They had found out about his actions.

As Deathstroke stood alone in a chamber within the halls of Canterlot, after having been relieved of his guns and weapons he noticed coldly, he assumed that the death of all of the fanatics had been the reason that Celestia and Luna had demanded that he be brought before them to "speak" with him. That or they suspected that he was responsible for the explosion that killed all of the fanatics. He had hoped to be able to play it off as an accident that they caused, but the princesses seemed to have him trailed. The smartest thing they had done yet.

He wasn't that worried about what they would say to him, though. The fanatics knew what he was there for and if word of that got out, he would find the entirety of Equestria, perhaps the entire world against him. And as good as he was, those kind of odds were too much for him. But if it was just princess Celestia and Luna against him, then this would be a breeze.

He didn't turn around when he heard the doors to the empty chamber open and two sets of hooves walked across the marble floors. Slade didn't need to turn around to know who had entered the room with him. It was obvious by their footsteps who was there. He also didn't bother to face them, despite the fact that he was certain that they might have been there to cause him bodily harm. He could crush the two of them with ease.

What Deahtstroke was more concerned with was not if he could beat the princesses, but how he should deal with them. He could beheaded both of them and mouth their skulls on the end of his staff. That would be the easiest solution. But that would turn the world against him. Talking his way out of this, lowering his head and taking whatever chastising they had for him, would be the smartest decision. But that wasn't how he did things.

'We'll play along for now and go from there,' Slade finally decided, before he turned to face the princesses. Like he had expected, the both of them had looks of absolute fury on their face. 'Guess I'm not going to be able to talk my way out of this one. Very well, force it is.'

"Slade," Celestia began in a voice that dripped with all of her rage. Slade smirked at her attempt at being angry. "It has been brought to my attention by one of my subordinates that you are responsible for the death of the fanatics. Do you deny these claims?"

"No. In fact, I took a sick joy in choking out the old, blind fanatic until the light faded from his empty eyes," Slade replied in a voice filled with merciless mirth. The result of him telling the truth was for Luna and Celestia to look at him with a sickened horror, the kind of looks he was used to getting. "Forget the formalities and royalty talk princess. I'm a merciless and ruthless killer, who will slaughter any in his path to achieve his goals. Forget about the fanatics. You don't really care about them. Tell me what you real want to talk to me about."

"You sick son of a-" Luna began, but Celestia held out a wing to stop her sister from getting any closer to the mercenary. "Sister, do not stop me! This monster deserves to be punished for the acts of evil that he has committed, both in this world and for what I am certain the acts he committed in his world as well."

"Stay back sister. Even without his weapons I am certain that he is the most dangerous being in this room," Celestia said with wise caution, but also, what Slade took sick delight in finding out, a tone of worry and concern for her sister.

'And there's your weakness.'

"You are correct, murderer. I do have another topic that I wish to converse with you. A legend, if you will," Celestia began with narrowed eyes. Slade pondered whether or not he should bother to answer her question or simply crush the both of them there and then. But he figured what her question would be and thought about how much fun it would be to crush her soul before he crushed her spirit.

"Before you showed up in my land, a vision came to me in my sleep. It was a vision of my nation being destroyed, of my ponies being slaughtered and our magic being stolen from us by a fearsome foe. A foe with a single, red eye. Tell me Slade, are you this being? Did you come here to kill us all and steal our magic?"

"Truthfully, I don't give a damn if your nation lives or dies. But as for stealing your magic, yes, the main reason I am here is to find the source of Equestria's magic and retrieve it for my client," Deathstroke said with such brutal honesty that neither of the princesses bothered to question his words. "And now that the both of you know the real reason that I am here, I am certain that you will both try to do something foolish, such as trying to stop me."

"It's almost like you've been in this spot before," Luna snarled with dangerous intent as she crouched down, her horn spewing magic. Celestia took up a defensive position next to her sister, eyes narrowed as her horn burned with the might of the sun.

Slade studied the both of them for a moment. Their magic was dangerous and their immortality might have made them a problem if he was foolish enough to fight them in a head on battle. But Slade was no fool.

Faster than either of them could register, Slade whipped out his nano-gun from within a hidden compartment and shot a dart straight into Luna's chest. Luna let out a cry more of shock than pain, before she ripped the dart out of her chest and tossed it to the side. For a moment she and Celestia gazed at the wound and waited for something terrible to happen, but when nothing did they both turned to face Slade with smiles.

"Seems you managed to keep a weapon concealed from us. Unfortunately for you it did not amount to much," Celestia said in a very angry tone as she began to walk towards Deathstroke. Deahtstroke's response was to push a button on the side of the nano-gun.

The moment he did Luna let out an agonizing shriek of pain and collapsed to the ground, her limbs writhing in agony while blood began to leak from her eyes and mouth. Celestia was at her sisters side in a heartbeat and cried out to her, but all Luna could do was scream as an unknown force tore apart her body from the inside.

"What are you doing to her?!" Celestia screamed at Slade.

"Killing her. Was that not obvious?"

"Cease at once!"

Much to Celestia's surprise, Slade did as she asked and a moment later Luna stopped screaming, but she continued to lay on the ground and breath heavily with shaky breaths. Celestia took a moment to comfort her sister and try to stop the bleeding, but then she slowly turned to face Slade, her eyes resting on his gun.

"Quite an ingenious invention, isn't it? Nanites. Little robots that are as small as your blood cells, which can tear apart a living being from the inside out if they are told to do so," Deathstroke told Celestia, whose eyes shrunk in her head as she looked from the merc to her sister. "And that is exactly what they will do to Luna, unless you listen and do everything exactly the way I tell you to. Now stand."

Her body shook with rage as Celestia slowly rose up to her hooves, her eyes glued to Slade as he walked up to her. "Code Red," he spoke aloud as he approached her, getting Celestia to narrow her eyes in confusion. "I have just activated a code within the nanites, programming them to destroy their host in 24 hours unless they hear a code word that deactivates them for another 24 hours."

"What? Why would-?"

"To make sure that you understand completely that any attempt to go against me will result in the very painful demise of your sister," Slade whispered as he moved his helmet mere inches away from Celestia's face. "Here is what you will do. You will go back to you allies and let them know what happened to the fanatics was the fanatics fault. You will also not speak to them about what happened in here. And just as further insurance..."

He reached into another hidden compartment, and made Celestia contemplate how many of those he had, and pulled out a tiny, insect looking machine. He pressed a button on the back of it and it fluttered to life, lifting off of Slade's hand and flying to Celestia, where it roosted right underneath of her crown, hidden from view.

"That will be my eyes and ears when I am not nearby. If you say or do anything even remotely close to informing someone else about my goal or what I have done to your sister, I will kill her without delay. If you go against my orders in anyway, I will kill her. If that machine shuts down for any reason, I kill her. Are we clear?" Slade asked Celestia. Celestia narrowed her eyes and glared at Slade, who then backhanded her a moment later with enough force to draw blood. "I said, are we clear?"

"Crystal," Celestia spat back.

"And just so you know, I have two more vials of the nanites. Meaning that if you force my hand to kill your sister, there are still two others that you can get killed as well," Slade said to Celestia as he walked past her, stopping next to Luna to glare down at her for a moment before he kicked her in the spine. Luna cried out and Celestia roared with fury, but her fury was quelled a moment later when Slade held a finger to the button. "Perhaps I will inject Twilight with the nanites next. You seem to be fond of her. Or maybe it will be Flurry Heart. Shall we add a foals death to your guilt as well? Think wisely, wise ruler."

"You're a monster," Celestia spat at Slade as he reached the door, her words stopping him long enough for him to glance over his shoulder. "You twisted, vial, heartless monster!"

"Celestia, please," Slade began as he turned to leave. "Flattery will not spare your sister."

{d:P}

Pinkie snored softly to herself in the tiny corner of the room where she now resided, having offered to give Wade her bed to make amends for trying to peek under Wade's mask. Wade did his best to ignore the snoring and the sounds of Luna screaming, which was still a few paragraphs too close for comfort, as he gazed down at a map that he had been "generously given" by one of the fanatics that he had spoken to.

'How adorable. The way of finding the greatest treasure in Equestria, and also the treasure that will earn me a shit ton of dough, is a treasure map. They even have a little X on it and everything. Oh these little fanatics are so adorable that it almost makes me wish that I hadn't blown their heads off,' Wade thought to himself with a happy smile, which was made even wider when he glanced at the fat sack of coins that was sitting on the nightstand next to his bed.

'That has got to be the second biggest sack filled with gold that I've ever seen,' Wade thought to himself, stifling a laugh when he thought of the first. 'But it was nice of Celestia to award the pay to me even when I totally chopped off at least three fanatic's heads. Then again, she can't prove I killed any of the others and even if she could, no court would convict me.'

"Yet here is my problem. i have no idea where the fuck any of these things on the map are located," Wade grumbled to himself as he tried to read past all the pony pun city names and locations. He gave up after his patience gave out, which was exactly three tenths of a second later, and flung the map across the room where it landed on Pinkie's sleeping face. "How in the hell am I supposed to find this place if I can't even-"

"Map. Locations. Twilight. Table," Pinkie snored allowed, having read the map even though she was asleep. Because she slept with her eyes open. Wade found it cute. He was the only one that did.

"So Twilight knows where this map leads, eh? Thanks best buddy, I promise to split the pay with you fifty-fifty when I get it...oh who the hell am I kidding, it's totally going to be seventy-thirty," Wade snorted with laughter as he stared out the window at the blood moon.

"Yyyyyaaaahhhhh-SNORE!"