//------------------------------//
// Clouded thoughts 
// Story: A Boundary Apart 
// by armid 
//------------------------------//

Rainbow Dash and I parted ways after that, however I could still hear her shouting "THIS IS AWESOOOOOOOME!" from a mile away. But I don't blame her. My motorcycle felt alive again. it was working flawlessly! I dare say even better than when I first got it. Steely Armor did me a great favor by fixing this for me. 

I got home pretty quick. My body felt sore from dragging my motorcycle, so I just crashed on my bed and before I knew it, I was napping. 

When I woke up, it was six-ish. I crawled out of the bed to change my clothes to something more comfortable and dropped on my couch. My mind was wondering about what had happened with Steely and what that blueprint was. He seemed really protective about it. I mean, he does act like the type that doesn't like engaging with others a lot but, still, why a blueprint in shapes? 

I was just looking around the social media for stuff to pass time, but I just couldn't get the thought off of my head, so I messaged Twilight to see whether she could help me or not.





-Hey

-Hi

-How are you?

-I'm good, a bit tired but ok
-How are you?

-preparing my new schedule for next week

"Of course you are!" I thought to myself.

-how is spike?

-he's eating his food

-dinner or evening meal?

-I don't know...he has been eating quite sporadically these days.

-why don't you make a schedule for his eating too?

-WOW! that's an amazing idea!

I literally face-palmed myself when I read that.

-I meant it as a joke

-Oh.

-you're still going to do it anyway, right?

She didn't respond for a while.

-NO!

-(-_-)
-never mind

"I'm sorry Spike!" I said, even though no one was there.

-hey, I wanted to ask you something
-how would you describe Steely Armor?

-Tall, wears a hat and goggles on top. A little chubby.

- No, I meant as in his personality and how he is overall. 

-we don't talk much about anything other than magic and our theories on it, but he seems like a nice guy?.
-why are you asking this?

I felt that explaining all that over text would have taken a long time, so I decided to call her.

-Hold on





I got up to a sitting position on the couch.

As I tapped my phone to call Twilight, I felt something wet on my left cheek. It was Ray, rubbing his head against my cheek. I picked him up with my finger and let him be there. 

After a few rings, Twilight picked up. "Hello Sunset!"

"Hey, so, I think it's better if I tell the story here."

"Ok, ugh, hold on." Her voice got all muffled all of a sudden and I could barely hear her. "What is it, Spike?...Yes, it’s her. Why?"

And then, I could hear her clearly again. "Hey Sunset, I'm going to turn on the webcam so Spike can see you."

"Ah, no problem." I adjusted myself on the couch before my camera turned on. And held the phone in front of me and made sure it was catching my face. Moments later, Twilight's camera also turned on and showed her holding Spike with her hands. I reckoned she had adjusted her phone somewhere since she was holding Spike with both hands.  

Spike greeted me the moment he saw me. "Hi Sunset!"

"Hi Spike! Have you eaten your dinner?"

"Um, more like an afternoon snack, to be honest." He rubbed his eyes with his paw.

"That's good too."

Twilight adjusted her glasses and spoke up. "So what did you want to say?"

"Right! So Rainbow Dash and I took our motorcycles to his garage today and-"

"He has a garage?" Twilight's face twisted and her eyes narrowed. "Where?"

"In the Car’s Graveyard. It seems he runs the place."

Twilight was silent. Her eyes narrowing and her lips pushed on one another. I knew she was deep in thought so I stayed silent too. However, after a few seconds, the silence was broken. "How is he working there? Usually the authorities choose someone to take care of things there, and I doubt they would pick a high school teen."

"What do you mean by that?" I asked.

"The Car's Graveyard is not public domain. It's private, and authorities have the responsibility of watching over it. Now, as far as I recall, it was an abandoned project by them, however I doubt they have not put someone in charge of it." She rubbed Spike's head as she was explaining. "Steely Armor managing to get a garage there's just...something that gets your attention."

"Well, that is interesting..." I shook my head. "Anyway, as I was saying,"

"Oh right, right, sorry!" She rapidly nodded and picked up Spike, put her hand under his belly and the other on his head. 

"We saw — or I mean, I saw a blueprint there, which was written in weird symbols." 

Twilight was playing with Spike a little bit but when I said that, she came closer to her phone. "A what?"

I rolled my eyes, "A blueprint! In some weird language! The scales, the descriptions, all of them were in weird symbols and shapes."

"Okaaaaaaaay?" Her head twisted around a little and she raised her eyebrow.

"And when I asked him about it, he rushed towards it and covered the thing up saying that it was really nothing!" I paused for a second to gather my thoughts. "He even pushed me to prevent me from looking at it."  

"Huh, that is weird." She looked down for a second, probably trying to put things together.

"Uhm, Twilight?" 

She looked at me again. "Yes?"

I pointed at the camera, trying to show her Spike who had fallen asleep. 

"Oh, I....I'll talk to you later Sunset." She hung up. 



 

I turned my phone off and tossed it aside. I thought of just passing time and playing some games but all the thoughts and questions I had in my head felt like a storm on a sunny beach, and I just couldn't stop wondering. Wondering what it all meant. "Why put in the effort to write everything in symbols? Is it that important that you don't want others to figure out what it is? If so, what is it?" My head was exploding! I just couldn't relax with anything now. Not even the new Tirek Rampage game I’d bought recently! I legitimately thought that would help, but even hack-and-slash was not the cure!

So I started looking at it from a different angle: "From what I’ve gathered about Steely Armor, he is an antisocial dude who clearly is not very keen on opening up, maybe he just doesn't like people looking at his stuff!" That helped a little. "Am I overthinking this?" I thought to myself while staring at the lonely white lamp that was hanging from the ceiling. "Maybe" I sat on the couch to think more straight, "But even if I am, It's better to be cautious!" I stood up and started walking around my not-so-big living room, but in the end I convinced myself to go back to sleep.