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Good Trooper Gilda

by Mitch H

Chapter 34: Loony In A Bin

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"Where are the explosives, Pinkie?" Gleaming Shield wasn't gleaming so much anymore, but she was cleaner than Gilda was, and didn't look half as tired as Gilda felt. They'd just got back from searching the catacombs under the Cathedral of Labour for what felt like the fourth time, but was probably only the second.

A better name than 'catacombs' would have been 'sewers', in Gilda's opinion.

"Twilight! Oh, It's so good to see you! Alive! There were so many ways that- well, none of that happened, obviously. Look at you! Breathing! And not zombified at all!"

"Pinkie! The missing explosives! What did you do with them?"

"You kind of stink, though. Aren't the prisoners the ones that should be all filthy and stinky and angry? What's the point of building dungeons if you're going to clean them? The prisoners end up all neat and tidy, and the guards are the ones who look like they're rolling around in the filth!"

"You have to know we just got out of the tunnels under the cathedral! We can't find them, Pinkie! Where'd you put them? We have the detonator, they're not going to go off now!"

"Oh, that doesn't sound right. Which detonator did you find? Who gave theirs up? I'm thinking Uncle Sandstone. He never did approve of our insurance policy. Did he get a pass for giving up the backup detonator?"

The captain closed her eyes with at least half as much disgust as Gilda was feeling right then. "Gilda! Go have them search Sergeant-Major Sandstone Pie's quarters and person. Again."

"Oh, Oopsie. Tell Uncle Sandy I'm sorry I gave him up!"


"Oh, hello, Gilda. Nice to see you. You're cleaner this time." Colonel Pie wasn't nearly as cheerful this time, but then, Captain Shield wasn't there for her to act up in front of. The bruising and the bandage-wrapped immobilizer on her left foreleg might have had something to do with her lack of energy, though.

"We found the rest of the detonators. And the entire battalion is in the stockade. All eight hundred and thirty-seven."

"Thirty-seven? There should be eight hundred and forty-three. Did somepony get hurt?"

"You know very well that Lieutenant Maud Pie and her team are missing. Where is Lieutenant Pie, Colonel Pie?" the bat-hen demanded.

There are too many Pies in this mess, Gilda fumed to herself.

"Oh, impossible to say now that she's had time to run. Could be under half the city by now. Or tunneling halfway to Bridlederry, for all I know. I told her to dig so deep that even I couldn't find her."

"She's digging? How far could she have gotten in three days? She can't be going outside of the city, the detonators won't work if she takes one that far away."

"I thought you said you had all the detonators?"

"If Maud Pie has one, clearly we don't have all the detonators."

"Where is Twilight Sparkle, anyways? Why is her bat-hen interrogating me? By your lonesome?"

"The captain is busy with your co-conspirators. Cheese Sandwich insists he didn't know anything about the bombs. I almost believe him. The spooks don't, though."

"Oh, yeah, the spooks." Pinkie Pie waved her bandaged foreleg. "Flagg Staff sends his regards."

"I didn't figure you did that to yourself. Charming paranoid, isn't he?"

"He doesn't fall for the changeling distraction anymore. I gather that's your fault, Gilda de Griffonstone."

"That maniac isn't my responsibility. Nor is whatever he did to you."

"He stopped quickly enough when I pointed out that the bombs might not have anything at all to do with the council job. They might even be insurance against ponies doing things like shoving hot nails into my frogs."

Gilda winced. "Sorry about that."

"Like you said, he's not your lunatic. Whose lunatic is he, is the question you silly ponies ought to be asking. I'm pretty sure he isn't mine," she sighed, looking at her bandaged hoof.

"About the bombs…" Gilda tried, hoping to get the discussion back on track.

"It's been three days, has it? Hard to tell in here. They're doing a good job, delivering the food at weird times. I've totally lost track of the time."

Gilda grimaced, realizing too late she'd given the pink menace exactly what she wanted.

"Three days… has the coronation happened yet?" asked said menace.

"We couldn't find the bombs, they had to move the ceremony to Government House. We can't use the cathedral until we find the explosives."

"Didn't keep you from using it for the abdication, did it? Nice job on that, by the way. Surprised the roadapples out of me."

"I don't believe that for a second. You had that plotted out to the minute. You laid the rails, we just ran the engine over the tracks."

"Is that what you think I was doing? Luring you into doing my bidding? Am I that clever?"

"I think you're exactly that clever. I just don't know how you did it. Nogriffon could possibly keep that many factors in their head. Nogriffon could possibly predict how so many different people would jump, minute to minute, second to second. We came damn close to everything ending in fire, Colonel Pie."

"Hrm. Then maybe it's a good thing I had an insurance policy, isn't it?"

"What I don't understand is why?"

"Why what? Why the revival of the national council? We couldn't end the war short of extermination without it, Corporal."

"Why did you stack the council with scoundrels? Why endanger the whole project by filling the gallery with crooks, criminals, and pocket warlords? We thought for sure that you were going to let the rebels into the city and engineer another Crab-Bucket."

"What? That's silly! Why would I repeat myself? Nopony likes a one-trick pony! No, it couldn't be the rebels. Again. They'd know better than to dance to my tune again, those that survived. And those that survived have mostly fled the city. The war's out there in the districts now, you know. Almost no rebels worth the name left in town. I made sure of that, you betcha.

"No, no more letting the rebels take the blame. I figured that if the city was going to self-destruct, I might as well bring the destructive elements inside the council itself. Keep the bloodshed contained, you know?

"And they might have surprised you, Corporal. Your scoundrels. Bad ponies have hearts, too. They get lonely, they want to be loved.

"Why did I choose the bad ponies? Because they're villains, Corporal. The good ponies have people who love them, they have hopes, dreams, expectations, priorities. Family mares have their family to think of; businessponies have their customers and their suppliers; landowners their tenants and their debts. Only bad ponies have room in their hearts for everypony, because they know deep down, nopony else will be there for them when the troubles come a-flocking. Patriotism is the last refuge of bad ponies, because they have nopony else. It concentrates the mind wonderfully, having no other choices. Of course I chose villains! They make the very best patriots!"

"But you threw them in with unionists, and nogriff else!" Gilda yelled. "We thought for sure you were just collecting griffons who you wouldn't miss. It looked exactly like you were planning another massacre!"

"Well, Corporal, what you see is your own problem. I like my pirates to dress like pirates. I don't trust villains that walk around dressed like bankers and good ponies. It makes my back itch." Pinkie suddenly spasmed, scratching her back like the maniac that she was.

"Are you quite alright, Colonel Pie?" Gilda asked, half-mocking, half-solicitously.

"No, I'm not. Three days… three days. So they're crowning the pink one today?"

Gilda raised an eyebrow at this characterization.

"Oh, you know what I mean. The little princess. I didn't really see that coming, you know. Despite what you seem to think, I don't see everything. The princesses are - it's like, they cast long, weird shadows? You can see some of the ripples, but you never see the stone. Look, Corporal."

The pink earth pony lunged, sending her chains rattling, her blue eyes bulging out of their sockets at a startled Gilda.

"Where is Marble? Where is my sister? I need my little sister! Right now! Give her to me!"

"Y-you're in no position to demand anything, Colonel Pie. Sergeant Marble Pie is in good talons. She's safe. How many of your relatives did you bring into the service with you? Is there anyone left at home?"

"We're earth ponies, our farms damn near run themselves. I'm not worried about Marble, she can take care of herself. I care about me! I need my sister! Right now!"

"Why is that, Colonel Pie? Does it have something to do with those drugs we found in her bags?"

"The drugs are just tools, they can be replaced by willpower. But Marble's the one who knows how to- oh, no." As quickly as Pinkie had scuttled forward, she retreated to the back of the cell, staring at something over Gilda's shoulder.

Gilda craned her neck, looking to see what the madpony had seen, if anything. The only thing she could see was a spider working on its web in the corner above the jail cell door.

"What is it, that spider? It's a common house-pest. Harmless."

"Where did you get that nonsense? Spiders aren't pests, they keep down the pests. I love spiders! No, no, if you have some more spiders, I'll give them good homes, I swear. Just bring me Marble. I don't want to be alone when they come! Oh, please hurry. Please, please please -"

And then Pinkamena Diane Pie, lieutenant colonel of the Rock Valley Pioneers, brevet colonel in the volunteer service, bureau chief J-13 Special Party Planning, stopped talking and started screaming like a terrified filly.


"I'm telling you, captain ma'am, she just collapsed and started screaming and sobbing. I couldn't get anything out of her. The guards say she hasn't touched her food since yesterday." Gilda was standing beside the military police jail's east-wing guard-post, two pony MPs staring wide-eyed at her and her unicorn captain as they waited for the officer of the day to bring the cell-keys.

"Sergeant Pie refuses to say why she had to deal with her sister personally," Gleaming Shield observed mildly.

"Can she actually say anything?" Gilda asked, dubious. She'd met Sergeant Marble Pie, and never heard her say a syllable.

"Despite what you think, Gilda, Marble Pie isn't a mute. Yes, we did get a few words out of her. Some indication of dosage, when I told her we were going to drug Pinkie with her help or without it. But she claims she has to be here, and won't say why." The officer of the day arrived, and led them down the corridor towards the imprisoned party pony's cell.

When they arrived at that cell, Gilda noted the splat of green ooze dried dripping opposite of the cell door. She sniffed at the mess as the MPs unlocked the cell door, and wrinkled her nostrils. Peat mush. I'd have thrown it at my guards, too.

Pinkie Pie was sitting in the center of the cell, her head bowed. Her mane was flat and greasy, hiding her eyes, but not her flattened, pursed lips. The cell was well-lit, but it seemed like the earth pony was draining all of the color and light towards herself. Not like that other pink pony, not as if she was drawing it into her, but as if there was something… some aura which was making the light… fade.

"We have a new duchess," the mare said, her eyes still hidden behind the darkness of her mane. "It was a great success."

"Y-yes," Gleaming Shield said. "The guards told you?"

"In a manner of speaking. I could smell it on them. A party. A successful one. Was there singing?"

"No, no there wasn't. I was disappointed. I wanted to see heartsong for myself. Gilda here got to hear two heartsongs in as many hours, the first I've been able to confirm since… I don't know. They say that they used to sing at the Grand Galloping Gala every year, like clockwork. I've never seen it."

"Heartsong is overrated. It wakes things up. Things you don't necessarily want to meet in a dark night of the soul. Or was that dark alleys? They're kind of similar when you're lost in them, Twilight."

"You know I don't like to be called that."

"And yet I can't be bothered to care. Most of me knows you by the old name, you know. It baffles them when I talk about Gleaming Shield. Except the ones that aren't Pinkie Pie, and the Bubble Berries get really, really confused when I use that name."

The earth pony paused for a second, and then looked up through the curtain of her lank mane at the unicorn. "You're not supposed to be Gleaming Shield. It breaks everything that you are."

"I'm sorry you don't approve, Pinkie. You've been scaring your guards."

"Good. They should be frightened. This is a horrible world. I should be one of the hanging Pinkies. It's an abomination that I'm me."

She turned at something Gilda couldn't see or hear, staring at one of the walls, then suddenly-

"SHUT UP ALL OF YOU! You don't get a SAY! You're all dead! Just hang there, and stop whispering! Yeah, that's right! I'm the one that says anything! You can just all shut up and let me talk to Gleaming Shield here! No, not that one, he's as dead as all of you! No, I'm not getting my genders mixed up again!" Pinkie's mane had blown back with the first scream, and her eyes were burning like Hotspur's under Cadance's influence.

"You gonna be quiet? I'm talking to my Twilight now! Right? Right. I'm sorry, Twilight," she said, calmly, turning back to Gilda and Gleaming Shield.

"The tree comes, and they come with it. And they just hang there, and they gossip. Like grannies! Dead, grimacing, rotting grannies! About everything! And they won't shut up until Marble sings them to sleep. I need my sister. Bring me my Marble." Colonel Pie bowed her head again, and hid those eyes full of Hades behind their curtain of lank, pink mane once more.

"They say we might be free and clear, by the way," the earth pony continued. "We're not going to see any new outbreaks. Not in the Isles, anyways. Who'd have thought that a mind-controlling abomination like Mi Dolente Cadenza would be the missing puzzle-piece? Also, there will be gonne smugglers on the west shore in a day and a half. Evening tide, this little port hamlet named Gould's Jetty. Get there ahead of time with the Princess's Own, and you can roll up the entire operation. Don't get there in time, and things get weird again. Not bad weird, though, I don't think." Pinkie turned her head, like she was considering something.

"Are they still going to be the Princess's Own, now that Celestia isn't the Duchess? I never understood how that worked. She interacted with the griffons as the Duchess for so long, how did the Rangers end up being the Princess's instead?"

"Cadance is still a Princess of Equestria, Celestia will probably transfer her colonelcy to Cadance," Gilda opined, staring at the terrifying pink conundrum slumping in the middle of the cell. "The Rangers are an EUP unit, not in the local military structure except by extension."

"Yes, Corporal, I know how these things work. But it's a new start, isn't it? When the time comes to transfer rights, that's the time to make things… right. To fix the things which are wrong. Can you ask her to come here and fix me?"

"Who, Cadance?" Gleaming Shield said, with a pitying look. "We couldn't possibly risk her safety by exposing her to you. She's fragile enough as it is."

"She's stronger than she looks," Pinkie said, her eyes hidden. "But I can see how you'd not want both of us in the same room. Celestia's right about her, you know. This world is Cadance's fault. No, you shut up, you just bucking hang there and keep your opinions to yourself, Pinkie!"

The mare took a shuddering breath, and continued. "It is her fault. If she'd controlled herself and saved the witch like she was supposed to, none of this would have happened. Look at you all! You were all happy, weren't you? You smug, horrible ponies! Damn you all for not being real! Damn her for not making any of you real.

"DO YOU THINK I WANTED TO BE THE ONE WHO GOT TO BE REAL?"

Pinkie Pie collapsed into a pink puddle, and started adding to the puddle with high-velocity streams of tears. Gleaming Shield broke free of Gilda's grasp, and rushed to her fellow-Academy graduate, gathering her up in a hug.

Gilda looked at her captain comforting the madpony who had nearly killed them all, and watched vigilantly for any twitch which might be Pinkie's mood turning murderous.

"I ju-just want my Marble. I'll be good, I'll be good. I've tried so hard to be good, but that damn princess messed things up so badly, and I see every last bit of it! Everything that we could have been, and will never be. This war made it all so much worse, you see. Can't you see?"

"No, Pinkie," Gleaming Shield said. "We don't see the world like you do. We can't see."

"And- and- that's a good thing. You'd be crazier than I am if you could see what I see. I - I - oh, that little bird. That little kitty. I did that to her! I did. It was my fault. She was my fault. Oh, she'd have been dead if I hadn't, but I scared her so badly… The blood gets everywhere, you know. Sometimes I can see the real blood, and sometimes, it's only the blood that might have been… The cathedral was the crux, you know? It was the point where everything turned, one way or the - well, a hundred others. But more good ways than bad! I think? I thought. So I put all of our bad eggs in that basket, and built it as strong as I could.

"I built it like an ark. An ark to carry us across that nasty little stream. Did it go well? It felt like it went good. I didn't see anypony die that day, not for real. So many ways for it to go wrong, so many ways for it to go really, really wrong.

"Of course I built an insurance policy into the ark. Into the buttresses. They're in the buttresses. The bombs are in the walls, and because there are no walls in that silly mass of stone and glass, I had to put them in the buttresses. Don't blame the Pioneers, they were following orders. And I had different ponies build the bombs than the ones who put the packages into the hollows.

"Maud will know how to defuse them. I'll tell you how to signal her, and she'll come out of whichever hole she dug for her team. Just give me Marble. I can't sleep like this.

"Please."


Sergeant Marble Pie sang sweetly, like a chorus of angels. It was exactly what Gilda had imagined when she’d listened to Grandpa Gruff’s stories of the ponies of Equestria and their songs. She sat slouched outside of the cell and listened to the mare sing old Harmonist spirituals for her disturbed sister.

Gilda sat and waited for the knock, waited until they had finished.

It was a long time coming.

Author's Notes:

Thanks for editing and pre-reading help to Shrink Laureate, Oliver, and the general Company.

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Good Trooper Gilda

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