Tempest woke early in the morning. The other two were still asleep, lying on either side of the other bed, Rarity with her sleep mask and earplugs in, and Pinkie lying backward in the bed with her head and one arm hanging off the edge of the bed. The corner of Tempest’s mouth twitched up. Innocents.
In the bathroom, she rolled up the edge of her nightshirt and poked her belly. Her finger sank in a fraction of an inch. All that time under arrest in Canterlot had made her soft. She needed to exercise, but she didn’t know what kind of exercise was best for this body.
She decided running was pretty safe. Humans looked like running creatures. She’d give that a try.
She dressed in her new exercise clothes, improvised some stretches, and headed out to the elevator and the street. Yesterday had been cool, but it had rained during the night, and the day was shaping up to be oppressive. Her skin quickly became soaked with sweat, but that sweat didn’t do anything but make her feel unclean. Her new sneakers, still stiff and uncomfortable, pounded against the sidewalk. Her legs, accustomed to idleness, burned. Her lungs felt tight. Her heart thudded. Pain, the drill sergeant cliche went, was weakness leaving the body.
She kept telling herself that. It was a hard world. She couldn’t afford to be weak.
Seven blocks downtown, she decided she’d had enough and she should cross the street and turn around. Waiting for the walk signal, she heard someone walk up behind her.
“You’re a tall drink of water.”
She looked over her shoulder. A man, well dressed, not bad looking, a little taller than her. Heavy in a sturdy, strong sort of way. “I don’t know what that means,” she said. She was very thirsty, but she doubted that was what he meant.
“You’ve got a funny accent. Where are you from?” the man said.
“No place you’ve heard of,” she said, trying not to sound hostile. She couldn't smell lust on him, but the human nose was useless. She suspected he was making advances towards her. She wasn’t prone to picking up random strangers, and his approach was crass. But she was lonely, and he was attractive. Thick, strong hands. She was interested in some of the possibilities of hands.
“No need to be rude,” huffed the man with a smirk suggesting this was within the range of what he considered flirting.
“I wasn’t trying to be rude,” she said, turning to face him and crossing her arms over her chest. “I’m from an extremely long way away.”
His eyes flicked toward her stump, and his expression changed. The corners of his mouth turned down, and he paled. Rage, Tempest’s old friend, rose up her chest and into her throat like boiling oil. “What, you don’t like this? Does this bother you?” she growled, thrusting her right arm into his face.
He threw up his arms and backed away from her. He was a little taller than Tempest and much heavier, but he was still intimidated by her. As he should be. She knew she could break him in half, and right now she wanted to. “Hey, hey, lady, I’m sorry, I just…”
Tempest waved her arm at him, making him step back. “You were making advances towards me. And then you saw this and you look at me like I’m something you found on the bottom of your hoof!”
“Hoof?” The man looked like he was about to say something else, but his heel caught on a vent grate and he went down. His breath went out of him as he hit the pavement, and Tempest cocked her arm back, ready for a quick blow to the neck.
No. This wasn’t a battlefield. She turned on her heel and pounded back towards the hotel at a sprint, cursing herself.
The instincts of a lifetime were just as useless here as they were in Equestria.
†
“Oh my gosh, no!” protested Pinkie. “You didn’t do anything wrong! That guy was a c-r-e-e-e-e-p! He had it coming! You should have actually punched him!”
“Pinkie is right, darling. You did nothing wrong except encouraging the advances of a rather crude stranger.”
Tempest lay on her back on the hotel bed and pressed the heel of her good hand between her eyes. “The point is that I was prepared to murder him. I’m not safe out here. I need to go back to Equestria, and into a cell.”
“Murder him,” said Pinkie, sitting on the edge of the other bed. “With your stump.”
“Pinkie!” gasped Rarity. “Please!” She was packing as they talked, walking between the closet and their one suitcase.
“No, it’s a stump,” growled Tempest. “And yes. I could snap any one of you weak babies in half with it without thinking.”
“The point,” said Rarity, carefully folding a t-shirt, “is that you didn’t. You were tested, and you prevailed.”
“You should’ve given him a black eye,” said Pinkie, punching the air with her plump little fists. “Guys like that burn my biscuit.”
Tempest sighed. They didn’t understand. “I don’t like this city.”
“Well, we never planned to spend more than one day here,” said Rarity. “Where shall we go next?”
“Mooby world! Mooby world!” said Pinkie, bouncing up on the bed without seeming to cross the intervening space.
Rarity laughed. “We may go to Mooby World if Tempest is interested. It’s two days’ drive away though. A bit of a long-range goal.”
“What’s Mooby World?” asked Tempest, sitting up in bed.
“Only the happiest place on earth!” said Pinkie, clapping her hands.
Tempest smirked. “Happiness. I could use some of that. Fine. Let’s go.” She hopped off the bed. “Dibs on the shower.”
†
The next day’s travels were uneventful.
They stopped at a bouncy house gym for a couple of hours to keep Pinkie’s morale up. The children handled Tempest’s missing hand better than that horny New Ponk City rando had. Early on in the visit, one of them asked: “What happened to your hand?”
“A bear ate it,” Tempest replied.
“Oh,” said the little boy. “Did it hurt?”
“Yes. A lot,” said Tempest. And that settled things.
Conversation over lunch centered around the idea that Tempest needed a phone.
“No,” said Tempest. “I’ve seen you people with those things. You stare at them all day and you don’t see anything happening around you. It’s horrifying.”
“But what if you get in trouble?” said Pinkie. “What if you need to call us.”
“Ah ah ah!” said Rarity, holding up a hand. “And don’t start with us about how strong you are darling. I mean the kind of trouble you can’t punch your way out of. Which is most kinds of trouble.”
Tempest fought them every inch of the way, but by the time they were on the highway again, she’d been equipped with her own little pink distraction box. It was kind of cool. She even looked at the internet for a few minutes — or she meant to. Pinkie suggested she search for ‘cute cat pictures’. Several hours later it had gotten dark, and she was only able to look away because she’d just gotten her first text.
Sunset: Hi. Sunset Shimmer here. Assuming Magic Twi told you about me? Let me know if you want to set up an Equestrian Expats society. Or a Reformed Twilight Sparkle Rivals Society if you want to be exclusive.
Tempest laboriously pecked out a reply with one thumb. Nut sure I count as reformed. She swore. Not, duck it.
Sunset: I got what you meant. Re: being reformed. It’s a process. Just try not to conquer and/or despoil anything today. Let tomorrow take care of itself.
Tempest: Wise advice.
Sunset: I do my best.
Tempest: Done talking. Thumb tired.
Sunset: TTYL!
Tempest craned her head over into the front seat. Pinkie was driving, and Rarity was snoring with her cheek smooshed against the passenger side window. “Pinkie, what does ‘TTLY’ mean?”
“It means talk to you laaattter!” said Pinkie, waving her hand dramatically.
Tempest nodded. “Thank you.”
Tempest: TTYL u 2.
†
“I need to learn to drive,” said Tempest as they walked to the car early the next morning.
“You need to what now?” said Rarity, grip on her iced skinny caramel macchiato tightening.
“Prreeeetttyy sure Tempest said she wants to learn to drive,” said Pinkie, fishing out her keys and tossing them to Tempest. Tempest deftly transferred her iced coffee to the crook of her right arm and caught the keys in midair.
“Pinkie darling do you really think now is the right time?” said Rarity, her voice wavering.
Tempest unlocked the car door, sat down, turned the keys in the ignition and gripped the wheel with her good hand. The car’s engine purred like a tiger.
“See,” said Pinkie, hopping into the passenger seat. “She’s a natural.”
Rarity bucked herself the back behind Pinkie and gripped her seat. “For all of our sakes, I hope she is.”
“I’ve been watching what you two do. I think I figured out the basics.” Tempest took a deep breath and pressed down on the right pedal. The wheels squealed and the engine roared and the car jumped, but went nowhere.”
“You, um, need to put it in gear,” said Pinkie looking at Tempest over the tops of her sunglasses.
“The one that says ‘D’, right?” said Tempest.
“Yeah. It’s an automatic,” said Pinkie.
“I don’t know what that means.”
“It means you don’t need to change gears while you’re driving. The car does it for you. When the engine thingy starts going too fast, it goes up a gear and you can go faster. Or something? I don’t understand it.”
Tempest hooked her right arm in the steering wheel and pushed the gear shift down to D. It wasn’t hard to move; she could probably use it with her bad arm if she needed to. She pressed on the gas again and the car jerked forward. Rarity yelped. Pinkie whooped. Tempest growled.
“Can you two keep the feedback to a minimum? I’m trying to concentrate.” She pressed on the gas pedal with a gentler, more even motion, and the car rolled gracefully out of its spot. The hotel parking lot was mostly empty, so Tempest drove around it in slow circles, getting used to how the vehicle handled.
“Oh, good heavens, watch out for that car!” yelped Rarity, ducking her head and bracing herself behind Pinkie’s seat.
“I’m nowhere near that car. I’m fine,” said Tempest.
“You’re right, you’re totally not,” said Pinkie, gesturing ahead of them with her coffee cup. “But you’re heading straight from that lamp post.”
Ignoring Rarity’s panicked screams, Tempest swung the wheel one way, then realized it was the wrong direction and whirled the wheel back the other way. The car skidded sideways and stopped inches from the lamp post. Tempest gripped the wheel breathing heavily.
Pinkie leaned over to hug her. “You didn’t wreck the car! Yay! You’re doing great!”
Tempest smirked. “Thank you.”
“Are we done yet?” said Rarity.
“Do you feel up to the highway, Tempest?” said Pinkie.
“Oh no no no no no,” said Rarity.
“Hell yeah,” said Tempest, and pressed down on the gas. “Hey, there have got to be rules and laws about this kind of thing,” said Tempest, jerkily trundling towards the parking lot exit.
Pinkie tapped her chin. “Um… let’s see. Use your turn signals. Don’t go so fast the police chase you, or so slow we get bored. Try not to run into the other cars. Red means stop, green means go, yellow means go very fast. Pull over one lane for emergency vehicles. Those are the big ones.”
“Pinkamina Diane Pie you know there is more to it than that!” said Rarity, pounding on the back of Pinkie’s seat.
“Oh yeah, signs! Be careful about signs! Policemen take those pretty seriously!”
“Speaking of signs which road do I want,” said Tempest, ignoring the horns blaring behind her as she wove between lanes.
“Ninety-five south all the way!” hooted Pinkie.
Tempest frowned at the sign near the end of the on-ramp. “Yield? I never yield! It is part of my code of honor!”
“Then don’t!” said Pinkie, pulling out the CD booklet as more honking broke out behind them.
Rarity folded her hands and put her head between her knees. “Dear Lord, if you let me survive this, I promise I will donate all of my clothes to charity and devote my life to helping the poor.”
“Don’t lie to God, Rarity!” Pinkie pushed a CD into the player. The speakers boomed out something about being on a highway to hell.
Tempest pushed her foot down until the pedal touched the floorboards. Pinkie’s little pink sedan growled like a racing hound being let off the leash. The lines on the highway flashed by on either side of the car. She smiled. She felt such power. Such control. Control had always been an issue in her life. The ursa major had taken control from her. The Storm King had taken control from her. Twilight had taken control from her. The mirror had taken control from her. But on some level, she also knew that she’d given up control, at every one of those points. Surrendered to her disability and her anger. Surrendered to a fool of a king in exchange for a promise that, on some level, she always knew he wouldn’t keep. Surrendered to Twilight Sparkle because… well, because Twilight Sparkle saw something good in her, and had offered to help her find it.
But surrender was surrender. Tempest was tired of surrender. She wiggled her fingers, adjusting her grip on the wheel. It wasn’t much, but right now this vehicle was hers to control. And it felt oh so very good.