Chapter 3
The Canterlot EqueRail Station was the type of location that came with a buildup. Long before the glazed front of its head house came into view, one couldn’t help but become acutely aware of its presence. A few miles from the station, Storm Stunner, Check Mate, and Crack Shot had begun to notice young, entrepreneurial foals flattening coins into unspendable discs on the tracks (in the economy of youth this was actually lucrative industry, and on the playground, a well-pressed bit could bring in thrice the cost of materials), and soon made out the tell-tale chorus of distant train whistles.
Farther along, hotels began to rise around them, taxis started crowding the streets, throngs of ponies ambled about with bags of luggage, and souvenir vendors found a nice niche selling Canterlot memorabilia, little of which was actually produced in Canterlot. Crack Shot panned his head about, taking in some of the hustle and most of the bustle.
“Jeez, what a mob scene!” he said. “I wonder where all these ponies are comin’ from and where they’re goin’.”
“Honestly, it could be just about anywhere,” Check Mate replied. “As I’ve heard, Canterlot is one of the primary junction stations of the EqueRail Company; long-distance commuters from different regions of Equestria stop here by necessity, and often they take advantage of the chance to see the city while they’re here.”
“All roads lead to Canterlot, huh?”
“Well, in a manner of speaking. It is more a matter of the efficient usage of resources. Rather than having a tangle of lines between every individual station and the profligacy of iron and lumber such construction would entail, and rather than attempting to reform great tracts of land, it’s more prudent to have individual nexus between key loci, and from those divarication.”
Crack Shot paused in place for a moment. “Twenty-bit word for ‘branching’, right?” he said at last.
Check Mate gave an embarrassed chuckle. “Er, sorry, yes, branching.”
“Heh, no need for apologizin’; not many ponies can say they’re friends with a word-a-day calendar. But I guess that’s the trouble with readin’ too much, dude,” Crack Shot mused. “You forget which words you’re not supposed to know. So one of those lines is gonna be divaricatin’ our way, I take it? Where were we goin’, again?”
“We’ll be travelling to Fiddler’s Plain, and we’ll be able to further plan our course once we arrive at the station; there they’ll be able to advise us on the appropriate route.”
Storm scanned the crowds. “Hmm, well whatever that may be, I hope we packed enough for it.” Seeing so many ponies struggle with their bags brought home how weightless his felt on his withers.
“Aw, we’re good, dude. Heck, my grandma always used to say it’s a good idea to pack light, just in case you ever need to skip town in a hurry.”
The guardsponies walked on in silence for a while, Storm and Check Mate sharing a look. Crack Shot began whistling.
“I take it the Guard hasn’t traditionally run in your family, then?” Storm asked carefully.
“Hmm? Nah, not that I know of. It might’ve run after a few of ‘em, though.”
As the road wound down a few more blocks, the crowds of peripatetic ponies grew thicker. Farther still, more and more businesses felt it necessary to include words like ‘tracks’ and ‘railway’ in their names, in the event that after a multi-hour train ride, anypony needed a reminder. Finally, turning at a corner, the guardsponies came to a signpost that did little else than reinforce what the rattling of rails and patterns of whistle code had been announcing in vivid, aural detail. Ahead of their approach, nested at the end of the cobblestones, stood the EqueRail Station, and its buildup was entirely deserved.
There were many features which could be used to describe the exterior of the Canterlot branch station. There was its aforementioned façade, formed of great panels of glass which were kept so impeccably polished that the savvier city birds had long ago learned not to bother with the area around the building, pointing their beaks elsewhere if they wished to keep the lengths of them. There was the steam and smoke which billowed and trailed from the engines in thick plumes off in the distance across the autumnal sky, to and from the station like a private, miniaturized weather system. There were the brightly colored, woodcut, split-flap displays keeping track of each arrival and departure in a series of clacks. There were also quite a lot of clocks. They appeared high beneath the eaves, grouped on brass posts, and in the following bit of philosophical thought:
There is an expression: ‘Even a broken clock is right twice a day.’ Now, if one were to allow for consideration of an exact Equestrian time based on solar position, along with the picoseconds, attoseconds, yoctoseconds (somehow the term minutiae doesn’t feel quite apropos), etcetera that could define it, nailing it twice in a day begins to sound a little more impressive; a clock that runs just a bit slow or a tad fast might do so once if it’s lucky. Things get even trickier with the added variable of Celestia sleeping in that morning.
To solve this nonissue, a clever group of clockmakers with too much time on their hooves decided the next logical step would be to expand on what they termed the Broken Clock Principle, further exploring the potential usages of non-functionality. The culmination of this thought process eventually led to the development of a specialized species of clock: one whose hands spun as quickly as current engineering would allow, in essence causing them to lap the correct hour (and picosecond, attosecond, yoctosecond, etcetera) millions of times over the course of a day. These clocks were technically accurate at more instances per diem than any other to be found in Equestria. They were also, of course, entirely devoid of meaning or readability, although they did make for very good blenders.
The clocks to be found in the EqueRail Station were of the more traditional, pragmatic design, but they were well-crafted, painstakingly calibrated, and you didn’t need a tachometer to count the ticks. When faced with picoseconds, attoseconds, yoctoseconds, etcetera, they rarely, if ever, gave the exact Equestrian time based on solar position.
But they came very, very close.
In ignorance of all of this, Storm said, “Looks like it’s about a quarter ‘til one; shall we head inside and see about getting some tickets?”
---
The head house’s foyer was even more of a sprawl than its outside, with a polychromatic sea of ponies ebbing and flowing between destinations, before and beyond the main ticket gates. However, the guardsponies had no trouble spotting the colorful banner of an information kiosk across from the entrance. More interestingly, they had no trouble approaching it. Unlike outside where everypony had been drifting in a kind of Brownian motion anyways, it was clear that as the guardsponies moved forward, ponies were making a subtle, but not unnoticeable effort to move out of their way. Like it or not, that was the buffer the Royal Guard barding provided: about a quarter inch of steel, a micron of gilt, and ten feet of distance.
“You know, sometimes I wish they wouldn’t do that,” Storm said conversationally. “Every once in a while I’d like the chance to say, ‘Pardon,’ or ‘Excuse me,’ though they’d probably think I was about to interrogate them.”
“I know what you mean, dude; armor’s like, I dunno, a reverse magnet.” Crack Shot tilted his head from one side to another as he weighed this theoretical concept. “What would you call that anyways, a mag-not?”
Check Mate bit his tongue. “…I wouldn’t, personally.”
“Maybe it’s just movement that does it,” Storm mused. “If you’re standing still, say outside of an important-looking gate or a special engagement, then nopony has any qualms about getting up close and looking up your nostrils or posing for a photograph.”
Crack Shot shrugged. “I figure it’s like this: if ponies see us on the beat, they assume that we’re on the lookout for trouble, right? And heck, that we might not have that much trouble, well, finding trouble if we wanted to.”
“And just how would we do that?”
“Easy, dude, you’d just have to call ‘em on, I dunno, loiterin’. Or conspiring to loiter. Or conspiring to conspire to loiter. Something like that. Maybe they figure one of us’ll go on a power trip if they get on our bad side or get in our way.”
“That’s terrible! None of us would do that!”
“Yeah, but they don’t know that.”
Storm sighed. “Come on, let’s just find out about these tickets.”
A path clearing itself through the ponies ahead of him, Storm strode briskly towards the kiosk with the purpose of getting on the tracks as soon as possible. This turned out to be more purpose than the pegasus standing behind the counter was prepared to deal with from a pony clad in official gold, and she gave him a worried look.
“Is something the matter, sir?” she asked, steeling herself. She had thought so little of taking the odd quill or two from work, and now here she was, found out and royally plucked.
“Huh? No, not that I’m aware of; I was just hoping you could give us a hoof with something. My friends and I are trying to get to Fiddler’s Plain.”
“Oh? Oh. Oh! Well, I can help you with that, no problem! Just one moment, please”—the pegasus ducked beneath the counter and resurfaced exactly one moment later with a brochure between her teeth—“and here you are, sir. Now, your best bet heading up that way is going to be the Borealis Byway; it passes through Fiddler’s Plain on its journey northward. Information about rates and amenities is listed inside, and tickets are available at one of our many booths, though of course I’ll be happy to answer any questions that you may have.”
“I believe this should be just fine,” Check Mate said as he levitated the brochure from the counter. He smiled gently at the mare. “Thank you very much for your assistance.”
After the Royal Guardsponies had disappeared once more into the throng, the pegasus exhaled deeply in relief. She then reached backwards and, with a slight wince, plucked a pinion from her wing and placed it in the quill holder beneath the counter. She had gotten lucky with the law and felt no sense in tempting fate twice.
---
Away from the kiosk, Check Mate unfolded the brochure, as Storm and Crack Shot gathered on either side of him to get a better look.
“Ah-hmm, it would appear that locomotives bound for Fiddler’s Plain only run thrice daily during the week, and that we’ve already missed the morning departure; however, there is another at 3:15,” Check read.
“Sounds good, let’s shoot for that one,” said Storm. “How much is it going to run us?”
“A one-way Economy ticket is listed at fifty bits, though as members of the Royal Guard it claims that we’re eligible for a ten percent discount.”
“Fifty bits?!” Crack Shot spat.
“Forty-five,” Check Mate corrected. He continued to read down the page. “Oh, how nice— foals under the age of six ride gratis.”
“Yeah, we might be a little big to pass. Yeesh, talk about friggin’ railway robbery; I thought it’d be like twenty bits, tops. I mean, the train’s already goin’ that way anyways, right? It’s not like we’d be askin’ it to hop tracks to make a detour.”
Storm leaned past Check and grinned. “You know, Crack Shot, if it’s going to make too large a hole in your wallet, we could always just follow by wing. It might make for a nice warm-up.”
Crack Shot rolled his eyes. “Eh, if I’m hurting for gold, I’ll just chip a bit off of my armor or something. Those seats better be comfortable as heck though, or I’m asking for a refund.”
Just as the pegasus at the kiosk had said, there was an abundance of ticket booths. Now, intuition would dictate that this would mean the benefit of much shorter queues due to additional hooves. This is because intuition does not work in customer service. Instead, the more senior ticket agents had long since decided that a much better benefit of additional hooves would be more hooves to pass the buck to in favor of a longer lunch break. And at one in the afternoon, everypony’s stomach was rumbling like the tracks. The guardsponies took a spot at the end of an extensive line that snaked between a serpentine length of red velvet rope towards a sacrificial ticket clerk.
Storm’s gaze drifted inevitably towards one of the station clocks. With a little over two hours, logic dictated that he and his friends had plenty of time to purchase their tickets. However, the line was inching forward rather slowly, seating space would be limited, and the interminable cadence of the seconds hand was drowning logic out. It was hard not worry. He glanced to his side and saw that Check Mate had removed the field guide lent to him by Ikebana from his bag and was eagerly turning through its pages. That set Storm at ease; if Check wasn’t concerned, that counted for something.
“Anything of interest in there?” he asked. As Check Mate looked up from the book, Storm saw that there was a newfound shimmer in the unicorn’s eyes.
“Everything!” Check exclaimed. “I’m currently reading through a section on dangerous and bizarre species, if you’re curious. Have you perchance heard of amanita phalloides, the mushroom also known as the death cap?”
“Uh, can’t say that I have,” Storm answered.
“Well, it’s notable in that it has a rather innocuous appearance; here is a picture if you’re interested”—Storm noted with mute horror how very similar in appearance the mushroom on the page was to the kind he’d eaten on a salad the other day—“and a pleasant bouquet and taste; however, as one might surmise from its colorful sobriquet, it is highly toxic.”
“I, um, I guess we’re talking a little worse than a stomach ache, then?” Storm chuckled uneasily.
“Oh, it’ll begin with a stomach ache; that’s the first sign of deterioration of the internal organs.”
Storm, his coat as white as it was, somehow managed to pale. “That’s uh… are there a lot of plants like that, out there in the rough?”
“Well, mushrooms aren’t technically a plant, but absolutely! According to an earlier entry, red maple leaves, while no danger when fresh on the branch, become erythrocytotoxic—that is to say they poison the red blood cells—as soon as they begin to wilt, due to a chemical breakdown during their decomposition.”
“Er, learn something new every day, eh?” Storm learned that he wasn’t going to be looking at maple syrup in the same way any time soon.
“So, any recommendations on what we can eat?” asked Crack Shot. “You know, just in case we don’t find any take-away places out in the middle of nowhere?”
“Mm, well, I haven’t gotten far enough in the book yet to find many recommended comestibles, I’m afraid.”
“What about grass?” Crack Shot asked. “Grass is alright, isn’t it?”
“Oh yes, certainly. Though caution is recommended when dealing with”—Check Mate flipped back a few pages—“arrowgrass, kleingrass, and sorghum to name a few.”
“Right,” said Storm miserably, “it’s nice to know that Mother Nature never wanted kids.”
“It is important for us to be aware of potential perils, lest they surprise us otherwise,” Check Mate said severely. “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, which may be difficult, if not impossible, to procure in such quantities, I might add.”
“Got it; discretion is the better part of breakfast. Just be sure to let us know what we can eat when we come across it, eh?” Crack Shot said.
“That I shall do.” Check Mate stuck his nose back into the book, his eyes widening in interest at the entry marked Cordyceps.
---
The line continued to move slowly, but move it did, until at last the guardsponies were at the head of it. With an absence of protest from Crack Shot, the three purchased their tickets at forty-five bits apiece and proceeded through the gates into the heart of the head house with over an hour until departure.
Despite having never taken a train ride, Storm nevertheless had certain expectations regarding the constituent parts of the process. There was, of course, the train; one couldn’t forget that. From there, one then needed the tracks, the ticket booths, the station, and to put all of them together in a way that got ponies from Point A to Point B, with perhaps a layover at Point C so everypony could stretch out their hooves. This was the limit to Storm’s expectations, so the sprawling pseudo city now unfolding before him came as a surprise.
Between two floors of prodigious expanse was a layout that would have given Canterlot’s shopping districts a run for their money, if it didn’t already catch potential patrons right at the starting gates. A number of famous Canterlot clothing retailers, restaurants, and even appliance dealers had storefronts within the station to lure in travelers off of the rails and off of their budgets. Souvenir shops like those outside of the station thrived inside of it as well, many offering an additional service where, for a nominal five-bit fee, they would use a specialized clockwork contraption to flatten a coin into an unspendable disc. There was even a bar or two tucked away for those ponies more eager to hit the salt than the road, and who knew that there was always another train coming. As they continued through the station, so did the storefronts, selling anything a pony could imagine and even some items beyond that.
The guardsponies eventually located the concourse at the other end of the station; the platforms jutted perpendicularly from both sides of it, just outside sets of double doors, like teeth on a two-sided comb. Comparing one of the station clocks to a nearby schedule board, Storm saw that a train destined for Ponyville was due to depart in a couple of minutes. Curious, he watched the seconds hand.
It struck the twelve once.
It struck the twelve twice, and there was the sound of a whistle and faint rumbling felt in his hooves. A part of him felt nonplussed; perhaps he had been inured to Corporal Kickstart’s unique take on time commitments, but there was just something unnatural about such reputable dependability.
After identifying their platform, and with plenty of time to kill, the guardsponies decided to pass it by returning to the enormousness of the station mall and squeezing into a nestled-away magazine shop-cum-café with the hideous name of CaBOOKse, claiming a table as soon as it freed. Storm noted dutifully to himself that the literary portion of the shop wasn’t nearly as nice as Nomde’s, by fault of, well, not being Nomde’s, although she would probably appreciate having such a ready source of caffeine nearby. Still, a brief scan of the selection was enough to validate this assessment. Aside from the magazines and newspapers, the written work available for purchase was comprised of nothing other than best-sellers. Storm smirked upon a recollection this stirred.
One night, when Nomde was locking up her shop after an hour or two of reorganization, Storm had decided to ask her a question about one of her store policies. Although she would give new releases a week at the front of her store, Nomde absolutely refused to keep a shelf for best-sellers. Often this lead to her shop getting disorganized in sloppy searches by ponies who, although they didn’t make it a habit of reading, nevertheless realized the pleasure in being able to say, ‘The book was better,’ and made their choices based on advertisement and celebrity recommendations.
Storm had asked her why she didn’t just set up a shelf to get such ponies in, out, and away from her, to which she had replied, “If I make them search for popular books, maybe it will hit home that other books exist. There are innumerous wonderful literary pieces out there that go unknown for not having had the benefit of an endorsement, so this is my way of leveling the playing field.” Then, after the spells binding her door had cooled, the two had gone on their way, and from there the memory was muddled into a pink haze of the whispers and teases and laughter of the rest of the evening.
He wondered what she was up to.
Check Mate was once more poring over his book, when Crack Shot nudged him on the shoulder.
“Hey, you mind if I check out that thing the geezer lent us?”
“Hm? Oh, but of course.” Check Mate levitated Gray Mane’s smart stone and stylus from his bag, and set it on the table before Crack Shot.
“Sweet, thanks!”
Crack Shot took the stylus in his mouth, gagged slightly at the adsorbed flavors of talcum and soy sauce, and then wrote across the small slab the words, What up, dude? He then blew across them, watching them wisp away in glittering green.
A few minutes later a reply coalesced on the upper panel in a hastily scrawled script.
Gray Mane says, and I quote: ‘Is that the layabout? If so, tell ‘im to pass over my bloody smart stone back to the nancy before he damages it.’
“Oh, what?!” Crack Shot picked up the stylus once more and scribbled furiously. Storm and Check Mate looked towards him in interest.
What the heck, Febs?! How’s he even know it was me?!
And so the momentous first exchange of this novel new mode of communication continued.
I imagine it would have been your distinctive diction. And I’d appreciate if you didn’t refer to me as ‘Febs’. Now, do you want something? For whatever reason, the old coot is working on a method to turn gold into lead to see if he can reverse it. It’s keeping me busy.
You said that you’d make sure that any letter we wrote would get sent out or whatever, right?
Gray Mane said that, but yes, I believe I have been corralled into such a task. Why, do you find yourself suddenly needing to send a letter, literally only hours after you’ve left the castle?
Sure, why not?
Miles away, a heavy sigh went unheard in Castle Canterlot.
Fine. By all means, go ahead. I’ll fetch a quill and parchment to transcribe it in the meantime. I do hope it’s important.
Crack Shot thought on all of that which he could include in this missive, and, deciding that brevity was, after all, the soul of wit, wrote the following:
Dear bro,
What up, dude?
-Crack Shot
It took a while for the response to arrive, but when it did, the penmanship had thickened noticeably, as if its writer were trying to carve it into the stone.
That’s it?!
Yep, short and sweet. Anything else you need?
Perhaps an address and, to avoid the inevitable ambiguity, a recipient that is identified a bit more specifically than ‘bro’?
Oh, whoops. Dude’s name is ‘Skyway’, and I guess you could send it to the Wonderbolts. They oughta make sure he gets it. Anything else?
That will be fine. Now if you’ll excuse me, one of our work tables has started galloping about the lab, so I would appreciate no more disturbances for the time being.
Sure thing, dude, TTYL.
“Huh, thing’s not too shabby.” Crack Shot slid the stylus and smart stone back across the table towards Check Mate. “Febre sends his regards, by the way.”
“That appeared to be quite the discourse between the two of you,” Check said as he returned the devices to his bag. “I imagine that he and Gray Mane are pleased with the functionality of their invention, though?”
“Ha, you wouldn’t know it by askin’ ‘em. Anyways, I hope that thing does work out in the sticks, because that’d be the only thing goin’ for it. The customer service kinda sucks.”
Crack Shot stood up and stretched.
“Alright, I got an extra whole five bits burnin’ a hole in my saddle bags from our royal discount, so I’m gonna head on over to the counter and see if I can afford part of a chai, if you guys wanna join me.”
---
When the EqueRail clocks struck five minutes ‘til three (with remarkable synchronicity, their engineers would have you know), the guardsponies gathered their saddlebags, departed from CaBOOKSe towards their platform, and were immediately stopped by a strained voice.
“Um, pardon me, but are you three members of the Royal Guard?”
The guardsponies turned to see a unicorn stallion looking at them, his brows knit with worry and sweat.
“What gave it awa—mmph?!” Crack Shot was silenced by a thrust of feathers into his face.
“Yes, that is correct,” Storm said, lowering his wing. “How may we help you, sir?”
The stallion noticed the saddlebags slung over each of the guardsponies’ withers. “Er, I won’t be putting you out of your way, will I?”
Storm snuck a glance at one of the station clocks. “…We’ll worry about that, sir. What seems to be the problem?”
“Well, you see, it’s my son.” The stallion’s throat bobbed. “He’s gone missing.”
The guardsponies’ eyes widened. A crowd like the one filling the station with its mass and its noise was a beast. It would swallow you.
“When and where did you become aware of his disappearance?” Check Mate asked.
“It-it must have been no more than ten, fifteen minutes ago, back towards an information desk near the entrance gates.” The stallion gestured with a shaking hoof in its general direction. “I thought he was right there with me, I know he was! B-but when I looked down—”
Storm placed a hoof on the stallion’s shoulder. “We’re going to help you find your son, so please try to stay calm. What’s your name?”
“…D-Deckle. And my son’s name is Landscape. We came from Trottingham to visit his grandparents, you see.”
“Alright, Mr. Deckle, what can you tell us about Landscape?”
Deckle gave a brittle smile that cracked at the edges. “Well, let’s see… he’s bright. He’s exceptionally bright. He once snuck into some watercolors I had left out and, well, he was a natural with them! Such an eye for it, and at such a tender age—”
“That’s wonderful. You should be very proud,” Storm interrupted gently. “However, would you be able to tell us a little about what he looks like?”
“Y-yes, of course, what was I thinking? He’s an earth pony. His mane is blonde, and he has a brown coat. He just turned three a few days ago, though I suppose he’s a bit small for his age. Oh, and his eyes are green if that helps. I’ve been asking everypony I’ve run into if they’ve seen him, but nopony has seen hide or hair…”
“I see. Alright, my name is Storm Stunner, and these two are Crack Shot and Check Mate.” The other two guardsponies nodded soberly. “Check Mate, how do you feel about Crack Shot and me continuing to spread word about Landscape, while you look around with Mr. Deckle?”
“I think that would be for the best, Storm; there is some more information I would like to learn about young Landscape. If that is alright, sir.”
“O-of course!” said Deckle.
“Okay, we’ll go and alert the station staff. If we find anything out, we’ll come and find you.” Storm nodded to Crack Shot. “Shall we?”
“Aye-aye, dude.”
The two pegasi leapt into flight and shot off across the head house to the sudden surprise of those ponies below them.
“Pardon me, sir,” Check Mate said, drawing Deckle’s attention from the spectacle, “you mentioned that your son has begun to paint, and that he had an eye for it. Could you clarify?”
“About his artwork? Well, yes, I suppose. Er, how would I put it…? He notices things, if that makes sense. He doesn’t know terms like value or chroma or crosshatching, but he incorporates them. He catches little details and communicates them.”
“I see. And has he also begun to read?”
“Well, he plays with his letter blocks, but that’s about the extent of it. He, erm, he hasn’t actually really begun speaking yet, though I make sure to read to him nightly.”
“But it’s possible that he does recognize letters, then?” Check Mate put a hoof to his chin in thought.
“Er, as far as I’m aware, that may be the case. Listen, I’m a proud father, but is this line of questioning really, well, critical? You know, er, given the current situation?” Deckle asked, anxiety strangling his voice to a piccolo pitch.
“Right now, yes. I believe they are the most salient questions I could ask.”
---
After a whirlwind trek spanning both floors of the station, Storm and Crack Shot reunited outside of a Pony Joe’s Express. At some point the clocks had struck three-fifteen to the muted accompaniment of whistles and engine noise from outside the building, but neither pony had noticed. Both had received assurances from the station staff that they would do everything in their ability to locate the missing foal. However, between the shapes, colors, sizes, and, most importantly, number of ponies passing through the station, none of the staff had taken special notice of a colt matching Landscape’s description prior to the guardsponies’ asking.
The two pegasi hadn’t any luck with an overhead view either: trying to find a pint-sized pony beneath the mishmash of manes was like attempting to find a sapling beneath a canopy. Storm cursed beneath his breath.
“Jeez, what a mess. You have to feel bad for the kid, huh?” he said. “All alone, separated from his dad, and probably no idea where he is.”
“Mm, yeah, I dunno, maybe…” Crack Shot had a distant look in his eyes, as if caught in some deep cogitation. Storm, completely unused to this, found himself unsettled.
“’Maybe’? Crack Shot, the kid has to be terrified!”
“Eh, could be, but I doubt he’s showin’ it, or else somepony probably woulda found him by now. A kid freakin’ out is one of those things ponies notice.”
Storm admitted to himself the possibility. “So what do you think he’s doing, then?”
Crack Shot watched a pair of ponies race past them towards the concourse. “Well, he might be tryin’ to figure out where his dad is.”
Storm waited for Crack Shot to continue.
“Like, a lot of ponies have it in their head that kids are dumb. And heck, maybe some are, but so are some adults, right? I think it’s more that they’re just caught up in tryin’ to figure out how things work. You know, like how two plus two is four, and four plus four is eight, and then how it just so happens that two fours are the same as four twos, and the next thing you know they’re tilting the plus sign over on its side and doin’ multiplication?
“The kid’s dad said he’s smart, right? Maybe he’s tryin’ to find his dad as much as his dad is tryin’ to find him.”
“So you think we should try to think like a foal would?”
“Why not, eh? Most ponies say that’s what I usually do.” Crack Shot stretched his wings. “I’m goin’ to check some other places out. Wanna go hunt down Check and see how they’re doin’?”
“Sure, I can do that.” Storm watched his friend as he prepared to take off once more. “You really think you know where he might’ve gone?”
“It’s just a hunch, but at least it’s something.”
---
Upon returning to the CaBOOKSe, Storm noticed the glint of Check Mate’s armor moving towards the concourse and flew up to catch him; Deckle was still beside him, a mess of misery, fear, hope, and determination. Check Mate acknowledged Storm with a nod, but didn’t slow his stride.
“Did either of you meet with any success in your inquiries?” Check Mate asked.
“Nothing, I’m afraid, but the word is out. Crack Shot did seem like he had an idea about where the kid went, though.”
“Yes, we saw him flying back towards the concourse in quite the hurry. I wonder… perhaps he has made a similar conjecture about Landscape’s whereabouts as we have.”
“And what is that?” Storm asked.
“Mr. Check Mate believes that my son may be on our platform looking for me,” said Deckle.
“But which one? There’s over a dozen!”
“Mr. Check Mate thinks that he might’ve seen where to go from one of the destination blinds, that he might have seen ‘Trottingham’ and recognized the word. Wouldn’t that be something? My own son reading at three years of age…” Deckle smiled weakly, pride for the moment topping the pit in his stomach that had been filled in with panic.
“Indeed it would be, sir,” said Check Mate with a charitable smile. “And should this assumption prove correct, we’ll have the both of you on the train home, reading together once more.”
As the crowds broke ahead of their stride, Storm snuck another glance at a schedule board for the next Trottingham departure. He looked at a clock. If Check Mate was to be correct, they would have to look quickly.
---
Crack Shot flew above the lengths of platforms, scanning them one-by-one and growing increasingly frustrated. Although a few of them were empty, most of them were already being crowded by ponies eager to be the first on their trains when they arrived.
“Dang, no sight of the ankle-biter so far,” he muttered to himself. “Jeez, that’s what, like, the fifth horseshoe cutie mark I’ve seen? It’s like these ponies are repeating themselves…”
He noted with annoyance that farther ahead a train had been so inconsiderate as to pull into the station and drop off another crowd of ponies to complicate his search. After moving back towards the concourse over another platform, Crack Shot flew over the top of the station and began scanning the next one, continuing his crisscrossing hunt, but meeting little luck.
---
Check Mate, Storm, and Deckle stepped through the doors for the Trottingham departure, whereupon the latter began pushing ahead through the crowds and shouting his son’s name. Farther down the rails, his train came into view. It was still a steaming point on the edge of vision that appeared nearly stationary, distance belying its speed.
“Still no sign of him so far,” Storm said.
The train signaled its approach with a low whistle.
“It would seem so...”
Check Mate took a deep breath and began to think carefully. Then he narrowed his eyes and searched. There was no seeing past the immediate line of ponies as they shuffled to watch Deckle struggle through the crowd, so he shifted his gaze to the other platform. Ponies waiting on the other side of the tracks for another train were beginning to turn towards Deckle in curiosity as well. Following the length of the platform, there only seemed to be more of the same—
—Check Mate’s eyes shot open, and he raced as quickly as he could towards Deckle and pressed a hoof tightly over his mouth.
“Mmff?!”
“Deckle, I ask that you be quiet and pay close attention. Move into the crowd, hide yourself, immediately.”
“Wh-why?”
Deckle found himself moving backwards, putting up little resistance against Check Mate’s press, until he caught a glimpse over the guardspony’s shoulder and froze in place. After a distressing, harrowing search, he had finally found him. There Landscape was, huddled under a bench at the end of the platform on the opposite side of the tracks. Unfortunately, Landscape had also spotted him. The colt’s green eyes lit up, and he quickly scrambled from beneath his hiding spot and scampered clumsily, frantically towards his father. Towards the tracks. The seconds stretched into terrible infinity.
Deckle was no longer thinking, operating on adrenaline and paternal, animal instinct. He was pushing past the guardspony and screaming at his son to stay put, and he was forcing his body to move, forcing it to run, forcing it to cover the impossible distance between them, and his son was tumbling down from the platform into the gravel, stumbling on the tracks, freezing in the face of the iron beast racing towards him, and others were screaming around him, but he was screaming louder, releasing a wordless, throaty cry that was swallowed by the bellow of that horrid engine and the futile screech of its emergency brakes as still it overtook him to overtake his son, and it was all happening too damn fast and he was too damn slow and—
—And then there was a flash of gold.
“Friggin’ yikes! Talk about cuttin’ it close! Didn’t your pops ever teach you to look both ways?” Crack Shot clutched the foal tightly between his hooves as they hovered above the rails. “I tell ya, it would’ve sucked to get plowed by that thing; I mean heart-shaped windows and pastel colors? That’s just—eugh!”
Landscape looked down towards the train which had very nearly ended his life.
“Hey, uh, you doin’ alright there, kiddo?”
Landscape tilted his head up towards the concerned face of his savior, the sun limning a halo around his helmet. Then he started screaming like crazy.
“WAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!”
“Whoa jeez!”
Crack Shot quickly descended and alighted next to his fellow guardsponies, whereupon little Landscape rushed into the hooves of his father to the sound of cheers and applause from all who had witnessed the spectacle. Station workers rushed onto the platforms, making sure there were no injuries inside or out of the train, and issuing assurances and apologies.
After the commotion and a preliminary inspection of the train, it was announced that the Trottingham departure would be delayed by thirty minutes to make sure that the train was fit to run after its sudden deceleration. It would be the first time in decades that a locomotive had ever run off-schedule from an EqueRail station. However, after seeing father and son reunited, the tears staining their cheeks and the soft sobs wracking their bodies, nopony was about to complain. His son pressed against the inside of his foreleg, Deckle looked towards the guardsponies with reddened eyes.
“Thank you. Heavens, thank you.”
“Aw, no worries, dude. We’re just doin’ our job.” Crack Shot gave a salute, with a wink added for good measure.
Once more Deckle’s eyes gravitated towards the guardsponies’ saddlebags. “We, er, um… you’re certain we didn’t put you out of your way?”
Crack Shot watched the foal pressed up against his father’s leg, trembling with his eyes squeezed tightly shut. A corner of his mouth bent upwards softly.
“Heh, nah. There’ll always be another train.”
---
The doors to the Trottingham-bound train slid shut, and with a belch of steam and smoke, it began rumbling down the tracks. After detailing the incident to one of the station workers, Storm joined Crack Shot and Check Mate to send it off. From a window, Deckle waved farewell to the guardsponies, and, for his part, so did little Landscape. As the train picked up speed and disappeared behind a roll of hills, Check Mate retrieved the Borealis Byway brochure from his saddlebag’s pocket and unfolded it.
“Well, that was excitin’,” Crack Shot said. “Now, how long until we take off?”
“According to the schedule,” Check Mate read, “the next and final departure should be about four hours from now, at 8:30.”
“8:30?!” Crack Shot’s mouth dropped. “What the heck, dude?!”
“Well, it wouldn’t be sensible for them to run their trains too closely together, after all.”
Storm gave Crack Shot a commiserative pat on the back. “If it’s any consolation, after speaking with the station staff I found that for your daring act of heroism they won’t require us to purchase a second set of tickets.”
“How generous of ‘em…”
The guardsponies entered back into the concourse and began walking towards the heart of the headhouse.
“Still, that was a pretty impressive dive back there,” said Storm. “Where’d you learn to pull something like that off?”
“Eh, growin’ up with a brother that wants to be in the Wonderbolts will do that to you.” Crack Shot grinned. “At least if you don’t want him to do anything to you after you drop a bucket of paint on his head. Call it a crash course in the school of hard knocks.”
“Nevertheless, that was truly laudable work today, Crack Shot; words do not suffice.”
Crack Shot shrugged. “No biggie. Still, four feather flippin’ hours! We better not have to pull off any more last-minute rescues today, or else we’re gonna have to find some benches to park on for the night.”
“I doubt we’ll have to worry about that; I think the station staff are going to be watching everypony like hawks after that scare.” Storm smiled. “Anyways, we’ve got four hours to pass. Come on; let us buy you another chai.”
---
A few hours later, when the gloaming turned to night as the last of the daylight bled away behind the hills west of Canterlot, the guardsponies finally boarded the train to Fiddler’s Plain. After showing their tickets to the steward, he directed them to the Economy cars and to their seating. The seats themselves weren’t much to look at, consisting of nothing more than plain, yellow, corduroy cushions a couple of feet off of the hardwood floor, but they were something soft to put one’s back to. After placing his saddlebags and armor at the base of one, that is precisely what Crack Shot did.
“What’s the verdict?” Storm asked.
“They can keep their bits,” Crack Shot answered, as he rolled over onto his side.
Storm shrugged off his items and took a spot behind him near a window, while Check Mate, field guide suspended before him, sat close to the aisle under a reading lamp. Other ponies began to file into the car, and soon it was filled with the low murmur of small talk as everypony waited for departure. Storm noticed a magazine resting in a sleeve to his side and pulled it out. The first several pages advertised products remarkable in their worthlessness, such as solar-powered sun lamps and shoes which could double a pegasus’s flight speed the moment they took them off. Further in, he found a crossword puzzle with a few of the blocks filled with some creatively spelled entries; he didn’t bother trying to complete the rest of it and instead replaced the magazine in its sleeve.
“So, Check, that brochure say anything about places to stay?” Storm asked, staring out the window and waiting for the scenery to start moving. He had to admit to himself that he was more than a little excited about the train ride.
“Unfortunately, it had little insight regarding amenities. However, I’m certain that we will be able to find additional information at our terminus if need be.”
“Yeah, I suppose you’re right. It’d be nice if we weren’t arriving in the dead of night, though.”
At 8:25, the conductor called out a final boarding call, and then five minutes later the Borealis Byway was on its way northward, descending into a range of hills. As the train began to pick up speed, and the world immediately outside his window crawled, then rolled, then whipped past, Storm couldn’t help making the comparison between the ride and the act of flying. It was closer to the ground, obviously. Yet, beyond that…
The wind was missing. Now, that wasn’t necessarily a terrible thing, per se; after all, the wind flowing through your mane also happened to be the wind blowing in your face. But it was a part of flying and, for a pegasus, a part of travel. It was a constant companion, sometimes aiding you, sometimes hindering you, and always there. Also gone were the subtle smells of rain, pollen, and ozone, replaced by the scent of air freshener mingled with that of his fellow passengers. It wasn’t better, it wasn’t worse, but it was different. Outside of his window, the stars stood still, while the world went blurring by. A voice behind him drew his attention.
“Say, any of y’all know an eleven letter word for ‘beauty’? Starts with a ‘P’ and ends with an ‘E’?”
The question came from a cream-colored earth pony with a friendly face. A green, paisley handkerchief was tied around his neck, and the same railway magazine as Storm’s lay open at his side.
“Pulchritude,” Check Mate answered without looking up from his book.
“Pulchritude? Hmm, pulch-ri-tude…” The pony said it slowly, tasted the word on his lips, and then stuck out his tongue. “Don’t know what they were thinkin’ when they put that one in the dictionary, but I’m much obliged for the help.”
He picked up a pencil between his teeth, marked the word in, and then set the magazine down. He shifted in his seat a bit and stared out of his window; after a moment, he tapped on Storm’s shoulder.
“Say, mind if I ask you somethin’?” He nodded towards the recumbent Crack Shot. “Are y’all two brothers?”
Storm had heard that one enough to have developed a reflex.
“Only in arms,” he replied.
“Huh. Dang if you two fellas don’t look alike.” The pony crooked his head towards Crack Shot once more. The pegasus’s head was draped over the side of his seat, and a line of drool was rolling from one corner of his mouth. He had begun to snore. Storm frowned.
“Well, I’d like to think there are some differences.” He shifted forward and nudged his friend awake. “You’re going to get a cramp sleeping like that.”
“We there already?” Crack Shot sat up with a yawn, popped his neck, and looked out the window. To his dismay, a stunning expanse of moonlit wilderness was still unfolding outside of it. “Ugh, dude, I was havin’ the best dream.”
“Where y’all headed anyways?” the earth pony asked.
“A place by the name of Fiddler’s Plain, if you’re familiar with it.”
The pony’s smile widened. “I’d say that I am! Sounds like we all got the same destination! And since we’re gettin’ off at the same stop, we might as well make introductions, I figure. Whaddya say? The name’s Kettle Corn.” The earth pony extended a hoof, and Storm took it.
“I’m Storm Stunner.”
Check Mate set his book down and turned to shake Kettle’s hoof as well. “My name is Check Mate. It is a pleasure to meet you.”
“Crack Shot. Nice to meet ya.” Crack Shot leaned across the seat, in between Storm and Check, and bumped hooves with the pony who wasn’t too certain about what to make of the gesture, but was content to take it in stride.
“So, ‘brothers-in-arms’… Guard folk, huh? Guess that explains the similarity.”
Kettle stared out of his window for a moment, and then pursed his lips in thought.
“Actually, no it don’t. Why do y’all look the same? They grow y’all in a lab or somethin’?”
“Nah, let’s just say it’s part of the uniform,” Crack Shot said gnomically.
Kettle let out a warm chuckle. “Fair enough. And what brings these uniforms out our way? It’s not often we get y’all stoppin’ by. Or anypony else, for that matter.”
“Call it a bit of sightseeing in between destinations,” said Storm. Yeah, that sounded better than: One of the princesses wishes to know how life is being conducted outside of her immediate observation. We may be taking notes, but please, don’t mind us.
“Well, I can’t imagine it’ll be as excitin’ as life in the city, but I reckon y’all oughta have a good time. You got it figured where you’re stayin’?”
“Not yet,” Storm said with a lilt of interest at what sounded like the beginning of an offer. Perhaps lodging would be easier to find than expected.
“Tell you what, then. Stick with me once we get off at our stop; I’ll getcha situated.”
Storm smiled. “That would be very kind of you, thank you. Is there anything we can do in return?”
“Well, extra hooves are always welcome back home if you’re willin’, but don’t y’all worry about that right now. And say, once we roll into town, whaddya say I show y’all the night life around our parts? See how it compares to the city?”
“When you say ‘night life’, you’re not talkin’ about, like, owls, are you?” asked Crack Shot, still uncertain about all of this impending nature and feeling suspicious.
“Heh, you’re a wit, ain’tcha? No, I’m talkin’ about good folk and good music. Call it a chance to meet some of the locals.”
“And such a congregation will take place so late on a weekday?” Check Mate asked. “I was under the impression that an early awakening was de rigueur for an agrarian lifestyle.”
“Well, that’s the norm for some, but it ain’t the rule. Take Monday: see, the name comes from the word ‘moon’, right? It’s only fittin’ to stay up and honor that.”
“So then what about Sunday?” Storm asked, adopting the Royal Guard poker face instead of the smirk behind it. He had a feeling Kettle was the type of pony to have an excuse for every day of the week.
“Now that’s a special case; weekends are meant for sleepin’ in, after all,” he stated as a matter of fact. “And iffin’ you get up late, you might as well stay up late, since you’re gonna be too keyed up to even think about goin’ to bed with the chickens.”
“You sleep with chickens?!” Crack Shot asked, leaning forward with huge, horrified eyes.
“It’s an expression,” Kettle said, meeting the pegasus’s stare with a flat look. “Means callin’ an early night?”
“Oh, uh, heh, my bad.”
“Anyways,” Storm interjected, “I’d be happy to take you up on your offer if these guys are. What do you say, Check? Crack Shot?”
“It’d be a discourtesy to reject such a gracious offer,” Check Mate said.
“Ditto,” Crack Shot followed.
“Swell! I’m sure everypony back home’ll be sure to give y’all a warm welcome.”
The ponies conversed idly for a few minutes more, before eventually returning to their own pursuits. Check Mate returned to his book, Kettle returned to his puzzle, Crack Shot returned to his dreams, and Storm returned to the window. The hills had disappeared, and in their place inky, sylvan stretches slowly crept past in the distance, their boughs swaying gently in a breeze separated by the glass. Outside of the window, the stars stood still; however, out of competition with the lights of the city, they shone just a bit brighter.
---
One of the stewards walked down the aisle of the guardsponies’ car, announcing the imminent arrival at Fiddler’s Plain. A few minutes later, the train pulled into a station which by a first glance showed that it wasn’t worth a second one. A stark contrast to the Canterlot station, it was nothing more than an unvarnished, wooden platform opposite another, with a lone ticket booth placed at its end near a squat set of stairs. Within an ancient lamp post at the base of the steps, a candle burned the last of its wick, casting a tawny light that did nothing but accentuate the darkness.
After fitting on their barding and gathering their bags, the guardsponies stepped with Kettle out onto the platform. It creaked in protest beneath this sudden new weight, obviously unused to such a surge in traffic. Inside of the ticket booth, a pony was stirring to wakefulness at the clamor of the locomotive’s arrival. The train sounded a final whistle before departing from the station, a line of lighted windows tracking its progress northward through the night. Kettle crossed the platform to greet the pony in the ticket booth, the guardsponies following behind him.
“Evenin’, Barley,” Kettle greeted. “Busy night so far?”
“Not until you showed up, Kettle.” Barley gave a lazy wave. “Who’s that you got with you?”
“Oh, just some fellas from the Guard stoppin’ in from Canterlot, to hear tell.”
“Uh-huh. You didn’t get yourself in any trouble now did you? Your sister ain’t gonna let you hear the end of it if you did.”
“Nossir. Well, least no trouble I wasn’t lookin’ for.” Kettle gave a grin that was a white slash in the darkness. “Anyways, these three are guests of mine, so you be sure to welcome ‘em proper, you hear?”
“That’s my job, ain’t it?” Barley coughed theatrically and drew a deep breath. “Welcome to Fiddler’s Plain; there either ain’t a whole lot to see, or more than enough to fill your days with, depending on your perspective. I’d ask where y’all are off to now, but seeing as y’all are with Kettle, I’ll bet the first stop’ll be Pimento’s.”
“Now, now, Barley, ya know ya ain’t supposed to assume.”
“I think I know you well enough to be past the point of assumptions, Kettle. Pimento’s, then?”
“Pimento’s,” Kettle conceded.
“Mm-hm. Well, I imagine they’re keepin’ your seat warm for you.” Barley nodded towards the guardsponies. “What do y’all go by?”
Storm, Check, and Crack Shot made their introductions.
“Alright, Mr. Stunner, Mr. Mate, Mr. Shot, it’s a privilege. I hope you boys have a good time, a memorable stay, and, since you’re goin’ to Pimento’s, that you can handle your salt. Have a good evenin’, you hear?”
Kettle gave a short nod. “Will do, Barley. Don’t work yourself too hard now.”
“Mm-hmm.”
Barley waved the ponies off down the road, then returned to his ticket booth and immediately fell back asleep.
---
Although the light of the train had done Storm’s night vision no favors, after about fifteen minutes of following Kettle down a dirt road, the dark, purple shapes around him gained some recognizable details. The road they were walking had deep grooves cut into it, no doubt from the passage of load-bearing wagons towards the rails. If a cart got its wheels lodged into them, its path would be as fixed as the train’s. Perhaps therein lay the inspiration for the modern rail, Storm mused. In the tussocks and scant trees on either side of them, a chorus of unseen night creatures filled the air with unidentifiable whistles and calls, although, admittedly, you got that in the city as well.
“Ain’t much farther until we get into town now,” Kettle said.
The road began to rise and fall in gentle knolls, simple wooden fences appearing on either side of it, and civilization started to show itself reluctantly, one structure at a time. Kettle identified each as they passed by. First was the post office; it was stone-faced and dug into a hill beneath the canopy of a grove of oak trees. Kettle explained how the earth above and around it made for steady temperatures year-round. It slowly disappeared from view as they walked on, the moonlight rippling in waves through the long grasses around them as a soft breeze swept by.
Around another bend, Kettle pointed out the schoolhouse, a single room cottage with a bell inside of a cupola on a grass-covered roof; swings had been fashioned from liana hanging from the surrounding ashes. It wasn’t large, but it apparently served Fiddler’s Plain’s small population.
As they walked on, it continued in that vein; any instance of architecture, whenever it happened to show itself, was built to take advantage of the nature around it, and, it appeared, to allow it its space. Storm felt that Kettle had been somewhat liberal with the word ‘town.’
Eventually they came to a hill that, while not particularly tall or particularly steep, still rose above the others. At its top stood a building that showed the first signs of activity the ponies had seen since they left the station, and more than made up for the lack. Erratically spaced windows on the first floor winnowed a hazy, flittering light, as shadows danced on their drawn shades. A warbling, rusting tune carried down the hill, riding on the sound of raucous laughter. Storm detected the faintest trace of something spicy in the air.
“Now last but not least. Here”—Kettle turned towards the guardsponies and extended a hoof in a flourish—“we have Pimento’s!” Once more his smile widened across his face.
Crack Shot stared at him. “Hey yeah, no kiddin’?”
“Aw, come now! Ain’t you got no flare for the dramatic?”
“Dude, we’ve been walkin’ for like an hour, and I’ve been goin’ for longer on an empty stomach. It’s hard to have any kinda flare when you’re runnin’ on fumes.”
“Yeah, you know you coulda just nicked somethin’ off the side of the road, right? Though I’m sorry to say it don’t come on a plate or in a plastic wrapper. Anyways, let’s head on up; Pimento oughta have somethin’ good to fill you.”
As the ponies neared the tavern, Storm saw that it was covered in what appeared to be pepper plants of a number of different species that he couldn’t possibly name; they grew out of the surrounding loam, from pots placed on windowsills, and even up the sides of the building. Kettle pushed open the door, one decorated appropriately enough with a woodcut bell pepper, and the music, laughter, and shouts exploded out in a roar.
“Howdy!” he called out over the din. “Y’all miss me?”
“Kettle!” The tavern at large turned as one creature and cheered his entrance.
Then the guardsponies followed in after him, the candlelight making their armor burn red and orange as they did so, and everypony went silent. In the sudden awkwardness, Storm noted glumly that at least the music was still—
—there was a record scratch. He couldn’t believe there was actually a bloody record scratch.
“Kettle Corn, what did you do?!” shouted an olive-colored unicorn standing behind a counter.
Kettle quickly put a hoof up in a peaceable gesture. “Relax, will ya?! They’re with me!”
“We can see that!”
There was a general feeling between the three guardsponies that something should be done to disarm the situation, and that they were the ones to do it, but before Storm or Check Mate could say anything, Crack Shot said something first.
“Caught him loiterin’, sir.” Crack Shot made a show of adjusting his champron and strutted out onto the sawdust-covered floor, a serious look on his face.
“Loitering?!” the tavern shouted, Kettle included.
“Psst— who’s Lloyd o’ rings?” somepony in a corner hissed in a slurred susurrus that managed to fill the room.
“Naaah, ‘s not a who. Means like… like leavin’ rubbish where ‘s not supposed to be; outside of the bin and all that,” the pony beside him replied knowledgeably.
“Well, conspirin’ to loiter, if you wanna be more specific. A pretty serious offense, you know, with a pretty hefty fine.”
“What’s he doing?” Storm whispered.
“Well… I believe that he may be working the crowd,” Check answered.
“…And what’s that?” Kettle asked, watching the guardspony carefully.
Crack Shot put a hoof to his chin and gave a meaningful glance upwards, before stepping up to the counter, removing his helmet, and shrugging off his bags down beside him.
“Whatever the house special is and a plate of sea salt oughta cover it.”
Silence reigned once more as everypony in the bar processed this turn of events, or at least those ponies that hadn’t been temporarily short-circuited by an excess of electrolytes. Then there was an uproar of laughter, and the mood from before the guardsponies had entered returned. Storm and Check moved to join Crack Shot, somepony put the needle back on the record, and music once more came to life, only to die an early death as it was drowned by the clamor of conversation.
Kettle clapped Crack Shot on the shoulder. “I gotta give it to ya, pardner; you really had me goin’!”
Crack Shot grinned. “Heh, when opportunity presents itself, eh? Don’t worry about buyin’ my dinner by the way; I got the bits.”
“No way, no how. Y’all are my guests tonight, and I’m treatin’ y’all as such. PIMENTO!”
“Ugh, I’m right here, Kettle.” The unicorn behind the counter set down a dirty dish and walked towards the group. “What can I get you boys?”
“It’ll be the usual for myself. As for these fellas, how about your spice rack chili and a round of sea salt like the gentlecolt asked for? Put it on my tab, iffin’ you would.”
“As long as you pay it,” Pimento replied, not bothering to write the order down. “You boys want that chili mild or wild?”
“’Mild or wild.’ A difference in capsaicin, I would hazard?” Check Mate asked.
Pimento gave the guardspony a curious look. “Yeah, partly, but most folks would just ask if one is spicier than the other. It’s not just heat though; consider it an overall step up in taste.”
Check Mate nodded. “Well then, consider me sold. I shall have the chili wild, please.”
Pimento grinned. “That’s what I like to hear. Same for you two?”
One couldn’t really say no, and neither Storm nor Crack Shot did.
“Alright, I’ll have your orders ready in just a bit.” Pimento retreated into the back of the bar through a pair batwing doors.
Storm took a cursory glance around the bar. The patrons were largely ignoring them now, having already enjoyed dinner and show, and were now playing card games (though as to which games they were, four players at a table would give four different answers), going through salt faster than a de-icer, and making for a night to misremember and a morning to regret.
Crack Shot was making conversation with Kettle, but Check Mate was quiet and seemed to Storm to have something on his mind, his chin resting on a hoof as he watched the excitement.
“How’s it going, Check? Everything alright?” Storm asked.
“Oh, yes.” Check Mate paused for a moment before speaking once more. “This establishment’s habitués are, erm, certainly a lively lot, aren’t they?”
A group of ponies casually lifted their plates from their table as a pegasus came crashing down on top of it.
“…Yeah, one could say that.”
“I will admit that I wouldn’t have expected the physiological response to an increased uptake of salt to be so pronounced.”
“Hmm… well, that’s more of an effect of the general atmosphere, I’d say.”
“Oh?”
“Well, like here everypony knows each other, music is playing, it’s a, uh, ‘Moon celebration’, apparently.” Storm still wasn’t quite ready to buy that last one. “But the point is that getting salted is an excuse to cut loose, to act ridiculous. I don’t know if that makes sense.”
“Yes, it does. I suppose setting aside one’s inhibitions for an evening may prove cathartic. Oh dear—” the previous pegasus attempted to roll over onto his back and ran out of table. “Goodness, I hope he’s alright.”
“He’ll be fine,” Storm said without looking back. “Anyways, it can be interesting, though I wouldn’t say it’s worth the headache if you overdo it.” A question came to Storm’s mind. “Say, Check, you’ve never gotten salted before, have you?”
“No, no I’ve never had the experience.” The unicorn stared forward at nothing in particular. “I don’t know if I’m particularly eager to do so either, to be forthright. I hope that doesn’t make me seem dour or unappreciative of our host’s hospitality.”
Storm gave his friend a friendly bump on the shoulder. “Nah, that just makes you you.”
Pimento returned from the kitchen with the ponies’ orders hovering before him and dropped them unceremoniously onto the counter, before announcing last call to the rest of the tavern. Along with the chili, the salt, some glasses of water, and a stuffed bell pepper for Kettle, were baskets loaded with rolls, labels on the wicker marked ‘Emergency Bread.’
“What’s that all about?” Storm asked, reading the print.
“Just have a bite of the chili first and you’ll know if you need it,” Pimento said, before walking off to attend to another part of the tavern where a guest still had a sense of balance and was looking to amend that while he still had the opportunity.
Storm looked into his bowl and a bit of his courage left him. In it was a dark pitch which seemed to swallow light and burn it alive. Unidentifiable, thickly cut vegetables bobbed to the surface and then sank back down like prehistoric beasts in a tar pit. For some reason the chili was bubbling. He couldn’t understand why it could be bubbling: there was no fire beneath it. Storm leaned down, took a tentative taste, and had the answer branded onto his tongue.
“Gah!” Storm immediately lunged for his glass of water and quaffed it; napalm spread across his taste buds. “GAAAH!
“Yeah, water’s just gonna make it worse,” Kettle noted between bites of his bell pepper. He tossed over one of the bread rolls. “Here; eat that.”
Storm bit into the bread roll and felt relief build slowly as he chewed. The chili was, beyond a doubt, the spiciest thing he had ever eaten, and he suspected it’d hold the title well into the future. But as the heat subsided, his traumatized taste buds hesitantly registered the other flavors. There was a smokiness which could be expected after that five-alarm fire, but there was also a sweetness and a strange, savory undertone. It was… it was…
…It was actually pretty dang good. The chili may’ve had an aftertaste like an afterburner, but past that there was a harmony of flavors that made the crucible worthwhile. Storm panted; his nose ran and a bead of sweat had formed on his brow.
“Phew! That’s a flank kicker for sure, but that stuff’s not half bad!”
“Indeed, it is piquant.” Check Mate replied as he dipped a piece of bread into his dish and took a bite, notably unfazed.
“Yeah, I’ll thay,” Crack Shot added. His bowl was empty, and he was now licking his plate of salt.
Storm felt a twinge of betrayal at this bilateral expression of nonchalance, but he shrugged it off and adopted Check’s style of dining. Taking his time, he eventually finished his meal, and his mouth was left with a satisfying numbness from the sensory overload. His salt still lay in front of him. He doubted that he’d be able to taste much of it, but if this tavern was like any of those found in the city, the salt would include a nice mix of calcium, potassium, and other exonerating minerals to excuse the type of overconsumption that leads to stumbling through the front door at an ungodly hour without bothering to unlock it first. He took a few licks for his health and decided to call it good.
By then, the tavern had settled into calmness as the other patrons walked or were carried out into the night. The music still played, but it had lost its off-key accompaniment of hollers and belches.
“Hmm, the salt not to your likin’, pardners?” Kettle asked of Check and Storm, looking at their unfinished plates.
“It’s just been a long day,” Storm said. “I think we’re all ready to call it a night. Or morning. Whichever.”
“Yes, and I’m not really one for salt in large quantities,” Check added.
“Huh, fair enough, I reckon. Let me go square the bill up with Pimento and see about gettin’ us put up for the night.”
The guardsponies collected their accoutrements and waited by the counter, while Kettle went to pay the tab, lifting the gramophone’s needle as he passed it. In the sudden, quiet stillness of the tavern, the song of cicadas and other creatures began to filter in.
“My, what an amicable pony,” Check Mate remarked.
Storm nodded. “Mm, they do seem pretty chummy out here.”
“Yeah, for real; it’s weird, isn’t it?”
Across the room, Kettle shook hooves with Pimento then waved the guardsponies over towards a banister.
“Okay, I got us set up with a room apiece right upstairs. Things ain’t too formal around here, so y’all grab whichever ones suitcha, and I’ll see y’all when the sun is up.”
The three gave their thanks then followed him up the stairs into a narrow, dimly lit hallway with numbered doors on each side. Kettle took the first one on the left, wished them a good morning, and closed the door behind him. After saying their pleasantries, Storm, Check, and Crack Shot separated into rooms of their choosing as well.
---
Storm had often heard the word ‘cozy’ used as a convenient euphemism when ‘small’ wouldn’t sell, but he conceded that his room was decidedly cozy. Taking up most of the floor space was a large poster bed, with a pair of down pillows and a patchwork quilt that must’ve been hoof-stitched. As a precaution, he pressed a hoof against the mattress and found it pliable. Prior experience had shown that he could never be too careful. He placed his armor and bags at the base of it and fished his journal out of the latter.
In a corner near a window stood a small, wooden desk; a large candle had been set upon it, along with a box of matches. Storm set his journal down on the desk, struck one of the matches, and lit the candle’s wick, sending sharp, black shadows jittering across the room. Turning to the second page of his journal, he mulled over what to write, and then realized he hadn’t brought anything to write with. He made a quick search of the room, but found neither lead nor ink. He briefly considered putting off the day’s entry, but putting it off once could easily turn into putting it off twice, and then into putting it off entirely. He’d feel better if he wrote something down.
Bugging Pimento at this hour was out of the question, but there had to be something he could come up with if he just took a moment to think about it. Well, at least finding a quill wouldn’t be a problem for him; it was just a matter of finding a pigment. What could he fashion that would do the job?
The candle flickered.
Inspiration struck.
Storm plucked a feather from one of his wings and held the tip of it in the flame momentarily; an acrid smell filled the air as it blackened and shriveled, but such was the price of invention. Putting it to the page, he was pleased to see it leave a light but distinct mark, and he managed to write a few characters down before needing to burn another bit of it. He wouldn’t be able to write anything substantial unless he was willing to give up flight for a week or two, but he could at least keep a commitment. If only it hadn’t been such an eventful day, and if only he hadn’t such a limited means of describing it.
Deciding compromise was in order, he marked the date at the top of the page, and then wrote his third entry.
Dear Journal—
I’ll tell you all about it later.
It wasn’t much, but it was a promise he meant to keep. Storm closed his journal and returned it to his bag, before blowing out the candle and climbing into bed. As he lay in the darkness, moonlight painting a distorted imitation of the window’s shape across him, the thought came unbidden that it was an awful lot of bed. He had grown used to his simple bunk at the castle, and to sharing a bed on the weekend; it felt strange having this sudden stretch of space without a certain warmth beside him.
But, it had been an eventful day, and any thoughts or protests he may have entertained softened and blurred about the edges as drowsiness took him. He pulled the counterpane over himself and, as the nocturnal creatures continued to sing their lullaby, drifted off to sleep.
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FCwL updated? Oh, frabjous day, callooh, callay!
Never put any coins on any railroad tracks, myself, but if my grandfather was to be believed, the lucky ex-shilling I still have in my box of childhood treasures has been in my family for six generations. Kids still make those?
I was worried you forgot about this story. I'm happy to see that I was wrong.
The long wait was worth it! Everything about your story makes me happy, everything!
Finally an update!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Whooo!
"Check Mate corrected. He continued to read down the page. “Oh, how nice— foals under the age of six ride gratis"
I think you mean for free, instead, as i don't think gratis is a English word, at least i have never heard it used in an English sentence. (Though it does mean free in danish)
Other then that, good chapter, keep up the good work.
"Now, if one were to allow for consideration of..."
=> Imagine two zero-dimensional ponies(dot-ponies) on a one dimensional road of finite length. One dot-pony is standing on the road. Another trots down the road back and forth. Then, both ponies will meet twice each time the other dot-pony moves back and forth, no matter where the first pony is standing, and no matter whether the moving pony is moving at a constant rate or not.
"Things get even trickier with the added variable of Celestia sleeping in that morning."
=> Celestia, being the omnipotent dot-pony, has the power to (inadvertently) manipulate the length of the road.
"Broken Clock Principle..."
=> If the clock made with the Broken Clock Principle has no deviation in its rate of spinning, then the length of each second can be redefined as a certain number of revolutions of the perfect BCP clock. In fact, this is the principle behind the atomic clock and the definition of the SI second: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second#International_second
A highly enjoyable chapter.
Finally caught up, now to play the waiting game
Oh and great chapter
I want a follow up story sometime down the road when Luna stops by Pimento's to try the chilli. Oh, and celebrating Mondays isn't so weird. Celestia herself apparently celebrates Tuesdays after all.
Cordyceps Aaaaaaaaaahhh!
Dear bro, What up, dude? -Crack Shot
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I've seen it used in English sentences. English has this thing it does where if another language has a word it likes, it'll just take it and start using it as if it were English. There a whole bunch of words we think of as English (algebra, behemoth, babble, cinnamon) that started out as loan words.
And then it updated and there was much celebration to be had.
I've always loved this story (and the one before it). Your characters are not only believable, but unique and fun (I wanted to snuggle Crack Shot on the train SO BADLY) and your writing style really fits with them. The plot may not be moving very fast, but the story isn't slow in the least. Two of the things I love most, though, have nothing to do with this story specifically: it's your writing style and your vocabulary. There are far too few stories that make me look up words, but even without looking them up I can understand what you're saying through context. And then your writing style ... wooh! I can feel myself getting drawn into the story so easily (though hearing the sounds of night outside my window probably helped me during the final part).
I can't wait for more!
Actually, that idiom makes no sense, I can wait, I just don't want to be forced to!
-Silver
951628
It is a word in English. Mac OS dashboard dictionary widget, huzzah!
(I love that widget! I use it all the time.)
954111
Why would Celestia celebrate the day named after Mars? I would have understood if you had said Sunday, but not Tuesday ...
951628
Just wanted to say, I've heard the phrased used in conversation before (in Canada) - usually by one of my friends exercising his vocabulary muscles.
956010
Does"Happy Tuesday" sound like a normal greeting to you? Obviously Celestia considers them to be special.
You are the only author who does not make me feel cheated once I finish reading a chapter. With other authors I always feel like I should be able to read a little bit more, or that they should attempt to post another chapter later on, but with you?
I finished reading this and I would love to read more, but I don't demand it. I feel absolutely satisfied and willing to wait.
That satisfaction is something no author has ever brought to me before. Thank you, it's a weird but wonderful feeling.
956048
Actually, it does sound normal to me. It's not so much a greeting, but a parting exclamation like `goodbye` or `later` instead (notice she said it after everything else). I've heard a bunch of different people (myself included) say "Have a happy/good [day of the week]" when ending a conversation, and shorting it to just "Happy [day of the week]" is normal (a lot of people say `later` instead of `see you later`).
I hope you don't think I'm being rude.
I'm not trying to contradict you, I'm just stating what my own experiences lead me to believe.
The savoury flavour in the chili leaves me a bit concerned. Do the ponies of Fiddler's Plain eat meat, perhaps?
Yay! an update!
> his eyes widening in interest at the entry marked Cordyceps.
Oh gods, cordyceps. That's some pure nightmare fuel right there. I laughed so hard at that
> “That’s wonderful. You should be very proud,” Storm interrupted gently. “However, would you be able to tell us a little about what he looks like?”
Haha, brilliant :)
> “Pulchritude,” Check Mate answered without looking up from his book.
Saw that coming, lol.
Excellent chapter. But whoo-boy, for making cracks about Check Mate using obscure words, you sure use a lot of stuff I had to google myself just to get through this
I had honestly forgotten about this until just the other day (you can thank Basic Training for that); I'm glad I found it again.
It took me 2 weeks to read this chapter, but I finally finished.
Very good, I quite enjoyed it.
Though, maybe it's me, but it seemed like, with some of the humor, at least, you'd read Pratchett's Guards series. Or just Pratchett in general. That thing with the broken clocks sounds like something he might do, and the mention of ALL the offenses you can wrack up (potentially) just for annoying a guard.
Not to say that's bad, and it's definately different, I was just reminded of that writer for some parts of the humor.
Keep up the good work
Fiddler Plains sounds like a town in which I'd love to live.
I like the idea of salt replacing alcohol in your universe instead of cider, as in so many other stories I've read here.
I'd like to add to the discussion on gratis:
. If taken out of context I would have said it was written by a swede who didn't know english too well 
.
)
Since I'm a swede and gratis is the most common word for free, that sentence reads really funny
Since that is the case, I can't help but read it like the "language" in magicka (wich really just is a mish-mash of english pronounced like swedish, swedish-ish words (yes that is a word now) and ancient nordic language).
Reference for yous all:
http://youtu.be/4fUR90k-kyo?t=2m34s
(Though Vlad speaks with more of a transylvanian inflection (he is NOT a vampire after all), it's still makes my point
Chapter 3: Poisons, Poisons, Everywhere!
>>>Have you perchance heard of amanita phalloides, the mushroom also known as the death cap?”>>>
Indeed I have! As well as its two close relatives the Fly Agaric and Destroying Angel.
They come in handy sometimes...
>>>“That I shall do.” Check Mate stuck his nose back into the book, his eyes widening in interest at the entry marked Cordyceps.>>>
Ah yes, one species is quite useful for exterminating changeling hives. It was named C. antibugponyata by its discoverer, who was rather lacking in the area of taxonomic terminology.
*imagines Chrysalis, frozen in place, with hollow eyes, a gaping mouth twisted into a silent scream indicative of an agonized end, and a plethora of ascocarps bursting from her joints.* Delightful. SO much hate for changelings! So much hate...
have individual nexus between key loci
At first I thought "nexus" should be pluralized, but then I realized Check might be referring to Canterlot as a singularly central hub from which lesser hubs emanate. But in that case, nexus being correctly singular, "individual" seems wrong to me—shouldn't it be "an individual", or simply "a nexus"?
Let me note that it is a testament to your writing that this is the first time I have even considered questioning Check Mate's word usage. Considering the extreme level of sequipedalian tendency he consistently displays, I am sure I would have made many, many mistakes in the time it took for me to notice even one of yours—and that's assuming I'm even right.
innumerous
I've always heard it as "innumerable", never "innumerous" ... are you quite sure your version is also correct?
check out at that thing
"check out"
edit: P.S. Having read the other nitpick comments, I'd like to add that gratis is totally a word in English, which I had always assumed was stolen from Latin or French. Perhaps that is where those other languages got it, too, or perhaps we stole it from a more Germanic source. Or both of those.
3310696
One of the things I really appreciate from readers is an additional bit of proofing, and I say that sincerely. I'll go over a chapter a few times, read it backwards, have a couple of friends look at it, and then have something like 'check out at that' sticking its tongue at me afterwards.
The other points you mention are well noted, though they're not quite as black and white. Nexus is a funny word in that there are multiple thoughts on its pluralization. Depending on the dictionary used, one might see 'nexus,' 'nexuses,' or 'nexi.' Though innumerous is interchangeable with innumerable, the latter does seem a popular choice.
'Gratis' has become a fun one for me, because I've gotten to see how different cultural perspectives have affected others' perception of it. I'm used to hearing it in colloquial speech, so seeing various thoughts about it has been illuminating.
Aaaand, since I'm gabbing here, I'll post a slight update. Chapter 13 is getting closer to completion, though real life got in the way, in the worst way.
QUESTIONS!
Ok first off: How do you pronounce "EqueRail"
Second: When he says "sharing a bed on the weekend" (im guessing hes talking about Nomde(i hope im spelling that right)) is he saying that he sleeps with Nomde or does he sleep with her. I dont care if its the later or not but I dont understand the relationship much as it is.
Ho ho ho its christmas early this year!
...Leaning backwards, maybe?
Also, racist!!
flair?