• Published 7th Aug 2016
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Around the World in 81 Days (And Other Problems Caused by Leap Years) - GaPJaxie



When Twilight and Celestia have an argument about the existence of leap years, there’s only one possible way to settle their differences: a race around the world!

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Day 4: The Pegasus Express

“It’s… it’s unbelieveable! Unbelieveable!” Twilight’s tail lashed back and forth in the little sky-chariot, whipping into packets of mail and small boxes. “What kind of rail company posts week-long delays without any warning? This would never stand in Equestria!”

“We’re not in Equestria, Twilight,” Spike reminded her, pulling his blanket tight around himself. The sun was as yet just a dull glow on the horizon, and while Twilight and their pegasus courier were untroubled by the early morning or the high altitude, Spike was less than pleased to realize that frost was forming on every surface. In the dim pre-dawn glow, he could barely make out the rickety old chariot around them, as well as the tight-wrapped bundles that filled it.

“No, no, we certainly are not!” Her hoof stomped. “I don’t even know why we visited Griffonstone! Griffonia is barely a country. It’s Equestria’s hat. Only my hat doesn’t require two billion bits a year of foreign aid to stop its economy from imploding!”

“She doesn’t mean that,” Spike quickly said to the courier out front, an off-yellow pegasus mare who only snorted in response.

“Oh, yes. Of course. Sorry.” Twilight’s high-strung tone became more subdued, and she shook her head. “No, I don’t mean that. I’m just frustrated. Thank you again, ma’am. It’s very nice of you to carry us all this way. I don’t know what we’d have done if you hadn’t been at the train station in just the nick of time.”

“She’s not doing us a favor, Twilight.” Spike shook his head. “She’s getting paid. Favors are how griffons insult each other.”

“She’s not a griffon, Spike, she’s a pony. Don’t be rude.” Twilight turned to Spike, her eyes flicking down to him and his blanket. “And… here,” she said. Her horn started to glow, casting a pale purple light over the chariot that mixed with the pre-dawn orange. His blanket glowed as well, and pulled tight and snug around him. Then the air around him started to heat, and the frost retreated, cracking and falling away behind them in the high mountain winds.

Spike opened his mouth to protest, and Twilight soon held up a hoof. “I know! I know. You’re old enough to take care of yourself.”

“Well, yeah, but…” He tugged at the blanket with a claw, warm air slowly worming its way in. “Thanks, Twilight.”

“You want to get some sleep?” she asked, voice soft and a little smile on her face.

“We switch couriers every half-hour. I don’t think either of us will get much sleep on this part of the trip.” He glanced over to his left, out of the back of the chariot. “But hey, look. There’s the train tracks.”

Below them, the train tracks were clearly visible, a twisting ribbon the color of sand with stripes of black down each of its sides. For several minutes they watched it trace its elegant course, but as it leveled out into the hills, its path was broken. One of the sections of ribbon of was missing its dark bands, the rails pulled off their bases.

“Twilight?” Spike asked, “What’s a ‘Black Hoof’?”

“I don’t know,” Twilight said. “Why?”

“Eh… nothing. Just something I heard in the hotel.” He sniffed at the air. “Do you smell smoke?”

Twilight sniffed at the air, looked around behind the chariot, and when she saw nothing, lifted her head over the windbreak to see forward. “Oh my gosh!” she shouted, and Spike rushed to scramble on her back and see what she saw. “The forest is on fire!”

Spike could see the smoke. See the vast wall of fire that spread out beyond the foothills, where the mountain rocks were replaced by open plains and knots of forest. It looked like half the countryside was ablaze, and in the predawn light, the flickering orange of the fire was so bright its glow seemed to compete with the sun’s own. “Hey!” he called to the courier out front, bellowing over the sound of the wind. “Where’s the weather crew!? Or firefighters or whatever griffons do.”

“They’re not coming!” she yelled back, straining to be heard. “It’s spring! That’s a slash-and-burn. They’ve got it under control. See? The wind is blowing it away from us.”

They soon realized their courier was right, and that they were only brushing the upwind edge of the massive smoke cloud. Over the next twenty minutes, they watched the landscape slowly roll by, more details becoming clear. They could see a line of griffons and ponies half a mile long slowly walking through the ash cloud behind the flames. The griffons and earth ponies looked like dark knights, clad head to hoof in protective gear. The unicorns wore much less, with jets of fire twenty feet long shooting from their horns to grow the blaze. There were no pegasi, and behind the line, only ashes and glowing cinders.

“Oh my gosh…” Twilight repeated, softer this time. She lifted her head, and turned to the mare pulling them. “Why are they doing this!?”

“Because they’re going to plow the fields soon! Duh!” she snapped back, the roll of her eyes audible in her tone even if her head remained forward. “These grasslands are full of razorgrain. It’s worthless! Even those crazy ponies who believe grazing is ‘more natural’ won’t eat it. So they’re burning it down to make room for cotton.”

“What?” Twilight leaned forward over the windbreak. “Why cotton!?”

“Money! Bits!” She lashed her tail, which like her feathers, was tinted purple at the ends. “You sell it!”

Twilight scrunched up her muzzle, glowering down at the creatures below them. Her tail lashed, and after a few more moments she asked: “Why are those ponies helping them!?”

“Because this is the west frontier!” The courier’s tone grew increasingly frustrated. “We’re about to cross the border back into pony territory.”

“No, I don’t mean why are they here, I mean…” Twilight growled, lifting a hoof to her face. “Ponies don’t set whole forests on fire just to make a few bits!”

“Equestrians don’t!” Her voice was becoming ragged from shouting. “I’m Griffon Aero-Lipizzian.”

“Griffon Aero…” Twilight scrunched up her muzzle. “What the heck does that mean?”

The courier let out an angry nicker, and blew off the question, putting on a turn of speed that made the wind whistle loud enough it was hard to talk. Eventually, Twilight gave up trying to speak with her, and sunk back down into the sky chariot. “Oh, we’ll see about this,” she swore. “When I meet Emperor Iron Cross, he and I are going to have words about his environmentally unsustainable agricultural policy.”

Spike wisely chose to say nothing, and after another few minutes the cloud station came into sight ahead of them. It was a mid-sized cloud house, with plenty of room for chariots out front, and what looked like bedrooms on the higher levels. The second chariot in their relay for the morning was already waiting, and Spike recognized the blue stallion he’d run into in the hotel.

“Hey, Wanderlust!” Spike waved, and the stallion waved back, Twilight giving them an odd look. They pulled up alongside him, and all the cargo—including Spike and Twilight—was quickly transferred. Without so much as a word of goodbye, the mare who had brought them for the first leg vanished inside the house and shut the door behind her, and Wanderlust carried them off into the next leg.

Twilight didn’t attempt to make conversation, and Spike at first joined her, saying only a few words of greeting before also falling silent. But as they progressed beyond the burning grass, the fields below them became orderly. There were neat rows of crops, and lumber mills to cut down what forest survived, and little houses in the traditional griffon style. Through it all ran the railway, teams of griffons and the occasional pony already at work repairing the track. In time, Spike raised his voice to shout over the wind.

“Hey!” he called to Wanderlust. “The last courier said she was ‘Griffon Aero-Lipizzian.’ What does that mean?”

“Lipizzian just means ponies from the lands west of Griffonia but east of Orlovia!” he shouted back. Twilight twitched an ear to listen, but stayed out of the conversation. “And aero means she’s a pegasus, but that’s not always the same as the Aero-Lipizzian Empire, which specifically refers to the territory Emperor Iron Cross controls. And if she works for the Express, she spends most of her time in Griffonia. So, Griffon Aero-Lipizzian.”

“That sounds really complicated!” Spike’s voice grew hoarse. Wanderlust only shrugged. “Does all that stuff even matter?”

“It matters to some ponies!” He managed to twist back in his harness a moment to make eye contact with Spike. “If I gave a care about titles, I’d be Griffon-Equestrian. Am I the same as a griffon or an Equestrian?”

“No you sure aren’t!” Spike yelled, coughing up a bit of smoke. Wanderlust laughed, turning back ahead to his route. “So, are you for all this then? Burning down the forests?”

“I guess,” he answered, though his tone was unenthused, and with more than a trace of doubt. “It’s money, and money is good, but I kind of liked it back when I was one of the only pegasi who lived in griffon lands. Now it’s getting awful crowded. The world’s changing, kid, you know?”

“Yeah,” Spike said, “I know.” He sunk back behind the windbreak, and after a moment, snuggled up against Twilight. She snuggled him back, and the two got what rest they could before the next relay.