A New Home

by Shads

Ch. 07 - The Search

The weekend couldn't have come faster for Mane. As the days passed since his talk with Cherry and Blue, he grew more and more excited about the prospect of actually owning a home. Owning property was very rare for changelings, mostly reserved to long-term infiltrators that spent several months or years in a town or city. He remembered visiting Infiltrator E01-15F's home once and he could tell how much he valued it. He was excited to give a tour of each room, giving Mane a look into the personal life that he had gained with his time spent among ponies.

He wanted something like that. Something of his that he could expand upon, to call his own.

Something to treasure and share.

---

The three walked out of the final home before Mane crossed it off the list. Nearly three-quarters of the houses had lines drawn through them while the remaining ones all had question marks next to them. Those ones seemed alright, but they weren't... perfect, as much as he hated to admit it. There was always some little flaw about them that bugged him -- no pun intended.

Mane groaned. "Am I just being too picky?"

"Maybe, but it's understandable," Blue spoke up. "If you're gonna live somewhere, you want to enjoy being there."

"Sure, sure..." He looked back down at his list of options, considering how many more he had to go through. "It just seems like every home is made for families. Is it really that uncommon to live on your own here?"

"Not entirely", Blue replied, "but we're mainly an earth pony town."

Mane was a little confused. "...meaning?"

"Earth ponies highly value their relationships with others, mainly family and friends, meaning we don't tend to live on our own." He tilted his head to the side, prompting Mane to look at the homes they passed by. "Because of that, most homes here are built for families or groups of ponies."

"Where did you find yours then?" Mane questioned. "All of these have at least 3 bedrooms, yet yours just has one big one."

"We built it," Cherry answered for him. "Well, mostly him and his coworkers, but I helped with the design and carried supplies around."

Right, he works in construction and maintenance... Mane looked over the map, humming to himself while deep in thought.

"What is it?" Cherry asked.

"I think we should pay the mayor a visit."

---

A somewhat-middle-aged unicorn sat at his desk, looking over the reports that he had to fill out today. It had been particularly slow so far, evidenced by the small stack of incomplete papers to his side, but that was to be expected of the weekend. Most ponies had taken to closing their businesses early to give everypony more time with their friends and family. Initially it confused him, but living here for so long had gotten him used to the rituals of the townponies. It made things a little awkward for visitors, but there were still a number of shops open to them most of the day.

He smiled to himself as he thought of returning home to his family after an easy workday. All that stood in his way was a couple hours of paperwo--

His door squeaked before his assistant poked her head through the door. "Sir, there's a pegasus here with Blue Moon and Cherry Blossom asking for you." She rubbed her hooves together nervously. "I know you don't normally take walk-ins, but I figured since it was the weekend and you weren't busy..." She trailed off.

"Hmm..." He hadn't talked to either of those two in a while, and he did need to get around to talking to Blue about something... "Alright, let them in, but let's not make a habit of this."

His assistant nodded at him before retreating back to her desk. The mayor sat back and sighed. He had been good friends with those two when he first came to this town. He couldn't even remember when and where they met, just that they were always there. He smiled as he reminisced on Cherry slowly breaking the blue stallion out of his shell. Unsurprisingly, when he was still just the mayor's assistant, they had gotten married. It was around that time that he slowly drifted from them, their new marriage and his responsibilities as mayor distracting them. In fact, the last time he even spoke with them was when they were looking to buy a plot of land to build their new home on.

Maybe this could be a good time to reconnect...

His door squeaked open again with two very familiar ponies following a blue pegasus in. "Good afternoon Mister Moon and Missus Blossom. It's been a while."

Blue smirked at him as he approached the desk. "Why the formalities, Quill? Has being mayor made you too good for us?"

"It's only part of the job, Blue." He grinned back before extending his hoof. Blue took it in his own and gave it a shake. "It's good to see you again, old friend."

"Old, huh? What does that make you then, grandpa?"

Quill laughed. "Not yet, not yet. Give it another ten or fifteen years." He sighed contentedly, leaning back in his seat. "I've missed talking with you Blue. We'll definitely need to do this more some time." Quill looks over to Cherry, smiling at her. "Of course, that includes you too, Cherry. Why, I don't think you've aged a bit since I last saw you."

"Oh, shush." She blushed. "You'd better not let your wife hear you say things like that. How is she, by the way?"

"She's fine. We just had our second foal a few months back, so she's taking care of him. Which reminds me," Quill looked back to Blue with a smirk of his own, "when do you two plan on having foals of your own?"

For the first time in his Mane's weeks here, Blue stood stunned with a small blush on his face.

"Oh, don't tease him, Quill. You know how he is about that stuff." Cherry piped in for her husband. "We've been thinking about adoption, but it's still just an idea. If we do that though, you'll likely to be the first one to hear about it."

"That's true." Quill finally spied the third pony in the room, the blue pegasus who had walked in with Blue and Cherry. He couldn't say that he knew him, but he had heard talk around town that Muffin had found a pegasus employee from out of town. "I don't believe we've been properly introduced. I'm Mayor Crow Quill. Might I ask who you are?"

Mane, realizing that the group had finished catching up with each other, perked up. "I'm Whitemane. I'm still fairly new to this town, so I've been living under Blue Moon and Cherry Blossom's roof for the past month. I'm also an assistant chef at Muffin's bakery." He walked up to Quill's desk as Blue moved to the side, presenting the papers of homes to him. "We recently decided that I need a home of my own, so we've been searching for one."

"Well, I would've liked to have met our town's newest resident a bit sooner," he looked over to Cherry and Blue, both seeming to look a bit guilty, "but I suppose I can overlook this." His horn glowed before picking up the papers that Mane had given him, noting all of the homes that they had gone to. "In that case, you'll have to sign a few papers that confirm your residency here. Have you decided which of these homes you'll purchase?"

"None of them."

Quill raised an eyebrow before looking back to over to Mane questioningly. "You've left me confused. Did you not say that you're looking for a home?"

"I have, but none of the ones available are to my liking. That's why I'd like to ask about purchasing something else instead."

Quill could see that the pegasus was playing some kind of game with him. By the look on Blue's face, he had likely put him up to it to test his patience. He sighed, remembering the stallion had a penchant for bugging him (which he usually returned in full). "Mr. Mane, I'll have to ask you to be a bit more specific as to what you're requesting."

Mane gave a big, confident smile. "I want to buy some land."

Author's Note:

You ever tell yourself you're going to catch up on a series/story only to rediscover a story you completely forgot about?

Yyyyeeaaaaaahhhhh...