Magical Amicus
Episode 2: The Gilding (Part 1)

"How often do we hide who we are from the rest of the world? Dark secrets, terrible pains, twisted fetishes, that Asian kid you ran over with your car and never talked about again. All of it deep under the placid surface, but when they shift under the water, they create ripples that move to the surface, disturbing the facade. It's in those moments we show our true colors...

Usually it means you're a bitch."

It was a quiet night in Equus City. The moon was out, casting a long shadows on the rooftop Twilight was perched upon. She was sitting on a lawn chair, reading a book on thermodynamic manipulation and scribbling some notes on the pages, pausing every minute or so to listen to the noises of the city. An uncontrollable sensation gripped Twilight as her mouth opened wide in a long, dreary yawn.

These late night guard duty/study sessions started about three weeks ago, after Twilight defeated Lady Nightmare with the help of five other girls using the unique weapons they had acquired from the Elements of Harmony. Spike used to join Twilight in the night watches, but after the first week of completely uneventful boredom he had refused to leave his comfy bed. Personally, Twilight preferred the solitude of studying alone over having to deal with a baby dragon constantly underfoot. He often did more harm than good.

A commotion disrupted Twilight's train of thought. Leaning over the edge of the roof, Twilight observed a hopelessly drunk, red headed woman stumble across the sidewalk below, shamelessly gripping a bottle of wine wrapped in a paper bag. A walkie-talkie sitting at Twilight's feet chirped to life, and a familiar southern drawl resonated from the tiny black box.

“AJ here, Ah'm not seeing any Beast activity tonight,” Jack said, “thought Ah saw Berry throw up n’to a trashcan though."

Twilight picked up the hand held radio and pressed the button on the side, “She's passing by me now, she can't seem to walk straight for longer than a few feet right now.”

Twilight heard Jack chuckle, “Sounds about right... well Ah’ve got chores in the morning so Ah'm gonna head home now,” Jack replied, “g'night Twi.”

“Okay Jack, I'll see you tomorrow,” Twilight responded.

There was a pause for a moment as Twilight could hear Jack let out a sigh on the other end of the line.

“About that,” Jack started, “Ah know you said we gotta help out n'all with this whole Beast situation, but its been three weeks since we kicked Lady Nightmare t’the curb and we haven't seen the least bit a trouble. Its awfully close t’harvest season and with my responsibilities at the farm I can't keep spending my nights out n'about,” Jack paused for a moment as she led into her intended conversational target, “Why don't you go see if Dash is willing to help? Ah haven't seen heads or tails of her since we first got together, why don't you pay her a visit at her garage?”

Jack crossed her fingers and awaited Twilight's response, hoping she would take the bait.

Twilight was silent for a moment as she held the button down on the radio, “...I see...That's fine, don't worry about it, I'll talk to Dash tomorrow.”

Jack let out a silent sigh of relief, “thanks fer understanding Twi.”

It is getting, late Twilight thought to herself as she stifled a yawn, I should probably start heading back to the library soon, She eyed the book resting in her chair, still open to her current page, Well I'll stay out for a while longer.

Twilight continued her studies atop the roof but soon realized her folly as her heavy eyelids seemed to sap her focus. At first her eyes would shut for a second, only for Twilight to snap back to attention, but then they began to stay shut for longer and longer intervals. Slowly her control over consciousness slipped as sleep grabbed hold of Twilight. The open book rested in her lap and her head slumped over.

Meanwhile Berry Punch staggered through the street. Taking another swig from the bottle in her hand trying to wash the faint acidic taste of vomit from her mouth. She looked around: nothing familiar. Somehow through this drunken haze Berry had to figure a way to get home before she did something regrettable...well more regrettable.

I promised I wouldn't overdo it like this anymore, Berry thought to herself, I thought tonight could have been normal, but then Caramel had to offer me a drink, he had to tell me to lighten up, he had to smile that sweet sappy smile of his and pretend I don't have a problem, pretend I could fit in for once and not make a fool of myself.

Berry threw her head back and took a long drink from the bottle, letting the wine tickle her throat on its way down. She hoped another drink would make her feel better, it didn't.

Losing her fragile balance, Berry tripped and fell face first into the pavement. Blood started to trickle from her nose, but with the alcohol running through her body Berry barely felt a thing. When she tried to get up her brain thrashed inside her skull, paralyzing her as she curled up into a ball and began sobbing uncontrollably, the thin streams of tears running down her face mixing with the gobs of blood flowing from her nose.

The minutes passed as Berry lay there on the unsympathetic pavement, completely unaware of her surroundings. Then she felt a warming hand on her shoulder. Berry let the hand help her rise to her feet, a handkerchief appeared in its palm to wipe the blood and tears away.

Berry looked up to the owner of the phantom hand to find it belonged to a girl that couldn't have been any older that herself. The girl had blonde hair and was wearing a heavy, thigh-length trench coat and underneath that a gray, wool sweater. It may have been the booze but it looked like the girl was looking at Berry and the street sign to her left at the same time. But Berry didn't care about her Samaritan’s peculiar vision, because the smile the girl gave Berry was the most heartfelt, honest, selfless smile she ever saw. It made Berry want to just bury her head in this girl's shoulder and let all her problems go.

“Are you okay?” the girl asked.

Berry started to regain some of her composure, wiping the leftover blood and tears off her face with the side of her arm, “umm...no, nod really, bud tanks for askig.”

“I can walk with you if you want, make sure you get home,” the girl offered.

“You don haftu boder yurself babysidin a sad duck,” Berry said under a thick slur, she didn't want this girl to have to see her try and stumble home, or her pigsty of an apartment for that matter.

“Nonsense, company is company- besides,” the girl paused for a moment, looking over her shoulder, something had the girl on edge, but Berry was too busy focusing on standing to notice, “it can get dangerous at night.”

The girl took her coat off and wrapped it around Berry, who only had a light shirt on at this point. Berry was too tired to try and argue so she let the girl lead her home. Every so often Berry would catch the girl looking over her shoulder and glancing at rooftops, but they were completely alone on the dimly lit street.

Then they stopped moving. Berry looked at her companion for an explanation but the girl's eyes were fixed ahead, wide with terror.

“Whs gon on?” Berry asked...sort of.

Berry followed the girl's eyes to see a large black mass sitting in the darkness just outside of the light of a street lamp twenty yards ahead of them. It's eyes glowed like candles and it had a pair of large feathery wings on its back. It walked on four legs, its two forearms ending in sharp talons, and a sharp pointed beak was set in a wicked grin as it began to approach the girls slowly and methodically. Swirls of hazy smoke surrounded the dark figure.

The girl made the first move when she took Berry by the shoulders and yelled right into her face, “RUN!”

Berry did as she was told and turned to sprint away. She took approximately four strides before slipping and colliding with a trashcan. Seeing there was no way Berry could escape on her own, the girl knew she had to distract the monster. Picking up some nearby garbage, the girl started flinging it at the monster, hoping to catch its attention.

Luckily an empty can of soda hit the monster right across the beak, angering it, unluckily an empty can of soda hit the monster right across the beak, angering it. The girl ran across the street and threw some more trash, drawing it away from the collapsed Berry Punch.

“Hey over here! Come and get it!” she shouted, “Some nice and tasty person-meat right over here!”

The Beast wasted no time in choosing its prey, deciding to gallop after the noisy, trash flinging girl over the comatose red head. The girl ran down the street, drawing the Beast farther and farther away from the drunken Berry.

As fast as she could the girl dashed down the dark, empty street, not far behind her she could hear the Beast gaining ground. The road was completely devoid of life, not even a stray animal or wayward bird dared make a move and present itself a potential target to something unnatural that stalked the night. That something was nearly upon the girl when she decided to take a desperate chance and make a quick turn at the upcoming alley, hoping the big, winged beast would be unable to corner as fast as a small human.

Giving no warning to her pursuer, the girl suddenly switched directions and bolted down a darkened alley. She turned over trash cans and knocked over stacks of boxes and garbage, trying to slow down the Beast in any way possible, but as the creature turned the corner it used its momentum to leap on the far wall and vault over the obstacles closing the gap between Beast and it's prey.

Unfortunately the girl's desperate decision had led her to a dead-end, she was trapped. Seeing this the Beast slowed down, approaching at a crawl as it walked with the coiled tension of a feline hunter preparing to pounce on its quarry.

With no way to escape the girl was left with but a single option. She took a big breath and let out an earsplitting scream, as loud as she possibly could, her last act of bravery and defiance.

The Beast almost seemed to laugh, it enjoyed the sight of its prey squirming. Raising up talons that glistened like razor sharp daggers, it was ready to bring the final blow that would end this hunt, and it's prey's life.

“HEY! YOU GED AWAY FERM HER YOU DAMN MOSDER!”

The Beast stopped. It's prey wasn't going anywhere so it decided to indulge this little distraction. Turning around to face the origin of the partially incoherent voice, it found Berry Punch clutching a bottle of wine like a cudgel and looking as intimidating as a short drunken red head who could barely stand could.

In an effort to try and save the girl, Berry Punch decided that her best course of action was to throw her bottle of wine at the Beast...drunk logic, go figure. She forgot one minor detail, drunk people have horrible spacial reasoning, something that comes in handy when throwing objects at anything smaller than a barn. Its not clear whether it was a moment of pure focus and clarity attained through years of chronic binge drinking, or just plain dumb luck, but as Berry swung her arm and let the bottle fly it managed to strike the Beast right in the face, shattering and drenching it's face in deep red colored wine.

The Beast growled as wine dripped off the edge of it's beak, it's face in a contorted expression of rage.

Realizing the full extent of her actions caused Berry to sober up real quick as she began backing away slowly.

“Uh-oh.”

A scream piercing through the night startled Twilight's slumber like a slap across the face. The hair on the back of her neck and arms stood completely on end. Something was very wrong, and since Applejack decided to quit early, it was Twilight's job to jump right into it- alone. She has spent her life alone, and now that she had knew what it was like to have people she could count on, going in without them was...distressing.

The scream came from the West and it sounded fairly close. Knowing that it would take too much time to get down to street level Twilight decided that her best bet would be to go by rooftop. Using her telekinesis to aid her jumps as she leaped from building to building.

When Twilight landed on top of the Quills and Sofas store she started to hear a commotion down below. Twilight jumped up on the ledge and leaned over, seeing two women trapped in an alley about to be assaulted by the unmistakable profile of a Beast.

Without another moments thought, Twilight pulled one of her bracelets off her wrist and, performing an action she had practiced a hundred times since learning it, gripped it tightly and willed it to change. It glowed and mutated, contorting its shape into a glistening white handgun.

Twilight aimed carefully and fired a warning shot towards the Beast, just a few feet across it's beak. The Beast stopped immediately and looked up to the at the roof in surprise.

Twilight leaped down off the roof, lowering her speed with telekinesis just enough that the fall wouldn't cause damage. The whole time she kept the gun trained on the Beast, she had practiced a lot with her weapon, but Twilight didn't have that much experience in a fight and she wanted to make sure she was close enough to ensure a clean kill shot.

“Don't make another mo-”

Before Twilight could finish her warning the Beast let out a shriek, sounding like the deafening roar of a lion and the shrill caw of an eagle at the same time. The unnatural noise paralyzed Twilight, causing her to almost be unable to dodge the trashcan the Beast had launched towards her head, but she was just a little too slow and the tip of the can grazed Twilight's skull, stunning her.

When Twilight regained her senses, the Beast had already took flight, fleeing under the cover of the cloudy night sky. Frustrated, Twilight pointlessly fired her gun at the quickly shrinking target, little more than a dot against the pale moon.

Twilight let out a sigh of exasperation and feebly reverted her gun back to a bracelet, turning to the two girls.

“Are you okay?” She asked.

The blonde girl nodded, “Yes, thank you so much. We would have died had you not scared that thing off.”

Heaving a barely conscious Berry Punch to her feet, the girl lead her charge out of the alley and, presumably, home. But Twilight wasn't concerned with them, as she looked solemnly up towards the sky where the Beast had escaped. She vowed that she would not fail in her appointed task of hunting theses Beasts down, and she wouldn't be foolish enough to let one get the drop on her again.

This one got pretty spooked when I showed up, it probably won't be hunting again anytime soon, it should be safe to go home and get some sleep, besides, Twilight thought to herself, Spike wouldn't be able to forgive me if I wasn't awake to feed him in the morning.

Stifling another yawn, Twilight walked out of the alley and made her way to the library and her soft bed.

Twilight's alarm clock was the morning rays peeking through the window. Twilight covered her eyes with her pillow in a futile gesture, but it was already too late, she was awake.

Climbing out of bed she performed her usual morning routine, starting with a shower. Twilight undressed and carefully folded her night robe, placing it neatly in its place. She turned the dial for the shower exactly one hundred and thirty degrees counter clockwise. Without even waiting for the water to heat up, Twilight stepped into the tub.

Letting the cool water wash over her shoulders, Twilight mentally walked through her fight from the night prior, taking note of every detail of the Beast she could remember: its size, features, behavior, whatever she could glean from the limited encounter.

It was a predator, isolating its prey and stalking it until the right moment presented itself, which appeared to be during the night. The fact it had managed to hunt so close to Twilight without her noticing told her that finding it would be almost impossible, a trap would have to be set to draw the Beast out in the open.

As the cool water turned hot, Twilight let the warming sensation wash over her. Carefully and methodically Twilight scrubbed every inch of her body, ensuring she was properly cleaned. When her shower was complete, Twilight made sure to brush her teeth and, with a little magic, brushed her hair as well, exactly forty strokes.

Finishing her cleaning ritual Twilight selected her outfit from a drawer of neatly organized and folded clothes, her usual outfit, a skirt with a dress shirt and a simple lavender tie. Apparel proper for a student of the Arcane Arts, Twilight judged, as se made her final inspection before the mirror.

Climbing down the stairs of the library, Twilight made way for its small little kitchen. Spike stood next to his bowl, his arms folded and impatiently tapping the ground with his foot. Grabbing a large bag from one of the cupboards Twilight used a cup to scoop out a big portion of small sparkling stones and poured them into Spike's bowl.

“There, industrial diamonds, your favorite.” said Twilight.

Spike nodded in quiet approval and stuck his face in the pile of gems. While Spike happily munched away at his breakfast, Twilight opted to grab a banana. A bygone of living with Celestia, is developing quite the taste for them. Sometimes it seemed to be the only thing to eat in the entire castle, Twilight could never figure out if it was a cruel joke or one of the Princess's weird tastes.

Twilight stopped in the doorway on her way out, “Spike, watch the library while I'm gone.”

Spike looked up from his bowl of diamonds to give a stalwart salute before jumping right back into his meal.

A short walk across town led Twilight to the dwelling of Rainbow Dash, a small one story auto shop. The only entrance was a large garage door, currently half open. The sound of heavy power tools and the occasional shower of sparks drifted from the open space.

Twilight bent underneath the door and was immediately assaulted by the harsh heat and metallic dust of Rainbow Dash's current project as she went to work on it with a welder. Most of what Dash was working on was covered by a tarp, but it looked like it could be some sort of car, a really big one- sort of....or maybe a tank.

“Dash?”

...Dash didn't respond or even notice Twilight had even entered, she seemed wholly focused on her work.

“Dash,” Twilight repeated.

So this is what it feels like, Twilight thought to herself, she knew better that to try and break Dash out of this kind of trance.

While Dash worked, Twilight took the opportunity to look around Rainbow Dash’s garage. there was a worktable in the back, resting on it was Dash’s signature katana, lovingly polished and cared for, a stark contrast with rest of the tools lying around it in various states of disrepair. The custom cyan motorcycle that Twilight had seen Dash ride was resting against the other wall. A hammock hung near the back corner to an old Wonderbolt flier and some yellowed newspaper clippings hung up against the wall, the only decoration on the otherwise bare walls. A pull up bar hanging from the rafters and some heavy iron barbells were nearby. Some empty beer cans and old pizza boxes were strewn about the floor and every other conceivable empty spaces, something that caused Twilight to cringe.

Then Dash suddenly get up from working. Twilight watched her stand up, still completely unaware of her guest, walk over towards a mini-fridge and grabbed a fresh can of beer. It was on the return trip to her project that Dash realized she was not alone. Pausing for a moment she looked over at Twilight.

“Woah- how long have you been there?” Dash asked.

“If you hadn’t decided to get a drink, a lot longer,” Twilight replied.

"Oh, heh, heh, sorry then. What brings you to the Fortress of Dash-itude?" Dash asked, motioning wide towards her home.

"I need your help, there has been an atta-"

"Can't do right now, I'm busy," said Dash as she put her welding goggles back on and firing up her welder again.

Twilight was surprised for a second, “Don’t you want to hear me out? There is a Beast, I surmised you would be interested in a chance for a fi-”

“I said I’m busy,” Dash said, cutting off Twilight again.

Twilight was not satisfied with the unusual behavior, “what are you even working on?”

“Not until I’m done,” Dash said curtly as she went back to work, “and besides, you have four other people that can help you in whatever it is you need, why can’t any of them help you? Why hasn’t Fluttershy helped, she doesn’t do anything besides hang out with animals. And what about Rarity? Isn’t she supposed to be the generous one?”

Twilight was beginning to lose some self control at Rainbow Dash’s uncalled for behavior, “it has been three weeks since we were given the Elements of Harmony and everyone, even Fluttershy and Rarity, has pitched in to help, ad now when an actual Beast shows up you don’t even lift a finger?! You’re the one that’s supposed to have our back!”

Dash stood tall against Twilight’s outburst, but only replied meekly as she averted Twilight's gaze, “look its just something I have to finish.”

Twilight caught herself before she said anything foolish and decided to take the much more tasteful approach of storming out of the garage.

Dash ignored Twilight’s exit and continued working on her project, carefully fusing steel with steel, but as she sat there alone in the garage her focus remained divided

Its not like I want to leave Twilight hangin, Dash tought to herself, but I need to do this, I can’t quit till I’m done with it. When I’m finished they’ll understand, I haven’t left them, I’m still helping in my own way.

Dash hadn’t realized that while she was busy rationalizing to herself, she had stopped working altogether and was just standing in the empty garage, the welder remained idly in her hand.

A noise resonated through the garage, a sharp clattering of misplaced objects. Dash snapped to attention, gripping the welder tightly. Another sound, a metallic ping and Dash tensed.

She was not alone.

Author's Note

Okay user Cwiis has brought an issue that I have been mulling over to back into the forefront of my brain: the language.
Panty & Stocking is one of the most perverse, foul mouthed, verbally diarrhetic shows ever created, and I am doing my best to emulate the show, but I was apprehensive about going all in on the language because I was concerned about having to put the 'Mature' tag on it. Should I worry about that or should I just make it 'mature' and start swearing like a sailor?