//------------------------------//
// Even Money 
// Story: Changing Ways 
// by Comma Typer 
//------------------------------//

A half dozen hours later, morning arrived but it did not feel like it did. Hidden from the warmth of the sun and from the refreshing expanse of the sky, it was as dark as before, with the lanterns and the lamps refilled by ponies carrying vials of oil and kerosene. Along with them were backup matches and emergency lighters, telling everyone how prepared they were for lighting problems.
The apple-promoting poster still hung on the wall, imposing itself over those dining ponies who, in the end, did not care much about the choice of food so much as the availability of it. Was it edible and not poisonous? Then, it was destined to be eaten, no matter what it was.
Still, the chefs did their best in making the best out of their limited ingredients and their inadequate appliances. The dish of the day which turned out to be a Sunday—and, if anyone did not know about that yet, they would definitely know it by the time they hear a cook rambling, “We got yer’ fried Sunday apple cobbler! Sunday apple cobbler on Sunday, Sunday, Sunday!—well, it was apple cobbler, wasn’t it?
Sandbar, possessing sturdy ears, did not feel the need to plug his ears with a pillow or, since there were no pillows nearby, a hay bale. Instead, he endured the outburst about cobbler and Sundays, went in line like all the rest, got his apple cobbler and apple cider while avoiding the careless swings of utensils and bowls flung onto somepony else’s head, rather, and quietly retreated to his own table.
There he was, alone at the table once again surrounded by troops of hungry eaters scarfing their special dishes of the day. Save for the rattle of metal forks and knives banging against each other, it was a rather peaceful place at this hour—a rather peaceful lobby of sorts if a barn-like foyer could be called a "lobby". He could hear hooves mixing up the floor hay under low conversations now and then. Over there, near the hallway leading to the staircase, sat a little crew gesturing about, and Sandbar could grab “airships”, “sand”, and “reports”.
He looked at the side of the room where the musician had been. His guitar leaned on the wall, staying alone and collecting a little dust. A passer-by or two would admire it from afar, giving it a long glance, before turning back to their own food, to their own conversations.
“So, how’s it?” he heard someone say to him.
He looked to his left.
Gallus landing on the bench, carrying his own cobbler and cider with both his claws. He placed them on the table. “Your food isn’t that bad. I can’t stand having to eat so much sugar all the time, but...it’s sugar. Energy. Good for these wings!” and proceeded to spread his wings open.
Sandbar sighed, downplaying the winged display. “You again?”
“What are you gonna do about it?” Gallus asked, sounding aggressive. “My friends are either lost or dead, I’ve got nowhere else to go to, and I have to be stuck with ponies like you. I might as well contribute to the cause, if nothing else.”
Sandbar turned away. He took a bite of the cobbler.
It was a crispy, crunchy sensation, jammed with that sweet taste only known to an apple coupled with butter’s creaminess. The end result was a sumptuous flow of flavor richly running down his throat.
Gallus took a bite of it, too. A smile, a pair of startled eyes. “Mm! I, uh...wow. I didn’t expect that! Who knew you could make it like a fry?”
“That’s why I said it was fried. It’s a deep fried apple cobbler.”
“Huh.” He tapped his chin and looked up, recognizing the ceiling above with some hooked lamps in place. “Is there shallow fry?”
Sandbar chuckled a bit. “Yeah, but we don’t call it a ‘shallow fry’. We just fry it.”
Gallus bent back and leaned on an imaginary recliner, supporting himself by his wingpower. “Could you fry other things like...oranges? Pears?”
“I don’t know,” with a confessing shrug. “I’m not a chef myself. I rarely make my own food.”
The griffon snickered. “Funny. You’re an Earth pony and you don’t make your own food?”
Sandbar raised a hoof in slight frustration. “Really, dude? I may be an Earth pony, but we’re more than just farmers. Back then, we Earth ponies handled businesses, nursed patients, held concerts, set fashion trends...that sort of thing.”
“But, that’s back then. Now, you’re farmers through and through, aren’t you?”
Struggling to keep up a calm facade: “Not me. I could help out with planting and harvesting, and I could withstand the heat all day long to bring in food, but that’s not what I’m really good at.”
Gallus smacked himself on the head. “Ah! It’s because of your cutie mark, huh?” He looked at it. “You’re good at...swimming?”
He nodded, a faint smile on his lips. “But, that’s not the point of my cutie mark.”
“So, what’s your number one talent? Teaching others how to swim? Taking care of turtles?”
Sandbar shrugged again. “I gotta admit...I don’t really have a number one talent. It’s more like a group of things I’m good at. When you bunch them up, that’s my...super-talent, or something like that.” A pause, then a frown. “You get what I mean?”
Gallus looked about him, browsing the room and checking its ponies strolling and talking about. “Don’t you have anyone who has a sword cutie mark? That’d be pretty helpful in this little war we’re all in.”
The pony raised a hoof to groan with, but restrained himself.
Gallus closed his eyes, and, in a brusque tone: “Don’t wanna be hurting feelings around here!”
Sandbar sighed. “OK, before you cause any trouble...why don’t you talk about yourself?”
Gallus met that question with a hearty laugh and an unexpected clawbump with his hoof. “That’s kinda’ more like it!”
“’Cause you’re proud and arro—“ and covered his mouth, eyeing Gallus to make sure he did not guess the rest of the sentence.
Gallus took a gulp of the cider, pounded the mug down to the table. Some drops splashed onto his sweet crumbly cobbler. “You already know my name.” He gestured to himself, presenting his person as an elevated subject of study. “As you can see, I’m a griffon. Half-eagle, half-lion.”
“I already learned that in class—“
“Like every griffon, I was born in Griffonstone. The moment I saw how it went everywhere else, I wanted to escape first chance I got. Sure, I had my school of rough knocks there, but everything I did felt like it meant nothing; it was just about making sure you had enough food to last you for next week. Princesses were kind to us, and I liked the food they sent us sometimes, but, of course, where’s the fun in that? I wanted griffon food cultivated by griffons, tested by griffons, cooked by griffons—all made for griffons.” He finished this with a smack of a fist onto his other claw.
Sandbar had been silent through the exposition. “What did you do when Chrysalis came over?”
He made a nonchalant curl of the beak. “Eh...it could’ve been worse. I finally found an excuse to fly away from home." Looked off into the distance, back to seeing the ponies around him, not minding the sole griffon himself nearby. "Poor Gruff, though—that slowpoke thought he could hold them off after they got Gestal, but he’s so stubborn, they had to kill him.”
Sandbar opened his mouth in shock—catching the air mid-breath, so to speak. “That’s not normal!”
Gallus gestured about with his claw, turning it round dismissively. “What else could they do? He insists on being called ‘Grampa Gruff’ even though his only grandfledgling left talks him down and insults him everyday." Sandbar could hear him fuming under those words. "Good for her; that old fossil bragged about his time in the army when we had no war in his time...kept saying everyone’s getting ahead and shouldn’t be going ahead of him. Serves him right Chrysalis didn’t spare him.”
“But,” Sandbar spoke in protest, “didn’t you pity him? I’m sure someone pitied him!”
“Pity someone who doesn’t know what he’s talking about and doesn’t admit it? Pretty self-centered to me.”
“Just like you,” he whispered to the side.
Gallus glared at the pony. “What was that?”
A forced grin on Sandbar’s face. “Uh, I said, ‘What happened to your friends who were...just like you?’”
Then, a pause as the griffon gave himself time to think over his next words. “I only had about three friends: Greta, Gabby, and Gilda. Gilda—she’s the grandfledgling. Don’t need to know much about them. What we did was get out together, stop to get food in the forests below, cross the strait to the dragons. From there, we got a ship sailing to Clyde Point. Barely avoided the changeling patrols on their boats.”
Sandbar leaned in, becoming interested and paying attention to his short narrative.
“We got to Clyde, but they told us we had to get deeper in if we wanted to stay long. We went out and traveled through the swamps, making sure we had to stay close to the river but not too close. We reached Dodge, and they told us to get to the next major base which was...here.”
Sandbar's mug, untouched before, was picked up for a sip. He let out a burp, covered his mouth as custom dictated, then put it down. Giving his full attention to Gallus now: “So, what happened to the other three?”
“Oh, you mean Greta and the other two?" He scratched his feathery cheek, rubbed his claws. "Lost Greta at sea. She fought the changelings, but got a bad knee, a sprained wing—went to the ocean and couldn’t keep herself afloat.”
“You didn’t help her?”
“We were...busy with our own fights. Didn’t even notice—she wasn’t crying for help, anyway, so it’s not all our fault.”
Sandbar showed off his disgust by backing away from him an inch. “What?”
Gallus brushed it off with a wave of a claw. “Gilda...she wanted to stay behind in Clyde. Said something about...what was it?” Tapped his chin, thinking more. “Something about...wanting to prove herself. Something along those lines.”
Sandbar turned his head to the side, wistful in his train of thought.
“Gabby...on the other claw, Gabby didn’t make it. Changelings got to her probably because she was all smiles and laughter the whole way and they got irritated after a while.” She snorted, laughed a bit at the idea. Then, he pointed to himself with both his claws. Proud this far: “Now, it’s me and only me—the survivor.”
The listening pony raised his shoulders, disturbed. A quick while later, calming down, “But, you’re not...you know, the last griffon in the world, right?”
“I don’t think so. I overheard plans back home about a move to unknown lands up Guto River—unmapped lands never seen before." Brought his lionesque tail to the table, lifted a part of it up. "Whatever’s out there, they’re certainly farther away from Chrysalis than I am.”
Sandbar raised a brow. “Then, why did you come here?”
Gallus gave him a hard, serious look. “Distance doesn’t mean safety. You know what’s past the maps?”
“Uhh—“
“Exactly. Mysterious monsters lurking about in the shadows, more evil than the changelings.” He spat on the table, taunting those adventurous explorers that way. “They’re dumb to go there. Me? I took the better route because I like life and being alive to tell you this story and to show my awesomeness.”
At the end of this wayward storytelling with its comments, Sandbar raised himself from his slump on the table.
He looked at the cafeteria and the kitchen behind it.
“Sorry, sorry,” one of the chefs shouted, “but we got a super-duper special on these Sunday apple cobblers! Better late than never and better late than eight, because we got these Sunday apple cobblers with syrup! Yes, sir, on this fine ‘ere Sunday, these Sunday apple cobblers are itchin’ to get you up and workin’ out there and runnin’ for freedom startin’ this Sunday! All free just as it’s always been on other days an’ Sundays!”
Covering an ear, Gallus shoved his head that way. “Really?! We’re going to get sick of these guys before they retire!”
Sandbar continued looking at that enthusiastic chef who had taken up the role as a salespony. “I don’t think they’ll retire anytime soon. They’re probably going to be out there fighting some changelings when the time comes.” He stopped to take a breath. “But, you can never be too sure.”
“Because they might be changelings?”
Sandbar coughed, then coughed some more, covering his mouth as his coughs became chokes and hacks. “Yeah, that’s—“ cough “—really great, a really good observation there, mister Gallus!”
Gallus stared at him odd. “This is a new kind of sarcasm to me.”
Sandbar lifted himself up to his ears. “You’re going to get us into big trouble if you let them hear that. It’s no joke!”
Gallus smiled. “I know it’s no joke. That’s the rules and regulations you have here, but I want to add some light into this place. I don’t want you guys sulking around all the time—not on my watch.”
“That’s the idea,” Sandbar said, concerned, looking out for any would-be hearers within earshot. “We don’t know who’s who—well, not fully, but I trust you, Braeburn, the sheriff...others….”
He smiled again. “A game, huh?”
The pony glared back at him. “Are you crazy?”
“I mean, not like a game game, but...it’s a kind of realistic game except it’s not really a game because it’s real and if you lose you could die—but, a game.”
Sandbar wiped his eyes, breathed in and out, looked upon his cobbler sitting nicely on its plastic plate, complete with warts and all—the bitemarks being the warts.
“Are you gonna eat that?” Gallus asked, touching the pony’s food.
“Please don’t steal my food,” Sandbar replied, a bit rough now in his voice. “It’s not for sale.”
“Well then, too bad, ‘cause I’ll order more.”
“You can’t order more.”
“Why not?”
A sigh. “Because you’ll be going past your rations. If you want more, wait until lunchtime.”
The griffon leaned back again and looked up at the ceiling once more. “I’ve seen those apple fields. They’re a lot. Could see them go on for miles. Pretty bad giveaway if you ask me.”
“Look, nopony’s perfect and—“
“And, look what we got here this Sunday!” yelled a chef, pointing a hoof towards those arguing creatures. “It’s so delicious, so scrumptious, that this pony and this griffon here want to abstain from the experience, to save it all for later either noon this Sunday or tonight—this Sunday night!”
Even from the hallway, ponies took notice of the shouted advertisement and, desiring to satisfy their curiosity, gathered around the table with its fiery occupants.
Sandbar looked at them, scared and still bothered at Gallus. Turning to him: “You’re making this really hard for us!”
Gallus half-closed his eyes, gawking at him with those grimacing eyes. “When have I heard that before?”
Sandbar stretched his hooves out to him. “Look, we’re in the middle of a life-and-death situation here. Think! This is no time to be snarky and sarcastic!”
The loud cook jumped over the fence and trotted to the table, faced the griffon with a mean hoof on the table. “I agree with the young stallion right here on Sunday. This isn’t like five years ago when you could just run around and do whatever you want. You obey, or we throw you away!"
Gallus crossed his forelegs and hovered over the table, level with him. “Really, huh?”
“Don’t you do it!” Sandbar whispered, his teeth clattering.
Gallus grinned, and he grabbed the cook’s hoof and shook it up and down with his claws. “Well, in that case, we’re going to have a good Sunday—“ leaned towards his face “—but, please, stop it. It’s getting on my nerves, and I don’t want to be reminded it’s Monday tomorrow.”
The cook hopped up to the table. “Well, not only is today a Sunday, but, tomorrow, you will encounter a great thing, a phenomenon only experienced and given and taken and received once a seven-day week, and that phenomenon as we know it is that great and grand Monday!”
And everypony cheered on that cook's performance while he bowed down profusely, doubling over and almost falling off the table.
Good thing he did not step on the apple cobbler and the apple cider, although that was not enough to calm the griffon down.



Inside the hat shop, the griffon and the pony found themselves sandwiched between a smorgasbord of items galore. Weapons, food, blankets, pillows, furniture, tools, books, board games, cameras, paper, stationery, grenades, potions...and yet, there was more to list down. This diverse collection—topped with a unique fragrance since all the testing colognes had their lids open for all to try—was a melting pot of objects from odds and ends, and at the counter was the happy owner of the shop himself: a cashier with a pair of thin, round glasses perched on his stately snout, counting the bits in his cash resgister.
Gallus pushed the shopping cart at a crawl, groaning at each stop as the pony grabbed a few items from the shelves and tossed them in.
“Can we go faster?” Gallus asked, holding up an open claw in despair. “You can’t possibly need that many arrows...and,” picked up a blue, freezing arrow, “why do we need ice arrows?”
“Because it’s better to stop them completely,” Sandbar said matter-of-factly. “Better to freeze them then let them keep moving. Pretty dangerous, pretty expensive, but it’s worth it.”
Gallus felt squeezed in that tight and tiny shop.
“There’s not much we could do,” Sandbar said further, scanning the matchboxes section. “It’s stockpiling season.”
“Which is every season for you guys,” Gallus shot back.
“Better than getting caught off guard. Remember when Cloudsdale fell over Neighagra Falls?”
Gallus shook his head. “I don’t read pony news.”
“You should.” He went back to the cart and pulled it forward with a casual hoof. He had gotten three boxes of matches all lying in the cart. “You can learn a thing or two about the world outside when you change your perspective.”
Gallus twirled a claw around the side of his head, making Sandbar look dumb.
Sandbar screeched to a halt, stopped the cart.
Gallus bumped into it, staggered to a shelf, wobbled the canned strawberries and mini-swords and nearly made them fall.
“Shush!” Sandbar raised a hoof. In a lowered whisper: “Do you hear that?”
Gallus cupped his ear. “You mean the pony at the other—“
Sandbar covered his mouth, Gallus grabbed that covering hoof.
“Stay quiet and listen, griffon!”
That griffon watched him like a hawk after that.
Nevertheless, the both of them lowered their heads and leaned close to the shelf, close to the inkwells on that lower shelf.
“I used to visit there on vacation!” a cheerful mare said in her no-nonsense manner. “But, I know being a tourist there is different from being an actual resident. What was it like, being raised there?”
A stallion’s diminishing cackle. Carrying a breathy speech in him: “Well n-now, it was certainly different. Living beside other pegasi and almost never an Earth pony or a unicorn is very, very different from what you m-might think.”
Gallus raised a brow at Sandbar. “Who’s that?”
“Swift River," was his reply. "A pony from one of those cloud cities—I think it's...I think it's Stratusburg.”
“Want me to meet him?” He flapped it.
Sandbar grabbed it, almost snagged it. “Not now!” he whispered as loud as he could. “You’re going to get us discovered!”
“You want to prank him?” Gallus asked, then was surprised at his own idea. “I’m OK with pranking him. Better than staying around and standing guard.”
“Look, just listen.”
The two of them lowered their backs to that shelf of inkwells.
“...didn’t feel anything for them?” the mare was asking.
“I did feel some common love for them,” Swift River said. “After all, we’re ponies, and for me to dislike a pony just because he doesn’t have wings...it’s not good. You could say I was indifferent. I’m not going to get all n-nosy into somepony’s business—I had my own matters to take care of.”
“Well, that’s nice to hear your side,” the mare said. “I could...tell you how mine went.”
“And...sorry, I didn’t get your location. Wh-Where?”
“I’m from Canterlot.”
A long harrowing pause. “Oh. What’s it like before the invasion—I mean, I know what Canterlot is and what the lifestyle is, but I’ve only visited it, too. How was living there?”
She chuckled a bit, too. “I did not really live there. I’m not even sure if I was a Canterlot pony in blood myself...I never did ask where we moved from—too young to remember.” A pause. “Since I was a foal, I always wanted to get out of the royal confines of the capital. I couldn't stand the stuffy ponies there, always looking down on everypony else just because they’re low-class, low-runged. The concept of seeing what it's like elsewhere in Equestria fascinated me because I wanted to connect with others, see how their plight was in places not so rich and wealthy. It brought me to many places, all the way from Vanhoover to Manehattan, from Yakyakistan to Basalt Beach.”
“And that’s how you became a journalist?” Swift River asked.
Another pause. “Yes, that’s how I became a journalist. The landscapes were gorgeous and I could travel around—even if I don’t have wings like yours. But, like I said, it’s the connections I'd made with others that counted...made the job all the worthwhile no matter how stressful it was, no matter how drained I felt when all was said and done.”
“Mm-hmm! That's good, very good. I wish I could travel around today just like you did back then, but I think you’re wishing the same.”
A sigh. “Yeah, I do wish. Can’t go two miles outside without risking your whole life being stuffed into a cocoon, to get the love sapped out of you—now, I heard they’re trying cages so they could figure out more ways to squeeze love out of us until they can't get anymore.”
“It’s very horrifying. Truly horrifying, it is." A pause, a stumbling and fidgeting of hooves. "I should know.”
A gasp. “Really, now? How do you know?”	
Gallus investigated a random sample from the line of inkwells on the shelf. He rocked the plastic jar lightly, sensing the thick liquid slushing inside the small container.
“Had a friend escape—a rare friend. He got caught again, though He’s no longer with us, but...what he's seen, I can't tell. Wait...I can tell, but it’s not something worth telling.” A quick breath. “No one dies there, and that’s what makes it all the worse: no ending to the pain and the suffering, no ending to becoming a loveless...pony? What's a pony without love?" Another sigh. "Will they remember? He thought there's something in their water—normal to changelings, bad to us. It made them forget...made them forget how they got there in the first place.”
“Just like they’ve always been there,” she murmured, trailing off.
“It’s a shame that they’re...th-that. They don’t fight fair, they don’t treat us fair...I don’t wanna e-even say I could blame them for their love h-hunger. If they only found a way to digest hay r-right, then there wouldn’t be any need for d-devouring our emotions and I would’ve been back in the Academy!”
Yet another pause. “We all do have those times, those wasted days….”
“Except you can’t blame yourself,” he said, becoming angrier. “Had it gone some o-other, we would be laughing over teacups, talking about the weather.”
They trailed off together. Then, the sounds of fumbling through the shelves.
Swift River grabbed a can, rotated it about and quietly read the words on the label. “Isn’t this a treat? They managed to do this kind of thing!”
Hurried hoofsteps. “Haven’t you seen this before?”
“No. Must’ve been ‘cause it was cider—fresh, hoof-picked apples for this here brewery prize or something.”
Another pause, then a fzz! They could still hear the crackle of that carbonated drink.
Swift River took a gulp of it.
“What’s wrong? Got stuck in your throat?”
He gulped it down, forced it down. “A-Actually, I wasn’t expecting that kick...but, it was good. Not bad, really." Another audible gulp. "Ah-choo!"
"Hey!" the cashier shouted, ceasing his bit-counting. "Keep it clean, will you?!"
"I’d rather have fresh cider, sir!” was Swift River's answer.
“Then you better wait it out, whiner!” the cashier yelled at him before turning back to his register and his mountain of bits.
Swift River sighed.
An “Ow!” rang out from behind the shelf.
A pause. “Who’s that?” asked Swift River
A claw raised into the air, then gripping it as if the claw was trying to catch the wind.
“Well, it must be that griffon they’ve talked about earlier this morning!”
Another hoof yanked the claw down.
Sandbar looked at him dead on. “You’re going to make us look bad!”
“I wanted to say hi!” Gallus yelled. “What’s wrong with a little greeting? If we avoid him too much, then that pony will start getting suspicious of us and we better hope he’s a good guy!”
“Since when did you start getting smart about it?” Sandbar said, now faster. “Where was that genius back in the train ride? Where was it?”
“I just reached the station! I was famished and got my first meal in ages! Did you think my mind was straight the whole time?!”
“What seems to be the problem?” asked Swift River himself.
Sandbar and Gallus looked at each other with frightened expressions and turned round.
At the end of the aisle, Swift River beside a hatted unicorn mare. “Like I said, what seems to be the problem?”