“Fillies, gentlecolts, it is my grave responsibility that I bring you a simple message: we do not have enough. The world as we know it is crumbling, not from the horrid machinations of war, nor the devious workings of tyranny and violence, but from the silent killer, a simple, almost pleasant word. Logistics. The world’s resources are rapidly depleting at unprecedented rates. There is not enough for all. So it falls to you, scientists, magicians, and engineers, to pioneer the next step in our evolution. We have work to do.”

-Establishment of Outer Planetary Exploration Committee - 2151 E.C.

Now to tell you a story about ships and maintenance. Every ship needs maintenance, especially a ship like the Bandit. One of the first things they teach you in pilot training is that having a ship is like having a foal. You have to feed it, clean it, care for it and lovingly put up with the crap it shoots at you if you’re not extra careful. It’s all part of the job. Neglect anything and the wrong part goes haywire at right time, and soon enough you find yourself floating in a glowing pile of parts with no hope of rescue. Keeping your ship in good shape can be the difference between life and death, and to keep it that way that you need income. And to get that income, you have to find work.

Work is the leash of freedom. As much as I’d love to wave goodbye to my days as a wage slave, I recognize that what freedom I enjoy comes at the cost of the blood, sweat, and tears I am willing to invest to make it that way. You can’t go far from work and still be free, well. Unless of course you’re rich, then you could do you what you damn well please. But for the rest of us, life is easier knowing that you have some way to pay for your next meal. Or better yet, a place to sleep.

Now of course there are different kinds of work, each with varying degrees of freedom. The rich can fly on their own dime, doing what they please as they please. They’re real entrepreneurs with the wits and balls to chase after the kinds of jobs that would leave most ponies in the poor house just for attempting. They have the most freedom. They have freedom to choose what they fly, where they fly, when they fly and how they fly. Sadly, not all of us can be so lucky. Ships eat bits like foals eat cereal, and for everyone else, flying on your own dime just isn’t an option. After all, we have the choice of eating, buying the next load, or fixing up the ship. And if you don’t fix up the ship every time, then you might as well be flying a stick of dynamite.

For the rest of us, we don’t fly on our own terms. We fly on the terms of those who can afford to pay us. Now granted if you own the ship outright then you have some leverage to negotiate, but again, that’s a rich pony thing. Smart ponies can spin deals in their favor, hide their costs and leave the table with a nice margin and perhaps a few beers to go with it.

Then of course, there’s not owning the ship at all. If someone else owns your ship, all you become is a glorified mailmare. You’re not flying the ship. You’re just delivering it to each location on your route. Picking up mail, dropping it off, delivering packages and completing tasks. Everything you do is dictated by the one pulling your strings. It's consistent paying work if you don't mind the boredom of docking queues, but Celestia help you if you actually want to do something during your flights. The pay is enough to get you through the next day, and that’s about it.

I had no money, or at least not enough to maintain a ship on, and I had no work. What I did have was a helpful little timer reminding me that I had just under 10 hours of air left.

I was screwed.

It took the better part of 8 hours and six consecutive jumps to reach the Earth Pony Rim Worlds. Once out there, I felt I could breathe a little easier, and started taking my time trying to find a station or colony to dock at. That was a mistake. I thought it would be easy, but, as it turned out, pegasi aren’t exactly the most popular ponies in the galaxy. Most of the stations I contacted took one look at my ship ID and charged the station batteries, a not too nice method of informing me my kind was not welcome there. Those few colonies that didn’t want to scrap me the moment I jumped on grid simply informed me that my ship would be confiscated if I docked there. I balked at that. Searching for a station that would admit me left me jumping all around the entire sector, until I had to start looking around the bleeding edge of the Earth Pony colonized space. By that time I was getting frantic. My suit could only support about 24 hours of breathable air, and I was getting dangerously close to the tail end of that by the time I finally made port at a colony called Winter's Edge.

---
“Scrap Bandit to Docking Authority. Scrap Bandit requesting docking instructions.”

There was a long pause as I waited for the tower’s response.

“Say again?” The tower responded.

Okay...

“Scrap Bandit to Docking Authority. Scrap Bandit requesting docking instructions.”

I thought I heard the buck on the other end chuckle, and then mutter something away from the microphone that sounded suspiciously like ‘stupid fucking pegasi.’

“Just wait right there Scrap Bandit, we’ll have docking instructions for you shortly.”

There were a few more chuckles, some repressed snorts, and then finally my WAND beeped with new instructions from the tower.

It was an image.

I won’t describe it, but the tower thought it was hilarious. I facehoofed and took a position behind a mass of ships heading for one of the open hangars, while the tower howled in fits of raucous laughter.

“Perverts.” I grumbled, cutting the C-Band.

I wasn’t sure what to do at that point, so I decided that the best thing to do might be to just wait and see. I waited for the better part of an hour, not moving, just clicking my hooves against the deck of the cockpit while I waited for the tower to give me something that didn’t involve ancient exotic literature. From my position outside the docking perimeter, I watched as a fleet of starships began forming ranks for a mass jump. Then, in a blinding flash, they vanished. Off to wherever in the universe they pleased, in likely many fewer jumps than it would take the scrap bandit to go.

Sullenly, I continued waiting, while watching my air supply continue to tick into the red.

A shuttle sailed past me headed toward the hangar, and that was the last straw.

Procedures be damned, I thought, steering after the shuttle. The C-Band flared back to
life as soon as I started moving again.

“Scrap Bandit you haven’t received docking instructions yet.” The buck chuckled. I heard another muffled snort in the background noise. Alright, fuck that.

“Tower, my ship is heavily damaged, out of atmosphere, and my emergency life support is nearly depleted. Stop fucking around and get me into queue!” At that, the laughing in the background quieted. I couldn’t see or hear what they were doing on the other end, but I had a sinking feeling that my ship was being scanned.

“Scrap Bandit there is no queue.” The tower controller said a few moments later.

“What?” That didn’t make sense. There was always a
queue.

“Docking is at will, Scrap Bandit. Now hurry up and get your stupid ass in here before you up and croak.”

Oh you have to be kidding me.

The tower continued.

“You’re not from around here are you?”

Well in truth I had never been outside Pegasus space before. I never thought procedures could have been different or a great many other things for that matter.

Another thought struck me.

If docking was at will what was the point in having a tower? I decided to dwell on that later.

“Scrap Bandit, proceed to Hangar two.” The tower said.

“Hangar two, aye tower.” I responded. The C-Band cut out with a pop. A moment later my WAND chirped and lit up, displaying an entry vector for an industrial hangar on the far side of the station. I sighed and steered the bandit along the course.

the course was a simple, optimized route suited to my ship’s size which led me on a fairly direct route straight to the hangar. In a way, a little too direct. I slowed down as I nearly clipped yet another outcropping. Eventually, I spotted the luminescent glow of the docking shield, and breaking course, directed myself toward it. I felt a familiar tingle as I crossed the threshold of the shield, and my body reacted to its potent magical energy.

Hangar two was massive.

From the gigantic freighters entering and exiting at regular intervals, to the small blocky industrial ships zipping between them, the sheer size of the hangar was only emphasized by how it made everything else seem small in comparison. Ships of all shapes and sizes zoomed about, freely entering and exiting without a care in the world, some making passes between each other close enough to make me cringe. There was no order there, It was just a chaotic mass of ships with feet-thick armored plating, occasionally buzzing shields as they zipped past at reckless speeds.

Navigating the maze of industrial ships and transport barges had me ducking under freighters and dodging small shuttlecraft. Once or twice I received an angry ping from the shuttle drivers, shouting insults for near misses. If anything it kept me on my toes. I quickly learned that getting anywhere in that mess meant throwing my weight around, and I’ll admit it wasn’t something I was going to do lightly. In an unshielded barge like mine, I might as well have hung a sign on it saying “crush me.”

So I cheated. After a few minutes of wandering about lost in traffic, I spotted a small ship of a similar size to mine, casually drifting toward the hangar and pulled up alongside it. It was a trash barge bearing an advertisement touting its waste disposal services [Smelly Socks Space Waste “You Buck it We chuck it.”] and seemed to know where it was going. I kept close on its tail, using it as a shield against the other hulking ships.

To a degree, my plan worked. While I was not entirely successful at tailing the garbage scow, shadowing him got me past the entrance traffic and toward the docks. The trash ship pilot was not pleased. When I finally broke away, he flared his burners at me, the starship equivalent of ‘go fuck yourself.’ I dipped a wing in salute. Thanks buddy, you too.

Once through the gate traffic I made my way into the docking area. Long catwalks extended out from the docking platforms to meet some of the larger ships, while the smaller industrials moored in between them. Convoys of shuttles and cargo lifts made trips to and from the freighters suspended in the center of the hangar, each loading cargo and passengers on and off of the behemoths. I took a moment to admire some of the massive container ships, one in particular caught my eye.

It was a massive ship that dwarfed everything in the hangar by a large margin. Too big for any of the industrial docks, it was instead being serviced by a veritable fleet of cargo and maintenance lifts, rapidly preparing its next shipment for departure.

Elsewhere, ships were packing into the docks in uneven rows and highly uneven compositions. Large ships parked along smaller ones, which nestled into the gaps and ledges between them. While it was nothing too small for the Bandit, the proximity to the other ships unnerved me. The most of the docks were very active, and the ships were parked close enough to easily scrape hulls. From what I knew about Earth Pony ship construction, I wanted none of that.

I decided to find a quieter parking area. One that didn’t look like a single mistake would turn me to paste. It was much harder than I thought, but eventually I managed to find one.

I spotted a small docking ledge crammed between a pair of bulky, armor plated haulers. It was a cozy fit, but roomy enough for me to be comfortable parking the Bandit, and far less active than the rest of the hangar. Idly I wondered just what kind of shipping those haulers did that required such heavy plating. Then, I got a better look at one of them as I settled into the ledge. Sitting on the underside of one of the heavy haulers was a pair of nasty anti-ship repeating cannons gleaming from its underside. As I got closer I noticed similar weapons were embedded into the ship on its dorsal side as well, hiding beneath small armored hatches in their presently inactive state. Involuntarily I shuddered. A single hit from one of those things would pulverize a ship like the Bandit. I could not imagine what a full on barrage would do. As the clamps extended, I kept a wary eye on the guns, making sure they weren’t tracking me.

I felt the docking clamps lock into place and I released a breath I didn’t know I was holding. While I had to admit the act of just finding an open spot was convenient, there was something about it that just didn’t sit well with me. The chaotic nature of the hangar was disturbing, having spent so much of my piloting career in the relative ease of the almost bureaucratic pegasus docking system. It almost felt like idling behind the mind numbing line of ships waiting to dock was somehow a necessary procedure. This free-for-all had the potential to go horribly and disastrously wrong, but, I had to credit them, was much more efficient. No lines, for one, that was a nice bonus. But was it worth the risk?

I pondered that while I unstrapped and headed to the airlock. There, I came to an unsettling conclusion. Procedures were comforting, if tedious.

I keyed open the airlock and stepped out onto the flimsy hull of the Bandit, closing the hatch behind me. From there, I kicked off to the platform below, and landed on its surface with a magnetic ‘thuck’.

The Docking platform was unlike anything I had seen before. It was rusted for one, and that bothered me. Where the airlock would have been on L6 was a solid wall, replaced instead by a central staircase descending into the guts of the station. Directly in front of the staircase was...

There was a tree on the docking platform. There were also ponies milling about the platform preparing to board shuttles for the other ships in the hangar, all without their helmets, and most staring in my general direction, probably wondering what the idiot on the dock was doing gawking at the tree.

I keyed the latches on my helmet and removed it, taking an irritated breath of acrid smelling air before trotting down the staircase, grumbling. The other ponies on the docking platform returned to what they were doing.

Already irritated, I trudged down the staircase and across a wide catwalk underneath the platform toward the station entrance. There I stopped.

The entrance to the station was a reinforced blast door with a sturdy, trapezoidal frame. A sign above it glowed warmly in neon orange letters, fizzing occasionally.

Welcome to Winter’s Edge. It read. To the right of the door was a steel placard:
Apple Industries Production Facility 729.

I trotted inside, disengaging the magnets in my boots as I crossed the entrance threshold. A small door just past the entrance admitted me to the station.

I had entered a very plain looking hallway. The steel walls had been painted a two color white and beige with few decorations. Tracklights were set into the floor on either side of the walkway at even intervals. The hall had no doors, no decorations, was somewhat dirty and appeared almost rusted in the sickly yellow lighting. Detritus from the hooves of a thousand ponies kicked around on the floor, including what appeared to be paper from some unfortunate pony’s briefcase. A small maintenance bot was crawling over near the far door, attempting to scoop the remainder of said paper into its forward wastebin and failing horribly. Judging by the larger debris sitting around it, it had probably been doing that for quite some time.

That said, the hallway would not have been that bad were it not for the ceiling. The ceiling was too low. It barely had headroom, and was low enough that it started the muscles of my wings itching every time I thought about it. Dread crept into my spine, thinking that I might not fly for a long, long while.

Ignoring the maintenance bot, I plodded up to the door, which opened automatically and admitted me into a, thankfully, much wider hallway. The ceiling, however, had not changed. What did, change was the smell. Something like baked apples wafted through the air, smelling like the apples they would occasionally sell at the grocery store on L6-C, but somehow better.
.
My stomach rumbled; a familiar sensation I had been putting off for my entire trip came back in full force.

I was starving! I followed the smell which ended up coming from an advertisement featuring ‘Granny Apple’s Baked Apple Pies’. My heart sank, mixing with anger and awe as I tried to quell the tide of saliva building in my mouth.

“Those evil, magnificent bastards.” I said in wonder, swallowing. A pony passing me gave me an odd look while continuing on his way. Only a truly evil pony would bombard hungry pilots with food smells after a long trip.

I shook my head and left the advertisement where it was, now feeling even more hungry than before. Searching around, I spotted what appeared to be a station directory, built as a divider in the center of the hallway. I trotted up to it and started browsing. Food, food, food court! Perfect. And close by at that. I plugged the coordinates into my WAND and off I went.

I followed the corridors to the food court, just a few minutes away, and by that time I was damn hungry. Having spent the last few minutes fantasizing about fresh Earth Pony food choices, I was practically drooling by the time I entered the court proper.

The food court could hardly be called that. Though, mercifully, it had some head room to work with. The food court was a two-story area crammed with ponies ordering any number of foods from the many stands packed into the center. It was a long, wide hallway, much wider than the regular corridors, with some fancier shopfronts selling much more expensive foods. The second floor featured a few tables and chairs, occupied of course, which looked like a dining area for the more expensive restaurants on the upper deck.

I tried to order something from one of the stands and was simply ignored, and then asked to leave saying that I was ‘bad for their business’. Eventually I spotted an open stand for lack of customers. Figures, it was run by a Pegasus. At least he looked friendly.

“Hey,” I said, trotting up to the stand. The peach colored owner looked up from behind his stand in something akin to shock. He had a fritter for a cutiemark, very promising.

“A… a customer.” He stammered. I gave him my best smile. The Pegasus smiled back hopefully.

“Oh… uh… well.” Okay maybe not so promising. “Heh sorry. I sell fritters. And other stuff. Just, um. Whatever sells.”
I raised an eyebrow. The Pegasus sighed.

“Business isn’t too good around here.” He said plaintively. “I do what I have to, to get by.”

“Right.” Poor buck, then again I could identify. “That makes two of us I guess. What do you recommend?”

“The fritters of course. Everything else is… well. Lets just say I don’t exactly get the best choices around here. The locals won’t sell me any good stock.” Wait… locals?

“No, I booked a flight from the PC a few years back. I figured I could make some money out here.” he sighed. “Damn wrong I was.”

“How about yourself?” The Pegasus turned from his stove and served up a nice hot fritter on a small plate and set it down in front of me. It smelled... well it was the best he could do with what he had. I couldn’t fault him for that.

“Just flew in from the PC myself.” I bent down and took a nibble. It tasted like cardboard stuffed with overripe peaches. So on my empty stomach, controversially delicious.

“Wow… I thought only rich ponies could afford to get their license out in the PC.”

“Junkyard’s Scrap Yard.” His expression changed from ‘happy to see me’ to ‘concerned pity’.

“No it’s just… you seem nicer than I’ve heard.” Ouch. Well, so much for my reputation.

“I see. Well that’s too bad. Hopefully you’ll fare better around here than I did.”

“Agreed.” I took another mouthful. The taste was not getting any better. worse yet, my mouth was starting to dry out.

“Forthy?” I sputtered. Crumbs sprayed out of my mouth and bounced off the counter top.

“I have a stand to run.” The Pegasus said shrugging his head. You could get a meal on L6 for less than ten. But, then again the poor guy was stranded. Aww, to hell with it. I shook my head and produced a bit stick. He took it and waved it through the scanner. The stick beeped as the credits were deducted.

“Add ten.” I said, feeling generous. He looked at me in surprise. The food was garbage, but it was garbage for a reason. That, and he was the first friendly face I had seen since getting there. It was a welcome change from the flight in and the odd looks in the docking area.

“No problem, just don’t get used to it.” I replied. I finished off my fritter and the pegasus took my plate, adding it to a stack of dishes in a tub behind his stand.

“A salvage barge, small cargo.” It was more salvage than barge in my opinion.

“Oh, well, in that case... you might try the shipping offices, but for a ship your size I doubt you’ll have much luck there.”

“Well one you’re a pegasus, and two you fly a scrap barge. You’ll need a bigger ship if you want to get a shipping contract. Provided they don’t kick you out on principle.”

“Well... you might be able to score a smaller private contract if you’re lucky. I’ve heard some of the pilots that roll through here talk about them.” I raised an eyebrow.

“At the other stands of course.” The owner lamented, and then spotted someone over my shoulder.

“Sure,” a dark gray buck said, cheerfully taking the seat next to me. I took that as my cue to leave.

“My pleasure.” The stand owner replied. “Oh and if you manage to get in with one of the shippers, put in a good word for me?” He added hopefully.

“I’ll think about it.” I said, while trotting back into the mess of ponies.

Once out of the crowd I started looking for another directory. I found one set into the bulkheads between a pair of shops. Bringing up its holographic display, I started searching for the shipping docks, poking at the air with a hoof at where I wanted to zoom. The map moved in response, rotating and spinning with a few simple movements.

Six floors up and about ten blocks away was an area labeled ‘shipping offices’.

The businesses listed in that area were all closed for the night according to station time. Although that did make sense, the shop next to the terminal appeared to be closing up as well.

“Well, so much for that plan.” I muttered. Plan B it was. I plugged in a request to find the nearest lodging. A few seconds and a few hoofclicks later I had my results.

There was a Tuck n’ Roll located six blocks away from the food court, and it was on the way to the shipping offices, if a couple floors in the wrong direction. I set a course for it with my WAND and let the thing work its navigational magic. My WAND processed my request for a moment before bringing up the AR matrix and pegging different objects around the room with little footnotes as to what they were. My attention leapt to the small arrow pointing to my right. I turned until the arrow disappeared, instead illuminating the door I needed to enter and marking it with a diamond shaped symbol. I smiled as I trotted forward.

I followed the indicators plotting my route through the station until I finally arrived at the Tuck n’ Roll. The entrance was a small door labeled public housing, which led to a squarish room with a receptionist sitting behind an open air desk and several doors opposite. The receptionist was a bubblegum colored mare with a perky peach mane, and reading what I was certain was a trashy romance novel. I cleared my throat to draw her attention.

“You want som’n featherbrain?” She intoned, clearly annoyed. She was chewing on something that I hoped was bubblegum.

I nodded my head toward the TucknRoll, and with an irritated sigh, the mare, dubbed Cheery Smiles by the plaque on the desk, slipped off her chair, dipped beneath the counter, and after a few short moments, placed a keycard on top of it with her teeth.

“Corridor three.” She droned, pointing a hoof at the furthest door, and then returned to her reading.

There was a brown smudge mark on the card where her teeth had been.

Not bubblegum. I thought grimly.

I stepped up to the door labeled 3 and waved the card across the reader. The reader beeped, and the door slid neatly open. I entered the little berthing space, and the door closed behind me.

The corridor was dimly lit and had one of the lights burned out on the far end, which popped and flickered at random intervals. Ponies were crammed into cubbies set into the walls on either side of the small dormitory, one to a cubby, while the snores of their occupants could be felt in the stale air. The smell wasn’t pleasant, something like body odor and puke, but after sleeping on my couch for so long, the fragrance was comfortingly familiar. Well, almost.

I paced down the room and flitted up to an open cubby near the far end. I shimmied in and performed the ceremonial Tuck’N’Roll routine. Tuck in, Roll over, Sleep. Tuck’n’Rolls sure lived up to their names. No food, no showers, no amenities, a just a hole in a wall where you could get something that passed for sleep for a few hours. Just pray the bucks near you didn’t snore too loudly.

I closed my eyes and tried to drift off, but even as tired as I was, I found the action difficult. Even lying in the dark side of the cubby, light still peeked around the cracks where my body did not quite obscure it, playing a flickering irritant to my eyes reflected tenfold by the unforgiving steel surface. I tried several things to get comfortable but nothing seemed to help. Eventually I simply gave up. The light was not going away, just moving around and getting brighter with every attempt I made, so instead I just focused on lying still and fighting off the nervous twichting of my wings. Eventually I drifted off.

That night lasted forever. I dreamt of police cruisers taking potshots at my ship, and of all the different ways I could have died, or worse been caught, in my escape attempt. It was a long night, but all things considered, at least I slept.

“Hey.” A gruff voice said in the back of my mind. It sounded more than a little irritated. I pictured Junkyard looming over me and decided to ignore it.

“Hey!” It said louder. Poke poke. Okay not a voice. I groaned and then shifted. The voice continued, somehow even more terse than before. “Time’s up. Get out.”

“I’m up, I’m up. Piss off.” I replied groggily. The room became brighter for some reason. Nope that was just me rolling over. Against my will. Oh crap.

My wings splayed out, but didn’t catch me in time. I hit the ground with a crunch as my cubby retracted into the wall and I tumbled head over hooves to the floor. The buck who woke me, I guessed the mare’s shift had ended, was already leaving through the corridor entrance by the time I recovered. I looked up in time to see his squat hindquarters disappear behind the steel door.

“Asshole.” I barked after him, and then balked. I was getting several cross looks from other residents of Cubbyville. I came to a steadfast conclusion.

I kept my head low as I stumbled back out into the cramped lobby. The buck was sitting behind the desk now. My irritation came to a boil as I approached the desk.

“Take this and shove it up your ass.” I threw the key card at him. He ducked, and came up grinning.

“Ruffle my feathers? Oh hell no, YOU PISSED ME OFF is what you did!” I shouted. I didn’t care. I didn’t care if I woke up all the ponies from here to Equestria Prime. I just wanted to vent all my pent up anger at this one buck who had the misfortune of waking me up on the wrong side of my morning.

I scraped myself off the corridor wall. Damn can earth ponies kick hard. Crumpled in a heap on the floor, I fumed. Even with the door closed I could still hear him cackling through the steel wall. Gathering myself, I gave the door a kick before leaving. Jerk.

Earth ponies suck. I decided. Feeling grumpy, I headed down the corridor to where the shipping offices were.

Several flights of stairs and many more cramped corridors later I finally entered the deck where the shipping offices were located. The offices were a series of low profile doors with brass plaques on them, all nearly identical save for the names on the plaques, and the engraved logos for the company each plaque represented. The offices were so ordinary looking that if I wasn’t navigating with my WAND I would have probably missed them entirely. The corridor was not any wider or longer than the ones I had just left, and aside from the plaques, looked identical to the rest of the facility. When I arrived I had been expecting to find something similar to the food court, with its much more spacious multi-tiered construction. Silently I wondered just how much of the facility was like this. The low ceilings were driving me crazy.

I checked my WAND for the station time. It was early in the morning, and the offices hadn’t officially opened yet. So I stood around for a few minutes, waiting.

“If you’re looking to find work you shouldn’t bother looking here.” Said a mare from behind me. I turned my head to her. She was, thankfully, wearing a flight suit like mine. Although something about her attitude portrayed some sort of disdain. Like she had just discovered a turd on the bottom of her hoof. It seemed fitting, seeing as she was a unicorn.

“Cling to your delusions.” She snubbed me, her nose in the air like some fashion queen.

“If you must know, I fly the Gros Navire.” Something about that name seemed familiar.

Oh. I recalled some very large lettering gleaming off the side of the largest ship in the hangar.

“I...” I fought for words as I was still coming to grips that I was probably speaking to the most well paid pilot on the colony.

The mare walked up to the first door, levitated out a key card and waved it in front of a reader set inside the bulkhead. The reader beeped, and then admitted her.

“By the way.” She said, casting a look back at me. “My office is now open. Don’t bother coming in.”

I stomped a hoof and glared at the door focusing the entirety of my hate at the pony inside. Rich bitch. I moved to the next door in line. This one a least, seemed to be open.

the door opened at my presence and I stepped inside the office of the Candy Cane Shipping Co.

The inside was a sparsely furnished office, complete with a desk, a plant and a small terminal set into the wall behind the desk. I suspected the plant was probably extra. Or breakfast. Several of the leaves had been nibbled. The red striped zebrony sitting behind the desk was regarding me with mounting distaste.

“You don’t have anything at all?” I said, mouth agape. This just kept getting better and better.

“We’re full.” She insisted, leaning slightly back from her desk. Her disgust seemed to peak. ”Please leave.”

I tried my luck at the next door, and the next, and the next. Until I was all out of doors. The fifth door was particularly memorable. I had managed a nice conversation with the first shipping office owner who did not immediately turn me around in the doorway and/or have me escorted out by force, until the point at which I must have let a comment slip about how pretty she looked.
For the second time in 24 hours I scraped myself off the corridor wall. The hoofmarks were a bit difficult to explain to door six, seven, and virtually every door after that. It wasn’t until I entered the offices of Sofas and Quills Inc that I got a real lead.

The mare behind the desk gave me a once over, but showed none of the growing distaste the other office owners had. Instead she smiled. I felt something like hope stir as I did my best to return the gesture. It probably looked as awkward as it felt.

I sighed. “I’ll take my leave then. Good day.” I turned to leave.
“Not officially anyway.” She continued. I stopped and looked back at her.

“Mega Millions has instructed me not to send any work your way, but I think she doesn’t know good labor when she sees it.” Mega Millions? Oh... the bitch.

“And you don’t have to be. I just need you to retrieve a parcel for me from a friend of mine near the processing levels.” Before I could respond my WAND beeped as it received new instructions.

“There, I’ve just sent you the location. Ask for Cinder Casserole. And do be quick. I’ll have a flight assignment for you when you get back.”

I left the office, still trying to figure out what had just happened. My gut instinct was telling me this was a bad idea, but, it was work, and flying would be involved eventually. Maybe this was just how things worked around here. Pushing my doubts aside, I followed the markers to my destination.

Following my WAND’s directions I brought up the station map as I descended yet another level. Wherever this parcel was, it wasn’t nearby, and my WAND’s navigation had picked one hell of a route to get there. I descended level after level, staircase after staircase, each one leaving me more and more winded as I progressed.

A few more staircases, a corridor or two, and then another level, As I descended, the corridors slowly changed from clean and shiny, to more and more rusted and beat up the deeper I went. The sick feeling in my stomach continued to build. Actively, I ignored it, wanting to just get this over with as quickly as possible.

Finally, I rounded a corner and my WAND notified me that I had reached my intended destination. It was a very cramped alleyway that led to a small locked door at the far end. Like the rest of the station, I had no room to fly and more importantly there was nothing there. I tried knocking at the door and no one answered.

“Well, so much for that.” I muttered. My ear flicked at a noise from behind me.

I was not, in fact, alone. There was a gang of seven or eight ponies directly behind me, all dressed in weatherworn barding and wearing confident toothy grins.

“That’s a nice shiny toy you’ve got there.” The lead mare said giving me an appraising look. She was a sand colored unicorn and from the look on her face, was liking what she was seeing.

“Why don’t you hoof it over and we won’t leave you as a bloody scrape on the wall.”

The other ponies started laughing. I then realized I wasn’t getting any closer. I was floating three inches off the station deck wrapped in an sickly orange glow, matched by similar glow coming from the horn of the lead unicorn. She was wearing a wicked grin on her face.

Vainly I tried stretching my wings, only to find them paralyzed at my sides either from fear or the strength of the mare’s telekinesis. I was helpless, utterly and completely helpless. My mind could only focus on one coherent thought.

I slowly accelerated forward toward the gang, and their eyes lit up in glee. Faster, and faster, and then, one of earth pony bucks stepped forward, spun, and kicked. I curled into a ball, and felt a pair of hooves crash into my sides. Pain arced throughout my body. I flew across the room, weightless, and smashed into the far wall with a thud and a sick crack. Orientation left me.

The world moved. I couldn’t tell which direction, just that I was moving faster than before. I flailed helplessly, and turned my head just in time to get a face full of horseshoe. My head rocked the other way and I felt something slam into my gut. I smashed into the ceiling, and then feeling my inertia fight me, slammed into the deck.

“TWO!” A mare said. I couldn’t tell which. At that point I don’t think it really mattered. Another kick sent me tumbling across the floor. I heard something in my leg break, and I kept rolling. There was more laughter, and a cacaphony of sound I couldn’t identify. I rolled to a stop, and then immediately started rolling the other direction, the ethereal pull dragging back to the gang.

The third one didn’t even bother to count. Neither did the rest. Their laughs became garbled, the world blurry. Something was oozing into my eyes turning my sight red, and still the sick sensation continued. Kick, pull, jolt, stop, repeat. Eventually I couldn’t even tell if I was moving.

I hung limp and motionless before a gang of ponies that I could hardly see. I was barely conscious as it was. The unicorn was saying something. I couldn’t hear a thing. Then I fell to the floor in a heap. I coughed blood which pooled on the deck beneath my head.

More words, no understanding of what was said. The unicorn stood above me and reared. Hooves came up. Hooves came down. Pain exploded in my side. I felt warmth in my suit, as well as cool air, a sensation of liquid pouring from my nethers and something wet and warm reaching the side of my face.

My head lolled and I moaned. I got a good last look at the mare above me. She probably would have been pretty under different circumstances. Sand colored, but with green irises and a tousled cream mane. Hooves came up.

And then nothing happened. The mare turned to look at something. Maybe she thought better. I felt a kick roll me over into a heap, and then magic carelessly fling me away. I hit the ground and didn’t move.

The beating, at least, had stopped. I couldn’t move. I could barely breathe. My legs wouldn’t respond and slowly I could feel myself going numb. All I could do was stare at the ceiling, the walls, and what little I could see of the floor from my crumpled heap. I coughed and more blood oozed out of my mouth. I couldn’t even taste the copper any more. Pain was gone, replaced by a sensation of distance.

I felt myself drifting, darkness clawing at the edge of my vision, until finally, I checked out.

The Stars Beyond The Veil

by Charlemane

03 - Chapter Three: Work