On Track
Duke and Frost woke up at around six the next morning easily enough. Duke started his day of with push-ups, Frost with sit-ups. Amel still slept peacefully in her bed, snoring gently in the dark room.
The men went to checking their gear again, as they were so used to doing. Even back home, they wouldn’t be checking their gear quite this much, but in this world, there was nothing else for them to do at the moment. They couldn’t go out because it might arouse the suspicions of the locals. Ponies might be afraid of them and call the authorities. Overall, it was a much better idea to just stay put early in the morning.
When the men finished their warm-ups for the morning, they each took a shower. Duke went first, taking a short shower to avoid using much hot water. It was a hotel, but hey, one never knows when in a foreign land. Frost went next and took an equally short time. By the time they finished, Amel was just beginning to stir.
“So, boss,” Frost said as he walked out of the bathroom, towel wrapped around him. “What’s the game plan for where we go next?”
“I think we need to head to the capital of Equestria,” Duke said. “That’s where we’ll find the political and hopefully military leaders of the country. From what Amel told us, I think that these princesses just about control everything to some extent, so they’re going to be the ponies to talk to.”
“I don’t know, Frost said. “Do you think we can trust them?”
“About as much as we trusted Sauri,” Duke said. “We’ll need to walk like we’re on eggshells out there, because we probably will be. We don’t know how things work out here, and it’s important that we don’t make them think we hope to change that. These princesses might be nice, they might be dangerous.”
“They’re definitely going to be asking us to help them in return for helping us to find OGA, assuming they even do help us,” Frost said. “What can we do to avoid that? Combat search and Rescue is our thing, and it wouldn’t be too much of a problem, I don’t think.”
“Not much,” Duke said. “But I think I can handle most of that. If we’re going to get what we want, we’ll need more than just the support of the national leaders. You might have to take a bit of a PR role, get the nationals to support us, too.”
Frost took in a deep breath. “I get that,” Frost said. “But what can we limit our role to?”
“I think we can limit it solely to operational support and rescues,” Duke said. “I know that we won’t train any of their soldiers if they ask. And we’ll only go on missions that either involve the potential of finding OGA or if the mission is in exchange for OGA. We can’t ignore the possibility that they might want to use him as a bargaining chip.”
“Damn, I hadn’t considered that,” Frost said. “This is just getting more and more complicated by the second.”
“That’s why we’re special operators, Frost, because we have to think differently from anyone else.” Duke looked at Amel, who was just starting to sit up and rub her eyes. “And we aren’t exactly going into it blind. More like, partially blind due to cataracts.”
“That makes me feel better,” Frost replied. He looked over to Amel as well. “Are you waking up now?” he asked her.
Amel rubbed her eyes and looked at him. “Yes,” she said simply. “How did you men sleep?”
“Well enough,” Duke replied. “Now hurry it up and get ready to leave. We need to get moving if we want to get transportation to the capital without too much trouble.”
Amel rolled off the bed and stood up, blinking away her sleepiness. “I am ready,” she said. “Shall we go?”
“You’re not going to at least shower first?” Duke asked. “We did you the courtesy of not smelling for the trip. And you should have gotten a whiff of Frost last night.” Duke looked over at Frost. “Though you might have gotten a good whiff of him already.” Frost opened his mouth to reply, but Amel spoke first.
“I know he smells bad. I have gotten this ‘whiff’ of him that you speak of.” Duke suddenly started chuckling and Frost shot him an unhappy look. “What?”
“Just ignore him,” Frost said. “Go take your shower. Just make it fast.”
Amel, confused and still somewhat tired, did as Frost ordered and went to the bathroom to take her shower. When she walked in, she was fascinated by what she beheld. A beautiful bathroom, with marble tiles on the floor and walls, and a huge mirror over two large sinks. The running water in and of itself was incredible to her, as she had not seen much of that in Saddle Arabia, but the multiple controls for hot and cold were amazing. Only the palace had running water, and she was not permitted in those areas which had it.
She turned to the shower and found a problem. She had no idea how to use it. She had never even seen a shower like this, and had no reference of how to operate it. She tried pushing a nozzle on top of a faucet back and forth, but nothing seemed to start it. She also pushed down a button-like piece on the faucet. Still, nothing. She quickly grew embittered by the contraption.
“What’s taking so long?” Duke asked through the door. He knocked hard on it. “Trouble?”
“I do not know how it works,” Amel said.
Duke opened the door and walked in, finding a confounded Amel staring at the faucet in the shower. She had turned the temperature nozzle all the way to hot, so maybe it was good that she was lost. He approached and turned the nozzle to a reasonable temperature, then pulled another nozzle away from the wall, starting the stream of water. Amel jumped back at the sudden deluge with a yelp.
“I always hated hotel showers,” Duke commented. “It always takes forever to figure out how they work. Just use the normal ones that people use, I always think.”
Amel watched in wonder at the massive quantity of water coming down at the base of the tub. In her homeland, everyone always fought over water, even killed for it. They had enough here to let it stream over them and remove their filth.
“Thank you,” Amel said. “And I just stand in it?”
“Well, you should use soap and shampoo,” Duke said. Then he realized. “But you don’t use it often, do you?”
“Not on myself,” Amel said.
Duke contemplated whether or not it would be worth it to help her. After taking a good sniff of the air around Amel, hh determined that it was, indeed, worth it. He didn’t want to do it on his own, so he called in Frost. They had Amel step into the shower and used soap and shampoo to clean her off. There was an awkward silence the entire time, but when she came out, she looked and smelled like a new mare. It would do to attract a little less attention, or at least negative attention.
“Nice and clean,” Duke said. “Feel better?”
“I feel funny,” Amel said. “My coat feels so... light.”
“It should, since it hasn’t got all that crap all over it now,” Frost said. “You’ll get used to the feeling.”
“Of being washed by my human friends?” Ame said with a raised eyebrow.
“No,” Duke replied. “Of being clean. You can do it yourself. If you want help, though, I can make Frost do it.”
“Thanks a million, boss,” Frost said.
The group packed all its gear and headed out to find the train station. The mare at the front desk of the hotel accepted their key suspiciously, as if they had done something to it or the room it went to. They carried the gear out of the building to find their way to the train station.
They hailed a cab pulled by a large stallion, and asked him to bring them to the train station. The guy had stopped after seeing Amel, not noticing the men at either side behind her. When he spotted them, he immediately bolted. When they hailed another one, they were able to talk the guy into taking them to a train station. When they arrived, they handed him the fare he asked for and sent him on his way without trouble.
The train station had few enough ponies at it. Most who were there froze and stared at the sight of the humans and Amel. On the way in, Duke and Frost let them stare and simply kept going. Amel, feeling conscious about how different she looked now, couldn’t ignore them. She was used to being ignored at home, with the attention going to either man at her side. Now, she couldn’t shake the idea that she was being looked at.
They went to the main building, a good-sized set of rooms next to two tracks, and dropped their bags. On the platform around them were several other ponies, standing alone, and then a small group. The small group seemed to consist of young stallions on a mission of mischief, giggling their little hearts away at some joke one of them told.
“Amel, you stay here,” Duke said, putting his hand on Frost’s shoulder. “We’re gonna go get some train tickets.”
“To where?” Amel asked.
“Whatever direction we need to start going to get to the capital,” Duke explained.
Duke and Frost entered the small building with the bag of bits from the previous day, leaving the gear with Amel to guard it. She still had her knife that Frost bought for her in Saddle Arabia, and she had been careful to keep it hidden so that even Duke and Frost wouldn’t know she had it, so she felt a little bit safer. For her shower, she hadn’t worn it, but put it on immediately after getting out.
So she stood silently over the pile of gear, watching the ponies around her with a sense of mild paranoia and distrust. The stallions in the group were particularly disconcerting, as they seemed to look at her every now and then and turn away when she noticed. She had her eyes on them. But then, they weren’t the ones who turned out to e the troublemakers.
“Hey, pretty lady,” a stallion said as he approached Amel from behind. She spun to face him. “You shouldn’t be out here all alone. Aren’t you lonely? Maybe you should spend the wait nice and safe with a big, strong stallion?” He added a disturbing attempt at a seductive grin at the end.
Amel had a feeling she knew what he meant. “No, thank you,” she said. “My friends are just inside and should be out shortly.”
“Come on, we can still have a dance or two,” the stallion said, getting closer. He put his hoof out to touch Amel, but she backed away.
“No,” she said. She put her hoof into her mane, where her knife was. “Please, go away.”
“Aww, now you’re hurting my feelings,” the stallion said. In the background, the mischievous group stopped chattering. “Come on. I promise, it’ll be fun.”
“I said, no,” Amel said. She was starting to grow afraid.
The stallion lunged forward and grabbed Amel’s left wrist. “Well, why not make it easier for us both, then?”
Amel put her right hoof into her mane and whipped out the knife, unfolding it like Frost showed her and shoving it forward toward the stallion. The stallion recoiled at the presence of the deadly weapon, just going back far enough to avoid being stabbed. When Amel landed with the knife hoof, she went to stab at him again, but he sidestepped it and tried to move around her.
Suddenly, the group of mischievous stallions was there and on top of the attacker, pulling him aside and throwing him toward the train tracks. Before he could adequately respond, two of them were on him and kicking him into submission, angrily yelling at him with strange accents. Another two started at the stallion, and the last one stood between the group and Amel.
She looked at them, befuddled. “Thank you,” she said.
“Oi, no worries,” the nice stallion said. “We’re from Buckston, where we don’t take too kindly tah bad apples like him.” He turned to see him buddies dragging the stallion away. “May the wind be at your back.” With that, he walked away.
Amel stared at the departed, dumbfounded. Back home, she would have been left to be attacked because she was a slave. Here, in Equestria, random strangers jumped in to save her. Much like what Frost and Duke did in Saddle Arabia.
The two men walked out of the building with three train tickets. “We heard a scuffle,” Frost said, going to Amel and kneeling down. “You okay?”
Amel nodded. “Yes, I am alright,” she said. “A nice group of stallions took care of me. Sounded funny.”
“I heard someone say ‘Buckston’ from inside,” Duke said. “Must be a regional accent.”
The group waited for their train to arrive at seven thirty-six. Duke and Frost were able to get tickets directly to the city of Canterlot, the capital of Equestria. They were told that the train ride would take most of the day, so they bought first class tickets so they could get food while on the train.
When the train arrived, ponies started filing out, and as they came out and noticed the humans, they would part to either side like they were the Red Sea. Duke and Frost took the lead forward, cutting a path through the crowd to the train.
It was nice inside, much nicer than most other trains the men had been on. This one had, at least in first class, tables you could eat at in one car and private rooms in which you sleep in the attached car. The floor was carpeted and all the furniture was made of some exotic hardwood. The seats were all velvet and well-cushioned, and very comfortable to sit on.
The group took a table and sat down. There were menus sitting on the table, and they had yet to eat breakfast, so they picked them up and inspected them for their options. It was all what Duke and Frost would refer to as “vegetarian” options, not very appetizing, but they had to eat something. The men went with simple salads and set their menus down.
“So, what do you think this city is going to be like?” Frost asked of Duke. “I mean, it sounds like ‘Camelot’, so when I imagine it, I think of Britishisms. There can’t be a coincidence there, not with everything else that we’ve seen.”
“I’d be convinced,” Duke said. “But I bet it’s a little more like Washington, back home. As the definite political capital, and with what I’ve perceived as some modern policies and a pretty modern society. They have electricity and such, so I think of it as being like nineties America at the earliest.”
“I hope it isn’t like D.C.,” Frost said. “The last thing we need is politicians as frustrating ours in a foreign country in which we’re operating.”
“The last thing we want is any politician making our job more difficult,” Duke said. “Avoid those ponies as much as possible. It’ll only be trouble if we get stuck dealing with them or making arrangements.”
“Only deal with the national leaders,” Frost summarized.
“Exactly,” Duke said.
A service mare came by and stopped to gawk at the military-clad humans sitting in the car. The men waited for a moment, but when the mare didn’t speak, they just stated which salads they wanted, and Amel did the same. Embarrassed at her own rudeness, the mare took the orders and continued along her way.
“So,” Amel said. “What will you do with all that money when we arrive?”
Frost looked at the sack of money and thought. They still had about eight hundred fifty bits left. It was a lot of money, and it was also a lot of weight to carry. He wasn’t interested in lugging it around everywhere.
“We’ll need to find a bank that takes money from foreigners,” Frost said. “I really hope we find one. This stuff’s heavy.”
“If it’s the capital, you can bet there will be,” Duke said. “Just be careful where you decide on. We might not use it after we leave, but money is money, and we’d rather keep it and not need it than lose it and find ourselves stuck.”
“I have heard horses and ponies talk about their banks before, during my old master’s dinners,” Amel said. “I think the one they trust most is called Harmony Vault Bank.”
“Well, that’s where we’ll be headed, then,” Frost said.
After that conversation, they didn’t talk much. The men fidgeted about, checking things and looking out the window. Amel stared at them the whole way. Thinking about it, she didn’t know a ton about them outside their military personas. She knew about Frost’s family, but she didn’t know about them specifically. She didn’t know what they liked to do, where they spent most of their free time, if they had any, or even about their culture. She had been with them for a while, yet still knew so little.
She didn’t like the silence, so she thought about how to ask them about their personal lives. From how they had described their jobs before, they might not be inclined to talk about their personal lives, though. There had to be some things that would seem normal to talk about, simple things.
“So,” Amel began, addressing Duke. “What do you do for fun?”
Duke sniffed. “What?” he said, looking over at Amel. “Uh, I just sort of go out with friends, usually to a bar not far from whatever base I’m at. We tell jokes, share stories, stuff like that.”
“Nothing else?” Amel asked. She found his answer unsatisfactory.
Duke shrugged. “Well, I...” He thought. “I have a bit of a management position, so I’m busy a lot of the time. I enjoy my job, most days, though, so my life is good.”
Now Amel could accept his answer. “You, Frost?” she asked.
Frost contemplated the question before answering. “We enlisted boys are a little less rigid most of the time than the officers,” he said. “Once you get to a high enough rank, you’re an NCO, so you get some level of management, but most of us do what Duke said; we hang out, head to the bar, stuff like that. We also like to have competitions, see who’s best in some physical activity. Money is usually-” He glanced at Duke. “Not involved.” Duke snorted.
“Just like when we talk about which of you will win, money is not involved,” Duke said. Frost gave a small laugh.
“But it is very similar?” Amel asked.
Frost shrugged. “Well, Duke really hit the nail on the head; we do it because we want to. We worked hard to get to where we are, so if we didn’t enjoy it, or thought we wouldn’t, we wouldn’t have signed up. We’re among the lucky few who can do what we want for a living and enjoy it.”
“The lucky few?” Amel asked. Both men nodded.
“Most of the time, and it’s especially true for those who enlist, they get assigned a job, and don’t often get to pick it. Unless it’s a specific thing, like SEALs, or PJs, like us, you don’t try out for anything. Most guys get a job, get trained for it, and go out.” Duke shrugged as he finished.
“That sounds a lot like gryphon society,” Amel said.
“They sound like a military society, then,” Duke replied.
Amel nodded. “Yes, very. I think the most war-oriented species in the world. They do very much with war paint and armor to signify their fighting prowess, and have many battle customs.”
“What kinds of customs are those?” Frost asked.
“Mostly about earning appearance and status,” Amel said. “I know very little.”
“Everything helps,” Duke said.
Their food came and they ate quickly. Once they were done, they moved out of the eating car and into the sleeping car, where they searched briefly for a room to rest in and kill the time of the ride. At this point, it seemed like they were more often just killing time than actually searching for their charge.
They closed and locked the door and sat down. There were four beds, two sets of two beds, one on top of the other, on either side of the relatively small room. Amel Hopped up to one of the beds on top and lay down. Frost was on the bed under her, Duke across from them on the bottom bunk. They had been carrying the gear with them the whole time, so Duke moved off of the bottom bunk and they put it there, and he took the top bunk.
Amel giggled as she watched Duke try to lie down, but the bed wasn’t long enough. he had to keep his legs bent at least thirty degrees, and they had to go to either side, because there wasn’t enough room on top for them to go up. Beneath Amel, Frost had enough space to keep his legs going up, but bumped Amel’s bunk several times.
Eventually, Duke lay down on his side, facing Frost and Amel. Amel could hear Frost adjust under her, also facing out. It didn’t look like a comfortable position. After a short time, Duke grew tired of his position and rolled off the bed and landed on the floor. There, he started going through his gear again, organizing it into two piles; his gear and Frost’s; and then into sub-groups based on the items.
Amel quickly grew bored. “What shall we do to pass the time?” she wondered aloud. Duke only grunted in response.
“Well, I know this game that Rangers liked to play when they were on patrol in Iraq,” Frost said. “It’s called Riddle Me This. I tell you a riddle, you try to answer it.”
Amel smiled and clopped her hooves together. “That sounds like fun!”
Duke continued checking the gear while Frost and Amel spoke in riddles and rhymes for most of the rest of the way, with everyone thinking about what awaited them once they arrived at the capital.