//------------------------------// // Chapter 1: Arrival // Story: The First Steps of the Rest of Your Life // by Rhino //------------------------------// ***Day 1, Friday, evening*** “Are we there yet?” “No, Rhino, we’re not.” “Damn.” Well that killed about five seconds, now what? Frankly after walking all day I’m proud of myself for even trying to kill boredom with conversation of all things since we pretty much ran out of things to say after the first few hours of mind-numbing walking. I suppose it isn’t that bad though. Wait, there’s something I need to do before anything else. My carriage pulling partner looks toward me questioningly and I catch a glimpse of myself in his shades. I'm a green unicorn more on the upper scale of height. My mane and tail are both black with a blue stripe running through them. My mane is short, what I might call a natural style, and the blue stripe runs vertically down slightly off center to the left. My tail is longer than most stallions' styles, but not really styled, just kept knot free. The stripe in my tail runs down the center of my tail, but horizontally and can be seen from both sides. My eyes are a chocolate brown, and as usual, I have on my watch. My cutie mark is a blue arcane circle with a heart in the center and veins coming out of the heart and reaching out to the edge of the circle. I look away for a moment before a thought occurs to me and I turn back to him, “Hey Hydro, I’m gonna turn the radio back on since we’re probably far enough from Everfree to not bother anything that lives there.” He nods as he faces forward again, “Oh yeah, I forgot we turned that off.” Figures he forgot. Oh well, let’s get some music going. I clicked the power button with my magic. What is love? Baby don’t hurt me, Don’t hurt me, No more. I love this song, plus it’s zone out music if I’ve ever heard it. Meh, it allows me reflect on why we’re headed to Ponyville in the first place. I suppose the simple answer would be jobs. Hydro Pump and I have been best friends since high school and kept in touch during college. We recently graduated from our respective colleges in our fields, him graduating with an Engineering degree and myself with a Biological Sciences one. After the semester ended but before the actual graduation, Hydro had approached me with an idea. He had heard of a job opportunity for him down in Ponyville, apparently there was a faulty dam in need of an on-site pony to maintain its internal workings, and had suggested I move there with him to look for a job myself since I hadn’t decided where I was going yet. I had thought of Ponyville as a potential location for me since I prefer small towns and they had a veterinary clinic I could apply for with my credentials. Add in having my best friend there and my mind was pretty much made up. Thus I find myself and Hydro approaching Ponyville from Canterlot along the path we took around Everfree, hitched up side-by-side to a large wagon filled with furniture and other home essential items. Never before have I hated the fact that my furniture was wood until I had to haul it cross-country, though with his earth pony endurance and my magic we were doing pretty well for ourselves on the trip. The sun was just starting to set as we round a hill to see we weren’t that far from the town itself. I admire the view of the orange bathed town as the last of sun’s rays begin fading, and then glance over to my longtime friend. Hydro is a dark red earth pony of similar build to me, but slightly thinner. His mane and tail are black like mine, but don't have any other colors in them. His mane is pretty much the exact style mine is, while his tail is about half the length. His jaw is more angled than mine. While his eyes are orange in color, I can't actually see them at the moment due to his shades. Finally, his cutie mark is a water wheel with water flowing underneath it. I gesture towards the town with my head, “I gotta say Hydro, I think you picked a real winner in this town.” He nods, “It sure looks that way, but I hear crazy stuff tends to happen here.” I refuse to let him kill my good mood as we make our way through the outskirts, “Well, the town’s still in one piece so it can’t be that bad.” “You know you totally jinxed us right?” He raises up his aviators as he says this. I cringe slightly as that thought occurs to me as well, “Yeah, I just realized that. Hopefully it waits until after we get all this to the house.” Our trek through the town is noticeably quiet, as not a single pony is seen. Not completely unexpected given how late we have arrived. The sun is almost completely set as we pull up to our new abode. It's at a street corner so thankfully we can just park the wagon to the side of the house and don’t have to worry about having it just sitting in front of the building for two days until the return pony comes to bring it back to the rental place. It is a very nice home, then again I don’t ask for anything too fancy. The house is two stories, 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, kitchen, living room… the works. It looks similar to most of the other houses on the street, but things like the color and personal touches tend to let houses like this still stay easily identifiable. Hydro and I unload all the boxes and furniture and put them in the front room for now. I find us two glasses from one of our boxes, get some water from the tap, and levitate his over to him. I settle down in one of the chairs after deciding that it would be better to avoid the couch for the moment, given its rather famous reputation of putting ponies into power naps before they even know what hit them. Ok, let’s see just how much more we are going to do today. “Ok Hydro now that we have a second, how about we decide the pertinent question of how much unpacking we’re doing right now.” He answers bluntly, “Depends on how much you got left in you.” I mull the query through my head before answering honestly, “I’m thinking I have enough left for one last burst of productivity, after that I’m crashing.” He smiles teasingly at me, “Fair enough dude, honestly I’m surprised you got this far.” I roll my eyes at him, “Oh hahah, I did it didn’t I? To be frank though, my legs are most likely going to be a little sore over the next few days but it won’t be that bad. Just don’t expect me to go running for anything short of my life, and even then I’ll have to think about it.” “Yeah, because you do so much running normally.” He rolls his eyes. “Alright, how bout we just get the furniture moved into the rooms, set up the beds, and then use them?” “I approve this plan.” I raise my glass and drink the rest of the water. I discuss it with Hydro and I end up with the bedroom next to the side street, he gets the one down the hall, and the upstairs bathroom between us. Next comes the worst part of moving, even worse than the move itself, bringing large and heavy furniture up stairs after an already tiring day. “Are you even listening Rhino? I said move it clockwise!” “You didn’t say which one of us it was relevant to so I took a guess!” “Well why didn’t you ask?” “Because I’m concentrating on not letting my freaking huge bookshelf squish me if it falls! I’m trying to get this done and having this conversation already makes it more difficult to react!” “Just levitate it to me so I can take it, you pansy.” Hmph. Let’s see you focus enough to lift furniture with your head while feeling like just falling asleep where you stand. A bit of grumbling from the long day and a few small scratches on the walls later, Hydro and I set up the beds. Mine being just the usual frame and mattress set up and his requiring running the hose through the house because somepony likes water beds. Come to think of it it’s a little funny how a pony who works with water so much for a living ends up sleeping on what is essentially his work every night, maybe it’s just comfortable for him. Whatever, too tired to care all that much right now. I yawn, “Alright, did we forget anything?” “That depends on if you plan on freezing me out with the air conditioner.” Hydro appears to be starting to wear down as well. I chuckle and respond teasingly, "It's not my fault you can't take the cold like I can." His counter is equally teasing, "Hey, if you make threats with the air conditioner, I can make threats with the heater." I cringe at his threat to my inverse temperature intolerance, "Touche. Middle ground?" "Glad we can agree." “Alright in that case, I’m going to go pass out, night dude.” “Night bro.” I fall asleep under Princess Luna’s shining orb with my last thought, ‘Note to self: invest in shades for windows.’