Silver Soul

by Typewrittensoul

Race To The Bottom

Chapter 4

What greeted Pip upon entering the library that morning was the sight of a six foot tall dragon butting heads with a blue unicorn less than half his size. It was a common enough occurrence that sadly, Pip had somewhat gotten used to over the past two weeks.

“When are you going to pay for your rent you good-for-nothing mare!?” the dragon growled from atop a tall rolling ladder. Though considering its size, it didn't particularly seem necessary for him to even use it. Pip would even say it was a comical sight, if not for the dragon currently baring his teeth at an unfazed blue pony. The sharp-toothed creature had no problems placing the set of books in his grasp back into their proper spots without looking.

“The heck to that! You should be paying me for attracting so many ponies to your library! I'm sexy and you know it!”

“Oh? So I have you to thank for the three ponies and a school trip of ten foals that came by yesterday? A school trip, by the way, that I helped organize? Get a real job before I kick you out!” the dragon said while hopping off the ladder.

“I do have a job!” Trixie quickly snapped back.

The skepticism practically shooting out like an optic blast, the dragon rolled his eyes while procuring the next set of books from a nearby return cart. “If that's the case where's your rent!?”

“...I fixed your table the other day, shouldn't that cover for enough?”

“You broke that table in the first place!” He sighed. “Trying out one of your 'saw a volunteer in half' tricks! And stop trying to change the subject, what was your job again?”

“Forget it...” Pipsqueak shook his head at the ongoing battle. “...forget that I ever had any hopes or dreams for the future...” Glumly taking a seat at one of the long tables set up in the library, Pip moped as the pony and dragon largely ignored the concept of being quiet in a library. His eyes wandered away from the spat before him, taking note of the surroundings.

Like any library there were shelves of books. Tall shelves that nearly reached the ceiling of the room's wooden interior (an obvious result of the library being inside a tree) and about as wide as the side of a car. As for the books themselves, there had to be quite a few hundred or more to fill up those tall and wide shelves. Fiction and non-fiction. Sci-fi, historical, fantasy, biology, romance, both human and Equestrian periodicals, drama, thrillers, adventure—there spanned a whole spectrum of genres from what he could tell. From where he sat, a few racks filled with the latest gamer guides were available for perusal.

“I am a show mare, of course! Or have all of these books pushed out your short term memory from that scaly head of yours?”

“It doesn't count if you get paid in free food and birthday cake!”

“Since when?”

“Since nobody accepts birthday cake as currency!”

“Well I accept it as currency. So that isn't 'nobody' anymore, is it? Quite the flaw in your logic.”

“You weren't even part of the equation, much less considered an exception!”

As much as he tried to avoid it, the continuing ruckus ended up drawing Pip's attention back toward the scene in front of him. His eyes first settled on the taller, meaner-looking dragon that was poking a clawed finger at Trixie's chest.

First of all, it couldn't really be said that many libraries had a dragon for a librarian. And to think that that dragon was the same Spike that was just a baby the last time Pip saw him. Unlike before though, Spike was now about twice the height of the average pony when he stood up tall, and just a head above most adult men. His arms and legs were lanky, but proportional to his long torso and prehensile tail that were bedecked with many green fins along his spine.

It was hard for Pip to determine whether dragons progressed naturally from baby to adult as quickly (or slowly?) as Spike had, or if it was the effect of having an entire library as part of his hoard. Pip didn't know much about dragons to begin with, and Spike was an atypical example when compared to the few dragons—mostly violent, greedy, brutish animals—that he had met on top of that.

Whatever the case, the scaly librarian had shown Pip so far that he was more than competent enough to be charged responsible as the custodian of literature. From coordinating field trips to helping pony scientists with research, Spike was involved in a lot of ways outside of simply lending books to the townsfolk.

Pip's eyes then settled over the blue pony that was jabbing her hoof into Spike's torso.

It was interesting to learn that Trixie was living in a library of all places. Whatever the reason the dragon had for renting the private room in the library to the apparently unemployed mare was beyond Pip's imagination.

“But it's the economy, the economy!” Trixie ended up relying on the oft-quoted explanation. “You can't just say that I'm not motivated enough! I'm not the only one without a job, you know...”

Pipsqueak would never admit it out loud—not after realizing Trixie's true persona as displayed now—but he was inspired by what she was able to do practically single hoofedly two weeks ago. What she did not just for Dinky but all of those enslaved human women on the floating airship. He never knew of anypony able to pull off such a stunt as reckless as taking on a gang of armed humans.

Unlike his short time in the Trottingham town watch, Pip didn't feel like his energy was going to waste. He also didn't know that Trixie was also technically jobless at the time, making his request to work for her moot, but it didn't take long to learn from Spike that she spent most of her time doing odd jobs around the area.

“It's not like I do it because I want to...” Pip remembered her admit with a huff at one point, “...but one must support herself in-between venues!”

'Well she is a show-mare, after all...' He thought. There weren't too many places where a performer like her could practice mundane tricks and slight-of-hoof-magic outside of variety shows and children's birthday parties. It was interesting to think what her shows were like, since he had yet to attend any. But it was even more interesting to realize once more, that by being in this library, Pip was back in Ponyville. While Trottingham would always be where he was born, Pip considered Ponyville his true hometown.

It was strange enough to see how much of Ponyville remained as much as it did when he was a kid. Following after Trixie a couple of weeks ago when he first started “working” for her, Pip noticed how the roads were still mostly dirt rather than paved, and that most homes and buildings here were still built from wood rather than steel and concrete. A set of apartment complexes nearby were of course a novel sight, but the very fact that the tree that housed the library was still here was testament enough to how human-led urban development had largely skipped this town.

It was lucky enough that the trip between Ponyville and Trottingham was no longer the arduous journey it once used to be. Cars and high-speed trains had overtaken the prominent position that steam powered (and horse-drawn) carts and trains once had. That made commuting less of a hassle.

“Then why don't you go work in a mine?” Pip heard Spike reply with a grunt. “That makes good money! Great, even. Haven't you heard? There's another planet just chock full of precious high-demand metals and minerals! You might even meet other blue creatures! Go reunite with your family on Pand*ra!”

“You makin' fun of me?” Trixie sneered at his comment. “I could make a lot of money selling dragon-skin purses! I know for a fact that B. Mak*sky would love to have a purple design next season!”

“Which reminds me, I've been meaning to get glue for the children's arts and crafts activity next week!”

“Eh? Arts and Crafts? You sure do have a lot of time on your claws! Shouldn't you be busy stopping *asty *orc?”

“Go jump off a diving board.”

“Go kidnap a princess!

Spike snarled at this and drew his face close to Trixie's, scowling all the while. “...you want to be homeless?”

“...I don't have time for this...” She snorted. Breaking eye contact, she backed away. “...I have a show to prepare for...” Without following up, Trixie turned her back to Spike and went into the adjoining room and up the stairs.

Pip waited for a moment until the other pony was out of earshot before approaching Spike. “I don't want to seem nosy, seeing how you two are always arguing but...that last one was kind of mean, Spike...”

“Meh...” his green eyes quickly observed the white and brown pony and narrowed slightly. After a moment though, the dragon shrugged and closed his eyes. As the tension in area disappeared, Spike quickly seemed more casual, quite different from his heated attitude just moments ago. “You don't have to worry. That mare is a lot tougher than she looks.” Lumbering over to a pile of books placed haphazardly on one of the long tables, he stacked and carried them easily in his arms and began to re-shelve them by memory. “Plus I could never just kick her out since I'd never get my money then.”

“Oh. I see.” Pip chuckled nervously at the dragon's reasoning. Without further ado, the colt rushed after the other pony. A bit perturbed yes, but less surprised than he thought coming from someone that was willing to give somepony like Trixie a roof to live under in the first place. No one who displayed that small look of concern like Spike did at Pip's comment could really be apathetic.

--

Pip had followed the blue unicorn up the stairs in the private residential area of the tree. Reaching the top landing, he looked around to see a normal-looking bedroom. A twin sized bed with blue and white blankets, a single white pillow. A chest and dresser with a vanity mirror. Windowed doors that opened to a balcony outside.

Looking around, the room was quite spacious. Both this room and the library proper were the same height, this private room had an alcove that served as a bedroom while the main floor was used as a common area. On the upper level Pip had a high view of the common area. Below, there was an all-purpose table, as well as a couch set in front of a television set. Several more shelves of books lined the walls.

Apparently Spike no longer lived in the library itself. Though the dragon lived in a nearby house, citing that the library's private space was too small for someone his size. His question about Twilight Sparkle's whereabouts were left unanswered by both the Spike and Trixie. That heavy atmosphere then was enough of an indication to Pip that that was a touchy subject. He made sure to keep that in mind.

While he was always welcome to stay at the library now that he was 'working' for Trixie, Pip was fine with commuting from Trottingham. Although he was quickly running out of the savings he had from his earnings as a town watchpony. Remaining quiet all the while, Pip watched Trixie lazily plop onto her bed. He chose to sit on the floor nearby. “So how are you going to come up with the rent?”

“I dunno.” She mumbled. “Maybe I can try gambling? I'm sure I can double or triple the money I have left so I can live comfortably for a few months.” Trixie absentmindedly swung her legs, pointed toward the ceiling, to and fro, as though walking down some imaginary upside down road.

“Even kids know they shouldn't do that with their allowances.” Pip scoffed. “Don't insult the parents of the world who give a part of their hard earned money to their children as allowances every week.”

Rolling onto her side, Trixie shot him a frustrated look, like he was saying something meaningless. “So what do you expect me to do, steal? No thanks. I already learned my lesson.”

“Eh? What? What are you saying?” Pip blinked a few times while trying to comprehend her comment. However she didn't wait his mind to catch up before continuing on.

“And I don't need my rap sheet getting any longer, either.” she shamelessly admitted. “It's tough enough that I had to report to a parole officer for a few months!”

“Children of the world, please don't look at this adult as a role model! Learn from her mistakes!” Pipsqueak felt the depression welling up, and became unable to look at the blue pony the same way. “Fine...” he started with a sigh. “...if you help me with my grocery shopping, I mean, I don't have money to pay you with...so I guess I can let you have some of the dinner I was planning to make tonight.”

“Really? You'd do that? You're so kind! Like a saint! What a kind soul you have, Pipsqueak!”

While the problem was revolving around the notion of her rent bill, and not being able to money to pay for it, Pip couldn't stop the pity he felt when he saw Trixie with such a joyous expression in her eyes. “This is so backwards...offering my so-called 'boss' work...” he said in a drawn out sigh.

--

The two ponies were walking along the dirt roads of Ponyville after finishing with their grocery shopping. Their saddlebags bounced as they trotted, filled with the vegetables, sauces and spices necessary for what Pip had planned for dinner.

'To think I'd end up back at Ponyville after all this time...' Pipsqeak couldn't help but think as he regarded the town they walked back to the library.

“I wonder where Dinky's living? I'd sure love to tap that flank right about now!”

“LIKE HELL I'D EVER SAY THAT, DAMNIT!” Pip could feel a vein throbbing in his head right about now as he glared daggers at the light-blue mare walking beside him, whose eyes just screamed mischief. “And stop reading my mind!”

“Oh, what is this? An admission of Pipsqueak's inner dark thoughts come to light?”

“Tsk...I'll meet you back home!” He decided to speed up to a gallop, unnerved that he took Trixie's bait and fell for her trap. Embarrassment at admitting his feelings may or may not have been a contributing factor.

“Hey Pip!” he heard her call from behind him in a mechanical tone. “Pipsqueak!!”

“I can't hear you! Lalelulelo!” Closing his eyes as he ran, he suddenly bumped into somepony in front of him and tumbled to the ground. Opening his eyes again, Pip first noticed how the contents of his saddlebag were all strewn about but luckily it seemed that nothing was broken or had slipped out of its packaging.

“I was going to tell you to watch out.” Trixie said with a bored tone as she arrived on scene.

“Well try harder, next time!” Pip angrily snapped and craned his head to see the mare approach. His attention then returned to the pony he had crashed into. “Oh no, I totally ran over her!” his voiced wavered while looking over the pony lying on the ground.

“You definitely trucked her, Pip. Such a brute. Look, she even has a bandage on already.” Trixie pointed out the white wrappings around the dark orangey-yellow pony. “Way to go.”

“What? No, that's probably an injury from somewhere else. Besides, I don't think she's really hurt. She may just be a bit shocked, that's all! Yeah, that's it...look, she's definitely ok. Excuse me, miss?” Pip spoke as though he was trying to get a waitress' attention in a busy family restaurant. “Sorry for scaring you like that...good thing that that was just a near miss, right? Miss...?”

“That's the most spectacular 'near miss' I've ever seen...”

“Shush!” He spat at the unicorn's unhelpful comment. Turning back toward the body, Pip tried nudging it softly this time with his hoof. “Excuse me...” He tried nudging again. No response. “Excuse me...you can get up now...it couldn't have been that hard a hit...” He tried using his other hoof to poke at the body. Still no response.

The colt's lip twitched.

“Hey! It's very rude of you to just sleep here on the road like that, Miss!” Pip raised his voice as though he was trying to grab the attention of a waitress who had been ignoring his attempt to make an order in an empty family restaurant, and pushed the body with heavier force. “Listen here, you get up right this instant or else-”

Then a deep red began to soak up the bandage, expanding outward from a single point, before a whole pool of red liquid appeared to spread on the ground around the body.

The colt's eyes grew as wide as dinner plates. “NOOOOOOO!”

--

Trixie and Pip quickly dragged their victim out of sight to a nearby alleyway, as the colt kept muttering thanks to Celestia that there weren't any witnesses.

“What do I do, what do I do, what do I do?”

“How about you watch where you're going...” a voice drunkenly grumbled in irritation from behind them.

Frozen in place, the two ponies mechanically turned their heads around and saw the dark orangey-yellow pony sitting upright on her haunches, her bandages covered in splotches of red dripping to the ground.

“Zombie pony! Zombie pony out to kill us!” Pip and Trixie screamed in each other's embrace.

“I am not a zombie pony...” the purple maned filly grumbled. “This must be some kind of sauce...it totally stained my bandage...” she said after sniffing the red liquid.

That was when Pip finally took a second glance at the pony standing before them. Her bright purple mane, greyish-purple eyes, that orange-yellow coat.

Pip couldn't believe his eyes. “Scoota...loo...?”

“Try being original! You already did that sort of cliffhanger in the first chapter, remember?” Trixie decided to jump-start Pip's mind, which had frozen from recognizing the pony before them, by noogying him with her blue hoof.

“Fine...just quit it first!” Pip struggled to push the blue pony's weight off of him, as his scalp began to burn from the friction. With a final shove, the colt succeeded. “Anyways...It's been a while, hasn't it? What have you been up to, Scootaloo?”

“Pipsqueak? Wow, yeah it has! Looks to me you managed to grow up pretty well.” the filly stated with a grin. Hoping that she wouldn't notice the sudden warmth he felt grow in his cheeks, Pip shrunk a bit from Scootaloo's inspecting glance. After looking between him and Trixie a few times, Scootaloo flashed an even wider smile. “Didn't know you'd be able to score a mare at your age! Good for you.”

“I am a fetching prize, aren't I?” Trixie smiled at the girl's affirmation of her greatness. Pip however, couldn't have disagreed as strongly as he did as a matter of principle.

“No. This one? Never. Not in a million years.”

“Really?” the filly blinked at his rapid response. “So it's just a 'casual' relationship?” Scootaloo smirked and wiggled her eyebrows, finally making her joking a bit more obvious to him. However silly she was trying to be, Pip felt a strong need to create as much distance between himself and Trixie. He was embarrassed enough for ever respecting her.

“So mean, Pip...”

“Like I said before, please stop reading my thoughts.”

“All kidding aside,” Scootaloo said to cut back into the conversation, “I just got back to Equestria. Did you know you need a license to fly now? Well I sure didn't! So after signing this bogus contract, I managed to get one. I was wondering if I could get a better one, because the one I have is for racing only.”

Breaking off his icy stare at the unicorn next to him, Pip looked back at the filly, taken aback by the casual manner that Scootaloo accepted her state of affairs. He had never heard about a contract being necessary to get a license.

Flying licenses, much like the magic ban, were the end result of the human domination of Equestria. They were made as a way to control the movement of the pegasi, just as the ban on magic was made to limit the dangers that unicorns naturally posed to humans.

Unlike in their cloud cities like Cloudsdale and Los Pegasus, pegasi were restricted to only a few reasons to fly near or within city limits of the Equestrian metropolis. Reasons such as weather control, delivery services, entertainment or sports. Humans had limited control of the countryside, so they didn't both with trying to expand their enforcement zone to the rural areas. But for those few pegasi that did decide to enter city limits, they had to keep their license on them at all times whenever they flew.

“What sort of contract?” Pip cocked his head, hoping that Scootaloo had just explained wrong. “Are you on a racing team? Because you mentioned that you had a racing license...”

“Nah, nothing serious like that.” the orange-ish filly scoffed at the notion. A cocky, toothy grin appeared in a manner too similar to a certain-blue-unicorn's image of herself that couldn't be coincidental. “I race on the betting tracks for a bunch of blowhard gangsters. I'm pretty top tier, but I only get a 10-90 cut of the winnings, not to mention that it's a ten year non-negotiable...that's a pretty bad deal, if you ask me!”

Again, the casual manner that she described her situation baffled the colt. “10-90? As in you only...? Wait, forget that, why were you only able to get a contract with gangsters? And a ten year deal at that! How did you end up signing something so messed up? Didn't you read the terms?”

“Well they were offering this wicked-looking platter of soybean empanadas when we were talking about the terms, and I was really hungry and-”

“SO IT WAS YOUR STOMACH!? YOUR STOMACH GOT YOU INTO THIS MESS!?”

Scootaloo recoiled from Pip's outburst and the saddened look in her eyes betrayed the small smile and chuckle she let out. “It's not just that...” Her voice was quieter this time, and she was immediately more measured about was she was going to say. “It seems that since I got back...nopony is willing to hire...much less affiliate themselves with a pegasus these days...”

Pip realized the purpose of those bandages now. It wasn't because she was hurt, but because they hid her wings. Thinking about it, even though licenses were required to fly now, that wouldn't explain why pegasi were all but non-existent in the city.

“You remember Rainbow Dash, right?” Pip nodded, surprised how the name has slipped from his mind until Scootaloo mentioned it. “Well a few years ago when humans first started coming to Equestria, she decided to go check out the Human World. And I went along with her. But I never knew what was going on until I came back just recently. Everything looks different...I haven't seen or heard from my friends in so long, and I even got in trouble for trying to fly while looking for everypony...”

“Scootaloo...” Pip felt awkward, not knowing if there was anything that could be done to help at this point. No, even if knew, he realized, was it something he even could do?

“And that's when I met up with those humans...” After soft inhale of breath, Scootaloo continued. “At first they paid me to win races. First against birds, then griffons and moved up to other pegasi. Later on I raced cars, trains, a fighter jet and even a rocket.”

“No, you have to be exaggerating...I think the last few ones are impossible...”

“Maybe...” she said and let out a soft laugh. “But those humans...now they want to take me back to the Human world...” Scootaloo's glance drifted downward and after another pause, her voice was even quieter. “...But I just want to stay here. Try to find everypony else...and show them how I'm able to fly now...but I don't want to do it just because I have to!”

“Well them's the breaks, kid. You're the one who signed the contract. You're the one who wanted to fly 'no matter what', aren't you?”

The voice came from a middle aged man, dressed in a black cotton robe and sandals. His black hair had streaks of gray and white in it, as did his small beard. A pair of dark wide-rimmed sunglasses hid his eyes from view. On either side of the portly man was about four other humans blocking the alleyway exit.

“Now that you've had your fun, it's about time to get back to the tracks. There's a race I need you in.” The man ordered. After a short wait, the man sucked air through his teeth at seeing that the ponies would not move. He let out a loud growling exhale and walked further into the alleyway, followed by the other men. To his surprise, the man strode right up and grabbed Scootaloo by her mane.

“Scootaloo!” Pip jumped forward at the sound of Scootaloo's pained cry only to be pulled back by someone grabbing his own mane. He craned his neck and saw two other humans, including the one keeping him from reaching Scootaloo. 'There were others behind us!?'

“Settle down, hotshot.” the man in sunglasses frowned. He combed his fingers through his hair and walked confidently to the colt. “She signed a deal and she's bound by its terms. It's something called the law. You wouldn't understand, kid. Complex adult stuff and all that.”

“Well that's a bullshit law! Let her go!” Pip winced at a heavy tug from the human grabbing his mane from behind him. “Let her go or I'll kick your ass!”

To this the man raised his hand and swung his arm, backhanding Pip. The force of the hit was surprising, but didn't do more than cause him to stumble back on his hind legs. Pip managed to catch his balance, though with his mane being held, remained standing on his two legs. “Noisy little runt, aren't you?” the man grumbled.

“Say...” taking a moment to look at the colt, the man chuckled. “I can never get over the fact that I'm talkin' to a pony. Say, are you one of her friends? Don't matter much to me but I gotta ask. For curiosity's sake...Do you know what she is?”

“What are you talking about!?” Pip's eyebrows furrowed.

“No!” the filly suddenly pleaded. She squirmed desperately while being held in response to the man's question. “Don't tell him!”

“Tell me what?” Pip's eyes widened. He struggled as best as he could from the tight hold on his mane. What was it that Scootaloo was so desperate not to let him know?

“Please! I beg of you!” Scootaloo was more panicked now, against the two to three humans it now took to hold her down.

“Shut up, already!” the man shouted at Scootaloo.

“Let her go!”

“You really didn't know, kid? I'd hate to break it to you but this pony friend of yours...is a pegasus. You're angry now, right? You earth ponies hate pegasuses, don't you?”

Pip gave a blank stare. “...uh...not really?”

“Wahaha, what a dumb kid!” he turned back to Pip with a wicked smile on his face. “You totally don't get it.” The man rubbed his temples as though he was grossly misunderstood and walked back to where Scootaloo was being apprehended. “Take a look. Under these bandages, she's been hiding a pair of wings! See! She's totally different from you!”

“Please Pip, don't look!” The filly's melodramatically panicked behavior was more apparent from the way she whined. So much so that Pip was unsure how to react anymore.

Despite her protests, the human took his knife edge under the fabric and ripped it open, revealing her wings. They spread out instantaneously after being released from the constricting bandages. Her body shook in a spasm and her head jerked back from the sudden force.

“W-well, uh...ah...huh...?” Pip's eyes danced around the image of her lean frame, probably as a result of the physical demands of racing. “Wait, no!” the colt violently shook his head and with a sudden backward thrust, hit the man behind him with the back of his head, managing to escape. This took the others by surprise, but no one moved to stop him.

“But...” the colt began after recovering his composure. “I knew already...that she's a pegasus. Kind of a pre-existing condition, I guess. I've always been ok with that.”

The old man adjusted his sunglasses. “Wait, really?”

“...yeah.” Pip said cautiously and stood his ground, appreciative that the group hadn't ganged up on him yet. While focused on the older man, Pip knew for certain that there were still the two men behind him, while using his peripheral vision was able to make out the others standing nearby the one in sunglasses.

“D-doesn't matter. We have a contract.” the older man finally said. He adjusted his robes and slowly regained his confidence as the white and brown pony failed to make any further erratic actions. He had the numerical advantage as well as assured that he was dealing with an earth pony, while Scootaloo was already restrained by his other men.

“She's already an integral part of our group. Back in our world, we're entertainers, you see And our audience has already gotten bored of talking ponies. So we're going after pegasi. We had heard that they were amazing flyers, but after meeting your friend here, we'd made more money than I could have ever imagined!”

“So...she's just entertainment? Somepony for your amusement you kept in a cage whenever you wanted?” Pip could feel his jaw ache. Clenching his teeth so tightly, he wanted nothing more than to charge at the man and pound him with his hoof. “That's totally messed up!”

The man scratched his chin. “Well...I'll tell you what. If you could get some other pony to fill in for your friend, I'm sure we could arrange a deal. I'm even willing to pay you a bonus if you got a unicorn to sign up! After all, what'd be more amazing than seeing real life magic?”

“Hey Pipsqueak, I got bored with your whole flirt-fest with your friend after you stopped paying attention to me, so I went to buy some magazines and a lotto ticket with your leftover grocery money. Don't worry, I saved the change.” Sauntering obliviously into the alleyway, the blue mare with a silver mane ignored the humans and walked right up to Pip, her saddlebags full of miscellaneous items that were not magazines or lottery tickets. For example the box of a make-your-own-slurpie kit was poking out of one of the pockets.

'I was wondering where she had wandered off to...' Pip mentally groaned. His worries were not helped one bit by this change in situation. He gulped, seeing how despite her arrival, they were still outnumbered. Pip remained tense, wondering how he was going to get out of this situation

“Get a load of this! It's a real unicorn!”

“N-no way!”

The seven humans, amazed by their find, all approached the Trixie with slack-jawed looks on their faces. Even the two humans standing behind Pip moved into his line of sight to have a better view of the pony. The man in sunglasses walked closer with a cooler attitude, but the smirk on his face was noticeable nonetheless.

“Oh hello...what do we have here?” Trixie's eyes lit up at the human group moving toward her. Her excitement grew in proportion to how many eyes were aimed in her direction.

“So this is a unicorn?”

“Definitely headliner material!”

“Think she can do any good tricks?”

“Mmmm, yes boys, do go on!” Trixie reveled in the attention, practically prancing in place as the compliments continued. “Don't be afraid of getting a close look!” Her show-mare instincts kicking in, the blue pony flashed a practiced smile and began posing to the astonishment of the men around her. “Ten bucks a picture...double if you want to take one with me.”

“Hey, that's a pretty sweet deal.” One of them commented, even checking through his wallet to see if he had enough.

“Just...wow...” Pip hung his head low at their pitiful amazement.

“You know miss, I'm in the entertainment business and I must say you're quite the specim-special kind of pony I've been looking for.” The old man took off his sunglasses, revealing dark brown eyes that had weathered old age.

“I think he was about to say 'specimen' and changed halfway through!” Pip exclaimed to no one in particular.

“The name's Maury.” Squatting down so he was at eye level with the pony, the man produced a small white business card and presented it for her to see. “I'd love to be your manager. If you have any questions, we can discuss them over lunch. My treat, of course.”

“OI! HE'S TRYING THE SAME TACTIC LIKE HE DID WITH SCOOTALOO! DON'T FALL FOR IT! DON'T LET YOUR STOMACH SELL YOU OUT!”

“Oh, really?” Trixie read through the limited text provided on the card.

MAURY B.

AGENT

(XXX) XXX-XXXX

“...Maury, is it?” Trixie said as she looked back toward the man. “I've got a question...”

“Oh? Can it wait until lunch? I'm sure you must be starving.” Maury fiddled with his robes again as he stood back up.

“No, I'm just curious about something.” Manipulating her lips into a pout, Trixie tilted her head slightly while remaining in eye contact with the human. “If you could be so kind? It's just a short question.”

“Okay,” he finally sighed and shrugged. “As long as it's a quick one. Please, ask away.”

“Do you know how painful getting kicked by a pony is, Maury?” she asked darkly, her eyes suddenly emotionless but still aimed up toward the human.

His eyes furrowed and a look of confusion created several wrinkle lines in his face. “Wha-?”

Two humans flew into the air and crashed into the garbage lined up along the alleyway walls. Her silver tail following after the lightning speed of her surprise attack. With a quick spin on her front hooves, two other men were too slow to avoid being bucked out of the alleyway entirely, thrown onto the main dirt road. The final two, breaking out of the shock from the unicorn's attacks on the others, had managed to dodge and duck respectfully from her two next strikes.

Pip took advantage of their complete focus on Trixie, running head first into the back of the man who had attacked him, then jumped on his hind legs and struck the other human with his left front hoof. They crumpled to the ground, unconscious before Pip landed.

“N-no!” The bearded Maury trembled at the sight of the two ponies now facing him. With a scream, the older man ran deeper into the alleyway as fast as his portly body could carry him. Too afraid to back look over his shoulder, he soon found himself at a dead end. “Shit! No!” He stared at the wall before him and froze as the approach of steps became louder behind him. His eyes wide, Maury slowly turned to have a long dark silhouette cover his body.

He blindly grasped behind him while stepping further back only to find himself against the wall. He sank to the ground, his legs losing feeling as the blue unicorn continued closing the distance between them, walking ever so slowly. Maury tried to scramble further into the wall, clawing at it as though it would suddenly give way. “Y-you wouldn't dare...” the older man gasped. “You attacked me first! I didn't do anything illegal! You got nothin' on me!”

“That's interesting to hear.” Trixie noted quietly. Standing normally on all four of her hooves, the pony was able to look down at the human cowering on the ground before her. “...you're really going to say that when you've been carrying out illegal gambling without a permit?” Trixie countered his perplexed expression with a wily smile. “I heard enough of the filly's story to know that you've been swindling the poor girl.”

“Well she signed the contract! It's a legal document!”

“Ha! There's no way anypony would normally accept a 10-90 cut. Or even a ten year contract for that matter. Even if that pegasus was being stupid about the whole thing, no one's going to accept that such a lopsided deal is legit. Besides...I'll have you know that I've memorized every racing team in the books. And I've never even heard of your team.”

“You shouldn't be proud of that...” Pip said as he reached the end of the alleyway, shaking his head in despair.

“I doubt that you didn't know that black market racing is a punishable offense in Equestria. Which means that the only reason you would still do it would mean that some official is looking the other way in exchange for a cut. Meaning that the government is losing all of that tax revenue. I'll let you know that most ponies are pretty set against corruption, although I'm sure that some of the less scrupulous ponies would be pretty pissed that they're not getting their cut.” Trixie had brought her face close to Maury's, wearing a malicious smile. “Now...let's make a deal, shall we?”

--

“You brought home another mouth to feed?” the purple and green dragon growled with his face resting in his scaly palm. As part of Pip's suggestion and partly for the colt's welcoming party, Spike had closed the library early that night to try Pip's preparation of parmesan pumpkin dumplings and oven roasted sunchokes.

Spike, expecting the dinner to be just the three of them, had skipped his usual pre-dinner snack. With the sudden and unannounced addition of a fourth however, the dragon's portions had gotten decidedly smaller.

“And a 'hello' to you too, Spike.”

Spike ignored Scootaloo's quip and focused instead on staring at Trixie. “You should expect your already-late rent to rise if you decide to let her stay with you. I'm not letting you scam me out of an extra meal for yourself. There's a reason it's called 'room and board'.” Trixie ignored the stare, focusing on eating her food.

“Though I love the idea, it's kind of hard to pull off when she eats twice as much as you do.”

With a snort, Spike scratched the back of his neck and looked at the pegasus sitting next to him. “Hi, Scootaloo. Good to see you.”

“Hi!” The filly's smile beamed warmly at his delayed response before turning to her fourth serving to everyone else's first or second. “This is...really good stuff, Pip.” She garbled between her chews. “You'll make a great wife some day!”

“Ha, ha.” the colt returned a frown. After taking a bite, he found it hard to prevent the happiness exuded from his taste buds to show. “But thanks for your compliment nonetheless.”

“I aim to please!” she chimed back. Independent of the cool, snarky look on Scootaloo's face, her wings fluttered lightly before settling back to their folded position.

Watching this, a thought came to Spike. “You realize that even though you got out of that contract, without a flying-specific job you can't get a license, even if you had the money, right?”

“That's only a temporary setback.” She said while plopping a sunchoke into her mouth. “You can rest assured my new job will let me pay for rent. As for a license, I'll figure something out. No big deal.” Scootaloo shrugged. “Hey, you gonna eat that?” her hoof was like a blur reaching across the table and grabbing the last of the dumplings. Holding the plate in her mouth, the pegasus placed the food onto Trixie's plate. “Here ya go, boss.”

Spike glared at Trixie, watching her take slow deliberate bites of her recently acquired food. After eating a portion, she returned Spike's glare and feigned innocence. “It's part of her contract.” She said with a smile. “She does good work.”

Dropping his fork onto his empty plate, the dragon let out a slow, heavy sigh. “...yeah....yeah...”

Comments

[Lionheart]

i must know what happened to twilight now now now now

[bcsnakeeyes]

so first he meets dinky , now hes run into scootaloooo my god pip your a ladies man you are, whars next sweetie bell and applebloom man is this going to be interesting.