Marehouse 13

by Silver-Brony

Ch.1 part 1 The Sapphire Stone Statue

It had been a dark and stormy night. Dawn crept slowly through the dusty streets of the old town. A deep breath filled his nose with the scent of decaying worms and soaking wet, rotten wood. He kept his head down to help shield his squinted eyes from the torrent of rain, but it still streamed freely down his young midnight blue face. He didn’t mind the rain, it was irksome, but after a lifetime of shrugging it off, he was used to it. No one wanted to be out in such weather; in this town, you did everything you needed to do rain or shine. Usually it was shine, since it was an arid region, but when it did rained, it was a nasty storm.

There were no pegasi, they left years ago once the cherry trees died. Or rather, were kicked out for killing the trees. Truthfully they had nothing to do with the tornado that destroyed the orchard, it was one grey weathermare that caused the damage. Still pegasi were discriminated against after that, so they all left. Soon after is when the rest of the smart ponies left, once the drought started. But the overly sentimental ones stayed, and became prisoners of the Triad.

The small colt looked back at his wings through the clumped orange mane that hung in front of his eyes and released a deep sigh. Sheets of rain had glued his feathers together and matted his coat, chilling him to the bone. Oh how he wished to fly up and dissipate this and all storms that came over Dodge. Things have changed since the Triad took over, now everypony dreamed of having pegasi back. He lifted his head and looked around at the seemingly vacant houses. Each one undoubtedly had at least one pony in it, however they stand on the verge of collapse. A gale blew through the old city which seemed to creak as a whole, singing a duet with the howling wind.

With another deep breath he walked into the exchange, the shop where odds and ends, whatever strange thing that found lying around, or that family relic that was in your family for 50 generations could be traded for ‘portion cards’, which are the currency of the Triad. There were two ways to make money in Dodge since the Triad came, sell anything and everything that came into your broken down old shack and the other, well, Dawn wasn’t old enough for it, yet.

“Hey Sport,” Shifty called from the back room. Dawn didn’t know his real name, nopony did, but that didn’t bother anypony because they knew he was one of the four unicorns in town. He was the only one that could resist the Triad, and that was enough to win the trust of everypony in Dodge.

“How do you always know it’s me?” Dawn asks in his young high pitched voice.

The old teal stallion walked out of the back room smiling, “I told ya Dawn, you just make wherever you walk into more lively.”

Dawn frowned as Shifty dried him with an old towel, “Why do you always have to be so secretive?”

“So what ya got today?” Shifty continued disregarding Dawn’s question.

Dawn scraped his hoof against the splintered wood floor, “It’s heirloom day.”

“You losing anything you like?”

“No, but it was hard on my mom.”

Shifty opened Dawn’s bags with his forest green aura and floated the contents onto the foggy and cracked glass counter.

“Oh dear…” Shifty said.

“Yeah, she really did like that stuff.”

As Shifty went to get the portion cards for Dawn he couldn’t help a nagging feeling looking at the small pile that was now atop his counter. It was strange, like something there was trying to call him. He tried to resist, but his eye kept drifting to the pile.

Desperate to get his mind off of it he asked, “So ya up and flying yet?”

Dawn became solemn, and his high cheery voice dropped to a low mumble “No…”

Once more returning to the counter Shifty glanced to the pile and saw a gentle gleam of light admits the dust. Searching through with his magic to find the source he picked out a simple necklace.

“What’s this?”

Dawn returned his gaze upwards, “Oh, that was my mother’s necklace. It was given to her by my grandma.”

Deep in thought as he looked at the simple purple strap adorned with an orange wing with an ‘S’ inscribed in gold on it, Shifty considered this necklace. “Ya know, I want you to keep this, maybe it will help you fly.”

Dawn smiled, then went pale as Shifty floated it around his neck and closed it, “What are you doing?!”

“Wearing a necklace won’t kill you, besides if it’s really you’re grandmother’s than you should be proud to wear it.”

Looking at the strange box that had arrived on the porch that morning, Shifty had another idea, “Dawn, I got that box on my porch this morning, and since we don’t get mail ‘round these parts, I have a good idea who sent it.”

Of course, Dawn knew who had sent it, the Triad. They were trying to take out the only other unicorn in town, “So you want me to give it back when I go?”

Shifty nodded, “And here, don’t forget the cards from today.”

It took a moment for Dawn to gather himself when he looked at the counter, “A-all this?”

“Dawn, your mom’s a great mare, known her my whole life, and I can take a little lose once in a while to give her a hoof.”

He glanced down at the necklace he was wearing, “Thank you Shifty.”

It warmed his heart to see that he had done good for Dawn and Blossom “Now go on outta here, I’m sure your mom doesn’t want you being gone long in this rain.”

Dawn put the cards in his saddlebags and lifted the plain brown box beneath his wing. He grunted from its weight, and had to readjust it several times.

“You got it kid?”

“Yeah,” Dawn said in parting. He paused and sighed at the doorway before returning into the icy torrent of rain.

He trudged through the muddy street, sinking nearly to his knees with every step, and crisscrossing the road to be underneath the collapsing porch roves were the mud was not as deep. Once he had reached the sturdiest roof he halted, and took a minute to catch his breath. He gazed in front of him, towards the gentle grey light of a cloud covered dawn and shed a solitary tear. He, like all those in Dodge, wished only to be free from this place. A freedom that neither he nor anyone else would achieve soon, if at all. The rail road had long been broken and in the eyes of the world, this city abandoned. True, some families have come to see where their family started, but they get trap, they get enslaved, and they live the rest of their lives along with all of the ponies in Dodge underneath the oppression of the Triad.

Dawn shook his head, dispelling these thought like does every week, day, or hour he has them, and continues trotting into the harsh deluge of rain. On sunny days, those kind of days that are so innumerable the region surrounding the badlands, Dawn could walk from Shifty’s shop to the Triad’s headquarters in ten minutes, but today it would take three times as long to traverse the mud saturated street.

He was grateful that he was the most spoiled pony in town. Not because he or his mother were rich, they were two of the most poor in the entire town. No, it was because he was the only child. He was more the town’s child then him mother’s. Nopony could bare to see him suffering, so whenever they could spare something, they handed it off to him.

Even the Triad was especially nice to him, though he knew that was because they expected him to join them once he was old enough. Either way, they still had ‘acquired’ saddle bags that were not only water proof but also fit him. Dawn was scared of this especially, he knew what they were doing, buttering him up, or putting him in debt of them. Both ways lead to one eventuality, him working with the Triad to help oppress everyone else in town.

Dawn had stopped. In the pouring rain, sinking into the mucky street, and shivering. He bit his lip and continued, but not without realizing that his pause had caused the box to become soaked and saggy. He tried adjusting the box beneath his wing, causing it to finally crumble. Over the drone of harsh rain on the surrounding roves and puddles the sound of a heavy plop of a bolder on soft ground traveled strong to the ear of the pony that stood near. A wave of icy mud plowed hard into the side, knocking him off balance and consequently made him slip and fall.

In this city, getting knocked down is a part of life. By day you fall, and by night you raise solely because the sweat dreams of one day being able to stay standing tall. Being a colt in such a world has claimed stronger willed ponies than Dawn, but so far he still has held on. Lying in the mud, stuck half way into the ground he didn’t know how to stand any more. Tired, all of a sudden so very tired Dawn struggled to even lift his head.

What he saw when he did drove him on, he could stand. His dreams had come true, a beam of hope had shown down through the dense clouds and has shown on him. In the deep brown mud laid the most beautiful thing he had ever seen,

A pure sapphire statue.

Comments

[Byte9291]

I now have to go watch this show but I'm likening the story so far