With the sudden greeting, we were swept into the town for the grand tour. Suffice to say, I was bored out of my mind. I never liked tours.
Then again, I was also too nice to voice said opinion.
"And here is the City Hall!" The mayor, Equal Trust, was far too enthusiastic for someone with his job. But having national heroes arrive would warrant a tour, I guess...
I just wanted to eat and go to sleep. Then get back on the road to the Mer-kingdom.
Tim was glancing at me every now and then. He had been with me during the time we were given a tour of a museum that Alice had wanted to go to. I grit my teeth and bore it, then complained at length to Tim why I did not like tours. Well, more like at Tim. I'm pretty sure he had fallen asleep during my speech.
But I digress.
"This is our best inn, where you will be staying!" The way he said that made me suspicious that he was only talking to the Elements of Harmony. Then I suddenly had a thought.
Where's Discord? I scanned the crowd for the brown suited god of chaos. After a few turns I saw a pair of yellow eyes looking right at me, along with a smirk under those eyes.
Just the eyes and mouth.
I rolled my eyes at his prank and turned back to hear the verdict about where I would be getting to lie down.
"Unfortunately, your...companions, will need to stay somewhere else. The inn does not have enough rooms for them." He had on this utterly pathetic looking pout, as if he actually cared about us.
I felt a tapping on my shoulder, but I ignored it. I could only guess as to what these people did and how corrupt the mayor was. Probably took money straight out of people's bank accounts or something. If they even had bank accounts in this backwater town.
It was making me physically ill to even think about these people.
Hold the phone… Why am I getting so worked up?
I shook my head, banishing those poisonous thoughts. The tapping on my shoulder increased, causing me to turn and look straight into Tim's eyes. He opened his mouth to say something before surprise showed up on his face.
"What? What did you want?" I whisper-asked.
He furrowed his eyebrows and said, "Nevermind, I thought I saw something on your face."
I shrugged my shoulders and turned back to Equal Trust. I caught the tail end of the conversation, where Snow was explaining to Twilight that, yes, we would be perfectly fine outside. But, I couldn't help but notice that he had glanced over at the eyes and smirking mouth, who winked back at him before fading away. Snow probably had made a plan with Discord about this before.
"Berserker, Celedon, let's go. We need to restock on a couple things," Jade spoke from behind me. The bow-woman parted the crowds with what had to be a terrifying face as she walked us through the masses.
"Alright, Celedon, since you can do the heavy-lifting without too much trouble, you're coming with me. Berserker, Rock is going with you to pick up some other essential foods." Rock suddenly appeared from my left and nodded before turning down the road, Tim following after him.
"Okay, apparently we are going to be needing a literal crate of food for the rest of the trip," Jade talked as she walked. “Or at least, from our side. Berserker and Rock are going to get some vegetables.”
“Alright, so what are we going for?”
“Some meat products, for protein. Plus, we need to get one of those fancy fridge-crates, so the meat won’t spoil before we even pack it up.”
"Ah, okay."
So we went walking off to the meat market that we had apparently been to.
"Celedon, exactly how out of it were you?" she asked incredulously.
I had the good graces to look embarrassed and told her, "I've never been a big fan of tours. It's a little restricting for me. I'd rather find out where the specific place I wanted to be is on my own, rather than have someone lead me to every other place and then finally reach my true destination. That or see the place I wanted to go and then have to walk right past it."
"Huh. Never would've pegged you for someone who doesn't like tours. Anyway, we're here." She spread her arms wide, showing the big meat market.
"Now do you get why I asked you? We literally were walked through that, and you didn't know where it was?"
"...Yeah, I can see how you would find it almost impossible for someone to miss it."
We walked into the entrance of the bazaar, Jade leading the way. All of a sudden, she stopped, focused off to the left of her for a few seconds, squealed, and ran off to look at a certain stall.
"Jade? Is that you?" Rather, she was running off to the owner of said stall. He was an older man, with a messy mop of dark green hair, interspersed with a little bit of white at his temples.
"Daddy!" She then proceeded to jump over the shelf in front of her and glomp her apparent father.
"Oof! Jade, you've got to be more careful! I'm not as young as I used to be." The man scolded her lightly, but I could hear the joy in his voice at seeing his daughter.
"But Daaaad, it's been five years! I think your daughter can be a little happy to see her Dad, don't you?" While they had been having their conversation, I was slowly walking over to them.
"Hahaha, yes, I believe I can allow it. Now, let me up, I've got some business to attend to." Sure enough, they both got up off the ground, Jade helping her father up. As he looked in my direction he couldn't help but be startled but my sudden appearance.
"Oh! Forgive me, my daughter is a little excitable at the best of times. What can I get for you?"
Instead of me replying, Jade said, "Dad, this is Celedon, she's with me." She then proceeded to climb out of the little stall and stand next to me on my left.
I bowed lightly. "A pleasure to meet the father of Jade Hunter."
Surprised by my formality, he nodded his head and introduced himself. "And a pleasure to meet you. My name is Malachite Tusk. It's been awhile since my daughter has introduced me to a new friend."
"Well, it's more like she's part of a mission. But!" she added with a finger pointing to the sky, "That doesn't mean I can't be friendly." Jade tried to get an arm around my neck, but ended up settling for just laying a hand on my shoulder.
Wow, I'm actually pretty tall compared to most people here.
Her father chuckled before saying, "Of course, I understand. But, since you're on a mission, I suppose you have another reason to be here besides looking for me?"
"It's not like I knew you were going to be here or something. But yeah, we need some fresh meat for the rest of the trip." And so Jade detailed out a list of meat products for her father, who gave the best cuts he could find. He almost gave them to her for free, but she insisted on paying for them, since it was government funds that she was using.
I was smiling the whole time at the interactions between father and daughter. Then my smile turned a little wistful at imagining what it would have been like...
"Celedon, hey, Equestria to Captain Celedon!" Jade was snapping her fingers in front of my face.
"Huh? Oh, sorry, got lost in thought." Malachite seemed to chuckle at that.
"It's alright, happens to the best of us. Now, I need you to lift this," Jade indicated a medium-sized crate covered in light blue runes. Condensation was rolling off of it.
"The fridge box I assume." Jade nodded.
"Jade, I'm pretty sure even you would have trouble with that box by yourself," her father interjected, looking a little stern and worried at the same time.
"Just watch," she replied with a smirk.
Effortlessly picking up the two feet cubed box, I enjoyed seeing the look of shock on Malachite's face. Then he looked to his daughter.
"You're making stranger and stranger company these days." Jade giggled and hopped the counter again. She gave her father a hug and jumped back over to me before saying goodbye to Malachite.
"Again, it was a pleasure to meet you Celedon. Have a nice day!"
"You too, and thank you." Then Jade led me off to a secluded spot outside of town where I could see the camp being set up.