Maud, Pinkie, and Mudbriar got off the train, and the moment Mudbriar stepped out, he immediately locked his vision on one of the many trees that grew in the city. He stared at it, basking in the magnificence of its branches.
Pinkie Pie was much more ecstatic, naturally.
“Wow! We’re once again in Fillydelphia! It feels like the last time we were here was ages ago, doesn’t it Maud!?”
“Pinkie, we were here last week for the PSSSDWR, remember?”
“What’s a PSSSDWR?” Mudbriar asked.
“Pie Sister Surprise Swap Day—“ Maud said.
“—With Rarity!” Pinkie finished, then gasped so loud she might as well have received a loudness complaint for it. “Maybe it means we should do it again so it doesn’t feel that distant! How does today sound, eh!?”
“Technically,” Mudbriar said, “days themselves don’t make sound, so today doesn’t sound like anything.”
Pinkie grumbled and stood uncharacteristically still while frowning at Mudbriar.
“Besides,” Mudbriar continued, oblivious to Pinkie’s disgust, “Rarity’s not here and you’re supposed to be helping your boyfriend today. It’s the reason you came here.”
“Cheese Sandwich, I almost forgot!” Pinkie exclaimed, blasting through the perpetual crowd of ponies on Fillydelphia’s streets. She quickly returned, however, to hug Maud tightly and wish her and Mudbriar good luck with their day.
Then she disappeared in a puff of smoke.
With Pinkie gone, Maud tagged alongside Mudbriar in his quest to find the perfect stick in Fillydelphia.
Maud found it cute when Mudbriar got excited over sticks and branches, but oftentimes, she would focus on her own hobbies instead.
They’d both do what they both loved to do. Silently, without saying a word, and focusing solely on their respective hobbies. Alone. Or rather, alone together.
Normally, she would study the effects modernization had had on the ground’s properties over the years, or how roots cracked through the surface of the floor, or simply look for minerals and interesting rocks stuck in-between the sidewalks.
However, Maud had been in Fillydelphia a lot of times before, and there were only so many times she could do those things before knowing every single pebble there was.
Thus, the only thing she could do was follow Mudbriar around while he stared intensely at tree branches, occasionally prancing in place when he found an interesting stick, which always made Maud smile, honestly.
But Mudbriar didn’t do that often.
Time went on, and when they reached a park on the opposite side of the city from where they started, Maud found something interesting… shiny, and sharp.
There, laying on the sidewalk was a beautiful black rock.
Inspecting the shard, Maud looked around, hoping to find out where such a beautiful piece of obsidian could have come from, especially in Fillydelphia of all places.
In doing so, she found another shard, and then another, and then another. They were all in a semi-straight line, almost as if it was a trail.
As a geologist, Maud couldn’t let an opportunity such as finding crystals or minerals in places they weren’t supposed to be pass away.
“Honey, I’m going to go this way. It could take me a while.”
Mudbriar didn’t say anything, and while anypony else would have just reiterated or left, Maud knew her boyfriend was actually evaluating possible responses, as he often did. She liked that about him.
“Very well,” he eventually said. “I’ll catch up with you later.”
Maud followed the trail for a while, picking the shards as she passed them by. The trail ended relatively quickly, though, and when it did, Maud glanced around to find any other clues.
Then she saw it.
A big, robust stallion leaning next to the wall. He carried a saddlebag with lots of stuff, but what caught Maud’s attention was the obsidian knife he was fiddling with, almost as if it was meant to be seen.
Maud started to walk towards this mysterious, shady, armed stallion standing in an alleyway.
Most ponies would’ve thought that was a bad idea, but Maud Pie was not afraid. She was confident in her superior strength and endurance from all the rocks she carried around at all times back at her family’s rock farm.
“That’s a nice piece of obsidian,” Maud told the stallion.
“Of course! I, Sturdy Dust, only get the finest equipment,” he said.
“I really like obsidian,” Maud said. “It’s a really cool rock. This one, in particular, is one of the purest I’ve seen. Do you know if it formed underground?”
“Uh… no, does that matter?” Sturdy Dust asked.
“Yes, if it’s from the surface, then it’d have a streaked appearance, since obsidian flows tend to overflow one another, thus overlapping during the process of devitrification.”
“Well,” Sturdy Dust said with a grin on his face, “I hear this one comes from the dragon lands.”
“Impressive. I heard the environment is so hot in there it makes obsidian petrification almost impossible…” she said, getting a bit closer to the knife. “It’s said that it’s sharper than the average obsidian, and thus a lot of early pony tribes used it as weapons.”
“I know,” he whispered, “wanna take a look!?”
Then, in one swift movement, the knife slid across the air towards Maud, who jumped out of range from the cutting edge just in time.
Maud shook her head with contempt.
“However, as it is volcanic glass, it’s very fragile, you see. Particularly against earth ponies, it’s not well-suited as use as a weap-“
And then Sturdy Dust swung the wooden bat that was in his saddlebag, which Maud did not notice as she could only see rocks and minerals.