Ticket Stub fought back the urge to sigh as he watched Coal Hopper eat her ice cream.
Or rather, his ice cream. After the waitress had brought out the ice cream he’d ordered for his companion – a task she’d done silently, making no mention of sprinkles or any other toppings – Ticket Stub had quietly paid her, only to discover that he’d had just enough money left to order a bowl for himself as well. Since plain vanilla had always been his favorite, he’d decided to indulge himself, spending the last of his money on a second bowl…only for Coal Hopper to snatch it from him as soon as it was brought to their table, digging in without so much as a word and leaving Ticket Stub bereft.
The brazen dessert-napping had been surprising, but not too much. I should have expected this, he’d decided as he’d watched her devour the tasty treat. It’s kind of par for the course so far.
Despite her making it clear up front that he was taking her out as an apology for needling her about telling Princess Cadance and Shining Armor what she’d seen in Vanhoover, and that romantic overtures would be violently rejected – with an emphasis on violently – Ticket Stub had still found himself nervously excited as he’d taken Coal Hopper out to eat. They were on a date! Sure, she’d never have called it that, but he was a guy taking a girl out on the town for an evening! That was the textbook definition of a date!
The thought had left him feeling unusually giddy. He hadn’t been on a date in quite some time, and the last time he had he’d been so nervous that he’d managed to bite his tongue a painful twenty-three times over the course of the evening. But despite Coal Hopper being the most belligerent mare he’d ever met, he hadn’t felt the least bit anxious around her.
At least, until he’d had to choose where to take her for dinner. His meager funds had placed all of Canterlot’s fancy restaurants (denoted by how they advertised their favorable reviews from noted food critic Zesty Gourmand) completely out of reach. With no other choice, he’d taken a gamble, reasoning that somepony as unpretentious as Coal Hopper wouldn’t want to eat at some fancy upscale place anyway.
Instead, he’d taken her to Burger Princess.
He’d held his breath waiting for her reaction when she saw where they were headed, half-expecting her to twist him into a pony pretzel, but she’d simply grunted at the sight with no further comment. That had been about the time that he’d realized that she’d been unusually quiet the entire evening, and for the first time he’d started to become a little nervous, worried that she wasn’t having a good time. She deserved that much, after the last few days.
But when their order – a plain veggie burger (hers with extra ketchup) and hay fries for each of them – came in, Coal Hopper had dug in with gusto. The sight had relieved Ticket Stub quite a bit, and he’d started to dig in…at least until he’d noticed Coal Hopper swiping his fries. She hadn’t even finished her own, but as he’d watched she’d telekinetically helped herself to one of his, then another, and then a third, acting as though it was completely normal. The sight had baffled him, but he’d known better than to protest, and by the end of the meal she’d eaten half of his fries in addition to her own.
After that it had been time for dessert. Since she’d made it plain before they’d left the castle that she expected to be taken to a specialty outlet for that, he’d led her back out into the Canterlot night. It had been a stroke of good fortune that he’d stumbled across The Delectable Dessert Den, a place whose focus on made-to-order treats had been obvious even if the waitress hadn’t leaned on them to try the sprinkles. But while going to a specialty dessert store and ordering plain vanilla ice cream might have been gauche, it was affordable and Coal Hopper seemed to like it…or at least, she didn’t hate it. That was what mattered.
Though I really would have liked some of that, he admitted silently as he watched his date eat the last scoop of the ice cream that had been intended for him…
Except suddenly there was a fresh bowl of the stuff on the table in front of him.
“You look like you want this more than we do,” came a voice that sounded vaguely familiar. But Ticket Stub didn’t have a chance to so much as glance over before somepony – a unicorn mare with a vermillion coat and gray mane, her horn bandaged – sat down on his left, closer than was polite. He barely had time to process that before another mare, this one with a tan coat and black mane, flanked him on his right.
“Who’re…” The question died on his lips as he reflexively glanced toward Coal Hopper and saw that she was also being flanked by a pair of ponies. On her left was an earth stallion with a brown coat and a blond mane that was slightly lighter than her own. To her right was another earth stallion, this one more powerfully built, with a burnt orange coat and deep brown mane. Coal Hopper herself slowly glanced at each of them, her features darkening as she quietly put her bowl and spoon down, the telekinetic glow around them fading to nothing.
“What do you want?” growled his date softly, the most that she’d spoken since they’d left the castle.
“We’re not threatening you,” piped up a third mare, this one a tiny little earth pony with a cerise coat and maroon mane and tail. Unlike her friends, this one wasn’t trying to pin them down, sitting a normal distance away and giving them puppy-dog eyes. “We just want to talk.”
Coal Hopper laughed mirthlessly at the statement. “I can tell,” she snorted, not bothering to hide her sarcasm. “Is that what you said to that crystal stallion before you offed him?”
Ticket Stub blinked at that. “Crystal stallion?” he echoed. “What do you-” Understanding suddenly poured over him, as he realized that these were those five ponies who had confessed to killing that crystal pony back at the train station, right before Princess Cadance had done the impossible and breathed life back into him. And now they’re here with us! The thought made Ticket’s stomach clench, and he was suddenly glad that he hadn’t eaten very much tonight, because he could feel it already threatening to come back up.
“Please listen,” urged the mare on his right, the one with the tan coat. “We’re not going to hurt anypony. If the two of you want to get up and walk away right now, we won’t stop you.”
“We didn’t approach you normally because we were worried you’d recognize us and freak out before we had a chance to say anything, that’s all. We’re not bad ponies,” explained the bulkier of the two stallions next to Coal Hopper, his voice having a pleading tone to it.
“Oh yeah? Then prove it. Let Coal Hopper go.”
It took Ticket Stub a second to realize what he’d just said, his eyes widening as he realized that he’d just mouthed off to five ponies who’d confessed to murder. The realization sent a paroxysm of terror through him, not wanting to be alone with these dangerous criminals. What if I made them angry? he thought in a panic. I bet they were just saying all that stuff about letting us go to keep us from screaming, and my calling them on it probably ticked them off! He could feel his blood running cold as he realized that he might have just doomed them both. I shouldn’t have said anything! Maybe if I apologize and beg for mercy, they’ll-
“Are you kidding me?” Coal Hopper’s incredulous voice dragged Ticket Stub back to his senses, looking across the table to where she was giving him a look of disbelief. “You’re really going to do the whole ‘let her go, take me instead’ routine for me?! ‘Cause let me tell you something, buster: from where I’m sitting, you’re not anywhere near macho enough to pull it off.”
Ticket Stub’s ears folded back, embarrassed by the rebuke. He wasn’t the only one, as the blond stallion on Coal Hopper’s left gave her a scowl. “Geez lady, the guy was thinking of you first. What’s your problem?”
Coal Hopper’s horn lit up, telekinetically lifting the spoon from her bowl of ice cream and waving it in the blond stallion’s face. “Do you see this?” she snarled. “Do you see this spoon? I will make you eat this if you say another word. I’m not even joking, I will literally shove this in your mouth and make you chew it up and swallow if down if I hear one more word out of you.” She learned forward then, nose-to-nose with the uppity stallion. “You got that?”
Apparently he did, because he leaned back and nodded his head quickly. The sight brought a satisfied snort to Coal Hopper’s lips, and she glanced back at Ticket Stub. “You see? That’s what you’re supposed to do: make them realize that they’re messing with the wrong ponies, not give up and try to negotiate for someone else to leave.”
The unexpected lecture, combined with the way Coal Hopper was nonchalantly threatening the ponies that had gotten the drop on them, was enough to erode Ticket Stub’s fear. Instead, he folded his ears back, chagrined by what the blonde mare was telling him. “S-sorry.”
“You better be,” she huffed. “We were having a perfectly nice evening until you had to go and do that.”
“…we were?” Ticket Stub blinked at that, unable to help the corners of his lips turning up despite their situation. “I mean, you were so quiet all night, I thought…”
“I was enjoying the ambiance,” she muttered, her voice losing its harsh edge. Even odder, she looked down as she said it, and Ticket Stub’s eyes widened as he saw her cheeks darken. Was she blushing?!
An awkward silence fell, as the five ponies surrounding them looked at each other uncertainly. Finally, the mare with the bandaged horn gave a perfunctory cough. “Ahem. Maybe we should get back to the business at hoof.”
“Fine,” agreed Coal Hopper, putting her spoon down. But the metal had barely touched the table when she glared at Ticket Stub. “Just so you know, tonight doesn’t count now. You’re going to have to take me out again when we get back to the Crystal Empire.”
Ticket Stub blinked. “I…really?”
“What kind of question is that? Yes, really!”
Despite the fact that they were surrounded by killers, Ticket Stub couldn’t stop his involuntary smile from turning into a completely goofy grin. “O-okay. It’s a date!”
“It-, it is NOT...” sputtered Coal Hopper, before telekinetically lifting the bowl of ice cream the injured unicorn mare had brought them and practically shoving it against his chest. “You know what? Shut up and eat your ice cream. Let me do the talking.” She didn’t wait for his reaction before shooting a glare at the unicorn in question. “So what’s your deal?”
Clearing her throat in a way that sounded suspiciously like a repressed laugh, the injured unicorn kept herself composed as she began to speak. “You two are railway workers, right?” she asked, nodding toward Coal Hopper’s uniform.
A roll of the eyes preceded the other mare’s response. “What, you think these are Nightmare Night costumes or something? Yeah, we work on a train.”
“I just wanted to be certain,” answered the vermillion unicorn, apparently unperturbed by Coal Hopper’s attitude. “There were a lot of ponies on the train platform when we met Princess Cadance, and I couldn’t remember if you two were there.”
“We were.”
“Okay,” nodded the mare, before letting out a deep breath. A moment later she spoke again, and said the last thing Ticket Stub would ever have expected.
“My friends and I need your help.”