Flynn approached the stone mouth of the first building—and he immediately had to hold a hoof over his muzzle. The dust flying through the scarcely-lit windows was so thick that he couldn't see the contents inside. Breathing in over his shoulder, he faced the shadow confines and squinted his natural eye. Meanwhile, the Job Squadder's mechanical lens rotated inward and outward, scanning through the mess for signs of life.
It wasn't long until he found them—bodies. The bodies of equines. With hunched frames and liquid lurches, they shuffled through an interior sea of junkyard debris. Stallions and mares alike took turns shuffling around both metal and stone odds-and-ends, forming newer piles against the Blob-side wall of the structure. Flynn stared and stared, but he was at a loss to discover a method to their labors.
Jaw clenched, he boldly trotted into the heart of the domain. It took a meager bit of concentration, but he lit his horn, illuminating the grime and sediment filling the place. It was more like a grand stone warehouse than a house, and Flynn could tell from the scrapes and marks on the inner surfaces of the place that it had been used to store all sorts of bric-a-brac for imperceivable centuries.
Flynn strolled past heaps of junk. At each pile, there was a pony sorting through smaller-to-larger collections of scrap and scavenged detritus. Without asking, he shone the bulk of his light into the passing Dihmer's face. Each pony barely registered him—but Flynn still got what he wanted. He caught sight of their eyes—and they bore color... at least far more color than the gray malaise that blanketed the sockets of all the Dihmers Flynn had seen before.
All but one.
"Uhm... excuse me...?" Flynn trotted up towards a stallion who was tossing junk up against a series of open windows looking out onto the looming ocean below. "What... uhhh... what exactly are you doing here?"
"It lingers," the Dihmer murmured, not stopping once in his labors.
"... ... ..." Flynn looked over his shoulder at all the other ponies working on similar sorting tasks. He stared once more at the stallion in front of him. "Wouldn't it be a bit more appropriate to say 'It separates?'"
"It lingers," the stallion said, and there was a noticeable edge to the second word.
Flynn blinked. "Yeah... I guess it does..." He glanced across his room, shining his light towards the furthest ends of the domain. "So... uh... is there a mare among you—a unicorn pony—with bright purple eyes? For some reason, I have a hunch that she hangs out here—"
"It lingers."
"Yeah. I know that. But you can answer a single question, can't you?" Flynn frowned slightly. "Or do you all look the same to each other as you do to me?"
"It lingers and it collects." The stallion shook his head unemotionally. "It talks and it does nothing."
"... ... ..." With a subdued grunt, Flynn kicked the pile of junk over in front of the stallion. Clatter!
The stallion lurched in place. He clenched his eyes shut and took a deep breath.
"Whoops." Flynn leaned forward, glaring. "It has no shits to give."
The Dihmer's light orange eyes opened, glaring at the Heraldite.
Flynn arched an eyebrow. "The sooner it gets some answers, the sooner it will leave that which lingers."
With a deeper breath, the stallion calmed. He began piling the kicked-over junk back up.
Flynn tried one more time. "Purple eyes. A horn on her head." He bit his lip. "Insists... that 'she fails' a lot..."
"It indeed does fail quite often," the stallion droned.
"Huh?" Flynn blinked. "You know her?!"
"It fails as it collects where it smelts," the stallion said. "It returns to linger with those who linger."
"Where... is she lingering now?" Flynn asked.
The Dihmer pointed out the door. "It moves to the lingering after next. There it continues to fail." His nostrils flared. "It lingers, that which cannot purge. All of it."
"Thanks." Flynn nodded. "See how smoothly things can go when we help each other?"
The stallion continued sorting junk.
Flynn squirmed in place. "I wish there was something I could give you for your troubles, but you dudes don't seem too keen on ownership—"
"It leaves!" the stallion snarled.
"R-right!" Flynn hobbled away from the Dihmer's burning orange eyes. "Holy crap...!"
With the Heraldite gone, the stallion breathed meditatively and returned to his calm task.
When Flynn approached the thirdmost warehouse, he was greeted with the sound of clattering metal... and hissing voices.
"Ya bloody glue stick!" He saw a goblin shaking his fist at somepony. An overturned cart of spilled junk lay on the ground between two imps and a trembling mare. "That theah's worth twenty streeps! We went through 'ell to get thees out from undah the bats-o's noses! Are ya out of your bloody mind?!"
"She's a dihmah, bud-o," the other imp droned. "They ain't got a mind, aye?"
The mare shivered. While the goblins grumbled and cursed at her, she calmly knelt down to push the cart back upright. One by one, she gripped the pieces of junk in her muzzle and placed them back into the cart.
"Did ya heah a word I said, sheila?!" One goblins hook his fist again. "These heah ain't just regulah rubbish! Theah's materials for smeltin' into boat hull! That's what gets your shorn noodle goin', aye?"
Taking a deep breath, the mare fought through her shivers to speak. "It receives ten strips," she managed, avoiding eye contact with the aggrivated imps. "It collects and returns to lingering."
"I dun bloody care what it does so long as it gives me what it owes me!" The goblin face-palmed. "Rnnnngh! Metal Mum's Muff... now she's got me sayin' like they say!"
"'eah, let me try." The other goblin leaned in. "Oi!" He snapped his fingers, his pointed nose inches from the mare's hairless airs. "Oi theah, love! Now ya might not understand the importance of streeps—what with all your bloodlettin' and meditative massacres and shite, but if ya don't pay us what youse rightfully owe, then you're upsettin' the balance of this heah symbiotic relationship we've got goin' on! Somewheah in your thick skull you're bound to understand that, aye?"
She clenched her eyes shut, trembling. "Ten st-strips. It... receives ten strips."
"Bah!" The imp stood up straight, tossing his arms. "I give up! Like talkin' to a chaos frog!"
"Ya daft drongo..." The first imp marched past him, gesturing. "Are we Stone-Bloodahs or ain't we?! We've got Peetra's Flame on our side!" That said, he angrily grabbed the mare's muzzle in four grimey fingers.
"!!!" The Dihmer gasped, her purple eyes reflecting the goblin's snarling face. Although he was far smaller than her, the unicorn cowered on folded limbs, shivering visibly.
"Now you listen heah, ya broken bottle of glue! If we're gonna have a problem, then I'm gonna fetch me cobbahs from Blobfall and theah're gonna set fire to all your heaps of rubbish! Then how will ya be earnin' your spot in the meditation pile, huh?!"
"Please..." The mare whimpered, her voice barely audible. Moisture lined the edges of her eyes. "Let g-go of me..."
"Oi!" The imp manhandling her looked over his shoulder at his buddy. "Didja heah the gams on her?!"
"Righ bloody unnatural, aye?"
"Seems somepony bumped her noggin' one too many times against the rocks!" The imp chuckled. "Ain't no crowns of thorns around heah. Reckon a good fist would do." He raised his other hand, clenching it. "You can thank me later, love—"
The mare's eyes clenched tight as her muscles tightened.
Fl-Flash!
The imp could be heard yelping.
With a gasp, the mare reopened her eyes to see the imp flying across the courtyard.
WHUMP! The goblin found himself pressed up against a wall of rock, his body frozen in the position to strike nopony. "Oi!" His angry eyes sliced across the open space as he struggled in the telekinetic field. "What the bloody 'ell?!"
Flynn marched towards him, horn glowing. "Oh, trust me." His balding brow furrowed. "There's no blood in the Hell you're goin'."
"What's it to you, ya one-eyed buggah?!" The imp frowned, struggling against the magic. "Fancy yourself a mutant supahorse, aye? Well bet you a million streeps I've got more friends with pointier sticks than yours!"
"I've been under fire by a giant deadly moon laser," Flynn droned. "You're gonna have to try harder than that to threaten me."
"I'll do ya one bettah, drongo!" The imp spat. "I'll rip ya into gartahs and sprinkle 'em all ovah your Mum—" There was a savage twisting sound. The other half of the goblin's body glowed with magic, and his voice reached a high pitch as his eyes widened.
"Ohhhhh..." Flynn grinned wide, his horn glowing wider. "So you do have testicles!" His good eye narrowed. "What's that you were about to say about my mother?" He clenched his teeth as he pressed his horn harder against the air. "Maybe first we should make you a mother yourself!"
"No no no no no no no no—" The imp chanted like a choir boy, shaking his head with drooped, wobbling ears. "That's fine, cobbah! You're fine! We're all fine! Now let go let go let go let go please!"
Flynn's horn went dark.
"OOMF!" The goblin slumped against the wall. Legs crossed, he crawled off with a whimpering noise. "C'mon, bud-o! B-back to sc-scavengin'!"
The other goblin stood in place, staring blankly at Flynn.
"Well?!?" Flynn frowned at him.
Gulping, the imp pointed a clawed finger at the cart. "What about our ten streeps, aye?"
"GO!!!" Flynn tossed a mess of rocks at him with telekinesis.
"Peetra's Ashes!" And the goblin scampered off after his hobbling friend.
Flynn snorted, glaring after them. "Popcorn farts..." Shrugging his shoulders, he turned around. "Sorry about those jerks. You know, you really shouldn't let those kind of punks treat you like—" He froze in place, blinking.
The mare was limping back into the warehouse, her back to the Heraldite. There was a slight shuddering sound—and Flynn swore he saw tearstains against the stone floor below. In a matter of seconds, she vanished within the stone building.
"... ... ..." He leaned back with a huff. "You're welcome...?"