Four weeks came and passed. Bush Beat comfortably settled into his new life working as a gardener for the Hay and Stay hotel. Here, he could make almost daily use of his newfound talent. This village sure didn’t have any shortage of laughter, kindness, or lively spirit. He occasionally thought back to his years in Manehattan, the city where ‘it’s everypony for herself.’ Back then, he had always assumed that to be the status quo across all of Equestria.
‘Humans do not know harmony.’ These words echoed in Bush Beat’s mind as he suddenly thought of Brightside. How might he be getting along in this... unharmonious world he was still stuck in? Would he ever find a way back to Equestria on his own? Could he use help? Help from... a friend, maybe? Bush Beat slowly came to realize that Brightside was, in many ways, the first actual friend he ever had. He sighed, sat down in the grass, and looked at the trees and plants that graced the garden around him.
“Inn diGo?” a voice in the background called out.
‘That’s what friends are there for!’ said the next echo in his head. Bush Beat remembered his brief encounter with Tendercare in the saloon of Dodge Junction. If it hadn’t been for her, he would certainly not have made it to Ponyville. Heck, it would never even have occurred to him to even visit the place. Yet here he was, leading a whole new life.
“Inn diGo?” As he now realized, the voice had come considerably closer.
Bush Beat stirred as he snapped out of his reflective thoughts. He lifted himself onto his legs, as he saw a grey mare approaching. She carried a bag of letters and postcards around her neck.
“Are you Inn diGo? Here’s a...”
Bush Beat interrupted her. “I’m sorry, Derpy, I... I have to go.”
Derpy looked surprised. “Go?... Go where?”
“To Fillydelphia,” Bush Beat answered with conviction. “There is a friend I have to find. He... needs my help. I need to go and find him.”
“But your mail...?” Derpy couldn’t finish the question as Bush Beat galloped past her, out of the garden and into the streets. He briefly stopped, turned around to shout, “Inn diGo is inside!” and continued on his way toward the train station.
Derpy blinked, then shrugged and trotted up to the hotel.
“Fillydelphia!” The train conductor’s voice was as enunciated as the last. The overnight train ride was long but smooth and comfortable save for all the turmoil inside of Bush Beat’s head. At least he got a few hours of sleep on the train.
“How do I get to the university?” Bush Beat asked the ticket-sales assistant across the counter in the station’s main hall. Her response was elaborate but clear and to the point. Weren’t it for all the distractions in his mind, finding his way around would have been easy from here.
After another hour laden with thoughts going back and forth, Bush Beat finally arrived at the university’s front desk.
“Excuse me, ma’am,” he addressed the clerk, slightly out of breath. The earth pony turned to face him and listened. “I need some information. There was a... a research team. About ten years ago. Here, at this university.” He paused to catch more air. “One of the researchers... I mean, research assistants... his name was Brightside. I need to know who else was on that team.” He took a deep breath.
“That’s quite an unusual request,” the older mare commented. “We can’t just disclose information about our staff. May I ask why you need this kind of information?”
Bush Beat tried to sound serious. “I have important information regarding this pony, Brightside. I need to talk to one of the actual researchers about it. Please. It’s really important.”
The clerk looked at him for a moment before replying, “Fine. I’ll see what I can find.” She turned away, walked towards the back of her space and opened a drawer to look at a series of files.
The minutes stretched as Bush Beat impatiently waited for her return.
The mare finally walked back to the desk with a file in her mouth, which she placed on the desk in front of her, then opened it. “Okay, here’s what I’ve got. Brightside briefly worked for the Department of Unicorn Magic ten years ago. He was in a team with several other ponies, two of whom are still with us today. Their names are Pioneer Rose and... hang on...”
While the clerk was pausing, Bush Beat thought about the name, but it didn’t ring any bells.
“... Silver Slither,” the mare finished.
Bush Beat’s eyes opened wide as the second name entered his consciousness. But he composed himself quickly.
“Many thanks,” he said, nodding to the clerk. “Where might I find this... Pioneer Rose?”
“Well, the Department of Unicorn Magic is in the building just across the courtyard.” She pointed out through the window. “Over there. The front door says ‘DUM’ on it.”
“Thank you.” Bush Beat tried to put on a smile, but it was overridden by a feeling of intense worry.
“Come in!” a female voice yelled from the other side of the ajar wooden door Bush Beat just knocked on. He gently pushed it open to reveal a room of desks, all stacked with a disorderly mess of books and loose sheets of paper.
Working at one of the desks was a magenta-coated pony with a dark crimson mane and tail, facing away from Bush Beat. He could see a pen engulfed in a reddish-brown magic aura that was scribbling on a piece of paper.
“Um... Pioneer Rose?” Bush Beat asked carefully, unsure whether it might have been more appropriate to wait quietly.
The aura surrounding the pen disappeared after the pen was laid onto the desk with care. The unicorn turned her head to look at Bush Beat and said, “Yes?” When she didn’t recognize the pony that had just entered the room, she turned around fully to face Bush Beat.
Bush Beat said, “I need to talk to you about Brightside.”
Pioneer Rose gasped upon hearing the name. She immediately used her magic to have the office door swing close. Then she inspected Bush Beat with narrowed eyes. “What?”
“Um... Brightside,” Bush Beat repeated. “Do you remember him? He was in your research team some ten y...”
“How do you know about Brightside?” Pioneer Rose narrowed her eyes even further.
“Um... I... met him?...” Bush Beat became hesitant.
“You met Brightside ten years ago?” she asked. “What do you want to talk about after all this time?”
“No,” Bush Beat contended, “I met him some five or six weeks ago. He’s...”
“What?” interrupted the mare, visibly confused. “But... that... wait. How... where...” Her eyes moved nervously back and forth as she was struggling to make sense of this. Then she looked back at Bush Beat’s face and asked, “Brightside is... alive?”
“Yes!” Bush Beat asserted. “Did you think he was dead?”
Pioneer Rose hesitated and then nodded. “We did, yes.” She gradually calmed, but still looked bewildered. “Where in the wide world of Equestria did you find him? Why did he never come back to the University?”
“That’s just the thing,” Bush Beat clarified, “he’s not in Equestria anymore. The spell that you cast ten years ago—”
“You know about the accident?”
Bush Beat nodded. “Why did you think he was dead?”
“Well, because...” Pioneer Rose’s eyes sank. “He just disappeared, and we never heard from him again.”
“Well, your spell took him to another world. He’s been stuck there ever since. I need your help to get him back home,” Bush Beat asserted.
Pioneer Rose thought for a moment. “What sort of help are you thinking?”
“All I need from you,” Bush Beat explained, “is to cast the spell again. On me. The same spell that got Brightside stranded in that other world. Take me there and I will find him.”
“Wait.” Pioneer Rose collected her thoughts. “You said Brightside is stranded in that other world. But you also said that you met him. So you’ve been there? How did you get there?”
Bush Beat inhaled to speak, but then stopped. “It’s... complicated.”
“Did somepony cast that spell on you?” Pioneer Rose insisted to know. “Who was it?”
Bush Beat paused before he nodded and answered. “It was Silver Slither.”
“Oh, well you’re in luck then!” Pioneer Rose smiled. “Silver Slither works right here at the univ—”
“I know,” Bush Beat interrupted, “but... she’s trying to kill me.”
Pioneer Rose gave Bush Beat a puzzled look. Her sudden expression of shock and disbelief was intense, but it was also short-lived and quickly dissolved into laughter. “Kill you? Silver?... That’s ridiculous. She’s my friend.”
“I’m not joking,” said Bush Beat seriously. “She used the spell on me in full belief it would kill me, just like you thought it killed Brightside. If she sees me now and finds out I’m not dead, she and her gang will try to find some other way to get rid of me.”
“Gang?!” Pioneer Rose started laughing even harder. “This is ridiculous! I know Silver, she has a sense of justice like you’ve never known! There’s no way she’s part of a gang!”
“Honestly, Pioneer Rose,” Bush Beat said, “she believes that she is serving justice.” He paused. “Perhaps I should start from the beginning and tell you everything that happened...”
“... I stayed with him for over a week, in which he resumed his research for me. In the end, it seems, he managed to find the spell. But for some reason it only sent me back. I have to return there to help him get back to us. I owe him that much.”
Finishing his short narrative, he felt a certain relief. This time there weren’t any lies to cover up. It felt freeing to tell nothing but the truth for once. He sensed an increased desire to set things right with Brightside.
Pioneer Rose was stunned. She sat back on her haunches, carefully listening to Bush Beat.
“That’s... quite a story,” she commented. She sighed and looked at the floor, eyes wide and vacant. “I would never have thought Silver would be capable of this. But I can’t deny that it fits her idea of justice. And it does explain how you know about Brightside and the accident. You wouldn’t ask to have the spell cast on yourself if you weren’t completely sure it was safe.” She waved a hoof and pondered, “What if Brightside did come back to Equestria with you, but simply wound up someplace else than you?”
“That was four weeks ago. If he’s back in Equestria, he would have come here and found you by now, wouldn’t he?” Bush Beat figured.
“That’s true, hm...” The scientist thought for a long moment, before she replied with a shrug. “Well... I would love to help you. Honestly, I would. But I can’t.”
Bush Beat blinked. “Why not? Just cast the spell from ten y—”
“I can’t just cast the spell,” she interrupted him while raising a hoof. “First, it’s been ten years. That’s a long time, and none of us have done any research in that area since. The entire project was canceled after the accident. Second, I’m a scientist, not a magician. Just because I research magic doesn’t mean I can cast any complex spell. Just like you wouldn’t expect a...” She struggled to find an example and looked around for inspiration. Her eyes fell onto Bush Beat’s cutie mark. “...floral biologist, say, to be any good at gardening. You know?”
‘Actually, I kind of would’, Bush Beat thought to himself.
“Third,” Pioneer Rose continued, “I never even cast the main spell in the first place. It was Silver. I only assisted.”
“So... um...” Bush Beat was unsure how to phrase the following question so as to not sound too demanding. “Would it be possible for you to learn the spell?”
Pioneer Rose shrugged and started to walk towards the door. “I’ll just ask Silver about—”
“No!” Bush Beat hastily interrupted her and stopped her by holding a foreleg up in her path. “You can’t tell her any of this! If she finds out that I’m still alive, she and her gang will come after me!”
“Isn’t that what you want?” wondered Pioneer Rose. “You want her to cast the spell again, right?”
“If she finds out I’m still alive, she’ll know that the spell doesn’t kill. Then she’ll try to kill me some other way.”
“Well,” Pioneer Rose pointed a hoof at herself, “I won’t be able to help you on my own. I don’t know the spell. It sounds like Silver is the only one who can take you to Brightside. Besides,” she tilted her head to the side, “if what you’re saying is true and she actually did try to kill you, shouldn’t you report her to the police?”
Bush Beat faltered. In all those past weeks, he never even thought of that; he was just glad to be back in Equestria. Slowly, the realization sunk in that throughout the last four weeks Silver Slither might have doomed other ponies to live in the human world, and he would have been in the position to prevent it. But right now he also needed Silver Slither’s help in order to rescue Brightside, and she would certainly not be of much support while in custody.
“If you can’t learn the spell, I need Silver Slither to do it. So we can’t expose the gang just yet. We also can’t just ask her, though...”
Both ponies intensely pondered for a while.
Bush Beat offered, “I guess we have to...”
“... trick her,” Pioneer Rose completed the sentence. “Somehow.”