Moving Day

by Timothy48


Chapter 23 Equipment Inspections

Chapter 23

The following morning found Allen standing in front of his kitchen stove preparing a breakfast of waffles and scrambled eggs. He’d already been up for a couple of hours already as he needed to get the morning chores done earlier than usual as today was promising to become rather busy.

Flipping the last of the waffles onto a waiting plate, Allen set it down on the kitchen table and then yelled, “Penny! Breakfast is ready!”

Seeing as how she was going to need to return to Ponyville the following morning anyway to help him set up a bank account and to properly inspect things. It had been decided that the best course of action was to allow her to stay the night at Allen’s place. This was done to spare her the indignity of air sickness and to facilitate a quick start the following morning.

Of course, that supposed ‘quick start’ didn’t seem to be happening as quickly as he thought it would. Waiting for several seconds to see if his words would have any effect, he was sadly disappointed as the house remained quiet. Rolling his eyes in mild frustration, he made the decision to go rouse her himself. Quickly ascending the stairs two at a time he turned left at the top and strode down the hall past his room. Coming to a stop at the guest bedroom door, he loudly rapped on it three times with his knuckles.

Knock, knock, knock! “Hey Penny! It’s time to get up! We’re burning daylight here!” he yelled through the door.

A muffled moan from the other side was his only reply. Trying the doorknob, he found it unlocked, and so decided to barge in to rouse his guest from their sleep. After all, it was after seven in the morning, and in farmer time, that was way past time to get up.

Opening the door he called out as he stepped through.“I hope you're decent, cause I’m coming in anyways.”

His announcement caused a pony-sized lump on the bed to groan as it shuffled groggily around under the warm comforters as it fought to stay asleep for a few more minutes. However, Allen’s entrance canceled those plans entirely.

Gently shaking the pony-sized lump, Allen said, “It’s time to rise and shine, Penny, we’ve got a lot of stuff to get done today.”

Groggily extracting herself from the comforting embrace of the guest bed and blearily rubbing her eyes with the back of her fetlocks, Penny smacked her lips together as her brain booted up for the morning.

“Oh, well, good morning there. Hurry up and get squared away, I just finished cooking waffles and scrambled eggs. Would you prefer tea or coffee to drink?” asked Allen.

“Coofe?” she half coherently mumbled.

“I’ll take that as a ‘yes you want coffee,’ grunt,” replied Allen with a chuckle as he turned and walked back through the doorway, leaving it open as he left.

Even though she still wasn’t fully awake, Penny’s body decided that it had waited long enough, and sent several messages to her still sleepy brain. The first was that she was hungry, and the second was that she needed to pee.

She decided to take care of the second need first.

Stumbling her way into the adjoining bathroom, she stared at the toilet and tried to figure out how best to use it. It’s white porcelain walls were too high for her to squat over it, like with a normal Equestrian toilet, and the seat wasn’t shaped properly for her to sit on without the risk of falling off of it. After staring at the weirdly shaped toilet for several moments, her tired brain, at the insistence of her full bladder, finally just gave up and told her to just use the shower behind her instead.

Exiting the bathroom a couple of minutes later, her brain having finally booted up sufficiently enough for it to have coherent thoughts, Penny felt her cheeks burn in embarrassment.

Oh, that was so embarrassing, relieving myself in the shower? Ugh, hopefully, Mr. Ross didn’t hear the shower running when I ‘flushed’. She thought to herself as she trudged downstairs, the scent of waffles and brewing coffee helping to further perk her up.

Entering the kitchen, Penny saw Allen setting a steaming cup of coffee at the dining room table alongside a large stack of syrup-soaked waffles, and golden colored scrambled eggs. Hearing her coming, Allen turned and smiled. “Bout time you wandered your way down here,” he said with a good-natured grin, “was worried I’d have to give you a shot of coffee to get you started. I heard the shower running for a moment upstairs, you didn’t have any problems with the sink, did you? I could have sworn I turned the water on to it last night.”

Feeling her cheeks flush hotly in embarrassment, Penny shook her head. “N-no, I didn’t have any trouble with the sink, I was able to wash my hooves with little issue.”

“Then how come I heard the shower running, if you didn’t need to wash up?” asked Allen, a confused look on his face.

Penny felt that if she blushed any harder, then she might spontaneously combust. “W-well,” she stammered, “I... had a little trouble with the toilet, it wasn’t really... built for a creature of my... proportions...” she said, her voice trailing off as her blush continued to rise.

Allen stared blankly at the blushing pony in front of him for a couple of heartbeats before realization dawned on him, and he facepalmed.

“Oh, yeah... that would make sense, your... bathroom fixtures are probably different than mine aren’t they?”

Penny just nodded.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable there. Just for the record, I’d rather you peed in my shower than try to use a toilet that wasn’t designed for you and hurt yourself. So, try not to feel embarrassed about it too much okay? We’ll just keep that little detail between ourselves, alright?”

Still feeling embarrassed, Penny simply nodded, thankful that Allen wasn’t upset at the situation. If anything, he seemed upset that he’d made his guest uncomfortable, even if the discomfort was unintentional. So taking the out that she was given, Penny quickly jumped up on a seat and said, “Thank you, Mr. Ross, I don’t know what I would do if word got around about... that.”

“Please, just call me Allen, and don’t sweat it, we all have done embarrassing things at one point or another,” replied Allen with a dismissive wave of his hand.

Deciding to take the opportunity, Penny moved the conversation forward. “So... Allen, what are this morning's plans?”

Swallowing a mouthful of waffles, Allen replied, “Well, if memory serves me right, I believe that Prince Blueblood said he was going to have some of your things delivered here from your apartment this morning.”

Penny nodded. “That’s right.”

“Then we’ll just hang around the farm till the delivery people show up then. I need to show you around anyways so that way you can get an initial feel of the place and what we should focus on putting those bits towards first.”

Penny hummed thoughtfully as she bit into a waffle, it’s delicious flavors flowing over her tongue as she chewed. After a moment of savoring the delicious golden brown pastry, she swallowed and said, “Alright then, as soon as I finish breakfast and get cleaned up and dressed, we can get started. I am assuming that after that you would like to head into town to set up an account at the local bank?”

Allen nodded as he cut into another waffle. “I think that would be a good idea, the sooner that account is set up, the better, plus I can receive the money that The Crown was planning on giving me as well.”

“Ah yes, I’d forgotten about that, His Grace did mention that The Crown would be compensating you for lost assets when you were foalnapped by Discord.”

Allen nodded. “Yeah, and I won’t be able to receive it till after my bank account is set up, so the sooner we get that done the better.”

“Agreed,” replied Penny with a nod. Having finished her breakfast, she hopped off of her chair and made her way towards the stairs. As she reached the stairs, she called back over her shoulder, and said, “I’m going to head upstairs and finish getting ready for the day. Thanks again for letting me stay the night, I know it was on very short notice and a major imposition.”

Allen waved her thanks away. “You’re welcome, it’s the least I can do considering what you and Prince Blueblood are doing for me. I’ll be outside in the main barn, so just head there when you’re ready to look around.”

“Sounds good, see you then,” replied Penny with a happy nod as she turned and headed upstairs.

Turning his attention back to the dishes in front of him, Allen decided to load them into the dishwasher before he headed outside, and a few minutes later, the dishwasher was happily burbling away in its never-ending duty of keeping the dishes spotless.

Satisfied, Allen turned and grabbed his gloves off the counter before heading outside. Blinking against the bright morning sun, he strode across the yard towards the main animal barn, intent on getting started on cleaning up some of the worst of the mess in there.

Stepping inside, he was greeted by the smell of a lived-in barn, musty hay, and manure, many people would turn their noses up in disgust and shy away, but to Allen, it was, while not a pleasant smell, at least comforting. Looking around, he surveyed the state of the barn. It was not pretty, old hay littered the floor, along with the feces of various small animals, as was to be expected, while the rafters were chock full of old dusty cobwebs and the bodies of dead bugs. The windows were caked in grime and there was dust everywhere, along with trash and discard items that either hadn’t been put back or thrown away. Sighing at the task ahead, Allen rolled up his sleeves and got to work.

By the time Penny had gotten cleaned and dressed, Allen had managed to rake most of the old hay into a large pile in the middle of the barn. While it wasn’t good for feed anymore, it would be fine as additional bedding for the livestock.

Waste not, want not, thought Allen to himself as he wiped some sweat from his forehead. The sound of hooves on wood caught his attention and turning, he spotted Penny carefully stepping over and around the dirtier sections of the floor.

Smirking, he said, “Honestly, you should have just skipped getting dressed if that suit was all you had.”

Flipping some of her mane out of her eye, she replied, “Yes well, I wanted to look professional while we took stock of things here, and I’ve got a few cleaning and dirt repelling spells that I can use if things get messy.”

Shrugging, he set his rake against a wall and said, “Alright, suit yourself then. So, where do you want to get started then?”

Levitating a clipboard out of her saddlebag, she replied, “I think we should start with what is in your inventory at the moment.”

“Okay, so what do you want an inventory of first then?” he asked simply.

“Uh... perhaps we could start with the buildings and what kind of shape they are in, and then work our way down?” suggested Penny, an unsure look on her face.

Nodding, Allen replied, “Alright, well as you know I’ve got a house,” he pointed with his chin at said house.

Giving Allen an unamused look, Penny made an exaggerated checkmark on her clipboard. “Okay, one house, got it,” she deadpanned.

Snickering at her reaction, Allen continued, “Heh, alright, I’ll get serious now,” he cleared his throat and motioned with a hand to the barn they were standing in, “this here is the main animal barn. It’s got a milking parlor down those stairs over there,” he pointed to his left, “though according to the DOTI, it doesn’t meet regulations, so we can’t use it. Though the equipment down there should still be good, even though my family hasn’t had any dairy cows for a few years. My dad kept the system in working order on the off chance we got back into the dairy business, but so far that hasn’t happened.”

Penny’s pencil was busy dancing across the page as she took notes. “How many cows did you have before you shut down?” she asked.

Allen rubbed his chin as he tried to remember. “I think we had about fifty or sixty cows at the height of our operation. Then the milk market crashed and we started selling them off to make ends meet.”

“I see, and what is up there?” she said, pointing up at the ceiling with her pencil.

Looking up, Allen replied, “That’s where we keep the hay and straw for our animals, we can usually store a couple of thousand bales of hay and or straw up there with minimal issue. My dad, when he took over the farm from his dad, had the barn renovated and the floors and walls reinforced as we had switched from loose hay to small square bales, which increased the amount of hay we could store up there, so we needed to make sure we wouldn’t exceed the weight capacity of the barn.”

“I see, so how long ago was that?”

“It was about ten years ago or so, though my grandpa kept working here until he died about five years ago,” replied Allen, “looking around, you can see that we’ve been pretty slack on building maintenance, comes from not having enough money I guess. So if we want to store hay here to sell later, then we’ll have to work on fixing the barn up.”

“Is this the only barn for hay storage?” inquired Penny as she looked around, taking down notes the whole time.

Allen shook his head, pointing out across the farmyard, at another, metal-sided barn, he replied, “Nope, we’ve got another barn over there that we use to store our bigger round bales in, along with whatever other miscellaneous equipment or stuff that we have that won’t fit elsewhere.”

“I see,” said Penny, as she scribbled something else on her clipboard, “and is that one in better condition?”

Allen waggled a hand back and forth in a ‘so-so’ motion. “It’s better than this one, seeing as it’s newer, by about twenty years and is clad in metal instead of wood, but the roof is starting to leak in places, and the paint is fading, exposing the metal to the elements. I actually think there are rust spots on the roof in some places too, so we’ll need to fix that. The concrete slab is still solid though. However, I’ve noticed a few cracks are forming, but if we get a handle on them soon, they shouldn’t be too hard to fix.”

Jotting more words down, Penny trotted out of the animal barn to get a closer look at the storage barn across the way with Allen falling in beside her. It was in better-looking condition than the wooden animal barn, just like Allen had said, but as she trotted closer, she could see the rust streaks and faded paint more easily. Trotting up to a service door, she tried the doorknob with her magic and found it unlocked, stepping through into the gloomy interior within. Looking around, she nearly jumped in surprise when the lights suddenly flicked on.

Whirling around, she spotted Allen giving her an apologetic grin, his finger just above a light switch by the door. “Sorry,” he said, “didn’t mean to spook ya there.”

Composing herself, Penny replied, “It’s alright, no harm done,” she paused and looked around at the now lighter interior. There wasn’t much to see, just a few old looking stacks of hay in the far corner, some tarp-covered objects, and miscellaneous junk scattered about with a thick covering of dust over everything. Trotting over to one of the tarp-covered objects, Penny cocked her head and asked, “So what is under these tarps?”

Allen strode over and peeked underneath. “One of our old Farmall tractors, she hasn’t run in about ten years, can’t remember why. My dad keeps meaning to get her running again, but he hasn’t gotten around to it yet.”

“Oh, and what is a ‘Farmall’ exactly?” asked Penny as she carefully lifted the tarp up higher, exposing the rubber wheels and dirty underside of the tractor to the light.

“It’s a brand name of farm equipment that doesn’t exist anymore, International Harvester, the company that built this tractor, dropped the Farmall name badge in the early 70s, before they, in turn, dropped the International Harvester name and sold their agricultural division to another company called Case.”

“I... see,” replied Penny, even though she was left with more questions than answers, she decided to move on for now and instead asked, “So what does a ‘tractor’ do?”

Allen shrugged. “Pretty much whatever you want, so long as you have the horsepower and the right attachments. You can plow, spray, weed, cultivate, plant, harvest, pull, drill, cut, rake, bale, the list goes on and on.”

“What does the term ‘horsepower’ mean?” inquired Penny, her head tilted to one side in question.

“It’s a unit of power that we use to determine how powerful an engine is. I don’t remember the specifics, but the gist of it was that before humans discovered the steam engine, a lot of things were powered by muscles, either human or animal, and horses were the preferred work animal back home. So when the steam engine was invented, it’s inventor needed a way to convince people to buy it, so he came up with a new unit of power as a marketing idea to compare how much work his steam engine could do in comparison to a horse in a certain time frame. The marketing gimmick worked, and the rest is history as they say,” explained Allen.

“Interesting,” replied Penny as she jotted down some more notes on her clipboard, “and would you happen to know more about it?”

“What, you mean like the formula and stuff?” asked Allen.

Penny nodded in reply.

“Not really no, and even if I did, it might not translate properly as our units of measurement might not be exactly the same,” replied Allen as he looked around the barn before then asking, “Was there anything else that you wanted to look at in here before we move on?”

Jotting another note down on her clipboard, Penny looked around for a moment and said, “No, I think I am good for now, I just want to get a basic idea about what you have for right now, we can go into the details later.”

Giving a nod, Allen turned and headed for the door, while Penny followed along behind him. Stepping aside, he let her walk through the doorway first before he followed after turning off the lights and shutting the door behind him. Standing outside in the bright morning sun, Allen squinted his eyes as he let them adjust to the different light level.

“So, what are your units of measurement?” asked Penny suddenly.

Looking down at her, Allen blinked and said, “Huh, sorry what did you say? I didn’t quite catch that.”

“I asked what the units of measurement that you use are,” repeated Penny, a tad annoyed that she had to repeat herself.

“Oh, uh, let’s see,” said Allen as he started walking towards a pair of large metal-clad sheds, “well there are two systems of measurement back home, one’s called the imperial system and the other is called metric. Pretty much everyone has switched over to metric these days as it is easier and more accurate to use than imperial, but some countries still use the old imperial system.”

Penny cocked her head to one side and asked, “Is your metric system based on units of ten by chance?”

Allen paused and turned to regard Penny with an unreadable look. “Let me guess, you call it the ‘maretic system’ here don’t you?”

Penny blinked in surprise. “Yes... how did you know?”

“Lucky guess,” was his reply.

“Right, well yes, that is what that system is called, the Prench came up with the idea about four hundred years ago, and it has since spread throughout the world. Equestria uses both it and the old ponish system of measurement, but it is slowly being phased out in favor of maretric,” explained Penny as she and Allen resumed walking.

“Yeah, that’s kind of happening back home as well, most things in the store have metric and imperial units of weight on them, and more things are being made using metric pattern parts. Though more often than not, they have a mix of both imperial and metric parts on a vehicle, so you need metric and imperial pattern tools to work on it.”

“I’m sure that can be quite frustrating,” said Penny, a hint of sympathy in her voice.

“You have no idea,” grumbled Allen in reply.

Coming to a stop in front of the service door, Allen stepped inside and flicked the switches on the wall causing the interior to be bathed in the bright white light of fluorescent bulbs. Stepping aside, he motioned for Penny to enter, and after stepping through, they continued their tour.

“You still haven’t told me what other measurement units you have,” said Penny as they stopped at a nearby workbench.

Allen reached into a drawer and pulled out a tape measure. Pulling the tab out about a foot, he pointed and said, “This,” he pointed at the yellow tape, “is an imperial pattern tape measure, and this number one right here represents one imperial inch,” he said as he pointed to a vertical line with a number one next to it. “Twelve inches make a foot, three feet make a yard, one thousand seven hundred and sixty yards make up a mile, conversely you could use feet instead. In which case it will be five thousand two hundred and eighty.”

“Odd,” replied Penny absently as she examined the tape measure, “Our old ponish system is exactly the same as your imperial, save for we use hoof instead of feet, though the Griffons use the term paw instead, they’re stubborn like that.”

Allen looked down at Penny’s hooves and said, “But that doesn’t make sense, a foot comes from literally using a person's foot as a means of measurement, your hooves aren’t twelve inches long.”

“That is correct,” replied Penny as she set the tape measure back on the table, “however, according to historians, the hoof as a unit of measurement has been in use for a little over two thousand years. There are some that believe the measurement came from a long-gone ancient civilization, and that we just co-opted it. Others believe that because ponies were much shorter back then, they used the leg as a form of measurement, instead of the actual hoof, and the word just became corrupted over time. In the end, nopony is really sure where or how it came to be, especially because most of our earlier history was lost during the reign of Discord, which occurred around the same time, so in theory, the ponish system could have been around even longer, we just don’t know.”

“Weird, I wonder if Lyra might have been on to something,” wondered Allen.

“Who?”

“Oh, Lyra Heartstrings, she’s a local who is apparently the local expert on humans and is working with Twilight Sparkle on a theory that my world and your world were linked together and that we’d been split apart at some point in the distant past. Not sure if I fully believe that, but it would explain a few things about back home,” replied Allen as he put the tape measure back in its little drawer.

“Stranger things have happened, and with Discord, anything is possible, I mean, he brought you here somehow,” Penny pointed out.

Allen nodded. “Fair point, but I’m just a farmer, thinking about stuff like that is way above my pay grade.”

Penny giggled and replied, “I agree, it’s probably best to leave that kind of thing up to the eggheads.”

“Agreed, so with that out of the way, how about we continue the tour, eh?”

“Sounds good to me,” said Penny with a firm nod as she looked around the interior of the building, “so what is in here?” she asked.

“This is the main heated shop,” replied Allen as he began walking towards the back, “ we do most of our heavy maintenance work in here as we’ve got a hydraulic lift and floor pit for easier access to the underside of the machines,” he pointed over to a clear area on the other side of the shed.

Trotting over, Penny could see the pit that Allen was talking about, though there appeared to be a metal grate over it at the moment. “We keep the pit covered when we’re not using it, as it helps reduce the risk of an accident, “explained Allen as he walked past. Pointing to a pair of metal poles sunk into the concrete, he continued, “This is our machine lift, we use it for our lighter equipment mostly, as it’s not strong enough for the more heavier tractors and such.”

Stepping closer, Penny could see that a pair of arms, each with a circular looking shallow bowl on the ends, were attached to the upright poles and that there appeared to be a control box attached to the right side pole. Turning to Allen she asked, “Do you use this often?”

Allen nodded. “Yeah, it’s more than paid for itself over the years as we’ve been able to fix our own equipment rather than have a mechanic do it for us, saves a lot of money on the labor side of things.”

Jotting some more notes down, she said, “Very well, what about the rest of the things in here? What are they?”

“Well, we keep our combine and our tractors in this shed, and the other vehicles and implements are either kept in the shed next door or are scattered around the farm either outside or under whatever cover is available,” replied Allen with a shrug.

Penny nodded absently as she jotted down another note. “Will you be able to show them to me today?”

“I can show you some of them, but to be honest, even I don’t know exactly what I have lying around. It’s not uncommon for old, unused equipment to get parked somewhere and forgotten. I know that there are a few old wooden sheds out on the eastern side of the property, near that forest, uh what was it called again?”

“That would be the Everfree,” remarked Penny absently as she trotted around several tool cabinets pencil dancing over the paper as she continued writing.

“Yeah, that place,” replied Allen as he followed along, “anyways, I’m pretty sure that there is stuff in those sheds, but I haven’t been out there in a long time, so no telling what kind of condition it is in. Basically, if it isn’t in one of these sheds up here or parked nearby, then it’s probably junk by this point.”

“Even if it’s junk, it might still have some sort of use, worst-case scenario we could have somepony look at it and see if it could be repaired or even copied if it is simple enough,” said Penny as she looked up at the massive machine in front of her. Pointing at it with a hoof she asked, “What is this?”

“That’s our combine, we use it to harvest crops like wheat or corn,” replied Allen as he paused next to her. Laying a hand gently on the side of the combine he said, “I managed to get this thing pretty cheaply a few years ago, and it’s been a real blessing for us. My grandpa was the brains of the operation and when he died, my dad had to take up the slack. Unfortunately, he isn’t a very good manager and made a lot of mistakes that cost the farm a lot of money. So several years ago, I sat down with a buddy of mine who is really good with numbers, and we came up with a plan to try and turn the farm around.”

“What did you do?”

Allen shrugged. “Sold off some land and got rid of all of the new equipment that my dad had foolishly bought after grandpa died. Took out some loans, used the money to buy older, less expensive equipment, made and stuck to a budget, rented land instead, streamlined the farm as best we could, and started looking for any side hustle that we could find.”

“Side hustle?” inquired Penny with a raised eyebrow.

“Uh yeah, I guess another way you could say it is that I started doing other jobs in addition to working on the farm,” replied Allen simply.

“Can you give me an example?”

“Sure,” replied Allen easily, “one of the things I did was get into the grave digging business. I had most of the stuff I needed already, such as a backhoe, skid loader, and flatbed trailer to haul it all with. I just needed to apply for a few permits and certifications, and I was good to go. It didn’t take long before I was providing grave-digging services for several graveyards in my area. The pay was pretty good too for the amount of work that I had to do, plus I made a lot of contacts. It wasn’t long before I was doing other things, like custom hay cutting and local hauling for people, all of these went to getting the farm back on its feet.”

“And what about your father?”

“Let’s just say that he and I had a... long conversation about me taking over the management of the farm, and leave it at that,” replied Allen hesitantly.

“Must have been quite the conversation,” remarked Penny dryly.

“Oooh yeah,” nodded Allen, “it was, and one I am not eager to repeat anytime soon. Thankfully, mostly with help from my grandma, I managed to convince him that his management style wasn’t working out and that we needed to change some things if we were going to keep the farm.”

Looking around, Penny remarked, “Well it looks like you succeeded.”

“For the most part,” replied Allen with a ‘so-so’ gesture, “as I said, my grandpa did the books for the farm right up until the day he died. My dad was more the manual labor element than anything else, and grandpa never really showed him how to run things right. Add in other things that distracted my dad at the time, and you have a recipe for a poorly run farm. Thankfully, I managed to stabilize the situation and if it wasn’t for the fact that I got sucked into this world with part of my farm, then I could have fully turned it around in a couple more years.”

Penny’s ears perked up for a moment and she said, “You said ‘part of your farm’, was there more to it than just three hundred acres then?”

Allen nodded. “Yeah, well... sort of. You see, we own three hundred acres, and rent the rest of it, either from family, friends, or neighbors too old to farm anymore. The average age of farmers back home is getting pretty high, and not very many young people are getting in these days, so when a farmer gets too old and he can’t do the work anymore, he either rents out the land or sells it. In my case, I had a couple of neighbors decide to get out of the farming business because they got too old. However, they didn’t want the land to get bought up by developers, so they approached me and asked if I wanted to rent their cropland. I said I was interested and we came to an agreement. This year I was going to be renting eleven hundred acres, with the option to rent another five hundred next year if I wanted to. The best part was that one of the farmers that I rent fields from lets me use some of his equipment, which is bigger than mine. All I have to do is just pay for upkeep and keep them running and in good condition.”

“That’s very generous of him,” remarked Penny as she trotted around the large red combine.

Allen nodded in agreement. “If it wasn’t for Mr. Wood’s generosity, I wouldn’t be nearly as far ahead as I was before I got pulled here. In fact, he was the one who sold me this Case 2388 combine here, along with the accompanying attachments, for a very good price. Which was great, because all we had left at the time was an old International 1440 that hadn’t run in a while and I wasn’t sure if I could resurrect it or not.”

“So if you didn’t have a working combine, how did you harvest your fields before you got this one?” asked Penny confused.

“Well, we did have a combine, the problem was, I had to get rid of it because it was too expensive for us to run. My dad got suckered at a farm show by a slick sales guy and ‘bought’ a brand new combine that he shouldn’t have bought to replace the old 1440 we had been using before. And when I mean bought, I mean he bought the thing on credit and we ended up spending thousands of dollars a month on payments. So when I took over, I got rid of the damn thing, and got this one instead,” said Allen as he affectionately patted the combine with a hand.

“I see, and did you have to get rid of other things that your father had purchased?” inquired Penny as she trotted around the backside of the harvester and took a closer look at it.

Allen nodded as he leaned an arm against the safety bar above the straw spreader rotors. “Yep, my dad bought into the idea that you had to have the best equipment with the fanciest gadgets on it, otherwise you’d be losing yield in the field, and therefore losing money. Problem was, he didn’t think about the size of our operation and how many acres he’d need to pay for all this equipment. Now, in the beginning, it was fine, cause grain prices were high, so he got away with it for a while, but then the agricultural market fell out beneath us, and well... so did the rest of the economy, add on other expenses and you get what you see here, a run down farm struggling to get back on top.”

Sticking her pencil in her mane bun, Penny turned to Allen and said, “Well, hopefully, we can get your farm back on top sooner than even you expected.”

Allen shrugged. “So long as my fuel holds out for these beasts, I’ll be able to out plow, plant, spray, or harvest anybody here, and that’s a fact.”

“What kind of fuel do these machines use? It doesn’t look like they have a firebox inside,” asked Penny curiously as she moved on to look at another piece of equipment just behind the combine.

“Naw, none of my machines run on coal or wood. These machines run mostly on a flammable liquid called diesel. Though I do have a couple that run on gasoline. I can stretch the diesel fuel a bit if I mix in stuff like cooking oil, but that has its own set of problems that need to be overcome. With gas-powered engines though? When the gasoline runs out, that’s it, those machines will either need to be converted to something else or they’ll just sit and rust. Honestly, that’s the thing I’m worried most about.”

“Running out of fuel?”

Allen shook his head. “Not just fuel, but lubricants, grease, filters, nuts and bolts, antifreeze, belts, tires, everything really. I’m not sure how much of this stuff you guys can provide. I mean, do you even have a crude oil industry?”

“I... don’t know,” replied Penny, an unsure look on her face, “though that doesn’t mean we don’t have some kind of substitute that you could use. After all, we need grease and lubricants for all of our machines, and science has been coming up with all kinds of new ideas over the past few years. Somepony might have made a breakthrough or might be close to one, that could help you,” she finished with a hopeful look on her face.

“Maybe,” replied Allen, though he didn’t feel very confident in that idea, “but if they haven’t, they better hurry up then, cause I won’t have enough to get through a full growing season. My combine has at least ten grease points that have to be greased every ten hours of operation. That basically means I’m greasing it every day, plus there are other grease points that have to be serviced at other intervals, and what happens if a part goes bad? Can it be replaced with something made locally? I’d bet the answer is probably no.”

“Allen,” said Penny gently as she placed a hoof on his leg, “let’s not go borrowing future trouble right now. The main thing we need to focus on is getting an idea of what you can produce quickly and cheaply, and worry about those other things when we need to. I’m assuming that you have an adequate supply of lubricants, fuel, and grease to get started?”

Allen gave a soft nod. “Yeah, I had a little extra money floating around this spring and the local parts store was having a sale, so I bought extra. If I just focus on hay production, rather than row crops, then I should have enough fuel, grease, and lubricant oils to get me through a hay season. It’s probably too late to plant anything around here anyways, not that I have any seed to plant with in the first place.”

“Actually, if I remember correctly, it’s still early enough that you could plant something still without having to worry about winter setting in before you are able to harvest,” replied Penny as she finished her preliminary tour of the machine shed.

“Really? Kind of feels like late spring or early summer out there right now,” said Allen as he and Penny stepped through the service door and he shut the lights off behind them.

“Oh no, it’s only the first week of May right now, there should be plenty of time to get a crop in. I mean, Winter Wrap Up was finished weeks ago.”

“Winter Wrap Up? Is that like some sort of holiday or something?” asked Allen, a confused look on his face.

Penny shook her head with a smile. “Not really, I mean someponies treat it like one, but it’s actually more of a transition time between winter and spring. I’m not sure if anypony has told you, but here in Equestria we have a bit more control over the seasons and local weather than in other parts of the world.”

Allen stopped and gave Penny an incredulous look. “Wait, hold up here. Are you telling me that you guys can control your own weather?”

“Yep!” replied Penny with a happy smile. “Well, sort of,” she added on seeing Allen’s skeptical look, “Cloudsdale is the primary producer of weather-related products here in Equestria. Though non-pegasi-created weather still happens, the pegasi tend to keep it under control for the most part. It’s one of the reasons why Equestria has never had to import food for most of its existence. Things like late or early frosts, flash floods, droughts, hurricanes, blizzards, and tornadoes to name a few things, don’t really happen that often here, and when they do, they are generally very mild compared to other parts of the world,” explained Penny as they entered the second machine shed.

Flipping the lights on, Allen tried to wrap his head around the idea of how a country could manage its own weather all the time. “Just... how? How do guys do it? I mean, a country is a big place, let alone a planet. You expect me to believe that you can shift entire global weather patterns, just like that?” he finished with a snap of his fingers.

Penny shook her head. “I’m not entirely sure of the process, you would need to speak to a weather pony for that. But, what I do know is that pegasi have an innate ability to shift weather patterns to suit the needs of a region, while at a local level they can exert more control over things like whether it rains or not.”

“So they don’t control every aspect of the weather then?”

“Well... no, not exactly. I suppose I should have been a bit more clear in my explanation earlier. I guess being an Equestrian I just take for granted the fact that our weather is fairly well controlled most of the time. Weather is often scheduled months in advance, especially in farming areas, and weather schedules are freely available at all local weather stations. Plus newspapers will print weekly weather schedules as well, just in case something changes,” explained Penny patiently.

Allen rubbed his forehead as his brain tried to wrap itself around the idea of controlled weather. “So what happens if weather causes damage or people get killed because of it? Does that mean people can sue these weather ponies?”

“Sort of,” replied Penny as she trotted around a folded up cultivator, “it depends on if there was gross negligence or malicious intent. But generally, if the weather ponies did everything correctly, and it was just an unfortunate accident, then there really isn’t anything that anypony can do. At the end of the day, weather can and does get out of control and can cause problems. Though most ponies understand that without weather pegasi, the weather would be a lot harsher than it is. So when things go wrong, they tend to be pretty patient and forgiving, so long as the weather teams did everything properly, and didn’t cut corners.”

Shaking his head, Allen decided to change the subject, lest he develop a migraine. “Alright, I’ll just take your word for it,” he said, a little dazedly.

Noticing that Allen was struggling, Penny paused in her inspection of what looked like some kind of mower and said, “Do you want to take a break? You look a little... overwhelmed.”

Allen shook his head and replied, “No, I’ll be fine, let’s just concentrate on getting this stuff done first.”

“Alright then, why don’t you tell me what this thing is here, it looks like something you could cut grass with, but I’m not sure,” replied Penny as she refocused the conversation.

“Yeah, that’s our discbine mower. It comes with a pair of heavy rollers that help squeeze out some of the excess moisture to make the hay dry down faster,” said Allen as he lifted one of the side skirts higher so that Penny could see underneath more easily.

“This thing is easily twice as fast as a sickle bar mower and won’t plug as easily,” explained Allen as Penny nodded along.

“I assume it’s because these,” she pointed a hoof at one of the two-bladed discs, “are more efficient at cutting thick grass? I must admit my knowledge of farming implements is limited.”

Allen nodded with a smile. “Yep, we call these turtle discs. It’s probably because they look like turtle shells.”

Cocking her head to one side, Penny gave the discs a closer look and then said with a smile, “Yes, they do look a lot like a turtle shell.”

“And they can turn real fast too,” said Allen as he dropped the side skirt when Penny had pulled her head back, “this thing can do easily two to three times the amount of field that a sickle bar mower design can. I’ve only had it a year, but I love it. The best part is that, even though this machine is used, all the important bits are brand new, so I don’t have to worry about them wearing out anytime soon.”

“Well, that is good to know,” replied Penny as she moved on to the next bit of equipment, “and what about this one-” and so it went for the next few hours. As both Penny and Allen walked around the farm, she would make an inquiry about something, and Allen would explain what it was, and what it did to the best of his ability.

By the time they had finished, the sun was moving towards late morning, and they had decided that they had covered enough for one day. Opening the front door, Allen stepped aside and allowed Penny to go first. By this point, her clipboard was full of papers that were covered in notes, but she was pleased by what she had seen so far. Yes, the buildings needed some repairs, along with a good coat of paint, and some spellwork to keep out pests, and some of his equipment wasn’t in the best of shape, but the important bits were, and that was what mattered.

Turning to Allen, she set her clipboard on the kitchen island and said, “Alright, it might take me a few days to lay out an initial development plan for your farm, but right now I believe I know how we can get some quick cash flow started.”

Pulling a pair of plastic glasses from the cupboard, Allen filled them up with water and handed one to Penny. Taking a sip from his, he asked, “And how would that be?”

“Well, you said that doing hay would be the least fuel-intensive option right now, and since His Grace has given you access to his lands, I believe we have a good place to start. A lot of the land surrounding Ponyville is either farmland or grassland, and on this side of town, it is a majority of grassland, meaning it’s perfect for what we have in mind.”

Allen took another sip of his water as he pondered Penny’s response. “True, I had been thinking about that, the question is, what kind of competition would I be facing in the hay market?”

“Little to none,” replied Penny, “hay is used in a lot of products domestically, and is eaten just by itself. Plus there is the overseas market to consider. The griffons import large amounts of hay from us to feed their livestock operations In fact, they import so much that the government has had to place limits on how much can be sold at a given time so as to make sure Equestrian needs are met first.”

Nodding, Allen rested an arm on the counter and asked, “So what kind of margins could I be seeing then?”

Opening her mouth to reply Penny was cut off by a sudden knock at the front door. Glancing down the hallway, Allen muttered, “Wonder who that could be.”

Getting up he strode down the hall and opened the door. Looking down, he saw a gray coated pegasus stallion standing there, several bags and boxes gathered around him.

“Can I help you?” asked Allen.

The stallion looked down at a clipboard that he had cradled in a wing and asked, “Is there a Ms. Penny Farthing here?”

“Yes, that’s me,” replied Penny, startling Allen as he hadn’t heard her come up behind him. Shooting Allen an apologetic look, she turned her attention back to the stallion and asked, “How may I help you?”

“Sign here please,” replied the stallion as he held out the clipboard to Penny, along with a pencil, “you want me to help bring these boxes inside, or would you rather I leave them on the porch?”

“Oh, you must be the movers!” exclaimed Penny when she saw the manifest.

“Yep, Speedy Delivery Service, at your service ma’am. We move it fast and intact,” replied the stallion as he took off his delivery cap and gave a small bow.

Giggling, Penny quickly signed the manifest and looking up at Allen asked, “Where would it be best to put these?”

Looking around at the boxes and bags on the porch, and then out to the ones still left in the cart, which were being unloaded by another pegasus delivery stallion, Allen rubbed his chin and asked, “What all did you have brought?”

Looking down at the clipboard, Penny replied, “Mostly clothing and personal effects, along with the basic essentials, towels, toiletries, some cookery, office supplies, that sort of stuff.”

Giving her a confused look, Allen asked, “You need all of this for a day or two to help me set up a bank account?”

Handing the signed clipboard back to the stallion, Penny replied, “Huh? Oh, I knew I was forgetting something! My apologies, Allen, I guess we didn’t tell you.”

“Tell me what?” asked Allen as he crossed his arms over his chest, and leveled a ‘come on, out with it’, look at Penny.

“Well, seeing as how this venture is going to require a lot of work to get started properly, His Grace asked me if I would be willing to open up a small office here in Ponyville to better oversee and represent His Grace’s interests in the area.”

Allen was even more confused now. “Office? What office?”

Seeing his confusion, Penny couldn’t help but giggle. “Sorry Allen, but you look so funny when you’re confused, it’s kind of cute in a way.”

Rolling his eyes, Allen simply motioned with a hand for Penny to get to the point. “Alright,” she said with a smile, “I’ll explain it in a minute, but first, we should probably let these fine gentlecolts unload their cart.”

Turning his gaze back to the pegasi delivery ponies, Allen could see that the gray coated stallion was giving him an impatient look. Letting go a sigh, Allen said, “Just go ahead and stick it in the foyer, anything that doesn’t fit there just shove it in the room to the left of the stairs, we’ll sort it out later.”

Giving a single nod, the lead delivery pony motioned for his partner to begin moving boxes inside. Stepping to one side so that they were out of the way, Penny began, “Before we left Canterlot last night, His Grace told me that he wants to better develop the economic potential of his holdings and to do that, he needs local representatives who can judge local economic conditions more accurately and in real-time. As such, he asked me if I would be willing to move to Ponyville to set up a small branch office and be that representative. Moreover, he wanted to have somepony he could trust close by in case you needed help with anything.”

Leaning his back against one of the house walls, Allen rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “I see, and I take it that Ponyville won’t be the only town getting one of these branch offices?”

“You would be correct,” replied Penny with a happy nod, “His Grace is moving to set up a proper company with himself at the head, so as to not repeat his father's mistakes. From my understanding, up until now, everything had been tied directly to his family’s personal assets, which was the main reason they lost so much when the Sugar Bubble popped.”

“So does this company have a name yet?”

“Not to my knowledge, His Grace is still in the preliminary stages, but when the company is fully set up, then he’ll move to have things, such as your contract, transferred over to it, rather than under his personal estate.”

“Which means I’ll probably need to sign more paperwork,” sighed Allen.

Giggling, Penny replied with a sympathetic smile, “It shouldn’t be that difficult, all you should need to do is sign some transfer papers stating that you are willing to have your contract moved from Prince Blueblood’s personal estate to his corporation.”

“Well, could be worse I guess,” sighed Allen as he pushed himself away from the wall. “Guess, we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it, in the meantime, it looks like the movers are just about done.”

Turning to look behind her, Penny saw that the two movers had just grabbed the last of the boxes and were trotting up the walkway now. Giving them a happy smile she said, “Thank you both so much.”

Setting his last box down in the entryway, the gray coated stallion doffed his hat once more and gave a little bow saying, “Our pleasure ma’am, and no need to worry about paying us anything, both the bill and tip were taken care of by your employer beforehoof. Hope you have a pleasant day, please feel free to let us know when you want the rest of your things moved from your apartment to Ponyville, and we’ll have them delivered the following morning.”

“I will, and thank you!” replied Penny happily.

Giving one last shallow bow, the stallion turned and trotted back to his coworker and quickly hitched himself to their cart before they then set off down the driveway. Watching them go for a moment, Allen asked, “So do you want to have something to eat first or head into town?”

A loud growl from Penny’s stomach answered the question for him. Chuckling at Penny’s blush, Allen simply turned and headed back inside saying, “Lunch it is then.”