92 - Getting Cozy
“Okay, that should do it!” Cloudbank smiled as she backed away from the warehouse doors, now repaired. She settled back down to stand with everypony else as they took a moment to admire their handiwork. Other than the fact that the new planks looked a little cleaner than the surrounding wood, the doors were as good as new.
“I have to admit, I’m surprised,” said Aisle, looking at the other ponies. “I didn’t think you guys would have lumber ready to go.”
A pegasus stallion – Ocean Spray, if Aisle remembered correctly – shook his head. “When something breaks down at sea, you can’t just fly to the store and buy some new parts. You have to have everything you could possibly need right there with you, and since the entire ship is made of wood, well…” He shrugged, but couldn’t help but look slightly pleased at getting to show off.
“I just wish we’d been able to set up some better traps,” sighed Drafty, giving the area a mournful look.
Cozy put a hoof on her shoulder encouragingly. “The ones we made aren’t so bad.”
“They’re a deadfall and a tripwire with some spikes in front of it,” replied Drafty flatly, her lack of enthusiasm obvious.
“It can’t be helped,” said Cloudbank, coming over to help buoy Drafty’s spirits. “This place is one big open space, and that’s a lot harder to rig up than a bunch of little rooms off of a hallway. Besides, we haven’t had much time. We just got started on this…what, an hour ago?”
“That sounds right,” nodded Ocean Spray. “But now that it’s taken care of we should go report back.” He looked over at where Sonata was still looking at the doors. “I bet this might make Lex at least a little happy, right?”
He paused, but Sonata didn’t respond, not seeming to have heard him. A round of curious glances was exchanged, before Cozy went over to her. “Sonata?”
“Huh?” She blinked as she turned to face the other mare, before giving an embarrassed smile. “Sorry, I was totes thinking about something else,” she admitted sheepishly.
Cozy smiled softly. “Was that something else a certain stallion with a terrible attitude?”
“…no,” said Sonata sourly, looking away with an unhappy expression on her face. It was enough to make Cozy smile softly. At that moment Sonata didn’t look like a Siren-turned-human-turned-pony that had lived a crazy life on three different worlds. Rather, she looked like an ordinary mare that was having a fight with her very special somepony.
It was enough to remind Cozy of why she’d become a priestess of Lashtada in the first place. Her job selling beds had always been rewarding, but she’d always liked it best when selling them to couples. Knowing that two ponies would look at each other first thing each morning and before they went to bed each night had always struck her as incredibly romantic, and playing a part in that had never failed to lift her spirits.
It had been enough just to help out, until she’d met Pillowcase. It hadn’t quite been love at first sight, but by their third date she’d known that she’d found “the one.” That his passion for pillows and cushions had perfectly complemented her own love of beds had been the icing on the cake. They had gotten married less than a year after their first meeting, and Cozy couldn’t have been happier. She still spent her days helping each and every pony that came to see her about finding a new bed to rest on, and now she got to do it with the love of her life. She had truly thought that she’d been content.
And then Princess Cadance had introduced her to Lashtada’s faith, and Cozy had found out that there was so much more.
Lashtada had shown her that the love that she’d been encouraging up until that point was just a smattering of what she could do. There were plenty of other ways to help ponies come to love each other than involved more than finding a comfortable mattress to share. While some of the more…advanced aspects of her faith were things she only felt comfortable trying with Pillow, she had been delighted to go out and help couples that had hit a rough patch in their relationships.
She’d come to Vanhoover because she’d thought that Lashtada’s work would be needed very badly here, only to find that the city had been far, far worse off than just she’d heard. Encouraging love had been forced to take a backseat to simply surviving. Worse, her husband had disappeared, a situation which made Cozy more and more anxious as time went on. Having a pony that looked and acted so much like King Sombra had been more than she’d been able to take at the time.
But as nightmarish as that encounter had been, Cozy was starting to wonder if maybe, just maybe, it had been the divine hoof of Lashtada at work. Because as much as Lex Legis seemed like King Sombra, there were important differences between him and the former tyrant of the Crystal Empire, the most important of which was that Lex had a girlfriend. To a disciple of the Goddess of Love, that was something that could not be overlooked, as it was evidence of him having love in his heart, something Cozy felt certain King Sombra never had.
Of course, that was only true if Lex actually loved Sonata, and Cozy didn’t feel at all certain of that. He’d never once spoken about her in the short time that she’d known him, and what little interaction she’d witnessed between the two had been terse at best and downright acrimonious at worst, all of which had been Lex’s fault. It was painfully obvious to Cozy that Sonata had feelings for Lex, but so far she’d seen no evidence that he felt the same way.
If that was true then Sonata was being taken advantage of, and certainly it made sense based on what Cozy knew about Lex. After all, he did seem to be making an honest attempt to use his magic to help Vanhoover through its current crisis, and given that Sonata had impressive magical powers of her own – having broken down two doors that Lex had warded attested to that – it made sense that he’d want to recruit her. After all, everypony had overheard his attempting to recruit her sister, even if her responses had been inaudible. It wasn’t farfetched to think that he was either ignoring Sonata’s feelings or just leading her on until she was no longer useful.
The proper thing, Cozy knew, would be to talk to Lex to try and figure out how he felt, but that simply wasn’t going to happen. Even leaving aside the current situation, she honestly couldn’t imagine that stallion ever opening up to her about how he felt. Worse than that, Cozy simply didn’t have it in her to make the attempt, not when he so closely resembled the monster that had terrorized her and all the other crystal ponies. Maybe she’d have been able to find the inner strength to try, but not after all of the fear and worry that she’d endured since coming to Vanhoover. Right now, she just wanted to find Pillow and go home. But for all of that, she couldn’t help but want to at least reach out to Sonata. The poor girl was quite clearly lovesick, and for one of Lashtada’s faithful, there was no turning away from that.
A quick glance around confirmed that everypony else had started to clean up the tools and supplies, giving the two of them some small measure of privacy. Turning back to Sonata, Cozy gave her a soft smile. “Listen, we don’t know each other very well, but if there’s ever anything that you want to talk about, I’m a pretty good listener.”
“What, you mean like about trap-making or something?” asked Sonata, clearly misunderstanding Cozy’s offer. “Because, like, that’s not really my thing.”
“Er, no,” replied Cozy, chagrined. “We just did that because-, no, it doesn’t matter. What I meant was that, since I’m a priestess of Lashtada, I’ve helped other ponies who have relationship problems.”
Sonata tilted her head. “Um, okay…?” What did that have to do with anything? It couldn’t be about her and Lex, since they had a great relationship, except for when he was being a big dumb jerk. Other than that, everything was totes awesome! Though it would be nice if they got to spend some more time in the sack together, but except for that, awesome!
Mistaking Sonata’s confusion for hesitancy, Cozy tried again. “I mean, if you wanted t-”
“Okay, that’s everything!” yelled Cloudbank. “Now let’s head back!”
Sighing as Sonata immediately moved to go rejoin the others, Cozy decided that it couldn’t be helped. If she wasn’t going to be able to try and fix the problem, maybe it was better not to pry too closely. But that didn’t mean that she could let this go; that would be an affront to Lashtada. Instead, Cozy closed her eyes as she touched a hoof to her holy symbol and made a brief prayer. Lashtada, please let us all get through this, and I promise that when Pillow and I make it back to the Crystal Empire, I’ll tell Princess Cadance about Lex and Sonata. She had no doubt that the Princess, Lashtada’s high priestess, would know what to do about the ill-matched pair. Opening her eyes, she moved to join the others as Cloudbank started to lead them back through the fog maze.
“You know, I just thought of something,” said Aisle, wandering over to her side.
“What’s that?” asked Cozy, looking over at him. For the hundredth time, she wondered if he was sweet on her. While everypony in their group had closely supported each other, she was aware that Aisle had been making a dedicated effort to look after her ever since Pillow had vanished. But she couldn’t figure out if he was just being kind, or if it was something more. The uncertainty made her vaguely uncomfortable, not because she thought he was trying to take advantage of her husband’s absence, but because she knew that Lashtada’s faith glorified open relationships. While not viewed as superior, such arrangements were held to best represent the “love without limits” mindset that was at the heart of Lashtada’s religion. As much as Cozy wanted to dedicate herself to living out the ideals of her goddess, that was a step that she wasn’t sure she could ever bring herself to take, and certainly not in the current circumstances.
Heedless of her discomfort, Aisle kept speaking. “If the other ponies were repairing the door to that inner area while we were out here, and Lex’s wards are still functioning, that means that we’re going to get back only to be locked out again.”
The realization almost made Cozy trip over her own hooves. “Wait, so Sonata’s going to have to break the door down again?!”
Aisle chuckled at her reaction. “I doubt it. Since Lex is in there, he should be able to open it no problem, just like he did for the outer doors, remember?”
“Right.” Cozy sighed with relief. “Don’t scare me like that.”
Aisle opened his mouth to say something back, but just before he could, Drafty’s voice rang out. “Everypony stop! Do you hear that?!”
From up ahead, Cozy could hear Cloudbank’s voice reply. “Drafty? What’s going on?”
“Listen!” repeated Drafty.
Everypony quieted down, ears swiveling as they listened intently. Closing her eyes, Cozy did the same. At first she didn’t hear anything, but then she realized that there was some sort of ambient noise, soft but pervasive. It seemed to be coming from…the ceiling?
“Is that…rain?” asked Aisle, his voice thick with confusion.
“It can’t be,” protested Cloudbank. “I was at the cloud depot when everything went down. We lost most of our raincloud supply in the flood.”
“Then what’s happening?” asked Cozy as she looked upward.
Somehow, she suspected that the answer was nothing good.
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Loving and secure families are best for young, but Lashtada cares little for the composition of said family. maybe two dads, three moms, or some other blend will do it right.
Oh good greif, its The Weather Old One. Its raining Sahaguin, theyre gonna kill ya, its raining Sahaguin.
8083751 I was wondering if I'd gotten the specifics about Lashtada's faith correct, at least in terms of sounding plausible. The trickiest part was saying that Lashtada's religion didn't put any sort of relationship as being the "best" one, while still lionizing open relationships. How do you think I did?
8084050 Time to break out the adamantine umbrellas +5!
8084211 It's a bit more nuanced. A secure and loyal couple is a lovely thing, but if some other comes along and one of them likes the look of them, they should be able to ask politely of the other and, without jealousy, go off and do as nature compels. Of course, if neither feels drawn to new blood, Lashtada will still be happy if they remain fruitful together.
The saddest ending would be for a loyal and fruitful couple to be sundered, be it through jealousy, disease, violence, or anything else.
So! In hierarchy, loving families are at the top, Lashtada cares not the arrangement. Then you have swinging bachelors and bachelorettes who should be kind, but quite willing to dance, if you catch the meaning. Then you have the awkward people who kinda want to but don't know how to dance well. They should be helped by those above them on this list. Lastly you have the recluses and loners who think they don't even want to dance. Obviously they are broken. Handle with care.
8084304 Hm, in that case, I suppose Cozy's interpretation matches well enough with what you've said. Of course, she's a low-level cleric who's only recently started worshipping Lashtada, so presumably she's not going to have all of the finer points down.
8084304 ...And below that you have the people Lashtada pissed off so much they now worship Zepar
8084212 I'd have thought it would be violet rain, but then I remembered that no-one made it back .-.
8085048 For those that aren't huge into Pathfinder lore, here's an overview of Zepar.
8085051 Fun fact: the violet rain described in the Book of Vile Darkness (where it's a natural phenomenon, and can also be deliberately called upon with the evil weather spell) was originally black rain, as written in the free online adventure Black Rain that used to be hosted on the Wizards of the Coast website. It's no coincidence that this adventure and the BoVD were both written by Monte Cook, though why he changed it from black to purple is beyond me!
8085121 Huh... I didn't know that. Hehe, maybe it's changed because Monte was sick of yet another [Evil] spell that requires onyx? XD
And yet another misinformed judgement based entirely on Lex's social ineptitude. Lex already has enough on his plate(even though he's the one that put most of them on it), a priestess of Lashtada trying to intervene on his love life is going to do wonders for his mood.
Though that's not the biggest problem at hand if the noise outside is anything to go by. They better hope that the warehouse, and by extension, the shelter remains unnoticed...but with the way you pointed out how different the wood was compared to the warehouse walls...
Also, nice tidbit with the cloud depot. I imagine that cities like Vanhoover don't have the luxury to just let their cloud stores just float around their area like Ponyville. At least, that's how I imagine Rainbow would manage the clouds just so she'd have plenty of places to nap.
8085558 Well, to be fair, Cozy was thinking that she was somewhat out of her league where Lex's relationship with Sonata was concerned. Of course, that just meant that she was going to run the issue of the metaphorical flagpole to Princess Cadance herself...
The interesting thing to remember about the warehouse door is that it's protected by an illusion to make it look like part of the wall, due to the guards and wards spell Lex placed on the place. But it's an open question as to whether or not that will change the coloration of the boards...
I'm glad you liked the bit with the cloud depot! I came up with that idea because the series - based on what we see in Hurricane Fluttershy and Tanks for the Memories - seems to suggest that Cloudsdale has centralized the actual production of meteorological phenomena (i.e. that's where rain, clouds, lightning, etc. are actually made), and then simply delivers set amounts to various towns and cities so that local pegasi can make the weather in their respective towns (and, likewise, receives periodic refills of water from each town to make into more weather). Snow seems to be the exception, as Cloudsdale itself shows up to deliver snow, but that makes sense, given just how much needs to be deposited on a given locale (essentially, all of Equestria during the winter!), so that means that it's too large of a job to farm out to various cities.
Given the state that Vanhoover is in, their local supply of weather has doubtlessly been impacted by the flooding and subsequent problems, so that's something that's going to come up at some point...if everypony survives the current spate of problems.
No typos to report sir! We seem to have already done a sterling job of removing the vermin from this area, over and out!
8372924 Booyah! That's the report I like to receive!
a kraken is cr 18. Isn't a bit much for lex and his group ? Especially if you count the small army it brings with him
8457682 Why yes. Yes it is.
That then creates an underlying tension of "what can they do against such an overwhelming threat?" which helps to set the stage for what's to come.