Even on the worst of days, life was a treasure beyond measure. It had only taken a lifetime for her to realize that. Admittedly, all she sought was something beyond having a heartbeat, and for that reason, Myrtle Warren had little cause, and even less desire, to complain. Almost as an afterthought, she had established herself as the top student in her class; decades of existence had given her perspective that her classmates lacked. Of course, the administration was astute enough to recognize that benefit and struck her from the standings; afterlife experience still counted as an unfair advantage.
Myrtle couldn’t have cared less about her ranking. She had learned long ago that some of the school’s culture was a joke, and a bad one at that. That might have explained why she was exempted from losing or gaining house points. While she had never commented on the merit of that system of discipline, the professors strongly suspected that she knew just how fragile the system actually was, and they had taken great pains to exclude her from it.
Her attitude, however, had landed her in a disputed that demanded punishment. To be strictly honest, it was Filch who demanded she be flayed repeatedly for refusing to apologize for tracking a few flecks of mud on his freshly-mopped hallway. A bit of groveling and a semi-sincere apology would probably have defused the situation. Myrtle had instead chosen to walk away from Filch mid-rant. One of the professors who had been newly hired to accommodate the inrush of new students had taken it upon himself to impose his authority. He had demanded that she serve detention with Filch.
She had politely declined.
He had demanded that she respect her elders.
She had calmly informed him that they were due only what they earned. She further explained that she was not paying the school to be bullied by a halfwit abusing his authority.
He had threatened to lock her in a room with both Filch and Mrs. Norris.
She had informed him that she was prepared to defend herself.
He had threatened to expel her.
She had told the professor he might want to reconsider threatening expulsion over such a minor offense. She mentioned that the board might question the wisdom of retaining a professor who willfully refused to uphold their duty of care.
He had said that no one would take her word over his.
The house ghosts had lent her their support.
The professor had told her that he didn’t like her attitude.
She had politely informed him that she couldn’t care less.
The detention was never officially given. She did, however, clean up after herself when Flitwick asked.
What was of greater concern to the staff, however, was something they strongly suspected but could not prove. Miss Warren had chosen a fellow Ravenclaw who was now her constant companion. They greatly suspected that he had gained knowledge well beyond his years, knowledge gained when he and Myrtle seemed to vanish for an hour or so. Despite their best efforts to monitor all of the castle’s hidden nooks, they could never determine where the pair had gone. They knew it had to be somewhere on campus. They also knew that Myrtle knew more about the castle than all of them combined. They could only hope that the couple was simply having some good, clean fun.
If asked, Myrtle would have let them know ‘clean’ was never a part of the equation. After all, whipped cream is tasty, and the house elves are remarkably accommodating.
Things were . . . going. It couldn’t be said exactly where they were headed or even if they were doing it in a positive or negative manner, but things were definitely going, even if things were going nowhere. The only thing that was certain was that a lot of confused people and ponies were unsure of how to proceed. This was not surprising since they were trying to make sense of an uncooperative child who had appeared out of nowhere. This, sadly, was not a unique situation; however, said child was an English-speaking filly found far afield in a dimension where ponies drew immediate attention, which is how she came under the scrutiny of the authorities in the first place.
How she had ended up where she was found wasn’t something she was willing to reveal. In truth, there were a lot of things she was obviously hiding. When asked where her guardians were, she had said she didn’t have any. She was rather condescending when it was suggested that she really ought to have someone responsible for her, which was a bit of a surprise since her demeanor had otherwise been cheerful and welcoming, almost comically so.
The conundrum only intensified when she let it slip that she was born in England. a statement that simultaneously confirmed several suspicions and brought new questions to the forefront. Armed with this detail, a representative was sent with the wizard’s minister to talk with the pony princesses. That representative was given strict instructions not to antagonize the royalty but still make an effort to get an exact timeframe for when ponies first visited Earth. After all, there was a confirmed Earth-born pegasus pony who seemed to be at least ten years old.
When confronted with the facts, the younger princess had turned to the elder and said one word. “Discord?”
To that, the elder had replied, “Do you even need to ask?”
The conclusion was that either the ponies were going to insist on being closed-mouthed on the subject or they had someone who had a very loose relationship with time and causality. Neither prospect was encouraging.
As for the young girl, things were uncertain. Her claims of British citizenship could not be ignored, and the pony princesses were unwilling to abandon one of their own. As a stopgap, a ring was provided, and the child proved too apt at being human for it to be her first time, though her momentary difficulty with her center of balance hinted toward her being stuck in pony form for some time.
Overall, there were more questions than answers, but due to bureaucracy being what it was, she was quietly shipped off to an orphanage while those in power argued over the best course of action.
Cozy Glow grinned as she left the back seat of the car. He hadn’t actually planned for things to go as they did, but far be it for her to not take advantage of the situation. She . . . he was back in England. All he needed to do now was get his bearings before going to visit one of her hidden caches. From there, it wouldn’t be too long before she’d summoned one of her more clandestine supporters. Now that she . . . he had a human form, things could progress; even if that human form was that of a little girl.
She’d only have to suffer that degradation for a limited time. Soon, she would have her trove . . . er, his trove of invaluable spell books. Soon, he’d be able to research his escape. Soon, he’d have a donor for a proper body. Soon! The world, wizarding and muggle alike, would tremble before the might of LORD VOLDEMORT!
“Well, the giggling is cute,” said a woman’s voice, forcing Cozy Glow to focus on the present.
“Excuse me.” The little girl turned up the charm. “I was distracted.”
“I could see that,” the woman said warmly. “Welcome to our orphanage; we are excited to have you.” A confused look crossed the woman’s face as she tilted her head. “Where is the love?”
“Pardon?” Cozy Glow asked in confusion.
The woman seemed to shake herself before continuing. “Never mind; I’m certain we’ll fix it. Once again, welcome. Welcome to the Love Farm.”
“Hello and welcome. We interrupt your normally scheduled program for yet another edition of 0921 SAW PONY.” The anchorman smiled winningly at the camera.
“There have been some interesting developments.” His blonde partner beamed. “Today marks the first day of classes for one aspiring pony. Here we see her approaching her school as she waves for the cameras.”
“It truly is a testament to cooperation,” the anchorman said. “The first pony to enroll in flight school, and it is obvious how exciting the prospect is for her.”
“Yes, and she has even brought her own broom, though I doubt she will be using it often.” The blonde smiled. “After all, Miss Cherry Berry is here to learn how to fly the big boys.”
“It should be noted that there have been some concerns on whether a pony could safely handle controls designed for humans.” The anchorman offered a tangent.
“Those concerns were made moot by Miss Berry’s willingness to take her classes as a human,” the blonde informed everyone.
“And here we have her first public appearance on two legs, as promised,” the anchorman said as the two turned toward their screens to witness the historic event.
“Aaand,” said the blonde, “we have another example of how ponies haven’t quite caught on to the human concept of proper clothing.”
“As evidenced by the tastefully placed black bar on your screen.” The anchorman nodded in agreement. “That is a fetching dress, though.”
“Despite it missing the point of being a dress in the first place.” His blonde partner blushed. “Why is it missing the front?”
“I would hazard that it is a practical design for ponies,” the anchorman said. “Less likely to trip them up that way.”
“Aaand Murphy has his say.” The blonde winced as the pony-turned-woman promptly face-planted while taking her first step.
“It’s still a nice dress,” the anchorman noted.
“Hard to say,” countered the blonde. “They are going wild with that censorship bar.”
“On that note,” the anchorman said, “it would be wise to remind our viewers that if you happen upon an individual say with bright orange hair . . .”
“Whose hair is obviously naturally that color,” the blonde added. “Because there is no room for doubt.”
“Please do not panic or overreact. It most likely is a chance to educate our pony friends on human clothing traditions.” Finished the anchorman.
With disgust, the pony threw Plan Q right out the metaphorical window. It followed the same trajectory previously taken by Plans A through P, and with good reason. There was no way it was going to succeed. To be blunt, it would most likely see him dead; a state of being that was most definitely not the objective of the strategy. Not that it wasn’t a clever plan; he was, after all, a certified genius. No, the problem lay with the addition of an extremely unsettling and unpredictable facet of this new reality in which he found himself living.
In a word, the problem was humans.
The day of watching that James Bond marathon while visiting Hector Granger and his family was proof enough of that. It brought to light the fact that the bipedal apes would not lightly suffer the reestablishment of his kingdom. Worse, the odds of them directly confronting him were minimal; it was more likely that he’d end up with a dagger in his back. They simply would not suffer the enslavement of all of ponykind, and there was no doubt that they would find some clever way to end him if he made the attempt.
It wasn’t as if he wasn’t aware that James Bond was a fiction. He was more than cognizant of that. That it was fiction meant for entertainment only emphasized the humans’ willingness to confront anypony on the path for world domination. That realization had been eye-opening.
Twilight Sparkle had offhoofedly opened that barn door. She had compared one of the villains they were watching to his previous exploits, not that she was aware that they were his exploits, but she had still mentioned his mind control helmets. It was unnerving to learn that they had somehow recovered one and it had only taken the mare two point seven five six three nine days to break his painstakingly encrypted magically controlled broadcasting system, something she had done with the aid of a human computer. If he were to employ that tool again, they’d turn his own minions against him.
She hadn’t even been rightfully proud of the accomplishment. Instead, she seemed to be embarrassed. According to her, she had brute-forced the problem instead of outthinking it. She had simply tried all combinations until she happened across the right one, which was an absurd notion since there were literally millions of combinations. Somehow, she had used a toy you could buy in any human store and managed it in a matter of days.
He, of course, had to test the waters. His rightful conquest was hanging in the balance, after all. The way he went about it was just so foolproof that it was almost scandalous in its simplicity. He asked the adults in the room their opinions. He’d have their help taking over the world!
Narf!
What? What was that?
So, he had suggested one of his least likely schemes as a way to approach that goal.
And Sirius Black immediately pointed out seven exploitable flaws.
Not one. Not three. Seven flaws that he himself had overlooked.
Worse, it was only seven because the human had gotten bored.
So, another plan was suggested, just to see how the humans would quake at his ruthless practicality.
That plan was shot down by one of Hector’s human colt friends.
This had brought two very important details to the forefront.
First of all, human children could be very cunning.
Secondly, they could be more ruthless than he himself.
In just one day it became apparent that the difficulty factor had risen drastically.
He’d just have to find a way to rise above it.
On the bright side, he could flee to another dimension whenever they planned on triggering that blasted crystal heart—not that he’d have to; both worlds would tremble at his name.
His original name that is.