"Laaauraaaa… Hey, Laura. Come on, wake up."
Laura groaned and pushed the blanket back from her muzzle. Light seeped around the little window's curtain, making her eyes ache. She felt groggy and barely rested, but at least her nap hadn't been interrupted with queer dreams this time. She'd lain down and gone out like a light.
Buttercup's yellow-furred face and brighter grin hovered at the hallway side of the cabin where she'd pushed through the thick curtain. "Nilla says it's the last lock today an' I thought you might wanna watch this time."
Laura licked her parched lips and asked, "Nilla?"
"Yeah, you know, Vanilla Grey? We met her this morning."
"Oh, right, the beige filly." Laura yawned as she struggled out from under the bedclothes. "What time is it?"
"Almost sunset. You sure did sleep a lot." Buttercup hopped into their cabin and dragged Laura's cardigan over from where it'd ended up crammed into a corner of the tiny room. She helped Laura dress in the cramped space, holding a sleeve open so Laura could wiggle a hoof into it. She said, "Some townponies on shore helped us with the first couple, but Cathy's done the last few with just her magic. She's awesome!"
Groggy and still tired, Laura felt a touch of pride as she easily managed the jump down from their bed. It was further than the hop from Chick's sidecar, but she didn't hesitate and her legs didn't let her down. Not even a stumble. The boat's deck vibrated very slightly beneath her hooves as they walked toward the bow. It was quiet aside from some clattering pots and chatter from the galley and murmured conversation from a cabin with its privacy curtains drawn. Laura had been surprised when, once everything and everypony was safely aboard, the boat had been untied and began silently backing away from the dock.
It seemed that stallion, Sang, was correct when he guess it used an electric motor.
Thank God for that! Or thank whoever had taken the trouble to convert it, anyway. She had had more than enough of loud diesel engines banging away while she was trying to sleep, thank you very much!
She followed Buttercup up the steps to the bow where Vanilla Grey stood.
"Hey, Nilla."
"Hi, Butts. Miss Smith."
The sun hovered near the horizon, blinding Laura for a moment. She winced and held a hoof up to shade her eyes. "Hello, Vanilla. Please call me Laura, Miss Smith is too formal."
"Okay, Laura." Vanilla pawed at the rope coiled up on the deck and said, "Butts said you might want to see how we handle getting through a lock."
"Yes, we have many canals in England, but I've never gongoozled."
Buttercup snorted and asked, "Gon-what?"
"Gongoozled." Laura chuckled and looked ahead with her eyes squinted as they powered around a bend in the river. "It's a silly term for watching canal boats go through a lock. A bit like train spotting, but wetter. Is that it?"
A steel girder bridge stretched across a frothing rapid in the river, and on the right side were a pair of small white two-story huts. The Freedom aimed straight for the watery gap between them, with the Fair Dinkum trailing a few metres behind.
Vanilla nodded and said, "Yep. We'll tie up for the night once we're through."
She flipped a white bumper over the side and the bottom end of the plastic cylinder dragged in the water, adding a rhythmic splash as the boat powered through the slow moving verdigris-green water. Concrete walls much taller than the boat drifted past as they sailed into the lock, past two immense grey doors with rusty-red steel showing through where paint had flaked away. The boat slowed and stopped beside the shore-side wall. It was stained dark until a metre or so from the top.
Vanilla stretched over the boat's side to slip a rope around a taught steel cable which ran up the wall. She looped it loosely around and tied it to a cleat on the deck, securing the boat. Laura guessed that the loop would slide up the cable as the lock filled, keeping them close to the wall but letting the boat rise.
A few minutes later, the Fair Dinkum pulled alongside. Vanilla and an unfamiliar yellow ochre mare on the other boat tied them together at the bow. Laura and Buttercup stood out of the way while they worked. More white plastic bumpers hung between the boats, keeping their hulls from bashing together.
"Okay", said Vanilla, once the last knot was tied. "Head to the stern 'cause that's where the show is starting. I've seen it a zillion times, but you newbies won't want to miss it!"
Buttercup nudged Laura toward the door. "She right! Let's-" She gasped as a large black stallion squeezed through the other boat's narrow cabin door and stepped onto its bow.
Laura's couldn't help staring too. He was huge!
For a pony.
Thick muscles like knotted cables moved beneath glossy black coat which was marred around his neck and broad shoulders with ragged pink scars. Laura's ears folded back as Buttercup made a loud trilling whistle.
She ducked as the filly's wings snapped open!
And got clouted on the side of her head, anyway. "Yipe!"
"Ouch! Owwwww…" Buttercup pulled her wings partly closed and nuzzled the one she'd smacked Laura with.
Vanilla Grey laughed at them while the big stallion snorted, a deep rumble that Laura swore made the deck vibrate, and rolled his slitted yellow eyes. His own wings flexed, and they were the oddest thing — leathery and bat-like rather than coated with feathers like Buttercup's.
Not that those soft feathers made Laura's cheek sting any less.
"Come on, we don't want to miss the light show", said Vanilla with a giggle bubbling in her voice. She pushed at Buttercup, who bumped into Laura, and all three of them stumbled downstairs.
Buttercup muttered, "Sorry, Laura."
"What on earth was that all about?" she asked as her ears flicked up and down.
They walked past cabins with ponies lounging in them and Buttercup whispered, "You saw that stud!" As if that explained anything.
Vanilla snickered behind them and said, "Control yourself, filly. Eventide wouldn't be interested in a skinny little brat like you, anyway."
Buttercup grumbled, "Great… Another untouchable hunk."
They passed through the boat's crowded galley, where Dolly Mix and Cathy prepared dinner on their left, and several passengers sat round the table on the right, playing cards and chatting. Chick amongst them. Buttercup rolled her eyes and tipped her head at him, and Laura's lips squeezed into a sour frown. She may have forgiven him for not seeing them off from Beantown, but she was still annoyed over the reason why: Apple Squire. That someone who'd been so dependable and kind would use a prostitute jarred her sense of right and wrong.
Yes, she knew that some men went to them, and yes, she knew some women — and mares, apparently — chose of their own free will a life of having sex with strangers in exchange for money. But it was disgusting and sinful, and she'd never personally known someone who was involved in that kind of thing… until now.
All the muscles in her tummy clenched.
She felt ill just seeing him.
"Come on! She's starting!" Vanilla pushed between them and clattered up the stairs. Laura and Buttercup followed her onto the boat's stern.
Captain Harris sat high up in the elevated chair by the boat's wheel, overseeing the rose-colour unicorn, Cathy, who stood by the stern rail. Her horn was brightly lit with a pulsing blue light and her legs spread and braced on the wood deck. Cathy grunted and leaned forward, like she was pushing something heavy with her forehead. A few metres away, one of the gigantic metal doors at the end of the lock glowed slightly, just barely visible, and groaned as it moved. It slowly swung away from the wall, swirling and churning the water, until it blocked half of the lock's entrance. The heavy canal boat actually surged forward a little, rocking beneath Laura's hooves.
Cathy let out her breath in a heavy puff and panted, "One down. One to go."
Her horn briefly dimmed and then lit up again. Glittering lines of electric blue magic spun out and wove into a complex pattern in the air, just in front of her. The spider web of lines and runes looked like something from a Lord of the Rings laser light-show. Cathy nodded, and it shot off to strike the other lock door, covering it briefly with a glittering web of sparkles. She braced her legs again and 'pushed' with her glowing horn, slowly shoving the other door closed. With a boom and splash it settled into place against the lip of the first door, sealing off the downriver end of the lock.
Cathy's horn flickered and went out. She turned around and noticed her awed audience. She grinned, raised her forelegs in the air and cried, "Tadah!"
"Woah", Buttercup breathed.
"That was amazing!" said Laura once she'd caught her breath.
Cathy grinned and swiped a hoof across her sweaty forehead. "Thank you. Thank you. I'm here all week, folks. Heh. Well, I have to go forward and open the sluice gate next. Excuse me." She walked around them and down into the cabin.
"Pretty amazing, huh?" asked Vanilla. "Wish I was a unicorn."
"You're perfect just the way you are", said Captain Harris as he jumped down from the chair.
Vanilla smiled shyly. "Thanks, Pa."
"Get along, now. Man your pole in case she shifts while the lock fills."
"Aye, sir." Vanilla saluted and scampered off towards the bow, taking the walkway down the left side of the boat.
Buttercup took off from the stern and flew over the lock to get a bird's-eye view.
Laura stepped back as Captain Harris retrieved a long pole from the cabin roof
She decided to head for the bow, in case there would be another impressive show of magic. Moving carefully along the walkway along the side of the canal boat was less nerve wracking with the huge slab of concrete wall right there. Water slapped and popped in the narrow gap between hull and wall.
Cathy sat at the bow with her horn glowing and she had her tongue stuck out. "Hmm… Where is it?"
"Where's what?"
"Oh, hi." Cathy squinted and tipped her head to one side. "The gear for opening the sluice gate. It's around here some- Ah! Gotcha."
Laura didn't see any change, other than Cathy's horn glowing brighter, so it seemed there wouldn't be a spectacular magic show this time.
"There used to be motors to do this at the push of a button", Cathy said wistfully while concentrating on whatever she was doing. The fur on her forehead and neck looked damp and dark with sweat.
Vanilla Grey stood nearby with her forelegs wrapped around a long pole. She held it pressed against her barrel with one end resting lightly against the lock's wall. Laura noticed movement in the water a few meters away from the boat's bow. A churning in the water.
"There we go." Cathy's horn-glow faded. "In about half an hour we'll be level with the shore."
Chick swung his head to the left and the sharp edge of the sickle he held in his mouth cut easily through a swath of grass stems, releasing a sweet green odour. A couple more swings of the curved blade, and spat out the wooden handle, catching it in his hooves. He set it aside and gathered up a bundle of grass in his forelegs.
"That's enough, Chick." Dolly Mix trotted over with a basket balanced on her back, filled with pungent leafy plants. "I found a thicket of Garlic Mustard", she said in an enthusiastic tone. "We'll have a delicious, fresh pesto for lunch tomorrow before we dock at Rome. Perfecto!"
Chick made a polite if humourless chuckle and dumped a load of grass into his larger basket. He'd joined the foraging team to have something to take his mind off of things, but it hadn't taken long to gather enough grass and dandelion leaves for salad, even for the dozen or so ponies aboard the canal boats. The shore was, like most places, overgrown with grass and weeds left to flourish now that mankind wasn't buzzing lawns flat and spraying chemicals everywhere.
He sighed and gazed around at their overnight stop.
The Mohawk River dominated the area, with its rapids by the far shore burbling away. A steel frame bridge, its green paint almost all peeled away to reveal brown rust, spanned the river. Swallows darted around it, snatching insects from the air, sometimes chased by Buttercup and Blue Skies, another young pegasus filly. Crewponies worked aboard the boats, securing them with additional ropes, transferring cargo, or lounging while waiting for supper. Most of the passengers had come ashore to stretch their legs after a day cooped up inside… the first of many. Some helped gather plants to supplement dinner, some explored the ruined canal master's house, while the rest trotted up and down the concrete path beside the lock.
Laura was there, by the boat, gamely doing her hopping exercise as she worked on learning to gallop. She hopped, hopped, hopped, stumbled, and said something to Vanilla Grey, who was walking along beside her giving advice.
"Heh. Thought so", said Dolly Mix, more to herself, but Chick couldn't help overhearing.
He blinked and looked at her. "What?"
She chuckled. "Nothing. Come on, let's get this aboard so I can finish supper. I hope the others found some mushrooms or fruit. Mmm… could go for some stewed plums and cream or baked apples."
He followed her toward the Freedom's stern, a path that crossed Laura's.
"Ah, looking good there, Laura." Pas fort! Was that the best he could think to say to her?
She looked at him like the idiot he was, eyes lidded and unimpressed. "Thank you."
"Come on, Chick", Dolly Mix called as she headed down into the kitchen.
Chick coughed and trotted on board to escape Laura's heavy gaze. She was plainly still pissed with him, though he didn't know why. He'd apologised for not saying 'goodbye' and, now that he was here, it was kind of irrelevant, anyway. Wasn't it? He hated being in the dog house with no idea how to get out.
"Set the grass up on the counter", Dolly Mix said while she tended to a bubbling pot on the stove. "Would you mind rinsing the salad, hon? You can set it in the colander to drain."
Chick nodded and stepped up on the wood platform to reach the tap. He rinsed off his dirty hooves before reaching for a bunch of dandelion leaves. Laura bunny-hopped past the window while he dunked them under the trickle of water. She was so determined to learn how to gallop, but somehow couldn't quite get the rhythm of which leg to move when because she was over-thinking it and nervous of screwing up. It was almost humorous, but his lips curled down in a pensive frown.
"Relax, hon." Dolly bumped shoulders with him and reached for a bunch of leafy Garlic Mustard to rinse. "Just wait and she'll let you know when she wants to talk."
He snorted slightly and shook his head. "I'm that obvious?"
Dolly chuckled. "Nah. But there's always a bit of passenger drama to enjoy on these trips. I'm just glad it's Laura you're after and not that slip of a pegasus."
"Buttercup? Hah! Not a chance. That annoying brat is more like a niece to me."
"Good." Dolly shook off her hoofful of plants, dropped them into the colander, and reached for more. "You and Laura would make a cute couple, so I'm rooting for you."
Chick sighed and shook his head as the subject of their conversation hopped past, heading in the other direction with Vanilla Grey following along and making encouraging noises. Cheering her on.
"It's not that easy", he muttered. She was loyal to 'her Thomas' and wouldn't give him a second look. This whole trip was a blind hope that he would reject her, hurt her, and what kind of stallion wished that on the mare he liked? Truly, he was a scavenger, waiting to pick at the pieces of a catastrophe.
"It never is. Well, put it out of your mind for now and get a wiggle on or we'll never finish supper. Here-" she passed him a large knife "-dice that grass. It'll be a bit tough, this late in the year."
He nodded and scooped up some damp grass, moved it to the wood cutting board, and got back to work. It was something to do. Something useful.
Laura was boggled at the amount of food Dolly Mix produced from the boat's tiny kitchen!
A hearty vegetable stew over mashed potatoes, tray after tray of hot biscuits, and a tremendous bowl of salad - though that was admittedly mostly lawn clippings with a few slices of tomato, cucumber, and cheese. It tasted wonderful to Laura anyway, and her flat teeth made short work of the more fibrous patches.
There wasn't enough room at the table for all of the passengers and crew, so the younger ponies and their parents were allowed to sit while everyone else had to find somewhere on the boats to sit down to eat. She went to the Freedom's bow with Buttercup, Vanilla, and another pegasus filly named Blue Skies. The three younger ponies had quickly become friends, and Laura couldn't help smiling at their odd and enthusiastic chatter about life as a filly. It reminded her of middle school, though she was usually at the heart of any conversation instead of just sitting nearby.
Chick sat on the steps down into the cabin, frequently glancing over his shoulder at her with a mournful expression.
She refused to acknowledge his existence and focused on eating, listening in on the fillies, and gazing up at the spectacular spread of stars overhead.
After dinner she helped dry dishes in the cramped cabin, which became even more crowded when the Captain asked for everypony to gather for some kind of announcement.
He sat at the table, up high where everypony could see him, with Dolly by his side. "I know not everypony is comfortable talking about the Event or before times", he said. "But it's become something of a tradition on board to share our stories. Don't feel like you have to if you don't want to and you can step out and stargaze if you'd prefer." Captain Batten waited for a few minutes, but nopony left the crowded cabin.
"Okay then. I'll start with the obvious question that's on everypony's mind: I was a man before the Event.
"The love of my life and wife, Dorothy here-" he wrapped a foreleg around Dolly's shoulder in a sideways hug "-was eight months pregnant and I had the bright idea to rent the Freedom and take her on a relaxing cruise before she was due."
Dolly Mix chuckled and said, "It wasn't so relaxing after the Event, was it dear?"
"Nope. It caught us while we were puttering across Oneida Lake, heading for one of our favourite fishing spots. Suddenly it was noon, and I had to learn real fast how to shut off the engine and weigh anchor with hooves! Vanilla came along a couple of weeks later, and before we knew it we'd been living on board for months. We decided to just make our home here on the Freedom since we didn't have anything to go back to. Any questions?"
Buttercup's hoof shot up into the air. "What did you do before the Event?"
The Captain groaned and shook his head. "I sold life insurance, but before that I was enlisted in the Navy and my idea of an ideal vacation was crewing aboard a forty-footer in the Caribbean. My heart's always been on the water, so at least the Event gave me that."
"I was a waitress", Dolly said with a nasal giggle. "So no career change for me."
That caused a ripple of laughter around the cabin, after which Captain Batten asked, "Anypony else want to share their story?"
Put on the spot, everypony shared nervous glances. Laura was about to volunteer when one of Buttercup's new friends, Blue Skies, held up a feathery wing and said, "I'll go!"
She cleared her throat and said, "Ahem. My sister, Jenny-"
"Prickly Pear!" a younger earth pony mare sitting beside her interrupted.
"You were Jenny back then! Will you let me tell it?"
Prickly Pear folded her forelegs together in a grouchy pose, but nodded.
"Jenny and I were too excited and couldn't sleep. We'd never been to Disney World before and had napped during the long, boring drive there. So I figured, since we were in the safest place for kids, we'd look around while our parents were sleeping. We got on the elevator but it stopped and the lights went out and we'd turned into ponies!"
"Best dream ever!" Prickly Pear laughed.
Blue Skies rolled her eyes. "That's what I thought too, at first, but we were stuck in that elevator for hours before I managed to get the door open. We wandered around the rides and stuff, and it was really creepy! Nopony around at all! The trees and plants were growing everywhere, and some parts were all swampy and full of gators."
"That's when ah showed up", said an orange furred earth pony stallion lying on the floor next to Prickly Pear. His voice had a thick, Southern US twang. He chuckled at the annoyed look Blue Skies gave him. "Okay, okay, tha's all ah'll say, it's your story."
Blue Skies nodded. "Darn right! But, yeah, Sang showed up-"
"Short for Sanguinelli, which is a blood orange cul-tee-var."
"I said: that's when Sang showed up! Ahem! Anyway, we lived at Disney World for a few months, met up with some other ponies, and moved to Orlando where they'd set up a little pony town.
"We left a letter in our parent's room, but… Yeah…"
Laura's heart went out to the young mare as she hesitated and frowned, plainly upset over the memory of having to abandon hope for ever seeing her parents again.
Prickly Pear sniffled and rubbed at her eyes.
Sang sat up and wrapped a foreleg around each of the sisters, hugging them to his orange-furred chest - a very protective and fatherly gesture. Prickly Pear buried her face against him, and Blue Skies let out a shuddering sigh.
He coughed and said, "Well, anyway, we all lived with the Orlando commune for a couple of years afore one of the ponies on our weather team warned us that a big ass hurricane was coming. A really, really bad one. Most of us voted to head north as fast as we could! Storm caught us in the outskirts of Atlanta and, holy crap, it was a tough one, even that far inland.
"After the flooding subsided ah figured we'd head for New York City, since the girls have… had… relatives there, but we never made it.
"We could see smoke from huge fires and hear gunshots from miles away, so we snuck on past and wound up in Beantown. Ah saw on the job bulletin board that Alexandria is looking for ponies experienced with growing exotic plants and ah figure oranges are plenty exotic for Illinois, raight?"
The question seemed to be for the girls, as Sang squeezed and gently shook them.
Blue Skies chuckled and said, "Right. Haven't seen one since we left Florida, have we?"
"Nope." Sang shook his head and heaved a theatrical sigh.
"I want an orange", Prickly Pear sniffled into his damp chest fur.
Sang chuckled. "Me too, girl. Me too."
"Sorry, we're fresh out of oranges, honey." Dolly Mix smiled warmly and said, "I hope you can grow them, Sang. Just imagine! Fresh squeezed orange juice, lemon meringue pie, margaritas!"
A murmur of approval ran through the gathered ponies. It had only been about a month since Laura last drank a cool glass of orange juice, and even she suddenly felt a craving.
"Okay, let's have one more story tonight and we'll put something on the TV", said Captain Batten. He pointed to her. "Laura isn't it? You looked like you want to share how you Returned?"
Laura nodded. "Yes, thank you. Well, as you may guess from my accent, I'm from England. My boyfriend, Thomas, and I were on a little holiday to Canada when-"
"Just for once in my life, I'd like to sleep until I woke up natural."
"Is your fire still in?"
"Yes, Mrs Patmore."
"Ooh, my, will wonders never cease?"
Chick sighed. He'd seen Downton Abbey many times and, though it was okay, he had no desire to sit through it again. It was a full-house of passengers and crew scattered around the small room, and Chick sat by the stairs at the stern-edge of the herd. The dining table was lowered and covered in cushions, turning it into a make-shift bed with half a dozen ponies lounging on it, including Laura. He watched her from the corner of his eye, but if she felt his gaze, she ignored it. Her eyes were glued to a bright television panel that had been folded out from a cabinet on a metal arm.
"Whatever are you doing there, crouching in the dark?"
"I didn't like to touch the curtains with my dirty hands."
"Quite right, too."
He blew a breath through his nostrils, a quiet snort with a hint of whinny, and tip-hooved up the stairs to the boat's stern deck.
With legs of lead, he slowly walked the plank to shore. He wandered away from the crowded boat to the end of the concrete pier and sat beside one of the little white huts which contained a defunct motor and transmission. Water seeped between the lock's huge steel gates, splashing and gurgling and drowning any sound coming from the canal boats.
Listening to Laura's story had been miserable.
She told it well enough and with more dramatic flare than he could have. From her lips it became an epic adventure, and she painted him as the stalwart hero who'd safely escorted her to Beantown.
When everypony turned to look, he'd forced his ears up and plastered a depreciating smile on his face.
"Just doing my job", he'd told them, like it was nothing, really.
When Laura gushed about her fiance — how he'd arranged her rescue on that deadly cliff; that he was a doctor, selflessly helping ponies in this new world; and he patiently waited for her to join him in fabled Alexandria — it tore him up inside. But he stayed quiet. Kept his ears up. Smiled and stomped his hooves at the right moments, along with everypony else.
That look Dolly had given him… Was it pity? A warning to stay away and not cause trouble? He wasn't sure, but he doubted she was 'rooting for him' after hearing Laura's romantic fable. He couldn't blame her for that. Was his only hope that Laura would be dumped by her fiance and throw herself into his arms, sobbing and broken? How could he desire such a thing?
Merde.
He missed his motorcycle. Not that cranky Ural, though it had a rough charm, but his smooth-as-silk K1200GT from before the Event. He'd had to leave it behind in Montreal, where one of his last acts as a human being had been to park the sleek blue BMW on the street in front of his apartment. Unprotected and untouched through nearly twenty years of bleaching summer sun and harsh Canadian winters had left it a rusting ruin. He'd wept to see it lying dead on its side in a snow drift, even if he couldn't ride it now, anyway. At times such as these, when he felt lost and hurt, he use to take it bombing around the sweeping curves of Parc national de la Mauricie, chasing a Zen-like peace and focus. Far better to work through his aggression that way, risking his neck to get a knee down, than to endure another screaming argument with Alice.
Ugh. He shook his head clear of sad memories, stood, and wagged his tail to brush dirt from his rump.
Maybe Sang would be up for that game of chess he'd promised? Then a swallow from a bottle of distilled alcohol he'd stashed in his saddlebags to help him sleep.
It was going to be a long voyage.