Bronze Ashes

by Mezphel

Intermission One

The sound of clinking glass and loud chatter filled Ponyville’s most famous pub, ‘The Blue Jays’.A heavy scent of alcohol and fried vegetables filled the air, giving the place its characteristic scent.

“Chug! Chug! Chug! Chug!”

The crowd’s voice overpowered the small fiddle being played in the distance, two figures were sitting in front of each other, uncountable empty mugs littered on top of their table.The two were drinking in hopes of winning against each other, and those who watched placed bets on top of who they thought would win.

A burly, red stallion with a blond mane, who went by Big Mac, and a ash gray kirin mare, none other than Bronze Ashes.

*THUMP*

The crowd hollered when both contestants, again, finished another round of hard cider, two waitresses hastily procured another pair of mugs, full of the golden goodness.Soon enough the crowd again chanted their pub mantra, and the two of them all but inhaled their drinks.

It was in this situation that Minuette, a fairly small unicorn mare, maya blue coated and two toned periwinkle and blue mane found herself in.She and Roseluck, a earth pony of cream coloration and raspberry toned mane, had invited Bronze for a night of drinks on the pub that they were currently in, but what she hadn’t expected was for Rose to pass out cold, and for Bronze to enter a drinking competition against Big Macintosh, who was famous for being able to hold himself in these types of situations fairly well.

She wasn’t much for drinking anything harder than wine, and as such she was the only one sober enough to be able to think properly, and probably the one who would have to carry out home a passed out mare and possibly a passed out kirin.

“Are you sure you want to do this Rose? you haven’t even talked with her much if what you told me is true.”
“Well, I talked with her once when she bought a few orchids…”
“That’s not talking, that’s selling a product for a customer, you both are neighbors for Celestia’s sake, haven’t you even said ‘hi, how are you?’ to her once?”
“Well… she isn’t the most approachable pony… kirin, whatever she is.”
“And you still want to ask her to come drink with us?”
“What? is there another better way to meet her than to get her drinking with us?”
“Yep, like a normal everyday conversation.That would be a better start.”

Her musings were cut short by a very loud and feminine warcry of victory, how she knew that she had no idea, but it didn’t matter as she saw the giant of a pony fall over to the ground, his mug of cider spilling over to the floor, and the winner, Bronze, yelling at the top of her lungs something incomprehensible.

Thinking that right then would be the best time to intervene, Minuette rose up from where she was sitting to fetch a drunk kirin and maybe, possibly, walk her home without needing to carry her.

“Bronze? Bronze, we should go home.”

“Heeeeeyyss… Who’sh yoo again?”

“Minuette, and Bronze, we should really get you home.”

“Eyyyy… shoop… Ahstill wanna drink more, ish there anyone that wansh to challaannm… whu?”

Grabbing the kirin by her withers, Minuette all but draged the drunken mare out of the grumbling circle of stallions and a few mares that were watching the spectacle.

“We should really, reaally get you home, you’re too drunk and you said yourself that you had work tomorrow.”

“Okaish mom, heeeey can we gesh shomethin to eat? ah’m shtarv… sharvv… hungry.”

“Home first, food later.”

“Alrigh - hic - t”

‘Parking’ Bronze on the table that she was sitting, Minuette levitated the passed out Roseluck on top of her back.Luckily for her the earth pony was quite light, being as small as she was.With utmost care to not let the drooling face of her friend’s on her mane, she set out of the pub, guiding the drunken kirin through the streets.

“And why do you say that she seems unapproachable?”
“Well… she is kinda creepy, you know…”
“And why, pray tell, or what, made you change your vision on her so much that you just want to go to her and ask her out?”
“I’m not asking her out,it’s we, and we are inviting her for some drinks.And she kinda saved my house on that parasprite invasion…”
“Ah, so this is a very late thank you gesture?”
“Eh, nah, it’s more like… Well, since that time, I kinda thought about it, and the only reason I kept my distance was because she seemed to not care about her neighbors, or that she purposefully avoided them.If she was really like that she wouldn’t have tried to save the entire neighborhood like she did.”
“And did she?”
“Well, she went around flying and breathing fire on those vermins, I like to think that if she hadn’t done that we would have to spend a lot more on rebuilding our houses.”
“Wait, she breathes fire?”
“She’s part dragon don’t you remember?”

Roseluck’s house came into vision after a good ten minutes of walking, the house, much like the mare’s store, had a very good looking front, with a variety of good smelling and beautiful flowers, a true snack garden of superb quality.

Remembering something that Rose had said sometime ago, she lifted the third vase from left to right, and on it’s bottom was a reserve key.Levitating it, Minuette quickly unlocked the door and barged in without much care.

“Goddesses, she may not be heavy but that still was a long walk.”

“Whosh yoo talkin’ to Minny?”

‘Oh hay I forgot about her… she was so quiet all the way here.’
“No one, wait there, I’ll just get Rose to her bed okay?”

“Okaysh.”

Minuette quickly found out that carrying somepony on your back while simultaneously going upstairs wasn’t the brightest idea she had conceived.Sighing, she strained the rest of her magic to carry Rose on her levitation aura to the mare’s bedroom.There, she tucked her friend in the mattress, and covered her with a blanket.

Downstairs she found Bronze sitting on her haunches, staring at somewhere with a distant look on her face, slightly worried Minuette made her way to the kirin with haste.

“You alright?”

The comment made the mare snap out of her trance, and back to the drunken state of before.

“Yeesh, you woorry too mooch.”

She couldn’t help but chuckle at the display.When all of this craziness had started, the kirin had acted somewhat cold to both of them, she still talked and joked like anypony would, but most of the time she had an air of distance towards them both, if somepony had said that the otherwise stoic kirin was this silly she would have told them that they were joking.

“Well, there’s her house.”
“Yep.”
“And now you do what you came here to do.”
“Yep.”
“You’re not going to knock on her door are you?”
“Nope.”
“If you can’t even knock on her door how do you think you’re going to ask her out?”
“Why you keep sayin that? It makes me look like i’m interested in her.”
“And you aren’t?”
“I’m not going to dignify that question with an answer.”
“So you are?”
“Go to Tartarus and don’t come back”
“Then go and knock on the door damn it!”
“Alright… well, here I go.”
They both waited, and as soon as Roseluck seemed to be leaving the door opened, and on the other side Bronze stood.
“Huh, new faces.”
“Hey there! My name’s Roseluck, and this here’s my friend Minuette, we were thinking about inviting you to drink with us on a pub here nearby.”
They both watched as the kirin raised one of her eyebrows, a curious look on her face.
“Come in, I need to finish something before.”
Entering the house, Minuette saw what most would say to be a barren abode.The small place was empty of most furniture one would deem necessary.Other than a oven, a fridge and a very uncomfortable looking couch, there was nothing.
“I wouldn’t sit on the couch.”
Those were the last words Bronze said before vanishing inside her bedroom.
“You really just blurted whatever came first on your mind didn’t you?”
Maybe it was the closeness that she had to Roseluck, maybe it was because she had whispered it, but something made the mare jump in the air with a muffled shriek.
“Damnit Minnu, you going to scare me to death like that!”
“I think I see now why so many stallions say that you are a weird mare, you can’t even start a conversation properly.”
“I am not trying to woo her or anything, so can you stop with it?”
“Did I say anything about you trying to woo her?”

Luckily for her, the door was already open when both of them got to Bronze’s house.Happy that she hadn’t needed to carry the kirin like she had done to her other friend, Minuette entered the house, still guiding Bronze like one would guide a very drunk pony.

Which, in this case, was very much what was happening.

“Alright, we’re on your home.”

“Shanksh, yoo are a naishe pony Colly.”

Before she could say anything she felt both of Bronze’s forelegs wrap around her neck and shoulders, squeezing her in a tight hug.

“Well, this isn’t awkward at all!”

Silence.

“Bronze?”

Again, Silence, and drool.

“Damn it.”

“Arghhh, how in Tartarus can somepony be so damned strong?”

Resistance was futile, or at least on Minuette’s case, as she tried time and time again to disentangle herself from the kirin’s death grip on her shoulders.She could feel a start of a headache coming, and the strength she had before had all gone away on both carrying and levitating Rose.

Sighing loudly, she tried a last time. and as expected was unsuccessful on removing herself from the iron grip.Deciding, against her own judgement, the unicorn half carried half shambled towards the bedroom.

Getting herself and Bronze on the bed was another awkward moment, but after a few curse words, last strength levitations and a deliberate using of the passed out mare’s body as a support, she found herself, still entangled, on top of the quite large bed.

“I don’t care of what happens tomorrow, that’s future Minuette’s problem.”

Those were the last words she uttered before diving into a dreamless sleep.

Bronze had a hangover.

Either she had drunk moonshine, or her weight worth of mead.

But she was in Equestria now, and neither of those were common, so she hadn’t expected the pounding headache she had, but that didn’t even come close to the other surprise she had when she tried to move.

Something soft and warm was pressing against her chest and shoulders, and it was alive, since it appeared to be breathing.

“Ah, you’re awake aren’t you?”

Opening her eyes, and closing them as a wave of pain came crashing on her head, Bronze cursed herself for thinking that these ponies wouldn’t have something strong to drink, she hadn’t expected cider to do this to her, and now she was paying the price.

“Not so loud…”

She heard a chuckle, and felt the pony trying to move away from her, but failing.She quickly remedied that by unwrapping her forelegs from this pony’s shoulders and neck, and scooting away slowly.

Trying again, she opened her eyes.The pony who was on her bed was none other than the mare she had met yesterday, Minuette, who looked as disheveled and tired as one could look.

“If I knew yesterday that I would end up sleeping entangled with you I wouldn’t have come with Rose.”

“Sorry,” rolling around to face the edge of the bed, she dropped out of it, and landed flank first on the ground, “I hugged you didn’t I?”

It was more of a statement than a question, and the only answer was a nod from the unicorn, who left the bed to try and help her.

“The way you say it seems to me that this wasn’t the first time this happened.”

“Back home, when I was still a wee lass, we would drink till the early day, a few times I woke up with someone else on my bed, just like this.”

“And they didn’t do anything about you?”

“The first few times it was pretty embarrassing yea, but after some time I got the reputation of having an iron grip while sleeping, and most of the kirins and dragons there avoided helping me to my home when we drunk too much.I kinda developed a drunken sense of where home was, but I think it will take some time for me to do the same here.”

“Wait, you’re already thinking on doing this again?”

“It was fun.”

Both of them left the bedroom in silence, thinking.One about what her life had turned into, and the other how she would be able to work in this state.

“You still have work don’t you?”

“Yep, and I’m going to be late if we stay chatting.”

“Yea, and I need to go check on Rose too.”

“Say hi to her for me.”

Author's Note:

Blame Risk of Rain for the lack of updates, and a minor case of writer block.
I decided to try something new with dialogue here, and a different perspective.
Tell me what you doods think,
See yall, take care.