//------------------------------// // Part Two: The Squeal // Story: The Little Curiosities // by Comma Typer //------------------------------// A woman stands at the edge of the river under the pitch black midnight sky. A man—her lover—walks up to her in slow, calculated steps. “Mustard?” she asks, only looking at her own reflection. “Please, don’t….” “I’m not here to tell you about that.” Only then does she look at him. That almond mullet: oh! how she looked upon him and that out-of-style hairdo back in the coffee shop all those years ago. “Then what is it?” His feet shuffle, his hands squirm in his suit’s pocket. “If this is the last night this wretched city will have us, in case they ever pull us apart for good—” “Spit it out, Mustard, what is it?!” He gulps. That is almost never a good sign. Mustard kneels down, those dreamy eyes beholding her all the same. Out of his suit’s pocket comes a little leather box. The opening reveals a ring studded with diamonds: the inheritance his dying mother told him to save for that special someone. “Turmie, my dear... will you… w-will… will you—“ Squeal! Rarity and Sunset busy themselves cleaning the sofa and the carpet from the mess of popcorn and ice cream. The romance movie on TV is paused. “Always expect the unexpected, huh?” Sunset chirps, glad to bamboozle Rarity with a curve ball of a film. The other unicorn gives off a lady-like giggle. “Touché! However, I wonder how Mustard would deal with the unavoidable divorce papers….” Blush appears on her white cheeks. “Not to mention my little outburst there… I’m so sorry for that, Sunset.” “Don’t get hung up over it! It’s fine.” As Sunset turns on her vacuum cleaner with her magic, she glances at Rarity scrubbing the carpet with a wet rag. “I think I know where you’re going with this.” “Yes, that whinny I made—“ “That’s a squeal.” “Alright, a squeal… I must admit, I am not yet entirely used to… horse sounds.” Sunset bumps her brows in acknowledgment. “Ah, you mean the whinny, the nicker, the snort… funny you mention it. When I came here, I was expecting to hear monkey sounds. That never happened when I realized: humans just… talked.” “I take it that conversations in Equestria are spiced with creature noises, aren’t they?” “Not every single sentence, not even every day at times, but it’s common enough. It’s not just the ponies too: griffons screech and caw, donkeys bray… don’t know what seaponies would sound like, but I’m sure they do something.” “Yes… we don’t have any human noises, as you might’ve figured out already.” Sunset nods. “You okay though?” Rarity’s cute smile comes across, her horn’s magic tinting it in blue. “It’s a thing I’ll get used to eventually, although the unicorns in my fairy tale cartoons never squealed so coarsely….” A shudder slithers down her bones. “Don’t you know how humiliating that is, climbing the social ladder and then you squeal like a little filly?” “If it helps—“ Sunset turns the vacuum off, the carpet free from popcorn “—the nobles in Canterlot squeal a lot because it’s dramatic. Maybe you should add that to your arsenal of hysterics….” “What do you mean, ‘You’re being kicked out of the theater?’ Do you know who you are talking to, you…?” “Name’s Sight See, and I know who you are. Doesn’t mean you get to make stupid sounds in the theater.” Rarity squeals at the accusation, her horse noise echoing across the hall. “Don’t people gasp at some big reveal or laugh at a universally funny joke? Why, I’d say that you do not like ponies trying to be ponies!” A horsey snort is what Sight See gives. “Not like I have a choice on being a pony, ma’am.”