The Search in Winsome Falls

by Comma Typer


Confusion

Soon, the hours passed and went, the celebration unfelt but remembered, and the moon lowered and gave way to the sun.
Now, it was morning. The birds sang their natural melodies of wooded lands nearby.
An eager pony who had a half note for a cutie mark ran to a tree where such a melody was being performed, huffing and puffing as he carried a music stand and a sheet of papers precariously threatening to disorganize themselves on the grassy ground—and, so, at times, he would stop and rearrange the papers before taking the stand up and galloping towards it.
"I must transcribe it!" the pony shouted. "I must! They have called me a crazy, unfettered musician for even thinking of recording such music to the ears, but that's what they shall call me—to throw mislabels at me—until I prove them wrong! Soon, they will know that their music can be enhanced, that we can up them by a notch or two."
He laughed, cackled.
That laugh caused the birds to fly away.
"Hold on!" the pony shouted, picking up the music stand again and galloping after the birds. "I'm going to catch you! You'll make me millions of bits; just stay still!"
The musician kept shouting and screaming at the fleeing birds flapping their wings to relative safety and freedom. Across the main street, now past the houses, he gained the ire of his fellow ponies by rudely waking them up and causing a few of them to open their windows and to return the favor by shouting and screaming at him.
These loud words, however, did not faze the chasing musician, holding dearly to his music stand—a look at the ruffled papers, then a look at the birds almost out of sight.
The pony then went down a dirt path, picking up speed as he got closer and closer to the birds—his run becoming faster and faster.
"Why don't you just stay here, birds?!"


Wakes Week woke up, eyes wide open and an angry face on her.
She looked to her left and right.
Isobar was hovering to the window; Dally News was getting up from bed and was moving there, too.
"What's happening?" Wakes Week asked, irritated as she shot up from bed. "Is there a criminal gone loose?"
"Apparently not," Isobar said, opened the window and stuck his head out.
Dally News stuck her head out, too.
"Come on, I wanna see what's the ruckus!" Wakes Week said, sticking her head out as well.
They saw a pony sprinting away from them, holding a music stand, shouting about in an enraged manner.
"The weird things that happen here," Dally News said. "Well, it isn't too off from the normal compared to other things, but it's still strange."
"Do you think he's a resident here?" Isobar asked.
She shook her head. "Never seen him before."
"There were lots of ponies at the Pony Tones performance last night," Wakes Week said. "There should have been a similar face there in the crowd somewhere!"
"Like I was focused on looking for a pony I didn't even know existed until now, Wakey." The unicorn rolled her eyes as she adjusted her glasses with her magic once again.
After that, her horn still glowing green, she looked away from the window and arranged the bed, levitating the scattered pillows and ruffled blanket and fixing them up as they glowed green as well. Then, the bed was tidy and clean.
She scanned the room. Her smile went away.
"Guys, where's Onion?"
The two ponies still at the window turned around.
Besides the three of them, the room was empty, void of anypony else.
Wakes Week gulped. "This is not good! Did somepony foalnap him already?!"
"Well," Isobar spoke up, raising a wing to his head, "if the robber foalnapped him, why him only? Why not all four of us?"
"Because all four of us are too heavy?"
Isobar sighed, disappointed. "For a pegasus or a unicorn, maybe. But, for an Earth pony—you know, the ones well-known for their immense strength and raw power besides other things—it would be a lickety-split."
"You're saying the ice cream pony did it?!" Wakes Week yelled.
"What? Not Lickety Split! He's a colt who lives in Ponyville helping out at the famous ice cream shop there—no way that he would be stealing ponies in their sleep way over here!"
"But, it's just two train stations away!"
"Uh, guys?" Dally News asked, poking Isobar on his wing.
"What is it—oh, it's you."
Onion stood in front of the door carrying a sling bag. He wore a sheepish grin as he slowly waved at them, also slowy moving towards the bed. "Uh, hi?"
"What have you been doing?" Isobar asked, a hoof pointed at him.
"Uh, eh, I was doing my normal, uh, early morning walk—a twilight walk, if you may! Heh-heh-heh-heh!"
"You don't do early morning walks," Isobar pointed out.
Wakes Week gasped. "Are you telling me that you're in cahoots with Lickety Split?!"
"Who?" Onion asked, confused. "The grandson of the pony running the ice cream—"
"It doesn't even make sense," Dally News said. Then, her horn glowed again and carried the bag away.
"W-what are you doing?" Onion said. "That's very important, top-secret stuff in there!"
Isobar caught the bag. Without saying anything, he unzipped the bag.
Papers inside.
Isobar scooped them up with a hoof. Eyeing the shy, retreating Onion, he said, "Waiting until we were asleep to go out and do whatever this is—" He pointed a wing to the stack of papers "—isn't the best idea! We thought you got foalnapped by a thief!"
"I wasn't foalnapped at all!" Onion protested. "I was just—"
"Stop. Let me skim this first."
Everyone went silent as Isobar read what was on the paper—scribbles, hurried turns and twists of the quill. He squinted his eyes at the hoofwriting before him.
"Before you say anything," Onion said, raising a hoof, "I wrote it with my magic, not my hoof."
"Must be why it's more legible than I thought," Isobar responded calmfully before returning to the squinting of eyes and the poring of papers.
A minute of this passed. Then, Isobar dropped the stack of papers down.
"What is it?" Dally News asked.
Isobar sighed again, looking at her. "I don't know what to say." Then, he looked at Onion. "I don't know what to say."
"Uh, I know this might be a bad time to say this," Onion said, "but: Are you impressed?"
"I don't know if I should be happy or sad," Isobar said, wincing while conveying a little smile. "It looks like you've done our first bit of interrogation all by yourself."
"It's the train's fault," Onion answered, raising his hoof again. "I couldn't get the schedule out of my head—it was going to leave at seven-thirty sharp or we would end up being late to the search and maybe whoever is doing something out-of-the-ordinary in Winsome Falls would have gotten away by then. I had to expect the worst, so I had to get away from the performance the first chance I got—which was when they finished their last song. I noticed all of you wanted to meet the Pony Tones so I took that opportunity to slip away, come here, write my report to Princess Luna, and then, after I was done with that, went back outside to interview the ponies here. It's kind of convenient that this is a town where ponies transport things so not only did I have lots of ponies waiting under the night with their wares and items and other things, I got some pretty good answers—gleaned some useful information. Turns out, there's a 'foresting industry' in Winsome Falls headed by the Flim Flam Brothers."
All three ponies were staring at him dumb-founded—eyes wide open, irises shrunken, and mouths open in wonder.
Isobar closed his mouth. "Don't do that again, but let's go!" He looked at the clock on the wall. "Thanks for reminding me about the train, Onion! We're five minutes away!"
"I didn't even get the pictures—" Wakes spoke up.
"They can wait when we come back! Let's hurry!"
So, with Onion leading the group, they hurried out of the room, rushed down the stairs, and went out of the inn, Onion and Wakes Week grabbing the wagon and pulling it in frantic pace.
"Are you sure we'll be able to get there?" Isobar asked. "We're a bit far away from the station!" Then, his eyes lighted up. "I got an idea! I'll stall the train!"
"What?!" Everypony yelled as they galloped.
"It's worth a shot!"
Then, Isobar flew away, leaving the three of them running on the dirt path, running closer to the more populated area of Fourbeat.
"Should we tell him that we're not that far away?" Dally News asked, pointing a hoof at the nearby train station. "And—wait a minute, why are we running to the train station?!"
Then, the three skidded and screeched their hooves.
Onion gasped then bit his hoof. "This is a big mistake!" Bringing his front hooves to his mouth, he called out: "Isobar! Come back! We're not supposed to be using the train station!" Turning to see Wakes Week, he said, "OK, uh, Wakey—can I use that nickname of—"
"You don't have to be so stiff! Of course you can call me—"
"Wakey, go to the square and ask anypony there if they know the way to Pace!" Turning to Dally, he then ordered, "Dally, help her get the wagon there—we can't afford to lose a single thing!"
"If we drop anything, we can just pick it back up," Dally News said with an expression of annoyed boredom.
"We can't afford to waste time!"
Dally sighed and rolled her eyes. "Can't argue with that."
And, the two mares were pushing the cart back to town.


"This is what we get for having Onion be the one spearheading this expedition," Dally News opined as she and Wakes Week stood along with the covered wagon in the open square where several ponies were going about.
Several stalls and mini-shops had been set up there, selling whatever they were selling: on this side were the fresh agricultural produce, on that side were the precious gems and stones glittering under the sharp sunlight, on another side over there was a lonely stall advertising apples by an enthusiastic Apple family member—that could be seen quite well by the fact that he wore a shirt that had apples on it, a hat with symbols and images of apples on it, his wooden stall had apples painted on it, and his cutie mark was four apples with a candied one on the side.
"He's the one telling us that we should be on time for this, saving time for that, always trying to be the relaxed honcho—but, look at what his 'time-saving techniques' did to all of us."
"Dally," Wakes Week replied, a bothered tone brooding, "you know that he means well. Just chalk it up to his brashness and hot-headedness."
"That still doesn't solve the problem," Dally News said, glancing at one of the stalls and observing it as she spoke. "That only tells us what the problem is."
"At least we know what the problem is!" She budged her on the shoulder. "That counts, right?"
Dally sighed, forcing a smile. "And, now we just wait for the two hardy stallions to get here and 'fess up."
As if on cue, the two hardy stallions turned a corner and appeared in their view—Watts Onion galloping, Isobar flying. Onion skidded once again, screeching to a halt in front of the mares while Isobar landed, his wings a bit too close to the mares as their manes flew about by the wind—Dally was holding on to her glasses.
Isobar smiled at the mares then glared at Onion. "Nice try."
The unicorn gulped before straightening himself up and forced a smile as well, taking up a commanding attitude. "So, girls, what's the status on the location of, uh, Pace?"
Dally News arched an eyebrow, her eyeglasses making it more outstanding. "Yes, we asked for directions, if that's what you meant."
Onion sighed in relief. "OK, then." He pointed a hoof at the mountains with their high buildings. "Off to Pace we—"
"Onion, you don't even know where to start," Dally said, placing a hoof on his shoulder.
Isobar groaned yet again, covering his face with a wing.
"Let us lead the way, Onion!" Wakes Week said cheerfully, smiling. "I'm sure you must be tired from all that interviewing and interrogating last night!"
Onion smiled wider, beaming at her. "Thanks."
"Now that the fiasco is all over," Isobar said, grumpy in his statement, "can we get a move on and make sure this goes off without a hitch?"
Dally News looked around in the busy square with its clanking of bits, its constant exchange of items, its evolving and ever-changing nonchalant, casual discussions. "Yeah." Looking at Onion—who was yawning—she said, "I think we can make it with more than enough time for you to sleep when we get there. It's quite nearby."
Wakes Week nodded. "And, if you stay awake, you'll see the beautiful trees and plants there. I'm now afraid that you might be tempted to sleep there!"
"Uh, thanks?"


The four ponies, from there on, walked on another dirt path, walking out of Fourbeat and into the nearby forest higher up in the hills.
They passed through the tall, towering trees of formidable trunk and bark—leaves, though gentle and delicate, emanating from them a prestigious image due to the stature of their trees. Unkempt, untrimmed grass ruled the ground—flowers and weeds were running wild here and so were the woodland creatures such as the rabbits and the foxes along with those birds whistling about. If one could strain and stretch their ears out, one could make out a voice shouting as if it was on a tirade against those flying animals. But, whoever was making that voice was too far away to listen to for a long time.
After some time, they came across a ledge. It gave the four travelling ponies a spanning vista of the land beyond them—Fourbeat, quaint little town, was only as big as the end of a pony's hoof while, rising above the numerous mountains and hills and other soaring land forms of somewhat short height—a purple glint, reflecting the rays of the sun in magnificent splendor.
The ponies—including Watts Onion—stopped at that ledge high up above the ground.
Not a word was said. Only the smiles and the wide open eyes spoke of awe and apprehending admiration at the landscape worthy of a painting—the clouds in fragile yet imposing form, the sky in infinite scope stretching its influence throughout its realm, the sun radiating its warmth and light as the unambiguous object of the time being.
But, a poke on Isobar's wing and a silent glare in response brought the four ponies to moving again as they approached a stone bridge and several wooden houses on the other side of it.