Flying to Dodge was something else, and the brown overcoat I was wearing in place of my uniform was only part of the reason. The thought that I was trying too hard not to be seen had crossed my mind, both when I was buying it in town and when I was putting in on back at the hotel, but the only other options were to either go in my uniform or without anything at all, and having my cutie mark hidden was still a step in the right direction. No, the flight to Dodge was special for another reason: I had used sky-chariots before, but the taximare was doing everything in her power to undermine my confidence in them. As soon as we cleared the grassy fields around Baltimare and the city was once again a gray blur on the horizon, she turned the chariot towards the ground and gave it her all. I held on with all my strength. After the initial shock from the sudden burst of speed, I slowly came to the realization that I could make out the individual trees on the rapidly approaching forest. And then the leafs on the trees. A chill went through my spine.
What is she doing?!
I was already preparing to hunker down and curl up for the impending crash, when the mare abruptly leveled the chariot over the treetops and continued with breakneck speed. Branches rushed by, birds flew off from their nests and scattered in fear, and it was only now that I had a moment to appreciate the sensation of the wind warping my face, and that I was still in one piece. Even as we approached the Filly Hills, and the forest gave way to ever thinner shrubs as the altitude climbed, she kept us as low to the ground as possible; throwing a quick glance to both sides every now and then for any signs of life on the ground. But while she was busy executing a premeditated maneuver, I was starting to enjoy myself.
Cold currents of air cut through the ever diminishing warmth radiating from the ground, and sent refreshing shockwaves along my back, each countering the adrenaline surging through my veins. When the peaks of the hills closed in, I suddenly realized I was on my very own roller coaster - one with an unparalleled view. The only thing missing was some cotton candy and me vomiting in a trashcan. The glare of the snowcapped peaks went by too quickly, and I had a huge grin on my face as we crossed over to the other side, massive forests spreading in front of us and the tiny triangle of the Canterlot Mountain standing guard at the horizon; a white dot pinpointed the castle. A river flashed by below us at some point, before more speeding treetops appeared, but then the scenery around us started changing.
The trees grew rarer and I could feel gentle grains of dust getting caught in my fur and mane. A warm wind replaced the cool air of the mountains as the desert came fully into view; en endless field of orange-brown stretching to the horizon. The taximare slowed down the further away from the Filly Hills we were, then stopped entirely, nearly landing the chariot on the dried up ground below. Before I could ask anything, she started a gentle climb, using the forest in the distance behind as the cover for making it look like we were just taking off. As we rose higher, a series of sharp shapes came into view, rising from the light brown dust of the desert.
Dodge City.
It was an optimistic name. Dodge was nothing more than a town with a comically oversized statue of… something at its center. The buildings were spread in a circle around it; small and submissive against the statue, as if they were bowing to it. A single desolate road went into the town, hugging the statue all around before ending at the salvage yard just out of town. There was only one thing I couldn't really discern - there were sharp rectangular silhouettes in the desert grass around the town. If the town were surrounded by fields, I would have thought some artsy pony had made those shapes by flattening the wheat, but seeing as this was a desert it was less probable. Not that I had much time to study them. We landed on the edge of Dodge and I started walking away from the chariot, determined to meet up with whomever had sent me the message, when I was stopped by the voice of the taximare.
“You should at least pretend you’re paying me.”
Huh?
I looked back and saw the curious expression on her face, as if she had expecting me to do that. Even in hindsight, I can't say I was wrong. Not only was the flight pre-arranged, it was common practice to pay in advance when it came to longer trips - such as this one. There was no point in arguing over it at the time, though. I was wary enough of unwanted attention as it was.
“Of course, I’m sorry! My mistake.” I quickly turned, putting myself directly between the statue and the taximare as I pretended to count the coins.
Might as well ask…
“Are there any contacts in the town?”
The taximare looked at me, stunned, before saying, “I’m just the flier.” Her eyes went wide and she lifted her eyebrows as she slowly added, “You do know what you’re doing, right?”
“Of course I do!” I gave her a quick, overly enthusiastic smile, “Thank you for getting me here; can you come back for me in the evening – let’s say at six?” I made sure to say the last part out loud to help my act as a tourist, in case anypony was listening. Or in case whoever had arranged the flight wasn't as good-intentioned as I had assumed.
The taximare nodded. With a simple, “Deal!” she turned the chariot around for takeoff, which was my cue to make my way to the most obvious tourist trap since that half-useless dam over Ponyville. The giant statue was surrounded by generic wood-paneled buildings of the wild south, including a saloon and a barber shop. But those weren’t the reason I was now confused. That had to do with what I was looking at. I just couldn’t make out the intended shape that the twisted steel beams, levers and occasional sprocket were meant to form. I squinted hard, and still the best I could come up with was that it was an abstract pony of some kind; misshapen to the point of grotesque. Or it was just a pile of scrap put together as a statue - I couldn't really tell. As I circled it, I noticed that the back of the statue was partially covered in steel that must have come from a cut-apart locomotive boiler. The whole thing was covered in rusting black paint.
At least I know they have locomotives to spare. That's a start.
“That there’s Hoofaestus,” a raspy voice from behind told me.
I turned to see an old orange pony with a beige mane looking at me, patched-up saddlebags strapped to the side. He was standing at a slight angle, kind of like he had stopped mid-limp, but a more reasonable guess was that his posture was a result of bones slowly giving way to old age and hard work.
“Protector of the forges and ponies who work in ‘em,” he finished.
“The forges?” I asked, certain I would have noticed them on my way here. I threw a quick glance at the buildings around us on the off chance I had missed them from the sky.
The old pony let out a short laugh and shook his head. “No. There aren’t any around anymore. But there used to be. Just like there used to be more ponies here. But I’m bein’ rude - my name’s Desert Carrot!” With that he extended his foreleg and rapidly shook my hoof as soon as I did the same. When he finally stopped to let me speak, I was already prepared to continue the act. I started with a wide, big-city-colt comes to the wild kind of smile.
“I’m Steel Ink, and I’m…”
“No, yer not.”
The way he kept his smile while saying that made it all the more menacing. Back in Baltimare, I had slowly prepared my cover while delivering the mail, and was ready for just about any scenario and any question. My hometown, my job, my reason for being here – even a fake birthplace and family; I had it all prepared in advance, even if it was all very much superficial. But being called out as soon as I presented myself? That was the spanner in the works. I never did make a good liar. While I frantically searched for a scenario that made sense, he just stared at me, the smile still on his face, with a touch of mischief mixing in.
“Come on; let’s get out of the Sun.”
I felt a pang of doubt whether I should follow him or not, but seeing as how my cover was blown so early on, it seemed pointless to refuse. If he was going to turn me over to the Guards, he sure had an elegant way of doing it, but something about the relaxed way in which he called my bluff told me that wasn’t the case. I followed him into one of the buildings nearby. Before the door closed behind me, I had already scanned the room for any possible threats and exits - trust or no trust, my training wouldn't have it any other way. The small living room we were in was full of metal sculptures, framed and nailed to a wall or sitting on one of the many shelves. They shared their space with pictures of what I assumed were his friends and family. The ripped couch and splinted furniture completed the décor. While I was eying-up the place, he trotted past me, over to a table, and grabbed a small note. Even from a distance, it looked quite a lot like the note I had received at the hotel. The size and color of the note were too similar not to be. He calmly read it.
“You’re getting a visitor from Canterlot…”
I couldn’t believe the words I was hearing. Everything was there: my name, who I was, how I looked, even why I was in Dodge.
“There are ponies who believe your heart is in the right place,” he concluded and waited for a moment to hear my reply, but I couldn’t muster anything other than an unknowing nod. “So, you want to know about the Flim-Flam brothers?” He didn't wait for an answer, although the look on my face probably told him everything he needed to know. “Let’s go see the Squeezy then, shall we?”
I could physically feel the weight of uncertainty being lifted from my chest; rapidly replaced by the excitement of seeing the machine. The time from the door opening to us leaving the statue behind went by instantly. The large brick building of the salvage yard was looming in the distance ahead and my mind raced with questions and possibilities of the machine I was about to see and, more importantly, what reasons I would learn were behind all the secrecy. I could already make out the empty patch of land between the last building of the town and the salvage yard, and I picked up my pace to a fast walk, when I heard Carrot calling out from behind.
“Where do ya think yer goin’?” I looked back to see him standing next to one of the wooden buildings, watching me with a smirk. I looked once more at the salvage yard before turning back and meeting up with him. When I was by his side once more, he quietly asked, “You didn’t think they would keep it at the most obvious place in all of Equestria, now did you?”
I let out a quiet sigh. Of all the things I could get fooled by, subterfuge this simple was the worst. A feeling of guilt formed as a sharp stab to my stomach, but I pushed it aside, just as I did with the accompanying thought that I was a Guard in the making and that I should have known better. But there would be time to mull that over some other time. I gave him an apologetic smile and shrugged. He turned to a narrow passage between two buildings and went in. I followed suit, but on the other side, I got a single warning.
“Don’t trip.”
On what?
There was nothing but desert grass in front of me, but I had a nagging feeling that I was about to make a fool of myself again if I didn’t think things through this time, so I entered the grassy field one step at a time. The answer to my own question came next as my hoof made contact with something solid. I brushed the grass away and saw a low wall of sand cutting a straight line through the ground. A crumbling brick was exposed in the part where I had struck it, the sand already moving with the gentle breeze to cover it up again. The tall grass around the wall had made a good job of hiding it until the last moment. But now that I knew what to look for, I looked around and saw the barely noticeable shadows of other such walls spreading ahead like a maze.
The forges?
Cities in ruins were hard to come by in Equestria. If anything, the cities were either growing or adapting; slowly transforming to keep up in with the few changes in the pony lifestyle. New settlements were formed where necessary, but that was about it. To see what must have been a thriving city recede back was unheard of, and a part of me wanted to investigate the issue further, but there was one thing even more important than that. Somewhere between these ruins was the reason for my trip here. At least, that was what I hoped. I looked up to search for Desert Carrot and saw that he was already a short way ahead. He was moving in a pattern that seemed outright weird, even though I quickly guessed the reason for it. He was walking on old streets, between the buildings of the forges. To someone watching from afar, it looked like the old stallion was drunkenly crossing a field of grass to nowhere. Not wanting to be too far behind, I went into a trot, already preparing the timing of my steps to avoid the tiny walls in my path, when he raised his voice to deliver another warning.
“Don't! You'll tumble down a cellar! The doors won't hold you.”
That brought me to a standstill. I struggled to find a way to see where the cellars might be. The best I could come up with were some mostly barren squares of sand where the cellar doors might have been. Some of the squares had barely sprouting strands of grass on them; there were tall ones on others, with only their scarcity revealing that they had not been there for as long as the grass around the town's outskirts. The cellars had been opened, but not all at once, and that made me wonder how many unopened ones were still hidden beneath the grass around me. Another question had to do with how strong the actual ceilings of the cellars were and which of the ruins ahead even had them. The streets were a safer bet, and once I caught up with Carrot, we went on. Our walk through the ruins got slower and slower and I soon noticed Carrot casually eying the surrounding area, looking for signs of any curious ponies looking at us. Something wasn’t quite clear though, so I had to ask.
“What about the ponies in Dodge? Won’t they see us?”
Without a moment’s hesitation I got the answer. “Yup, but it doesn’t matter.” He shifted his gaze to the ground nearby, as if searching for something and slowed down even more. “As far as they’re concerned, I’m lookin’ for things to salvage. So as long as nopony's watchin' out every move...”
“What do you do exactly?” It was about time I asked that.
“I find things from old times and bring 'em to the yard to be repurposed.” The way he pronounced that last word and raised his eyebrows made me wonder what was so special about that, but first I wanted to see the machine, so I put the question in the mental pile with all the other things I would have to ask.
We came to a full stop in front of a square patch of desert - and I do mean desert. There was only sand and stones on it. Carrot strained his eyes and lowered his head to find something in the ground, but I was the one who noticed it first. A single string, running along the edge of the grass, just a hair above the sand and disappearing under the sand covered bricks of another relic. I pointed it out, and received a slow nod in return. We carefully stepped over it and stopped once more.
“There’s handles on the sides, grab one.” He started clearing away the sand from the bottom edge of the door, with me following suit at the top. Rusted steel peered through the sand, and the handles, cut into the frames of the door, followed suit. We pulled on the levers and pushed the door sideways into the frame. The stairs led down into…
Sand?
The start of a steel staircase was the only thing protruding from the sand in the basement. There was just enough room for a pony or two in the confined space below. I looked at Carrot, expecting him to burst out laughing at any moment, but he stood next to me as relaxed as ever.
“Go on.”
Well… I didn’t come this far for nothing.
I stepped over the doorframe and descended into the ground, my hooves sinking deep into the sand. He pulled a torch from his saddlebag and followed me in. With a loud click, the doors slid back into place just above our heads and a flash of light from the torch cut though the darkness. Before my eyes could adjust to it, the sand beneath us shifted; receding ever further to reveal the remainder of the stairs and the basement below. In a matter of seconds, I caught the glimpse of a large sheet, deformed by the strange lines of a very particular machine, as it emerged from the disappearing sand. I moved my leg forward, to start my descent, but a nudge from the side brought me out of my fixation. With a glance, I saw Desert Carrot looking proudly at the staircase below us. I followed his stare and saw the sea of sand below getting lower and lower, seemingly disappearing into the ground itself, until if reached the floor of the basement. And then it vanished into it.
Huh?
I'd seen magic before, but nothing quite like that before. Suddenly I no longer felt quite like such an idiot for trying to look for the machine at the salvage yard. With cautious steps, I descended the stairs, and it was only when I was about to step onto the floor that I noticed the small grates that hid the drainage system. As I marveled for a moment at the effort that went into hiding the machine, Carrot walked past me to a box on a nearby wall and pulled a switch. White light flooded the room. I whirled around and saw that it was coming from oddly long glass lamps near the ceiling.
“Ready?”
The question brought me back to the machine. Carrot moved over to its side, ready to pull off the cover, and I wasted no time in joining him on the other side. I grabbed it with my mouth and we gave it a tug, then continued pulling on it slowly to stop it ripping on the many odd shapes on the machine. When I felt the cover suddenly go light, and a loud flop echoed from behind, as the cover collapsed to the ground, the machine was revealed; as shiny and exciting as the day I first saw it - even if it was a bit dusty. If anything, the lack of all the lights and sounds it was producing in Ponyville made it seem even more unusual.
Strange glass tubes, once filled with lightning, looked like ornaments on a stage prop. Steel chimneys and modified barrels protruded from the glaringly red structure on wheels. In the center sat some kind of an apparatus, with a few dials and a glass cover. I didn’t even have a chance to think about the lounge chair attached at the front with all that to take in, but I was at least partially right in my guess that had brought me here. The wheels, the lights and even entire metal sections were taken straight from a locomotive. As for the other parts? I had no idea. Apart from the barrels. I knew they were barrels, at least on the outside. I don’t know how much time I spent taking in all the various details, but I must have circled the machine a dozen times, always finding something new to admire. Desert Carrot kept by the side, casually leaning against a wall and chewing tobacco.
“So… What does it do?” I finally managed to ask.
“Well, it makes cider.” If the tone didn’t give away that that was only a half-truth, the smirk on his face did.
I returned the favor. “I saw that. What else?”
There was no way a machine this large and complex would be used to merely make cider, even if that was what the brothers were using to compete with the Apple family. There had to be something more. From what I knew, Earth ponies wouldn't have had much of a problem competing against a machine that made cider - that was what they were best at. The Unicorns would need to put in more work to get the same results as Earth ponies when it came to making food, and even making a machine to make it wouldn't mean much if they needed magic to power it. They'd just be taking the same effort and spreading it differently - the result would still be the same. That's why you don't see Unicorns in flying machines.
He briefly looked at the ground, and back at me, before saying in a tone that implied I had missed something important, “That's it.”
If he'd said that in any other way, I would have thought I'd offended him by accidentally dismissing the machine as unimpressive. Yet, something about the way he was looking at me, as a teacher drawing a question out of a student, and almost knowing it will be the right one, left me with only one way to reply.
“Why?”
“Because it's so much better to make it this way.”
That wasn't even an answer.
“But with magic-”
“Magic?” he cut me off. “It ain't magic that's powerin' this device.” He pointed at it. “It's electricity.”
“What?” I asked in a flat tone, blinking once.
I could see he had expected me to react to that as I did, but my question wasn’t that out of place. The stuff was practically useless, except for a machine here or there to do the tedious work that would inconvenience a Unicorn. But all those machines were built on Celestia's order to lighten the load of the common ponies. Other than that, the three races could easily do anything we needed to do by working together. We barely had any electrical machinery at the Royal Guard - even the castle in Canterlot was lit by candles, and here I was supposed to believe they used electricity for something us Earth ponies could do by ourselves? It didn’t add up.
“Electricity.” He pointed to the grates in the ground. “What did you think made the sand disappear – magic?”
Yes.
“There’s one good thing that you can do with it that you can’t with magic,” he continued as I put a hoof in the air to get a word in. “You can make it. No need for Unicorns or gems. And you’d be surprised what else it can be used for.”
I thought back to the day in Ponyville, when I saw the brothers and the machine for the first time. There was something in that memory that I was sure would put a quick end to his made-believe story.
“Flim and Flam are unicorns, aren't they?”
“Yes, and you probably saw them using their magic to turn the generator and control the arm. The rest was done by the apple mill inside. And that’s powered by electricity. Same as the lights here.”
He was sticking to it and the whole thing was getting too technical for my liking. My lack of expertise on the subject of engineering was well and truly showing. Moreover, I couldn’t wrap my head around the whole idea of using electricity for something as mundane as cider making. Or lighting. There had to be a way to get to the truth. At the same time, I felt slightly curious as to how far he would be able to go in his persuasion. I glanced at the lights and the machine, keeping my eyes on both a split second longer than required to make sure he saw what I was doing, and then looked at him.
“So, why aren’t we using it for everything?” I forced my lips tight to conceal the smile that wanted to form. If there was anything I knew, it was that the answer was going to be interesting, either by being overly elaborate or evasive; prepared in advance in any case.
“Well, we used to, but not anymore. Not for a long time. Now when somepony finds a rusty machine they don’t understand, it makes its way to the yard. But there’s a whole heap of the old stuff still scattered all over Equestria. You just have to know where to look.” His tone went from cautious and hushed-like to ever more prideful. “And it’s my job to find ‘em. Then I see if there’s anything that looks like it could work…” He went quiet and tilted his muzzle to the machine behind us.
I was struggling to come up with anything to counter with. It wasn’t so much about what he was saying, but the lack of any telltale signs of lying in the way he said it that made me freeze. Truth or not, he genuinely believed what he told me.
“Take a good look at it - it's done its job, so we're gonna scrap it.”
“Why?!” I involuntarily raised my voice. No matter how far-fetched the explanation was, is was still a unique machine that could have been placed in an art museum. And if the explanation was true, it made even less sense. Mayor Mare's words gave me something to complete the question. “I thought they wanted to sell it?”
“What? Who told you that?” For once I had succeeded in surprising him, but he quickly regained his jovial composure. “Doesn't matter. No, no. We're not sellin' it. We made it for one reason, and one reason alone: we wanted to see how many ponies would try to find it. We went to as many towns in Equestria with it as we could.” You could hear the mix of satisfaction and sadness in his voice as he spoke. “Enough ponies have seen it. But that also means too many ponies have seen it.”
“So what was it - a rolling commercial?”
He laughed. “No, no, no. Well, in a way yes, but no.” This wasn’t helping with my confusion. He contemplated for a few seconds, brushing his chin with his hoof, before saying in a cautious, slow tone, “What do you know about the Mechanized Era?”
The Mechanized Era? My blank stare revealed the thought.
“That’s what I figured. Help me out, will ya?”
He turned around and grabbed the cover. As soon as I saw what he was doing, my mind got flooded. It was amazing how many things I suddenly wanted to know about the machine, now that it was time to hide it back.
Who helped him build it? Where did they build it - in the salvage yard? How did they get Princess Celestia to approve it - for what purpose? What are the going to make out of it? Why wouldn't they sell it if it was so good at making cider?...
With the way Carrot had so far either predicted or reacted to my actions, I knew it would be a waste of time to voice any of the questions I now had, so I grabbed the other end and helped guide the cover back into place and when it was once again gracefully showing off the strange structure beneath it, I took a step back and looked at it; wondering if I would ever see it again and knowing that I was about to learn things that were far more mysterious than the machine itself. Carrot motioned for me to leave and walked to the stairs. As soon as I joined him, he lit the torch and pulled the switch to turn off the lights. The door clicked open and the room filled up with sand as we climbed the stairs back to the desert.
“Watch out for the wire.”
“I know. So what’s the Mechanized Era?”
We slowly walked back to Dodge, again following the paths between the ruins. I was by his side, keeping a step short of being neck-and-neck so I could follow his path without walking behind him. I wanted to keep all my focus on what he was saying rather than having to keep looking for the next turn.
“There used to be more than 40,000 ponies living here,” he said, as I looked around at the shadows of old buildings, “Now there's less than 500 left.”
It was only now that I noticed something. The building of the salvage yard was the only brick structure still standing. They built new Dodge over the ruins of the old one.
“What happened?”
I didn’t get a reply to that, so I asked again. Carrot continued walking dead straight. Then, as if I hadn’t said anything, he asked back, “You have to go back to Canterlot soon, right?”
“Yes, tomorrow morning. Why?”
“Okay.”
The answer stopped me in my tracks for a moment and I nudged my head sideways in a jolt. His sudden refusal to even acknowledge my questions was starting to annoy me, but that’s when I heard the sound of hooves clopping against the road in the town. The ponies, wherever they’d been before, had come out of hiding and were strolling about town. The answer would have to wait until we were back at his house, so I followed him through the passage between the buildings, and back onto the main road, ready to head back to the house.
“Carrot!” came a high pitched shout from behind. We quickly turned around to see the source – a lime green mare was fast approaching.
“Hello Radiant!” Carrot replied. The jagged voice in which he said that and the overly enthusiastic smile he was trying to force made it clear he hadn’t expected the encounter. Now he just wanted to get the inevitable conversation out of the way as soon as possible.
Speaking with a strong, fluid country accent, she asked, “What are you up to? And who’s the gentlecoat you’ve kidnapped?” She looked at me with her dark green eyes and now I was the one sweating.
“Good afternoon, I’m-”
“This is mister Steel Ink,” Carrot interrupted me before I had a chance to impress the local. With the attention shifted back to him, I witnessed how quickly he was able to make up a story on the fly. “He’s a safety inspector from Baltimare – those paper-pushers don’t trust me lookin’ out for myself when I’m treasure huntin’.” A condescending glance toward me sealed the deal.
Damn, he made it sound believable.
I had nothing else to do but to play along, so I took a step in her direction, as I’d seen any Canterlot officials do when they’re proving their might, and addressed her in an official tone I didn’t even know I had up until then. “And I’m very happy to see that everything is in order. Now it’s just a case of finishing the paperwork!” I never knew I could pull off such an act. At least the mare bought it.
“Well, then I’d better leave you two gentlecolts to your business. I sure wouldn’t want to intrude.” She bowed gently, again looking me directly in the eyes and slowly went about her business again. We breathed a sigh of relief and stepped up the pace to the house.
As we rounded the statue, I was surprised to see the taximare already waiting for me just outside of town. She pranced around nervously; she had clearly been waiting for me. Did she even get back to Baltimare? For a moment, I didn’t know what to do. Looking at her, I could see the uneasiness with which she was waiting, which implied I should have gone to her immediately. Only the thought of not getting my questions answered kept me pinned to the spot.
“Come ‘ere, I wanna show you somethin’,” Carrot unknowingly solved my dilemma as he pointed at his house.
He didn’t give me a chance to ask him anything, when we got inside. Instead, he murmured that he’ll be right back and disappeared through a door in the living room, leaving me turning in place from the ever increasing battle between my desire to learn more and the knowledge I had to leave as soon as possible. My ears peaked at the noise coming from the other room. Drawers were being opened, boxes and what sounded like entire pieces of furniture were moved about, and all the while I kept guessing what it was that Carrot was searching for. A map? A key? Another hidden door? He returned with a book.
“Somethin’ for you to read on the train.”
And that was that. Not quite sure if there was something else I should do, I thanked him, put the book in my saddlebag and offered a hoofshake before leaving. He closed the door behind me and I made my way to the waiting taximare, very much wondering what I had done wrong to get a book out of an adventure such as this.
“Hurry, we have to go!” was the first thing she said as I approached. She didn’t outright shout, as that would draw attention from the ponies nearby, but the sharpness of her tone was more than enough to bring the point across. I got into the chariot without question and we set off.
Even from the start this wasn’t the same trip as coming here. Instead of waiting to be at least a little bit out of town before speeding up, she made a running start for the skies. And even though we were flying fast on our way here, it was nothing compared to how we were flying now. The previously graceful but strong turns and altitude changes became sharp and aggressive, and I found myself grabbing for the rails in the chariot for support. The desert ground turned to forests, the forests to mountains and it was only when the cold wind started slicing at my face that I managed to ask what was going on.
“They’re looking for you!” came a shout from the front.
Oh no.
I instantly regretted my trip to Dodge. Not only had I not learned anything, apart from some vague notion about a Mechanized Era, whatever that meant, but the machine I was looking for was on its way to being destroyed and the only one who knew something about it was also convinced that electricity was better than magic. The last part of that revelation struck me the most. Carrot is just insane. Or bored. The enthusiasm with which I had looked at the machine was quickly eroding and in its place came a single question. How much trouble am I going to get into for going off on adventures? My last encounter with Pearl was still fresh in my mind. There was one thing that could get me out of trouble, though.
“Do you know where the dance school is?” I shouted at her. If there ever was a need for leaning on old friends, this was it.
“Which one?”
Damn! I hadn’t asked Silverline about the name of her place, but there was one more option.
“The mare! You took her home before the hotel!” The turbulent air and the urgency of the situation really didn’t allow for any more detailed explanations.
She understood my request, even if I didn’t finish saying it. The Sun was getting lower on the horizon as we approached Baltimare at low altitude, only this time we didn’t climb to make it seem like we were taking off, but continued at full speed at an altitude so low, I could have probably picked a few flowers off the ground if I were heading to a date. Not that I had any desire to do something like that at the time. I was far too busy seeking out any buildings and rouge signs that threatened to take us out of the sky in the style of a bloody pancake and wondering if she had seen them or not. Then gripping every part of the chariot I could get my hooves on with more force than I thought possible as she dodged them.
An abrupt halt near a familiar building was all that was needed for my scaredy-cat look to be complete. Every hair on my body was standing on edge, my pupils were as small as ladybugs and my mane and tail were a mess, only that last part was mostly down to the gusts of wind every time we changed direction. Now, finally on solid ground, my body wanted to take some time to shake itself to pieces, but that wasn’t an option.
“Do you see it?”
“Y-yes,” I barely replied as the taximare quickly took off and disappeared into the city.
I automatically looked around to see if anypony had seen us land, but the moment I moved my head, I realized the pointlessness of doing that. This was a large city, full of tall buildings and countless ponies walking the streets. The chances of not being seen were microscopic, so the only things left to do was to hope nopony cared enough to take notice - this was a big city after all. I rushed to the apartment complex where Silverline lived and nearly jumped through the door. As soon as I closed it, I took off my coat and looked at the list of tenants on the wall. A short walk up the stairs later, I gently knocked on her door.
Please, be here!
There was no response. I knocked again, and at the same time felt my heart beating faster.
Damn!
There was only silence on the other side of the door. At this point Plan B should have stepped into action – if I had made one. It was time to improvise, and the first step to that was to gallop back to the Greenlit and make something up on the way. I ran down the stairs, opened the door to the street and nearly hit Silverline in the muzzle.
“I’m so sorry, I didn’t see you!” I blabbered out.
She gasped and recoiled back. There was more than a trace of fear in her stare. Nopony expects their recently met-again friend to appear inside their apartment building like that, and the wide grin on my face just added to the strangeness of it all. I knew I should say something to comfort her, but the giant weight that was now lifted off my chest meant I was far too busy enjoying the fact that I’d met her at all. When she saw I was merely standing there, creepily smiling at her, she carefully replied.
“Yeah. Um.” She held her head slightly sideways as she talked, the uneasiness of the situation she was in showing in her nearly stuttering voice. “No problem. What are you doing here?”
There was no time for an in-depth explanation, even if what I was about to ask of her required it.
“I need a favor.” Before I got an answer, I was already stepping outside
“Sure, what’s wrong?”
There was still a tone of nervousness in her voice, but I had no alternatives. It was this way or the harder way. I calmly took a step forward, and calmly said, with no more of a sense of urgency than if I were spelling out a list of things I was asking her to buy, “I need you to go with me to the Greenlit and if anypony asks, we were together the whole day.” The reaction was predictable.
“Why? What’s going on?”
“I'll explain on the way. Please.”
“Okay, let me just drop these,” she pointed at her saddlebags, “And I have to brush my-”
“There's no time for that. Trust me, you look fine, and I can take those if you want.”
She nodded and we started walking to the first road where we could find a chariot to the Greenlit, although she kept the saddlebags on herself - not that I expected her to part with them, as I wouldn't have parted with mine if anypony offered the same. I hated myself for dragging her into my problems and I made a silent vow to repay her kindness with interest. But I genuinely didn’t have any other options - if I knew the Royal Guards, and I did, they had already checked with those I had delivered the mail to and had already figured out I finished my assignment early. Having somepony to give me an alibi was the only way to avoid whatever sanctions were waiting for me. There were only two things I was certain of: that Manners-Mare Pearl had it out for me, and that the Academy wouldn't bother to probe into the issue of my disappearance further the moment I had somepony to vouch for me. Now, if it were another Specialist, they would dissect his story to each individual second, but a civilian - a mare even - would stop their investigation faster than if I'd admitted where I'd gone. A slap on the hoof was the most that would come of this, I was certain.
She wasn’t entirely comfortable with what I'd asked her to do, but on the way to finding a chariot, my nervousness had returned as well. It was all very well coming up with the plan we were now enacting; trusting somepony else with their part was something entirely different, so I did the only thing I could to make her feel better about the whole ordeal. I started by briefly explaining my predicament - the events in Canterlot, my trip to Dodge and how she would help me get out of a ridiculous punishment for leaving the city. I left the Squeezy, and everything else I'd seen in Dodge, out of it, though. After that, I turned the conversation around to more everyday topics, although this part was meant more for my own fears than hers. I went into details of the things we discussed the previous evening, I talked about the stale jokes I was getting from the mail recipients. All in all, by the time we reached the chariot, we were talking as normally as the day before.
When we got closer to the Greenlit, I started sneaking glances at the ponies walking past it, then at the windows of nearby buildings. So far, so good. There wasn't a Guard in sight. At the gates to the hotel, I paid the taxipony for the trip and we stepped off from the chariot.
“Now, remember, just say I came to see you at the school when you were done and that I walked you home.” The timing didn't work out entirely, but I could justify the rest by the walk to the dance school and taking detours on the way.
“Okay,” she said with newfound anxiety.
“It's going to be fine, I promise,” I reassured her, as we stepped through gates of the hotel.
She let out a quiet gasp at the sight of the luxurious lobby of the hotel and I saw her eyes go wide. I felt a strange feeling of joy and pride that I could show her something she hadn't experienced before - me, a mere Specialist to a big-city mare! But the moment of pride quickly vanished as I remembered why we were here in the first place. I started pointing my muzzle at various directions, saying things such as, “And that's the dining hall...” as if I were showing her around, while in reality checking for any signs of trouble. When I'd gone through the whole lobby, there was only one thing bothering me.
There's nopony here.
Nopony that would be looking for me anyway; there were only the usual staff and well-dressed ponies walking about. I did a double take of the whole lobby and, sure enough, everything was normal. With the thread of danger gone and Silverline next to me, looking like she was about to sprain her eyes from all the glamor around her, there was only one thing I could think of to celebrate the way things had turned out and thank her for wanting to help me, even if I didn't need it in the end. I summoned the most elegant voice I could muster.
“How would you like to join me for dinner?”
She raised an eyebrow. “So, this was your plan all along?”
“No! No,” I chuckled, “I really thought I needed your help. But, since we're here, we might as well enjoy it, right?”
She blushed and looked away for a moment, not believing a word I'd just said. Still, when she turned back to me, the answer was a solid, “Yes.”
She stepped to my side and we walked slowly toward the door to the dining hall, heads raised high as if we were among the aristocracy that moved past us; a Specialist looking like he'd just been in a tornado and a wide-eyed mare at his side, saddlebags and all. If there was one way to look out-of place in a hotel like the Greenlit, we'd discovered it.
“Specialist Neigh?” the receptionist called out as we were about to pass by.
“Yes?”
“I have a letter for you.”
The envelope she was holding had the distinct marks of an urgent order from the Academy.
No.