//------------------------------//
// Interlude: Shipping and Handling 
// Story: Equestrian Concepts 
// by Achaian 
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Interlude



Shipping and Handling



The mornings were always calm and gentle, the afternoons more hectic and intriguing, the evenings revealing and revelatory. If that pattern held, today would be quite the day. Maybe her morning would last forever. Maybe I’ll grow a horn, too.

It wasn’t really as much of a question of how to find him as much as which way she would choose to find him. Ditzy was absentmindedly enjoying some tea that room service had brought her, coming to terms with the path she had chosen, and still finding it hard to believe that it was only three days ago that she had been on a train to Canterlot, oblivious to the worlds contained within. When she awoke this morning, the first things she had noticed were a fuzzy taste in her mouth, a poor reaction to light, and a persistently painful headache: sure signs of a hangover, but she had expected something of that nature. Once she cleared her mind of the desire to close all the blinds, plug her ears and bury herself in her bed by means of a cold shower—and the colder implications of how her mood might swing if she gave herself too much time to wonder about the things she had seen—she began her planning. Tick didn’t appear in the brightest of lights in his recollections. But Ditzy wasn’t going to let herself think about that, anyways. At least not consciously.

So instead she thought how astounding it was that she was not broken. The severity of her extreme swings in mood and perspective over the last few days were more than unsettling; they called into question the very core of her existence. For she believed herself to be a rational, pragmatic individual, and had filled the few years of her adult life with a relatively simple existence and the singular struggle of acceptance in a small town. She had done her best to raise Dinky in a loving home—she missed her dearly now; Ditzy wondered how she was doing cohabitating with Rarity and Sweetie Belle—and had remained dedicated to her job. After Discord had worn away the supporting pillars of her mental fortitude, she had been continuously experiencing a slow collapse of the temple of her mind. With no walls to protect her, her more savage emotions had been given contested reign of her consciousness; an endless struggle against pain and apathy had ensued. The encounter with Rainbow Dash had just been a breaking point.

It was just a lapse. I have to guard myself against it; it had just been a long time and so I wasn’t prepared.

The still-unexplained event at the falls had granted her a measure of peace and fortitude, but she now knew that it wouldn’t just be that easy. She had to fight for her own mind, own righteousness, own sanity against this… maelstrom, torrent, nightmare, whatever she might call it.

Unbidden, memories of Tick’s recollections flooded her mind, but one thing in particular was recognizable this time. Although it had been reflected through many minds, Luna’s Nightmare seemed uncomfortably familiar, for that was what it was, after all—it had to be a piece of what Luna could remember from her banishment. Something in Tick’s mind had triggered Luna’s remembrance, and it had been powerful enough to dominate Tick without any apparent struggle. Was what Tick did intentional? What had happened afterwards and how did he get here? Why did it feel so familiar to me?

It was an unsettling enough thought that her troubles might be related to an ancient, unknown phenomenon that it jolted her back out of her thoughts into physical realization as she shifted on her bed. Was it even possible that a thousand years of tormented existence was relatable to someone who would live at most a tenth of that?

I can’t think about that now. I won’t get anywhere. It’s all just conjecture and I’m getting too worried over an issue that I solved a long time ago.

Silently berating herself for sliding back into untenable questions, she reviewed what evidence she had of Tick. She could brood over her problems when she had more context. Laid out before her were all of the pieces of parchment that Tick had written his answers upon. While he had not included any information about his current residence, that wasn’t a problem for Ditzy. At least, not for what she was planning. Aside from that, she knew several important things. First of all, she knew what he looked like. Second, she knew he was injured: he would then have a hospital record and therefore a paper trail could be found beyond what she already had. Third—and this was the most volatile piece of information—she knew his name, or one of his aliases. This had potential to be the most or least valuable piece of information, likely somewhere in between. ‘Tick’ could be anything: a nickname, which was likely, an alias or pseudonym, which was likelier, or his actual name, which was plausible. Any of those would help immensely. However, he could have created it in an impromptu manner and thus it would be useless. Fortunately for Ditzy, she wasn’t examining his responses for clues to his whereabouts, or hoping for some hidden inspiration about him. It didn’t matter what he looked like, nor was she planning to go through the local hospital records. She didn’t need his name, either.

She was memorizing his hoofwriting. Actually, the two most important pieces of information she had were that and the fact that he would be having a massive hangover right about now.

Every last pony had a distinct style to their writing and lettering, even if they used magic as their scribe. Ditzy knew every exact style of the inhabitants of Ponyville, to the point where she knew some only by how they wrote and not by person. She had ended up reading a lot of the improperly addressed mail, although technically she wasn’t supposed to, and ended up being able to send most of them along because of it. Occasionally she even learned the interesting thing or two about her neighbors, but she declined to talk about it, and told nopony else of her readings. It doesn't happen often, and it’s for a good enough cause. I don’t abuse that privilege.

The significant feature of the hangover was that he couldn’t be traveling and was probably hunkered down in some dark, quiet hole cursing the day alcohol was discovered, making him just that easier to find. He was hiding now, and he couldn’t run. If he does manage to run it will be slowly and painfully.

Bereft of reasons to stall any longer, she once again stored Tick’s writings and left her room. As she exited through the lobby, she noticed that Quirk still wasn’t there—she couldn’t make up her mind whether to bug him about last night’s performance or steer clear of him. It was a secondary concern, though. Probably tertiary. Not to mention, she really didn’t want to run into any situation where he could attempt any kind sort of sexual advance or talk to him in any fashion. She had more important things to do, like try to mail herself in a package by infiltrating the Canterlot post office after identifying Tick’s address only by his handwriting.

It had a reasonable chance of success, considering he would probably be at his home. He would never suspect a package to actually contain anypony, and she would be fine inside of a package as long as she took all necessary precautions, and forged a note that recommended express delivery and extreme delicacy in shipping and handling. It had a better chance of success than just showing up at wherever he lived; he would understandably be caught extremely off his guard.

The post office for the city of Canterlot was decidedly nondescript, being tucked in between a shop and a restaurant that were almost garish in comparison to its blank, grey walls. It had a single door in the front along with a couple windows, all too small to squeeze through. She watched it for a minute, and nothing came in or out. It would be a tough job to get in undetected. There were an immense number of variables surrounding any plot to creep inside.

Or I can just walk in the front door.

So she entered through the solitary door openly, without any attempt to hide her intent. Fortunately, none of that was needed, as the door opened into a small lobby with a lone clerk snoring, head on his hooves, behind a counter. His mane was lengthy for a stallion and sandy-colored, with his horn just showing through it and what looked oddly like a dark purple paint splatter on one side.
Ditzy approached and cleared her throat, failing to seize his attention. Her initial efforts thwarted, she began mercilessly poking him until he awakened. His head rolled about; he muttered something directed at an entity named Inkie about how they couldn’t leave paint buckets lying around.

“Can I help you?” he asked groggily, his eyes still half-closed from his slumber. Ditzy had more than half a mind to tell him off for sleeping on the job. She was a mailmare too, after all, and had a strong dislike for laziness, but she retained focus. She had to keep a pedestrian profile; she could do nothing that would grab attention.

“Do you mind if I go through some of the old residence records? I’m trying to find where an old friend went,” Ditzy asked casually. It was only half a fabrication, at least.

“Nope. Just, ah, sign in first.” He yawned. “And make sure you put everything back where you found it.” He laid his head back down, shifting until he found a comfortable position.

Through a door, into a cramped room, she set herself up at a small table in the remarkably stuffed but still sizeable room. On one side, a chute for all the receiving mail led into sorting bins, and those into sorted stacks, in a grander simulation of her own workspace. The other four walls were dominated by shelves stacked upon shelves, filled to the brim (and to overflowing, in some cases) with record books, sheaves of paper, and, of course, mail. Alarm bells went off in the back of Ditzy’s mind—if left uncontested, this mess could spiral out of control in less than a week and cause one of those catastrophic mail explosions that Rainbow Dash had been so intrigued by. No time to worry about that now—the records would take ages to sift through and identify. Ditzy decided to leave a notice with the dream-laden painted clerk after she had found Tick’s records. It wouldn’t take that much effort to prevent it, but I don’t have time and it’s their mess anyways.

Two hours later, she was nearly buried by stacks of hoof-written books containing all the notifications of residents changing their addresses. Ditzy had never seen as many books, except for the one time she had been delivering an unusually large shipment of books to Twilight’s library and had run into Twilight herself, who had been in the throes of a dilemma (not to mention the throes of a veritable mountain of thick-looking tomes) about how light was a wave or a particle, or both somehow, and that was supposed to be impossible and Ditzy didn’t even know what. She didn’t understand much of Twilight’s ramblings about science or literature or books in general, anyways. Few did. The point was that Ditzy was getting tired of scanning through the thousands of pages of droll, scribbled records, and she suspected that if she took too much longer the opportunity to catch Tick would slip away from her.

Flying back up to one of the higher racks, Ditzy grabbed the next couple of record books, bound with strips of thin metal instead of the usual hard backings. It was an unconventional method of binding, but it made the books flexible and harder to damage at the same time. She hadn’t seen that particular method of binding before, and she stored it away in her mind as an idea that might be useful in some unforeseen context later.

Unfortunately for Ditzy, her absorption with the strange bindings led her to crash into a parallel shelf on her way down to her appropriated desk. She must have cursed a bit louder than she should have, because a few moments later the sandy-haired clerk poked his head into the room. Great. At least I didn’t knock it over.

“Everything ok?” he asked, glancing around the room.

“Yes, yes, fine. Just fine,” Ditzy answered hurriedly.

“You’ve been looking for few hours, do you want some help?”

“No,” Ditzy answered more firmly than was needed.

“‘Kay,” he answered, sounding like he was unsure how to respond. “If you need some help, I’ll be out here.”

If you aren’t sleeping on the job again. If I worked here… “Alright, thank you.” She answered more amicably this time, and the sandy-maned mailworker removed his head from the doorway as it closed. Silently, she once again reminded herself that drawing attention to her plans would only disrupt them.

With a sigh, she returned to the scribbled letters preserved in the strangely bound tome. To ensure the accuracy of mail, whenever somepony moved or obtained a new residence they had to inform the postal service. This was also how the Equestrian Revenue Service kept track of the general population, so it was taken seriously. Taxes were enough trouble without an auditor or tax evasion fines compounding the mixture of unpleasant paperwork. She was about halfway through scanning Canterlot’s last five years of records so far. I have to be getting close.

Many enervating, incredulously boring minutes later, without fanfare or excitement, she found it. The notation looked a little odd; there were some abbreviations and figures that probably denoted some difference in the way Canterlot ran its addresses, but it was definitely Tick’s hoofwriting. She pulled out one of his responses to confirm, and she was vindicated at last. Tick was also his actual name, oddly enough, or at least the name he preferred. It reinforced an initial perception of Ditzy’s that he was not, generally, of a bad way—he had given her his real name after all. It was just a guess she had had, but its confirmation made her feel more confident.

Ditzy held the book still, pausing for a moment of introspection. It was a quiet room, filled with the dust of a thousand pages. The silence was calming, and the simple work had drained most of her anxieties and left her in a reverie. With a mild sense of satisfaction and finality, she leaned back, thinking of the one she was chasing.

So you are Tick, and now I can find you and figure out this mess that you so unexpectedly gave me, along with your other oddities. You’re wounded and I don’t know how deep; you care about things that nopony else does. I wonder about you…

But Ditzy would not linger on speculation; she preferred by far to get to the real thing. That moment would be within this very day if her scheming came to fruition. All she had to do now was mail herself to Tick’s place. And get herself in the package. And get the undoubtedly asleep clerk’s attention while in said package without arousing suspicion as to her being in the package.

Not my first option, but I can’t take the time to figure out where this is and get there myself.

She looked around the room, pieces coming together to the plan she had hazily imagined earlier.

It would be easy enough. She would prop a bookshelf onto a chair, tie some string to a leg of that same chair, and thread it through an air hole in the crate she had prepared. Packaging tape could be used while inside to seal up the top whilst inside, and she could use the string to dislodge the chair, causing the shelf to collapse and the staff to come running; they would see the crate with the forged notes of urgency and commence panicking. One-day shipping meant that if it was late, the refund came out of the responsible worker’s check, so they would inadvertently deliver Ditzy that day instead of waiting for the next to send her off.

Into the crate she went. Ditzy had to admit, in the very back of her mind she might have had a shadow of a doubt about the possibility of this not being the wisest decision, but she was driven, decided, determined. She wasn’t about to stop now, so close was she. With the slightest hint of trepidation, she took the plunge—made the irrevocable choice—all else had been thought; now it was immutable action. Funny that it should be crawling into an oversized, repurposed crate originally designed for books that should inscribe her fate.

And before she knew it, she was in a dark crate save for the miniscule circular rings of light surrounding her with a string between her teeth, pulling the chair out from under a shelf. A very loud, messy crash resounded. She heard somepony run to the door, open it, followed by a very loud groan, then a sigh and some quiet cursing.

“Inkie!” She heard him yell—it had to be the clerk. “I’m going to need some help!”

“Coming!” Ditzy heard a young mare’s voice call. It was vaguely familiar—had she run into Ditzy before? She had little time to contemplate and investigate, as the clerk had noticed the unsent crate.

“Oh, sweet Celestia no… Inkie, we missed a priority package somehow. We need to get this out immediately, we’ll be lucky enough if we can get this cleaned up before The Inspector gets here.”

“Okey dokey. Have fun with The Inspector!”

"I don't think 'fun' is the right word..." Ditzy heard the clerk mutter as the door closed, and she thought sympathetically along similar lines.

She felt a stab of guilt for the mess she had caused. She had been the object of The Inspector’s scrutiny before, and it had been about as pleasant as Tartarus must be. The Inspector had a critical, single eye on which he wore a monocle; whatever remained of the other eye was unknown, covered with an eyepatch. He had the distinct air of angry dissatisfaction with everything: he despised filth, grime, unorderlyness, and inattentiveness, and laziness. Not a single pony knew his real name, or the few who did dare not speak of it. His mane had started to grey; it was rumored he had a history in the Fillydelphian mail explosion. The last mailpony to pry into that matter had lost his job soon after. He was a force of science and nature, freezing all nearby with his dominating aura while his eye starkly and efficiently analyzed everything around him. He was one of very few who could look Ditzy in the eyes for extended periods of time and not lose focus. And now he was headed here, to pour his wrath out on those unfortunate souls, the sleepy clerk and Inkie while the records and mail-sorting room now comprised of a small disaster area. Ditzy felt terrible; being subjected to him was something she would wish on no pony. She would have to make it up to Inkie and the clerk later, somehow. Hopefully anonymously. She didn’t want to have to explain what she had done and have to insistently defend her sanity afterwards. It’s all a moot point. I’m probably not going to see them again. If I can make it up to them later I will.

Nonetheless, she felt guilty.

As those thoughts transpired in her mind, she felt her crate being loaded into whatever vehicle they were going to use to transport her. At least they put the crate the right-side up. She felt the light bumpiness of the road begin. It was nice and dark, surprisingly cozy. She had had the foresight to put some padding in the crate, and she was very glad of it. The temptation to sleep was strong, and she resisted it only for a short while. Losing so much sleep over the past few days didn’t bode well for that fight. She could take a nap, she reassured herself. It would take long enough for her to get wherever she was going, so she curled up into anticipatory dreams, dreams of lights and shadows, of nightmares and a brilliantly bright and burning radiance that was either healing or incinerating—it was hard to tell at times.

A lone cart rolled down the sunburst-styled, elegant avenues, destined for the unexplored palace.