Spike was aided in his quest to locate the stallion by the facts that Ponville was a small town, and one with which he was intimately familiar. He had clearly seen the stallion at the door: a big, bluff hearty fellow with a brown coat, untidy shock of dark brown mane, and intense dark green eyes, wearing a large tan Stetson, and clad in a matching tan cape -- rather heavily-dressed, for the warm August afternoon.
Their visitor hadn't had much time to go far, and he hadn't gone far. Spike noticed him sitting at a street-corner cafe table, eating an ice-cream sundae, but a block and a half north of the Carousel Boutique. He had gone in the direction of the train station, Spike noted, and wa glad that he had chosen to start searching in that direction. Wouldn't do to have him leave town before Rarity got to talk to him.
Spike ambled over. The stallion spotted him almost immediately -- as the only Dragon amongst Ponies, Spike stood out despite his short stature. Spike smiled at him, and gave him a friendly wave.
"Hello, Mr. Cape," Spike said, walking over to his table. "Mind if I join you?"
"It's a free realm," Dashing replied. He sounded depressed, and his ears drooped. "Though, frankly, Ah'm a mite surprised to see you."
"Why's that?" asked Spike, with studied innocence.
"Wal, Ah know Miss Rarity was avoiding me," sighed Dashing. "Ah suppose it's 'cause of how Starlight treated her at Our Town. And Ah didn't make so much as a peep o'protest, 'least not until Double Diamond and Party Favor raised rebellion." He sighed again. "Ah'm a tailor. Ah never claimed to be no hero." For all his size, the big stallion suddenly seemed helpless and small.
Dashing's suggestions were uncomfortably close to the truth. Spike did not like to lie directly, so he asked instead:
"And how are Double Diamond and Party Favor doing now?"
"They're doing right tolearable," Dashing said, his mood brightening. "DeeDee ... that's Double Diamond ... he's become something of our leader, though he doesn't try to meddle in everypony's private business the way Starlight did. Which is a relief, Ah tell you. Party Favor and Night Glider are his main honchos -- PeeEff organizes town shindigs, and Night Glider flies patrols and keeps folk from gettin' too rowdy. They all hang out at Sugar Belle's shop -- she's thick with all o'them, now." He smiled. "They're a good bunch o'Ponies. And Sugar Belle makes some tasty treats these days!"
"Sounds like you're all doing well, then," commented Spike.
"We're all a-okay. Now that we can use our talents proper-like, we've all been doing our jobs much better. Double Diamond and Party Favor are talking about building a ski resort and bringing in tourists, so we can make us some bits and order things from the catalogs. See, Starlight used to buy supplies for us -- she had some kind of money, I think it was from rich Equalists -- but o'course we don't have that any more. But now we can make nice things ourselves, and that feels a lot better. But we can't make everything in Our Town -- we're way too small for that. We need outside trade."
"That makes sense," said Spike.
"Party Favor explained it. He's himself from some old clan, Canterlot gentry -- the Ruins or something like that."
"Runes?" asked Spike. "I think I've heard of them. I'm originally from Canterlot myself." He knew of an old family named that -- Twiight had once had a class under a noted professor of magical theory named Quasar Rune, and he himself had once met a Silk Shimmer Rune, who had mostly used her magic for party tricks: he'd heard something about her going on to career as a stage magician. He wondered if they were some sort of kin to Party Favor.
"Yeah, something like that. Pee-Eff says they're all powerful mages and scholars -- 'cept for him, the way he talked he was sort of the runt o' the litter when it came to magic." He chuckled. "Though Pee-Eff does things with his balloons that rightly shouldn't be possible, so I think he got more o'the magic than he lets on."
"From what I heard, Party Favor's balloon constructs were amazing," said Spike. He had heard rather a lot about them from Twilight Sparkle, who had witnessed them herself, and been fascinated by the physics questions they raised. "He should be proud of them."
"Yeah," said Dashing. "Pee-Eff's too hard on himself, sometimes. That's what Sugar Belle says. He and Sugar Belle have become right friendly-like these days." He leaned forward confidentially. "Just between you and me," he said, "Ah wouldn't be too surprised if they formed an Intention."
This was roughly equivalent to an 'understanding' in urbane terms: it meant that the couple involved were considering a formal engagement, or Betrothal, as more rustic Ponies put it.
"Really?" Spike asked, though he in fact believed Dashing Cape. Twilight's report, which Spike had helped her write, had mentioned that Party Favor and Sugar Belle had been very good friends, and specifically that Party Favor had endured emotional abuse from Starlight Glimmer to shield Sugar Baker from suspicion. To Spike, who similarly would have endured anything to protect Rarity from harm, this seemed a sure sign of some sort of love.
"Oh, shore," said Dashing. "Ah've seen them makin' goo-goo eyes at each other, when they didn't think no one was watching." He winked. "There's been a lot o'that in Our Town, since The Sameness ended."
"The Sameness kept Ponies from falling in love?" Spike asked.
"Yeah. Living under The Sameness was sort o'like iiving under gauze -- all muffled-like, Ah mean --" He broke off and looked at Spike uncertainly, an uncertainity with which Spike was all too familiar. Sometimes, it was useful to look rather like a Pony foal. Much of the time, though, it was annoying. "How old are you, exactly?"
"Fifteen," Spike said He had no idea how long his egg had lain dormant, but he counted from hatching, as a Pony would have from birth.
"Wal, Ah guess yore old enough," said Dashing, leaning in again, and speaking in confidential tones "See, our mares'd still Cycle, and we'd still be roused -- a little. But it was all sort o' vague. Kind of like they were 'I'd mebbe like some pesterin' if h really liked yew, and yew asked real nice and often,' and we'd be 'If'n yew really asked us we'd mebbe pester yew, if'n we felt like it and weren't too busy,' but neither stallion nor mare really cared about it all that much, if yew see what Ah mean."
Spike nodded. "Sort of like seeing a pretty filly at a party, but not wanting all that much to talk to her, in particular?" Spike had no instinctive reaction to marescent as such, though he recognized it; there were other wys in which Rarity excited him.
"Yew got it! Starlight, that bothered her some, 'cause she wanted us to mate and have foals, but that's one thing yew cain't force, not and still be Pony. Some of the mares and stallions tried, but their hearts weren't really in it. And most didn't want to at all, not without Love, and we couldn't feel nothin' so intense, under The Sameness. So it didn't work."
It occurred to Spike, who as a Drake friendly with rather many mares was quite familiar with mares complaining about their Cycles, that Starlight Glimmer had accidentally hit on a possible Suppressor -- though at a price in skill and sanity that few mares would care to pay. He wondered briefly, what Rarity or Twilight would think of this observtion; then realized that it might be an awkward topic for any male to raise to a female.
"But when The Sameness went away," Dashing explained, "we could all feel again!" He smiled joyfully. "Those of us who'd made friends with a mare, come to like her a mite even under The Sameness, why, we was fit to bustin' with Friendship and Love!"
His smile broadened.
"There's this one mare -- Ah worked with her under The Sameness -- and we'd come to be friends, even all flattened down like we was, 'cause -- well, Ah don't know what she sees in an ole has-been or never-was, like me -- but her --" He breathed in deepy. "She's just plain the smartest and nicest and purtiest and best mare Ah ever did meet. Wicked sense o'humor -- she got it back, after we were free, and had me fit to bust a gut laughing with her that first night o'freedom. Some later nights --" Suddenly, he seemed a bit embarrassed. "There's things a gentlecolt shouldn't say, not outright. 'Specially not about a lady as classy as Garter Stitch."
Abruptly, a weight Spike had not even noticed oppressing him, before that moment, lifted from Spike's soul, and he found himself regarding Dashing Cape with kindlier eyes.
"You're in love with her, then?" Spike asked. "Garter Stitch?"
Dashing nodded. "Ah want to declare mah Intention," he said. "But Ah don't want to take me out of pity. She's real good at making purty lingerie. There's always an upscale market for those sort of female fineries." He sighed. "But me, on the other hoof ..." He gazed at Spike earnestly.
"Ah want to pull mah own weight with her. Ah don't want to be some sorta fancy colt living off her Talent. Ah want to be worthy of her. Ah want to use mah own Talent -- the more so now, after so many months deprived o'it.
"But mah Talent's fer makin' cloaks and capes. And those've gone out o'fashion. Also, Ah'm country though and through. An ole cowpoke from the Palomino. Yew kin hear it in mah voice, Ah reckon."
Spike nodded.
"Ah'm not one o' those fancy Canterlot or Manehattan fashion Ponies, like Prim Hemline or Hoity Toity. Ah tried to break into design work in Manehattan before -- but every time Ah opened mah fool mouth, Ah was laughed right out the door. They barely even looked at mah designs -- pegged me as a dumb hick," Dashing said bitterly. "Ah must've been plumb loco to think an outsider like me could make it in the world o'fashion!"
Spike was moved. He was quite the opposite of a hick -- but he knew what it was to be an outsider, and have to try twice as hard as anypony to find acceptance.
Dashing Cape continued.
"Then, Ah met Rarity. We didn't say that much to each other, but Ah found out she was a fashion designer. Later, Ah read about her in a magazine, and Ah larned she weren't no big-city mare to start with neither. She wa a small-town girl from Ponyville, jest a little place on the edge o' the Everfree 'til Princess Twilight moved there. She'd made 'em listen to her.
"Ah got the crazy notion that, if she could do it, mebbe Ah might as well. Ah got out mah ole sketchbook, started workin' on some new cape designs, fer the first time in years. Rarity was mah inspiration, an' Garter Stitch, she encouraged me. Ah started to think mebbe, just mebbe, Ah had a chance." His voice was thick wth passion.
"So Ah came out here to Ponville." He sighed. "Ah reckon Ah was a fool to do so. Miss Rarity -- she must be a mighty busy mare, and Ah should've written ahead, and ... oh, Ah was just a fool to think that somepony as special and important as Rarity Belle would have any time fer a nopony like me!" The big, burly stallion seemed close to tears.
"Wal," he said "Ah suppose Ah won't trouble yew or yore friend no more. Ah'll jest finish this sundae, an' get right back on the next train north, an' jest fergit bout mah foolish dream ..."
"Hold on," said Spike. "Miss Rarity was busy when you knocked on the door -- in the middle of some very delicate work. That's why she slammed the door." He smiled and winked at Dashing. "She can be tempermental at times -- you'd know too, being another creative type."
Dashing Cape looked at Spike with the eagerness of a drowning Pony being offered a helping hoof.
"She asked me to convey her apologies for being so short with you," Spike continued, "and would like you to come back in --" Spike glanced at the clock tower "-- half an hour. She would love to hear you out."
"Fer real?" gasped Dashing Cape, in almost disbelieving happiness.
"Oh yes," said Spike. "For real. Miss Rarity's one of the realest Ponies around, under all her glamour." He paused for a moment. "Just show her what you've got. And give it your all. Rarity respects that."
"Thank yew, Mr. Spike," Dashing said. "Ah'll give it mah best shot."
"You do that," Spike said, sliding off his seat. He wouldn't have minded an ice-cream himself -- watching Dashing eat that sundae had reminded him of how good they tasted -- but he really needed get back to Rarity and report what he had discovered. He'd treat himself later. "I think you'll find she'll be generous toward your ideas."
She usually was.