Tuxley and Reginald took their seats on the train platform. A pair of folding chairs, a table, two cups and a thermos of piping hot tea were all the pair had. The other refugees were crammed inside the train, which they would be as well after they were done. But for now, they had tea, and that was all they needed.
"It occurs to me, sir, that this will be..."
Tuxley looked up. "Yes?" he encouraged.
Reginald's found the strength to keep his chin raised, hard as it was. "This is to be our last tea on Equestria."
Tuxley blinked, phased by his friend's words. "I... yes, you're right. Quite right, indeed." The two of them knew it, but to truly acknowledge it, put all the more weight on the heart. "Wherever we do wind up, there will be tea again. Surely."
"Surely, sir," Reginald repeated, as confidently as they could. In truth, neither of them knew for sure, but it was a pretty good bet these were not their last cups.
The two of them having tea might have seemed like an odd pair. And they were, there was no doubt about that. Reginald, and his odd position with the Crystal Empire and Tuxley, with his being a dinosaur and all, were two individuals that had very little in common in their natures to do with each other or even the world they were in. That was what made tea all the more important for them; in a world where they seemed out of place, they made their place in it every day. They made the world make sense with tea.
"Should we do something... special, sir?" Reginald proposed. "To commemorate the occasion."
"What did you have in mind?"
"Mind if I join you, gentlemen?" Doctor Whooves asked. "I could really use a good cuppa right about now."
"Did someone say tea?"
"I smell tea."
"I both heard and smell tea."
Ponies, donkeys, all of them made their way out the train. They crowded around the table on the platform.
Dollars removed his helmet. "I could go for a hot drink." Jake, Kelsan and the storm troopers joined them, but did not remove their own helmets.
The two gentries looked around them, quickly realizing a problem. "I, well... errm..."
"I don't think we- we may not have quite enough for everybody," Reginald said, the thermos looking small in his hooves. He looked over to Tuxley, not wanting to have said what he just said. Even if they both went without a cup, there was no way they could possibly spare a drop for everyone there. They simply didn't have enough tea. They didn't even have enough cups.
"We... we could try," Reginald said. He turned around. "Would everyone here care for tea?"
The answer came in unified nods, in softly spoken words, in eager eyes and hopeful faces. It was all the same answer. The two odd gentlemen knew what their only response could be.
Tux patted his claw on Reginald's shoulder. "Let's have tea, then." And it was just so.
In the depths of the cannon
"...And that's why, while we haven't been using the cannon exactly, we did find another use for it."
"That's amazing," Twilight said. "I had no idea Luna... I mean, Princess Luna, had that much foresight." Even as she said it, Twilight thought now that it should've been obvious to her.
True to his word, Reed Roamer and his former-criminal thugs had activated the pumps at each of the respective cities. There was something poetic about the Spiral Staircase having been a prison and now it being operated by former crooks, but either way, they would be joining Twilight and the others as they made their escape. The four substances of Donquestria filled the massive chamber below Twilight's hooves, immense pressure building.
Trish nodded. "Mm-hmm. And now, for our part in things." Standing around a ring-shaped platform encircling and just above the chamber, were the members of the New Baltimare Gun Club. The platform had four stations accompanied by gauges, levers, dials, knobs, doodads and what have you but no computers. There was nothing electrical in the complex aside from what had been installed after the cannon was converted into a prison.
The four donkeys got to work. Only the four of them, the Gun Club members, really knew how to work the enormous contraption.
"Readings are looking good so far," Vintage said. He tapped with of the dials with his hoof. "Could use a good dusting, though."
"We'll have to make a not of that," Poshley remarked, busy at his own station. "Are the calibrations set, Libby?"
"Almost... there... aaaaaannnnddd," Libby examined her sensitive scientific instruments. The toaster dinged, the toast popped up and Libra grabbed the first slice and took a bite. "Mmmmm-hmm, yup! We're good!" Truly, the intricacies of the cannon's complex inner workings were a technological marvel that few minds could comprehend. Maybe Pinkie.
"What do I do?" Twilight asked, in a voice that sounded timid to ears not her own. Even with all her power, she was still the same cautious and clever purple mare she'd always been.
"Just a moment, your majesty! And..." The microwave dinged, the kettle whistled and a tiny figurine of a Scotsman blew his bagpipes. And yeah, no electricity, that's still going on.
Outside, as Dan did battle with the flying steel donut, a massive dome of magic energy covered the concave complex. Dark as night at first, it slowly materialized into a view of space. But not just any space, no- deep space. Quite possibly the spaciest space of all, even more than that one with the jam in it.
Stars, nebulae, planets all appeared across the vast vista overhead. It was like the complex had a giant planetarium projection above it.
Even though Twilight was deep inside the cannon itself, she saw everything above her and more. Princess Luna and the donkeys had been mapping the stars, mapping space itself. She started looking for a second Equestria long ago.