Onto the Pony Planet
Chapter 31: Mounting Expeditions, part 2
Admiral Biscuit
Viridian had been teleported before, back when he was training in Trotheim. Everypony had to do it, but they didn't have to like it. He hadn’t liked it then.
He still didn't like it.
While he was no expert on the intricacies of unicorn magic, this felt like a much longer journey than usual. When they arrived, he stumbled on his hooves and almost fell down on the damp sand.
It was always jarring to be seeing one thing, and then one eyeblink later to be seeing something entirely different. In this case, one moment he was in a ready room in the castle and the next he was squinting his eyes against bright sunshine reflecting off water.
All the smells were different as well, and the sounds, and the feel of the ground underhoof, and his body had had no time to get used to it.
Much to his surprise, Cerulean had fared even worse than he had. Even though their outward appearance didn't change very much due to the enchantments in their armor, Viridian could see that his companion was completely exhausted, and as his horn dimmed, Cerulean collapsed to the ground.
Viridian opened his mouth and dropped the box, took a quick look around to make sure that there were no immediate threats, and then crossed over to his companion. “Are you okay?”
Cerulean nodded. “More effort . . . than I thought. Should have—”
“Don't talk. I think. . .” Viridian pressed a hoof up against the unicorn's flank. “Spell exhaustion—you're too hot. Have you got gem dust in your pack?”
“Yeah. Don't know if I should grab it. Might lose what I’ve got.”
“Let me.” He nosed around in Cerulean's travel pack for a moment, until he’d found the small oiled canvas pouch. Most unicorn guards carried them, in case of spell fatigue.
He fumbled with the knot—it was a more complex knot than he would have used. Once the drawstring was finally loose, he gave the bag to Cerulean, then unstrapped his own canteen and helped the exhausted unicorn wash down the ground gemstones.
“We're alone for now,” Viridian said. “I took a quick look and didn't see anyhuman. Looks like we're on the south end of the island. According to the reports, the water around us is fresh and drinkable.”
“Have we still got the box?”
Viridian nodded.
“I'm going to cool off in the water, then. Pull the box out of the shield, in case I lose the spell, then plant our flag inside.”
Before even waiting for a reply, Cerulean walked down the beach and into the water. The beach was mostly sand, scattered with wave-worn rocks. The bottom went down slowly and he didn’t want to get too far out, so once the water was up to his hocks, he kneeled down in it, keeping a watch for any fish that might want to gobble him up. Usually fish big enough to eat a pony didn’t swim very close to shore, but it never hurt to be cautious.
I should have taken off my travel pack first. But that was on his back, and if he didn't crouch down too low, it wouldn't get wet.
He didn't stay in the water very long, just long enough to rinse the sweat out from under his uniform and cool him off a little bit. He also took the opportunity to stick his muzzle down into the cool water and get a drink.
He had gotten far enough out into the water to confirm that they had indeed arrived near the southernmost point of the island. There was another island to the southwest of theirs, and that was the only other land he could see in any direction. Their briefing had said that there was land far to the east as well, but it was obscured by a rainstorm. Cerulean watched the clouds, both to see if there were any pegasi up there, and which way the storm was moving. Despite his earlier instructions to Viridian, they’d want to retreat to the shelter of the forest until it had passed if it was coming their way.
The island stretched out to the north, widening as it went. He couldn’t see anything along the shore that looked unnatural—a dock would be an obvious thing to have built if there was regular boat traffic.
Viridian had done as he'd been instructed. He'd pulled the box out onto the beach, a few ponylengths away from the bubble. He'd also set up their flag in the middle of the shield.
Maybe a flag wasn't the best idea, Cerulean thought. Somepony might think that we're claiming this land for our own. But it did serve a symbolic purpose: inside the bubble was Equestria, at least temporarily, and it did convey some authority to their mission. It would also serve as a warning to keep back; they were not to have a repeat of the accidental teleportation.
When he was only fetlock-deep in the water, he shook himself off as well as he could, then rejoined his partner on the beach.
“There's nothing around here. I haven't smelled anything too unfamiliar. It’s weird, though. Everything smells kind of familiar, but not quite the same.”
“I noticed that, too.” Viridian glanced over the water. “At least the briefing said what humans smell like, but I wish they could have given us a fresh human artifact, so we'd be sure. They could have gotten something and sent it back with the pictures.”
“Yeah.” Cerulean looked up and down the beach. “Ambassador Lyra's field notes don't say anything about tides, but a storm could push waves pretty far up on the beach. I hadn’t noticed it before, but the sand’s wet, maybe from that storm that’s out there or maybe from waves. We've got to think of somewhere we can put the box where it won't get washed away, but also where somepony will see it.”
“Right up on the rise would be best,” Viridian suggested. “There are trees and bushes growing there, and I don't think the waves can get that far.”
“It might be hard to see, though. And what if a big storm comes?”
“The trees would be damaged if that happened often. I spent some time on the coast, and you could tell the trees and plants that were too close to the water, ‘cause they’d be growing bent from all the wind and waves hitting them all the time. These are straight, so the weather doesn’t affect them much.”
“Even around the bases of the trees . . . there’s a lot of underbrush, and the box might get overlooked.”
“We could put the flag there if we haven’t seen anypony by the time we have to go back.”
“Yeah, you're right.” He studied the ridge. “There’s a spot that’s sort of open over there, which would be a good spot. Even without the flag, it could be seen. And then we can move to the southern tip and have better visibility.”
Viridian nodded, and with the unicorn's help, tugged the box up onto the ridge. “There's a little path over there. I wonder if that's where it happened?”
“I bet it is.” Cerulean looked at the path curiously. “Huh, that makes it seem more real. Not just a report. Well, if that's where humans were traveling, that's probably the best place to put the box. Anyperson who wants to go into the woods or down to the beach is going to trip over it.”
Lyra had managed to sleep through most of the morning confusion, until running feet and galloping hooves finally managed to rouse her.
She yawned and stretched out in bed, rolling towards where Bon Bon ought to have been, but of course there was nopony there since she was in the embassy.
We should have had the embassy at my house. That was a silly idea: their house wasn't big enough for Dale and Kate and Starlight and Diamond Mint and all the other ponies and minotaurs and griffons and whoever else might come to visit. And Bon Bon wouldn't like for another mare to be in her kitchen. She wouldn't like that at all. Lyra herself had been smacked on the muzzle with a stirring spoon more times than she could count. Something about unicorn magic messing up the chocolate, which was almost certainly a lie.
If it hadn't been for Raven being here. She opened the bedroom door and looked down towards the bathroom, but it was currently in use. I guess that must have been all the noise I was hearing.
Downstairs was just as good. If Raven was already up, she'd see Lyra with bedmane, but she didn't care. Dale probably wouldn't, either—but just the same, she swept her hoof across it, to make sure that nothing was sticking up too wildly.
The living room was abandoned, and Dale's office door was closed. There was food and coffee to be had, so she turned left, towards the dining room.
Diamond was waiting patiently, right next to the kitchen door. Before Lyra had even taken a seat, Diamond floated a cup of coffee over to her.
“What's Starlight cooking for breakfast?”
“She made an egg casserole.” Diamond set a plate in front of Lyra and then nodded her head towards the office door. “Dale hasn't eaten yet.”
“He's probably still worried about the contract.” Lyra said absently. She couldn't remember if she'd ever had an egg casserole before, but it smelled delicious. “Isn't that a lot of work for Starlight?”
“I don't know. You'd have to ask her.”
“Oh, come on, Diamond. We're friends, right, and there's nopony else in here. We can be informal.”
Diamond glanced around the dining room, as if some other pony might be hiding behind the plant in the corner. “It's 'cause she didn't think that everypony would want to eat breakfast at the same time, and it's easier to keep it warm and ready to go whenever somepony wants to eat.” She lowered her voice and leaned in a bit closer to Lyra. “Raven got up before sunrise. 'Cause she's Princess Celestia's assistant. Starlight must have known she would. I woulda been taken by surprise, except that I slept on the couch.”
“I'd have given you my bed for the night. Then I would have had an excuse . . . hey, Diamond, do you think it would be okay to have Dale put in the contract that I don't have to sleep here all the time?”
“Why are you asking me?”
Lyra's ears drooped, then perked back up. “It's 'cause—'cause you know stuff like that. And we messed up . . . I messed up when Princess Celestia was here. I didn't tell Dale everything that I should have, and that made a lot more work for you.”
“I don't know anything about embassy protocol,” Diamond admitted. “Or translating for Dale. You weren't here yesterday when Raven arrived. Is it in your contract that you have to stay here?”
“No, it doesn't say anything about that. Either way.” When Diamond didn’t say anything right away, she continued. “Or Dale’s contract.”
“I think the proper way would be for you and Dale to figure it out together. And Ka-th-rin and her ambassador when she gets one. I don't think that it should be in a contract. Otherwise you might get stuck by what you pick now. If you don't say anything, you could change later if you wanted to, or if you had to.”
“Yeah, you're probably right.” Lyra looked down at her plate. “What if—you're not going to be mad if we eat in the office, will you?”
“I can't stop you.”
“That wasn't what I asked.”
“I ought to have added something in the contract about mealtimes and that food’s to be eaten in the dining room only. Not outside, not in the living room, not in the kitchen, or anyplace else anypony decides to eat. If you decide to have a meeting with Dale in his bedroom, I don’t want to have to carry food or tea up there.”
Lyra winced, the memory of the trial still fresh in her mind. “I don’t think we’ll be doing that.”
“It's probably better this way. Because if there's a rule and you have to break it or ignore it, I'll just get frustrated but if there are no rules we can do what works the best for us. Even if it means having casseroles for breakfast every day.” Her ears perked. “Maybe Starlight will teach me how to make a casserole.”
•••
Lyra opened the door herself, rather than knock first. Dale wasn't at the desk; he was standing at the window, looking out at the backyard, but he turned as soon as he heard the door open.
Diamond followed her in and set the plates on the desk, well away from the papers, before taking her leave.
“Good morning, Lyra.”
“Good morning, Dale. I have bring—brought breakfast. Do you sleep well?”
“Yes—did you?”
She nodded. “Can I move papers?”
He didn't wait for her; he picked up a pile and pushed it aside. “I am nervous. I want to make sure everything is right.”
“Eat first,” Lyra said. “No worry without food. Raven will wait. Contract will wait. Princess Celestia will wait. She is very patient.”
“How patient is she?”
Lyra shrugged. “She has ruling Equestria for longer than twenty thousand moons.”
“Oh.” Dale carved a small corner off his casserole and nibbled on it thoughtfully, then his eyes went wide and he dropped his fork and leaned forward. “Did you say twenty thousand moons?”
She nodded.
“That’s . . .” He closed his eyes for a minute, finally speaking. “It’s not. It can’t be.”
“We—she is not . . . it is complicate. Before, there was Discord and the three tribes, not good keeping of books of past thing. Not good keeping count.”
“But twenty thousand.”
Lyra frowned. She’d never considered Princess Celestia’s age to be particularly remarkable. She’d been ruling Equestria for a long time, since the three tribes had unified. Everypony knew that—foals knew that. Now that she thought about it, she couldn’t really visualize what twenty thousand moons was, and maybe that’s what Dale was having trouble with. His face had gone pale and his hand was trembling slightly.
Unfortunately, she couldn’t think of a better way of explaining it. Princess Celestia was the ruler of Equestria, and had been since unification. If she knew Equestrian history better, she could walk Dale through it, but she hadn’t paid as much attention as she should have in her classes.
“She . . .” Instead of eating his food, Dale pulled over a piece of paper and started doing math on it. He occasionally muttered under his breath, and shook his head when he got his result. “That can't be right. There’s no way.”
“What is cant?”
“It—never mind.” Dale pushed the paper away. “We should eat and then figure out the rest of the contract and get Raven.”
“Yes.” Lyra said. “Is egg casserole. Is good.”
Blueblood had spent the night in a guest room: that hadn’t been the plan, but he and Fancy had had a few drinks too many while they were discussing the embassy and everypony agreed that it was better for him to stay.
Their breakfast conversation had quickly turned back to the embassy, and after they’d finished eating, they’d moved into the conservatory and continued discussing plans until the morning newspaper had arrived. Blueblood quickly skimmed through it to see if there were any slanderous editorials, while Fancy Pants took the opportunity to examine the sports section.
Fleur's ears perked up as she heard the doorbell ring. “There’s somepony at the door. I’ll be right back.”
Fancy Pants nodded. “Whatever you say, dear.”
She rolled her eyes. Her husband was a wonderful stallion, amazingly talented . . . and when he was thinking about hoofball, so oblivious that he could miss a changeling invasion.
Most estates had a doorpony, but they didn’t. Aside from formal occasions, the two normally kept their manor very lightly staffed. The snobbier Canterlot elite assumed that they simply didn't have enough bits to pay for a proper domestic staff, but the truth was neither of them felt the need to have somepony to do simple tasks that they could just as easily do themselves.
Fleur slipped the latch back and opened the front door. A young pegasus colt—barely old enough to have earned a cutie mark—stood there with a flight satchel slung across his barrel. He wore the blue shirt and pillbox hat of the Equestrian Railroad Telegraph Service.
“Telegram, miss,” he said, reaching into his messenger bag and pulling out a small envelope. “From Ponyville.”
He blushed as Fleur's magic brushed against his lips, and the blush deepened as she gave him a quarter-bit coin, placing it neatly in his mouth.
The messenger tried to tip his hat, but it got caught on the chinstrap and slid partially over one eye. Fleur could have easily straightened it out, but instead she left the poor embarrassed colt to figure it out for himself and went back inside to read the message.
Her name was misspelled, which wasn't that unusual. A lot of ponies apparently didn't know that she was Prench and spelled it the Equestrian way.
She read it twice on her way back to the conservatory. Fancy Pants and Blueblood were both as she'd left them; they probably hadn't even noticed that she'd been gone.
It was something she could get done in minutes: a few telegrams to the right ponies and things would happen. But it'll be good practice for Blueblood to solve the problem, and even he would have a hard time screwing it up.
“Fancy, dear, excuse me for interrupting, but this is important.” If Blueblood hadn't been half the conversation, she would have just yanked the newspaper away from her husband to get his attention.
She held the telegram out for him to read. Blueblood, predictably, also started reading it, although to his credit he tried to act like he wasn't.
Blueblood's ears flicked as he noticed her name was misspelled, and he lifted a forehoof off the floor to point out the error before remembering that he was pretending not to read it.
“You should read this, too,” Fancy Pants said, ending the Prince's dilemma by passing him the telegram.
He relaxed slightly and nodded. Then in less than two seconds he gave it back. “Nurse Tenderheart spelled—”
“Yes, I know.”
“You should make her send another telegram with your name spelled correctly.”
“That would be a complete waste of effort.”
“It's disrespectful!”
“Never mind that,” Fancy Pants said. “What do you think?”
“I—why do they need more sheets? How are they using them up so quickly? Surely the hospital has plenty. And to demand them from Canterlot? What's wrong with the sheets in Ponyville?”
“The humans are taller than ponies,” Fleur explained. “Haven’t you seen pictures? Most of the embassy's furnishings are left over from when the minotaur embassy was remodeled.”
“Sweat.” Fancy Pants frowned. “It could be natural, I suppose, but I think—”
“It's not even that warm at night,” Blueblood muttered. “Maybe if they were smart enough to open a window . . . I guess ponies who don't even know how to spell your name—”
“When you're ambassador, you can tell them,” Fancy Pants said flatly.
“I don't want to—” His ears drooped as realization struck: this was a problem for him to solve. “I guess . . . maybe Nurse Tenderheart can't spell, or maybe it was the telegram pony. Sometimes they make mistakes. He could have pushed the wrong key.
“I could go to the palace and find out who has minotaur sheets. Or the minotaur embassy.”
“That's the idea.”
“And then somepony could take them to the train station . . . I’ll have to have my crest sewn on the sheets so they'd know who was sending them.”
Both Fancy Pants and Fleur shook their heads.
“But clothes—where would we get those? Do minotaur clothes even fit them?”
“I doubt it.” Fleur had previously considered the idea, and it was possible a juvenile minotaur would be a reasonable match.However, she suspected that the alterations might be more time-consuming than simply making new clothes, which was why she hadn’t followed up on it yet.
“Nopony has their measurements. How could anypony make clothes without them?”
“Not in Canterlot, no. But Rarity would.”
“She'd never make clothes if I requested them.”
“We can send her a telegram. But you'd have to authorize the expense.”
“Right now? There isn't any time to convene a meeting.”
“Emergency funds. They can be retroactively approved at a meeting of the Nobles' Council.”
Blueblood nodded. “I can introduce a motion in the Council. I'll go to the minotaur embassy and have sheets delivered to the train station, and then go write an order for more funds to be allocated to the embassy.”
“And I'll go to the train station,” Fleur said, “and send a telegram to Rarity. I bet she could make a few sets of simple sleeping clothes in one day.”
“They’ll probably want some more for the day, as well.” Fancy Pants glanced over at Blueblood. “I don’t think this is common knowledge yet, but they don’t like being without them. Featherbrain got kicked out of the hospital for trying to take pictures under their clothes because it upset Dale, and he won’t get undressed if there is anypony else around.”
Blueblood opened his mouth but didn’t speak. Progress, Fleur thought.
“Maybe, what if—aren’t there reptiles that can’t keep themselves warm properly? They could be reptiles. They don’t have coats,” Blueblood said. “We don’t know.”
That they did know humans were not reptiles was immaterial. Both Fleur and Fancy Pants nodded: Blueblood was indeed making progress.
“How many clothes would they need?” Blueblood’s ears twitched as he considered how many clothes he had and when he wore them. “Two or three sets should surely be enough. One for casual wear and one for fancy occasions and, and one for work.” He managed to shudder slightly as he said that.
“How often do you bathe?” Fleur asked. “Clothes get dirty just as quickly and need to be cleaned just as often.”
“How often do they bathe?” Fancy Pants mused. “Do we know that?”
“I can find out,” Fleur said. “There are things that they would need and want to make themselves more comfortable. Brushes and files and shampoos and—Saddle Arabians dust bathe sometimes; I wonder if they do?”
“Dust bathe? Roll around in dust?”
Fancy Pants nodded. “Buffalo do, too. The sand at their embassy was imported, you know.”
“We should consider that,” Fleur said. “Ponies need food and water at a minimum to survive, and friendship and shelter as well, but they’re ambassadors and they ought to have more than that available to them. We would be poor hosts to not offer it.”
“I can already imagine the scathing editorial in the Baltimare Sun if we start sending them beauty supplies,” Blueblood muttered.
“So? You would have survived if you’d slept on the lawn last night,” Fleur observed. “Survival isn’t the same as comfort. If they can’t groom themselves properly, they’re not going to be happy, and maybe they’ll want other beauty supplies. I can check into that; the nurses surely know what they use for basic bathing, but did they have a choice, or was it just what the hospital had available?”
“You’ve got stylists and groomers,” Fancy Pants suggested. “And if you’re worried about complaints in the newspaper, send your own. Pay for their tickets yourself.”
“I can’t—”
“Are you sure?”
“Hmm, yes.” Fancy nodded. “Now that I’m thinking about it, would it be better to send somepony from Canterlot . . . or, isn’t there a spa in Ponyville? Local ponies would a wiser choice; they’re already used to them, and the bits saved on train tickets could go directly towards other needs.”
Dale tried to push the bombshell of Celestia's age to the back of his mind, but it was impossible. Every moment he wasn't trying to parse something specific in the contract, his mind returned to that unlikely number.
There were any number of people in the Bible that had allegedly lived that long, although that was almost certainly either hyperbole or mistranslation. No scientific evidence suggested that Methuselah could have actually lived for 969 years . . . and yet, if his calculations were correct, Princess Celestia had been ruling for longer than that.
Granted, it was possible for an organism to live that long on Earth. There were lots of animals that lived for hundreds of years, and some trees were still around that had been there when the Roman Empire was still thriving. He couldn't remember for sure, but he was fairly certain that the oldest known tree was a bit over four thousand years old. And a mistranslation was entirely possible. He thought they’d counted days into weeks and months and years, but he could easily have misunderstood what they were actually counting. Maybe she was part of a dynasty that had ruled for that long. Maybe pony rulers just kept taking the same name as they assumed the throne and that was what counted, not which specific ruler was actually on the throne.
While he was unlikely to get all the nuances of it any time soon, having a history book would be a valuable addition to the embassy, and that was worth considering. “Can we add books?”
“Books?”
“For learning.”
“Yes, books.” Lyra glanced through the contract again briefly. “This is not about . . . about getting things. Is about doing things.”
This was not the first time this had come up, and it probably wouldn't be the last, although he was almost out of ideas. “What if—I want to make sure. 'Books will be provided as. . . .'” he paused, considering. At the discretion of the ambassador or as needed or as required would be just fine for an Earth contract, but he wasn't sure how to say any of that in a way Lyra was sure to understand. “Put in that if I want them for good reason I get them.”
Lyra nodded, and added a little note to the contract. “There is library. Many books. Twilight Sparkle can bring books to you, if—you live here in Ponyville, now so books can be, um, you keep and read and then give back.”
“Unlimited access,” he said, and then when she frowned at his words, they both worked to get the idea across. One thing that he knew about repressive governments was that they tried to keep information from the public. He had trouble reading their language now, and it wasn't likely to get significantly better in the near future, but they didn't need to know that.
“Is there more?”
A thousand years or more, no matter how I count. Dale shook his head, pushing that thought back once again. “I . . . no.” There were surely hundreds more things that he should check and verify, but they'd been over it again and again, and sooner or later it was time to just sign the thing and be done with it. There was no sense in waiting until he was fluent in their language. That would take the rest of his life, if not longer, and no matter how patient Princess Celestia was, she'd kick him out of the house if he was still refusing to sign in a decade.
“I will get Raven.”
Dr. Forsyth finally had his expedition ready.
Between the professors who had decided to tag along and the equipment that they thought they might want for their investigation, they were convoying up north in three rented minivans. As expected, the hardest part of the entire endeavour had been finding a charter boat on short notice. Apparently, nearly all of them were booked months in advance, and Dr. Forsyth had had to call companies in an ever-widening circle until he finally found one in Petoskey that was available.
Given the cost of the charter, he wondered if it might have been cheaper for them to pool their money and buy their own boat.
He probably should have asked Detective Moller if it was okay to go to the island, or if it was still considered a crime scene . . . but on the other hand, he knew that sometimes it was better to beg for forgiveness later, and anyway, if the island had been off-limits, the charter companies he’d called would have mentioned it.
His initial plan had been to fly there—the island did have a grass runway, after all—but as the gear and the volunteers began to pile up, it was obvious that things weren’t going to all fit on an airplane, and while multiple flights were a possibility, they’d still have to carry all the gear to the south end of the island. With a boat, they could make landfall near where Dale and Kate had vanished and get to work right away.
They’d managed to get two rooms at a Super 8 that wasn’t too far from the charter service, which would let them get off to a good start in the morning. The hotels, too, apparently booked up months in advance, and he’d been lucky to get the rooms.
After they’d checked in, the group split up briefly; Dr. Forsyth performed a quick reconnaissance run to the charter dock just to make sure that he could easily find it in the morning. Meanwhile, Dr. Dillamond and Dr. Clay left in their own cars to find pizza for dinner. Dr. Cresida checked the weather on her iPhone: there had been rain off and on all the way up to Petoskey.
The groups met up again an hour later, all crowding into one hotel room. It gave them one more chance to look at the map of the island, plot out their search grids, and consider what equipment they might have to leave behind if the boat was too small.
They all went to bed early, the men in one room and the women in the other.
Tomorrow was going to be a busy day.
There was no great signing ceremony with photographers and members of the press shouting questions. Raven simply read over the changes, there were a couple of brief exchanges between herself and Lyra that he barely understood, and then he and Raven both signed it and that was it.
There was no champagne, either. The three of them went out to the living room together and Diamond brought tea that tasted terrible but he drank it anyway. He couldn't quite place the flavor, but thought that if someone had poured the juice out of a jar of beets and warmed it up, that was kind of close.
Lyra and Raven both seemed to like it, and even Diamond looked happy by how things had turned out.
He'd thought that Raven was going to leave, now that she had signed the contract, but she didn't. It turned out that there was more business to deal with.
It was something he should have seen coming—now that he was apparently a fully-fledged diplomat, it was time to have meetings.
Lecol covered a yawn. Kate was dozing again. She wasn't sure if that was normal—Dale had seemed fairly active during the day in all the time she'd seen him. Of course, he hadn't been so badly injured. It took a lot for a body to heal, and without magic, it must be even harder to recover.
She turned her ear as the door opened—it was Dr. Goodall again.
“Sleeping?”
Lecol nodded.
“Poor thing.” The vet moved over to the bed. “I wonder . . . sometimes with sick animals, you have to get them to move around. It's not good for them to rest for too long.”
“Maybe . . . ” Lecol considered it. There were of course injuries that necessitated bed rest, but other maladies were best treated with as much activity as the patient would bear. Sometimes even more—the physical therapists at Canterlot General were always getting yelled at by their patients for being almost as demanding as a drill sergeant. “We should ask Dale. Maybe he knows.”
Dr. Goodall's ears fell. “I wish I could talk with her. It would be so much easier if I could.” She put her head down on the bed, resting her muzzle lightly against Kate's arm and watched as she clenched her fingers into a loose fist. “At least her paw still works.”
“I was worried,” Lecol admitted. “There was so much damage, and she didn't tolerate the magic all that well. Bodies are surprisingly resilient.”
“I wish that we could make her more comfortable.”
“This is the part of healing that the professors don't tell you about.” Lecol frowned. “Recovery is sometimes the hardest part. You do your best when they come in and save their life but then it's sometimes a really long process after that.”
“Maybe food will tempt her.” Dr. Goodall looked back at the door. “She only picked at her lunch, but maybe when she wakes up again she'll be hungry. I think we should always make sure it's available, anyway. Let her eat when she feels like it. I can't imagine what she's going through.”
“We had a professor who knew a spell that would make us sick.” Lecol held up a hoof to forestall any objection. “Not really sick, but it felt like it. He thought that we wouldn't be good doctors if we didn't know what a patient was feeling. Some ponies objected—he used to just cast it on students during anatomy lab—so anypony who gave him permission, he'd make us feel sick one weekend. Really sick. I thought he'd screwed up, I thought I was dying, I was so scared. I kind of knew in the back of my mind that it was just a spell, but still. . . .”
“Were you hungry?”
“I knew I should eat, but I didn't. It was too much work to make food, and I didn't want to go out so I just picked at some old alfalfa I had in my room.” Lecol sighed. “I wish we knew what foods they really like—what food she really likes. Maybe that would tempt her.”
Their conversation was interrupted by a brief knock on the door. Without even waiting for a reply, the door opened and Nurse Redheart came in. “How is she?”
“Sleeping.” Lecol glanced back at the bed for a moment, to make sure that that was still the case. “She's had a rough morning, poor thing. Been in the bathroom most of the time she's awake. We're out of clean sheets again.”
“I brought more. They won't fit the bed right, but they're better than nothing.” Redheart sighed. “That's about all we've got for spares at the hospital.”
“I'll talk to Starlight,” Dr. Goodall said. “She probably knows some ponies who have extras, even if they won't fit the bed. Has anypony checked with the inn?”
Lecol and Nurse Redheart exchanged a look. Neither of them had thought of that.
“I'll do it on my way back to the vet clinic. The inn might make us pay for any that get damaged, though.”
“We can probably work that out of the hospital budget in the short term,” Nurse Redheart said. “I don't see that being a huge problem. Although it'll probably be a lot of paperwork later.”
“Just write 'Embassy' on everything,” Lecol suggested. “I've got a friend who works at the castle who can make sure that it gets taken care of. Even if it's not official yet, since Dale hasn't signed the paperwork.”
“He did,” Nurse Redheart said. “Diamond told me when I came in. I guess it's not official offical yet, 'cause Raven probably hasn't made it back to Canterlot.”
“That means all sorts of diplomatic functions.”
“It does?”
Lecol nodded. “They happen all the time in Canterlot. Plus, everyone is going to want to meet Dale, since he’s a new species. They're probably already demanding that Princess Celestia let them see him, and once it's official she can't really refuse. I think he'll have to be the one to make the decisions. We might want to move Kate before the circus begins.”
“Back to the hospital?” Nurse Tenderheart frowned. “I don’t think that’s in the best interests of anypony.”
“What about a recovery house? You've got those, right?”
“Yeah.” Nurse Redheart nodded. “I think . . . I'm not completely sure; I don't do that—that’s Nurse Snowheart’s side of things—so I don't know what we've got available. Kind of depends on what sort of care we think she’s going to need going forward. If things get bad, we’d have to go outside of Ponyville for high security.”
“High security?” Lecol frowned. “I don’t think she’ll be much of a threat.”
“It’d keep her safe from anypony who wanted to get in, plus maybe she is. She broke the short-range analyzer and half the furniture in her room. I think she was just panicked—everypony at the hospital thinks that—but we could be wrong. I just want to make sure that we’ve got other options if we need them. It’s not good for her to keep moving her around just because we can’t figure out what to do with her, but we also can’t risk other patients with unknowns. And we're not going to kick anypony out, if that's what you're thinking. Snowheart wouldn't budge on that even if Princess Celestia herself asked.”
Lecol nodded. That was something she could respect—the patient always came first. “I don't think it would be best for her, but it's something that we have to consider. For her. We can't risk her recovery if the whole embassy is tramping with other creatures.”
“We haven't got anything that's really private,” Nurse Redheart said. “The only way you could really keep her away from everypony would be to hide her in the Everfree somewhere and—“
“Zecora?”
Redheart nodded. “If we were desperate. That's really a last option, though. I don't even know if Zecora would be willing.”
“I don't know her all that well,” Dr. Goodall admitted. “But I think that if you did want to really, really hide Kate from everypony, she'd be your best choice.”
“She wouldn't be happy at all.”
“It's something to consider. If we have to,” Lecol said. “And it's better than what I was thinking, which was to see if Featherbrain would let us use her apartment in Canterlot.”
Off in the distance, there were boats. Even though the design of sails was unusual, they were unmistakably boats.They’d come out after the sky to the east had cleared.
Neither Viridian nor Cerulean were sailors, so they were not particularly good at identifying how far away those boats were. They simply knew that they were far, because their hulls were hidden by the horizon and their white sails were dimmed by the distance.
Those weren't the only boats they saw, either. A distant ship loomed over the horizon, a ship that was inconceivably large. It grew and grew and grew until it was the size of a city bearing down on their island.
It was brick-red with a thin black and thick grey diagonal stripe at the bow and an enormous white sterncastle. Despite their orders, both Cerulean and Viridian cowered back into the woods even though it was obvious that the trees could provide no protection against something so colossal.
Both of them knew that islands were firmly fixed to the seafloor, and yet it seemed that the thing was so vast that it could easily sweep the island aside without even hesitating. Its engine was a living thing, thumping out its heartbeat loud enough for them to not only hear, but feel in the ground as it passed by.
“There were letters on it,” Viridian said quietly once it had missed the beach and continued on its way. “On the front and the back. I think that they were its name.” He traced them out in the damp sand with his hoof. “They are not humanish words that I know, but we should remember.”
“Nopony would believe such a thing exists—that such a thing could exist.” Cerulean moved down to the end of the beach and looked north, where its stern could still be seen in the distance. “I think . . . it wasn't bigger than Canterlot, but it felt like it was. Such a thing should not float, unless it's buoyed up with magic.”
“It shouldn't even hold together,” Viridian said. “Not unless it were made of stone by clever craftsponies.”
Cerulean nodded. “How close do you think it got?”
“I don't know. I—it's hard to know.” He closed his eyes to better remember what it had looked like, and to think if there had been any clues that would have revealed the scale of it. “Humans are like minotaurs but narrower at the shoulders and they don't have horns or fur. And they walk on paws instead of hooves.” There had been sketches that everypony had seen.
He shook his head. “There was a fence around the top of it, I think, maybe so humans wouldn't fall off, but I don't know how high a fence like that should be. It was so big that there must be hundreds or maybe thousands of them aboard.”
“Some ponies think that they could be nomadic,” Cerulean said. “That's what I heard. What if they build big floating cities so that they can move around from island to island?”
“Yeah, like Cloudsdale but it floats on the water instead of in the sky.” This was more comfortable for him to consider. “I think maybe they have some kind of water magic.” He sat down on the beach and looked out over the water. “That's an important detail to remember.”
The celestial wing of the palace was filled with large windows in nearly every room, bringing in sunlight wherever possible. Balconies dotted the common rooms as well as the private chambers to allow those who lived in or visited the higher towers to be outside if they so chose. Curtains were thin and gauzy to allow privacy while still letting sunlight filter through.
While there were also many rooms in the lunar wing with large windows, there were some more-central rooms that were dark all the time. The barracks for the thestrals had thick sunstones which blocked and diffused most of the light, giving the room a dusky appearance during the day: enough light for non-thestrals to see if they had to enter, but not enough to wake the lunar guards sleeping in their roosts.
There were other rooms deeper in the tower which had no windows whatsoever. Even at noon, when the door was closed they were as black as a moonless night.
It was there that Nightgazer and his roostmate were stretched out on cushions. Nightgazer's eyes were distant and unfocused: he was patrolling the dreamscape.
Before her banishment, Princess Luna had never considered any way of signalling to those who remained behind. She had not needed to; she was powerful enough that there were no serious dangers for her. Her thestrals were not, and especially after she had first been exiled they did not always return from dreams.
Even now that she was back, whenever a thestral ventured into the dreamscape, a roostmate always stayed close, ready to rescue the dreamwalker if needed.
He had seen Kate's dreams from outside and knew their signature, and so he patrolled, watching and waiting. Whenever one of them bubbled up in the dreamscape he was there, circling around the edge and categorizing it in a language that few non-thestrals knew. He would skim across the surface of it, letting the feelings of the ever-shifting dream touch him lightly, and then his wings would twitch or his ears would move and if it was bad, his roostmate would chitter to others and they would tell Princess Luna.
Thus far, by the time she'd joined him, Kate's dreams had always fled.
It was frustrating. Normal ponies—and most other creatures—had a sleeping time when their dreams could be interacted with. Kate was an exception. Princess Luna had explained to him that she was walking the border between the real world and the shadow world, and he didn't like that. Ponies never did that, not in his experience.
His ears turned as they caught a familiar noise in the dreamscape and his eyes followed and even though he knew that he wouldn't get there in time he flew just the same, willing the wings he'd left behind in the chamber to flare so that his roostmate would know.
Would it be easier if I were closer to her? He grasped the collapsing edges of the field, faltering in the air as he was hit by a wave of confusion and pain and fear, the same as always. And then it was gone, and he clamped his real wings back shut again while he continued to circle and wait.
They'd explored their end of the island and found nothing. Viridian picked up the faintest trace of pony scent. It was probably Lyra, although since he didn't know her personally he couldn't say for sure. Cerulean could vaguely sense that there had been magic, but it was too far gone for him to recognize any but the barest traces.
One of the virtues hammered into all the guards during training was patience, and both Viridian and Cerulean were patient. But there was nothing to be patient for. The island was deserted, at least as far as their explorations had gone. There was nothing there and no evidence that there had ever been.
If their orders had been to protect the box at all costs, they would have. But they were not supposed to do that, so both of them sat on the beach and watched the sun slowly dip into the water. Both were silent until it was gone, then Cerulean spoke.
“Do you think we should try to build a fire before it gets dark?”
Viridan considered the idea. It wouldn't be too much effort to get some deadwood and drag it to the beach. That would be safe; there would be no risk of it spreading if it were on sand. And it might act as a signal beacon. “We . . . .” he paused. Normally, giving away their position would be a dangerous thing. Everypony knew fires were visible for quite some distance, both from the smoke during the day and from the flames during the night. Downwind, the scent carried even further, and would alert any enemy that they were there. But they weren't supposed to be hidden. They had a message to deliver, and a fire might get attention. “I think we should.” He tilted his head down towards the sand. “Right here. Anypony would be able to see it, maybe from the island to the south, or another big city-ship. Or pegasi.” He glanced up at the dusky sky. “It might attract them.”
“We shouldn’t have hidden before.”
“I know. If . . . nopony ever said that they had floating cities. I wasn’t ready for that. I wasn’t thinking. Maybe another one will come by.”
Cerulean nodded, and moved off into the scrubby trees to search for deadwood. A moment later, Viridian joined him.