The Progress and the Progress

It's been a while, hasn't it? I'm still working on this story. I've progressed to four chapters now, but I'm rather reluctant to release them just yet. As I'm writing, I'm finding myself having to go back and tweak earlier chapters (the first chapter, for example, requires a bit of tweaking in its narrative). So I've decided not to release any of the chapters until everything is done and dusted.

Once that's done, I'll start a regular upload of one chapter per week (two if the chapters are particularly short).

In the meantime, here's an extract where Pinkie's being Pinkie and hijacked the narrative:

Natürlich hatte sie Schwierigkeiten, die Aufmerksamkeit der Barkeeper bekommen.

Sorry, I forgot I had to do this in English.

Let me start again: naturally, Rarity had difficulties getting the bartender’s attention.

Though she’d changed her evening dress to cover her cutie mark, she’d completely forgotten that her dress used Diurnal Equestrian fabrics, which of course came in colours that were illegal in Nocturnal Equestria.

Luckily, she’d kept her visitor’s hat on, so when the bartender did a double-take—a wonderful example of a double-take—he apologised and served her.

I was slightly further down the bar chugging down a vinegar drink of my own—raspberry flavour mixed with white beer that's as pink as my coat. Now, anypony who’s had a white beer before will know it’s naturally sour, but vinegar drinks are actually sweet with a bit of an afterkick. Top tip: don’t drink these things with a sore throat—it stings like Tartarus!

Wait, where was I again?

Oh yeah, Rarity!

She’d picked out an apple flavour vinegar mixed with water. I’m a bit wary of apple-based products myself: they all come from the Appleloosa Labour Camp. Some of the prisoners there deserve it, but others…

It was actually kind of interesting watching Rarity and her minder. One hides behind her mane, the other hides behind dresses and make up. Both of them are clearly afraid of letting other ponies see the real them, probably afraid of what other ponies would see.

They look to be about the same age as me, so they were probably really close to Ponyville or in the city itself when the Ten Day War kicked off. Dark times, those. I got my cutie mark then, as did a lot of ponies. I’m lucky the story behind mine is a happy one. Not many can claim the same and some still react badly to the sight of rainbows.

Sorry, I’m getting distracted again.

Now all this time, Rarity had been glancing in my direction. It was hard not to notice. I’m really perceptive. There may be other universes where I’m this weird, kooky pony who can’t read facial expressions—or one that only pretends not to be able to read facial expressions—but not in this universe, pal. Here, it’s part of my job and I think I know exactly why she was looking at me like that.

It’s my ainkhürn. I get it a lot. It’s broken and I can’t use magic. From a unicorn’s perspective, I’m disabled. From an earth pony’s perspective, I just have this weird growth and that’s it.

Yeah, you know what? I don’t want to come off as a hippogriff—sorry, hypocrite—so I’m just going to admit to you right now that my ainkhürn isn’t real. Earth ponies are a minority here in Nocturnal Equestria and there’s still a bit of racial prejudice against us. Unicorns believe we should be out in the fields, growing food for them. Well, not all unicorns, but there’s a lot that think that way.

“Lang lebe die Nacht!” I said softly. “So how are you finding the play?”

Rarity looked at me in surprise. I’d walked over when her attention was distracted. I can walk really quickly and quietly when I want.

“Dr Pinkamena Pie,” I introduced myself after the Pegasus mare translated for me. “You can call me, Pinkie, though.”

That was when I learnt her name was Rarity. She asked me whether my foal was in the play.

“Yes and no,” I responded. “I’m a psychologist. One of my patients is on stage.”

Patient-doctor confidentiality meant I couldn’t discuss his case, but let’s say Twilight was overreacting when she sent him my way. The colt’s fine—or rather, the reason she sent him to see me has nothing to do with his problems. Anyway, it’s nice to know the supposedly cold-hearted Inquisitor still had a soft spot for foals.

“I guess you could say I’m his adoptive big sister,” I said with a laugh. “Say, aren’t you that private investigator?”

“Waarom ja, ik ben.”

Didn’t need a translator for that; the Nocturnal Equestrian is similar enough it was like listening to her speak in a weird accent.

“Oh mijn! Wat is dat?”

“This is Gummy, my pet alligator,” I responded. “Couldn’t leave him alone today, so I had to take him with.” I reassured her that he wouldn’t bite, or rather, he didn’t have much in the way of teeth.

“Oh my, he’s so adorable!” exclaimed the Pegasus mare.

At which point I was forced to toss Gummy into the air. Luckily for me, Fluttershy—I learnt her name later—took the bait and dived after him.

Just in the nick of time, too!

“E 'la mia macchina fotografica; Farò quello che voglio con esso!”

A human rushed past where Fluttershy had been standing. He clearly wasn’t looking where he was going, so if I hadn’t tossed Gummy into the air, he’d have tripped over her and possibly crushed her wings—let’s say the human was quite well fed.

His minder—a unicorn, naturally—rushed past after him.

“I think we should stay back,” ventured Fluttershy.

It didn’t seem right that the human looked so unhappy, but I’m not going against the Ministry of Information. There’s only so much you can do, you know?

“Lasciate andare!”

Something broke and the camera went flying. There was a squeak from Fluttershy as it nearly struck her in the head. It wouldn’t have, but I don’t blame her. Sometimes, I do cut it really fine.

Rarity picked the camera up with her magic. She took one look at the preview screen on its back—it was one of those digital cameras—and ended up with a faraway expression on her face.

“That’s Grau-Stadt,” I said. “Why’d he want to take a picture of that?”

Well, technically it was the wall that surrounded Grau-Stadt. As a foreigner, he wouldn’t have been allowed inside that part of Nocturnal Ponyville. The human had managed to snap a shot of a tan earth pony heading through the only gateway into the district.

“Mevrouw Rarity, please give that back,” implored Fluttershy.

Rarity looked at Fluttershy as if she’d just woken from a dream. Did she fancy that pony or something? I could see the charm. He looked nice in a sweet kind of dorky way.

“It’s Meneer Caramel,” said Rarity as she angled the camera towards Fluttershy.

So his parents named him after the colour of his coat, huh?

“You’re not supposed to see that!” protested the unicorn minder as she galloped over.

“Ridatemi la mia macchina fotografica!” shouted the human.

“He said he wants you to…” began Fluttershy.

Yeah, we get it. Didn’t take a genius to figure out what he was saying. Boy that human was expressive. It’s difficult to read human emotions, but that guy was an open book.

The unicorn minder turned on the human and yelled at him in some language I didn’t quite understand. She was going a mile a minute. I could match her in terms of word speed, but not in a foreign language I couldn’t. Had no idea what she said, but it seemed to deflate the human a great deal.

“Inquisitor Sparkle… see this,” said Rarity.

Didn’t quite understand the middle of her sentence, but that was the general jist of what she was saying.

The unicorn minder shouted something in Diurnal Equestria, before she grabbed the camera in her own magical aura. Rarity protested as she tried to pull the camera out of the minder’s grasp.

Oh, low blow!

The Ministry mare smashed the camera into Rarity’s horn. I was about to yell at her, before she smashed the camera again into Rarity’s head.

The Diurnal Equestrian went down like baked bads.

“This pony is an accessory to this human’s attempts at besmirching the Kingdom of Equestria,” announced the minder sternly with a furious glare at Fluttershy. “I’m having her arrested and taken to the nearest Inquisition Constabulary.”