Starry spent a few days in a blur. She filled the few orders that did come in and did a few odd jobs around town. But she would come home feeling exhausted and would just lay there in bed until Rochester or Jane would scamper in to tell her about their day.
She couldn’t understand squirrel talk. But the thought still mattered.
Cass and Bee occasionally stopped by, as always. Although, Cass had been acting a bit unusual compared to her normal self. Starry once woke up in the middle of the night thinking Rochester was combing through her kitchen, only to be met with an apologetic Cass holding a box of Starry’s favorite cookies. Starry was more shocked that Cass was up than that she was stealing food. Cass normally sleeps like a log at night on cue.
She told a few of the ponies about her trip when they would stop by, but most of them really didn’t care. They were more fixated on their daily lives than on what was out there.
Mainly she cried. It was frustrating. She lost one of her main sources of income. She lost her spot in the show to nopony knows who. Edgy didn’t seem to be coming back any time soon. And she felt like nopony in town really cared about her adventure.
About a week in to her return to Ponyville, Starry was at the back of her house attempting to try to cheer herself up with some gardening. With her magic, she lifted up her garden hose by the metal knob and turned on the water. As she could hear the water slowly come through the hose she had the sudden urge to dump the water on her head. She wanted to see if it would jolt her out of her misery. She whipped the hose up above her head just as the water burst out.
Whoosh!
It felt miserable. The jolt caused her to release her grip on the hose and it launched into the air and sprayed all over her fence and onto the pet of the stallion next door. The goose squawked in shock and gave her a menacing look before angrily squawking again and flying off into the opposite corner of his yard. Agatha wasn’t the friendliest goose, and they had had run ins before.
“Hey, Em! Haven’t seen you out here since before the Friendship Festival! How’ve you been?” a cheery voice called out from the other side of the fence.
It was Postage Stamp, one of the mailponies of Ponyville who usually did the emergency telegrams whenever Post Haste was too busy, which didn’t happen too often, but often enough. It meant he had to work at all random hours of the day, but he always seemed really relaxed and cheery when he was at home. He also liked to do woodcarvings and would share some of his work with Starry. Today, he was sitting on his back porch pondering a new set of wings he was carving into a light brown block of wood.
“I’ve been fine,” Starry said with her head hung. She wouldn’t even look his direction. She had a hold of the hose again and finished up watering the few herbs that grew around her windowsills and tree before heading back indoors.
The next day, Starry woke up to a knock on her front door. She didn’t even bother even fully waking up but rolled out of bed with a thump onto the floor and then nearly crawled down the stairs as she headed to the front door.
Postage Stamp was outside holding a box all wrapped up with a bow on it.
“Ta da! I thought you might like something extra for your garden. Open it!”
Starry levitated it from his hooves with a sigh and slowly took off the bow and the wrapping. She was happy for a present, but she couldn’t manage enough energy to show it.
Inside was a miniature wooden version of Rochester and Jane. It was about half their size, and inside Jane’s arms were some small lumps Starry couldn’t make out for a second. But then Starry’s eyes managed to widen in surprise. It was a small litter of baby squirrels. She looked back up at Postage Stamp and he was starting to look nervous.
“Ah, I know Jane doesn’t quite look it yet, but I can tell she’s expecting. I asked Mane Goodall about it to make sure I knew the signs.”
Starry couldn’t believe it. Her little boy was already having a family! But, again, she felt crushed that she wasn’t the one to know of it first. And now both Postage Stamp and the vet knew of it before she did.
She let Postage Stamp stay for a little longer. He told her about the new series of carvings he was working on. And she nodded and found things to do around the kitchen while he talked. But she was only half paying attention. She mentioned a few of the things she saw on her journey, and Postage Stamp was curious about the different animals and almost didn’t believe the star spider story. But she had reached the point that even she wasn’t as thrilled about it as she had been.
When he left, she crawled back up into bed and didn’t leave for the rest of the day.
The next two weeks she began running low on things to do. She hadn’t had anything new come in for a while and she stopped doing her normal chores around the house. It seemed like she was just going to wither away in her room until she decided she was just going to leave.
*** *** *** *** *** ***
Edgy came into town much the same way he always did. Though he did get his uniform tailored at his last stop so that it looked brand new and was almost unrecognizable from the Storm King uniform it used to be, he still looked intimidating at first glance. His dark uniform and his scars were still totally strange in a world filled with bright colors and smooth shapes.
It was only three weeks since he had left Ponyville and it still amazed him how all the ponies could be so caught up in their small lives when there was so much out there that could attack them at any moment. It seemed to him that most of Equestria knew the Elements would protect them from any major problem, even problems they wouldn’t even think of, like getting turned into trees.
He wondered how Starry was doing. It had killed him to have to spend so long away, especially once he first realized what it was like to have a real friend. He still felt loneliness, but he had hope now, and it made it a bit easier. Still, it would be nice to finally come back to someone he felt he could count on to be there.
He didn’t even make it to the forge when he saw Cass zipping around the streets looking for someone.
She spotted him and then zipped off before he could ask what was going on. It didn’t seem too unusual to him, though. From what he knew of her, she was quick to action just like Rainbow Dash was reported to be. She always had somewhere to fly off to.
He continued his way toward the forge, but it didn’t seem to be open. In fact, from the shutter that constantly swung, he could see inside and noticed the dust that had built up. It was as if it hadn’t been worked in in days. Metal scraps were strewn about her work bench and the floor, like the leftovers from a demolition site. The ashes in the fire pit looked as chill as snow.
It didn’t take him too long to trot over to her house to find it similarly empty. Her front door was jammed but after a brief chant he was able to use his power to unstick it and enter. He didn’t want to accidentally break her door.
This place looked deserted as well. Dirty dishes were piled up in the kitchen. Her room looked unlived in.
Unfortunately, he didn’t know where Cass and Bee lived, and now he wished he had followed Cass when he saw her earlier. But Ponyville was a small town. And he knew that if he just kept walking he’d eventually bump into her.
He tried to make it appear like he knew where he was going, without making it obvious he was looking for somepony. He walked by Town Hall, and even went by Twilight’s castle, before he had to duck behind some bushes as two unicorns, one purple and the other blue, walked past. He didn’t want to look too suspicious.
When he finally reached the part of town with more restaurants in it, he was both tired and hungry, and he felt a bit anxious to know what happened to Starry.
Luckily, he didn’t have to wonder long.
At the front of the nearest hayburger joint, Starry sat at a table piled high with what seemed like everything from the menu. Cass and Bee were both nearby watching with the most excited faces. A brown and grey earth pony was watching by with a list in his hooves.
“Now, fillies and gentlecolts, we have a new wanna be champion in our midst! The pony that claims that she can eat every single thing off our menu within two hours, and the pony that wants to claim her spot on the Wall of the Greats!”
Here, he pointed to a wall with a few pictures of ponies on it. Some looked a bit sick, and some looked a bit proud of themselves. One picture had two ponies fighting over each other but laughing all the while. It looked like an orange earth pony and a blue pegasus.
Starry didn’t seem too interested in the Wall or the ponies gathering around to witness the spectacle. She had a determined look on her face but also a look in her eye that seemed hard to decipher.
Edgy decided to watch for himself.
It didn’t take two hours to empty that table. In two flashes, Cass and Bee had swooped in and taken off with two hooffuls each of food. And Starry herself made a dramatic flash like a magician would as they make their way off stage.
And just like that Edgy lost sight of her again. He wasn’t going to stick around and see what the angry moderator pony was going to do, so he managed to squeeze himself back through the crowd and start his search all over again.
He was just about to turn the corner when he saw a few hay fries scattered on the ground.
“That was awesome! I doubt we’ll be allowed to eat there again, but still pretty awesome.”
It sounded like Bee’s voice.
He continued following the hay fry trail to see the band of miscreants huddled in a makeshift camp. It was almost admirable the way they were able to hide one in a town where there were so many open areas and ponies walking freely everywhere.
Starry and Cass were both in giggling fits and were drinking some fizzy sodas.
They stopped talking when he walked up. Starry looked up at him and just had a brief moment of surprise flit across her face, before she turned around in a huff. Bee saw it and looked amused.
“So you finally managed to make it back? We thought you were dead!” Bee said before laughing again.
Starry seemed to brighten a bit and laughed along.
“He probably did die, but after he got there he decided to wake up one morning and leave.”
Edgy couldn’t believe Starry would say that. She still said it like it was a joke but he had the feeling that there was a lot of underlying bitterness in there.
The three hooligans huddled together for a second before announcing that they were going to play a game of ding dong ditch.
Cass and Bee chose Starry to knock on the door, and Edgy was free to do whatever.
Starry trotted up to one door, making sure that nopony was watching, and knocked. She hadn’t expected the pony of the house to be close enough to the door and she nearly jumped when the door started opening before she could take one hoof off the door step.