//------------------------------// // Chapter 07 - Wish You Were Here // Story: Music Sounds Better With You // by Proswagonist //------------------------------// Chapter 7 After waving goodbye, Alan and Vinyl Scratch find themselves sitting on the bike while the motor ran idle. "So, what do you wanna do now?" Vinyl Scratch asked her human companion. Alan scratched his chin for a moment, humming to himself. "Well, I don't know really. Want to just take a ride around town? You could show me around, I guess." he said with a shrug. "I'm down for that, yeah." Vinyl nodded before adding "Say, one question, though?" "Yeah?" "I gathered you weren't into social gatherings? How come you were asking Twilight to have more guests at the pad?" She asked. "You picked up on that huh?" Alan smiled. "Well, I'm trying to change a bad habit. I've got this weird, well, switch in my head. I can do things I'd normally be uncomfortable with if I'm already in an uncomfortable or just plain weird situation. Turns out, my best changes always happen at this sort of time, so I figure I'll start on this," Alan replied with another shrug, then hit the gas. "It's not like it could hurt." A couple hours later and Vinyl had pretty much shown Alan nearly the entire town, and the pair of them had stopped at Vinyl's favorite local restaurant. "I'm amazed. This menu's got a lot of stuff that sounds like things I could get at home. I'm not all that keen on this thing with the hay and daisies, though. Not quite things that agree with the human digestive system," Alan said with a chuckle. "Do they really use potatoes to make fries with on Earth?" Vinyl Scratch asked, her own menu folded in front of her. "Yeah, but honestly, there's a lot you can do with them, and I can't even name half of it," Alan replied with a smile. "Maybe I can introduce the idea a bit. I certainly don't want to bring EVERYTHING about Earth society here, but I'll gladly share the more useful or fun stuff if I can." Vinyl paused for a moment before asking "Do...you miss it?" Alan closed his eyes and smiled. "I miss how things were before Steve died. Him and dad an me were always up to something. Like, we had this thing we'd go to for a couple weeks in the summer called the society for creative anachronism, which is basically a bunch of guys in ancient armor themed protective gear wielding padded sticks as weapons and walloping the crap out of similarly armed dudes. The last one I was really able to participate in was two years ago, before my knee went bad." "That sounds like a lot of fun, actually." "It was. Even after my knee went bad, I took a first aid course so I could still go and have a role. Turns out, first aid providers get the better parking." Alan said with a chuckle, then took a deep breath. "So, yeah, I do miss home, back when it still felt like home. But I don't regret leaving. Not one bit." "No other relatives you're leaving behind?" Vinyl asked before taking a sip of water. "No other friends or girlfriends?" "I've got a rotten drunk of an uncle I'm leaving behind, but I can't even fathom considering him family anymore. As for friends, I had only a handful of people I really considered my friends, and they all eventually moved elsewhere. We kept in contact, but it just never felt the same." Alan stopped to count on his fingers before adding "And I haven't had a girlfriend in eight years, and the last one I had was batshit insane." Alan paused before looking to Vinyl with a smile "So how about you? I've been talking way too much about myself for my own likes lately, so let me hear about you some." "Fair enough. My dad is a blues singer named Bass Profundo. I've never known my mom, and dad won't talk about her much. I know she's alive, and probably lives somewhere in Manehattan. When I was growing up it was always just me and daddy. I never really seemed to connect with anypony, so I had a lot of acquaintances, but no real friends. Not until music school, anyway. I, eh, kinda went through a phase there, and ended up dating a mare who was going to school there for the exact opposite stuff I was. Her name was Octavia, but everypony just calls her Tavi for short. We had a thing for a while, but she started getting really possessive, and honestly, kinda mean in the sack. I'm REALLY glad I got out of that when I did. It was enough to put me off other girls." Vinyl said with a slight shudder. "You mentioned someone named Lyra earlier as your friend?" Alan noted. "Believe it or not, she's Tavi's cousin. I met her not long after Tavi and me started going out. She was in music school for classical studies like Tavi, but Lyra is waaaaaayyy more chill. A bit zonkers, but she's a good pony. It was actually my hanging out with Lyra that started Tavi's possessive streak." Vinyl chuckled a bit "So, I guess we both have batshit insane girls in our past." "Must be one of those universal constants, like gravity or bullshit." "Man, I hadn't had salmon in a while. The chef there really knows their stuff." Alan says while patting his now full stomach. "Sorry I couldn't chip in for the bill." "Dude, don't even worry about it. As long as I'm living at your house, I'm paying for stuff like this. I'm actually fairly successful, you know. I just like to live semi-modestly." Vinyl Scratch replied with a grin. For a moment, she forgot her glasses were gone and tried to adjust them slightly, only to be met with her bare temple. "hu.. oh, right, they're busted." Alan stopped in his tracks "What's wrong?" "I had these really killer shades I wore all the time. They kinda got blowed up with the rest of my stuff." Vinyl replied, her head hanging slightly. "I thought I saw you messing with a busted pair of shades when we first met. They looked like they were pretty cool when they were whole." "Oh man, you have NO idea. They were a custom job I had done by a specialty shop in Canterlot. I never went anywhere without-" Vinyl said before being interrupted by the sound of a crash and the voices of three panicking fillies. Wordlessly, Vinyl and Alan look to eachother and nodded before heading over to the source of the noise. Rounding the corner, they find a pile of what recently used to be a wagon cart along with a pegasus, unicorn, and earth pony filly in various states of pain. "Are you three okay?" Alan says, kneeling next to the butter yellow earth pony to look her over. "Ah think mah leg's broken," the filly says, with her face twisted in pain, struggling slightly to move before giving up and groaning "Eyup, definitely broke." "I'm not hurting badly anywhere" said the unicorn filly "What about you, Scootaloo?" "Just some ruffled feathers and a little cut. Applebloom, are you go... whoa. You're that human guy, right?" "Yeah I am. Listen I don't want to sound rude, but I can answer your questions in a minute here. Let me take care of your friend first. " Alan said while tearing strips of cloth off of his sleeve. "I need to make a splint. Vinyl, could you get the first aid kit from the bike's sidesaddle and Take care of her cut?" Vinyl Scratch replied with a nod and a quick "Sure" before zipping off to the bike. "What in the world were you three doing to cause this mess?" Alan asked while digging through the wreckage for a suitable piece of wood for his task. "This cart's really sturdy, so you'd have to have been traveling pretty fast to get it to smash like this." "Well..." all three girls began sheepishly. "We were trying to get our cutie marks in aerodynamic cart design." Sweetie Bell finally replied. Alan stopped, making a face like he had just watched a politician swallow a mouse on live television. Vinyl Scratch came back just in time to see Alan's brain stop. "Uh... Ok, not one bit of that sentence made any sense to me. What's a cutie mark?" By the time the three enthusiastic girls had explained to Alan the concept of a cutie mark, how one obtains it, and the nature of the trio's special club, his ears had started ringing and he had finished wrapping up Applebloom's broken leg. Promising he'd get their friend safely to the nearest hospital, Alan had Sweetie Bell and Scootaloo run along to go tell Applebloom's family where she'd be. Loading her into the bike's sidecar had been no trouble, since the filly was fairly light to him. The amazement of riding in such a foreign vehicle left the girl awed, and mercifully forgetful of how much her leg had hurt at the time. From there, barely any time had passed before Alan and Vinyl had delivered the wounded filly at the clinic, and a doctor and a pair of nurses had carted off Applebloom to have a more thorough examination. Tiredly, Alan sat down in the dirt besides his bike and let out a sigh. After a long moment, he looked up at the clouds on the horizon. "Yeah, we did good today," Alan said with the slightest of smiles.