[i]*Snip*[/i] She was the client he had to plan the rest around. [i]*Snip*[/i] Her smile, crisp and vivid, shone beneath two endless pools of frozen blue that held his gaze, unwavering, no matter how far down the hedge he trimmed. [i]*Snip*[/i] His pulse quickened in time with a rhythmic pulsing of her hornglow. He didn’t know why she lit her horn sometimes, only that— [b][i]*Schlorp!*[/i][/b] Hayseed Turnip Truck jerked to a halt. He dragged his eyes from the lodestone that was Minuette’s smile, and considered the slick red sheen upon his trimmers. Which, he realized, had been stuck out a bit farther than where the hedge ended and the sidewalk began… “Why’s this hedge all red, too?” he asked, leaning over it, expecting to see just the clean, polished white of a Canterlot sidewalk. He did not, in fact, see a clean sidewalk. Hayseed screamed, dropped the trimmers, and tumbled backwards, scrabbling hoof-over-hoof through the pristine lawn he’d just mowed. “Oh I’m done for! I’m [i]done[/i] for! It’s gon’ be like Cousin Double-Wide all over again!” “Hey, heyyyy, it’s okay,” said the warm, insistent mass he’d blundered into. Hayseed whirled around, and found himself nestled in Minuette’s embrace. Heat suffused his barrel as she rocked him, ran her forehooves through his tousled brown mane, and made even cuter little “shush”ing sounds that he’d imagined anytime this moment had played out in his fantasies. “L—Lovel—lace,” he stammered, because accidentally decapitating one of Minuette’s neighbors—and another of his clients—hadn’t been part of his fantasies, either. Minuette’s muzzle screwed up with the cutest look of determination. Her horn lit for a second, too. Then her smile returned, and his heart hammered with the sheer desire to plant his bucktoothed muzzle right in the middle of it. “It’s okay,” she said, somehow smiling deeper. “But it can’t be! I just—” “[i]I[/i] just used my talent,” she said, drawing his attention down to her flank with a slow, dare he say even [i]teasing[/i], gesture. “Short-term temporal stasis… y’know, freezing! Even works on ponies… or in this case, parts of them!” Her giggle seemed genuine. Yet Hayseed furrowed his heavy brow. “Y’all [i]froze[/i] Lovelace?” “Of course! We can’t have her bleeding out before we find a way to bring her back, can we?” “B—But we all can’t bring back a dead pony! My cousin tried that with my grandpa, and grandma’s velvet paintings [i]still[/i] stink!” “Oh, you say that now, but I have something special: [i]friendship![/i]” Minuette’s smile took on a harder edge; her eyes, though dark and deep, showed a glimmer that doused the heat in Hayseed’s barrel surer than a burst sprinkler line. “Moondancer’s the second-smartest pony that I know, and not as connected to law enforcement as the first!” [hr] As introductions went, Hayseed felt that dumping a decapitated body on a pony’s kitchen table lacked a certain something. Sure enough, Moondancer screamed, flailed, and tried to wrench herself away from Minuette’s iron grasp. Hayseed felt a little jealous at seeing that turned on somepony else, and a little turned on at seeing Minuette hugging another mare who was, in fact, quite cute as well. Where Minuette was a vision in periwinkle perfection, Moondancer’s worn black sweater, up-done red mane, and thick-rimmed glasses, seemed… comfortable. Approachable. There was something about her that he instantly liked, and it wasn’t just her completely relatable response to having a dead body dragged into her home. “Hush now, it’s okay,” Minuette cooed, stroking Moondancer’s mane. “You’ve just gotta help us put Lovelace back together, that’s all.” Moondancer’s screaming abated. She drew back and stared straight at Minuette. “What do you mean ‘put her back together?!’ She’s dead!” “[i]Buuuut[/i] Twilight shared [i]oodles[/i] of high-level spells with you since you reconnected, didn’t she?” The glint in Minuette’s eye continued to worry Hayseed. But strangely, the horror writ upon Moondancer’s muzzle didn’t quite blot out her comfy charm. “N—[i]Necromancy?[/i] That’s… forbidden!” “But-it’s-the-only-way,” Minuette singsonged. Moondancer froze, then looked at Hayseed with desperation. “W—We have to go to the authorities. They’ll understand it was an accident. Stallionslaughter gets lighter sentencing than—” “Conspiracy?” Minuette’s grin made Hayseed’s coat bristle. “Oh, we’re all accessories to Lovelace’s fate now, aren’t we?” She gestured at the body, and plunked down the duffel bag with the head. Moondancer kneaded her forehead. “The palace library has a forbidden wing. If we could get in, we [i]might[/i]—” Minuette squeed, and pressed her muzzle close to Hayseed’s. “Ooo! You have a contract with the library, yes?” “Y—Yes, ma’am—” “Then it’s settled!” Minuette clopped her forehooves together, then lit her horn and refreshed the preservation spell on Lovelace. “Let’s go take a little off the top!” She flicked her eyes down to the body. “Of the library hedges, of course!” “Ah’m too pretty fer jail,” Hayseed moaned. [hr] Hayseed had never broken and entered before. Not even the time his third cousin Turd Burglar tricked him into smashing a feedlot’s office window as a kid, and left him holding the bag in more ways than one. Then again, Turd Burglar hadn’t had Minuette’s smile, or a dead body, or books full of ancient lore that could help make everything right again. This time, when Hayseed smashed the window, it wasn’t by accident; it wasn’t on the ground floor; and he climbed right up the library’s brick edifice alongside one mare holding an invisibility spell on them, and another levitating the dead body. The trio landed in a chamber that seemed straight out of the tracts warning about Ogres & Oubliettes that Hayseed’s Aunt Chick carried around. Black tapestries with crimson symbols hung above dusty shelves festooned with cauldrons, bones, and other unnerving objects. “There,” Moondancer said, dropping their invisibility spell and walking to a hidebound tome set on a pedestal. “Twilight only let me in here once, but this thing… has some serious horseapples.” A rapping at the chamber’s door drew all their eyes. The rap-rap-rapping turned into a pound-pound-pounding, accompanied by calls of: “Stop right there, criminal scum!” “[i]Horseapples![/i]” Moondancer repeated, flipping through pages. “Brace the door—I’ll find a resurrection spell!” Hayseed charged the door, and slammed into it just as a potent buck impacted on the other side. He turned desperate eyes on Minuette— His blood ran cold at the sight of her perfect white teeth shining like daggers in the room’s fading sunlight. Another buck jerked him out of his reverie. “Moondancer?!” “I’ve found one, but it needs a sacrifice! Like a part of one’s soul!” Hayseed’s side lit up with pain as another hit came at the door. “M—Minuette?!” She was [i]laughing[/i]. The next hit burst the door asunder, bowling Hayseed over in a tangle of guards. His muzzle smacked the ground [i]hard[/i], his face blossoming with agony. Minuette screamed. Its shrillness wrenched Hayseed out of gauzy unconsciousness, and left the guards writhing. “Your teeth!” she bellowed. “Your ugly, [i]ugly[/i] teeth!” “Whut,” Hayseed managed. “Oh, how I’ve stared at them for [i]hours[/i], dreaming of the day I’d fix them!” Minuette devolved into blubbering. “I… I froze time for them! I would’ve frozen it… [i]forever![/i]” Hayseed blinked. Horror dawned upon him. “Y’all… played with time,” he said beneath the pile of guards. “Y’all [i]made[/i] me kill Lovelace!” “[i]Hayseed![/i]” screamed Moondancer. “A piece of my soul… I know! Take my love for Minuette—she [i]cray-cray![/i]” “Here goes…” A blinding burst of light overtook the room. [hr] In the days that followed, Hayseed learned firsthand why one of his family’s favorite phrases was: “[i]...And they didn’t press charges![/i]”