Mystery Mash Up

by W1kk3d_Mango

Chapter 3

The Doctor tried adjusting himself in the seat and found trouble finding a good spot. "Well," he began, still wriggling in his seat, "if I must repeat myself, I am the Doctor. It is a pleasure to meet you again, Ms. Do."

Daring stared at him with tired eyes. She was very strong-willed, but this stallion just seemed to push her to her mental limits. Derpy sat directly across from her, staring straight ahead. "Do you remember my name?" The small grey mare asked happily.

"Yes, I believe I do. Derpy, correct?"

"That's it! Yay!" Derpy twisted her body and neck around to where she could nearly touch her back. Turning back around a couple seconds later, she now held a small brown sack in her teeth. Daring heard her say something, but it was muffled by the sack.

"I'm sorry, what was that?" Daring stared at the sacks, clearly puzzled.

Derpy dropped the sack and opened it up with her hooves. She reached in and produced a muffin. Smiling she added in a cheery tone, "I said, 'would you like a muffin?'" Derpy held out the muffin, gesturing for Daring to take it.

"Uhh..." Daring stared at it. She felt these new ponies were going to scramble her brains. She thought back on the many adventures she had been on, all the puzzles she had solved, the detective work, and all the amazing places and people she had seen and met. How could two ponies from out of nowhere throw her off so much? But it wouldn't matter for long. Daring thought about the town she was headed to and relaxed at the realization that she could get away from these two.

Reaching out for the muffin, Daring lifted it and brought it towards her mouth. Taking a bite, she was surprised at how amazing the flavor was. It was staggeringly good; she found herself staring at the muffin. She looked up to notice Derpy had been talking about how she made them. Daring tuned back into reality as the train began to pick up speed and was now fully back in action.

During this exchange the Doctor had been wriggling around trying to find a comfortable spot. After a bit of struggling he had finally found his favorite position. He now sat with one back hoof on the floor while the other back hoof lay on the arm rest. His front right hoof was twisted behind his back and his left lay over his forehead which in turn lay against the window of the train. The Doctor let out a large sigh of relief, paused for a moment, then immediately jumped up and looked at the two mares. "I'm going to go chat with some of the other passengers!" he informed them.

He slunk in between Daring and Derpy and trotted up to the front of the train. Daring leaned to the side so she could fully see the Doctor as he walked right up to the two stallions in business attire. "Hello there," he started, "I'm the Doctor, what's your name?" The two stallions turned to look at him with surprise. The Doctor stood by their seats gleefully looking back and forth between the two of them. “Well you two seem dressed sharp!” He added on after a moment of silence.

“Yes,” one finally replied. He had dark hair in a slick business haircut. His cutie mark appeared to be a few stacks of coins. “we’re heading to Equinath to spot locations for a new observatory.”

The Doctor stuck out his lower jaw and squinted his eyes slightly, “Ooooh, observatory! I love those!”

The two looked at each other. The other pony with divided hair, one half red and the other blue, tilted his head slightly. “You are interested in the sciences as well?” He replied curiously. This pony’s cutie mark resembled a red lambda with what would relate to two electrons circling it.

The Doctor smiled wide and looked at the two of them, “Me? Interested in science? Oh you have no idea!”

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

After Daring had listened to the umpteenth “funny” muffin story from Derpy, she realized that two small muffins, though delicious as they were, were not enough to hold her over until the train reached its destination. “How would you like to go to the dining cart? As best I can tell we’ll be on this train for at least 5 hours.” Derpy shook her head energetically.

The two pegasi got out of their seats. Daring grabbed her bag, not wanting to leave the scroll by itself. Something was clearly up and she wanted to speak with Derpy privately. There was no doubt in her mind that there was something up with this Doctor and she needed to find out what it was. Derpy seemed harmless enough, so she might try and get some information out of her.

The two passed by the Doctor rambling off something that seemed to be complete gibberish to the both of them. Yet the two other stallions seemed to be drooling at the sound of his words. Derpy chimed up as they passed by, “We’re going to see if they have any treats in the dinning cart!” Daring stuttered a bit with her next step. She hoped the Doctor wouldn’t join them. Of course she had known Derpy was gleeful enough to say something, but she didn’t have a plan to divert the Doctor if he asked to join his assistant.

“We’ll be doing girl talk.” Daring said without thinking. The phrase nearly knocked her off her feet. She HATED girl talk. And what would she have in common with this kitchen pony anyways?

The Doctor clearly looked surprised himself. “Well, didn’t figure you the sort, but the two of you have fun!” He turned his attention back to the two stallions next to him and continued to prattle on about stars and hydrogen fission. Daring quietly breathed a sigh of relief.

The two mares walked into the dining carriage, which had mostly been cleaned up. The few back tables where they had entered were dressed and ready to serve. Daring had appreciated the anonymous “friend” for putting her on such a high class train ride. Mostly she had been treated to the back carriage or more often than not, been forced to hide away in a crate somewhere. There was, however, a part of her that missed the excitement of it. But she wasn’t going to let this make her soft.

They found a table in the back and a couple unicorns still sweeping up gestured for a waiter to bring them menus. Derpy began poking the napkin, which was folded in a pyramid shape neatly on the plate in front of her. She let out a slight amazed ‘ooo’ and began poking it with her hoof. She looked up at Daring. “Do you always travel like this?”

Daring chuckled to herself remembering some of the roughest trips. “Not quite. So where are you two from?” She didn’t want to waste much time before anyone else who the Doctor may talk to – or worse, the Doctor himself – came in..

“Well,” Derpy began, “I’m from Ponyville, a nice little town with a lot of nice ponies there. I kind of miss it, but traveling with the Doctor has been really fun!” Daring showed a smile, but hid the jump for joy inside. This was going to be easier than she thought.

A short unicorn with a feathered hare walked up to their table, an aura of magic engulfing two menus that gently found their way in front of Derpy and Daring. “Might I interest anypony in a couple drinks?” She said hurriedly. Daring figured she was needed to help finish cleaning the dining carriage before more ponies decided to come in and eat.

Daring didn’t look at the menu. She just wanted Derpy to get some nice food and find out what was going on. “I’ll just have water. Derpy, don’t worry about prices, I’ll get anything you want.”

“Gee, really!” Derpy said excitedly. She turned her attention to the server. “Do you have any lemon pomegranate green tea? With a little slice of lime on the corner.” Both Daring and the server looked at her oddly.

“Umm, I’m sure we have the necessary tools to make that. We have quite a skilled chef here. I’ll be back shortly.” The server walked down the isle of tables towards the kitchen. Daring returned her gaze to Derpy who was examining the menu closely.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The two stallions who had been captivated by the Doctor’s vast knowledge of the stars were sad to see him go. But at least they had been given much to think about, which would lead them to even more questions and possible discoveries to make. The doctor walked down to the middle of the aisle where the lone mare sat. He approached her noticing the obvious cutie mark of a roll of film. Her mane was long and bright blue while her coat was a quaint silver. She had a nice red butterfly jewel in her mane. The Doctor walked up beside her. “Hello there! Notice anything interesting?”

She had again returned to gazing out the window, but turned to meet the owner of the greeting. "Hello," she replied with a small sniff. The doctor noticed a couple make up smudges around her eyes. "Well, yes, the view here is absolutely remarkable."

“Brilliant, I love a good view. I’m the Doctor by the way, very nice to meet you! Mind if I have a seat?”

The mare looked at him a bit surprised but smiled and said, “Of course. I’m Photo Capson, what exactly are you a doctor of?”

“Oh, just the usual loads of stuff,” he said with a smile, “I’ve been around, seen some things, bit of a rubbish memory from some of them. You, on the other hand, must have a solid memory! Photographer?”

Photo chuckled, “Yes, I have seen quite a few things, some beautiful, some not. But I figure I can relax in a quiet little mountain town. No pony to control me.”

“Control you?” The Doctor tilted his head, “I doubt many people could have a grasp of a photographer.”

“Oh, believe me,” she started, “It’s possible. It’s been just me and my faithful camera for a while.” She stopped abruptly and stared at a bag on the ground. “It’s just been us for a while.”

The Doctor smiled, "You said that twice, friend." His smile seemed to go unnoticed. Photo's expression seemed to be bleak and down-trot. "Is something the matter? The train is moving again now. In fact, I should add that the train is even functioning better, thanks to a very, very, very, clever stallion!" he now beamed with excitement at the thought of his work in the engine carriage earlier.

"No. Well, yes that is a fact, but," her eyes wandered to the bag sitting on her lap. She unzipped it and pulled out a bag to reveal the smashed pieces of a camera. The Doctor looked at it and tilted his head. Photo stared into the pieces as a hundred memories she had shared with the amazing device flooded into her brain again. "It has been with me for 10 years. Everypony said it was out of date and there were new and better models out. But this one always stayed true. It was top of the line when I first got it, so by the time the 'more advanced' models came out, this baby kept right on up with them."

The Doctor, again holding back a slight giggle at the mention of "everypony," of course felt bad for the mare, but perhaps it wasn't all a loss. "Well Photo darling, I believe I could help out with that," he said with a smile, "I bet I could take a look at some of these pieces here and maybe fix it up to be good as new!" The Doctor followed this statement by pulled out his sonic screwdriver.

Photo stared at the strange device. "What is that? Can it really help my camera? What would I need to pay you?" the pony stared at him with hopeful eyes.

Chuckling to himself, the doctor replied softly, " Just tell me a little about yourself, why you’re on the train, nothing too personal if you don't like." He picked up the bag containing the broken camera pieces and sorted them out as best he could.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“So tell me more about this Doctor. Where is he from? How did you two get on the train?” Daring hadn’t looked at the menu once. She was trying to get as much out of Derpy as she could. So far, her efforts had been mostly left to dry. Derpy was either avoiding telling her or honestly didn’t know; Daring figured it was the latter.

“That’s so weird how they put the pictures of the food in here!” Derpy said. Daring grumbled, reached across the table and flipped Derpy’s menu over for her. “Much better!” Derpy happily stated. At that point, Daring figured she either generally didn’t know much or had forgotten a lot of it. “So what were you asking earlier?” Derpy’s attention stayed fixed on the menu.
“Just,” Daring started, trying not to sound annoyed, “How did you get onto the train?”

“Well that’s because of the TARDY.” Derpy said, her eyes still searching the menu for something. “OH! Hay, Barely, and oat soup. Sounds fancy. How did you get on this train?”

Daring rolled her eyes, “I walked on, what is a TARDY?”

“It’s just the Doctors special ship thing.”

“Ship thing?” She shook her head, then just decided to skip that question. “What are you and the Doctor doing here?”

“I’m not sure. The Doctor said he got a weird message on some piece of paper he was carrying In his pocket. It’s strange because I don’t remember anyone delivering it to him. It was like he already had it. Sounds kind of ridiculous I know. But the Doctor has a lot of weird stuff!”

Daring thought hard about this one. The first actual lead onto who they really were. If he already had a paper, could he be the one sending her the messages? But then he got a message, so a competitor maybe? Daring was legendary in her field, why would anypony send multiple talents. What if there was a second force trying to stop her? For every day there was a night, right? “What did this paper look like? Was it a scroll?”

“No, it was more small and in some sort of sleeve. Do you think they had muffins? I doubt they could beat my recipe.” Derpy suddenly put her menu down and looked directly at Daring. “You like questions don’t you.”

Daring was slightly startled by the sudden question. “Uhh, it’s sort of in my line of work.” She looked back at Derpy who wasn’t budging. There was no way she could have caught on to their conspiracy, if there even was one. Daring looked down at the menu for the first time. “So, what was that soup again?”

Comments

[Natr1x]

Still going good but please don't let the plot point be about some fourth wall breaking stuff. I think that has been done quite enough

[W1kk3d_Mango]

411584 Got it I had to do a couple things for future plot in there. The muffin bit was a tad far, but I will be straight back to the adventure! Honest

[Natr1x]

412725 Oh no you get me wrong I saw definitely no fault this chapter I thought it was great :D It's just that I hope the main story won't be centered around some fourth wall breaking plot point like the author being the villain or something like that. Obviously you can't change whole story so easily but it is just my opinion that those concepts have been done enough for now if you get my meaning :)

[MyLittleChichi57]

I'm actually staying up late just to read this