> Wubs North of the Border > by Captain Scrappie > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > 1. Quarter of a century and things are already going to hell. > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Typical mornings were the norm for me. Wake up, get coffee, make toast/cereal (depending on time/mood), shower, dress, go to stupid job to pay for stupid bills. My god did I wish I woke up dead. Then again I would have just not woke up at all. When I thought about it I remembered the little ditty that Sheograth from Oblivion sang: O'Ryle is dead and O'Really don't know it, O'Really is dead and O'Ryle don't know it, O'Ryle is dead and O'Really don't know it, They're in the same bed but don't know the other one's dead. "Ba-room, Ba-room" I continued out loud and gave myself a chuckle. Man that DLC was worth it just for that. My radio went off with my alarm. "City's breaking down on the camels back, They just have to go 'cause they don't know whack, So all you fill the streets, it's appealing to see... You won't get out-, you're a dead man free, Y-y-you've got a new horizon it's the federal style, A melancholy town where we never smil-e-e, And all I want to hear is the message beep, Your dreams-crackle- cause we don't get sleep, no... Ugh, my Gorllaz CD is skipping again. I swear I need to replace it. That or go check at the post office for the damn turntable I won on eBay. That's the real way to listen to music kids. Laying on the bean bag chair, headphones on and a couple of magazines to pass the time. I wasn't a eighties kid but by god I wish I was. They got all of the cool shit. I didn't get a lot of sleep lately you see. For on Tuesday it shall be my birthday. And on that day it will be filled with cake! I've got it booked off and everything. My friends have stuff planned for me as well. I looked at my phone which was on the dresser next to me. I was hoping for conformation that the package I was expecting came in from Fed-Ex. Fuckers always knock once and don't come back after that. Even when it is very clear that I was at home. *boodle-ding!* It was my Steam going off with a message. Steam message: Don't give your password to anyone. 6:30 May Red teams little sister.j2 : Hey there birthday boy! Scrapple RAGE.j2: You do realize that its tomorrow right? Red teams little sister.j2: Meh, Might as well get it in a day advance so i don't forget. Scrapple RAGE.j2: Yep Scrapple RAGE.j2: What are you doing up this early? Red teams little sister.j2: Nothing much : ) just can't wait until tomorrow when we have that awesome party. Scrapple RAGE.j2: I thought you were in mexico. Red teams little sister.j2: That got canceled :( Red teams little sister.j2: Got all of thoses shots for nothing. Well that sucked. She was talking about that trip for months. She seemed so excited to go. Scrapple RAGE.j2: That sucks. Scrapple RAGE.j2: Well I got to get ready for work, see you tomorrow Nat. Red teams little sister.j2: see ya john. Guess I needed to get up sometime today right? Today I was 24 years old. In two days I will be 25 years out of the womb. Spent the last 4 of those trying to become a game designer. All just to be put in a dead end tech job at a little corner computer repair shop trying to pay off student debt. Least I got my rent cheap. My uncle was the land lord. Gave me a Hundred dollar discount in the rent. That brings it down to about $650 a month. Not a good price but at least it isn't a place in the slums. Let me tell you do not want to live in the slums of Toronto. That shit was scary. Not like Detroit where they have whole abandoned districts mind you but here It could be just as worse. I got up out of bed and got myself into the shower. After a quick rinse I got myself some cereal. Tony the Tiger was staring at me with his trade mark "It's grrrreat!" pose as I got it out of the cupboards. I poured it out into a bowl and went to the fridge to get the milk. I opened it up to find that the tray holding the plastic bags of white, calcium rich goodness were empty. "Aww." Genuine disappointment filled my voice. I tried to stay on the positive However. It was my birthday on Saturday. But that is one of those things that make and break your day. "Eh, I'll just pick some up on the way home." Optimism! My phone buzzed to life again when one of my friends had Steam messaged me. FAT FUCKIN COCK: hey man whats up? Scrapple RAGE.j2: Not much Phill. You? FAT FUCKIN COCK: not much either. Other than me being in toronto for the week. Cool! Phill and I go way back. We were friends since middle school. We watched out for each other and what not. We were best of friends. He left for British Columbia to study to become a doctor. Right now he's in his fifth year at U.B.C. I was proud for him when he got in. Right now he's working at one of the medical research labs in the University. Scrapple RAGE.j2: Nice man! We should hook up sometime, get some beers. FAT FUCKIN COCK: yeah that would be cool FAT FUCKIN COCK: so hows the job hunt going? Scrapple RAGE.j2: Not so good right now. It's hard to find a company looking for fresh people in the industry. FAT FUCKIN COCK: well keep trying man. You'll get in one day. Scrapple RAGE.j2: Thanks. See ya man. FAT FUCKIN COCK: np peace. I then decided I would just make a cheese bagel. I put the bagel slices in the toaster and then got my self a glass of OJ. Spread the butter and put the cheese on the bagel. Let the cheese melt in the middle and BOOM! You've got yourself a cheese bagel. I know I know, hold your applause. Taking my medication (A cocktail of ADD medication, vitamins and OMEGA-3) I brushed my teeth and got myself dressed. I didn't dress as fancy as you would think to a tech job. I wore a short sleeved dress shirt with some jeans and Converses if the weather was permitting. But today I wore a long sleeved variant of the dress shirt. It was a bit chilly out. We keep the doors open during the day so the cool air always got in. I grabbed my black wind-breaker jacket and put it on. It had a little Canadian flag on the left shoulder. I zipped it up and put on my Gorillaz edition Converses. Those cost me a pretty penny to find. Mostly due to the fact that they went out of circulation 6 years ago. I got them on eBay from a guy who bought them a size to small. Size 11 mens if you were wondering. It was windy as I stepped out of my apartment block. I looked up to see clear sky with little puffs of smog streaking the sky. I walked to the local Tim Hortons (that's like the Canadian version of Starbucks but cheaper and better) I grabbed myself a iced cappuccino. Even though I was on a kinda-sorta diet I decided I would treat myself. I got to the Shop and opened it up. Jenning & Associates was the name of the place. I was usually the first to clock in. It's not like I was married to my job or anything it was just that I felt like getting there first. It's not like I had anything to do at home in the first place. I sat at my place at the "bench" and booted my laptop. It was one of those giant ASUS gaming laptops. It was nice and powerful but it was huge at the same time. It took up a quarter of my work area. I looked at my background. Derpy Hooves was flying in the sky with a mail bag on her back. The contents of which are spilling out. I guess I should mention that I'm a brony. Yep about a year ago the show was cancelled due to drop in toy sales that Hasbro had reported. Surprising as the fandom had been dying down since season four started. Only lasted for five. Shame. I was one of those die-hard-on-the-inside bronies. I kept backlogs of fan art, animations, music and fanfiction in a special password-protected flash drive in my desk at home. I had some T-shirts but I outgrew them and We Love Fine stopped selling those in favour of Bravest Warriors merch. Nice show by the guy who made Adventure time. It had a good run but It all came crashing down on them when the season ended. Poor reviews across the board. This was one of the times that the writers were literally running out of ideas and made Discord the villain again. That sparked an outcry like when Bioware released Mass Effect 3. Except in this case there more was no DLC to give more insight on the endings. I brought up the work orders for this week. Three blue screens and RAM needed to be replaced. I got to work and got most of the work done by lunch. Some of the other guys came in an hour late. I was chatting with them about the new episode of Defiance that aired last night. We played the game and watched the show. We were fans of the whole "What happens in one thing affects the other" kind of thing going on with it. "Yeah those Hellions are a bitch" My co-worker Theo said. "I saw a guy who was ramming it with his truck. I think it was doing damage as well!" We laughed at that. Dude got killed instantly but it was doing damage. Damn funny to watch. "So what are your plans for tomorrow?" Theo asked me. "I dunno, my friends got something planned for me though. Not sure what." I said while inserting a RAM chip into the motherboard. My computer went into screen saver mode and was playing on a loop the scene in which Rainbow Dash does a Sonic Rainboom over Cloudsdale. I hit the side of the bench to get it off of the screen saver, My co-worker noticed the thing before it went back to uTorrent to see me downloading Adobe Bridge. Theo looked at me with an eyebrow cocked "My Little Pony? Really?" "So?" I took up a defensive posture. "Dude that's gay." "Least it's better then your Otaku crap. Bleach, Naruto and what's this?" I said while going through his desktop folders to find a PDF file of some comic only marked with a single asterisk. I double clicked it. "Wait, DON'T!" I saw only tentacles. Lots and lots of tenticles. "OH, GOD!" I yelped and quickly alt+f4'd the hell out of it. "See? Way the hell better." "Yeah but you probably clop , don't you?" Ugh, I hated this part of the coming out of the metaphorical brony closet. "A: I do not clop, B: If I did I wouldn't be telling you this and C: It's a fucking kids show dude, I like my porn not to be animated and full of tenticles unlike someone here." I poked his shoulder. "'Sides, I don't condemn them for it. Frig, other people have their things and I have mine. But sometimes I don't like seeing the things that they have but I don't hate them for it." "So you want live footage of ponies fucking, is that what you want?" "Dude that's zoophiles territory. I don't go near it and neither should anyone." I then booted up the PC I was fixing to see if it didn't automatically shut off due to the RAM not put in correctly. The constant beeping made me do a hard shutdown and root around in the case again. I cursed under my breath and started again "Okay then, what's your stance on furries?" "They're okay as long as they keep the weird shit away from me." "So no yiffing?" "Like I said; They keep the 'Not-Safe-For-Work' stuff away from me then they can go sweat to death in a fur-suit all they like. I don't judge people." "Fair." The boss came in again to see if we were slacking off again. He usually catches us but this time he was pleasantly surprised to see us on task. He was an old man but knew his salt with computers. "Theo, is the server for Varcon up yet?" The Bossman asked. "Not yet, the server is still shutting down." "Okay, I need it done by tomorrow. Oh and happy early birthday John, in case I forget." He then walked back to his office in the back. "Well that's a first. He remembered someone's birthday." Theo muttered "That's normal?" Theo was here longer than me. He knew more about the place than I did. "He's buried in work lately. This place hasn't seen a lot of business in the past months. Trying to rake in more customers. Not to mention he's kind of losing his mental faculties." He was right, My work order list hasn't been this empty then around Christmas. I found myself dicking around on Derpiborru on my phone looking at fan art most of the time. There used to be a sea of art coming in all the time but now there was only a puddle left. Shame. I was looking at a comic series on there but it ended abruptly. I went out to Subway to get myself a foot long BLT. Again I was treating myself but I didn't want to go to Mc Donalds or anything, that place is nasty. KFC was a no go when I heard reports of human hair being baked into the bread crumb coating. After that fiasco the majority of the locations were shut down. I would go to Wendy's but they closed down and the only thing good was a Baconator. Even that was fucking greasy as hell as most of the things there.. I got back to work. I got to check up on the servers in the storage room. I hated doing it mostly because of the dust and spiders in there. Not to mention the dim light. It feels like If I get locked in I was going to be locked in there forever. Pinkies line came to mind then. Then Giggle at the Ghostly got stuck in my head. I liked the song but God damn it I hated when a song gets stuck in my head. I like all kinds of music but I hated to hear the same song over and over playing in my brain to the point where I want to slap a bitch. We had a radio hooked up to the phone system so that when you get put on hold that's what you listen to. It's always on those stations that claim to have a no-repeat-workday but lie terribly when they play the same song right after it. If Applejack were here They would have been castrated with a rusty paint chipper right then and there. I was about done when It came to quitting time. I walked back to my desk, packed my things and went home stopping at Timies for a doughnut and a 7-Up. Boston Cream wasn't my favourite flavour but they were out of all of the sour-cream glazed ones. I got home and made myself some ramen for dinner. I wasn't a picky eater when it came too but at least I wasn't lazy enough to forget to eat. I'm a low maintenance guy. Ladies... I got on my desktop and booted Team Fortress 2. I was surprised that Valve didn't move on to some other game, but when a community is making tonnes of money for you, you don't want to give it up. Map-makers, weapon and hat modellers actually make more than Valve combined. I went to the Joe 2 server ([In]Famous for the Machinima series 'The Locals") I was a regular on it. I didn't usually go on it that often lately. Work was getting in the way and such. I went as sniper. My overly flamboyant sniper could be seen from a mile away with all of the conflicting colours on my hats and miscellaneous items. But that made it more challenging for me and I liked it like that. Especially with my Flaming Pillaring Tower of Hats. Took me about 20 keys to get one. I freaked out when I did get it I turns out I was more rusty than I thought. I got stabbed multiple times by a freaking spy that I was shit at noticing. On the third or fifth time the dude sprayed "Go back to Cawadoody, Noob!" on the wall next to me. Nice... I did then notice the time. It was about twelve thirty in the morning. Now was defiantly the time to turn in. I shut it down after checking Steam for any deals on the classics. Sadly Bastion was still full price and unattainable by my broke ass. I sighed in delight though. I brushed my teeth and what not. I climbed into bed and went to sleep. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "Vinyl...? Wake up..." Why did that voice sound familiar? Why do I feel my bed vibrating? Why did the voice call me Vinyl? "Ehn... wha? I opened my eyes. We were in a small room that seemed to be rattling. Now when I say "We" I mean there were a group of other... Were those even people? The hell? My dream was fuzzy. All I saw was coloured blurs. Even that was being vague to the point of no return. "We're almost to the Empire..." the vaguely familiar voice said "Ehn... Five more minutes... I think Cadence can wait a bit..." My eyes slowly fluttered back closed and the whole of my blurry world faded to black. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I awoke to my alarm going off. I must have forgot to turn it off. I brushed the sleep out of my eyes. Welp. Today is the big Two-Five. 25 years after being born in a hospital supply closet since all the other rooms were full at the time. Yeah you read that right. They were also out of beds as well. Anyway, I was getting up as I felt a tiny pain in the back of my eyeballs. It wasn't too, too bad but it was noticeable. I rubbed them again trying to offset the pain but I then just decided to deal with it the rest of the day. I got up and went to the bathroom. As I was relieving myself I couldn't help but wonder what the frig was going on in my dream. I was trying to think of where I heard that voice before. Then I thought about the one name that was spoken in the dream. Cadence? That could be a billion different people. I was still thinking about it while I was in the shower, drying myself off. I tend to do these thinking sessions while in the shower where I zone out and lose track of time. I snapped out of my stupor when I heard my phone ringing. We can dance if we want to; We can leave your friends behind. 'Cause your friends don't dance, And if they don't dance-- I got out of the shower with a towel around my waist and answered the phone. "Hey John! It's Phill. We're coming to pick you up with a couple of others as well." "How many?" I asked "Just two others. Not a lot were able to make it." "Who was able to make it?" "Gav and Natalie. The others had other crap going on." Now I was disappointed and relieved at the same time. I got to hang out with some of my friends. Now don't get me wrong I like hanging out with friends. It's just that I don't like dealing with all of them in a small time frame. "Okay, when you guys gonna pick me up?" "In like ten minutes." I looked at the clock on my phone. Jesus was I in the shower for 3 hours? My hands felt prune-y as fuck. "Oh shi- Yeah I'll see you then." I hung up and got myself dried off and dressed as quickly as possible. I didn't have enough time to brush my teeth properly. All I ended up doing was gargling mouth wash and getting my ass out the door. Now you may be asking yourself 'Does it take you so long to get ready in a ten minute time span?' Well here's the thing: Phill likes to see me scramble. He's already here. I see the nice blue Audi outside, the one painted with a Decepticon logo on the hood. I threw on a t-shirt and some jeans. I grabbed my Phone, jacket and laptop bag and ran out the door and into the front passenger seat Dukes style. "Jeez dude! You could have just used the door. Like a normal human being, for god's sake." Gav said from the back. "Aw, I missed you too, ya little rascal you" I smirked as I pinched his cheek. I looked at Phill, "You know you could have just said: 'Oh I'm here but you can take as much time as you need.' Not like I just got out of the shower or anything." "Well you do look soaked." Nat rubbed the top of my head. The little droplet's of water were getting on the surrounding patrons of the motor vehicle. We all had a chuckle. "So where are we headed?" I asked the person at the helm. "Montana's then to Medieval times!" Medieval times was the bomb here in Toronto. You get a huge meal and entertainment of actors beating each other with replica swords. They also used to have a little dungeon maze thing that was pretty cool. Gav groaned from the back. "Oh what is it this time?" Nat asked the whiner. "You know the last time we went to Montana's I got food poisoning, right?" Ah yes, I remember the week after that with good detail. I remember that Gav had a nice little chat with the manager. And when I say "Nice little chat" I mean he got pissed to the point where he was threatening to sue. The owner got fired by corporate management and replaced soon after. Gav gave the free coupon for a meal to me. I held onto it so that I could mock him. Didn't get to do that often enough. "Well I guess I finally use this then, won't I?" I held up the coupon in his face. I synced up my phone with the car system. I put on some Gorillaz. All present company minus one was singing along. That one was Gav. He was a bit of a party pooper in that he always complained about the music we listened to. We grew up together. We were in the same class in a snooty private school two hours north of the city. Even though I hated it there we were friends. Even though he was sticking to his families status he was cool once you get to know him. I also introduced him to the whole craze of ponies in the first place. Facebook was a wonderful thing. We were opposite ends of the spectrum anyway. I was in school for game design while he was in for classical music. He played the cello. Classical was the only genre that he *quote* "Can listen to without blowing out [his] brains." We finally got to the restaurant after a bit of traffic. Montana's was a cool restaurant in that it had that "outback" style to it. You could get your drinks in mason jars like the rednecks use. As we ate we talked about what was going on in our lives. "Weirdest thing came in to the lab before I left. A blood sample was given to us saying that it came from a guy in... Boston or Seattle... Some place south of the border. Anyway the day of the flight I got a text from my professor saying it wasn't human. It was equine." Phill said. "You think that someone played a prank or something?" Nat asked "If they did they would have gotten fired like that," he snapped his fingers for effect. "That and they wouldn't get a job in the medical field for a very long time." "Then how did you get horse blood?" I asked "No clue. But then again we do get the mail from the forensic and veterinarian labs from time to time. I wouldn't know. I'm the bottom bitch there." "Jesus Phill, by now you should be running that place." I said to him while punching him in the shoulder. "Eh, it's not like I want to run the place. I just want to better the life of the common man." "That or create enough anthrax to wipe out a small nation and then establish yourself as defact-o ruler." Nat said. "Jeez, for a social worker you have some dark ideas there." I said while taking a bite of my chicken jalapeño wrap. Natalie was one of the last people you would think to be a social worker. She was one of the people who would be needing one rather then helping other people. I guess it takes a crazy person to know another crazy. I met Nat in college. She was nice and friendly, but a bit of a show off as well. I remember when she was paying off her loans she took a second job as a birthday party magician. She was apart of those packages that came with a bounce castle. Most of the stuff she did was cool but nothing like Chris Angel level of showmanship. "So anyone for cake?" Nat said while snapping her fingers twice When she did five members of the staff came with a chocolate cake with candles that were shaped like the number twenty five. They did the little song and dance (literally, they did a little jig). All but one of them buggered off. She gave me the knife to cut it with. I began to cut the cake when about half way through it I felt it impact on something. I tried to force it a bit more but Gav stopped me. "Split the thing apart." He said. I did and I found a silver metal box. The three looked at me. 'Open it!' was clearly written on their faces. I did. In there was about $150 and another case. I opened the other case and I found the thing that would make my heart jump right out of my goddamn chest and dethrone God himself. DJ Pon-3 Glasses. Now this isn't ones you would find in like a toy store mind you. This was one of the five hundred made by Oakley when they were in close relation with Hasbro. That was three years ago but shit these were rare. You could find these on sale on Ebay for about $500. And that was when people were getting rid of all of their pony stuff because of "The Final Betrayal" that was season 5. "Oh. My GOD!" I fumbled the case in my hands, snapping them shut when I reached over to give Nat a hug that could crush bones and rupture organs. I did the same to Phill and Gav. I even got out of the booth to give our waitress a hug. I knew she wasn't apart of the group but I felt as if she needed one. "Oh thank you, THANK YOU!" I almost squealed with delight. My friends were looking at me weird. I realized that I was hugging the waitress for a good five minutes. I let go and gave her a ten note. "For having to deal with me." She then scuttled off to deal with more of the other customers that were waiting by the door. I tried them on. My giddiness reached a new level as they were a perfect fit. The lenses were large, reaching past my eyebrows and reaching my hairline. These would most likely would be more at home on a female but at this point I didn't care. I always felt like I should get all of the limited items. I always got collectors edition on everything; games, action figures, you name it. Except for cars. I hated rich people, just another reason I don't like my parents. We finished eating and got ourselves back to our car. Phill got a ticket for over staying his welcome at the parking meter. "Damn it." I heard him mutter as we got in. "It's not like I get those a lot." I said to him. "Why? Are you some sort of parking guru that you can get out of all parking violations with a snap of the finger?" "No, I just don't have a car." Everyone was looking at me with a confused look on their face. "What?" "You don't have a car?" Gav asked. "Nor do I have a license. I was always busy and never got around to getting it." We were driving towards the north end of the city. The Medieval Times was located near the downtown core. They opened up a casino near there even though a bunch of people were unhappy with it. It did open up a lot more business from people who wanted to waste money but couldn't afford to go to Vegas. But alas since that happened the roads were packed to the point of bullshittery due to all of the tourists. "Come on! We got places to be!" I heard a guy yelling out of his window while honking. After it let up we got to the venue that was Medieval Times. I loved this place. I was always a huge fantasy buff. I always went here when I got the chance. My parents took me here every other month when I was younger. They started doing extended shows that go past midnight. Those ones were the hardest to book as there were also the cheapest. They had us sit in the green section. That means that we were cheering for the Green Knight. They gave us green paper crowns and plastic flags. The food was awesome as well. "Dragons blood" (tomato) soup, Dragon (pork) Ribs and mead (Pepsi). Before the jousting began the guy who played the king stood up. "Well these festivities are going quite pleasant!" He jubilantly announced. "Indeed father, and I do believe there are a few amongst the lords and ladies in the audience who are celebrating other occasions as well!" the princess then pulled out a scroll. "Ah yes," He said as he pulled out a scroll of the same description. He started to list of some of the people that were here celebrating other birthdays, anniversaries, and other things. "And to a miss... Vinyl Scratch, celebrating her twenty fifth birthday in about six minutes from now!" "Why'd you call me Vinyl?" I yelled over the noise of the music to Phill. "Ever since you tried to get me into that crap you gushed about her all the time. I'd thought I might humour you for a night." "Tis a lot of people who are turning quarter of a century old this year, father!" "Indeed there are my child. But I do believe that-" A thunder bolt went off in the center of the arena. They liked to change up the story once in a while here. In this one the wizard proclaims that one of the knights is a traitor to the throne and will be revealed through combat. It's the Captain of the Guard guy. It always is. I looked at my phone. It was 11:59 and there would be only thirty seconds before my days as a twenty four year old are done. "Five score divided by four..." the wizard began. As soon as he said that my head started to hurt. A lot. Like I just slammed back a bottle of tequila and this was the hangover the morning after. I did that before and I nearly had and regrets were had the next morning. I turned over to see Gav watching me rub my head. The world seemed to slow down for a bit. I stared at him. Why did those eyes look so familiar. They were sort of purple or grey with a purple tinge. "'Tavi?" I muttered for a second. I then got nudged in the shoulder by Phill. "Dude birthday shots!" Next thing I knew I was in a bar with a large amount of chocolate coloured shots in front of me. "Ugh, wait what? How did we get here?" I asked in bewilderment. "You zoned out for an hour? Jeeze that's a new record even for you." Gav reminded me. Last time I zoned out like that was when I went to see The Lorax. I usually can't sit through an entire movie but when I do it's cause I don't pay attention to all of it. I recognized the place we were at. It was A little Irish pub on the west end. Ironically the people who owned the place weren't even Irish. They were Italian. Our server was speaking in a thick Irish accent though. She could be from New Foundland though but I wasn't complaining. "What's on your mind?" Nat asked while taking a shot. I was thinking about the little fiasco in my brain thinking Gav was Octavia. I mean come on. That shit wasn't real. "Well-" she put a shot glass up to my mouth "No. Bad Vinyl. You shouldn't have a care on your birthday." "But-" "NO." I just took the shot. I didn't want to think of the weird moment between me and Gav there. And besides, Nat was right. I needed to let loose and enjoy today. I took another. And another. And another. And another until I blacked out. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I woke up to my alarm going off. It sounded louder than before. I balled my hand into a fist and gave it a good smack. I am not getting up at all. I scratched my thigh a bit. There was a smooth spot. I didn't shave there at all. Why was it smooth? I grimaced at the sunlight reflecting off of the corporate building across the street. The light burning my eyes like they were going to burst into flames at the bat of an eyelash. My head was pounding and my stomach was churning to no end. I looked at my side. Why the frig do I have Eighth note tattoos? ... My friends are assholes. > It starts off small... > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Mother fucker." I grumbled. I would have screamed but I was too tired to do anything. Not to mention my hangover. Why did my uncle have to buy out an apartment complex right next to a mirror-glass office building? I sat up and scratched the tattoos to see if they were temporary. They weren't. They let me get a tattoo while drunk. Those assholes I got up and trudged to the bathroom. I took a look at my eyes. Bloodshot as expected. Opening up the medicine cabinet I saw the different coloured bottles of concoctions that were supposedly able to cure their particular ailment. Ah, Tylenol. This could be weighed in gold right about now. I opened it up and took out the cotton ball at the top. I know that your supposed to only take two but I upped the dosage to five "wonder" pills. I should get an appointment to get these things removed. My phone was in the living room. That was one of the things I remember from my Baileys induced haze. Me being in a lazy mood and wanting to sleep off this self-induced hell), decided on sleeping on the couch. The curtains are thicker than the ones in my bedroom and the leather couch was more comfortable than my bed anyhow. The light was brighter in the living room. I grabbed the five hundred dollar collector glasses. Everything was painted in a dark purple as I put them on. Much more friendly to my eyes at the moment. I turned around. Someone was sleeping on the couch while snoring rather loudly. The shape of the body was familiar. "Gav?" I gave him a shove on the shoulder. He didn't respond. He was a heavy sleeper. A couple of shoves still produced no response. I then decided to grab his shoulders and shake like the devil himself was at our doorstep. "God damn it. You nearly gave me a heart attack." He said while rubbing his head. "Good morning, sunshine. And also go fuck yourself." "What the hell did I do?" "I guess you need a little reminder what you let me do the other day." I pulled down the side of my pyjama pants to show him the ink job. "What the hell?" He said in bewilderment. "We had a pact, man!" That pact went back to when we met up after college. "Do I need to get the sheet from out of the fire-proof safe?" I wrote it on a bar serviette with pen. We were bored and we came up with it off of the top of our heads at the time. Having a near perfect (read: ADD addled) memory I remembered it like the back of my hand. As friends we agreed to: 1. Never trip each other in a zombie apocalypse. 2. If one of us were to become a shrimp boat captain, the other must come work for him. 3. If Skynet ever becomes a thing we'll firebomb the hell out of it. 4. If the other was drunk and wants to go to a tattoo place, DO NOT LET THEM. Even if the drunken version wants to so badly. The list goes on. "You know I'm surprised you're not on Hoarders for all of the crap that you keep." "Just go clean yourself up. I want the couch." He got up and went to the bathroom. Not even a second after I heard the door close, I heard a scream. It was either from shock or terror. At this sleep needing point I couldn't tell. I trudged over to where the bathroom door was and knocked. "You okay?" I asked through the door. "N-No I'm not." "You decent?" "Y-Yeah." "I'm coming in then." I opened the door. "So what did you d-What the hell!?" He was on the toilet with his pants down and his rather plain polo-shirt over his knees. What I was looking at was his thigh. A treble clef tattoo was clearly noticeable. "Why the frig do you have Octavia's cutie mark as a tattoo!?" I yelled out. "I have no clue!" "Who was the designated driver last night?" My teeth could be ground to dust for how angry I was right now. He was muttering something along the lines of 'Oh god what will my parents say?' as I was dialling Nat's number. His parents had some issues when he got one before. disowned him right then and there. Nat decided to finally pick up. "Y-yeah?" I heard her rasp. She still sounded sleepy. "Did you at any point on our way to my place stop at a tattoo parlour?" "What? No. Why?" "Okay then could you explain why the frig me and Gav have these? Cause I would love to see your explanation as to why we have these." I snapped photos of the marks and sending them to her. Gav objected by covering the mark with his hand but it was still sticking out and the shape was still visible. There was a silence on the other end of the line until I could hear chuckling turning into full out laughter. "What the fuck. I know you and Gav like those characters but my god, you two have reached the point of weeaboo in the MLP fandom." "She didn't drive us there apparently." I said to Gav while cursing up a storm under my breath. "Then why the fuck do we have these!?" He shouted. He kept on incoherently doing one of those 'oh god why me this shouldn't be happening oh Jesus this is bad' things rather loud. I know he was my friend but my god is he being annoying. "CALM DOWN, 'TAVI!" I shouted back at him. "I am pissed, hung-over, and I'm trying to figure out as to how the hell this happened! So if you can shut your trap for a second and lemme hear myself in my head, I can think of a logical explanation for all of this." I was normally laid back in these types of situations. Stress coupled with a hangover and lack of sleep can get anyone filled with rage. After a good ten seconds of silence Gav finally decided to speak. "Did you call me 'Tavi?" I replayed the scene back in my head. Nat mocking us, Gav sputtering, me yelling for Octavia to- wait, why the hell did I call Gav, Octavia? "I... have no clue?" "...You there?" Nat came from the speakerphone. "Yeah. Apparently none of us did it. Ugh, look could you swing by my place? We're in a bit of a predicament." "Yeah, corner of Brimley and Younge?" "You were here last night. But yeah. I'll buzz you in." "Okay, be there in about twenty minutes. See ya Vinyl." "Wait did you just-" By the time I tried to say what I was going to say she hung up. "So what did she say?" "Trix? She's coming by." I just noticed what I said. "I did it too, didn't I?" "What the hell is going on? I mean this has to be a coincidence, right?" He looked at me. "Right?" "Look, I can assure you this: It's probably a thing that would just all blow over. We'll look back on this day and all have a nice little laugh. I promise." "Yeah but if this gets any worse..." He seemed to be drifting off into space. "Any worse... I'll..." Waving my hand in front of his face did nothing. Snapping my fingers also did squat. I gave him a pat on the face and his disposition didn't change. "Come on buddy, back to reality" Still no answer. Part of me was thinking of getting a Sharpie and drawing a smiley face but the part that was overwhelming was the need to see if he was alright. Leaning in, I checked his pulse just under his chin. No skipped beats or anything. I brought myself down to eye level with him. He seems fine but he's just... out of it. As I tried to back away he leaned forward and gave me a open mouth kiss right on lips and was hugging me in a near death-grip with my ribs and arms crying for release. Part of me felt as if this was... right. In the back of my head a little voice was whispering 'Give in... You want this....' My eyes closed, thinking everything was going to be alright. Wait...WHAT? "HMMH?!" His eyes were closed but my eyes flew wide open. I wrestled my arms from the bear hug and tried to pry his face away from mine. "Rrrg! Ger dur furk off me!" My lips weren't giving me the ability to form proper words. I was pushing his face away until his eyes opened up and looked back at me. He looked down to what he was doing. "What the hell?" He said as he started to look at what he was doing. The death grip was released and I was able to get the hell away from him. "What the hell is wrong with you!?" "What was I doing?" His face was ripe with genuine confusion. "You seriously didn't notice that?" "What are you talking about?" "You came onto me and you didn't notice?!" I was just about fed up with the world at this point. I mean come on! I wake up and I have a tattoo on my ass, no one is 'fessing up as to who allowed this to happen and now one of my friends is coming onto me!? Not that I didn't appreciate the sentiment but there should have been some warning there! "You know what? Forget it. I've had enough. I'm going to sleep on the couch. If I wake up and we're sucking face, I will do the twenty-five-to-life sentence with an honest to god smile on my face and absolutely NO regrets." With a straight face the message went through well enough. The next four hours were of me falling in and out of sleep. I wasn't feeling hungry by the time it was lunch. I looked at the clock each time I awoke. It was about two in the afternoon and I was only half asleep when I heard the foot steps next to me. "Gav, I swear, if you kiss me one more time..." "What? Did someone also do the nasty while drunk?" The voice was female. God damn it Nat. She always catches us while we say something compromising. I took the pillow off of my face and there she was standing with her arms behind her back and a little grin on her face. I was surprised at the fact that I didn't hear the door open so Gav must have let her in. "There was no nasty being had, no I do not want to talk about it." "Sure. You hungry? I brought Timmies." I perked up at the mention of it. "You get the usual?" "BLT with less tomato, extra bacon, extra low-fat mayo and pickle slices?" "What would I ever do without you?" "Starve to death, most likely." My stomach was a bit calmed down by this point and was grumbling for some form of sustenance. She sat down next to me and put down a medium sized cup of hot chocolate. "By the way, What took so long?" "Mostly me getting sidetracked by multiple things. Had some work matters to take care of. How are you taking the whole tattoo on your ass thing?" "Pissed off beyond belief and I want to kill whoever allowed this." "Understandable. Where's Gav?" "'Dunno. Bathroom I think?" "Okay then. You need some company?" "I... I don't know." "Right now I think you need some company. Besides, I would be pissed if I got tattoos and I had no say in the matter." "Yeah, sure." I said in defeat. I leaned my head onto her shoulder. I was coming up with crazy scenarios in my head as to how we got these. One involved magic. Like the stuff you see on the show. I shook my head at the thought. As much as I would love magic to be real, that would probably break the universe as a whole. Speaking of magic... "Hey, could you show me that coin trick with the glass?" I was pointing at my glass coffee table. Her eyes lit up when I said that. He liked showing off her tricks. "Yeah sure. Don't think I can do it any more but I can try!" She seemed eager to get started. I gave her a loonie. That's the Canadian one dollar coin for the uninitiated. It was gold and imprinted with the image of a loon on one side and the image of Queen Elizabeth the Second on the other. She took the coin and put it on the table top. She then pressed hard with the palm of her hand. She looked like she was going to bring her hand right through the table if she were to push any harder. When she pulled her hand off the coin looked like it was still on top of the table. "Go ahead. Touch it." She commanded. I did. All I felt was glass. Looking closely at it I saw that it was between the layer of heated sand. "My god that is cool." "What's cool?" A familiar voice came from behind. Gav was out of the bathroom, finally. "Ooh... is that a herb and garlic bagel I smell?" He said while picking up the paper bag. "Yeah it is..." Nat was more interested with what she was doing. She was now putting both of her palms on both the top and bottom of the glass. She added more pressure and when she removed her hands the coin was in the bottom one. I clapped. "Man I wish I knew how to do that." I gave her a pat on the back. She seemed to give no reaction. I looked to see Nat staring off into space once. In her general direction was the turned off flat screen. I did the same things to snap her out of it Gav came up to her. "Trixie?" "Dude this is what you did right before you... kissed... me." I said while realizing what Gav had just said. "Vinyl, what are you talking about?" "Why did you call her Trixie?" "That's her name isn't it?" "No, her name is N-" This was the point where my brain went 'Hold the freaking phone there, I think he's gone insane.' Whereas in the back of my mind it's saying 'The hell you talking about? He's right.' Both of our faces were filled to the brim with confusion. "What the hell, brain?" "What?" "I called you Octavia, you and I called her Trixie and just now you called me Vinyl." "Whoa, what the hell?" Nat was coming out of her stupor. "Urgh, I need to go to the bathroom..." She was scratching her thigh as she got up. We cleared a path for her as she trudged into the other room. I looked back at Gav. "Okay. What if we're just over reacting?" "I never wanted a tramp stamp in the first place. No one knows as to how we got these. I don't know about you but I think panic is acceptable at this point in time." "AHH! What the hell?!" That was Nat's voice. We both jogged over to the bathroom and knocked on the door. "You okay?" "Not at all!" "Should I wait? Do you need anything?" "Could you come in? You need to see this." I looked at Gav and he just shrugged. I opened the door and saw her pants down. A tattoo with a wand and a blue mist was on her side. "Was that there before?" I asked trying not to stare at the area after the thigh. "No it wasn't." "Like, was it there before you got here?" "No! I got here then I zoned out on the couch and Trixie just went to the-" "You did it again!" I shouted. For some reason when she did that it just grated on my nerves. "I did what again?" "You referred to yourself in the third-person! Trixie, I swear to go-" What am I saying? HER NAME ISN'T TRIXIE! "There is seriously something very wrong going on!" I was shouting more than I usually did. Someone was knocking on the door. I rubbed the frustration from my eyes and went over and answered it. It was the nice old lady from next door. Although today she wasn't in a particularly friendly mood. "Young man, I need a word from you." She said with a rather cross look on her face. "I'm sorry if I'm being too loud. I'm having a bit of a crisis right now." I was trying to sound calm and collected but that wasn't happening. Luckily she wasn't in the mood to ask what was wrong. "You better be. First it was the noise that you call music. Then it was the shouting. My precious has been going crazy for the entire morning!" She was talking about her cat. Thing kept on shitting on my balcony. "I'll try to keep it down. I'm really, really sorry." "Okay. Make sure it doesn't happen again." She then went back to her apartment. With the door open the odours of the smokers across the hall were seeping in. I closed the door and sighed. A thought then occurred to me. "Hey guys? Where's Phill?" "When I dropped you guys off I brought him back to his hotel. You think he has something to do with this?" Nat was talking through a couch cushion on her face as she was laying down. "I dunno, but I intend to find the hell out." I grabbed my phone from out of my room. There was a missed call, from my mom. I played the message. "Hey there birthday boy. It's Mommy just calling to say happy birthday! The big two-five, eh? A quarter of a century! Hehe, I would get dad on the line but he's a bit busy in Brazil at the moment." Of course he is. "I know you and dad haven't seen eye-to-eye on most subjects but let me just say that we're here for you. Don't ever forget that. Don't hesitate to call if anything is wrong, Okay? I'll let you get to your festivities. Don't want to keep your friends waiting. Ciao!" Shaking my head, I dialed Phill's number. After a minute or two he answered. "Yeah John, what is it? I'm in a bit of a rush here." "Why, what's going on?" "You know that blood sample that I told you about? Apparently another came in and this was equine but it was confirmed to come from another human!" "Wha- How the hell was that even possible?" "No clue! My professor told me to cut the vacation short and come back. They need all hands on deck for this. Wish I could stay longer but I need to get the hell back to Vancouver, ASAP. Also-" He paused for a moment as the notification beep on his end caused him to silence for a good moment or two. "You there?" "Uhm, apparently what I just said broke the confidentiality agreement that I'm gonna sign when I get there. So, don't say, like... anything. Okay?" "Uhh, sure. Just a question before you go; did we stop by a tattoo place on the way back from Medieval Times?" "No, why?" "No reason. Um, I don't know how to word this... Do you have a tattoo on your thigh?" "I'm changing right now, I would have noticed. Why, did..." There was a silence coming from his end, until I heard chuckling turn into hysteric laughter. "HAHAHA! You're fucking serious? My god that is priceless! Haha! Ohhh... But in all seriousness. If your gonna keep it you should keep away from hot tubs for a good week or so, so you can avoid bacterial infections. If you want to remove it I would suggest going back to the place tha-" "That's the thing. None of us went anywhere close to a parlour. Nat just zoned out and when she snapped out of it she had it on her thigh. And Gav and I woke up with one." Another silence. "That's not how tattoos work, dude." "Exactly." Ugh, this is wracking my brain. "Look if there's any developments I'll message you on Skype, okay? Also, this stays between us." "My lips are sealed. So should yours on your end as well." "Yeah, okay. See ya." Nat turned towards me. "So?" "We apparently didn't go anywhere near the place." I turned on the T.V. and booted my Netflix app on the flat screen of HD goodness. "I think we need something to get our minds off of all of this. How 'bout ponies?" I might as well have just told them to go fuck themselves as I was greeted by dirty looks on both sides. All I did was chuckle as I looked up the last episode of the fifth season. No reason in particular. Sometimes I like to see when giants fall. The episode started to play. The trademark opening sequence followed by the recap of the last episode. Celestia was fighting demons in a volcano with Discord. When Celestia got injured and Discord came over to help her, all he did was kick her off of the cliff they were fighting on. I hated this part for a good reason: Celestia has wings. Why the hell didn't she use them? "Fuckin' A" "Ugh, this is like the new shark jumping. Fonzie could learn a thing or two." Nat said as she just stared at her phone, not paying any real attention. I skipped through the fluff. There was a ton of stuff this particular viewing didn't need. "What the hell? Where's the Crystal Empire? That was one of the only good scenes in it!" Gav yelled. "Yeah! Why the hell did they leave Trixie out? That was one of the best parts!" Nat then complained. "Octavia's overture was awesome in it! Gah, why'd they leave it out?" Gav was up out of his seat. I then realized what they were saying. Octavia and Trixie were only in the last bit of the finale. "What the hell are you two smoking? It mostly focused on Vinyl! Vinyl was doing a show and Discord shows up and starts wrecking the place. Vinyl tries to fight back but Discord does the whole 'I'm more powerful than anything you can throw at me' shtick. Octavia and Trixie show up to help but only get sucked into some vortex along with Vinyl and then... Boom. Just credits." "Yeah that's the same description but it focused on Trixie doing the magic show and then they come over to help Vinyl." Nat then argued. "Wait, no. They focused on Octavia. Damn, her musical number was just divine." "Did one of you guys just hit your head? Damn it guys, honestly." I said just shaking my head. "I'm not shitting you, that's what happened." Nat then tried to argue. Standing up, I put my arms up in a stretch. "Whatever, I'm gonna go play some Killing Floor. If you need me I shall be in my room, killing... floors." I paused to think how stupid that sounded and shook my head. "God, I thought I had something for that." I did a quick detour to the bathroom before hand, checking the mirror to see if I didn't have any upper body tattoos that I missed during my first look. ADD can make you miss the more obvious things. I felt the stubble just under my chin. Taking a closer look, I noticed it was... white. Like a very pale white. My hair was a dirty blonde, why the hell was it white? It also felt a bit... thicker as well. It offered more resistance when I brushed my fingers over it. "Heh, I must have scared my self half to death." I thought to myself and exited the room. Turning down the short hallway leading to my room, I looked at the many framed things that adorned my wall. Mostly it was filled with collectibles from comic conventions. The one I stopped to take a look at was my family reunion photo of 2005. Everybody in my family was there, all except for dad. I really wish he could have been there. I was showing off my black belt to every one. Five years of practice finally paying off. I sighed as I continued on into my room and sat down at my home computer. I booted it and started playing the Zed killing simulator. I had a couple of MLP mods installed. One of them allowed my to play as some MLP characters. After a round or three in a horrific recreation of Ponyville, I felt... like I've been there. Like the architecture was to the point that I see it everyday and that I could find my way around like the back of my hand. For some reason one of the streets looked very familiar and I felt like I could say that I lived on that particular one. I deviated from my team as I tried to go where the house was. Unfortunately a pile of burning wreckage stopped me from progressing. My little moment of not paying attention was rewarded with a freak coming up behind me and thrusting a chainsaw for an arm through my chest while cackling up a storm. "Your squad has been wiped out" was painted on the screen. I face-palmed in frustration with the sounds of my team-mates yelling at me for my incompetence resonating in my headphones. "Hey John?" Nat came in. "Could I... Stay here for the night? With the weird crap going on... Nat just wants some company." I mostly ignored her referring to herself in the third person again. I've never heard someone do that before but for some reason it just grates on my nerves. "Uh, yeah sure. Do you need anything? I've got a couple of blankets in the closet if you need them." I said as I pointed towards the closet in the corner of the room. "I'm sure Na- I mean, I'm sure I'll be fine, thank you." I looked at the time. Jeeze it was already seven? I missed my lunch. I went out into the living room slash kitchen to grab the sandwich that was awaiting me. Gav was sitting on the couch watching the news as I bit into the rather cold sandwich. "The Australian warship is to bring the displaced fishermen back to the Israel port town by the end of the week. An update on the Seattle explosion. Sources say tha-" I shut off the TV to the displeasure of Gav. "I was watching that." He said with a scowl "I know but half of the time the news is just depressing." "Well I like to know what's going on in the world." He looked at me. "You don't mind If I stay here tonight, do you?" He asked as I bit into my sandwich. "Huh, Nat asked the same thing. But no, you're okay to stay as well. Why?" "It's late, I don't have my car and I frankly hate the subway and the GO train. Especially when they started that no talking on the upper levels rule." "Okay, but you can't come into my room and try and molest me while I'm asleep." "What?" I face palmed again. "You seriously didn't remember? I mean really, it's not very hard to notice when some one is kissing you on the lips and they are of the same gender. Especially when one is straight and not wanting any." "We've done it before, right?" This was weird. Gav was straight. He wouldn't stop obsessing about girls at the bars we go to. Then again he could have been in denial all this time. What the hell is he talking about? "What? Other than this morning, we haven't done anything with each other. I know that for a freaking fact." "What do you mean? We've done it before, haven't... we?" "Dude. I'm okay if you swing for the other team but understand that I don't. Just don't do it to me, okay?" "I... It just felt... I 'unno, natural I guess." He gave a grunt and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Wait, what are we talking about?" "Man you are zoning out more than I do. That's just sad." I put a hand on his shoulder. "Look, it's great that you came out of the closet but don't come onto me, okay?" I gave him a pat on the cheek and went back into my room. "Wha-? I'm not gay!" he came from the other room. "Hypocrisy gets you nowhere!" I called back. When I got into my room Nat was looking at the various memorabilia on my shelves. "Do you mind sleeping on the couch? Also you might have to share with Gav." "Nat doesn't object with either." "Also could you keep an eye on him? He doesn't seem in the right mind today." "Yeah, Nat noticed that too." There it was again. "Why are you doing the third person thing? It's really annoying." "Nat doesn't know what you're talking about." "You are doing it. Right now. You've never done this, like, ever." "Seriously? Look, Trixie is tired. It's been a long day. Trixie is sure you are too. You had a lot to drink last night. Trixie suggests you get ready for bed and sleep off whatever is left of your hangover and wake up tomorrow with a refreshed mind and body." Third person speaking aside, she was right. My head did still hurt and those bed sheets do look inviting. "Yeah, I guess you're right. My brain isn't all there." Going into my room, I flopped down on the bed. I looked at my phone for the time. Eight thirty seven PM. I opened Twitter and, out of curiosity, went to the #MLP trend. Even there the fandom has all but dried up. Looking at the timeline, this one stood out: "Woke up with a cutie mark on my thigh #mlp #weird" There were others that were some iteration of this below it and with that there were a good number of other people who were all having the same dilemma. My thumb was circling around the reply button on the most recent post but I felt that it should be kept under wraps. Most of my family followed me and they would not be happy to hear that I got a tramp stamp. After spending a good hour and a half or so dicking around with various mobile games, I put the phone on charge. My eyelids were heavy. I'm tired and I haven't done anything productive today. Part of me hated it but I couldn't blame myself for it. Tattoos coming out of nowhere is not the best way to wake up. I rolled over onto my side. This was just silly. Checking to see if the tattoo truly was permanent, I dipped my hand in a cup of water that I had on the nightstand and rubbed my fingers on the mark to see if it would come off. It didn't. Frustrated, I wiped the water off with my shirt, took it off and threw it into the laundry basket. I put a pillow over my head and waited for the sweet embrace of sleep. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ "Hoist the banners up on those pillars! We need those up and ready for when the patrons arrive! Cooks! Where in hay are those treats?!" Everything was still a blur. I could make some shapes out this time around but there was no definition in any object. "Remind me why we're doing this?" I could feel as if I were talking but it wasn't my voice that was coming out. "For the last time; we are here to promote Equestrian culture to the Crystal Empire. Cadence asked for the best and Celestia sent us. A bit unsure as to why you are here..." It was different voice than my other dream. I still couldn't place it but it still sounded familiar. "Come along now, The Great and Powerful Trixie needs to rest before the show." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I felt a hand on my shoulder. My eyes wanted to stay shut but I needed to know why there was a hand on my shoulder. I forced them open but my vision was foggy at best. There was a humanoid figure resting his head right next to mine. Needless to say I got startled. I panicked and punched whomever was next to me right in the eye. They landed on the floor next to the bed with a loud thud and a cry of pain. "AHH! What the fuck was that for?!" Oh shit, that was Gav's voice. > ((Update)) > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Ugh... You guys, I don't think I want to keep doing this. It's becoming close to the next school year and I'm running out of steam, ideas and I'm just not having fun doing it. So, I'm sorry to say that I'm cancelling this fic. I know you guys want more but I'm just out of it and I can't find time to write half of the time. Not to mention I need to get my crap together for college (I've got a year to learn Blender and make a portfolio, WHEE!) I don't even know why you guys like this crap (not that I question your taste). But yeah... Sorry.