The world it seemed, was conspiring against them.
First it was the bucket of sealant sending two ponies to the showers, with a bottle of white spirits.
Unfortunately, that was only the first in a long line of ‘mysterious accidents’. Falling planks, potholes, nails ending up in sandwiches, one stallion had even managed to fall into a pail of concrete.
Panzer Hoof was quite seriously beginning to wonder if the place was haunted, at least up-until he started to work out that the disaster area seemed to centre around a certain Twilight Sparkle, and that seemingly had only affected the stallions...
The little purple unicorn had been invaluable despite all the setbacks. She had still managed through the powers of organization and efficiency (Read: Lists and Yelling) to get the fallen walls repaired and patched the roof all in the space of a single day. The interior was still ruined, rotten patches still evident amongst the separators and big black patches of mould still rife amongst the flooring. The initial discussions had put the estimate on making the place pony habitable at nearly a week, a long time for nearly twenty five assorted ponies to crash in a barn, but with the work done that day under the eyes of the Princess' student it looked like they could move in as early as tomorrow if they managed to keep up the pace they were at, and didn't breathe the spoors too hard. Sure, it wouldn’t be the most pleasant or comfortable, but it wouldn’t be that much worse than the barn at Sweet Apple Acres, and would be several steps up from the barracks back at Canterlot Castle after inter-guard sports day. Nothing stank quite like thousands of unwashed ponies after a long day sweating in plate armour. Still, beating the pegasi at Rugby was totally worth it.
It had been bothering Panzer Hoof that they been staying with the Apple Family. While it seemed an unavoidable necessity at the moment it brought the group closer to the public eye sooner than he liked. The original idea agreed between the three ponies nominally in command had been to keep under the radar of the various importants in Ponyville for a good month or so, just keeping to themselves and establishing a routine and public persona for their little band of lumberjacks.
Instead they were living with one, making another their forepony and, last he checked, obtaining materials and supplies from another. Considering for a moment, all the bizarre things that had been taking place in the last day or so, was it beyond the realms of possibility that this latest round of ‘mishaps’ was one of those very importants playing games?
It was possible. The files on the way down had drawn particular attention to the fact that both the pegasus Rainbow Dash and the baker Pinkie Pie were well known pranksters. Panzer dismissed the idea however when he considered that poor Treadhead had nearly drowned when the earth he was standing on had suddenly become a mire of mud. Something so dangerous and mean spirited didn’t fit the MO of either jokester.
The other possibility was that they were receiving aid from a certain local band of fillies.
No, that was unlikely too given the lack of shouting.
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The cause of all the mishaps had finally decided to take a break. Despite all the problems Cloudy Sky had caused for the guard stallions they hadn’t let that break their work flow. In a way she swelled a little with pride at just how well they had coped with problem after problem. The fact that over half of those incidents had been total flukes didn’t dent her sense of accomplishment one bit. Maybe they would be a bit more careful around her darling Twilight Sparkle in future.