“Look, Doll Stripe.” Star lifts his head from the sofa and nods towards the window in an attempt to direct Doll Stripe’s attention. The black and white stallion follows his gaze to the new rays of sunshine filtering through Star’s purple curtains.
“Guess it’s time to go, then,” Doll Stripe hops off Star’s loveseat and trots over to the suitcases. He reaches over to grab them when purple magic envelopes all their luggage and it levitates above him. “Oh,” He hums, “Thanks.”
They had been in Star Comet’s observatory for the entire night, napping and chatting, Doll Stripe only getting an hour or two of sleep in all, he is dead tired now. The unicorn doesn’t seem better off, for as soon as he lugs himself off his couch, he rubs at his sun-colored eyes and approaches the nearest mirror to pat down his mane and return it to its crisp, perfect state.
“You sure you don’t want more coffee before we go?” Doll Stripe nods over at Star’s coffee machine and all his discarded mugs from the night. The blue unicorn shakes his head and floats the luggage closer to him, so all the bags hover above his body.
“I’m fine. Let’s get going, we don’t want to miss the morning train,” Star Comet passes the white stallion and opens the door with magic. He trots out onto the dirt path and Doll Stripe trails behind him. The sky is still cloudy and the world seems to have lost saturation. The ground was muddy beneath his hooves and water dripped off the leaves of the trees. Doll finds himself wondering how they hadn’t flooded, but he quickly dismisses the thought. It’s Ponyville, and there’s no natural disaster in Ponyville that isn’t caused by a clumsy pegasus.
The familiar brightly colored cottages and stores come back into view, and the town is in full bustle again. Earth ponies with wagons and saddlebags chat ambiently outside of stores, unicorns walking about with a sense of task and importance, and pegasi napping in the dry clouds above or flying overhead. For such a small town, it really has a sense of community.
Realizing that he was lagging behind, Doll Stripe speeds up a bit to catch up to Star Comet’s side. They pass into Town Square, past a bulletin of town notices and advertisements. He pauses, a slip of paper catching his eye. It’s a warning poster with a poorly drawn picture of what appears to be a deformed bat with horns. Beneath it is a simple caution reading: dangerous creature spotted at Everfree forest. It probably isn’t anything to worry about, Doll decides, so he turns and goes to catch up with Star Comet.
The train ride to Canterlot is quiet except for the train itself. The other ponies seem worn out, which Doll supposes is because it’s early in the morning and the world outside is still bleary. As time passes, sunrays slowly begin to break free. By the time they make it to the city, the color was beginning to seep back into the environment.
The train stills with a loud pulse of gas and the doors slide open. Doll Stripe hops off the seat and Star Comet lifts their luggage down from the storage spaces above them, his horn glimmering brightly. The white stallion steps off onto the platform and stretches out. Here, the community melts away to reveal the true industry of ponies. It is nowhere near as hostile as Manehatten, but the royal purples and bright colors can’t hide what is obvious to Doll Stripe about Canterlot.
Canterlot is the snob capital of the world, the rich pony’s sanctuary, a world of competition and passive aggressive hostility. Whereas Manehatten is just a cesspool of the competition to survive and nopony is afraid to break out into arguments that take out their whole day, Canterlot is the land of subtle war. Doll loves a good subtle war.
Unicorns walk around with their noses in the air here, their every step imbued with power. Power that Doll Stripe would’ve played for here, had his life gone differently. Perhaps it will turn out that way, and maybe instead of rejoining the circus, he’ll perform in Canterlot and gain social standing. Social power.
Nobody would dare remove him from what he loved if he were at the top of the social ladder. They’d be too afraid of losing their own social standing. They’d be afraid to hate him. Doll Stripe steps down off the platform and onto the stone road. He shakes his mane. He never adjusted it after sleeping at Star’s observatory, so it’s somewhat of a mess. The looks he’s pulling from the stuck up ponies around him can tell him all he needs to know about his appearance. He probably looks like Nightmare Moon went swimming in dirt.
“So, where to first?” Star Comet taps Doll Stripe with a floating suitcase, having suddenly appeared by the white stallion’s side.
“Well, I’m not in a rush. Why not stop by that bookstore you mentioned?”
“Bookstore?” The unicorn repeats, a note of confusion in his voice. He widens his eyes, “Oh! Right, the bookstore. Well, I’m not sure where it is. Or what its name is.”
“Or if Canterlot even has a massive bookstore?” Doll Stripe mutters exasperatedly, and when Star Comet says nothing, he rolls his eyes. “Why’d you bother lying in the first place? At least remember your lies.”
The night-colored stallion coughs awkwardly, “Maybe you’re just delusional- I don’t remember saying anything about a bookstore. Hey, but, there’s this candy shop in town run by this pegasus, Mint Cotton, and it’s absolutely amazing. We should go there.”
“Mint Cotton?” Doll Stripe mutters, “Well, whatever, I suppose. As long as you weren’t lying about paying for me, too.”
“I don’t lie, my friend.” Star Comet smiles brightly and starts leading the way to through the town. As he follows, Doll makes an effort to straighten his appearance at least a tad. No matter what he does, he’s still going to look like he just stepped out of a circus, but he can at least look like it was a clean circus.
They make their way through Canterlot to the candy store Star is enthusiastic to go to. The unicorn seems to have picked the farthest possible shop from the train station, because they end up walking for what feels like forever. But eventually, they come across a building decorated with mint green and pink stripes. Doll steps over to the window. Unique looking candies line the display- tiny, flower shaped cotton candy dishes, gummies shaped like ponies and building blocks, and zapapple candy apples. Doll’s stomach growls eagerly.
“What can I get you?” The door to the shop has busted open and there stands a bubbling mint-colored pegasus with short pastel cotton-candy-like hair. Without waiting for the stallions to answer, the small mare waves them inside, “Come in and look around! We’ve got everything, and I mean everything. But, if you don’t find anything you like, you can place a custom order. Come on, come in!”
Star Comet rushes inside first and sets their bags down inside by the door. Doll Stripe follows after him. He instantly feels completely out of place. He’s used to being surrounded by circus colors, but he always fit in at a circus. This shop is more pastel than the bakery in Ponyville. It’s covered in pink and green and other pastel colors as accents. His eyes threaten to jump out of his head.
On the other hoof, the treats all around him soothe his aching eyes a bit. They’re truly amazing. Various chocolate sculptures catch Doll’s eye and he parts away from Star, who, of course, is staring down some cute moon-and-star-shaped candy floss.
Doll has always been a sucker for chocolate. He’s inspecting a chocolate sculpture of Discord, the lord of chaos, when the mint mare from before (who he assumes to be Mint Cotton) pops in by his side, an overly enthusiastic grin on her face. Her punch-colored eyes sparkle at him, and suddenly, he knows to be careful. That look is on every excellent salespony. Mint is no different, even though her demeanor is eccentric and as sweet as the candy she sells. He’s playing the defensive. He must not buy any chocolate.
“Got any free samples?” Doll Stripe interjects before Mint can get a word out. Her grin twists into something of shock, but she giggles.
“Free? This is a business.”
“But everything is so expensive. Do you have anything simple so I can taste test your candy?”
“Not unless you intend on paying for that simple thing. This is all my candy and this is my shop, I’m not giving away anything for free,” She laughs brightly, “But anyway, how about some chocolate shoes? You can walk a mile with these shoes. Not in them, of course, but…” Mint Cotton sticks her tongue out, “Or what about this chocolate cheese grater? It’s pretty grate.”
Doll Stripe hums, “But what if I don’t like the way you make chocolate?”
Mint Cotton stares at him blankly. A bird tweets outside and a unicorn pauses outside of the shop to observe some of the display candies. The pegasus bursts into laughter suddenly, tears forming in the corners of her eyes, “You’re such a funny pony!” Mint Cotton pushes him gently with her hoof, “Of course you like the way I make chocolate! Everypony does!”
“But, I haven’t tried it.”
“And maybe you really don’t like it!” Mint giggles, “But think of it this way. Even if you don’t end up absolutely loving it, and you positively will ‘cause I make grate,” She wiggles her eyebrows at the cheese grater chocolate, “chocolate, you will have donated to a poor mare to help her continue making things she loves.”
Doll Stripe raises a brow, “You’re not exactly a poor mare, though.” The shop glimmers shinily around him. She chuckles and pokes his nose.
“But every bit counts!” Mint turns and nods at a sculpture of a rocking chair. She leans over to whisper loudly to him, “This one is special, ‘cause it looks like a rocking chair, but it has a secret!”
“...What secret?”
“It can’t rock! Out, anyway. You don’t know how many times I’ve tried playing a good rock tune around that chair and it hasn’t moved an inch. It’s either super shy or I’m not great with making rocking chairs yet. Oh well.” Mint Cotton sighs at the chocolate chair. She trots away and takes a seat behind the counter, which has several cakes on display in glass. Doll Stripe decides to follow after her, slightly confused.
Star Comet approaches the counter with a couple of candies floating by his head. They look like various things: flowers, stars, tiny rowboats, ect. He’s gleaming at them. Doll’s pretty sure he’s drooling a bit too. Mint Cotton looks over all the treats he has with him and for a moment, money signs appear in her eyes. Or at least it looks like they do. Doll shakes his head.
“That’ll be 75 bits,” Mint starts, and Star wiggles his tail excitedly. His enthusiasm is suddenly crushed when she finishes with, “each.” Doll isn’t sure why Star ever thought 75 bits in total was fair in the first place, but with him carrying 6 of the candy things, 450 bits is definitely overpriced. Even Doll’s old circus used less outrageous prices.
“That’s clearly too much,” Doll Stripe argues, since Star seems to be incapacitated in shock, “I don’t care if you’re the best candy maker in all of Equestria, 75 bits for those tiny candy pops is absurd.”
Mint Cotton giggles, “‘Course it’s fair, silly! I’m not the best candy maker in Equestria, I’m the best in the entire world!” She flutters up to a shelf behind her and takes down a box to put Star’s candy in as he travels, “So what’ll it be? You buying or not?”
“Can I just… have a discount?” Star murmurs, already sounding defeated. Doll Stripe taps his hoof impatiently. There is no way this mare is going to even think about lowering the price. She looks like she’s ready to bust a gut laughing at the mere thought of it. Giggling to herself, Mint Cotton shakes her head. Surely Star was ready to put the candies back and leave, or at least just get one. He doubts he’ll be leaving happily either way, “Can I trade you something then? How about a horoscope?”
“A horoscope?” Mint tilts her head, “I could just get one of those in the paper, silly! Why would I want some random unicorn to tell me something I could get for free, in place of bits? That’s like… that would be crazy!” She stretches out her wings as if it helps with her point at all, which it doesn’t. Even so, Doll silently agrees with her.
“Some random unicorn? I’m no random unicorn, miss,” The blue stallion puffs out his chest. Oh, great, now the salespony look is in his eyes too. Doll Stripe huffs out a sigh as Star Comet continues talking, “I’m the greatest of all astrology unicorns. Surely you’re civilized enough to recognize me.”
“Civilized?” Mint Cotton beams, “That’s hilarious! Who’d wanna be civilized, that’s so boring! But I am the best candy maker ever, which is why you’d be super weird if you wanted to miss out on these candies.”
“Do you care nothing for destiny?” Star Comet demands, “Have you no interest in how the stars can read your future? Don’t you want to know if your candies spread over the land? If you find love? If you become… the richest pony alive?” Oh, now he’s got her. The salespony sparkle in the green pegasus’ eyes dulls and is replaced with curiosity. Doll Stripe has to admit, he may be a snake in the grass, but Star Comet knows how to capture a pony’s interest.
The argument flutters on as Mint Cotton attempts to regain her hoof in the debate. Doll Stripe mutters with annoyance. He’s not getting anywhere with this. He turns tail and walks over to the door, grabs his suitcase, and steps out of the shop. A voice somewhere in his head whispers something about not abandoning others, but he dismisses it with an irritated huff. What loyalty did he owe, after all, to two bickering knuckleheads.
As the shop door closes behind him and the ponies’ looping voices are cut off, Doll Stripe makes his way back to the town square. Surely, there was some news about an incoming circus there.
And if not, maybe another insane pony would lead him to one. One could hope.