//------------------------------// // Let's Be Tourists // Story: Pandemic: Big Apple // by Lawra //------------------------------// American Museum of Natural History The air was warm and humid in the climate controlled room for the special exhibit. Making me even more uncomfortable with this gaudy black shirt on. Exotic trees lined the greenhouse space creating a winding path, UV lights overhead provided enough illumination for them to survive, and kept the temperature up to tropical levels. A few museum employees were wandering around answering questions or luring in butterflies with slices of fruit. “This is— wonderful,” I exclaimed, watching as dozens of brightly colored butterflies fluttered delicately overhead. The museum was comfortably crowded today, mostly humans but there were some ponies mixed in, but in this smaller space made it feel a little more cramped. Inside were a few human families and a couple older guests like me and Will, though they were all humans. Other than us, there were only a few young earth pony foals clamoring to see a few butterflies perched on an orange slice. “I told you that you’d like it,” Will said with a happy smile. “I’ll need to bring my nieces sometime,” I said, carefully stretching out my left wing so as not to disturb the air, and allowing one of the small insects to perch on it. “Not that I’ll be able to arrange time away again for a long time,” I lamented, I loved being a weather pony but there was going to be so much to do before we all figured out the best way to deal with winter and I was going to have to manage it all. “Your cushy government job doesn’t give out use it or lose it time to ponies?” “Of course we have that, I’m just the first pony to actual use it for a non-emergency. My boss said I had to take some time off,” I answered, gingerly maneuvering my wing closer to get a better look at the resting butterfly lightly flexing its wings. “Did you just call my job cushy?” “You love it and do nothing but talk about how wonderful a time you have with it. So yes.” “Okay, it is wonderful and fulfilling and I love doing it. But that doesn’t make it cushy,” I replied before favoring him with a look. “If you’re that jealous you have my open invitation to come and be an actual weather pony for as long as you can take it,” I challenged, watching the butterfly that had been perched on my wing take off into the air. “As enticing as She made me to find that offer,” he spared a forlorn look up at the butterflies dancing overhead before giving an annoyed flick of his tail and heading towards the greenhouse exit. “I’m just not cut out for spending my days up in the clouds.” “Open offer,” I teased, following him to exit the humid glass box. Passing by yet another of the no flying signs and one proclaiming no eating of insects showing off a cartoonish night pony head about to eat a butterfly. “So being that I successfully distracted you from your failure to teach kids advanced flight before lunch with pretty butterflies, where to next?” he asked, stopping to sit underneath a big map of the Pacific ocean showing off different prevailing wind patterns. “The Equestrian Gallery of course,” I answered with a big grin, taking a seat next to him so a few humans could pass by. “And then lunch.” “Pony propaganda,” Will then dropped his voice to a tiny unenthused whisper. “Yay.” “I know right, hopefully it has something new I haven’t seen before. Magic demonstrations maybe? Wait no, humans would never let any unicorns see higher level magic. This place is too small for a proper weather show. And it’s inside so no earth pony shows. Although they did have the butterfly house, I bet if they had some proper soil setup they could show off some really impressive stuff,” “Are you done wondering yet?” He asked with a genuine laugh. “We’re only one floor down and a few rooms over from it.” I paused to take in a deep breath. “Not done yet, need to fantasize just a little bit more.” Staring ahead he sighed, “No regrets huh?” “I— um— what? Regrets?” I asked in confusion. “Wings, hooves, the whole pony package. You don’t have any regrets, no desire to go back at all do you? You love it.” he finished in a tired nearly defeated tone. “That sounds like a very loaded question.” “I guess it is. It’s just you’re totally Sapphire Sky now.” “Thanks, I guess?” “You’re like meeting someone new. We were friends for years. And most of what interests and drives you now isn’t what drove— you. I miss her a bit.” He finished turning away from me throughout eyes staring into the floor as he grew less comfortable with what he was saying. I chewed on my lower lip mulling over a response, and waiting until we once again had a bit more privacy as a few more visitors to the museum passed by. “So you don’t like who I am?” “That isn’t what I meant. You seem very happy, Alena—” Will trailed off abruptly realizing he had used my former name. My ears pinned back as the muscles in my chest and throat tightened, my pupils contracting into small dots. “Will,” I responded flatly. “I would appreciate it if you didn’t call me by that name, you wouldn’t like it if I called you Crimson Cirrus.” “No I wouldn’t like that, sorry— it just slipped out,” he admitted apologetically. “Forget it then,” I quickly dismissed the insult, eager to forgive. “Let’s go see what safe stuff the humans will allow us to see,” I playfully bumped against his shoulder as I stood back up and knocked him over in surprise. “Ow,” He groaned getting back up onto all four hooves. “You’re so violent.” “Pssh, that was clearly playful bordering on flirty if you could stay upright, don’t you ever spend time around other ponies?” I scoffed, trotting off in the direction of the steps to go up a floor. “No.” He quickly answered gruffly. “I mean, not rough ones that like to beat me up like you do,” he joked, quickly catching up. “My nose still hurts from this morning,” Will whined dramatically. Climbing the awkwardly sized steps for a pony to the third floor, we took some time to pass through the Primate hall. Evolution had been one of my favorite things to learn about. I found the experience of looking at a series of different hominid skeletons next to each other behind the wall of glass to be oddly fascinating now that it no longer applied to me. I almost left Will who was alternating between glaring at the human skeleton and an upturned hoof. “You ever try to remember what it was like to have fingers?” He asked, flexing his fetlock to roll his hoof towards himself. “I’m good at imagining things, so yes, but no I can’t remember what it was actually like to have those weird grabby sausages,” I answered, hoping that he wasn’t trying to restart the fight we had just avoided. “Me either,” he sighed with a little irritated shrug. “They’d be really nice to have for work. But if I still had a choice, I don’t know if I could stand to give up flying or lazing on clouds anymore.” “Any luck making a cloud bed that’ll stick around?” I asked, moving away from the display in the direction of the Equestrian exhibit. “Ha ha— no. I did fall asleep on the fluffiest cumulus once and ended up in Massachusetts. That was a fun phone call to work to try and explain how I slept in and floated halfway to Boston.” Snorting in amusement, I smiled at him actually having pegasus problems. “I’ve done that too, but try waking up in Canada without your passport.” “Nice to know I’m not the only pony stupid enough to do that.” He said chuckling. “How far into Canada you end up?” “A little place called Wawa, Ontario. Misty Way and Jasper accompanied me on that little adventure. Jasper just had her birthday and they were able to convince me to have some drinks and we had a wee bit too much and had the brilliant drunken idea to sleep it off on a cloud. Thirteen hours later, we woke up over some tiny Canadian town. Hung over, we stumbled into a Tim Hortons for some muffins and timbits before getting chewed out by the local cops. There weren’t any ponies in that town so we sort of stood out.” Throughout my story he kept snickering louder and louder before finally as my story ended he asked with a chortle, “You know you have a real gift for getting into and out of trouble.” “A lot of humans still can’t look past our appearance. Which is occasionally very useful,” I answered, exiting the Primate hall to pass by another flight of steps to our left. “Humans being gullible are one thing, but don’t blame them for your poor decision making,” he started with an irritated roll of his eyes. “I still get students who try to brush me. As if that wouldn’t be super unprofessional and inappropriate.” “Alright enough about humans weirdness,” I stopped to sit down, forcing a few other visitors exiting to walk around us, so I could take a picture of the extravagant entrance to the Equestrian hall. Growing from two wooden planters on either side of the entryway were thick trees with a sparse covering of small leaf covered branches, following the frame perfectly straight and then horizontally to meet in the middle where the tops curled together in to snake around each other to form the initials of the museum, AMNH. Binding the two together was an exotic climbing vine with small purple flowers that wrapped around both trees. It was the kind of tree shaping that would have taken years to accomplish but with magic it likely had only taken a few days if they were taking their time. Attached to the ceiling were four UV lights to provide illumination for the plants and highlight them in a soft orange glow. “With three seeds and three tribes this gift was grown into one. A piece of our world to live on in yours. Our bond of friendship is stronger than any force that would seek to bring disharmony between us,” Will said to my side obviously impressed by the work. “How nice.” “It is, isn’t it,” I replied with a smile, snapping another picture of the dedication plaque before putting my phone away. “Guess they didn’t think to include any Night or Crystal ponies,” I noted, passing slowly through the arch into the hall crowded mostly with humans. “Who knows? We only ever see a few that Equestria trots out for us to talk with.” “Don’t you ever get tired of being suspicious?” I rolled my eyes, catching sight of a few ponies wearing bright yellow vests with Equestrian written on the sides in English and the runed language of Equestrian going around answering questions. “I get tired of being the only pony I know to be.” he whispered wearily. “Why don’t we just ask?” I questioned, stopping in a short line to talk to a actual Equestrian unicorn waiting inside the entrance to answer questions. Will put a hoof in my path and stared at me with wide fearful eyes. “You’re going to talk to an Equestrian unicorn? Are you crazy?” he whispered harshly. “Um yes? He’s there to answer questions,” I stared at him briefly before rolling my eyes. “Right. Well you do that. I’ll just be over there looking at the Cloudsdale model. Don’t come crying to me if they melt your brain and make it run on pure sugarey pony goodness or something.” “Two things. First you’re going to stand right next to me and quit being weird,” I commanded before finishing with a shrug of my wings. “And second, it already does?” The muscles around his jaw tightened and he narrowed his eyes. “Fine.” “Excuse me, sir,” I started and he regarded the two of us with a pleasant but tired smile. “How can I help?” he asked with perfect English. “We had a question about the tree at the entrance. Do you know why Night and Crystal ponies aren’t mentioned?” “Crystal ponies aren’t mentioned because on Equestria they aren’t considered separate from Earth ponies. While Night ponies tend to keep to themselves and don’t often engage in outreach programs. It’s a common question and if you wish to know more, the sections of the exhibit related to them go into more detail on their history,” he explained helpfully. “Thank you.”   “Yes, thanks,” Will brusquely replied as he leaned his shoulder into me to push me along. “Enjoy the exhibit,” the stallion added. “You survived the big bad helpful Equestrian,” I teased. “And we got away before he did any magic,” Will retorted breathing out a large sigh of relief. I couldn’t help but roll my eyes again at his paranoia. “Let’s escape over to the Cloudsdale model since you were so interested in it,” I suggested and pointed a hoof towards the display case in the center of the hall with the cities name displayed prominently across the top.   “Yes I want to see it,” he admitted, brown eyes looking away evasively. “Then stop being such a doofus,” I playfully bumped against him again to push him towards the display. “A pony is supposed to enjoy life, not worry about every little thing.” “Ugh, don’t quote Her vision at me,” Will grumbled half heartedly but didn’t stop moving. A Couple Hours Later “This is definitely what I imagined a pizza place in New York to look like,” I remarked as I entered first, hooves making loud clops on the tiled floor. Stepping out of the way of a trio of humans leaving with pizza slices on paper plates who nearly walked into us. Black and white checkerboard walls, cramped seating with one table cut short for ponies, and a counter that was far too high for a pony to ever hope to see over. A quaint little stereotypical place that I would have thoroughly enjoyed if it wasn’t for the off putting scent of cooked meat. It was warm enough outside that they had the front of the store open to the outside so at least there was fresh air. Thankfully they had helpfully placed a menu over a portion of the counter base so I wouldn’t need to fly to see what they offered. Placed low as well was a chip reader for easier payments. On the menu it listed all their standard pizzas but also a Pony Special that was a pop, mistakenly called soda in this backward area, and a slice of their veggie only pizza. “It’s an authentic city Pizzeria. If it was fancy it wouldn’t be good.” Will replied, quickly trotting to stand next to me. A man in his early twenties leaned over the counter to lazily look between them. “Two pony specials?” he asked gruffly. “Yes, please,” I answered. “Yes,” Will answered at the same time. “Take out or eating in?” “We’ll eat here,” I answered. “Thirteen fifty,” the human said before disappearing behind the high counter. The chip reader lit up and I was able to get my phone to it before Will could, having had it tucked underneath my wing. “To drink?” “Um—,” I ended up humming as I looked over their selection. “Cherry Coke.” “Sprite.” “You gonna want that cut up or just the slice?” he asked. “Cut up, please,” I answered. “I’m fine with the slice,” Will answered gruffly. “Have a seat, I’ll call you when it’s ready,” the man instructed, vanishing behind the counter again. “What?” I asked at his narrowed eyes, trotting over to take a seat at the lone pony sized table in the tiny restaurant. Giving a quick swish of my tail I sat down so that it would wrap comfortably around my legs and not get walked on by any humans. “I gotta pay you back somehow for all that expired Valentine candy you kept sending me.” “I send those to a lot of people, and it was day after sale, not expired,” he grumbled as he took his seat across from me. “So what did you want to see when we go back? We can catch the planetarium show, those are every half hour.” “That seems like a good place to start back up. I haven’t been to a planetarium since I was in middle school and I do want to see more of the dinosaur stuff, even if they don’t let us fly to get a better look,” I pouted. “So we’ll explore the rest of the museum then what else do you want to do? It’s your vacation.” “Yea— but you’re the one who actually knows this place.” “But I don’t know what to do!” Will suddenly replied putting his hooves up to his head and flaring his wings unconsciously, coming close to hitting a human walking past to the counter who tossed him a dirty look. “Sorry.” “I—” “Do you want to go see the top of the Empire State— oh wait we could fly and have a better view. Take the ferry out to see the Statue of Liberty? That’s a pretty standard touristy thing to do— oh, stupid me we could just fly and it makes the entire experience pointless. Broadway? Comedy shows? Nightclubs? See some more live TV being filmed? I don’t know what we should do and it’s exhausting. You could have at least visited during Hockey season then you could have finally went to a Devils game.” “Sorry,” I stared at the table and my ears drooped. “I know I dropped this trip on you at short notice.” “No, not your fault. I just wish I had realized how— boring so many things I would have recommended a year ago are when you’re a pony who can fly.” ‘And they don’t really want us to fly here,’ I added to myself. “Order up, two pony specials,” a different human called out from behind the counter, sliding a plastic tray with a disposable carry handle for a pony to bite down on. “I’ll get it,” Will offered, quickly going to rear up against the counter so he could grab the tray with his mouth and carefully return to the low table. “Smells good,” I said, inspecting the bite size slices of pizza topped with green peppers, onions, tomato, mushrooms, black olives, and broccoli. Will’s on the other hand was a whole slice and judging by it’s unwieldy size may have need for the plastic knife and fork that sat off to the side. “You know it doesn’t matter to me what we’re doing,” I started, watching him fumble briefly to get the knife and fork in position between his pasterns. “I know I wasn’t— happy about the train ride but even if we don’t do anything else, today has been wonderful.” He stopped fumbling with the too small cutlery to look up at me briefly before answering. “You’re not half bad for company in person, even with how you keep getting us in trouble.” “If you say so,” I replied with a smirk, dipping my head down to take a bite of pizza. “Go ahead and admit it, New York pizza is best pizza,” Will encouraged before I had even had a chance to chew and swallow. “Your whole life has been a lie up until this very moment.” “It’s definitely good,” I answered slowly. “But I think you oversold it too much and nothing could live up to such expectations,” I added haughtily, avoiding mentioning that the lack of pony grown ingredients was a major knock against it. “I can’t believe you would lie to me like this,” he snorted loudly. “A pony is supposed to be honest.” “I’m not lying, and now who’s quoting the vision,” I scoffed and took another bite. “For years now you’ve boasted about how unimaginably superior the pizza is here,” I explained with a mouthful of pizza. “Nothing could have lived up to the expectations you yourself created.” “It’ll hit you later, and then— much like how you wear the shame of your cheating ways, you’ll admit to me that I was right,” Will nodded to himself and began to eat his pizza. “Not that I would ever say I would have picked it out for myself,” I started, leaning back slightly to brush some imaginary dirt off the logo of my black shirt which was making the hot weather a little less bearable. “But it does contrast nicely with my coat,” I added haughtily, giving a small sideways glance at a loud human couple who were now eating at a nearby table. ‘Why do humans always have to start shouting at each other when they get excited?’ “Contrast is good, you were looking a little blue,” Will pointed out helpfully. “But I’m always blue?” I asked as I took another piece in my mouth before freezing as I realized what joke he was making. Rather than rise to the bait I simply went back to eating at a leisurely pace. “Why are you so blue?” he continued, struggling to stop himself from snickering. “Cause it’s my fur color?” I answered casually, completely ignoring that he was joking. “Don’t try to claim that you’re color blind.” “You ruined it,” he sighed, giving up trying to force the joke. “I really don’t know what I ruined, so why the long face?” I asked innocently and stared at him expectantly. “You ruined a good joke by trying too hard,” he groaned. “You deserved it.” I finished with a light laugh. He returned my laugh with a chuckle of his own. “We are both so witty.” “Indeed, we are clever ponies,” I agreed sarcastically. Settling into a comfortable silence between us as we finished our meals, listening to the humans talk, and the sounds filtering in from outside. Listening to a man complain about how late a cable technician was getting to his home made me want to speak up in their defense, people not in the industry never understood the job. I was just about to do so when my phone rang. Hurriedly digging it free from my saddlebag, Will stared at me with a raised eyebrow. “I’m surprised your phone hasn’t rang more,” he joked as I swiped with my stylus to answer. “Cause my public number is set to go right to voicemail,” I answered and used a wing to hold the phone to my head. “Hello Seth, what do you need?” “Hello Sapphire, I know you’re on vacation but I needed to double check something, we got a call earlier from a New York TV station asking for clarification on some things about our weather program. Did you do an interview with them?” “I did do an interview— what were they asking about? Is there a problem?” I asked nervously, trying to remember if I had said anything that could cause issues. “No, not a problem. They just wanted to know more details. Can you stay in the city for the next few hours? They seemed pretty excited and we’re waiting to hear back if they want to have a follow up. When we know more we’ll send over some guidelines for you.” “Wasn’t going to leave till later so I can stick around,” I answered, not like I was going to get back on a train, so we were free to leave whenever we wanted. Will’s home wasn’t too long a flight. All we had to do was follow the Hudson North for a couple hours at a leisurely pace, couldn’t even get lost. ”Thanks, Sapphire. I’ll give you a call as soon as I hear more.” “No problem,” I responded and prepared to hang up when he spoke again. ”Oh and just in case something like this happens again, please give me a call before you talk to the press. The higher ups gets a little nervous when our employees talk to the press without any talking points and handlers. Wouldn’t want an innocent statement to cause any problems, not with how paranoid the feds are about magic.” “Will do,” I answered and hung up. “Will do what?” Will asked with a dumb grin on his face. “Sorry, puns. So who was that? Sounded official. Problem with work?” “That was Seth, he’s the human who manages the media and public relations. Guess this might become a working vacation later.” “Want to go do the touristy Statue of Liberty trip first? I remember reading that they have a pegasus pass, cheaper than the ferry, and we can just fly right to the island.” “Sounds great.” Liberty Island Gift Shop “Um— excuse me,” I tried to interrupt a trio of women who were standing in front of a display and blocking me from getting at a small bag I wanted to get for my youngest niece. They ignored me to continuing talking amongst themselves and comparing things on their phones. Frowning, my wings rustled in irritation but I couldn’t try to interrupt their conversation again before I had to dart out of the way as a man nearly stepped on me. The real gift shop building was being remodeled so everything had been shoved into a smaller space making the temporary gift shop extremely crowded with all the humans from the tours trying to get in. I didn’t take up that much space as a pony which only made it worse as the humans weren’t paying attention to where they were going. “Hey,” I spoke up more forcefully and gently nudged the nearest woman in the side of her calf with my knee. She jerked like I had zapped her with static electricity and bumped into her nearest friend. Gasping before sighing in relief she rolled her eyes. “Oh it’s just a pony.” “Good job being scared of a little pony, Jackie,” one of them teased and knelt down to be closer. “You’re so adorable, what can I do for you cutie?” I frowned and one of my ears flipped down. “I just wanted to get one of the small green bags,” I answered and pointed towards the display I could barely see. “Sure thing,” the one called Jackie answered and easily picked one to hold out for me to take. “Thank you,” I sat to take it from her with my hooves before tucking it under a wing. “You mind taking a quick selfie with me? There aren’t any ponies back home and you’re all so cute.” “I— guess,” I answered after a brief hesitation, hoping to be friendly and make a good impression. The three young women quickly knelt down to crowd around me, squeezing in close around me as they all tried to awkwardly use their phones at once to take a picture. I maintained a pleasant smile even though whatever perfume or lotion they had bathed in, irritated my nose. It was a struggle but I thought I did well to keep my irritation from showing up until one of them started running her fingers through my mane down my neck. “You must spend a fortune on conditioner,” the one with her hand in my mane said. “You’ve got to feel this, she’s so soft.” “Ooh she is! I thought it’d be more horse-like.” “It’s— um not polite to— pet ponies you don’t know,” I tried to explain, backing up to get away from the trio, I ended up bumping into the wall. They didn’t seem to hear, trapping me as they reached out to place their hands on me. “Stop. Please,” I protested, my wings spreading involuntarily preparing to take flight, and dropping the bag I had just received. “I said stop!” I demanded and slammed my hoof on the floor making the trio jump slightly, but at least they took their hands away. “Sorry, but I’m a pony, not some pet and you were making me very uncomfortable,” I explained in attempt to be diplomatic towards their ignorance. Even human strangers could be friends waiting to be made. “Can you believe this? She’s so rude,” the first one to pet me snorted. “You’d think we insulted her.” “We were just being friendly. God, I didn’t know ponies were so rude!” ‘I was being exceptionally accommodating,’I thought, pupils shrinking in anger. The harsh taps of a hoof against the floor stopped me before I could point out that they were the ones being rude. “Is there a problem here?” a stallion with a deep voice asked. He was a larger than an average earth pony, wearing a green vest with a yellow badge prominently displayed on the front of his chest, and a tan campaign hat modified to let his ears peak up through the brim. “No problem except this rude pony,” one of the woman answered. “Let’s just go, stupid barn animals,” she muttered under her breath. “Enjoy your time on the island,” the earth stallion remarked in a tone that lacked any sincerity, the trio of women roughly pushing past him already chatting amongst themselves about the the perceived unfairness of being accused of wrongdoing. “Thanks, I’m not used to dealing with such— pushy humans,” I told the stallion with an embarrassed chuckle. “Sorry it took so long to step in,” he reached up to incline his hat towards me. “Most guests are more respectful.” “Well, thank you again,” I repeated and leaned down to pick up the bag that had fallen to the floor and return it under my wing. When I looked back up, I noticed him take a serious look at my blank flank before his eyes lit up. “Oh hey I just saw you on TV!” he exclaimed excitedly. “Oh, it’s already after four?” I asked rhetorically, starting to make my way towards the checkout. “Yeah, just had my lunch break and you were on the news for an interview,” he explained as he followed me. “The pegasi I know, never get to do any weather magic, so it was cool to see even a little.” “I’ve noticed that about the pegasi here. Hopefully the humans will quit being paranoid soon and let them help out with the weather,” I answered.   “So if they let you control the weather, does that mean it’s mostly ponies like out West? I heard that only ponies in the homestead lands were allowed to do that.” “Yea it’s mostly ponies,” I nodded. “Actually feels weird to be around so many humans, I forgot what it was like,” I joked. “It can be— trying, being around them all the time,” He said softly, eyes almost crossed in contemplation. “I’d like to see a place where it’s more pony someday.” “We’d never turn away a friendly face,” I gave him a big smile, happy that my brief interview was going over well, at least with one pony. “You have a great day,” he said, tipping his hat to me once again. “I should get back to work.” “You have a great day too,” I told him while taking a place in line, and beginning to dig out my phone to pay. I would likely be getting a call soon from Seth if it’s already past four. While Will should be done with the call he had to take from the new hire at his school, in order for him to explain how to do a basic task that the human had been hired to do. Five minutes later I was outside flying in a lazy circle around the island around twenty feet in the air searching for Will. ‘He said he was just going to find someplace quiet, where did he fly off to?’ Our tickets let us fly so long as we stayed beneath the height of the pedestal the Statue of Liberty stood on. Unlike the city itself, this area did have several pegasi in high visibility vests patrolling to make sure that rule was followed by the dozen or so pegasi who were taking advantage of the special tickets. But I was being allowed to stretch my wings so I wasn’t going to complain about a little thing like height restriction. Coming to a stop to hover as I reached the front of the Statue of Liberty, I decided to come back to this spot to take a picture with Will’s help, I wanted to be in the shot. I had expected the statue to be bigger but it was still absolutely marvelous to see in real life. “I wonder if I could do a full pan shot,” I considered, spinning around to look away from the island. An endless body of water felt so normal to look out over but the exotic saltwater smell strongly reminded me that this was not any of the Great Lakes, no matter how familiar the view. Swooping down, I skimmed the surface of the water to resume my search for the missing stallion. Just to amuse myself for a little bit, I trailed my hooves through the gentle waves as I followed the coast. A wave jumped up suddenly and drenched my legs, so I shot upwards to get out of it. “Having fun?” Will called out, flying in to land at the railing of the brick path at the edge of the island before rearing up to lean against the railing. “Watch out for the sharks.” “Oh no! Sharks!” I bemoaned sarcastically, trying to kick off the excess wetness clinging to my legs before flying over to land next to him on the brick walkway. “Finish your work thing?” “Yes,” he answered tiredly. “Not being on call apparently means call me immediately with the stupidest possible problem. But good thing they got their fancy IT degrees. And you should keep your hooves out of the water around here, you’re likely to grow flippers from all the stuff in it.” “Grew hooves once, I can live without flippers,” I remarked and absently tried to shake more water from my fur. “Personally I think you look pretty surrounded by water,” he said with some hesitation and sat back to quickly dug out his phone to show off that he had taken a picture of me as I flew over the water. “I guess if you wanted I could get it from the other side and have the island in the frame,” he nervously suggested, stylus hanging out his mouth to one side. “No way, it’s great just the way it is.” “Guess you’ll want me to post it,” he flipped the phone around in his hooves to face him, and switched to the right app. “There’s no rush,” I said and sat down next to him to watch. “And I thought you weren’t really active on social media? You’ve been posting more than I have.” “I—,” he floundered for a response. “I normally don’t have a reason, today I do,” he explained evasively. “Oh, okay,” I nodded, easily accepting the excuse considering it didn’t sound like he had a lot of other friends left from our conversations, or made much of an attempt to make new ones. “Jasper replied to that oddly quickly, even though you didn’t tag me,” I noted suspiciously. “Um— maybe she’s watching my stuff since I posted that pic of you on the train this morning?” Will answered a little too quickly. “I guess she is kind of obsessive like that. You should send her a friend request, she’s a really nice mare,” I suggested helpfully. Will could use some more ponies to talk to. “She sent me one earlier,” Will said before he turned to stare at me. “Are you trying to set me up?” “With new friends, sure,” I answered with cheeky grin. “If you want more than that, well— it’s not up to me what two consenting ponies do.” “Don’t play matchmaker for me,” he grumbled and put his phone away. “What? It could be my special talent! I can’t know unless I try,” I giggled as I dug out my phone from my saddlebag. “I’m going to tell everypony I know to friend you. Ooh, what kind of mares do you like?” “Sapphire, please— just don’t,” he quickly replied with an expression like he had swallowed a lemon. “Think I’ve had my fill of crazy mares for the year.” He whispered softly under his breath. “What was that?” I asked dropping my phone into an upturned hoof as I dipped my head back into my bag to take out the stylus. “Nothing!” He answered quickly. “No call from your PR guy?” Waking my phone up, I gulped audibly. “Ope, that’s a lot of notifications,” I grimaced. Even condensed it showed over five hundred for just one social media account. “No I’m going to give him one, I’m tired of waiting.” “Hey Siri,” I started and waited for the pleasant chime that indicated it was listening. “Call Seth Andriacchi.” “Mobile or Work?” “Mobile. Or— uh maybe work is better.” “Did you say Mobile?” “No. Work.” “Calling Seth Andreacheche, Work,” the synthesized woman finally replied and I switched to holding the phone with both hooves so I could hold it to my head. Seth picked up after the second ring. “You have perfect timing, I was just about to give you a call.” ‘Uh huh, sure,’ I thought. “So what’s going on?” “Well— the Governor has taken a personal interest in this, and since this is your vacation time and you can decline, she would look upon this as a personal favor.” “To do what?” I interrupted. “We received an offer for you to appear on national TV tomorrow morning and act as a goodwill ambassador for the program. I know you’re aware of how unpopular pony magic as a whole is becoming in Washington, and she feels you’re the best pony to do that.” “Uh—” I floundered for a response, glancing over to Will to see if he’d offer any kind of moral support as I knew he would have heard. “She’s offering to pay you off. Ask for stuff.” Will whispered conspiratorially. I started to smirk before catching myself. I wasn’t going to hold out for personal gain when this could benefit so many. “Of course I’ll do it. What show and when?” “You were just on it this morning,” Seth answered, not trying to hide how happy my acceptance made him. “The Today Show is going to slot you in for a segment at eight. We have a hotel room booked for you at Rockefeller Plaza so you don’t have to worry about travel. Sound good?” My mouth suddenly felt very dry and my forelegs drooped before I recovered and raised the phone back to my head. “Sounds— great,” I answered nervously and gulped. “Thanks, you’re the best Sapphire, I’ll email you all the nitty gritty details. Oh, and we’ll reimburse all your expenses from here on out.” “Okay,” I responded still feeling overwhelmed. “Right, call me if you have any questions. NBC should be contacting you soon as well. And I’ll call you tomorrow if anything new pops up. Bye,” Seth didn’t wait for a response before he hung up. “Bye,” I mumbled numbly, wings relaxing to almost touch the ground. “Oh—,” Will started, staring at his own phone as he moved around with his stylus held in his mouth. “Your little interview earlier is trending on Twitter,” he remarked before looking up. “Grats, you’re famous?” “I think I need to lie down for a bit,” I replied and stumbled over to the inside a brick barrier to sink down to the ground. “Hey, you alright?” Will asked in concern. “Don’t faint on me, you’re way too heavy to lug around.” “I’m fine, really I just—,” “Need some water?” he asked when I trailed off. “I think I could use some,” I nodded and swung my head around to dig out my water bottle by the tiny carry handle with my teeth to drop between my waiting shaking forelegs. Unfortunately only a tiny sliver of the water I had made from purified rain water remained. “Here,” he snagged my bottle with his teeth before I could protest. “You relax, take some deep breaths, and I’ll go fill this up quick,” he explained and I could only nod in response. A soft flurry of feathers and he was gone leaving me alone. Immediately I found the hard path uncomfortable to lay on so I jumped up past the small inner wall to the grass field surrounding the statue. Taking several deep breaths I was starting to feel a little better. It’s going to be just another interview, obviously the one I had already done was fine, and I could do that again. ‘I will do it again,’ I reaffirmed over and over in my head. My phone vibrating with yet another round of notifications abruptly ended my train of thought. But I did feel like I could start dealing with it now. I could at least start clearing out the notifications I didn’t need to worry about. A lot of my older posts to communicate with the weather program were getting traffic. All the new friend requests though would take a lot more time to go through, and it didn’t feel right to simply decline them all. There were far less direct messages but it was still a daunting number to have to sort through or respond to. Will landed next to me in the grass with my water bottle held in his teeth. “Sorry, only had that fake spring water stuff to fill it up with,” he explained and placed it next to my forelegs. “I’ll survive,” I set my phone aside and popped open the lid to take a drink of the chemical filled water. “Thank you.” “Let’s sort this famous pony stuff out so you can quit being such a nervous wreck.” “It’s going to take forever. I’m going to just send Seth a message to log in and deal with it for now. Put those hands of his to work.” “Just, let me take a look,” he dug out his own stylus and laid down next to me. I shifted to shove my phone over in his direction. Will spent several minutes looking through messages before he began his own. “Let’s just make a generic tweet so that all these new followers know you’re a little too busy to properly respond. Lock out your private messaging to only those you follow, thank them for their interest, yadda yadda yadda, and done with that.” “Wow, that was fast,” I remarked, watching as he quickly navigated around and easily phrased a message that I would have spent hours agonizing over attempting to make it perfect. “Facebook, let’s just start a fan page and make your personal page friends only. Seth can be a mod, I’ll send him a message so that he knows he needs to deal with things there, be more detailed with information, manage requests, and promote others to help moderate. And let’s just mute all notifications until all this activity dies down. We’ll make you a Instagram and Snapchat account later.” “Can I just hire you to do this for me?” I asked, stunned by how effortlessly he had sorted things. “You couldn’t afford me.” He returned with a smile. “Name your price.” I offered. “Wouldn’t work out, helping others like this only works when I’m with them.” He replied with a shrug glancing back towards the mark on his flank. “Oh! So that’s your special talent, that’s really cool. Well you could always move up to me and do it right?” “It’s not that useful and doesn’t always work when I want it to. Besides, I don’t like when it comes out, feels like I’m losing whatever is left of my humanity.” “I’m sorry to hear that,” I replied, not really understanding why that remained such a huge deal to him. “Anypony would love to have a talent that lets them help out others like you can.” “Maybe if I had a choice in it and if it felt like I wasn’t being used just for it sometimes,” he said spitefully. Staring wide eyed I gulped feeling immediately extremely guilty. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to—” “Oh no. Not you.” He replied quickly shaking his head. “It makes me really happy when someone genuinely needs the help and appreciates it. Feels like the whole world makes sense and anything is possible. But there are times when— well let’s not talk about that now.” “Right,” I trailed off before trying to change subjects. “So you’re not going to leave me all alone in the dangerous city at night are you?” I asked. “Don’t play that game, and of course I’ll stick around to keep your backwoods hick pony self from getting into more trouble,” he teased before poking a bit at the shirt he had forced me to wear with an outstretched wing. “Anything you think you need for tomorrow? A cute little black dress or something?” he asked with a joking tone. “I’m not going to wear clothes on TV.” I said seriously, feeling a phantom itch to get this stupid shirt off. “Heh. Ok ok.” He replied. “You want to go get your mane done or something?” “Psh. I don’t need that. I’m beautiful and perfect from hoof to wing.” I said mockingly, jumping to my hooves to flare my wings dramatically and sticking a foreleg out. Immediately noticing how many of my feathers were out of sorts and how much I needed a good preening. My eyes traced the tip of my outstretched hoof, a small otherwise imperceptible crack at the very tip standing out making me think it would split in half at any moment. My bangs draped in my vision showing nothing but split ends. Will was right. I looked atrocious! I had to make a good impression for the weather program and all the ponies relying on me and everyone that would be listening. I had to look as good as I possibly could! “Sapphire you ok?” “Spa.” I whispered. “What?” “I need a spa!” I screamed turning my body to inspect my wings as best I could and staring at my hooves critically. How had I left myself get this bad? “Why would I know where a spa is in New York City?” He answered annoyed, cutting into my inspection. “Let alone one that’ll know how to serve one of us.” “We have to find one.”