"Well, girls?" Amber asked, standing readily in the doorway of the old Defense Force base, the tunnels inside forming the most direct route from Skyfreeze. "We've got the whole day to hang out and enjoy Ironridge. What do we do?"
"I wouldn't mind going shopping," Maple offered, smiling tentatively. "I never got to see the civilized side of the city last time I was here, so that might be nice. As long as I don't have to carry too much on the way back."
Gerardo cleared his throat. "Yes, I believe that's another lesson learned from last time. Should any of you grow weary, or should we find ourselves in possession of more belongings than can fit comfortably upon our backs, we'll procure a cart posthaste to aid in transportation."
"Amber?" Willow glanced over to her yellow friend. "How all right are you with walking?"
Amber grinned, standing freely on her own. "Whatever was in that food last night must've had a real kick to it, because I feel decent. Or maybe it's this air. But I'll let you know if I get tired. How about you, Willow? Where do you want to go?"
Willow hummed. "I wouldn't mind going somewhere where we could listen to ponies. Somewhere nice, but not nice enough that nobody talks freely. Like how I remember the docks being before the ships stopped coming... I would enjoy getting to do that again."
"Cool." Amber winked. "As for me, I really wanna find a clothing store and check out the local fashion. Feeling a little adventurous after that mane trim, you know?" She glanced around. "Anyone else? How about you, Valey?"
"Valey?" a dark gray mare in a brightly-striped sweater, five-gallon hat and aviator shades asked, looking around herself. "Who's Valey? I don't see any Valeys around here..."
Amber giggled, the disguise covering Valey's bat features and making her resemble an ordinary citizen with an atrocious sense of style. "Right, you're just hanging out. Starlight?"
Starlight shrugged. "I don't care."
"Aww, come on..." Disappointed, Amber stuck out her lip. "We're doing this for fun! Surely there's something you enjoy doing, isn't there?"
Her strange conversation with the crystal tree echoed in Starlight's mind. What did she do for fun? She had more or less purged herself of the concept after Sunburst left, when she decided she didn't want a cutie mark, and while that didn't bother her as much as it once had...
"I don't know," she said honestly. "Really."
"You could write a random pony an anonymous, flirty letter," not-Valey suggested. "Climb one of Dangerous Karma's trees, steal some fruit and take a nap in the branches. Sneak into some place that reeks of paperwork and forge a few random signatures as a prank. Find an interesting-looking pony and stalk them for a day. Climb on top of a fence and sing as loudly and badly as you can and see how long it takes someone to throw something at you. Prop a bucket of water on top of a half-open door. Go bowling with watermelons. Take a page out of Sparky's book and smash a chili pepper, then put it in a water cooler. It's a wide, wide world, kiddo."
Willow glanced worriedly at her. "Have you done all of those?"
"Not the pepper," Valey answered, hanging her head in shame. "I didn't actually know about it until Sparky mentioned it earlier. Remind me to try that before we bail on Ironridge. That's what I have on my bucket list."
Willow shook her head. Maple shrugged in Valey's defense, and Gerardo nodded sagely. "So," Valey said, "Anything in there sound good?"
"I'll just follow along and keep you safe," Starlight decided. "Just in case anything happens."
Valey smirked. "Pretty sure that's what I'm here for, and also why we've got a pile of ex-mercenaries tailing us at a distance without getting in the way... but yeah, you do that. At least try to have some fun though, so we can taunt Sparky for not wanting to get a disguise so she could come with us." She flexed her wings beneath the sweater, striped black and bright red. "I'd love to see her in something this ridiculous."
"I'll try," Starlight promised, and left it at that.
"This looks like a clothing store," Amber remarked, looking pleased with her navigation. Gerardo didn't feel like flying and Valey's wings were pinned, so they had traveled on intuition and finally found a Stone District building with an outline of a shirt on the sign. "Want to stop here first?"
"An entire street of such merchants," Gerardo added, sweeping a talon down the sloped, cobbled brick road. Why a street was made out of cobblestones when it was already carved into the face of a stone mountain was beyond Starlight.
"And fashionable-looking ponies, too," Maple murmured, glancing at the pedestrians they were passing. Starlight sized several ponies up, and judging by the upturned noses Valey's get-up generated, they were equines who knew their local culture. Ponies chatted with vendors in stalls with their backs to the Earth District and wandered in and out of darkened, proper storefronts, wearing coats that matched their own colorations, or else those of their partners. She didn't know enough about fashion to pick out trends aside from calling things hats and jackets and scarves, but at least she could see the influence of their temperate climate. Single articles of clothing were more popular than full sets, and many ponies would wear a hat or a light jacket but not both.
Valey shrugged. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure I'm getting tossed out of whatever store I try to walk in here. But knock yourselves out. And try not to run Arambai bankrupt."
Grinning, Amber nodded, and led the way into the nearest store.
The sun was halfway to noon in the mountainous sky when the six friends finally left the clothing street behind, high enough to shine over the remaining Water District dam and warm the stones beneath their hooves. Gerardo volunteered as the pack griffon, but most everyone had purchases they could wear or carry in their own saddlebags just fine. The exception was Valey, who had been forcibly offered an entire wardrobe by a concerned socialite, unhappily carrying it on her back.
"We gotta get a caaart..." she whined, so many bags balanced atop her that they had to be tied together with rope to keep from falling off. "Why did she buy me so many copies of the same outfit? Are you supposed to just wear the same look over and over again and change into the same thing when your clothes get dirty? That's lame. This whole thing is lame. They probably make me look fat, too. Hey, Starlight, you should complain with me. It's fun."
"No," Starlight said, a hair clip having restored her mane to the messy ponytail Maple liked. Hopefully, it would be more durable than the old bands she had given her back in Riverfall.
Amber glanced back, a deep blue bandana tied around her neck for an adventurous, schoolfilly look. "If we need a cart, we should probably get it sooner rather than later? I don't want anyone to collapse..."
"I think she's joking," Maple offered, looking as if she fervently hoped she was right. "Right, Valey?"
"You're ruining the joke," Valey muttered, plodding along with her head down.
"How hungry is everyone?" Willow interrupted, her long mane done up close to her head with more pins like Starlight's and a coat designed to look good with saddlebags that was long around the sides and didn't close on the front or bottom. "I think we're entering an area of food shops, next. We could buy something to eat?"
Gerardo shook his head, sporting a new golden pocketwatch and toting bags that held exquisite dresses for each of the Riverfall mares, as well as a more toned-down set of finery they didn't want to be hiking around the city in. "I think it will be a good hour or more before I'm ready, but if you wish to stop here regardless, I could leave and procure a cart and we could take whatever we buy with us to eat on the road. What say you?"
Maple shrugged. "That sounds like a plan."
Amber was too busy salivating at a merchant booth. "Girls, look at the size of these cheese wheels! I've never seen any like these! We need to buy one!..."
Noon rolled past, seeing Maple, Amber and Willow riding in the back of a wooden cart pulled by Gerardo and Valey. It was smaller than the ones used in the evacuation, snugly fitting the three of them and Starlight, along with their goods, with just enough room to be comfortable.
"Vegetables vegetables vegetables..." Amber hummed, inspecting their stock. "I bet you could make a fantastic soup with this, Maple, if we weren't on the road. Maybe we could have a really crispy salad?"
Willow shook her head, eyeing a massive, pale yellow cheese wheel propped against the railing. "Maybe we should start eating that? It's nearly as big as you are when you curl up, Amber. And we don't want it to go bad..."
Amber shrugged. "Cheese doesn't go bad. It gets sharp and aged. Tastes better that way."
Maple frowned, contemplating the cheese. "Under certain conditions..."
"Eh, you'll have to find out!" Valey called back from in front of the cart. "Because I'm pretty sure eating that much cheese in one sitting will give you a lot worse gas than letting it sit for a day!"
Maple grimaced. "I'm pretty sure it would give you even worse than that. But let's see what I can make with it, right here and now. Hmm... We can't cook, but cheese does go good with some types of salad..."
"I vote," Gerardo announced, chewing on a fruit kebab made with melon slices and grapes and blocks of cheese, "that we pay Blueleaf a visit. I seem to recall we possess a good ally there by the name of Elise, which could well be enjoyable for Miss Willow if her aim is to have a chinwag with the locals. Quite a bit more civilized than crashing a bar, as well."
"Agreed. Drunk ponies are weird." Valey didn't look up from her snack, gorging herself on sugary fruit and not-so-sugary lettuce and celery, eaten fresh and with the limited preparation Maple could give it for an on-the-go lunch. "Actually, ponies are weird in general, sometimes, but that's their problem."
Willow looked up in interest. "Elise?" She angled her ears. "I remember you talking about her. She was the Blueleaf mayor's wife, wasn't she? Remind me what she did?"
Gerardo pointed a talon. "As I've heard it, she had both a remarkably eventful and nearly heroic foalhood full of drama, epic conflicts and leadership struggles over the fate of a nation, followed by a ten-year exodus spent wandering the world in the vein of an adventurer myself. Of that, though, I know nothing. It might be perfectly aligned with your goals, our team already has connections to her, and I must admit I'd be very curious to hear from her myself.
Willow's eyes sparkled, and she nodded in appreciation.
"Do we really want to travel through Blueleaf?" Maple asked, glancing up, worried. "The road there got damaged or maybe destroyed by an airship crash, and it's probably overflowing with refugees. I know we're trying to enjoy this trip and not worry about things, but that sounds dangerous and not very enjoyable."
Gerardo rubbed his chin. "Hrrrrmm... It would certainly be convenient if we possessed a way to simply fly over and skip the ascent through the city's levels, now..."
Darkwind and a team of seven other pegasi set the cart down like a chariot in Blueleaf's sculpted, perfected fifth level. It bore signs of the city's hard times just like everywhere else; the artificial river had stopped running in an effort to conserve power for the pumps, or perhaps because the source was gone. No lights shone through the miniature mansions' windows, though the clear blue sky was more than enough to make up in lighting. But the lawns and gardens looked somehow better-tended than last time, and crews of ponies were even moving around, performing cosmetic work on some of the houses. It made sense, since the city would be filled with the unemployed and any act of finding work for the refugees would reflect favorably on the level five residents, but Starlight couldn't help but wonder if it would be fairer for them to be doing that work on the lower, dingier levels.
The doors to Elise's home were all propped wide open, and her pegasus brother Fernand greeted them like a trained, professional butler. "Maple and Starlight!" His eyes widened in surprise. "And others. Arambai had told us you were returning to Ironridge, but said he didn't expect you to brave the Earth District so quickly."
Maple smiled awkwardly. "Hi, Fernand. We flew in with the new Defense Force. I don't suppose everyone isn't busy? We're trying to enjoy our trip, this time, and felt it would be nice to visit..."
Fernand nodded. "My sister has been elevated in importance with the new administration. She is more than just the Blueleaf mayor's wife, now."
"I see..." Maple folded her ears.
Fernand broke into a smile. "Which is why I'm all the more certain she could use a break from her labors to meet with you. Attempting to balance Arambai's agenda, the good of the city and the private interests of Dangerous Karma is a slow and, as I've heard it, very frustrating task. Some ponies simply aren't willing to allow their corporate empires to be dismantled in the name of the greater good, it seems..."
Valey rolled her shaded eyes. "Wow, I wonder why."
Amber nudged her. "Yeah, if you owned that much fruit too, you'd probably stop at nothing to keep it all to yourself."
"Hey!" Valey shoved her back.
"Hee hee hee..."