//------------------------------// // Mare Problems // Story: My Little Caboose: Blue is Magic! // by DarkWing //------------------------------// "Good evening." The mare at the ticket booth greeted as the group approached the station. "What can I do for you tonight?" "We need some tickets to Canterlot please." Twilight said pleasantly. "Alrighty, how many are in your party?" "Thirteen ponies and a baby dragon." "Baby dragon, huh?" The mare said, not overly shocked as she quickly put a stamp on each ticket. "Not a lot of ponies going to Canterlot today, only one other pair of ponies is going tonight, and they're riding in cart 'A'. What's the occasion?" "Just having a friendly meal with friends." Twilight smiled. "Well I hope you have a pleasant night." The mare smiled, feeding each individual ticket through the slot. "The ticket collector will be doing his rounds in two minutes, so you'll have to find your seats fast. The ride will take half an hour and will be fifty bits in total." "Thanks." Twilight said, dropping a small bag of bits into the other slot. "Seems about right." The mare said as she jangled the small satchel. "That's seven tickets for cart 'C' and seven tickets or cart 'D'." "Not all in one cart?" Church asked. "There's only room for twelve per cart, so I felt you guys would like to be split even rather than have two odd ones out." "Fair enough." Church nodded, looking at the tickets. "So who goes in which cart?" "I think the guys should go in cart 'C' so I don't have to look at them." Tex smirked. "I was about to suggest the same thing." Grif chuckled, grabbing his ticket as he made his way to one of the carts. "Shotgun!" "There is no shotgun on a train..." Simmons sighed. "You're just mad because I called it first!" "This is going to be a fun half hour..." Church muttered. "I know! I've never been on a train before!" Caboose said with childlike excitement. "You were on one when we went to Canterlot for the wedding, idiot." Tucker said, shaking his head. "Oh... yeah!" "One minute." The mare at the counter said loudly. The group collectively nodded and trotted up to their respective carts and entered. The girls slowly got settled in their seats, and once they did the door separating their cart from the guys' opened. "Tickets please." A stallion yawned as he walked towards the girls. The girls looked over at him to see him wearing a cap that read Ticket Collector, as well as a small satchel that clung to his side. Each of the girls prepared their tickets and he slowly approached them, eyeing them warily. "Those stallions in the other cart with you?" "Yes." Twilight nodded, holding out her ticket. "Just to let you know one of them tore out his cushion shouting something about Lucky Charms..." The stallion said annoyingly, grabbing each of their tickets to examine them. "Oh, I'm sorry... that must have been Caboose." "I was going to reprimand him but one of them already seemed to be doing it." The stallion nodded. Once he confirmed the tickets were genuine, he threw them in the satchel he wore on his side. "If you need anything I'll be sitting at the back of this cart seeing as nopony is in the others." 'We will, thank you." Twilight nodded. The stallion returned the nod and lazily took a seat at the other end of the cart. "This is so exciting. Oh, I do hope they ask Tex where she got her dress." Rarity chirped happily, laying on the cushion. "I'm sure they will." Fluttershy said encouragingly. "It's simply beautiful." "Thank you. I believe the simplicity really does make it look rather charming. Much more so then some other designs I've made." Rarity said, eyeing Tex who shifted uncomfortably. "Tex, you look lovely, there is no need to be embarrassed." "I'm not embarrassed... actually, I am, but this thing is so damn tight I can barely do anything." Tex grunted, trying to stretch her hind legs. "This is why I hate dresses." "Skir-" "Please stop correcting me." Tex sighed, unable to get comfortable in the seat. "Rarity, is there any way to stretch the fabric so it won't be so... constricting?" Twilight asked curiously. "I guess if you massage the fabric carefully it would work, but Tex would need to take it off first." "Fine with me." Tex nodded quickly, beginning to unzip the dress. "Wait." Twilight said quickly. "What? Listen, if you want to see me uncomfortable because of what I did back in the tunn-" "No, it's not that." Twilight said, motioning towards the stallion sitting on the other end of the cart. "The whole point of the dress was to cover up your-" "Right." Tex muttered. "So I'm stuck being uncomfortable. Fun." "Not necessarily." Twilight said, looking at the door next to the ticket collector. "The back cart is empty, remember?" Tex smirked and gave Twilight a thankful nod, before jumping off her seat to walk to the door. "Take care of the skirt, will you?" Rarity asked hastily as she reached out with her forelegs, seemingly trying to catch Tex before she left. "It would be a shame if it got ripped on the way there." "I'll do the stretching." Twilight said, walking next to Tex. "I suppose that's fine then." Rarity smiled worriedly. "Don't worry, I'll take especially good care of it." Rarity thought briefly then nodded at them. Tex and Twilight nodded in return and they made their way to the door. As Tex reached for the door, the stallion stuck out his foreleg, blocking her path. "What are you doing?" Tex asked. "I don't see any reason for you to go in there." The stallion shrugged, adjusting his hat. "Can we please get through?" Tex asked forcefully, trying the polite card. "Not if you don't give me a good reason as to why I should let you." The stallion said, matching Tex's forceful tone. "Listen, I don't have time to-" "I don't have time for this either, so take your seat." The stallion interrupted. Tex flexed her hind legs in anger, wanting to kick the stallions ass at the same time as not wanting to damage the skirt. "I apologize, but our friend here is having some mare troubles, if you catch my meaning." Twilight said, reading Tex's body language to carefully form an idea. "What are you talking about?" The stallion asked hesitantly, wondering what they were up to. "Let's just say that there is a reason our stallion friends are in the other cart right now." "Just tell me what''s wrong. I'm not interested in-" "You know... bad attitude... extremely stressed... low patience?" "Alright, that's enough games for now. Please take your-" The stallion began, but his face soon blanched. Quickly understanding what she was hinting at, he scrambled off of his seat and jumped to the door. "Just knock when you need to come back in." And with that, the stallion quickly unlocked the door and kicked it open, before moving out of Tex's way. "That's more like it." Tex muttered, purposely bumping into the stallion, making him fall to the ground. "Sorry for the inconvenience." Twilight said pleasantly as they walked into the next cart. "N-not at all." The stallion stuttered, locking the door behind them. "Nice going." Tex nodded thoughtfully. "But why did he let us in? I mean, every cart is the same, so there's no real need for us having to go into this one..." "I think he was just trying not to think about it." Twilight giggled. Back in the other cart, Applejack was staring out the window, deep in thought. "Wacha thinking about AJ?" Rainbow Dash asked, quickly jumping next to Applejack to talk to her. Applejack turned to her and gave a quick shrug as a response. "Something is obviously wrong, so just tell us." "Just gettin' this strange vibe or somethin'." "What kind of vibe?" Fluttershy asked. "Ooh, do you have to go to the little fillies room?" Pinkie asked with a smile. "It's not that Pinkie. It's just that Twi' told me a bit 'bout the fragments a while back, tellin' me which ones we can trust and what not, and it got me thinkin' about 'em." "Is that what this is about?" Rainbow Dash asked with a laugh. "I mean, I think we already know we can't trust Gary..." "Both O'Malley and Sigma are dangerous as well." Rarity added, only paying slight attention to the conversation due to her worrying over the state of her dress in the cart over. "Exactly, but didn't she tell ya'll which ones we could trust?" "Yeah, I think she said Theta and Delta were cool." Rainbow Dash nodded slowly. "What's your point?" "What ah'm sayin' is that she left one lil' bit out of th' equation." Applejack said, taking a deep breath as she looked out the window. "C'mon AJ, just tell us." Rainbow Dash grunted. "She ain't never said anythin' 'bout us bein' able to trust th' Epsilon fragment."