420 - Countdown to Distraction
“Master Legis?”
You drove her to this.
“Miss Dusk and Miss Blaze finished their, er, conversations. I directed them to Miss Bank’s manor as you instructed me.”
Nosey never really loved you. She simply needed you in order to feel safe after what that monster did to her. You were the one who thought it was more than that.
“I didn’t see that you were still here until after I’d already told them where you wanted them to go. Should I see if I can still catch them?”
Now that she’s recovered her strength, she simply pointed out what you should have known all along: that you have nothing to offer her. Before she met you, she had a career that she was passionate about, family and friends who cared for her, and no shortage of comfortable amenities. And you expected her to give all that up just for you? The loathsome, abhorrent pony that pontificates about building a better Equestria but still can’t reverse the flagging fortunes of this small camp? Who ignored her except to use her as an outlet for your lust, when you weren’t doting on other mares right in front of her? You’re a fool. She probably resents you for the fact that it was your negligence that led to her being possessed in the first place. Her assurances that she still cared for you were given only to stop you from throwing a tantrum and cursing her.
“…Master Legis…?”
Slowly, struggling to concentrate despite the malevolent voice in his head, Lex turned around to face Feather Duster. “…no.”
Blinking, she tilted her head to the side. “Sir?”
“No,” he repeated. “Do not retrieve Sonata and Aria.”
“Oh. I mean, as you wish.”
She fell silent then, but the voice in Lex’s mind continued unabated. If anything it grew more aggressive, and he found himself wishing for the millionth time that he’d figured out how to control the thing, the way the Night Mare had told him he could. But it was pointless to think about that now. Now…now he suddenly found himself looking for something else to direct his attention toward. Anything else.
Fortunately, Feather Duster had more to report. “Um, some of the ponies here are setting up some games to play. A few of them told me to ask if you wanted to join them. I didn’t think you’d want to, but I thought it would be presumptuous of me to speak on your behalf…”
It took several seconds for Lex to answer, and when he did it came as a whisper, as much to himself as to her. “No. No more games.”
Not sure what to make of that answer, Feather Duster nodded hesitantly. “Yes sir. I’ll tell them-”
“Take me to River’s manor,” demanded Lex suddenly. “Now!”
Startled, Feather Duster nodded immediately. “Y-yes sir!” She was already moving before she’d finished speaking, stumbling into a nervous trot.
Lex stalked after her, his eyes already starting to glow in anger. But not at her. Indeed, at that moment his jittery maid was the furthest thing from his mind.
Instead, he thought about games. Or rather, the games that he’d been forced to play ever since he’d gotten here. Appeasing a petulant goddess was just the latest in a long line of distractions and hostilities that had made him waste time and lose focus about what needed to be done. As a consequence of that, while he’d been slaughtering ghouls and fighting princesses and wasting time on inconsequential nonsense like romance, what little headway he’d made in restoring Vanhoover had completely stalled. But no longer.
NO LONGER!
Keeping one eye on Feather Duster as she hurried through the camp at a trot, Lex turned his attention toward his saddlebags, ignoring the friendly calls from nearby ponies. Instead, he pulled out the ledger of the Bank family accounts that River had given him, opening it and starting to read. Even as he devoured the facts and figures on each page, plans began to coalesce in his mind, slowly starting to drown out the hateful words of his tulpa.
By the time they were halfway to their destination, Lex had finished going over the account book and decided on a course of action. It was drastic, and more than a little risky since he had yet to secure a steady source of revenue, but it offered the best chance of creating the groundwork necessary to restore Vanhoover to a livable state. More importantly, it would quickly alleviate the miserable conditions that everypony here was still laboring under.
There were myriad details that needed to be worked out, of course. But Lex was already working through them, leaving nothing overlooked. By the time they approached River’s mansion, he had completely forgotten about what had happened with Nosey.
Almost.
“You want me to do what?” croaked Ribbon Cutter, not sure that she’d heard correctly.
“Announce that Vanhoover has right of first refusal on all of Tall Tale’s lumber exports,” repeated Lex.
Ribbon could only stare at him, before looking around the room at everypony else, wordlessly asking for help.
“Everypony else,” in this case, referred to Sonata, Aria, and River. Alongside herself and Lex, the five of them had sequestered themselves in River’s office, dismissing the staff that had been serving tea and sandwiches when Lex had finally arrived. With that old butler, Trotsworth, promising to wait across the hall if they needed anything, and Lex’s maid excusing herself to go check on her “daughter’s friend’s baby brother,” Ribbon had thought that she’d have a chance to ask Lex for some more details regarding what had happened with Celestia and Luna, and what it meant for Tall Tale…and Equestria as a whole.
Instead, Lex had immediately launched into some bold new initiative that he’d thought up. Though “bold” wasn’t the word that Ribbon Cutter would have used for it, considering what Lex had just told her to do. But looking around the room, Sonata didn’t seem to understand what Lex had just said, Aria (whom Ribbon had just met, but could already tell had a bad attitude) didn’t seem to care, and River didn’t seem to have a problem with it.
Licking her lips, Ribbon Cutter tried to figure out how to protest what Lex was telling her to do without upsetting him. “Lex, my city-”
“Your city?” asked Aria pointedly, a mocking smirk on her lips. “I thought that you gave it to Lex after he killed that dragon that made you its plaything?”
“That’s right!” added Sonata cheerfully, apparently missing Aria’s derisive tone. “I was there!”
Taking a deep breath, Ribbon counted to five before trying again. “Of course. Your city,” she corrected, making herself focus on Lex. “But Lex, Tall Tale’s exports are only just now getting ready to resume now that the train tracks have been repaired, and we’re still waiting for ships to start returning to port. Every single lumber company has unfulfilled orders on their books, and they’re all worried that if they don’t meet them soon their customers will simply cancel and get their lumber from somewhere else, if they haven’t already. Telling them that they have to offer to sell their goods to you first-”
“Is necessary,” interrupted Lex sharply. “And I will not allow-”
He stopped speaking as Sonata whispered something, putting a hoof over her mouth as she did. Even so, Ribbon heard the words “explain,” “understand,” and “want to help” pass the other mare’s lips. Confused, she was about to ask what was going on – it almost seemed like Sonata was whispering something to Lex, but he was standing across the room from her – when Lex gave a sigh and started speaking again. “I understand that this will cause a disruption to Tall Tale’s business community, and that they’ll be…distressed by it,” he said slowly.
“That’s putting it mildly.” Ribbon smiled as she said it, trying to encourage whatever had prompted Lex to remain calm. But she couldn’t keep her tone light in the face of what he was describing. “Lex, what you’re proposing will put a strain on Tall Tale’s timber industry at a time when the city’s businesses are already hurting from having been cut off from the rest of Equestria.”
Lex didn’t answer right away, and Ribbon could tell that he was trying to figure out how to say what he wanted. “That,” he began at last, “will happen no matter what.”
“But-”
“You saw the condition Vanhoover is in,” continued Lex, cutting off Ribbon’s protest. “How much of Tall Tale’s business is this city normally responsible for? How much commerce do you think it’s fit to engage in now?”
The questions made Ribbon wince. As the closest city, Vanhoover and Tall Tale had always had a strong economic partnership, even if they hadn’t had a direct overland connection. “Okay, point taken, but if you’re going to resume buying stuff from Tall Tale…” She paused as the obvious question occurred to her. “Um, I’m sorry to ask this, but how exactly are you planning on buying lumber? When you left, you’d used up all of your cash-on-hoof…”
She half-expected him to be angry at the question, but Lex’s face remained impassive as he glanced over at River. Recognizing her cue, the other mare set down her teacup. “I’ve turned the entirety of my family’s assets over to Lex,” she announced. “That should be enough to cover whatever purchases he wants to make in the short-term.”
Ribbon’s jaw dropped. She couldn’t help it; everypony who knew River Bank knew that she was a mare who lived to make money. The idea that she would so casually turn her fortune over to Lex and let him spend it as he saw fit was staggering!
Finally, when she was able to close her mouth, Ribbon looked back at Lex. As stunning as it was that River would be so generous, it still didn’t speak to the underlying problem she had with Lex’s proposal. “Okay, if you have the money to start buying from Tall Tale again, why do you need right of first refusal on our timber? I’m sure a lot of our businesses have unfulfilled orders from here that you can appropriate.”
“That’s too unspecific,” declared Lex flatly. “It doesn’t help everypony here if there are open orders for miscellaneous wood products. The ponies at that camp don’t need easels or drum sticks or birdhouses. We need building materials suitable for constructing temporary housing so that everyone can stop sleeping on the ground, and we need them before the summer ends.” He made a motion toward a window that faced Vanhoover’s city proper. “We can scavenge enough minor materials to perform the actual construction and outfitting from what’s left of the city, and what we can’t can be purchased from the farm ponies north of here. But a major supply of building materials can only come from Tall Tale.”
Ribbon bit her lip. What could she say to that? That everypony here should keep living like animals just so everyone in Tall Tale could save a few extra bits?
“Tall Tale will lose some money because of this,” admitted Lex. “But that was a foregone conclusion from the moment Vanhoover fell apart. You can’t have a major city be effectively wiped off the map and not have it cause an economic downturn across the region. Doing this will help to blunt the worst of the impact, and set Vanhoover back on the path to recovery.”
“I…I understand,” said Ribbon at last. For a moment, she slumped in place, imagining the angry business leaders that would flood her office after she announced this. But she shook it off a moment later, forcing herself to sit up straight and smile. “If Vanhoover’s this bad off, it’s our duty as their neighbors to lend them a helping hoof however we can.”
“Just so,” nodded Lex gravely, before turning to Sonata. “In the meantime, I want you to go on a tour of every hamlet, village, or other farming community north of here and let them know that Vanhoover is open again.”
“Aw, this again?” pouted Sonata. “I already delivered a bunch of money to the ones near here to make up for how everyone was stealing food before.”
“And as a result, the number of ponies coming here to sell their produce has turned into a trickle,” replied Lex immediately. “We need more than that. So now I want you to go to every community that sold food here and spread the word that Vanhoover’s markets are once again open. Use your magic if you have to, but make sure they know that if they have food to sell, we have ponies who will buy it.”
“That will take her a while to do,” chimed in River. “There are a lot of little communities north of here, Lex. None of them are too far away, if you make good time traveling, but going to all of them will take a while, and I’m not sure we need that much food anyway. There aren’t that many ponies in that camp.”
“There will be.” Lex turned to Ribbon. “After you let Tall Tale know that we have right of first refusal for their timber, I want you to make it clear that Vanhoover is hiring. If somepony is willing to work hard, my government will pay them a decent wage for their efforts.”
“Workers?” echoed Ribbon. “For what?”
“A number of tasks,” replied Lex. “Not the least of which will be helping to reclaim the city.” He turned his gaze to Aria then. “That’s what you’ll be doing.”
Her answer came with a suspicious look, clearly not liking where this was going. “And by 'helping to reclaim the city,' you want me to do…what, exactly?”
“To begin with, you’ll be guarding the ponies that go into Vanhoover to find materials or start the cleanup, using your tracking spell to detect if there are any more ghouls still lurking about. If there are, find them and destroy them. Other than that, you’ll be using that same spell to locate any remaining survivors that haven’t come out yet.”
Aria looked ready to protest, but Sonata beat her to it. “Back up a sec, you’re sending me away?” She got up from her chair then, walking over to Lex. “I totes don’t think that’s a good idea.”
Lex grimaced, but remained resolute. “This has to happen, Sonata. Vanhoover can’t survive in its current state otherwise, and you’re the best pony for the job.”
“But what about you?” she pressed. “Will you be okay without me here?”
In any other instance Lex would have snapped at her for asking him that, but after just having had another girl he cared about announce that she was leaving him, Lex’s indignation was blunted by pain, and he instinctively moved into damage control, repressing his emotions as best as he could. “I’ll be fine,” he reassured her, his voice neutral. “I have other projects that I’ll focus on while you’re gone.” He looked over her shoulder then, at River. “And I won’t be the only one.”
River nodded, knowing he was talking about sending her to Las Pegasus. The initiative he was talking about would require far, FAR more money than her family fortune could provide, meaning that he was placing a lot on her ability to bring rich ponies here so that he could get a loan from them. But there was one problem. “Lex, if Ribbon Cutter here is going to be moving timber products and workers from Tall Tale, which I assume you’ll want as soon as possible, then how am I supposed to get to Las Pegasus? Without my yacht…”
“I know,” answered Lex with a frown. “There’s no choice now but to wait for another train to arrive. Once it does, you’ll have to make your way there and secure passage back with as many-”
He was interrupted by a knock at the door. Before anyone had a chance to react, Trotsworth stepped inside. “My deepest apologies for intruding,” he answered with a bow. “But there’s a situation that I judged it prudent to make everyone aware of at the earliest opportunity.”
River frowned, standing up. “What situation?”
But in contrast to her alarm, Trotsworth smiled slightly. “I believe you’ll see it if you look out the window, Madam.”
That was odd enough that everyone shared a confused look, save for Lex, who didn’t hesitate before striding over to the window in question and looking outside. For a split second he couldn’t see what the old butler had been talking about…and then he looked upward and spotted it. His breath catching in his throat at the unexpected sight, Lex gave a grunt that was almost a laugh.
“What is it?” asked Ribbon.
“Do you recall that message I told you to send several days ago, when I contacted you with my magic?” asked Lex, still looking upward.
Ribbon nodded. “Yeah. Your voice came out of nowhere, telling me that Vanhoover had lost their raincloud depot and to contact Cloudsdale for some more.” She didn’t add that she’d had no idea if the message had actually gotten through or not. Smoke signals weren’t exactly the most reliable method of long-distance communication, especially since Lucy had been the one to send it, claiming she still remembered how from when she’d gone to camp as a filly.
“It worked,” announced Lex as he moved back from the window, gesturing for them to take a look. “Cloudsdale is here.”
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Now THATS Help.
Just as long as it doesnt go all Mortal Engines.
You have repeated
9966442 Whoops, fixed now! Thanks for catching that!
9966268 I never actually read that series, so the reference is sadly lost on me.
9966535
Mobile living cities that eat other mobile living towns and cities.
Cloudsdale being the Biggest mobile living city in Equestria.
With the Rainbow Factory.
9966534
Surprised no’un corrects mah grammah
Burying one's grief and misery under copious amount of work is usually bad news in the long run but given that Lex has worked under worse conditions, physically at least, he should be fine, physically.
On the bright side, with his focus on reclaiming Vanhoover and rebuilding its economy, it will definitely help with the populace's growing opinion of him, which will be helpful when the Elements inevitably arrive(totally betting Rainbow Dash on believing they're brainwashed), hopefully before Garden and her friends get back and warn him in time.
On the downside, neglecting his girls won't be good but with so much on his plate, sacrifices must be made. Hopefully they won't take it too badly later on.
Lex is making vary sound plans and it looks like things are coming together.
there are still a few wiled cards out in the wind.
lets not forget 2 fat lazy princess that are licking there wounds.
I am kind of hopping Luna has co come begging for Lex to turn her back,
9967001 Lex throwing himself into his work is likely to produce dramatic results, since he's normally given toward active engagement anyway. But in terms of his emotional health it's not exactly the best course of action. All the more so since the one mare who tries to engage with him on an emotional level, Sonata, is being sent away. Sonata herself realizes that this is a bad idea, even if she doesn't know about his conversation with Nosey (though it seems obvious in hindsight that she knew this was coming), but there's not much she can do about it now.
Still, insofar as everypony else is likely to be concerned, this will hopefully result in good things happening for Vanhoover. On the face of it, his plans look good, and the arrival of Cloudsdale is certainly a good sign. Now let's just hope that River can come through when she goes to Las Pegasus, since she's made it plain that this new plan will go through her family fortune in no time. But if she can, and everything works, then it'll be interesting to see what happens if Twilight and friends show up and find everypony praising Lex for saving their city.
9967155 At this point, Celestia and Luna haven't even made it back to Canterlot yet. But once they do, and meet up with Twilight and start coordinating with Cadance and quite a few others, we can expect quite a bit to start getting into motion. As for what their eventual response will be, well...it's uncertain if it'll be negotiation or violent action. But something will happen, one way or another.