A Dream

by totallynotabrony

A Matter of Principals

I had a Coke and a tequila and considered my options.

I could mix them. I could put them on the rocks. I guess that was about it.

I mixed them and put them on the rocks.

“Slow day, huh?” observed Guinness.

“My Coca-Cola business is the most profitable thing I’ve ever done. I literally cannot believe the money I have coming in. I think I’ll buy out the other shares in Valiantco® from Twilight and the estate of Bruce Springsteen.”

“That fast?” said Guinness. “It’s only been a week or two. How much money is it?”

“If I told you, you literally would not believe it. I could buy several banks and begin printing my own currency that would compete with bits, and I’d win because I bought so many banks that I’d have the majority in the country. Also, metal money is stupid and I think ponies would agree that thin paper bills are much easier to carry around.”

I shrugged. “Maybe I’m still in shock with how well this soft drink empire worked out and it hasn’t sunk in yet. I’ve got so much money that I could choke a horse. Screw it. I’m going to replace the currency of an entire country because I can. Well, and I’d benefit because carrying paper money is easier.”

“If you’re in a generous mood, I’ve got this bridge I’ve been trying to sell,” said Guinness, grinning.

“Yeah, sure.” I waved my hoof. “Put it on my tab.”

“That was a joke.”

“I know. I’m so wealthy that I just spent whatever you’re going to bill me just to make it not funny.”

I finished my drink and got up. Maybe I was in shock, I was finding that having a personal GDP rivaling most nations outside of Equestria was kind of boring. It wasn’t like I didn’t already get what I wanted, and there were some problems that literally no amount of money could solve.

Like Cordoba being Tim Allen.

I winced. Oh, I made myself sad.

Plus, now that I had all this money and influence from selling soft drinks, I didn’t need to sell out Das Booty to peddle toilet paper or whatever else I was going to sell. And I’d had such a good slogan prepared for the ads.

I turned around from the bar and tossed my used napkin through the magic portal Fizzy had set up in the middle of the floor. With some help from Twilight we’d DEVGRU’d a solution. It wasn’t the first time I’d figured out how to combine technology and magic. There was a small dial with various destinations that could be set. The knob was currently pointing to “trash.” I didn’t know where it went.

Speaking of Twilight, she came in just then. “There you are, Valiant. I was hoping you could help us with something.” Yona and Owlowiscious followed her into the room.

“What is it?” I asked.

“I want to investigate what I’m terming ‘dichotomy shops:’ stores that sell completely unrelated items.”

“Like Quills & Sofas in Ponyville?” I said.

She nodded. “It’s a thin theory, but I have an idea that such stores have something subtle and unseen going on. I’m not sure what we’ll find, maybe nothing, but I wanted to look into it.”

Hell, as rich as I was, this would be easy. Yes, thank you, I will take one weird store, please.

I flipped the dial to “Ponyville Library” and hopped through.

I startled Sunburst, who was studying. He recovered quickly, though, and came over to me. “I wanted to ask you some questions.”

“Don’t sex the robot.”

“Valiant, I was never going to sex the robot, especially now that I know it’s not Starlight Glimmer.”

“Not for lack of trying.”

He ignored me and kept talking, barely noticing Twilight, Yona, and Owlowiscious coming through the portal. “So, if you didn’t use Starlight’s soul to power another aircraft, what did you use it for?”

I pulled out my autodarkening sunglasses and put them on, though he’d already seen me so they were useless as a disguise. I pulled out my wad of cash and started flipping through it.

“You said something really cryptic the last time we met,” Starburst continued. “‘She’s closer than you think.’ What did you mean by that?”

“I tend to be pretty literal when I say something,” I said. “How much money would it take for you to stop talking right now?”

He selectively ignored me again. “So she’s close? Like...how close?”

“I think there’s a more interesting question you should be asking,” I said. I briefly lowered my sunglasses so I could look him in the eye. “If Starlight isn’t Libby...then who did Libby used to be?”

While he was struck dumb by that, I brushed by him and headed for the door.

“I’m kind of interested in that myself,” said Twilight as we walked.

“Someone who used to be vitally important, but lost their place in this alternate universe and I decided to make a few changes to keep their relevance,” I said. “But look at me, blustering on about people near to me with secret identities. We have stores to investigate.”

When you looked at it, Ponyville had a lot of weird stores. I only knew about Quills & Sofas because old Twilight used to go there all the time. But as we got to looking around we also discovered that the place was conveniently located between Soup & Clothes, and Board Games & Drilling Equipment.

“Wait,” said Yona. “You mean secret identities like Mystic and Super Cow, or something else? Something you did and didn’t tell?”

“Oh look,” I said, “I just bought all these stores. Now we can investigate their secrets at will.”

Twilight stared at my wad of cash. “Just how much of that do you have?”

I’d already used “enough to choke a horse” on Guinness. Coming up with metaphors for every person that asked was hard. I should hire a script writer to follow me around.

In response to her question, I said, “Enough to break capitalism and bring it back around to feudalism.” I frowned. Shit, when I put it like that.

I quickly distracted them by striding into the nearest store like I owned the place. I mean, I did, but that’s not the point. It was the store that sold soup and clothes.

“It appears to be a well stocked, legitimate business,” said Twilight, glancing around.

I grabbed a shirt off the rack and put it on. Maybe it would be enough to complete the disguise I had been missing the last time I saw Sunburst. It was kind of ugly, though.

We hunted around for a little while, but didn’t find anything obviously a red flag. Whatever. It’s not like I cared about material goods anyway now that being so incredibly wealthy kind of rendered every monetary pissing contest moot.

“Wait, what the-” Twilight stopped short, bending down to examine a hairline crack in the floor. “This doesn’t look right.”

Yona came over and pounded on the floor a few times. “Sound hollow.”

Twilight tried magic and managed to pry up a trap door. It led down to a dark basement.

“Huh, this wasn’t on the blueprints.” I pulled out a flare and dropped it down the hole.

“Wouldn’t a flashlight have worked better?” said Twilight, squinting at the dim red light.

“I’m kind of to the point in my life where I’m lighting candles just to watch them burn.”

“You’re not that old.”

“I never said it had anything to do with age.”

We went down. There was a body.

Twilight gasped. She gingerly reached out with magic, tilting the limp pony’s head to expose a slashed throat. “Who could the killer be!?”

“The killer is OJ.” I shrugged. “No idea who did this murder, though.”

“We need to gather evidence and figure this out,” she said.

“Yeah. Sometimes I wonder why Ponyville doesn’t have its own police force.”

We searched the area, but other than being a bare basement, there wasn’t much. I didn’t immediately recognize the dead pony.

I turned my head so the tiny camera in my earpiece could see the body. “Tin Mare, run a search for this pony.”

“Processing satellite imagery.” After thirty seconds, she came back. “I have this pony entering the store three days ago but not leaving.”

“What’s their name?”

“Park Bench.”

“Sounds Korean,” I mused. “All right, do we have a probable killer? I’m going to take a guess and say the former owner of this store?”

“Based on traffic flow, I assess Park Bench was alone with Savory Styles, the former owner.”

“Cool. Is Libby with you?”

“Yep!” Libby chimed in.

“Hang on,” Twilight said. “If we already have an idea who it is, and they only left the building a few minutes ago, this is a perfect opportunity for the superhero team.”

I nodded. “Fair enough.”

“Aw man,” said Libby. “You totally blueballed me.”

“You don’t have balls.”

“It’s an expression!”

“I know.”

Mystic, Super Cow, and whatever Owlowiscious’ superhero name was suited up. Given a name, physical description, and direction, it wasn’t difficult to find Savory Styles. I went along to watch.

“Halt, evildoer!” shouted Twilight as they ran up on him.

Yona stomped the ground. Twilight charged her magic. Owlowiscious did too, but suddenly let the spell go, knocking over the other two.

“Jesus, you really aren’t that good at magic,” I said.

“Well, he’s good for an owl,” Twilight said weakly.

Meanwhile, their target had taken the time to run.

“Please let me smear him, Valiant,” Libby begged.

“What’s the collateral damage estimate?”

“I don’t know.”

I rolled my eyes. “Tin Mare.”

“On it.”

“You never let me do anything fun!” Libby complained.

“You’re a robot; you’re not supposed to know what fun is. You wouldn’t know it if you had it.”

“Because you never let me.”

Tin Mare swooped by. I heard a fwoosh followed shortly by a scream and a relatively small explosion. I wondered why Tin Mare didn’t use her gun, but figured she must have slung one of the laser-guided rockets instead.

Either way, my eyes were protected by my fancy shades. It did kind of remind me of that time Valiantina had tried to kill me with eye lasers, though.

Turning away from the explosion, I saw a guy coming down the street. I immediately took notice because he dared make eye contact. Among ponies, that stood out as suspicious.

He made a beeline for me and I was already locking down for combat. Tin Mare, of course, was right there. Plus Mystic and Super Cow weren’t totally useless unlike their partner.

He stopped a few feet away and smirked. “Nice shirt. Does it come in mens?”

“You look like you come in mens,” I reflexively replied.

His face twitched, but he held the smirk. “So I hear you’ve come into some recent wealth.”

“So what?”

“I’m Accurate Analysis, sixth of the Seven School Superintendents.”

“What do you teach?”

Somehow, he turned up the haughtiness another notch. “I’m an economist.”

I blinked. “You are maybe the smuggest economist I’ve ever met, Accurate Anal.”

Another crack appeared in his expression, but he persevered. “I’m here to tell you what a pathetic loser you are and how money doesn’t make you cool and only makes everyone think you’re a dick.”

“Hmm,” I said. I took out my wad of bills and began counting them off.

He watched me. I kept flipping through the cash.

He started to look annoyed. I continued to go through my money and wave it under his nose.

Another minute passed.

His lip had curled, and a smirk had instead begun to appear on my face.

“Stop it,” he suddenly demanded. “Can’t you see you’re embarrassing yourself?”

I stepped back away from the huge pile I had counted off. “You tell me. I’ll give you this hundred million dollars that I just threw away. Just go away and leave me alone. Are you willing to be bought? Are you willing to swallow your attitude and walk away with the biggest single payday you or literally anyone in this world has ever seen? I’ll bet it’s a hell of a lot more than a teacher’s salary.”

I frowned. “Shit, I’m a teacher. Why am I still a teacher? I’m suddenly not sure it’s even worth winning the bet with Twilight anymore.”

“I’m not a teacher, I’m an administrator,” he snapped.

I shrugged. “Well, either way, good thing I have enough money to choke a horse.”

He didn’t reply. Kind of hard when someone’s hoof is ramming dozens of bills down your throat.

Comments

[Selias]

I really should have seen that coming.

[Divan1229]

soy mexicano y aun así mi personaje favorito es córdoba. casi todos sus dialogos estan bien usados pero algunos pocos están fuera de lugar en cuanto al contexto.
al parecer ha de haber un promedio de 1 chiste o juego de palabras en cada capítulo. por cierto, yo he leído todos los capítulos de este fic (y "more dreams") y hasta ahora, este fic es mi favorito en el tema de comedia.

[Salty Milk]

i used to be able to keep up with this plot

[totallynotabrony]

9088694
I used to be able to keep up with this plot

[totallynotabrony]

9088587
Muchas gracias. Es possible soy incluiré mas Cordoba.

[Salty Milk]

9088698
i don't know if i should be concerned or jumping out the window of this thrill ride.

[pootdispencer]

wow, this didn't have a reference to the episode its name after and the last chapter was just one sentence. Is there even a point of putting the episode name in the chapter titles anymore?

[totallynotabrony]

9092337
Well, without Starlight and Discord, there wasn't much left to reference.

[Mordred]

9092337
I think he just wants to give a chronological reference to the show.

[TartarusFire]

Soup & Clothes

9087789

He didn’t reply. Kind of hard when someone’s hoof is ramming dozens of bills down your throat.