The first rest stop from Appleloosa to Las Pegasus consisted of a large wayside inn. Carriages and stage coaches were lined up along the western wall and stalls hocking tourist trap quality wares along the eastern. There were a sparse amount of trees surrounding the water hole that had sprouted up in the middle of the desert; a deep well naturally made with walls of rock.
The stage coach that Spiral Flame and Eclipse had boarded came to an easy stop. The drivers quick to inform their passengers that their trip would begin anew at sunrise tomorrow. Despite her desire to do other wise, Spiral rented two adjacent rooms for Eclipse and herself. Spitfire's threat constantly enfolding her mind playing out like a loud speaker upon Spiral's thoughts. The pair left to visit the stalls after delivering their saddlebags to their rooms.
Once outside, side by side, Eclipse and Spiral moved to the eastern side of the inn. Most of the booths were of basic wood construction with tarps over the tops to free the owners of both sun and rain. One booth took both ponies attention immediately. A banner across the front read 'Flim and Flam'. Behind it, a large motorized vehicle covered in gizmos and doodads the which neither had ever seen. Electricity shot through glass tubes, steam and black smoke pumped from brass trumpet shaped opening all attached on top of a carriage without reigns.
Ponies passed by the booth where two yellow unicorns wearing pin stripped blue and white shirts and their mane and tail red and white striped, gave a marvelous display of musical lyrics and dances. One brother, bearing a red mustache came towards a filly foal and her father. He slid towards them dropping down onto one knee with a sales pony smile. “Excuse me, sir! Your little girl looks like she could use some nuts and cider!” The stallion saw little amusement to this as a front hoof slammed against the pony's face sending him crashing back. Questions erupted form the child, but non were answered by her snarling parent.
The clean shaven unicorn, snatching up a Barber Shop Quartet hat, came up from the rear of their stall and buggy tossing a fore leg around a marefriend and coltfriend. “Say there, buddy, show your marefriend you love her! Nuts and cider makes a great gift and my brother Flam and I are the ones to give them to her!” This brought rage from both ponies who in turn shoved a hoof each into Flim's face launching him back away. He performed three perfect spirals before crashing down across his brother's stomach.
Eclipse and Spiral had taken to watching the brothers, just out of ear shot, for thirty minutes as they went from mare to colt to couple to family pitching their wares only to be shot back with a physical blow. Spiral had to give these two some credit as a many pony would have given into their injuries and rejections. Some thoughts came to Spiral as to the wares these brothers were selling to be given such treatment and all the lecherous pony could imagine were things that caused an image of Spitfire beating her senseless to appear in her imagination. The large mare shuttered at the violation she felt having the fire pony rudely break apart her little day dreams.
“Sh...Should we go take a look?” Eclipse finally spoke up gathering the courage to venture towards the brothers. Within glowing pools there was sympathy for the plight of the unicorns. They must be doing wrong whatever they must be doing. The only way to know how to solve the situation is to know what it is to begin with. Upon her larger friend Eclipse did cast a smile. The effects the smile had on Spiral she would never know.
Spiral winced each time a brother took a blow. Something about them getting back up only to take a beating again reminded her of her seven brothers and the fights they would have. She could have swore that a foal had collected a tooth or two off the ground from the brothers'. “Why would you want to go near those two...” There was more to say, but Spiral's knees buckled the moment she saw Eclipse's smile. Every ounce of defiance she had to avoid the troublesome unicorns had vanished with the curving of lips. “Not fair...” Whispers words escaped as she hung her head forward.
The smaller filly lead the pair straight towards the down trodden brothers. At the sight of two possible customers, they sprang into action. “Welcome, my dear fillies!” Unison speaking shouted out. Their bodies went straight ahead, skidding in front of Eclipse and Spiral with one hind knee down, the other hind leg extended backwards. Their bodies were tilted at forty five degrees to the mares, right fore leg offered to them with their hats on hoofs, and the left raised up pointing up and away. The spectacle brought a short laugh from Eclipse but a snarl from Spiral. To the stunt pony they looked like they should be selling Discord Prevention insurance.
“I say, dear brother, what we have here are two beatiful fillies just begging for something!” The mustached brother spoke riding back up to his hind legs shifting to give the mares the view of his other side.
“Yes and I say, we are just the stallions to give it to them too! Say, there big and brownish orange, would you little filly there like some nuts and cider?” The shaven brother questioned slamming his back against his brothers. With synchronization they rolled their hats along their forelegs letting them land onto their stripped manes.
“What..” Spiral moved to stand in front of Eclipse. She wasn't sure if she had heard either of them right. A quick look at Eclipse told her all she needed to know just then; Eclipse had no idea what the brothers might have said.
“Some nuts and cider! We have a specialty for it!”
“That's right. We loving giving fillies nuts and cider!”
That was all it took. Chestnut mane appeared to rise up standing at the roots going jagged. Nostrils flared puffing out black smoke. Burnt umber eyes glared becoming a wild fire of raw emotions and hate. “If anyone is going to put their nuts inside her it's going to be me!” She declared to the heavens digging her front hooves into the dirt. Hind legs parted kicking her right hoof back digging a small hole preparing to launch herself at the brothers. Each of them glanced at each other. They learned just then that any pain they felt before would seem pleasure for what is to come. “And nopony else!” The next shout was a battle cry. She twisted her self around raising her hind quarters into the air. Each hind legs shot like a rocket connecting her hooves to the jaws of each brother. Their bodies were sent away, spiraling to smack belly first against the side of the inn.
Once they slid down to the soil below, stars circling with birds chirping around their heads, they raised to see everypony they had spoken to before. Some held clubs, some held sticks, and others simply clapped their hooves together in preparation for this moment. If only they knew what the brothers had truly been selling.
“Dear brother. I do say that ever since we left Ponyville, it has been like some sort of celestial being has frowned upon us.”
“Yes. I do agree.” Scrambling together, they clung to each other prepared for the worst yet to come.
Feeling proud of herself defending Eclipse's honor, Spiral turned to her charge and puffed her chest out. “Wasn't I wonderful? Nopony else would defend you like that, Eclipse... Eclipse?” Glancing around she found the filly no longer behind her. Frantic, she spun in place until she noticed Eclipse by the booth and odd vehicle that the brothers were in front of. With cautious approach, Spiral came to see what Eclipse was doing.
Eclipse lowered her head again into a small mug drinking the sweet, crisp drink inside. “This ci..cider isn't bad.” Her voice peaked up looking across her shoulder to the approaching Spiral. “They were giving away free samples of cider and nuts!” A hoof moved motioning to the dozens of ignored cups filled to the brim with Flim and Flam Cider and assortment of nuts. Spiral faltered nearly collapsing to her side.
Not only was her actions unnecessary and brutish, but Eclipse didn't even know what she had done or why she did it. There would be other chances, Spiral decided. For now, with a merry smile forced onto her muzzle, she joined the smaller filly with enjoying the flavorful drink and food samples.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
The rest of the evening did not progress as Spiral ever expected it to. A normal string of events had her wowing her date with tales of her amazing stunts, death defying acts, and showering the pony with false compliments to further the chance of her getting the pony to come home with her. With Eclipse, things traversed in a direction that Spiral had never gone.
Over dinner, she instead listened to Eclipse talk about herself. Spiral learned that Eclipse's favorite food was her friend Octavia's artichoke Alfredo with homemade wheat and hay pasta. For desert, she loved the taste of a fresh sliced apple; something Eclipse claimed she hadn't had since she was five until a almost two months prior. Spiral had a hard time swallowing that one. The gray pony enjoyed all kinds of music due to her constant ventures into clubs and the symphony. Eclipse had a love of reading and cooking. In the end, after dinner had ended and their conversation turned to getting to sleep, Spiral found they had very little in common.
Any talk of Eclipse's broken horn or her days before meeting Octavia and Vinyl were met with an uncomfortable silence. Spiral couldn't even get an answer to who Eclipse's parents were without making the feeling look distraught. So, without anything else to talk about, the pair went to their separate rooms. It was this visit that they found a door that connected the two together.
Now, late in the midnight hour, Spiral laid away on her bed staring at the ceiling. The pain in her chest was coupled with a warmth each time her heart beat. It was emotions that were different for her, foreign in many ways. Spiral never once doubted that she was popular or loved until today when Spitfire had verbally tore her down. Past events played a slide show of depression in her mind reliving times that she believed she was the life of the party, but now found the ponies who knew her well scowled or glared at her. Every pony she played with and never returned a letter, ignored the very next day as if they never met, or simply road down until they were putty to be cast aside.
Spitfire's words continued to plague her as she tossed and turned on her bed. The sheets soaked over with her sweat. The quiet of the night in this roadside inn was enough that the memories were deafening and without interruption. The stunt pony came to realize that it wasn't Spitfire who had started these doubts. The Wonderbolts Captain only gave the final crack to the dam. These doubts began to surface the moment she had met the alicorn like filly. Eclipse was the trigger.
The mysterious alicorn placed some sort of spell on Spiral Flame from the moment she had come in contact with her. It was her that eventually removed Spitfire from her mind and seduced all her thoughts into pure forms of kindness and attraction. Spiral could remember every inch of Eclipse's body in such a short time from her mane to her flank and to her cutie mark. Yes, the unusual cutie mark. She could have swore the colors were black-white-black during noon but during dinner they had gone to white-black-white. Such an oddity. The stunt pony decided that something had to be done.
Inching herself out of bed, Spiral crawled on all hooves and her belly to the floor, towards the single door that separated their rooms. Triangle ear pressed to the hollow wood door listening to the sounds on the other side. Spiral expected it to be just like everything else; utterly peaceful silence. Instead she heard tiny whimpers and cries like something you'd hear from a nightmare stricken foal. A softness loosened her intention wrapped face. With great ease Spiral let herself within Eclipse's room peering through the moonlight towards the bed that the glowing pony slept. Eclipse was crying within her slumber. Tears drops even seemed to produce a glow either from her hair or another source reflecting from them.
Spiral dared to venture closer to the sleeping filly. Blood rushed to her ears and the sound of her heart now overtaking anything else in this eerie silence. Straining to see in the low illumination, she found Eclipse curled beneath the sheets tangling her forelegs around only one of the two dolls that Spiral had seen the night prior. For a grown filly she certainly was attached to foal toys. “Momma... Co..come back. Wh..where are you...” The words whispered past trembling lips. The stunt pony did not expect her to talk in her sleep. Whatever dream that Eclipse was having caused a torrent of emotions to strike the gray pony. It broke Spiral's heart to see her as such.
Stepping closer to the bed, while images of Spitfire pointed a warning hoof at her in her mind, she felt something soft beneath a hoof. Glancing down, she found the Nightmare Moon doll down fallen on the floor. Something clicked in her head. If Eclipse had slept so peacefully sleeping with both last night, then surely... The chance was taken up. Her head dropped, ignoring the mess chestnut mane that fell over her face, to snatch the doll up by a leg in her mouth. She was gentle in returning it to Eclipse's arms.
Instantly, the filly began to smile and fresh tears no longer were shed. The nightmares appeared to have vanished, and Spiral could actually smile at the sight of Eclipse sleeping peacefully. She sighed. If this was any other pony, she would have just gotten into bed with them, had her way, and went back to her own room. Now, she couldn't even bring herself to kiss the pony on the forehead without feeling guilty that her feelings would be wrong. Teeth clenched the hem of the sheets pulling them back to Eclipse's neck. She would need to think about these things longer. Why staring at Eclipse made her feel so warm, and why when looking at Eclipse she felt such pain remembering what Spitfire had said. There would be no dreams for Spiral when she returned to bed. Only a bleak nothingness to haunt her until the morning.