobblestones, muzzle aching from the fall. But Jasper gets up, again and again and again. No matter the amount of failures, the unwieldy limbs, the strange way her hooves feel when landing hard on the stones below. What use will she be otherwise, when she finds the others? (If she finds them, her mind traitorously whispers.)

By the time Jasper feels comfortable in walking, running, and the solidness and power her hind legs can put into a jump; the alley’s shadows have rescinded at the behest of the sun. Yet she still hasn’t found herself comfortable in translating her experience into solid combative movement. A punch leaves her unbalanced and tripping over her own feet as she attempts to throw a second. A kick that has much to be desired, the uncertainty of being unable to see what she’s doing leading to an uncertainty in her strikes. Something that could be worked on in time- But not now. She’s spent enough time in this alleyway already, tormenting the bins. It’s a wonder no-one’s come over to inspect the noise, though the hubbub of the street may have drowned it out completely.

The cacophony becomes clearer once Jasper cautiously approaches the mouth of the alleyway, keeping to whatever shadow there was left. The sight of a busy street awaits her, filled with colourful ponies of every size, shape, and colour. All rushing too and fro, all with some distant destination (or not-so distant) location in mind. Clad in suits, dresses, novelty t-shirts. Toting all sorts of accessories, with belongings in saddlebags or floating in a glittering aura of colour. It’s no wonder she went unnoticed, the sounds of the horse drawn… Cabs? Overtaking much of the crowd’s already loud babble.

Jasper simply stands there, taking it all in. Eyes critically running over every inch of highrise, pavement, and cobblestone that she can see. Most made of a sheer glass and metal, brick and stone, or solid concrete. A mix you’d find in the middle of any city. Though the foot traffic, and the vehicles on the road were not.

The clearest of differences she noted between her and what must be the common equine, was what differentiated her from the common human. But the biggest difference of all. Her size. She stood a full head taller, maybe more, than the rest of the ponies hurrying by on the street.

This meant something quite simple, that she was an anomaly to the ‘default’. An unsafe thing to be in situations like this- If only she wasn’t lacking everything she owned. If she’d been left with her glamour, or even her cloak of the unseen, this wouldn’t be a problem. Though, Jasper supposed, that was likely the point.

She tries not to think about the similarities between the colours, the hip-marks, the mix of regular, unicorn, and pegasus horse types, and the dimly-remembered pony show of her childhood. That had looked nothing like this, though again, perhaps that was the point. The not-quite familiar, and a home she’ll never find again. (Or she’s remembering it wrong, it has been over thirty years since then.)

It brings Jasper’s thoughts to the image emblazoned on her own hip, the one she’s been pointedly ignoring since she saw it. Another monument to her own hubris- Were the golden arms and hands not enough? She had to see that fucking chalice again, stamped on her hip for all to see? Its taunting open, hungry mouths and lolling tongues etched into a dingy once-bright gold. Artfully carved. A horrendous reminder. Just her fucking luck. (At least it was rendered… Somewhat stylistically. Lacking much of its true detail.)

A sigh that sounds uncomfortably close to a nicker leaves her lips as she shifts on her hooves. She’s seen enough, a glimpse of a world that she had no doubt would tear her to shreds if she let her guard drop at the seemingly cute and cuddly appearance of the beings around her. She needed to find the others.

Jasper turns, trotting back down the alleyway. Deeper into the metropolitan maze. If she was lucky, they’d all be in the same city block. (But she was never lucky.)

~*~

A crisp breeze blows through the empty, darkened streets. Bringing a heightened chill, causing ponies who were still out at this late hour to clutch whatever warm scrap of clothing close and pick up their pace. The moon shines brightly, just above the rooftops in the glory of her full size. A watchful eye over the whole of the night.

Jasper creeps through the lamplight, as she has for the past few nights, combing the streets for her coworkers. Friends. Family. The sureness she’d held on the first day of their nearness fading into apathetic acceptance. Stalking the streets of this city, the name of which she still hasn’t learnt despite all her eavesdropping. Waiting under open windows for a scrap of something useful, only to hear inane shit about the pony’s personal life- She’s at least figured out they’re called ponies, though she’s still not sure what that makes her. Some sort of demon pony, she suspects.

A tiring thing it was, surviving on the scraps of the city. A near-constant fear she’ll be discovered during her daily naps, tucked deeply away in the depths of the alleys, where no-one tends to tread. Made more so by her lack of progress, lack of knowing- All the time she’s spent here, searching, and what has she accomplished? She can’t keep searching fruitlessly for JD, Milo, and Rory, if they’re here, they’ll have to hunt her down themselves.

If she’s alone, truly alone… Well, it’s not the first time Jasper’s had to take on a case by herself. (Neither is it the first that she’s caused.)

The soft clip-clop of her hooves comes to a halt as she stops in-between one lamplight and the next. Mind made up. It was time she took this situation into her own hands, starting with remaking the glamour. If, if her magic worked here. It was clear these ponies had it, but despite all her attempts before and after resting she still hadn’t managed a single spark from her supposed ‘unicorn’ horn. Perhaps she just lacks their natural magic, with her focus on runic circles… Nevertheless, she’d need materials to test it. It might as well be an attempt at artificing the glamour, it is a full moon every night- Why not take advantage?

The amount of times Jasper has performed the task of crafting a glamour has burned the requirements into her brain. An article of jewellery- ideally small and made of a pure metal, a gemstone soaked in the moon’s light- both before and during the casting, a piece of who it’ll be tied to (easy, hair will do), and something emblematic of illusion- she usually uses makeup (a dollar store eyeliner usually does it), but do ponies have makeup? It may be best to find a mirror instead… And of course, chalk to draw the circle.

All of which she had no way of obtaining legally, but in her wanderings had a solid idea of where to steal them from instead. Once a thief, always a thief. No matter how long it’s been since she broke and entered, she can’t help but case whatever building she finds herself near. Highrises aren’t the best to steal from, but the various shops on the other hand… Seem quite lacking in the security department. They surely have something, but it can't be worse than a mummified corpse that consumes energy. (She wishes she didn’t remember that.) Though how is she going to pick anything up? She’s seen the regular ponies use their hooves to grab small objects, but how is she to replicate that?

Jasper starts moving again at a quick trot, her goal now set. She can certainly nab one of the items tonight, with the moon still high in the sky. She's got time.

~*~

The storefront of Ruby’s Jewellery was dark behind its large glass window displays, holding gemstone-studded necklaces, earrings, and most importantly, rings. Little placards litter the various tables, proclaiming a ‘25% off sale’. Past the window displays are the true prizes, clean silver ring bands tucked away in their own little display case.

There’s no visible alarm system, or even a warning sign of one. The glass feels… Glassy for lack of a better word, as Jasper taps on it gently with a hoof. Ideally she’d go through a back door, but she has neither lockpicks nor the dexterity to use them right now. Therefore: brute force it was.

CRASH

Jasper considers her hoof, now punched through the glass. The lack of alarms blaring leads to her punching out the rest, hauling herself in through the window. Scattering the carefully-made displays across the floor. The glass shatters harmlessly against her scales, but she can’t stop the automatic shake once she’s got all four hooves on the floor, sending glass clinking to the floor. She feels a little bad for the mess, but pragmatism wins out. Eyes on the prize, Jasper.

She approaches the case, a burnished wood holding inset glass panelling. Little placards claim the silver’s purity- A nice, simple band. Perfect for her needs. She taps her hoof against the glass, making a soft hum at the thickness. Unlikely to stop her, unless it’s got something else going on.

CRACK

Her first strike doesn’t make it all the way through, spiderwebbing cracks lining the top panel of glass. Her second goes clean through, scattering glass amongst the silver rings. It’s now she has the simple thought, how am I going to pick this up?

She stops. She stares. The barely-visible glass and accursed silver glints at her, tauntingly.

“Fuck.” Jasper curses with venom, lifting herself up with her front hooves to balance on her hind legs. Leaning on a foreleg, she paws in vain at the mess in the case. Desperately trying to grasp a single ring in her hoof. How the hell did those ponies do it?! All she manages is to slide it all around, her expression quickly turning into a snarl of bared teeth.

The soft tinkling of glass and silver permeates the store, drowning out all else. It quickly gets grating, to the point Jasper tries to spear a ring with her horn. The horn she has barely any spacial awareness of. The feeling of it hitting the floor of the display rattles her teeth, but she’s getting closer. On her third jousting attempt, she hears something over the glass. An ear flicking back behind her as she raises her head. The sound of sirens.

Jasper ducks her head back down immediately, her motions getting more and more sloppy, more desperate. The wailing sirens growing closer and closer. Her attempts getting no closer than before, and in fact is slipping further from success. Her horn aches, her hooves ache, she is soon to be caught red-handed by the cops. One option left, one potential.

She bites the bullet, and bites a ring. Immediate, instant success. Glass sticks to her lips as she draws her head from the display, dropping the ring into her waiting hoof. She tries to be delicate in getting the glass off, but with the sirens getting far too close for comfort- She brushes it off against her foreleg, rough and coarse. Glass and scale alike cut her lips. Superficial. She’s had worse. She shoves the ring back between her tongue and teeth, pushing off the display and galloping back out the window. She clears it with a jump. Out clean.

The sirens are so much louder now Jasper stands on the street again, so much closer than she’d thought. A red and blue flashing light shines from down the street. It rapidly grows closer, as does the siren. She bolts.

Something Jasper doesn’t care to listen to is shouted, inaudible over the siren. Something sparks behind her. She doesn’t look back, taking the first alleyway she comes across. A light shines upon her for the briefest of moments. Then a clattering of hooves hit the cobblestones, right as she hits the first corner to go deeper. To disappear. She gets the barest of glimpses of a pony silhouetted by the light, stock-still, before she’s gone. Deep into the twists and the turns of the metropolis’ alleyways. So deep that no-one could find her.

Author's Note

don't expect a consistent schedule, those never work well for me, but I'll try to post it weekly either way! hope you enjoyed <3

note: so long as you're nice about it, you can note down spelling mistakes & such in the comments if you notice. I'd like to think I'm pretty good at editing it myself though

2 - Unlucky Break

“I know what I saw, sir! A horrible scaled pony-dragon, tall as Celestia, clearly just done feedin’ on something.”

“Lieutenant, was there anypony hurt at the scene?”

“W-well no sir but we did find-”

“Was anything taken?”

“We’re ah- Not sure still. The owner still hasn’t given us a full inventory but I think-”

“The valuable display pieces were untouched, weren’t they?”

“Well, yes but the case-”

“Was a display of paltry silver rings. Nothing else was touched, correct?”

“I… No sir.”

“Then what this sounds like to me, Lieutenant, is that the sirens scared the perp off before he had a chance to rob anything. And you, eager to find the stallion, rushed to the nearest alley in hope to find him. Being that it was late into the nightshift, you were tired and mistook whatever garbage was back there as some kind of monster-pony. Am I wrong?”

“...I know what I saw.”

“What was that, Lieutenant?”

“Nothing sir, you aren’t wrong, sir.”

~*~

Jasper awoke to the taste of copper on her tongue and a ring clasped tightly between her hooves. She gingerly probes her lips with her tongue, finding the wounds healed but the taste to be lingering. She spits out a missed shard of glass, aiming far from her meagre setup of an overturned dumpster and a blanket stolen off a washing line. The trash once held by the bin piled far from it, and what refuse had been left was dealt with by a scrap of cloth and rainwater. The day’s rain collects in the upturned lid, the best she’s got. Cleaned the best she can. Jasper dips her head and drinks. It hasn’t killed her yet.

She turns attention to the ring, still tightly sandwiched between her hooves. It’s a delicate operation to balance it on one hoof, but she manages. She scowls at it. The damning little thing. She needed to fix her issue of gripping things, else trying to find anything else would be a bust. Perhaps quite literally, caught by the cops and brought into what would surely be a fate worse than death. (She’s fucking sick of those.)

Thus, she sits. Pawing with hoof on hoof, trying to grasp the ring in the way she’s witnessed before. To the point she knocks it off onto the floor (side) of the dumpster, so she just tries from there. Curled up under a blanket, still half asleep but unable to truly rest. Even for just a moment. It’s something to distract from the red fog still permeating her brain. (It’s reaching for something- She doesn’t want to know what.)

A heavy sigh leaves her lips. Dull scraping of metal on metal permeating the small space. What was she to do here, really? Scrape together enough materials to wander this society in the light? Then what? Cobble together a runic combination powerful enough to break out of this reality- Pocket dimension- Whatever it is? Her expertise is demonology (and artificing) not fucking dimensional travel. (Honestly, that’s what put her in this mess. Messing with shit she barely understands.) She’s barely surviving as-is. A world she doesn’t know (barely knows), a society with rules she has no chance of knowing- She sucks in a deep breath, and gives her head a quick shake. She needs to think smaller. To ignore her current task’s hopelessness and look toward the immediate future. What will she do once glamoured?

Jasper’s attempts at picking up the ring falter as her attention wanders. What can she do after? Other than find her way to a warm bed and a hot bath… Mm… A bubble bath would be heaven right about now…

Clink.

Her eyes snap to her hoof, barely raised, and the ring now stuck to it. The sound had been from her absently tapping it against the dumpster, not even realising she’d lifted it. She sits up and the blanket slides down her shoulders, raising her hoof higher to examine the now-dangling ring. She still can’t wrap her mind around it. How? An expanse of keratin, with a mild concave slope in the centre. She wiggles her hoof gently and when the ring stays solidly stuck, more violently. As her hoof relaxes into the motion, something she hadn’t noticed tensing, releases. The ring goes flying across the alleyway into the far stone wall.

“Shit.” Jasper hisses, scrambling onto her hooves to chase it down.

From the quiet plinks she heard of it bouncing off the wall to the ground, it had to have ended up closer to the alley’s intersection. But with the lack of light, a small ring- even in this remarkably clean alleyway- was going to take an age to find. What she wouldn’t give for a light right now.

Jasper sticks her nose close to the ground and gets to searching. Sweeping back and forth across the alley until she reaches the end, or the intersection, and doubling back to try again. It takes an embarrassing amount of time to find the ring again, an event she vows to never speak of when she eventually recounts this case.

A somewhat hesitant hoof is placed upon the ring, the moment of truth: can she replicate it, or was it a fluke? Some sort of muscle had been tense when she gripped it originally, so can she just…

It’s strange, trying to flex a muscle you’ve never had. A tensing of an entire limb to try and force it, and when it is- With the familiar fizz and warmth of magic- Jasper finally understands.

She lifts the ring to her face, sitting back on her haunches to pass it from hoof to hoof. A wide grin beginning to stretch across her face. A flow of magic, much like her runic circle channelling, but concentrated. Tied to the flexing of a specific muscle, bringing forth a tiny wellspring shaped into the simple functionality of picking something up. It’s utterly insane, but completely sensibly for creatures lacking hands but full of fountains of magic.

A laugh bubbles up, and she knows she sounds utterly deranged, but she figured it out! She did it! The first step in a long, long line, had finally been completed. Now she can finally, finally put the ring where she won’t lose it. (And where it’s supposed to be worn.)

Jasper reaches a delicate hoof up to her horn, prodding gently before she adjusts her grip on the ring and carefully slides it over top. The silver feels cold against it, quickly warming from her body heat. An odd feeling, when her usual pair is a simple curled mass of bone. This feels more like bone, covered by a layer of flesh and skin. (Maybe, she’s not certain.) Like a deer’s velvet before it sheds- Unlikely to ever shed, unless unicorns sparred with their horns. A harder tap against her horn disproves that theory quickly with the sharp pain it produces. Clearly not an object made for fighting.

Jasper returns back to the dumpster with tad more of a spring to her step than it has in the days she’s spent here. She takes another long drink of the rainwater, then carefully drains it- A task made far easier now by her ability to simply grab the lid, rather than carefully balancing it on a hoof.

As water spills and drains along the cracks and seams of the cobblestones, she glances around the alley. Thoughts and eyes wandering, her gaze lands on the rubbish. By all accounts, someone should be around to collect it soon. Or add to it. Or both. She’s been lucky enough to stay here for this long undiscovered anyway. Well, moving will be made easier when she gets this dumpster back on its wheels. She’s not cleaning another one of these stupid things.

There’s nothing else to do today, anyway. Might as well make her way closer to her next target too.

~*~

It takes only a couple hours for Jasper to move the dumpster, made easier by the discovery her hind hooves can grip as well as the front. Bracing herself to push it had never been easier. Rolling through the city’s alleyways and occasional deserted sidestreet, she’d crossed into a new block of buildings. These ones smaller, but no less popular than her previous locale.

From her nighttime wanderings, this district seemed to hold some sort of gemcutter, and a few other smaller stores- A food market, a clothing store with more plain-looking fashion, and a basic general store to name a few. Most other buildings seemed to be residencies, based on the mailboxes she’d observed.

The buildings here stood of brick and mortar, older than where she’d previously been if she had to guess. Lot of wood accents. Very charming, reminds her of London, just a little. (Can’t let the homesickness set in, push it down Jasper.) Too much colour for that though.

The dumpster’s new home is against the back wall of a dead-end alleyway, tucked behind two buildings with no rear entrances- Some windows though, but curtained. It once more lies on its side, lid flat to collect the eventual rainwater. Safe enough… For now.

Now though, Jasper rests. Curled up underneath her blanket, silver ring shining on her horn. Conserving her strength for the tasks yet to come.

~*~

The skies have only just gone dark, and the day’s crowds have not yet dispersed, but it’s closing time for Cleft in Twain. Five PM on the dot. Lights off and staff gone by five thirty at the latest, like clockwork they file out the front door one-by-one and lock up shop. Not once has anyone stayed behind for longer, by Jasper’s careful observance over the last two days. Unwilling to repeat her previous mistakes (or make new ones), she takes the backdoor.

Still no lockpicks, but she does have something better. The spare key. On her initial late-night recon, she’d found it sitting under the backdoor’s welcome mat. It had been a whim to check, a just-in-case check. A delightful jackpot to discover, and the reasons she’s willing to risk it just after sunset. In and out. And later tonight, the general store too- They leave the storeroom window open, it’ll be a tight fit but she bets she can make it. (And leave through the front door. Though the risk of the upstairs living space…)

With a soft click, the door unlocks to its own key. Jasper’s hoof-dexterity growing by the minute as she turns the handle and pushes the door aside. The sight that greets her is a short hallway with two doors and an archway. Her footsteps are quiet on the floor’s carpeting. The archway leads to a small kitchen with a few chairs and a table, a staffroom. The first door is a bathroom. The second leads to what she’s here for, the workshop. (And if that doesn’t have what she needs, the storefront itself.)

The workshop is a large space, clearly taking up much of the building itself, with five desks in various states of use. All covered in various tools, blades, dremels, sandpaper, and who knows what else. Some desks have half-cut stones, others have uncut rock, and a single desk has a fully cut gem.

This draws Jasper’s attention the moment she spots it, her hooves loud in tiled space. The gemstone was around the size of an apple, purple, with glistening facets under the still-shining desk light. An amethyst perhaps, if she had to take a guess. Whatever it truly was however, was suitable for her purposes. She reaches out to grab it before pausing. If she tried to carry it in her mouth like the ring, she was likely to drop it with its sheer size.

Maybe the room had a bag…?

Jasper starts poking around, under desks and through drawers for something that could be called a ‘bag’. It doesn’t take long to find a pair of bags underneath a desk. Both bags were attached by a strap at the top, and a belt at the bottom- forming a loop. It tickles at a faded memory of her childhood… Something to do with that time Aunt Susie had taken her to the faire…? Or had it been a circus…

Whichever it had been, it’d given Jasper an idea. It’s a fiddly affair to undo the buckle, but she manages. The bags’ contents were quickly dumped on a nearby desk, filled with notebooks, a pair of headphones, and a few small gems. Then, time for the fiddliest part of all. Fitting the bags on her back. Sitting on her haunches, trying to slide a belt strap through a buckle it does not want to go through is not what she’d call a ‘fun time’ in any sense of the word. She succeeds in the end however, the bags tightly secured to her withers.

It’s a piece of cake to toss the gemstone into one, walk out the way she’d come, and lock the door behind her. Leaving the key right back where she’d found it. Returning to the alleyways and her dumpster.

~*~

This, Jasper decides with her hips stuck in the window frame, is also not going in the case report. She pushes at the surrounding walls, pushes off the nearby shelves, but doesn’t shift an inch. A quiet growl emanates from her throat.

It’s validating, almost, that her hips are giving her issues. But it is more than anything else, annoying as all hell. It’s barely even her hips! She’s got the bags on and they’ve got clearance. It’s her fucking hind legs, she can’t lift them back far enough to slide through the window. Forcing the issue as she has, has only made her legs hurt and her fury rise. Her tail flicks back and forth, her displeasure apparent to all who could see her- Which fortunately, was none.

Jasper slumps, sliding back against the wall and falling as limp as one can when halfway through a window and is digging into all your organs. She needed a new plan, and quickly. This was not only embarrassing, but risky. Maybe if she tried rolling…?

The process to roll onto her back was painful, the window frame grinding into every inch of organ and spine it can get its little wooden hands on. But- But-! It’s working. A careful process of pulling her back half through, braced on whatever goddamn shelf she can reach. And she’s almost-!

Bang!

Jasper lands in a crumpled heap below the window. She stifles a groan as she untangles herself, getting to her hooves. Hopefully that hadn’t woken anyone upstairs, or if it had, they’d ignore it and go back to sleep. Either way, she should be quick. Everything she wants should be in the storefront. The shelves make quick navigation hard, however. Despite this, it’s a quick trip through the hanging bead curtain- A regrettable noise, but unavoidable.

There’s a small child section in the corner, which Jasper beelines for. She’d seen it in her earlier observance. Though she hadn’t seen chalk, there was a high chance it was there. (Else she wasn’t sure where she’d get it.) She squints at all the labelling and packaging in the dark, despite her decent night vision, text was still hard.

A creak of a floorboard up above. She needed to move faster.

Jasper stops bothering to read the text, focusing on packaging and shape- Though would it even be in a form she recognises? Chalk pails were shaped because humans had the fingers and grip to peel them open, ponies might have magic fucking hooves but that didn’t mean their children were able to make use of it so early.

Her momentary lapse in searching was rewarded by discovering a small pack of chalk, tucked under a mask of… She doesn’t know what it’s supposed to be. She tucks the chalk away in a bag, moving immediately to try and find a mirror of some sort. Maybe just with a mirror sheen.

The aisles that greet her are filled with shelf-stable goods, gardening tools, non-gardening tools, linen, and all sorts of what have you. Nothing mirror-like or even an alternative illusionary replacement. Her hooves making far too much noise as she picks up the pace, unable to keep moving at a pace to keep them near-silent. More movement from upstairs, faster, louder too.

Last aisle. Full of nothing but household goods. Fuck. Was there anything else? If there was, there wasn’t any time. She can hear a thundering of hooves down the stairs.

Jasper changes tracks, spinning around for the door. Her hooves pounding against the wood. She had to go, there was no mirror no nothing but a- She’s not even thinking as she barely misses the door and delves back into the children’s aisle. The mask is right where she left it. It’s just been shoved into her bag when a female voice bellows into the storefront.

“STOP RIGHT THERE WHOEVER YOU ARE!”

Jasper does not stop. The lights flick on.

“I’VE GOT AN AXE AND I’M NOT AFRAID TO USE IT!”

The door lock clicks in her hooves.

“HEY YOU-”

The bell jingles as she throws the door open. She’s out the door by the time the scream starts.

Jasper doesn’t wait for the sound of sirens she knows are coming. She was lucky last time, with her hideaway so far from the scene of the crime. But now? It’s far too close for comfort. She has to move. Now. Can’t risk being cornered like this.

The bags sit heavy around her waist as she heaves the dumpster upright, a clattering of noise she wishes she could avoid. She plants her hooves on the side and gets to pushing. Retracing her earlier steps of a few days ago, but not quite. She needed someplace quiet, far away from the hustle and bustle of the city’s storefronts. (And police.)

She hears the sirens start to echo as she leaves the city block. Blood rushing through her ears as she pushes faster, over a far too open stretch of street.

Her hooves take her as far as she can go, crisscrossing empty street after empty street, alleyway after alleyway. It all looks the same. Like a labyrinth of huge proportions, leading her in circles until she exhausts herself running from a monster that is simply waiting for her at the end of it all. She goes in as a straight line as she can manage after a certain point, moving until her hooves cannot move any further.

Jasper uses the last of her strength to push the dumpster off the street. Into barely an alleyway, neither building flanking it tall enough to bring any sort of security. The street far too close to it for comfort, but her legs are screaming at her.

Her movements sluggish, unable to even knock the dumpster over. Forcing her to claw her way to the top, and into it. Closing the lid as she collapses upon the blanket inside. Eyes slipping closed, until she thinks no more.

3 - Mare Triumphant

The fog, the red, scarlet fog and its glass-bottle path… It grips you, drags you deep. Your exhaustion far too much to fight, this time- fight it you have to fight it- It will try to consume you- but you’re so tired…

~*~

“Can you please give me the description of the pony that broke in?”

“I can tell you one thing, officer, that thing was no pony.”

~*~

Jasper wakes with a start to darkness, and a comfortable warmth. Her heartbeat racing, breathing rapidly. But as she carefully touches her surroundings, rubbing her fetlocks against the softness of the blanket, she gradually brings her heart and breathing under control. The fog clings, thick and cloying. She ignores it as she always has, lifting the lid slowly, peering through the crack at her surroundings. Surroundings she didn’t even remember from her mad dash across the city last night.

The alley Jasper had finally collapsed in was less of an alley and more of a side street, lit brightly by the overhead sun. If she had to guess, it was sometime in the afternoon. The buildings that flanked the side street seemed to be homes, rather than any sort of store or apartment building. They were made of wood, brightly painted in reds and oranges. Unpleasant.

The street itself seemed to be mostly empty, though she could definitely hear the sounds of children playing further up- Or was it down? She couldn’t tell from this angle, but what it did confirm was that she was undoubtedly stuck for the time being. She had to settle down and wait, the worst thing of all.

Well, best to get these bags off her first.

~*~

In the warmth of the sun and the dark of the dumpster, Jasper inevitably falls asleep. Her exhaustion gaining the better of her once again, dragging her deep into a slumber- One hopefully far more restful than the last.

By the time she wakes, the only warmth left is that of her own body heat. The blanket she's lying on protecting her from the chill of the metal. Her thoughts are fuzzy, but she knows what she must do. She extracts the chalk and amethyst from the bags, and climbs out of the dumpster. A graceful fall, but one nevertheless.

Jasper then, right next to the dumpster, extracts a stick of chalk and begins to carefully draw a runic circle. A small circle inlaid to a bigger one, with runes inscribed in the in-between. It’s a slow process, very particular with not only the runes, but the circles' shape as well. Once complete she places the amethyst within the smallest circle, sized perfectly. She slots the chalk back into its pack, closes it up and gently tosses it back into the dumpster.

Jasper then plants both her hooves beside the runic circle and takes a deep breath. Moment of truth. Was all the work she’d just put in worth it?

She reaches for the magic she knows lives inside her, a warm, fizzy, vibrant hum of power and certainty. Almost cloying at points, thickly sweet- Overwhelmingly present but with nowhere to go. Trapped within herself, until she pulled it forth to give it a task. One it always followed, completed, with such eagerness to perform. It was a comfort to have, to feel. A knowledge she always had a trick up her sleeve, even if she had been stripped of all else.

But what she finds is not quite right. Not quite what she remembers. More liquid, yet more… Immense. Yet still so clearly her’s. She puzzles this as she gently tugs at her magic and directs its flow through her forelimbs, as she would with her hands. It resists her attempts, attempting to flow elsewhere. The harder she forces, the harder it resists. Until it’s doing whatever the fuck it wants, through an avenue she’s never seen before, out of her metaphorical reach. The most she manages is its directive, the circle.

A sudden, bright shine of a bright, brilliant gold forces her to shut her eyes. Her heart rate jumps- But when she opens her eyes, the circle is lit with a softly glowing yellow- But the original flash of light is nowhere to be seen.

“Thank god.” Jasper whispers, the soft embrace of relief washing over her. A smile doesn’t grace her face however, as she stares at the amethyst and its trickle of growing moonlight deep within its facets. She was so close now, so close she could taste it.

She sits there all night, watching it slowly fill up.

~*~

Jasper sleeps all day, curled around the amethyst, glowing a soft silver from within. Whatever brief moments of waking she has are spent checking the stone, and cracking the lid so she doesn't cook. The sun's warmth keeps her in a state of dozing, her consciousness dancing through wakefulness and the deep fog of sleep.

She awakens at nightfall, lips chapped and stomach rumbling. (It’s always rumbling, now.) There is nothing to be done, so she ignores it and gets to work.

The sounds of the community around her have not yet quieted, so still Jasper sits in the dumpster, occupying herself with necessary preparation. It’s fortunate that most of these circles can be small, but with the rounded bottom of the bin it’ll still be a task to get the chalk to stick and the shape correct.

She doesn’t know how long it takes, drawing and redrawing the chalk, the runes, the circle. Entirely focused on making it perfect. One mistake here could spell catastrophe later. Time passes like molasses, thick and cloying. The muffled voices of ponies around her slowly grow silent, until the only sound left is that of chalk on metal and her own breathing. She’s finally done, runes to her satisfaction. Intricate and interwoven. So many more than the simple set done to collect the moonlight- For good reason.

The ring is placed in the centre of the circle, carefully, reaching over the stretch of worryingly fragile chalk. She finally allows herself to sit back and breathe. One last check, to be certain. Running her gaze over the circles until she’s finally confirmed what she already knows.

It’s time to engrave the ring.

Jasper presses her hooves near the edge of the outer circle and reaches for her magic. It responds, far more eager than she’s ever felt. She gently pulls it forward, making the briefest attempt to push it through her forelimbs, but it resists once again. She relents, and lets it find its own way to fruition. A bright, blinding glow fills the small space with golden light- Not fading in the slightest as she presses on with filling the runic circles with magic. (It had to be her horn- What else could it be? She’d figure it out later. Always later.) The slow creep of a soft golden-yellow glow spills over the chalk. Spreading across her lines, her runes, bringing the carefully crafted spell to life.

As the circle nears completion, the silver ring starts glowing too. It begins to float, spinning slowly as Jasper watches. The golden glow vanishes as she cuts off her magic, the circle now brimming with power. It hums, imperceptibly, momentarily frozen before it sparks to life. The ring spins faster, runes beginning to form and shine brightly as they’re etched into the metal, inside and out. So small, so intricate that they could never be done by hand. A blazing pattern making use of every inch of space it had. The glare gets so blinding that she has to shield her eyes with a foreleg, squinting against the light.

The dull clink of the ring hitting the floor marks the end of the lightshow, and the ritual itself. Jasper reaches forward, now not caring about smudging the chalk, and picks up the ring. She inspects it from every angle, eyes running over runes that begin to bleed into each other as she stares. Barely able to distinguish one from the other, but from her other versions… It looks right, one can only hope that it is.

She puts it back on her horn for safekeeping, and sets to work moving everything else outside. Finally realising the lateness of the hour, and the lack of potential witnesses.

~*~

The circle takes up the entirety of the sidestreet, its lines and runes thick and solid but no less intricate. Intersecting circles, each holding their respective materials. At the point, the moonlight filled amethyst. At an equal distance away to its left and right, the mask and a lock of her hair. (Not cut- Yanked from her own head. Her scalp still stung.) The centre, the curved triangle made of the overlapping circles, holds the ring. Runes line its edges, its interior, chalk lines run along most edges, channelling it all to the centre.

Jasper sits in an overlap of the mask and hair, within an even smaller circle. Her tail curled around her body tightly to avoid smudging. A glance at the moon tells her that there’s not much of the night left, it’s now or never.

Her magic jumps to her command, practically running itself as she nudges it into place. Pressing it deep into the circle, spreading outward in waves of power. Golden light spilling from near all that she can see, so bright she has to squint, eyes locked on the ring as it begins to rise from its place on the ground once again.

It all begins to float as she dumps her power into it, forcing it through the chalk at a pace she really shouldn’t. The thought of how close she is beginning to break down her patience. The thrum she feels once the amethyst is connected is heady, the moonlight pouring out to coalesce in the centre of the ring as it spins. She forces more magic into the runes, and the taste of the moon as the ritual finally grips it in its grasp is intoxicating. It spills upon the circle, upon its materials, upon her. Blessing it all with her light, her power.

If Jasper hadn’t been forced to experience this world entirely alone, for far too long… Perhaps she’d be a little bit more careful in her use of the moon. Drawing more power than she needs, simply because she can. She doesn’t need a glamour as strong as this will make it- But why not? Why shouldn’t she? Doesn’t she deserve something nice?

The moment the ritual reaches its head, and her magic cuts off- Her connection cuts off- Jasper realises her mistake. Gone was the warmth and light and power of the moon, and all that’s left is her own magic. Drained, tired, overextended in a way she never should have attempted.

The ritual glows brightly around her- Too brightly. Overfilled with power, spinning not quite out of control, doing precisely what it was told. Make a glamour. The air smells thickly of ozone and heat. The ring itself spins rapidly within a flowing orb of moonlight, far, far too large. It pours into the ring, pressing up against the edges of its circle, barely contained within the protective wards.

“Shit.” Is all Jasper gets out, before everything explodes.

A cacophony of sound and light, rushing over Jasper and parting over her wards in a wave. Overcharged as they are, barely protecting her from the onslaught. She collapses, ears ringing, eyes blinded. Her rapid heartbeat being the only thing audible, before her hearing slowly begins to return. The barking of dogs, shouts of alarm, distant, distant sirens.

She hauls herself to her feet, blinking quickly to try and get her sight to return any faster. She stumbles forward towards the ring, where she’d last seen it, tapping quickly against the ground before she finds it. Her sight returned enough to be able to squint at it, and its entire mundanity. No longer covered in runes, it looks like the same ring she’d originally stolen- She thinks.

Voices, growing closer- Sirens too. She needs to move. Again.

The moment it takes to finagle the ring onto her horn is still a moment too long, and Jasper is moving before it even begins to take effect. Eyesight finally having returned enough to navigate, leaving all of it behind.

The glamour is warm as it spreads over her body, starting from the tip of her horn and ending at her tail. Both constricting and a comfort. Her demonic tail becoming a flowing mass of hair. Her scales becoming fur. Her eyes- They feel strange as the glamour spreads over them- Perhaps she’d done something right in overcharging it, to allow for it to even cover that. (One of the few flaws of a glamour, the eyes and teeth.) It happens in an instant. It happens so slowly she ages immeasurably.

But- But- What matters is it works.

As the sirens fade behind her, much as the yelling of voices and barking of dogs, Jasper smiles, laughs! Bright and giddy and gleeful. For all her mistakes, for all the missteps she’s taken, she did it! No longer does she have to skulk in shadows, afraid of being discovered for what might happen.

She’s finally, finally free to explore!