//------------------------------// // Chapter 10 // Story: Joe // by JMDARE //------------------------------// They had been walking for several minutes with Pinkie Pie chattering and Spike trying to keep up with her rapid changes of subject and the strange links she made between them. It was pleasant weather and pleasant company but Joe found himself mired in gloom as each step, or bounce from Pinkie Pie, took them closer to the Diamond Dogs. “You look as sad as Cranky,” commented Pinkie Pie, boinging ahead and then across Joe’s path to circle him. “What you thinking about?” “I was thinking about you jumping on my shoulders yesterday,” Joe replied, adding hurriedly, “which was not an invitation.” “Silly! Would be Spike’s turn to carry me today.” “I could try,” Spike said dubiously. Pinkie Pie giggled and then gave Joe what passed for a frown with her. “Why would that make you look sad though?” “I’ve been cautious with this armour,” Joe sighed. “As I said to the Cutie Mark Crusaders the plates are not that thick, the chainmail sleeves not full length and it only comes to mid-thigh rather than knee, the chain is not as dense as it could be, and I’ve no armour on my legs. All of which to save weight.” “What’s that got to do with Pinkie Pie jumping on you?” asked Spike, looking baffled at the apparent change of subject, even with the practice in baffling changes of subject Pinkie Pie had been giving him. “With all respect to her svelte shapeliness,” Joe said, giving her a little nod-bow and getting a smile in return, “and the grace of her landing I’d have expected my knees to have buckled a little. Or the knees of almost any man, with what I’d consider normal strength.” “That was why I jumped on him,” added Pinkie Pie. “Twilight said Discord had made Joe as strong for his size as a Pony, so I wanted to test how strong the magic had made him.” “So yesterday proved I’d been too cautious,” Joe said, managing a smile. “I’d tried to make sure the armour was light enough I could easily wear it, but with how effective the magic has been I could have been working the other way. Aiming for something heavier than ‘normal’, rather than as light or lighter.” “You’re worried about the Diamond Dogs?” Spike asked. “I am hoping I won’t regret having skin that is bare or covered only with cloth, and that where I do have armour it is thick enough,” Joe replied before chuckling. “I’d reassure myself that someone dressed like this would still be regarded as well armoured, but ‘myself’ would argue that it depends how strong the Diamond Dogs are.” “We managed to buck them off when they tried pouncing,” said Pinkie Pie, shifting from a bounce into some rodeo moves. “Good you were able to get them to buck off,” Joe nodded, deadpan. “Last time, with Rarity, we were able to mine a lot before they noticed,” said Spike, adding his own reassurances, “and I’m not asking you, either of you, to go further than the edges of where they might be.” “Hopefully we’ll be able to get in and out without trouble,” Joe said, nodding again. “And if they do attack us, then so much the worse for them!” Spike declared, waving around a stick he had found. Joe blinked at this and then started to parry as Spike thrust and slashed at him with that fearsome weapon. How a Dragon, with teeth and claws, raised by Ponies, without hands, had picked up the concept of swordplay was a mystery to add to all the others. And a mystery that seemed less important to Joe than whether to offer to lend Spike his knife, it was not large but compared with the size of Spike it would be almost a dagger. Then one attack and parry let the stick meet the edge rather than the flat of Joe’s spearhead. “Whoa,” said Spike, looking at the effects of that relatively light encounter between wood and metal. “The smith did good work,” Joe agreed, glancing at how neatly the edge had cut through the stick. Spike discarded the half of the stick that had been left in his handpaw and Joe made an effort to join the conversation as they made their way into danger. It became clear that Spike was underestimating the difficulty of finding the gems without Rarity and her talent there to locate them. Spike had to admit this and had to also admit how Twilight Sparkle would have reacted if he’d asked her to come here to find gems, which she could use her general talent for magic to do, though with more effort than Rarity. Joe was tempted to use these admissions to argue they should give up, but it was no surprise Twilight Sparkle would be angry and he was feeling stubborn. It might be the lingering feeling of unreality but he’d started the ‘quest’ so he was going to finish it. Eventually they reached their rather unpromising looking destination. Joe glanced for pebbles that might dull the blade and then stabbed his spear into the ground to free that hand. Then he cursed under his breath as he went to shrug his backpack off. “Problem?” Spike asked. “Going to have to unfasten this strap, rather than just loosen it to slide it down the arm,” replied Joe, “either that or take my shield off and, even if it’s going to make digging more awkward, I’d rather keep that on.” Pinkie Pie bounced around looking for anything sparkly as Joe unfastened the strap and lowered the backpack to the ground. Then slid the mattock with its straight shaft free before unfastening the strap holding the shovel, since the crosspiece at the top of its longer shaft meant he couldn’t just slide it out. Joe looked at Spike and Pinkie Pie as they looked around. “Anything?” “Nope!” Pinkie Pie replied, sounding just as cheerful as ever. “I am sure there were some around here,” muttered Spike, making a quick hole and peering into it. Despite the extra trouble it had caused by needing the strap to be unfastened Joe was pleased he had brought the shovel. It looked like he had been right to think they might have to dig quite an area up, though at least from the hole Spike had made it seemed they wouldn’t have to dig deep as well as broad. Pinkie Pie was still bouncing in an apparently random search and Spike wandering and pausing to make more small holes as Joe took a moment to think. Then he picked up his mattock and drove the pick-end into the reasonably soft soil to root it. He unfastened the strap holding the coil of rope, glad that he’d the spare after having had to leave one with that crocodile, and loosely wrapped one end around the adze-end of the mattock. Taking no chances and picking up his spear to take it with him he walked and uncoiled the rope, keeping it slightly taut as he did. Joe dropped the rest of the coil of rope on top of the bush he’d aimed at and returned to his backpack and the shovel beside it in a series of long strides, pausing every other stride to kick a scuff mark with a boot heel. His roughly equidistant marks along a relatively straight line produced Joe picked up his shovel and began to work back towards the bush. Most of the test pits he dug along that rope, either on that first line or when he re-laid it along others, produced nothing and even when he did find something and widened and deepened the hole he was not finding a huge amount. Pinkie Pie and Spike seemed to be having just as much success with her jumping around and telling Spike to dig, sometimes several hops away from the last hole and sometimes right next to it. It was good they were all having some luck with their different methods but the evidence of their success was giving Joe another concern. That they would be digging gems up rather than mining them out of rock had already seemed strange but mountains could shatter and crumble and their remains be buried by drifting soil. What they were finding though were not stones and boulders with veins of gems running through them or even just those gems stripped bare by erosion. The gems they were digging up, and which the other two seemed to find unremarkable, were already polished and cut so Joe had to wonder if they were looting buried caches. He didn’t know enough about archaeology to be able to judge the acidity of the soil, or recognise the stains they might have left, but it did seem possible these had been in cloth bags that had since rotted away. And if these were gems that had been mined elsewhere and processed and then buried for safety that was not promising for how the Diamond Dogs might react. “Wheee-eeeek!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed, breaking into Joe’s gloomy thoughts. Dismissing whether the attempt to enslave Rarity could be considered an attempt to force her to repay the same theft they were performing Joe stuck his shovel into the ground and pulled his spear out of it. He knew very little about the last time Spike and the others were here and should have his mind on the present rather than the past anyway. Trying to look casual Joe strolled across to where the small Dragon and Pink Mare were. “My Pinkie-sense is twitching,” said Pinkie Pie as soon as Joe got close. “We’re being watched.” “Pinkie-se…” Joe began before he gave a slight shake of his head. That Pinkie Pie had some sort of extra perception made no less sense than anything else about her, or about this world. He stabbed his spear back into the ground and, trying to not appear as if he was hurrying, pulled his cap on and began to unbuckle the chinstrap to free his helmet from his belt… A trio of what Joe assumed were Diamond Dogs stepped out from behind a bush and were immediately glared at by Spike. Attempting to not show any concern Joe finished putting his helmet on and plucked his spear back into his hand. Then he calmly looked at them and tried to let the silence build. “You had better not try anything!” Spike warned them, breaking the silence. “Hrah! You try to take our gems!” retorted the middle Diamond Dog. “You ones that are trying something!” “We ones that willing to make deal,” Joe said, talking a short step forward. “Offer one gem in ten as payment.” “Why we take such deal?” scowled the Diamond Dog, also taking a step forward. “We can take all you dug and make you dig more.” “Would make this a bad day,” Joe replied, “be a bad day for me having to kill, but be a worse day for you being dead.” “Huh, Ponies not kill,” snorted one of the other Diamond Dogs. “I am not a Pony,” Joe said, raising his spear a little. “Neither am I,” added Spike, letting out a little puff of fire and hoping they’d not realise that was about as much flame as he could produce. “I am!” Pinkie Pie said cheerfully. “But… grrr!” “You do not want me to describe what a human nation would have done to your people if you had kidnapped one of their own,” added Joe. “How we would deal with a lair of slavers and predators on our borders.” “I not scared,” the lead Diamond Dog replied, jutting his chin out. Joe was not impressed by this, he’d met real Bulldogs and in some ways they were more his nation’s animal than the official Lions or Leopards. “But we take twice as much, take a quarter, and let you mine.” “Twice a tenth is a fifth,” Joe frowned, the expression mostly wasted as his forehead was protected by his helmet. “Okay, we accept a fifth,” replied the Diamond Dog at once, suspiciously quickly. “A fifth does seem fair,” Joe nodded, “whether you genuinely thought a quarter was twice a tenth, or whether that ‘mistake’ was a negotiating tactic to draw me into saying that by correcting you.” The Diamond Dog looked even more shifty. “You just make sure our gems put separate.” Joe nodded to him again as the trio retreated, then he moved back the step to where he could speak softly with Pinkie Pie and Spike. “I am not sure where those words came from,” he admitted, “but as I am wearing armour, carrying a spear, and my companions are a Pink Pony and a small Dragon I suppose it makes sense I’d make the sort of threats a fantasy warrior might.” “Seemed to work,” Spike said before giving Joe a worried look. “Do we want to know what humans would have done to them?” “Probably not,” chuckled Joe, giving Spike a smile. “Actually we’d have been fairly gentle about it all these days, but… let’s just say that the humans who wore similar armour to this two millennia ago would not have been, and I’d have described some of their more… imaginative… ways of dealing with those outside their borders who posed a threat.” “So we don’t want to know.” “Would make it a bad day,” agreed Joe, before adding, “though not as bad as having to kill, and nowhere near as bad as becoming dead.” “So it still might be bad,” Spike whispered, “they might be going to attack us despite the offer.” “I am still getting warning itchie-twitchies,” agreed Pinkie Pie. “Follow me please,” Joe said, starting towards his backpack. Then he raised his voice. “They would have to be very stupid to have confronted us before they were ready!” “We not stupid!” a voice protested from a different bush than the one the trio had stepped out from behind. “Sssshhh!” another voice chided from behind the same bush. “And it seems they are that stupid,” Joe muttered, stabbing his spear into the ground and upending his backpack, “so let’s get the gems sorted and leave.” “Okay,” agreed Spike, watching Joe count four and one, “though I was hoping for a few more, especially since we are losing a fifth.” Joe sighed and looked to his other companion. “How accurate is your Pinkie-sense? Can you tell when they are going to ambush rather than watch?” “I’m not sure,” Pinkie Pie admitted, looking and sounding more serious than normal. “It would be a different twitch, but I couldn’t be sure that was what the twitch meant.” Joe nodded and finished sorting the gems from his backpack as he thought. “We’d need to leave at a moment’s notice,” he mused, “so I had better get my rope coiled and tools strapped to my backpack and that strapped on my back, whether we linger or not.” “Okie-dokie-loki!” Pinkie Pie said, swinging her head left and right to unfasten the flaps of her panniers. Then she plopped onto her back so those, as well as her, were upside down and squirmed around a little to empty them. While Spike sorted those gems onto the pile or into Joe’s backpack Joe hauled the free end of his rope in. He considered trying to drag the mattock to him but each time he’d done it he’d not wrapped the other end that tightly and had made sure the point was well rooted. So instead he walked back along the rope, careful of the holes he’d dug and of how awkward carrying his spear was while he was doing this, to coil the rope as he went and retrieve his other tool. Pinkie Pie began her random looking bouncing as Joe strapped his shovel to his backpack and slid the mattock back into its strap, her first demand for Spike to dig coming as Joe slid the backpack strap up his speararm and hauled at the other strap to refasten it, and the first new gem coming as Joe tightened both straps. Joe stood guard for several minutes and tried to look intimidating and alert. And to not wish too fervently for grenades or a flamethrower as he saw bushes rustle with more than the slight breeze. Eventually Pinkie Pie paused and gave them both a look. Joe nodded to her as Spike added what seemed the final gem to Pinkie Pie’s panniers. Then as they joined him Joe looked at a bush close to where they’d pass to leave. “I am quite impressed by your flames,” Joe said, louder than needed for the two to hear him, “how large can you make them?” “I… don’t know,” replied Spike, giving Joe a strange look. “Perhaps we should test it?” Joe winked as he pointed with his spear. “I bet you could not engulf that entire bush.” “Oh!” said Spike, catching on. “I bet I can…” There was a loud rustle and the three Diamond Dogs that had shown themselves before showed themselves again. The slightly smaller one that had been doing most of the talking glowered at Joe and Spike. “Hello again!” Pinkie Pie said cheerfully. “Indeed,” nodded Joe, adding in a deadpan tone. “What a surprise. I had no idea you were hiding there.” The three Diamond Dogs moved towards the trio of Dragon, human, and Pony. “Where the rest of our gems?” hissed the middle one. “You watched us dig and watched us sort those we had dug before,” Joe replied, moving to meet him. “So you know that pile is the agreed share.” “And if we want more?” said the Diamond Dog, coming within arm’s reach and leaning forward intimidating as he bared his teeth. Then his expression changed in a blink and he audibly gulped. “Do you want me to move my spearhead?” Joe asked with a pleasant smile. “It’s sharp enough it could shave some fur off, but, alas, I don’t think I could move it subtly enough to only remove fur.” “Bah,” choked the Diamond Dog. “Go.” Joe pulled his spear back from where the head of it had been lightly resting, his grip on the shaft nearer the butt end than usual as he’d needed a little bit of extra reach. A small gesture with head and shield, and the spear levelled at his gut, persuaded the Diamond Dog to step aside, his two friends following suit and all three glowering as the trio passed. Spike hopped up onto Pinkie Pie’s back to sit facing backwards and cheerfully waved to the Diamond Dogs as he kept an eye on them. The watching for an attack being more welcome to Joe than the waving that could annoy them enough to provoke such an attack. “Would you really have cut his…” Spike asked, twisting to face Joe a little. “Clean off,” said Joe, “and hopefully been able to finish the fight before I puked my guts up.” He paused and looked to Pinkie Pie. “Metaphorically.” “Oooh, wait until I tell…” Pinkie Pie began. “Don’t. Mention. It,” interrupted Joe. “Ooops,” Pinkie Pie smiled. “Lips are sealed.” “Which is okay here as no buns,” said Joe, returning the smile. Then he glanced back. “I think we are out of sight, so it would not besmirch our dignity to pick up the pace.” “Yeee-hah! Ride it Spike!” Pinkie Pie said, breaking into a surprisingly sudden gallop. “Waaaaahhhhh!” cried Spike, almost falling off and saved only by a desperate grab at the panniers. Joe took a moment to react and a moment longer to decide protesting he hadn’t meant by that much would be useless. He started to sprint in pursuit and was not surprised that Pinkie Pie was outdistancing him. Joe dug deep and tried to run faster, hoping he’d not be too out of breath and Pinkie Pie would not be too far ahead by the time she realised or remembered he was not as fast as her. But as he continued to sprint and wait for when he would need to slow to a more sustainable pace Joe began to become a little puzzled and impressed with himself. It seemed the jog out of the Everfree had been very much within his limits and there might be a small chance he’d catch up through his own efforts. One of the oldest human hunting methods was ‘chase thing until it tired, then hit with rock until it dead’ and this had worked on horses, though Joe doubted it would work on Pinkie Pie with her almost boundless energy and didn’t think it was far enough back into Ponyville anyway. So it was more like a very very small chance and the question became moot anyway as Joe saw that Pinkie Pie had slowed and, as he caught up, that she was not looking tired enough for that to have been forced on her rather than her choice. “What am I going to tell Twilight, or Rarity?” Spike asked, having managed to turn to face ahead and able to speak now Pinkie Pie was only cantering and he was not clinging on so desperately. “Ooh! I know…” said Pinkie Pie, giving Spike a glance over her shoulder as Joe matched her pace. “There was a great big mean scary Dragon and you found his lair and his hoard, and confronted him… snuck past him… to gain your prize!” “Risking all for fair lady,” Joe said, the rhythm of his words defined by how he had to control his breathing. “A heroic feat.” “I like the sound of that!” grinned Spike, before he looked a little more unsure. “But that did happen when I found a cave to shelter in, and Twilight and Owlowiscious had to save me, so she’d be very upset with me if she thought I had done it on purpose rather than by accident.” “Speaking selfishly I’d rather she was upset with you than with me,” Joe admitted, “but let’s try to avoid her being upset with any of us.” “So what am I going to tell her?” “You must have had some time to yourself,” Joe mused, “so maybe you took a walk and found a small vein of gems, in a cave or exposed by a landslide?” “That might work,” agreed Spike, “but what if they wanted to see?” “Hmm, true. Even if they didn’t want to check your story they’d be right to think they’d be able to find gems there that we’d missed.” They continued for a few minutes in silence. To Joe’s relief, as he was beginning to feel the strain, Pinkie Pie slowed a little and perhaps the extra little bit of breath available for brain rather than legs helped. “A mountain stream?” he suggested. “Some gems washed down by the spring melt floods…” “Dashie and the weather teams are careful when they wrap up winter,” commented Pinkie Pie. “Try to avoid floods.” Joe blinked and looked at her, before returning his eyes to avoiding tripping over anything. What she meant by that he didn’t know, but it was probably irrelevant for now. “Still, if we were picking gems up from a streambed then the flow of water would soon remove any signs of digging.” “They still might want to see,” Spike pointed out. “True again, and be hard to find a stream which would fit the story. Maybe just say you found the vein and want to keep where it is a secret so you can surprise them again… though not be much surprise the second time… ah, I don’t know.” “What were you going to tell them Spikey?” Pinkie Pie asked. “What?” “You must have had some idea how you were going to explain the gems,” Joe said, realising what Pinkie Pie meant. “Er…” “Is that an ‘er, I didn’t think of that’,” Joe asked, feeling suspicious, “or an ‘er, I was going to drop Joe in the crap with the truth’?” “An ‘er, I didn’t think how much I’d be dropping you in the crap’?” replied Spike, looking nervous. “More reason to avoid Ponyville for me, not that I was going to enter the town while armed and armoured… and I could do with a pause.” “Okie-dokie-loki,” Pinkie Pie said cheerily, slowing to a stop, “getting tired?” “Surprisingly not,” shrugged Joe, also stopping, “but easier to take my helmet off while standing still and if Spike holds my spear.” “Sure,” Spike said. Joe nodded and put the butt end of the spear onto the ground next to Pinkie Pie, Spike reaching out one dragon handpaw to steady it as Joe lent it towards him and her. With an effort Spike managed to lift the spear and get it couched between his arm and side as if it was a lance. Joe paused in unbuckling his helmet chinstrap and wondered if that was knowledge, since Rainbow Dash had mentioned jousting, or just seemed the obvious way to hold it. In either case it was unwise as without a saddle with prongs to wrap around his thighs or stirrups to brace his feet into he’d be knocked off by the impact of his own weapon. Deciding to not advise Spike about this, or the alternate method of driving a thinner lance, more a spear, down from above your shoulder, as it would require more mention of human horse riding Joe finished removing his helmet. He rebuckled the chinstrap through his belt, tucked the cap back under his belt at the other side, and retrieved his spear before Spike could do anything silly. “Still,” Joe said as they jogged back into motion, “Spike found gems somewhere and we helped him get them. Or if Pinkie Pie can carry all the gems you could say was only you two, that way you can go straight into Ponyville rather than having to divert back to my hut.” “I don’t know,” replied Spike. “Pinkie’s panniers are quite full, and you deserve some of the credit.” “Credit could lead to blame, and we could probably perch my backpack on top of the panniers. Though I’d take the shovel and mattock off so Pinkie doesn’t have to carry those.” Joe paused. “Which still leaves the problem of the gems already being cut and polished.” “What do you mean?” asked Spike, sounding baffled. “That they look like that rather than freshly dug,” Joe replied, sounding as baffled at why Spike was baffled, “the ones that are rounded rather than faceted could have been smoothed by the water but…” Joe stopped as he saw the expression the small Dragon and Pink Pony were giving him. For a moment he rejected the idea but then he said, more than asked, “Gems come out of the ground already cut and polished here?” “How else were you expecting the gems to look?” asked Spike. “Fairly dull,” Joe said, “still translucent but not transparent and sparkling until a Gemcutter shaped them.” He shook his head. “So much for that trade here.” Spike gave Joe another eloquently puzzled look. If there was something Dragons were expert in it was gems and this was bizarre. “I’m not sure about not mentioning your help,” he said finally, “wouldn’t it be obvious from us having your backpack?” “Probably,” Joe shrugged, “could just say I had lent you the bag, which I would have done, but that is only a half-truth.” “And half truths are not proper full truths,” Pinkie Pie reminded them. “I’d not expect either of you to lie, and this is getting a bit murky, but though I might have let my chivalrous instincts…” Joe stopped as Pinkie Pie began to giggle. “What?” he asked, turning the giggles into full blown laughter at his expression. “Horse… instincts…” Pinkie Pie managed to choke out, nearly making Spike fall from her back with her happy shaking. “Hor…” blinked Joe, then he remembered what the root word of Chivalry was and sighed. “I may have let good manners draw me into going but I don’t want trouble with or questions from Ponies a third day in a row.” “I hear you,” Spike nodded.