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The First Verse4,182 words
The Second Verse5,100 words
The Third Verse2,154 words
The Fourth Verse3,607 words

The Fourth Verse

Everyone was quiet around the breakfast table that morning. Howard sipped gingerly at his glass of orange juice, occasionally switching to his coffee and bite of eggs. For some reason, he was reminded of the morning before, when they were seated around the table, and he was in a secure sense of denial.

Octavia kept her face even, and her eyes down at her plate while she ate, while Vinyl Scratch slouched in her chair, shifting her eyes from between Octavia and Howard. She clearly wasn't wanting to make eye contact with anyone. And it may have been Howard's imagination, but it seemed as if there was a discernible pink hue to her cheeks.

He was definitely going to ask about how that worked later on.

Figuring it was time to break the uncomfortable silence, Howard cleared his throat loudly. "So, I was thinking," he said. "I'm going to take the day off from work, and maybe we could go to my friend's place and you two could get a listen to what my style is all about." Looking up, Vinyl Scratch showed some mild enthusiasm, but was otherwise unfazed by the idea. "I thought maybe you could start in on my lessons... if you two wanted to."

Letting her eyes roaming between Howard and Vinyl, Octavia let out a sigh. "Of course, we'd be delighted to get underway with the training," she said, as she brought up her napkin to wipe at the side of her mouth. Giving a sterner look at Vinyl, she continued. "Isn't that right, Vinyl Scratch?"

Slowly bringing her eyes up to look Octavia in the face, Vinyl nodded.

This was beginning to be too much. They were acting like members of Jefferson Airplane and they weren't even a real band. Howard slapped his hand lightly on the table in front of him, to get their attention. "Look," he said. "I'm not going to stick my nose into anything, but I just want to let you know, that I don't want you two feeling weird about what happened earlier. I didn't realize that you two were... uh, together; so now that I know, I just want you to know, that I'm cool with it."

Blushing harder, Vinyl Scratch stood up in her chair, and regarded Howard with a frown. "We aren't together!" she blurted out. "We're just friends, okay?!"

"Vinyl, calm down!" Octavia said, scolding her; then turning to Howard. "Our relationship, is sort of complicated," she said.

"Fair enough, just so long as everyone understands that this has been a rather strange and freaky past couple of days; we should be good. If you guys want to do the freak-nasty, then that's your deal."

Vinyl Scratch just scoffed, and resumed staring down. Octavia took it as a good sign. As long as Vinyl was quiet, then she couldn't say anything that would be embarrassing.

"What time do you want to go?" Octavia asked.

"I figure after we eat should be fine, but I'll need to figure out a way of sneaking you two out of here."

"I really don't think that the human population will think it so strange to see us," she said. "I mean, you do have horses and ponies in this world."

"Yeah, but like I keep saying: there are no talking ponies here. They are silent animals that laze away all day in the fields eating grass, or being entertainment for little girls at their sixth birthday parties, where they get smeared with cake and ridden for hours."

There was a mild unified look of confusion and revulsion on their faces. Vinyl Scratch sat there with her mouth slightly agape, and Octavia's eyes were wide. "Surely, you have to be kidding about that, right?"

"I wish I was," Howard said. "I wish I was."

Once the breakfast dishes were cleared away and in the sink, Howard officially introduced his two guest to his music room. It was still impressive enough to elicit a whistle from Vinyl, as she stood in the doorway of the spare room, all but twerking from her caffeine rush.

"Do you know how to play all these instruments?" Octavia asked him, as she ran her hoof across a Yamaha keyboard. She had almost forgotten what it looked like inside the room from the day before.

"I can play a few of them," Howard said going to the row of guitars on the wall, and selecting a semi-hollow body Gibson Memphis, jet black, complete with black soap-bar pick-ups and a Bigsby tremolo. It wasn't the nicest that he had displayed on the wall, but he figured that it would do for a practice jam session.

"Woah, that thing looks expensive."

Stopping mid search for the hard case, Howard regarded Vinyl Scratch as she rooted through a stack of musical folders with various riffs and scales.

"It's pricey," Howard said nodding. "I'm not sure what you use for money, or what the exchange rate is, so I'm not sure if I could give you an accurate comparison."

"What does an apple cost here?" Octavia asked, making her way past the drum set that Vinyl Scratch had pounded on the day before. "For us, an apple costs a half a bit, and a bit will buy a big loaf of bread."

"Okay, that sounds about on par with our dollar. So then, if one of my dollars is about the same as one of your bits, then this guitar cost me around one thousand, two hundred bits."

Turning her gaze back up toward the wall of guitars, Octavia noted that he had at least a dozen dangling from wall mounts. Not to mention the other pieces of musical equipment. "Why do you have so many?"

With the correct hard case for the Gibson in his hands, Howard turned to see that Octavia was looking at him questioningly. "It was always a dream of mine to have a big rock band. I wanted to either play lead guitar, or at best sing. I guess, I was a little obsessive about it. I wanted to own every awesome guitar, get every latest new effect pedal, soak myself in the music." Looking around the inside of the room, Howard let out a small sigh. "It just didn't seem to work out all that well. Real life got in the way, and when there's adult responsibilities, the dreams get put on an indeterminate hold."

For a while there was silence, as the three of them milled about the room. Vinyl Scratch was more or less contented with watching as Octavia and Howard made their small talk, but when things turned silent, she too fell into the realms of the quiet. It was one of those things that they may have forgotten. They were all adults here. Howard was a working male in his modern times, as the two ponies were in theirs. He spent his days dreaming of something better, and working to achieve those goals, and they each worked as best as they could to get ahead with their dreams.

Granted, Octavia and Vinyl Scratch were closer to their dreams than Howard, they could still, nevertheless, relate to him on that level.

"Alright, that just leaves some cables and an amplifier," Howard said as he fast walked across the narrow space in the room in search of the items.

"That's great and all, but what are we supposed to play?" Vinyl Scratch was resting against a large speaker cabinet, nonchalantly gazing at the edge of her hoof, as though she were examining her finger nails.

"I thought I was just going to audition, and you were going to go from there?"

"No, no, no... sheesh. What is this, a tryout for a record label? You already have the gig, Tiny. What we need to be able to do, is instruct you on getting better; we can't do that without some gear."

Looking around, Howard saw that Octavia was nodding her head. Clearly, he hadn't given much thought as to what he was expecting to come from all this.

"Alright then, what instruments do you want?"

"Do you have a turn table?"

"Like a DJ table?"

Nodding furiously, Vinyl bolted from her spot and ran up to Howard. "Tell me you have a Wobble Master Six Thousand, with extended bass effect!"

"Uh... not really. I have a combination DJ table and beat machine. I normally just use it to generate generic background beats when I'm playing or practicing by myself."

Vinyl's face seem to fall at the thought of Howard using a drum machine as a generic music box. "How dare you use such a complex piece of equipment as a generic anything, mister!"

"What about you, Octavia?" Howard said, hoping to escape the harsh glare from Vinyl.

"I'll just observe for now," she said, sitting down on the floor, "if you don't mind."

"Suit yourself," he said, as he pushed Vinyl away from him. "I'll start loading this stuff in my truck."

With a loud "oomph", Howard lifted the guitar case and a large Vox amplifier and walked them out of the music room, toward the front door. He was barely gone five seconds when Vinyl Scratch started in on her friend.

"You don't need to play the part of a celibate monk, you know."

"I'm absolutely positive that I don't know what you mean."

Giving her eyes a quick roll, Vinyl said, "Don't play dumb Ocee. There, not two trots away is a perfectly fine cello."

"I'm not interested in playing right now," Octavia said, brushing off Vinyl's suggestion with a wave of her hoof. "I'm not being indifferent."

"No, I think that is exactly what you're being."

Tossing a massive glare at Vinyl, Octavia narrowed her eyes, then let out a massive pent up sigh of frustration. "Oh, all right... fine! So I don't want to play on some foreign cello. What are you going to do about it?"

Shrugging, Vinyl walked away slowly. "Guess there's nothing to be done then. You'll just instruct, and the rest of us will have fun."

"We aren't here to have fun; we're here to make this joker into a first rate musician. We're here to do a job."

"You know, I'm beginning to think that Celestia sending us here was some sort of punishment. The thought of being stuck here with you and your sad moody ass is down-right torture."

"Hah! You're one to talk. News flash, sweetheart, you aren't always rainbows and ribbons." Octavia was upright on her back legs with her front hooves resting on her sides.

"I just want to at least enjoy this, we should, right?"

Tilting her head sideways, Octavia had to consider that there were other ramifications to their sojourn rather than just assisting a fellow of the arts with his craft. It was entirely possible that Celestia in her infinite wisdom was working something deeper in the process for all parties involved. Nodding, she was forced to agree. "I'm sorry. I'll try harder to have a good time here."

—|—|—

The problem with getting two small ponies from the apartment wasn't just a challenge; it was down-right brutal. It wasn't as though he could have them simply stroll out in front of everyone, touting the fact that one of the boarders had two animals in his apartment.

After several rounds of protest, Howard was able to convince the two to be boxed up in a large gear crate, and wheeled out to the parking area, where he could let them out discretely.

"That was terrible," Vinyl said, giving Howard a serious punch in the leg. "I thought I was going to suffocate in there."

"It was rather uncomfortable in there," Octavia said, chiming in along with Vinyl. "Suppose the lock had gotten stuck, and we'd been forced to die in there."

"That would never happen," Howard told them, rubbing at his leg. "I would have known, and pried the latch."

Once they were in the front of his Honda, he instructed them to remain as close to the floor board as possible until he was sure that the coast was clear. After they were on the road, then they could come out and look around.

"Whoa, so this is what your world looks like outside," Vinyl said, pressing her face as close to the glass as possible.

"Yeah, it's something," Howard agreed.

Beside them, Octavia was sitting perfectly still, squeezing her eyes shut. She was holding her hooves to her stomach, and making light groaning noises.

"Hey, are you all right there?" Howard asked her, reaching a hand out to press against her head.

"I'm not feeling too well," she said, trying to swat his hand away while keeping her eyes closed. "I'm not used to travel of this sort."

"It doesn't bother me," Vinyl chimed.

"That's because you... do so much flailing on stage, you're already used to this."

"I meant to ask you earlier," Howard said. "What is it exactly that you do, Vinyl?"

"I'm a freestyle musical artist."

"More like freestyle noise maker," Octavia said between clenched teeth. "She takes records of better musicians, and scratches them to shreds."

"Are you sure you're okay, Octavia?"

"I'll be fine, as long as it doesn't take us long to get where we're going."

"She'll be fine," Vinyl said, giving Octavia a small jab to her side. "She's just not one for travel. Whenever she takes a train-ride, she usually barfs at least once."

"Vinyl! That's personal!"

"Well it's true. If she doesn't blow wads either going or coming back, it's not a road trip."

Offering Octavia a thin smile, Howard regarded her, and noticed that she actually seemed to be turning a mild shade of green. How in the hell did they do that?

"I'll do my best to get there as fast as I can," Howard told her. "Just hang on a little bit more."

It was fortunate for Howard, that his friend didn't live far, otherwise, Octavia would have been singing with the seals before too much longer. As it was, by the time he got there, she was already holding her hooves over her mouth, and making slight gurgling noises.

The warehouse was in a more private area, one with large parking, and despite that it was a refurbished warehouse, it was in a more secure part of the city. It wasn't a problem that the two ponies walked in on their own. Something that Octavia seemed eternally grateful for.

Karl's apartment was usually empty for days on end, so it wasn't a big deal for Howard to pop in whenever he felt like it.

"Are you sure it's okay for us to be here?" Octavia asked, trailing close behind Howard as he hoisted the musical equipment into the elevator.

"Oh, yeah, it's fine. He's a good friend from back when we were in a band together, and he knows about my situation. He lets me come here anytime I want. Which it why I have a key."

"What does this friend of yours do," Vinyl asked, as she and Octavia were led inside.

"He tours with his band, trying to get famous."

"If you're his bandmate, then why aren't you with them?"

"It's complicated," Howard said.

It didn't take long, and Howard had the gear inside, and set up. A large portion of the studio apartment was dedicated to band practice, and it featured a huge area just for equipment.

"So," Howard said, reaching for the Gibson. "You want something to drink, before we get started?"

"Nope," Vinyl told him. "Hit us with your best shot!"

"Are you sure, it's all right?" Octavia asked again. "I wouldn't want to make it complicated for you if anyone found out we were here."

"The chances of anyone walking in, are two million to one," Howard said, once more reassuring her.

Picking up his guitar, Howard was ready to begin a rousing rendition of Lightning Crashes by the band, Live when a noise came from the back of the studio, and his friend walked in followed by the other two members of his band.

"I told you, it was Howard," the taller of the three said over his shoulder to the others. "Hey, Howie! Three days in Dallas, and boy are my arms tired. So, what's happening dude?! Whoa! Who are the two hotties you've got here?"

At the first sound of noise, Octavia and Vinyl Scratch froze perfectly still, only their eyes widening the size of saucers. Octavia was no doubt running the numbers, and figuring that Howard's math was bunk.

"Hotties?" Howard said, regarding the three members of Wilted Garden. Then turning to Karl, he said, "Are you stoned?"

"Don't be a dick, Howie, seriously... who are these two lovely ladies?"

Exchanging looks with one another, Octavia and Vinyl could only wonder if maybe there was something wrong with the human's eyes. Turning to look at Howard beseechingly, Octavia asked, "What do we look like?"

"Uh... is this a trick question?"

"I'm rather curious myself," Howard said, gripping his guitar with a firm hand. "You don't see two ponies?"

"That's rather rude." Then turning to Octavia and Vinyl, he said, "Is he always this mean?"

"Seriously, dude?"

"Seriously, man," Dawson said, as he sat down on the small love seat across from the drum kit. "Those are two girls there, we aren't stoned, so you can't trick us."

"Yeah, the last time we did any kind of drugs was high school, and it was weed." Lonnie was agreeing, though Howard knew better. If anyone was doing weed then or now, it was both of them, especially, Dawson.

"You really don't see two ponies?"

"How many times do we have to say it?" Karl pleaded. "This joke is old. What's really happening?"

"Howard was just about to jam out, and let us hear what he sounded like," Vinyl said, jumping to the rescue. "If he's good enough, we might let him join our band."

Offering Vinyl a hard glare, Octavia reluctantly nodded her head. "Yes, that's right. We wanted to hear how he sounded in a controlled environment. Not some... club."

Waving the two of them over, Howard leaned down, and whispered. "What in the holy hell is going on? I thought you were ponies?"

"We are ponies," Vinyl hissed. "It's your friends that are screwed up in the noggin."

"They think you're human girls though."

"This is a good thing," Vinyl said. "It means we don't have to worry about being seen now."

Squeezing his eyes shut, Howard stood back up and considered the possibility that his life would be a lot better if other people could see them as human. It only brought up one huge issue. Why he saw them as ponies?

Going back to his position, Howard noticed that Karl was conversing with his friends. Before Howard could strum the first chord, Karl stood while Dawson moved to the drums, and Lonnie went to get a bass. "We're gonna give you a hand," he said. "Pick a song."

"Are you sure everything is cool?"

"If this is an audition, then yeah... we'll give you a hand."

"I was gonna do Lightning Crashes."

"We can do better than that," Karl said, moving to grab a backup guitar and stepping front of a keyboard. "How about we go with some Biffy Clyro?"

"Hit me boys," Vinyl said.