//------------------------------//
// Second Lesson- All Aboard the Ponyland Express! 
// Story: The Magnificent Six 
// by Paradise Oasis 
//------------------------------//

"This is so exciting!" Surprise exclaimed as they all trotted towards the Hoofkaido station. "I've never been on a train ride before!"

"Neither have I, but I've always wanted to," Firefly replied, flexing her wings. "I've always thought those iron monsters looked really cool!"

"D-did you say monster?" Poesy whimpered as they came around to the loading platform for the train. The nervous filly caught sight of the large black and red engine, roaring and spewing steam from its towering smokestack.  "I-I don't think I wanna go on this ride anymore!" The terrified yellow earth pony tried to bolt away from the station.

"Come on, ya scardey filly!" Glory called out as she and Applejack galloped after her. "With the chariot gone, this thing is the only way to get to Bright Valley in any level of comfort."

"Yer gettin’ on that train if we have to hog tie you and throw you in the baggage compartment,"  Applejack snorted as she and Glory grabbed the fleeing filly, dragging her back to the platform. "Now stop struggling, and get your flank on board!"

Of course they all knew AJ didn't mean what she said, but that didn't do anything to calm Poesy's fear.

"This wasn't a good idea! I don't belong here," the yellow filly whimpered, "I'm just a gardener. I'm not cut out to be a Harmony Bearer!"

"Now that's nonsense, and you know it!" Twilight Shine told her, as she tried to help the other two get her on the train. "You showed great courage getting on that stage and performing like that."

"T-that's only because Cadance cast a spell to make the audience invisible," Poesy whined. "I pretended they weren't there!"

"C'mon, Poesy! Stop being a ‘fraidy pony!" Firefly snapped, pushing AJ back and trying to help the two unicorns maneuver their friend into the passenger car's entrance. "Princess Cadance is waiting for us, so you're getting on board, NOW!"

"I... said... NO!" The panicking earth pony kicked all three of the others away and ran to the edge of the platform. She was about to jump off, when a voice from the train called out to her.

"Excuse me, miss? But you really shouldn't jump down from there. You could hurt yourself."

All of the fillies turned to see a colt about their age sticking his head out from the engine.  He was a pink earth pony, with a white mane and a conductor's cap, and a train engine cutie mark. Poesy suddenly stopped and stared at him, all the terror draining from her face.

"W-who who are you?" she asked, with a dreamy, faraway look on her face.

"Name's Steamer, Miss. Apprentice engineer on the Ponyland Express!" The colt trotted up to her, took off his conductor's cap, and bowed. "And if you're too frightened to ride on the train, you could ride up in the engine cabin with me. I'll show you there's nothing to be afraid of!"

Poesy looked at the pink colt, all starry-eyed and smiling. "That... would be lovely..." She suddenly snapped back to reality, and looked back towards the other five.

"Go ahead," Twilight nodded. "We'll be fine in the passenger car!"

The colt gently led the timid earth filly back to the engine cab, and the five remaining fillies just shook their heads.

"Can you believe it?" Surprise giggled. "It took a cute colt to get her on the train!"

"That's usually the thing that'll get a filly or a mare to do the stupidest stuff!" Firefly chuckled as they all trotted onto the train.

...

The train may have looked impressive from the outside- with its luxurious green passenger cars with yellow trimming- but the interior was truly a sight to behold. Posh red cushioning with comfortable velvet seats lined the walls of each car. Mares, stallions and colts were seated all around the car, chatting and enjoying their meals.

"This.. this is so wonderful," Twilight whinnied, nearly breathless. "I never thought a train ride would be like this!"

"Girls, over here!" Cadance called out, motioning them over to a set of seats at the back of the car. "They wanted to give me a car all to myself, but I insisted you girls should have things as normal as possible."

As the five ponies came over and sat down, Cadance looked around, a puzzled expression on her face.

"Oh no, where did Poesy go this time?" the alicorn groaned.

"Oh, don't worry, Aunt Cadance!" Twilight smiled. "The apprentice engineer invited her to ride in the engine with him."

"Oh, well that's good!" she replied with a smile. "A colt should help keep her mind off of her fears."

It was at that point that the whistle blew, and the train began to slowly chug forward. As the locomotive began to pick up speed, Surprise stuck her head out the window.

"Oh wow! This it totally cool!" the white pegasus exclaimed, letting her tongue hang out of her mouth like a canine.

"Gotta admit, this is really awesome!" Firefly let the wind blow through her mane. "If only Medley could see me now. She'd be sooo jealous!"

"Bah, you girls need to get out more," Glory scoffed. "I've been on trains with my mother. We ride to Manehattan all the time, to barter with human merchants for dress fabrics."

"Shame the boys couldn’t join us," AJ sighed, shaking her mane. "Guess they had ta finish tidyin' up stuff back at Hoofkaido."

"They should be catching up with us at Fort Rainbow Dash, fair Applejack," Cadance replied with a smile. "For now, we should be concentrating on your next lesson!"

"So we're going to Bright Valley next, right?" Twilight asked. "The earth pony town ruled by Princess Silver Swirl?"

"That's correct, Twiley!" Cadance answered, not noticing Twilight Shine's distaste for Shining Armor's old nickname for his sister. "It is the most modern city in all of Ponyland, and they need your help with planning a performance."

"Wait, what?" Firefly stuck her head back in the window. "Okay, I can understand the political stuff we got involved with back in Hoofkaido, but why are Harmony Bearers helping to put together a stage show?"

"Seems somebody didn't pay attention in school!" Surprise giggled, pulling her head back inside. "Hearth's Warming Eve, the Crystal Fair; the Harmony Bearers did that kind of stuff all the time!"

"There is more to be a Harmony Bearer than just fighting and politics, my good Firefly," Cadance informed her. "Silver Swirl is counting on you six to make a very important traditional play shine like never before this year."

Before the alicorn could say more, the unicorn stewardess wheeled a cart in beside the table, levitating the lids from seven steaming plates of food.

"Dinner is served," the serving mare said with a smile.

"Thank you very much!" the alicorn whinnied, levitating each tray of food to its intended filly. "Could you take this seventh one to the filly in the engine car?"

"As you wish, your highness!" The stewardess bowed, and wheeled her cart away with her mouth.

"I ordered each meal based on the cuisines of your own home towns!" Cadance beamed. "Enjoy, girls!"

"Oh, man... Hay-flavored gyros!"  Firefly licked her lips. "I haven't had these in ages."

"Hoofkaido vegetable lo mein!" Surprise licked her lips. "Mom never made this stuff, no matter how much I begged!"

"We had a bit more trouble with you, AJ, seeing as you won't tell us where you're originally from." The alicorn frowned. "So I had to fall back on your clan's specialty."

"Apple pie, apple cobbler, an apple fritter, and an apple turnover,"  the orange earth pony grumbled, looking over her plate. "I do like eating other foods, ya know!"

The other ponies all glanced over at Twilight and Glory's plates, looks of confusion on their faces. Glory had a pizza on her tray, but it had all these odd red circles on it. And Twilight was eating some kind of odd, curved food that gave off a funny smell after being cooked.

"That... looks like an interesting dish you have there, Twilight,"  a curious Surprise looked it over. "How does it taste?"

"Oh, the sauce is delicious," Twilight whinnied, cutting a piece of the strange food off with her levitated fork, and taking a bite. "And the chef cooked it just long enough, too!"

"What are those strange sticks the food comes on?" Firefly asked, picking the oddly shaped thing up with her wing and looking at it curiously.

"Oh, those are rib bones." Glory informed her, taking a bite of her pizza. Suddenly, the other two fillies realized, with horror, what the two unicorns were eating.

"Meat...." Surprise spat some of her lo mein out in shock. "You girls are eating flanking MEAT?!"

"It's all true! Dream Valley ponies are barbarians!"  Firefly inched away from the unicorn in the seat next to her. "Back, back you bloodthirsty cannibal! You'll not get my innards this night!"

"You forgot to tell them that Dream Valley ponies have spells cast on their stomachs as foals so they can digest meat, didn't you, Your Highness?" AJ smiled at the alicorn sardonically.

A frustrated Princess Cadance buried her face in her hooves. "Celestia help me..."

...

As the train continued on its way north, two witches on the hill above watched the locomotive go by, eagerly plotting what they were going to do next.

"Okay Reeka, gimmie the spellbook," the one witch hissed. "I'm gonna conjure up a dozen manticores to tear the train to pieces!"

"Naw, you cast the spell last time," her sister growled, greedily holding onto the book. "Lemme conjure up a tar pit in the middle of the tracks, so the train'll sink into the mud!"

"You just want all the glory from momma!"

"You wanna have all the fun!"

The two struggled back and forth with the book, until a great roiling sphere of dark magic shot forth from its pages, and rocketed down towards the train tracks. It blew the bridge in front of the train to pieces, leaving the yawning chasm of Galloping Gorge beneath it.

"Wow, looks like the book responded to our fighting," Draggle noted. "Guess we shouldn't have used the incantations momma taught us as curse words."

"They’re gonna fall to their deaths now," Reeka replied, wringing her hands together. "Falling to their death is good, right?"

"Let's go back and tell Hydia the good news," the taller sister cackled, as the two siblings quickly trudged away. "Those ponies will soon be nothing but pancakes!"

...

At the very front of the train, Poesy and Steamer were sitting and talking, while the colt kept an eye on the furnace. The master engineer had decided to take a break and trusted his young apprentice to keep an eye on the situation, even with a young filly there to distract him.

"So you're from Bright Valley, huh?" Steamer asked the filly riding in the cab with him. "I'm from Fort Rainbow Dash, myself, though my apprenticeship takes me all over Ponyland!"

"It sounds lovely...." Poesy whispered, still staring at the colt. "I've always been so afraid of traveling anywhere. The world always seemed like such a big, scary place..."

"I used to be the same way, afraid of train whistles," Steamer replied, nodding in understanding. "That loud noise always frightened me as a colt."

"Oh, but trains are your special talent!" Posey whinnied, as the colt beside her shoveled more coal into the furnace. "How did you ever overcome your fear?"

"By telling myself that there was really nothing to be afraid of," he told her, smiling. "I pretended that that loud whistle was just a screaming baby, and I was able to see it as not being scary long enough to find I actually liked trains!"

"Wow, that's so-" Poesy was suddenly cut off, as a look of horror appeared in her eyes. "Steamer, look out ahead!"

The colt suddenly spun around, and to his horror, saw that the Starswirl the Bearded Bridge across the Great Galloping Gorge was out.

"Uh oh..." Steamer gulped, all the color draining from his face. "I think we just ran out of track."