***Saturday, Day 15, morning***
*Door closing*
Huh? What was that… must have been Hydro leaving.
I crack open one eye to look at my clock.
7:30… on a Saturday… curse you Hydro, how dare you interfere with my plans to sleep late…
I work my way out of my bed and look over at Specter’s bed on the shelf. He sits there staring at me with a look that says ‘You may be getting up, but I’m going back to sleep.’ With that brief unspoken statement he promptly curls up and goes back to sleep as I try to wake myself up enough to successfully walk down the hall without hitting anything.
One breakfast of biscuits, jelly, and the last of the milk later, and I was ready for the next part of my day, restocking the groceries.
Wait, I feel like something is missing…
I feel a familiar weight on my head as Specs forces me to hold up my promise to spend more time with him.
Ok, now I’m ready.
Some Resing around town with a squirrel perched on my head later. (How’s that for a time skip?)
Ok last thing on the list, milk. Hmm should probably up it to three gallons at a time now… I think they said their based at the Acres.
I Blink my way over to the dairy barn at Applejack’s farm and spot some of the bovine in question.
Ok, now for the difficult part, which one of these is the one I was talking to last time about my order? Without as many distinguishing colors as ponies have, cows are harder to tell apart for me.
I eventually found Daisy Joe, the acting spokescow for the herd, and got myself all set up after enduring some light jabs that I must have a baby at home to keep going through all this milk. I told the ladies they better hope my kids like this stuff as much as I do, because if that’s the case I’ll probably have to make this trip 2-3 times a week! I chuckle to myself as I start down the path.
Nice ladies… hmm?
I squint my eyes at some colorful blurs moving around down in some of the apple fields as I head back. Recognizing a few of them, I head closer to see Hydro, Applejack, and a red stallion as tall as me but much more muscular. A yellow blur running around the trees proves the presence of a certain Apple filly as well.
Hydro notices me and waves as I get closer, “Hey, Rhino! What are you doing here?”
I stare at him with the easily noticeable gallons of milk in my bag.
Apparently it registers to him after a moment, “Oh right, stupid question.”
I roll my eyes at him as I turn to the orange one of the group, “Good morning Applejack.”
She smiles back, “Morning Rhino, oh where are my manners? This here is my brother, Big Macintosh.” She pats the large red earth pony on the side.
Same height as me or not this guy is huge!
We shake hooves, “Nice to meet you,” I say.
“Eeyup.”
Applejack puts a foreleg over her eyes and sighs, “Sorry about that, Big Mac doesn’t talk much.”
I shrug. Fine by me, I’ve never been one for forcing casual conversation.
I look at what looks like a trench behind the three ponies, “So what are you three up to anyways?”
Hydro goes on to explain how he’s setting the orchard up with a new irrigation system. The logistics are something along the lines of installing every other row of the orchard with mini sprinklers for the tree will save time on watering and lead to more time for other farm chores. It will also save them money on clouds for those days when they don’t have time to water the trees by hoof. They were working with a small section of the field as a trial, but before anything else can be done, first you have to dig the trenches for the pipes.
Makes sense, seems they’ve got it all figured out.
Hydro looks at me, “Hey why don’t you help us out with this?”
Well, I’d like to but I have these groceries and well…
Applejack looks toward from over where she was appraising the hole, “We could really use yer help.”
… And now there’s no way I can say no without feeling guilty, thanks Applejack…
“Umm, sure!”
Hydro looks to me like he knew it was going to come to this, “Nice, alright, why don’t you go drop Specter and the groceries off at the house and while you’re in town,” he hoofs me an envelope, “drop this off at town hall so we can get approval for a large scale irrigation system when the time comes. Come back here after that and we’ll be all set to finish up this section.”
***
A while later I find myself back with the reinforcements of Twilight, Volt, and Blue.
How did this happen again?! Ok let me think, Twilight saw me coming out of town hall and I ended up telling her about the work over here and she got weirdly excited about helping organize the efforts for the installation. Blue was flying over and heard us talking and asked whether he could tag along to ask the Apples about a job since he really needed a source of income, he said the opportunity to show them he was a good worker would help too. What was Volt’s reason… oh I remember:
Volt looks at me with his still fairly bandaged body, “Apparently when librarians know princesses, they have enough pull with the government to force you not to work when you’re injured even if you really want to.”
I nod sagely, “Indeed, librarians are mysterious and powerful beings.”
With all of us here it should go faster. Twilight is put in charge of keeping us on track, Volt being her assistant in the matter, Applejack and Big Macintosh are laying the pipes in the already dug out parts of the trench, and Hydro, myself, and Blue are handed shovels to dig.
If I’m going to sit here and shovel dirt today, I’m going to have some fun with it.
Hydro points me to a spot to start, “Ok Rhino, start over there and Blue and I will meet you back here from our side.”
I salute with the shovel in my magical grasp, “Roger that, oh sultan of soil.”
He raises an eyebrow before heading off with Blue. We toil for a bit before digging to the designated spot.
I look towards Hydro, “What next, duke of dirt?”
I get my next orders and get Blue assisting me this time, of course things are no fun if they go smoothly.
I shout over to Hydro, “Hey earl of earth! Can I get your opinion on this tree root?”
Hydro walks over and gives it a look, confers with Applejack, and comes back to us, “Just go around it.”
I start digging, “As you command, lord of loam.” Hydro goes back to his hole.
I think I saw a smirk that time.
The day continues like this for a while as I come up with new titles, each time I feel myself wearing away at him more and more.
“Governor of grit.”
“Baron of brown.”
“Monarch of mud.”
Eventually Applejack calls us in for a drink to refresh ourselves. Hydro calls out to Blue and I since we are the farthest away.
I yell back, “Acknowledged oh queen of questionably clean!”
As I walk up to the refreshing lemonade, Hydro gives me the eye, “Are you done with the titles yet?”
I swirl my glass a moment searching for ones I hadn’t thought of yet, “Yeah, I think that’s all I have for now.”
Hydro finishes his lemonade and sets it back down on the table with a thud, “Good.” He looks over at Twilight, “But just in case, Twilight, would you mind casting that little mind spell of yours on Rhino so we have some music to listen to?”
Twilight looks up from a blueprint she was scanning, “Oh sure, no problem.” Her horn glows and I hear the music in my head project for everypony around to hear as they work.
Hah! You can’t escape it Hydro.
Work for a good while to the tune, the beat keeping us all working at a steady pace until we shovel the last bit of earth onto the now filled back trenches signaling the day’s work ended. Applejack brings us out a basket full of cool apples which taste amazing after working all day despite the fact we were surrounded by them for the entirety of said day.
We all sit there munching and cooling off, Hydro explaining that the system won’t be up few at least a week since he had to get things all set up on the dam’s end of things. Applejack nods and Big Mac gives his single word approval as well. We eat for a little longer until our ears perk up at a strange scraping sound. We all look to the source to see the shovels all slowly dragging themselves blades first towards an unsuspecting Volt’s backside. The movements were smooth as if they were drawn to him.
As the shovels reach Volt they lay their blades flat onto his thighs, causing him to look back and notice them. He promptly stands up and tries to shake them off but they simply swing back and forth still attached to his hips by their blades.
We all bust out laughing as I remark, “Volt, I know times are tough since you can’t work right now, but surely you can afford to make yourself a dress out of something other than farm tools?”
The resulting increase in laughter was probably heard even back in town.
Blue was the first to get his merriment under control as he finished an apple and looked after the orange provider of it, “Applejack, I’ve been meaning to ask, do you have any paying jobs I could do here on the farm?”
Applejack gives him an apologetic look, “Sorry sugarcube, but harvest season ain’t here yet so we don’t have much to do other than general upkeep. Ya’ll might try to weather office though.”
Blue perks up at this, “That’s a great idea!” He zooms off the find the office before it closes.
We stare at his empty seat a moment before shovel dress over there remarks, “Did he just ditch us?”
I give him a blank look, “That depends, was that pun intentional?”
“Umm, no?”
“Then yes he ditched us.”
“What would you have said if I said yes?”
I swallow a bite of apple, “I wouldn’t have said anything, I would have watched Hydro bop you with one of those shovels.”
Even Volt laughs as we all unwind after a long day.