//------------------------------// // Chapter 7: Packing // Story: Fire and Thunder // by computerneek //------------------------------// Finally, she gets back to her little shack on the outskirts of town.  It’s a quaint, unassuming little building. Most ponies would assume it is what it looks like:  A cheap little three-room building, containing little more than a kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom.  However, only one pony in Equestria knows it has a basement.  Not a very big basement, unfortunately- but it still has one.  Once she closes and locks the main door, it takes a light but very finicky spell to reveal and open the door in the floorboards. She trots downstairs, closes the door, and lights up her horn.  A quick scan of the room reveals nothing of interest- only a few cardboard boxes, a wooden dresser, and a desk.  She sets to work drawing things out of the drawers and boxes. She also removes her saddlebags, placing them on the ground so she can select what to pack. She starts with the map she’d built of Fluttershy’s most recent mission.  It’ll be pretty important to bring- and she makes sure to update it with the final leg of the pegasus’ journey before she packs it in. Next, she pulls it right back out again, spreading it out on the desk to review the terrain.  The train ride will present no particular challenge, the forest will be fairly safe. The desert…  Pinkie had mentioned some kind of monster out there that Fluttershy’s stare wouldn’t work on. Which reminds her- Pinkie had come to her for her manufacturing skill.  Pinkie had wanted fireworks… From a pony on the opposite side of town as the one that’s good at making the things.  She had tried to refer Pinkie to said other pony; any fireworks she makes are more likely to be dangerous than not.  The party pony had then surprised her by declaring that as exactly what she was looking for.  So, with some words of caution, she had manufactured some “fireworks”.  As Pinkie had taken the bag of what amounted to firework-disguised short-fused RPGs, she had mentioned something about it not mattering how dangerous they are to use, so long as they have all the right ingredients.  That had confused her to no end; a pile of ingredients might be stable in one configuration… Or highly volatile in another.  She doesn’t know what Pinkie did with them- but she has a sudden suspicion. She’ll make some fairly hefty explosives to drag along on her journey.  No firework disguises- she’s a licensed explosive handler, though nopony knows.  That piece of paper will get undisguised explosives past any random customs checks- and as long as she doesn’t pull them out, only the guards that perform those checks will ever know.  She hopes she won’t need them- but, the way she sees it, better safe than sorry. Especially out in the Undiscovered West. What else will she need?  She tries thinking back to what Fluttershy had brought.  Food & water, “fireworks”, enchanted gems… No, she won’t be needing any of those; as a unicorn, she can cast the spell directly, pulling from her own virtually limitless supply of mana, rather than the limited quantity even the finest gemstone can store.  Then again… She decides to bring two gemstones anyways, neither enchanted. One never knows when such tools might be useful, even for a unicorn. She pulls two fine rubies out of one of the boxes, adding them to her pack. Quite rare it is to find stones of such purity; most stones aren’t quite so perfect.  She could never show them to Spike; flinging one of these into the upper atmosphere should be enough to distract every mature dragon for fifty miles around.  Young dragons like Spike wouldn’t see it from so far away but, with their undeveloped brains, would go absolutely nuts for it, like a cat in a field of catnip. While she inserts these, she recalls what Twilight had insisted Fluttershy bring:  A book. A book.  She’s fairly certain the purple alicorn had picked a random book off the shelf; Teaching Your Foal To Read isn’t one Fluttershy would be likely to need, let alone on a journey.  Then… Why not bring something to read? Twilight’s choice may have been random, but hers won’t be.  She slides open one of the desk drawers, removing the mysteriously preserved tome she’d discovered during her first- and most recent- foray into the Undiscovered West.  She adds it to her saddlebag. Now, all she has left to pack is her usual little purse, a decent supply of food and water, and those explosives she has yet to manufacture.  The purse she inserts casually, after drawing it from another desk drawer, and before she starts pulling volatile ingredients from another box.  Food and water will go in last, as the easiest to obtain. Oh- and before she forgets, she folds the map back up, packing it once again.  Fairly important, that. Days have passed.  She’s continued to pack her bags, bit by bit.  Today is Friday. Normally, she’d bring her friend with her- except that said friend, as a true professional, would overshadow everything she does.  She’d never get noticed, never be allowed to become one herself. Her skills would remain rather forcibly limited to the creation of too-powerful pyrotechnic devices.  Just a little training- a little training- would fix that.  A little study, at someplace like the earth pony institution she’d been too unicorn to get into, and her pyrotechnics could quit being too powerful.  They could also be better shaped- and thence completely harmless to detonate in her mouth, so long as she pointed it the other way. If she could get noticed by those professionals- in a good way…  If they let her join their ranks.  They’d provide training. Yes, some of it would be less desirable; other parts of it would be boring.  She’s always been a strong thinker, quick to poke holes in her own plans. Unlike a certain professional she knows, the newspaper she’d used in her cover had been both right-side-up AND a current issue!  Not that that had been any sort of difficult. She’d actually read the newspaper, set the page-turning on a timer to match her reading pace (with reset to the first page when she reached the end), and pre-charged- but not pre-activated- the transparency spell before the train had even arrived.  When it did, she was still only halfway through the paper the first time- and the transparency spell had been flawless. The outer three inches or so of each page remained fully visible from both sides; as a matter of fact, only the side of each page that faced her at any given moment even showed any difference! Double score, she’d purchased the paper just half an hour before the train showed, from the station newsstand.  Beat that with an alchemical potion that must be poured on it beforehand- and has permanent effects!  She could have handed her paper to Twilight when she was done, and nopony would be any the wiser. Though, to be fair, many of those professionals are not unicorns, and only a unicorn can covertly fabricate such complicated tools on-scene like that.  Especially ones that can be casually discarded like a used newspaper once their task is complete. Before she goes to work today, she fabricates all her meals for the journey, packing them into her now full saddlebags, and inserts a decent supply of water.  She’s since heard Fluttershy had crossed a desert of some sort on her way- good thing she’d brought water. She plans to be out all weekend, and possibly into Monday morning; hopefully, she can be back by then.  She’ll be jumping on the train about an hour after she closes up shop today- an overnight train to the station Fluttershy had used as her railway access point. She checks the clock once again and heads out to find her friend’s shop.  The aforementioned friend is away doing some of the stuff she wishes she could be doing- and, by her last letter, expects to be back Tuesday sometime.  Until then, she’s taking care of the shop. Not that she knows how to run the entire thing- she expects much of the stock to enter ‘Sold Out’ status today, there to remain until the owner returns. Oh- that’s another reason she won’t be bringing her friend with her on her adventure:  She’s busy, doing that stuff. The shop day goes about as well as she expected.  Pinkie Pie had stopped by to ask when her friend was coming back; apparently, a party is expected Tuesday night, and they’re both invited.  She had shrugged, informing Pinkie that her friend expected to get home sometime Tuesday, but with her line of work… Pinkie had understood that, nodding calmly, if somewhat disappointedly.  As the pink mare had turned to go, the Pinkie Sense had gone off- and three seconds later, she found the confused party pony leaning on the counter again, whispering a message into her ear. “Don’t forget the library…?” Quite a cryptic message- but that’s only usual, from the Pinkie Sense.  As the mare had bounced out the door, her mind had turned it over a few times.  Unfortunately, even now while she closes up for the weekend, she hasn’t figured out what it means. She knows her friend is normally open over the weekends too; however, there isn’t enough stock left over- and her friend had specifically exempted the weekends from the friendly request.  After all, it’s not like she has access to any of the secret ‘weekend special’ barrels in the basement. Seriously, that hidden door is a pushover to find, and the following puzzle lock is so easy to pick.  Well, perhaps not for an earth pony, but for a unicorn, it’s almost easier than pushing a lever.  Nevermind she’s good at opening standard unicorn-resistant key-based locks.  She’s even opened the occasional unicorn-proof lock. But her friend doesn’t know that, and she doesn’t plan on telling her just yet. It’s also unimportant, except that it means she’s completely free all weekend, with nothing to do for those two long days- except that which nopony knows about.  The train ticket costs her all of two bits and ten minutes worth of magic-based visual adjustment of herself.  So far as the clerk- or anypony else- knows, it’s a dark brown earth pony stallion with black hair and a pretty typical hourglass cutie mark that just purchased that ticket, not her.