I shook my head to clear my mind.

I had gone and done it again.

Ugh! What was wrong with me?!

You! This is all your fault!

"Do you really think I don't realize that?!" I asked loudly, now unafraid of alerting anyone. "What else can they see?! A fluffy teddy bear?!"

A groan from the other room broke me out of my rant.

"Mother fucker." I cursed to myself. The girl. She was still alive, and would be waking up when ever she felt like it. I trotted past the corpse whose esophagus was grossly distended by the aluminum can lodged half way down his throat. The kitchen was exactly as I left it, including the cooling body of the 'pizza guy'. I started pulling open drawers, looking for clean dish rags I could use. I found a few in a drawer near the sink. I folded it neatly into a triangular half as I left towards the entry hallway.

The lady was shifting slightly. Not fully awake but rapidly resurfacing into consciousness. I held onto the rags opposing corners and twirled the rag in on itself, folding it into an easy blindfold. I held the cloth away as I picked up the lady, setting her into a sitting position. Thankfully she didn't wake, but she did mumble something under her breath.

My time was running out.

I tied the blindfold around her face, tight enough to not fall off, but loose enough that it could be removed easily just by lifting it. Not wanting her to come to just on the floor, I picked her up in my levitation and carried her towards the living room couch in the other room.

I pulled the dead man off the couch and flopped him into a corner before setting the lady down in what I hoped was a comfortable position. Strangely, that seemed to send the lady back to sleep rather than forcing her into wakefulness.

I took a moment to breathe and calm back down.

She didn't ask to be here. She appeared to be relatively unharmed. And the perpetrators would never kidnap anyone ever again.

Surely that was enough to celebrate, even just a tiny bit right?

But the feeling that I was much too dangerous to be let free fell on my shoulders again, like the lash from a cat-o-nine tails.

I must never think what I did was okay by any stretch of the imagination. If I did?

A flash of memory, not one of the original Luna's, but one of Lucas'.

I clenched my eyes shut, trying to block out the memory.

I may be a monster, but if I was forced to regret no matter what path I chose, then I could at the very least rest knowing I had saved someone.

And that would have to be enough.

Reigning in control of my emotions, I flipped the off switch on my rage and threw dry ice into its boiler. A peculiar chill then fell over my soul, suffocating everything with the exception of cold logic.

Okay. The lady is still asleep. The men are dead. While I did save this one victim, this was only one head of this hydra. At best, this was only the first stop in a long chain of warehouses and stores with stashes of illicit goods. If I were to place a bet, the official owner of this house was a drug dealer who imported cocaine to sell, and exported kidnapped ladies for the sex trade.

While it was good this place had been shut down, it was only a small part of a vast criminal network. That meant the problem was far from solved. There was a market for human trafficking, and where there was a market, there were those willing to cater. And if there were those willing to cater, there was at least one willing to unite the scum into one business.

And those 'people' would have resources. Resources that could be used to hide away a certain alien horse princess.

If nothing else, my targeting the crime organization would also bring the fed's attention to their doorstep. I could wreck chaos... And slip away in the resulting confusion, fading away into obscurity.

Yes. This was the start of a plausible plan...

But first I needed information...

I glanced over at the girl on the couch, my gaze settling on the pile of cooling meat that used to be a man. I lit my horn and began to rifle through his pockets. Wallet, phone, ring of keys, and a 9 millimeter. I set the keys and gun aside, opting to open his wallet first.

According to his driver's license, his name had been Juan Suárez. Born in 1987. Juan held in his possession two credit cards and nearly 400 in various bills. I pulled the license out of the leather wallet and set it on his chest. I had no use for it. I set the remaining wallet in a new pile adjacent to the gun and keys.

Juan's phone was a more difficult matter. It was locked with the standard 4 digit code that Apple products tended to demand. With no real way to guess the code, I held the camera up to the dead man's face. Jackpot.

At first I had difficultly with the touch screen, not surprisingly, hooves didn't work on the touch screen. Cursing to myself quietly, I lifted the dead man's hand and used his limp finger as a stylus.

I then immersed myself in Juan's data stream. He had several Facebook and Twitter notifications, but a brief glance didn't reveal anything beyond interactions with what appeared to be a local friend group. A lead, but one that seemed to be a more round about way to my current goal. I opened his messenger app and scrolled down. Benign conversations between friends... Significant other who seemed to be angry about something at work... Long healthy conversations with his mother... Aha! The contact of 'Jefe' seemed promising.

I clicked on the message log eagerly, only to be disappointed. The conversation was with whom I assumed to be Juan's superior, but the conversation was very one sided. Mostly with 'Jefe' demanding to meet in person. Which I honestly should have expected. Nothing incriminating was written down for the cops to find. Unfortunate, but not unsurmountable.

I tapped open his 'Maps' app, quickly opening his favorites tab and glancing around. Hmm. Seems to just be favorite restaurants. Possibly used as both easy directions and contact list? I closed the favorites tab and tapped the search bar, glancing down his recent history. Restaurant Store... Store... An address? I tapped on the strange address, the app took a moment to load, but brought up a route highlighted in red from what I assumed to be my current position to this address. From what I remembered from flying, it was the city I was currently in. The red line crossed the map, but didn't ever leave the confines of the displayed city.

The home of a friend? Or the home of a stranger who Juan had recently visited? Or was it where 'Jefe' lived?

I swiped back to the main screen, but didn't close the app. Another lead, but was there anything else I could use?

I glanced back towards the sleeping lady, idlily pondering when she would awaken. Her chest rose and fell peacefully. I felt one of my ears flick mindlessly. I looked back down at the phone and opened the settings, glancing down the list, I tapped on "Face ID and Passcode".

"Enter your passcode."

"Damnit." I muttered outloud as a keypad appeared on the phone. "Hmmm..."

I turned the phone sideways so I could catch light on any finger smudges I could find. My use of the dead man's finger had screwed up the the smudges on the screen. But I could make out that the top right, the middle right, and the center had been pressed frequently. Although a broad swipe had passed over the lower center, smearing finger grease across the screen.

I hummed in thought again, clicking the power button once to put the phone to sleep, and again to wake up the phone on the passcode screen. The corresponding numbers were '3', '6', '5', and potentially '8'. Since I had no idea what a combination of numbers would be significant to Juan, I pondered how the phone would sit in his hand. What would be the easiest scheme to type? After all, it would be annoying to type an essentially random sequence every time right?

Three six five eight?

The phone vibrated slightly in my magic, and the number pad reset.

Eight five six three?

The home screen appeared.

I smiled grimly to myself. Never underestimate a mistake that can be attributed to laziness.

I turned back to the settings and used my new code to disable the face recognition and the locking passcode. I clicked the power button a few times to test if I could access the phone without the programmed keys. The home screen appeared several times before I was satisfied.

I swiped up the wallet, keys and gun, which joined my newly captured phone in my levitation. I almost whistled merrily as I went back into the kitchen, rather proud of myself for my detective work.

I then performed similar searches for all of the bodies. All in all, I found almost a thousand in cash, seven credit cards, three key rings, four various makes and models of guns, five phones, three of which locked themselves when I tried to open them, and one purse. I left the other guns by their owners, the 9 mil I had chosen would be enough. I stuffed the cash and the credit cards in the wallet I had stolen, just so I wouldn't be locked out of society just because I didn't have money. I deposited the purse on the couch next to the still sleeping lady, but she still didn't awaken.

I was hesitant to leave the girl in a house full of dead bodies. So I hung around with not much to do as I waited for her to wake up. So I burned more time by searching through the house itself. The closet of one of the bedrooms was full of men's clothing. Mostly purple hoodies and destressed blue jeans. They smelled clean, so I took a hoodie and the most intact jeans for use as a way to hold my ill gotten gains and for use as a disguise. They wouldn't do much if I was seen sulking on all fours, or if the hood was down, but if I kept the hood up while casting gaseous form...

All I needed to complete the disguise was shoes and gloves to hide my lack of actual hands and feet. The shoes were easy, the man who had been sleeping had a set near the bed. They didn't have the fading warmth of a cooling body that the others had, so I took those.

The 'hands' were also easy, nitrile latex gloves were tucked away with the cleaning supplies in the kitchen. I took a hoof full and stuffed them in one of the jean pockets. I sat on my haunches, now wearing a dark purple hoodie and awkwardly tight jeans in front of the sleeping lady, scrolling through my newly captured phone by using a latex glove inflated with my telekinesis as a stylus. They keys and wallet were tucked into another jean pocket, but the gun settled easily into the front pocket of the hoodie.

I scrolled through the news app for nearly an hour, immersing myself in the events that had happened since I ran away from my- Lucas' family. Culture war. Culture war. Propaganda. New health study. Oh? A surprise State of the Union? What was that about? I clicked on the article, but didn't read too far as the lady on the couch finally sat up, suddenly awake and cognizant of the last thing she remembered.

"Who's there?! Where am I?!" she exclaimed.

"Easy! Easy..." I answered calmly, only half surprised she had woken up. "You're safe. I won't hurt you."

"The last thing I remember I-" she put a hand on her forehead.

"I know. I saw the whole thing." I answered, trying to keep her from spiraling. "I saw and I stopped them."

"Who-" she began to tug the blindfold off, apparently realizing her hands were free.

"Don't!" I exclaimed suddenly, afraid of what she would do if she saw who I was. "For my, and your own sake." Something in my voice must've sounded authoritative enough to be worth listening to, because she stopped and let her hand fell back to the couch.

"Who are you?" she asked, her voice quivering as she tried to keep herself calm.

"I-I'm- I'm nobody." I stammered as I tried to think of an adequate answer. "If you knew, you'd understand why I don't want you to see me. But you'll be much happier and safer if you didn't. So I'm going to lead you out of this place, have you count to 30 in the front lawn, and then remove your blindfold to call the police. Whatever you do, do not reenter the house. Wait for the police to show up and let them take care of you."

"You- You're not going to be waiting with me?" she asked. Crap, she was trying to bond herself to me.

"No. I will be watching, but you must never see me." I tried to explain.

"I- I don't understand..." she started to weep.

"I know..." I sighed sadly, feeling my ears pin backwards. I lifted up my levitating latex glove, filled as if an actual hand was inside. "Come, the sooner you get under the protection of the police the better." I gently grabbed her hand with the glove, guiding her to stand.

"But who are you?!" she cried.

"Nobody to concern yourself with." I stated, tears threatening to break away from my eyes. I lead the way towards the front door, trying to keep my hoofsteps quiet, the shoes of my disguise floating beside me.

I noticed she hadn't grabbed her purse, so I reached out with my levitation and pressed it into her hands. She jerked in surprise, but grabbed it as she realized what it was.

I unlocked the door and pulled it open, letting the cool night air blow over the threshold.

"Careful, there's a few steps." I warned as I guided the lady across the front porch. She slowly took a few steps down onto the front path, her hand white she was gripping so hard. I reached back and closed the door, not bothering to lock it.

"Okay Ma'am, count out loud to thirty." I murmured when she was on the front lawn.

"Will- Will I ever see you again?" she whispered fearfully.

I couldn't help myself. I let slip a loud, amused snort. "If you ever were to see me, you would know without a doubt who I am. Now please-" I trailed off. "Count to thirty."

"Ah... One? Two? Three." she called out.

That was my cue.

Her hand was in a death grip on the latex glove I was puppeting, but that didn't stop my magic from flowing out of it easily, abandoning the blue latex to its fate. The lady gasped, but continued to count.

"Seven. Eight. Nine-"

I cast gaseous form, coalescing inside the the baggy clothing like a limp balloon. From there, it was easy to "blow away" as I forced the clothing to fly bonelessly through the air behind the bushes of another house.

"Thirteen. Fourteen. Fifteen-"

I slide the hoodie and jeans over the ground like an air hockey puck, gliding only millimeters above the blades of grass.

"Twenty. Twenty one. Twenty two-"

I blew the hoodie and jeans over a fence, the shoes floating close behind. From there, the lady's voice faded into the distance as I forced the clothing higher into the air, aiming to use the fabric to glide into the next neighborhood.

I floated the clothing back down in the darkness next to a highway. I didn't solidify, but I pushed the cloud of my gas into a vaguely humanoid shape, filling out the clothing's limbs as if there was a real body underneath. The shoes assumed their natural position, as tendrils extended past the pant legs into the shoe's openings. A pair of gloves pulled themselves out of the front jean pocket and inflated, positioning themselves into the gaping sleeves of the hoodie. The hoodie pulled itself up and over my "head", pulling itself low to hide where my face should've been.

And to the casual observer, I was one more, just a regular human.

*Normal human noises*