Trixie takes a deep breath and listens to her surroundings. She is blindfolded with a thick piece of cloth that won’t allow even the smallest rays of light in. The zebras are trying to teach her to listen to her surroundings, and she can understand why they are doing it, but she really, really wants her heart to calm down. Its beats sound ten times louder than normal and it feels like it wants jump out of her body and run away.

Suddenly, a very blunt object smacks against the back of her head and she face-plants the mud.

“You’re too busy worrying,” says Adanz. Or maybe it is Wazza.

Trixie pushes herself out of the mud. “I can’t see anything!”

“That’s the idea, silly pony,” says Wazza . Maybe Adanz.

“But Gray Muffin said I should always keep my eyes on the target!”

Trixie is hit two more times, once in the leg to make her lose her balance and the other to her side. She once again falls in the mud, and she has a sudden urge to bust some zebra gonads when she hears the two laughing at her painful misfortune.

“Ah, yes, keep both eyes on target. Good advice. I like it,” says one of the twins.

“But what happens when you cannot see your enemy? What happens when your eyes deceive your or the shadows become your foes?” says the other twin.

Trixie spits out some mud, it tastes more foul than last time she got a mouthful of the wet dirt.

“I was a magician, I know deception,” she says irritably before scratching her tongue against her teeth to get the taste out.

“You know deception in the art of entertainment, but not in the art of combat,” says Adanz or Wazza.

“Now, little pony, sit still, stay quiet, relax and listen,” says Wazza or Adanz soothingly.

Trixie sighs and sits still. Very still. She hears Wazza or Adanz repeating their order for her to relax, but he’s too far away to strike her. When Trixie still can’t get herself to relax, she hears Wazza or Adanz humming what sounds like a zebra lullaby.

What ever the zebra is humming, it is so relaxing that Trixie feels her muscles slack on top of her breathing and heart rate slowing down, and everything becomes clearer. She hears and feels everything, from the gentle humming of machinery to the separate grains in the mud, and even the light from the light bulbs feels warmer.

Then she hears it.

Soft, almost inaudible steps coming towards her, quickly. It’s like the hooves are gliding over the floor and she can hear the assailant jumping. She shifts her position slightly, turns towards the source and shoots out her forehoof. She feels it connect with the attacker’s body and he attacker gaks and splashes in the mud next to her. Trixie smiles when she hears Wazza or Adanz stomping the ground and cheering.

“Excellent job! Excellent job, Trixie! You may remove the blindfold!” says Wazza or Adanz.

Trixie uses her magic to yank off the blindfold and sees Adanz lying on his back in the mud with a red spot on his neck. Trixie instantly feels sorry for him and apologizes while helping him up with her magic. He clears his throat before talking.

“There is no need to apologize,” says Adanz while rubbing his throat .“You did well, hopefully next time my brother won’t have to use the lullaby to get you to relax.”

Trixie looks at Wazza, and he smiles broadly while walking towards them.

“That was amazing. Can you teach me that lullaby?” asks Trixie hopefully.

“You’re interested in putting ponies to sleep, yes?” teases Wazza.

“N-no, I just think it’ll be helpful for future exercise. Relaxation and all.”

Trixie smiles and makes a small squee sound. Wazza and Adanz stare at her for a few seconds before looking at her, then they look at each other, then back at Trixie, and then at each other once again.

“I hate it when ponies make that noise,” says Adanz.

“Yes, the adorableness is hard to resist,” says Wazza, then he looks at Trixie. “Yes, I will train you in the art of zebra lullabies, but you must not rely solely on soothing music to keep yourself calm. You must train your body how to relax without external influences.”

Trixie nods her head excitedly, and then the door opens and Gray Muffin walks in the room, looking like he’s ready to explode. All three take a step back as Trixie’s mentor approaches them, and the closer he gets the clearer the fires of hate in his eyes are.

“Is something wrong, Mister Muffin?” asks Adanz with worry.

“Trixie, wash up and meet me outside Roar Shock’s chambers,” orders Gray Muffin, his tone gruffer than usual.

Trixie nods and leaves quickly, not wanting to test Gray Muffin's patience in any way. She goes straifght to the showers, and while she washes the surprisingly resilient mud off of her coat she ponders on why Gray Muffin looked ready to murder someone. Sure, she’s seen him angry before, but last time she saw him as angry as he is now he stomped a pegasus to death.

Just thinking about watching him stomp Sunshine to death and popping his neck open with his bare hooves makes Trixie shudder. To distract her from the gory death that her rapist suffered, and to distract her from the memory of Sunshine's very existence, Trixie closes her eyes and tries to focus on the water. She wants to think about how the warm water massages her body, washing away the mud and relaxing the sore muscles that are the results of training with the twins and Gray Muffin.

Trixie sighs and runs her hoof through her mane, wiping away excess water from it and her face. After that, she sits on the floor with her eyes closed and head bowed as her whole body feels relaxation coming in, beckoning her to sleep. She start swaying in the shower with water pooling around her, and-

“Careful now, darlin', ya don't wanna fall asleep in the showers. Ya never know who may be lurking,” says Sunshine, his voice echoing in the shower.

Trixie’s eyes shoot open with a yelp, and she looks over shoulder to see a silhouette of a pony on the other side of the shower curtain. Trixie's heart races and a whimper builds her throat as she extends a shaky hoof towards the curtain. The shadow figure remains, and her heart pounds inside her chest, nearly at an exploding point when her hooves touch the fabric. Then she yanks the curtain aside and sees and hears no one, save for a bluish-gray earth pony mare with a flat powder-violet mane and a diamond shaped rock as her cutie mark.

The pony has a look made of pure apathy as she strolls in, and Trixie watches her carefully as she walks in, goes to a shower stall and walks back out with a rock in her mouth. The strange pony looks at Trixie, blinks slowly, then leaves without a word. After the said earth pony leaves, Trixie blinks, shakes her head, then turns off the shower and shakes herself off, more to get the jitters out than actually dry herself off.

“Pull yourself together, Trixie,” she tells herself.

To emphasize the point she’s making to herself, she slaps herself across the face and then shakes her head. After that, she walks as fast as she can towards Roar Shock’s chambers, trying to make up for the lost time of almost falling asleep in the shower. She reaches Roar Shock’s chambers and sees Gray Muffin and the zebras are waiting for her. The twins nod to her and Gray Muffin immediately opens the large doors and orders everyone inside the huge, dimly lit room.

Trixie looks at the zebras and sees that they have grim expressions on their faces, and when she looks around the room she sees all the gizmos Roar Shock has built, some finished and other not, one of which is a metallic shell of a pony. Her eyes then drift to the wall and sees that it it completely covered with projected pictures of some costumed hero wannabe and the Mayor of Ponyville. She does one more look around in search of the League's leader, but comes up empty and confused.

“Um, Gray Muffin, sir, where’s Roar Shock?” asks Trixie hesitantly.

“Working,” snaps Gray Muffin, then he turns to the group. “The attack on Ponyville was a failure. A major failure. We lost one of our ships, two of our ponies died in the crash and Terra is has been taken by the government.”

Trixie’s jaw drops and she looks at Wazza and Adanz, they merely nod at her, further enforcing Gray Muffin’s claim. Gray Muffin steps towards Trixie, and she instinctively takes a step back.

“What happened today will lead the Equestrian government to do whatever it takes to shut us down,” continues Gray Muffin, “but this will not stop us from fighting injustice. That being said, your first test, Trixie, is to kill Mare-Do-Well.”

“Who?” asks Trixie blankly. The loud sighs from the twins and Gray Muffin's face-hoof make her feel small, and she shrinks down slightly with drooped ears as she looks between the three. “What? What did I do?”

“You seriously do not know who Mare-Do-Well is?” asks Wazza.

“Should I know?”

“Mare-Do-Well is a Ponyville legend,” begins Adanz.

Wazza slithers in front of Trixie and waves his hooves dramatically in front of her face, making her recoil slightly. “They say she is able to predict the future because she is always there at times of trouble and nopony can land a hit on her.”

Adanz moves next to Trixie's cheek, once again making her retreat a couple of steps. “They also say that she is an alicorn because she can fly and perform magic and is able to stop a runaway trolley with her bare-hooves!”

“A-an alicorn?” whimpers Trixie uneasily.

“The Alicorn of Time,” whispers Wazza dramatically, adding in a hoof wave as if he is spelling the title in the air for more effect.

Adanz and Wazza then grow mean-spirited smiles as they move closer to Trixie, and she steps back, shrinking ever so slightly until she is lying on the ground, trembling under their vicious smiles.

“And you know what else?” asks Adanz, speaking in a husky whisper in her ear.

“Wha-What?” stammers Trixie, peering straight into Adanz's eyes and trembling so much her bones are heard rattling.

“She. Can't. Die.”

Suddenly a pair of hooves grab Trixie's waist and a horrible yell punches her in the ear. “BAH!”

Trixie shrieks and jumps in the air, and when she lands, her fur and mane is standing straight up and her heart is beating a mile a second. But while Wazza and Adanz are howling with laughter, Gray Muffin is the exact opposite

“Enough!” snaps Gray Muffin, killing the zebras' smiles on the spot. He then glares at Wazza. “For somepony who was supposed to care about Terra, you taking this a lot lighter than you should!”

“I'm just coping,” claims Wazza in a sad mutter, averting his eyes and pawing the ground a little.

Gray Muffin snorts. “Your way of coping is disgusting. As for you, Trixie, Mare-Do-Well has proven that she does not have the interest of the common good in her heart and mind. She was the reason why Redheart was captured, and intercepted messages report that Captain Shining Armor and Mare-Do-Well engaged Terra before her capture. She is as much an enemy to us as the criminals and corrupt politicians and once we figure out who she really is you will kill her under my supervision.”

Trixie gulps and nods her head. She doesn’t like how Gray Muffin has given her an assignment to kill someone that could just very well be an invincible alicorn. The alicorn part is bad enough, but the invincible part? That sends shivers all over her body and the idea of refusing to fight such a foe seems to be a very good idea, however, she also does not want to disappoint Gray Muffin. He did save her from Sunshine, after all.

“Oh-okay,” says Trixie shakily. “But what if I can't finish it? Like what if she does some weird alicorn stuff on me or... Or breaks all my legs or... Something?”

“I will be there to assist you, but only when I am certain that you need help. This is your big test, Trixie, and it is the biggest test we have given to any recruit, so you will need to be trained very hard for this,” replies Gray Muffin almost immediately. Then he looks at the zebra twins and their eyes snap to him. “Double shifts for her. Make it as rigorous as you can.”

The zebras nod, but Trixie squeaks pathetically.

“What?” she says.

“It’s for your own good, Trixie,” says Gray Muffin. “I will not have you or any more of my ponies die. Not under my watch. Dismissed.”

The zebras bow fluidly, but Trixie is too dumbfounded by this turn of events to bow. That is until Wazza clears his throat and Adanz gently guides her body down until she bows, and once they are done, they leave Gray Muffin in Roar Shock’s chambers. When they are in the hall, Trixie looks over her shoulder just in time to see Gray Muffin’s shoulders sulk and his hoof rub his lowered head before the door shuts.

“Wazza, what did you and Gray Muffin talk about after I left?” asks Trixie as she looks at the door.

“I’m sorry, Trixie, but we have strict orders not to tell you,” says Wazza grimly.

“We must not falter, I’ve only seen him this way once and it was a terrifying sight,” says Adanz.

“Right. Come, Trixie, we must teach you how to relax.”

Trixie nods and follows the zebras back to the arena. She knows she’s going to have a hard time with their relaxation lesson with Gray Muffin in a state that even terrifies Wazza and Adanz.

Author's Notes:

Added 12 Oct 2014