Moon Dust. Alicorn Powder. Murder Dirt. Call it what you want, but to me it's just an old friend. From the Canterlot elite, to back water mud ponies, it's on the tip of everypony's nose. Strangely popular with older mares and stallions. I guess it helps them with all their missing mommy issues.
It's illegal as sin. Possession alone will give you five to ten. But giddies are more likely to hoof it for themselves, should they find a pony with it. Emphasis on the word 'pony.'
It's our main crop. The way we fund our other little adventures. And producing it alone is probably the most dangerous thing we ever do. It's Shake's job. Mostly. Since he's the pony with all the brewing know-how. But it's still the responsibility of every Colt to know the process, and pitch in from time to time.
You start with twenty parts hayseed oil. The industrial kind, not the cooking. Yes, there's a difference. Mix that with one part hydra venom, to make a solution we call killing juice. Warm it to a low simmer, but don't ever let it bubble. If the solution boils at any point in time, it's ruined and you've got to start over.
Now comes the dangerous part. You need one hell of a ventilation system, and a backup respirator anyway. Once the killing juice is nice and warm, you have to mix in the crushed stamen of poison joke, stirring the whole time. I'm no alchemist, so I'm not going to pretend to understand how this shit works. But Shake says the hydra venom bonds with the curses embedded in poison joke, creating a new compound with a very low boiling point. What this means is that as you mix the two, it starts giving off a vapor straight from Tartarus itself. A single whiff of it will kill a pony on the spot, twisting up her insides. Happens all the time in dust farms. Some ponies skimp on ventilation, and authorities arrive on the scene after neighbors complain about the rotting smell.
Anyway.
You mix in two parts killing joke, and keep stirring until the vapor stops. Then you keep stirring anyway, because if there's any hydra venom left you're going to fuck up the first pony that tries the batch. And killing off or disfiguring your clients is a good way to ruin your reputation. It's also why most customers make you try some of your own dust in front of them before they'll buy a batch. But once you're bored out of your mind, and your hoof is getting sore, and you're damned sure you've mixed it all, you pour the remaining mixture through a sieve and collect it in a jar. Don't ever fill a jar more than half way though. Use a second one if you're not sure.
Let it cool off a bit. Take a smoke break or something, and get back some feeling in the hoof you've been stirring with.
When you're good and ready, mix in six parts Heart's Desire. Seal the jar, write the date on the lid, and let it sit for a week. There's some flexibility here, but if you open it up too soon then your dust isn't going to be very potent. And if you open it up too late, then it's going to smell really, really bad. That's the other way dust farms sometimes get found. Though usually the neighbors can't tell the difference between the two.
Yeah. It's that bad.
So it's a week later, and you've opened up the jar. The mixture should be lumpy and kind of reddish purple. And if it was done right, it should now be taking up that second half of the jar. But if there's any mold on the top, that means the jar wasn't properly sealed and you have to start over. Which is not only annoying as fuck, but it's costly too. Because you know that tiny bit of hydra venom, way back from the beginning? That usually has a black market value of around five hundred bits. And trust me; it's not something you want to go out collecting on your own.
So you've gotten this far without screwing up, and you've got a lovely jar of purple mushy shit we call Luna's Tea. Some ponies actually stop here. You've got about a five hour window before it spoils, where you can actually eat or drink it. Some social rings even consider it a delicacy, but they're fucked in the head for more than one reason. Not only does it taste like a mix between vomit and burnt rubber, it has some magical properties that scare the living daylights out of me. So any given sane and rational pony will be inclined to take Luna's Tea, and put it through the final stage of processing to make Moon Dust.
The first part of that processing involves filtering out the liquid from the mush. That liquid, called Luna's Wrath, is a special kind of substance. No color, no odor, no taste, and perfectly safe to ingest. You'll just piss it out later, completely intact. It's unremarkable in every way, except for two things about it: as far as any pony knows, it can't be broken down by conventional means, and when it's ignited by a searing spell, it will create a magical flame that can't be put out. That flame will continue to blaze until it consumes itself. No exceptions. This has lead to some interesting cultural practices. It's considered a testament of trust to share Luna's Tea among a group of unicorns, because any one of them might be able to ignite the Wrath in another and slowly cook the pony inside out. Unsurprisingly, this doesn't always turn out well. Sometimes the giddies will find a hoofful of burning corpses in a warehouse, or alley, wine cellar, even a hotel room. Sometimes it's a deal gone wrong, or an assassination, or a message from one clique to another, or even just a simple interrogation technique of, "we'll kill you once you tell us what we want to know." Whatever the cause, they're all still called the same thing: Canterlot Tea Parties.
As I said: Completely. Fucked. In. The. Head.
Anyway.
For processing you need to filter out the Wrath. And that's where things get a little weird. Shake says that ponies have tried a lot of different filtration methods, but there's only one that's both consistent and reliable. Cloud filtering. So any given dust operation needs a token cloud pusher. This is also why dusting is so popular among griffin cliques; they've got all the tools they need to get the job done.
Well, I'm no pegasus, so I can't say I've ever actually done the filtration before. Likewise, I'm sure there's a lot of important technical details I'm lacking in my understanding of the process. But from what I can tell, it's just a matter of pouring Luna's Tea over a fucking cloud, and collecting the Wrath that pours out beneath it. Which, if you ask me, is an infuriating reason to have to keep a flying feathered fuckhead around the base of operations. All due respects to Windy Skies, of course.
So now you have a container of Luna's Wrath, and a cloud with lumpy purple shit on top of it. You set the Wrath aside for later. It gets sold on the black market to cover some of the costs of the hydra venom, while you try your best to not think about what ponies are going to do with it. For now though, you instruct your feathered fuckhead to take the cloud and put it on a simple baking sheet. Place the sheet in an oven on its lowest setting, and let it bake for a day or two. You'll know its done when the left over residue is gray and flaky; when it's at the point where it will crumble if you nudge it with a hoof.
That right there. The labor of the past week of your life. That's Moon Dust. Grind it up, and you should have about fifteen grams of dust per gram of hydra venom you started with. Each gram of dust should net you 100 bits on the market, and yield at least three fixes when cut right.