• Published 9th Oct 2016
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A Basket, A Blanket, and a Bundle of Bills - kudzuhaiku



One morning, just before work, Copperquick finds a basket, a blanket, and a bundle of bills

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Chapter 7

Standing just outside of the door, Copperquick hesitated, his bones weary with exhaustion. Inside, he heard crying and he thought about crying as well. The growls from his stomach sounded like some caged beast. For a second, just a second, he wondered what he was doing and why he was doing it. Almost asleep on his feet, he pushed the door open.

Amidst a flurry of wings, he was pulled inside, herded through the room, and shoved down on the couch, too tired to resist. A crying, screaming infant was stuffed into his embrace, and overcome with numbness, he looked down. Esmeralda let out one final ear piercing squall, then began to snuffle as she looked up at him.

“Oh, thank providence!” Miss Oddbody said in a weak voice. “She’s been crying for hours. Turns out she just wanted to be held by her father.” With an exhausted cry, the panting pegasus collapsed upon the couch and went still. She sat there, sniffling, as she too had been crying, overwhelmed and frustrated.

Holding his daughter, who appeared to be sleepy, Copperquick looked around his tiny, cramped living room. There was a cradle now in the corner and on one end there was a big wind up mechanical contraption that made it self rocking, or so it appeared. There were stacks of diapers, formula, and foal stuff. A few stuffed animals littered the floor.

“I think we’re in trouble, Copperquick,” Miss Oddbody mumbled. “The neighbors are peeved. They’ve been banging on the wall, the ceiling, from down below, and even on the door.”

The thought was disquieting. This apartment complex was for single ponies, students and low wage workers just getting started. There would likely be no tolerance here for a cryer with powerful earth pony lungs. Unable to form a response, Copperquick remained quiet, knowing that he could be evicted for noise violations. He had signed a strict lease, as he had wanted quiet himself, and not a lot of loud partying while he was studying.

Laying against her father, Esmeralda hiccuped and went still. Copperquick thought about studying, but he didn’t have it in him to get up off of the couch. There was a savage rumble from his stomach, but he didn’t dare get up or move, for the fear that his daughter might start crying again.

“Perhaps the fatigue I am suffering is impairing my judgment, but whatever did you see in Cielo del Este?” Without lifting her head, Miss Oddbody turned it so that she was looking over at Copperquick.

“You really want to know?”

“Yeah, I asked.”

“She was a conquest,” Copperquick admitted in a weary, dry whisper. “She was smoking hot and way out of my league. I did it so that I could look back on the days when I was young and say that I had me a fine bit of tail. As it turns out though, she was as dumb as a bag of hammers and I found that I didn’t like her.”

“Oh.” Miss Oddbody blinked her eyes. “When I first came to university, I snogged a filly… somehow, I convinced myself that young mares came to university to experiment. I was drunk, she was drunk, and I think both of us found the kiss pretty disgusting.”

“What happened?” Copperquick asked.

“She puked in my mouth,” Miss Oddbody replied, “and when that happened, I puked back into hers. It came squirting out of her nose and splashed me in the face. I knew then and there that my days of snogging fillies was over. Since then, I have been a prim and proper pegasus who has looked after her own needs with thoroughly modern battery powered devices. What about you, have you learned anything from your experience?”

“Yeah.” Copperquick paused for a moment and considered his thoughts. “Now that I have a daughter, no more conquests. I don’t want her learning the wrong things. It’s time to grow up.” The earth pony shifted his bulk and tried to get himself comfortable on his lumpy couch.

“You know, something tells me that if you used your charms on Sapphire Shores, she could be another notch on your bedpost.” The sleepy pegasus’ eyes kept trying to close and she kept fighting to keep them open. “She likes you. I can tell. You’d hardly have to try. She wants to jump you because of Esmeralda.”

“I, uh, get the feeling that she likes you as well. If you felt like trying to kiss a mare again, there you go.” Copperquick was too sleepy to notice the drool soaking into his coppery pelt from Esmeralda, who was now sound asleep.

“You could have a Sugar Mama.”

“And what sort of message would that send my daughter?”

“I was just saying. Never mind me, I get weird when I get tired.”

“I love her so much already.” Copperquick’s voice was an exhausted, emotional whine. “The entire time I was in class, I thought about her. I talked about her. I drove some of my fellow students crazy.”

“Don’t you have friends?” Miss Oddbody asked.

“Sort of,” Copperquick replied.

“I sort of have friends as well. It feels like everypony I know is just at university to party. I came there to change the world. I value my grades more than social experiences I suppose. Maybe I should relax and party more, but I just can’t. The world needs saving.” Miss Oddbody let heave a sigh and she deflated, somehow looking smaller and more thin.

Staring at Miss Buttermilk Oddbody, Copperquick realised that she was more than a little pretty. Her mane hung down in long, loose strands, free of its confining bun and her glasses were askew. Miss Oddbody wasn’t pretty like Cielo del Este was pretty, a mare with a hot body that made for a hotter fling. No, Miss Oddbody was pretty like a gem that you kept and you treasured—or something like that. He noticed for the first time that her eyes were a sort of hazel-green. His sleep deprived brain thought back to the story Miss Oddbody had told him about how her mother had lured her father to stay with hot buttery toast and cheese.

Not to mention the fact that she was a pegasus. Copperquick had a thing for pretty pegasi. Wings. Lovely wings. Wings for flying, wings for dancing, wings for fanning, and wings for tickling. Wings, which offered flight, and thus made pegasi somewhat unattainable, unless they wanted to be caught. And if a pegasus wanted to be caught, well then, you did things with them until they flew away. Or didn’t fly away, as the case may be. That was the dream, the fantasy. Catching one and enticing them to stay on the ground with you. Giving them a reason to stay. Offering them a reason to come and make a nest with you, because that is what pegasi did, when they weren’t playing in some nearby birdbath.

It was such a wonderful fantasy.


Bleary eyed, half awake, Copperquick tried to collect his senses. Esmeralda had somehow slept for several long hours and so had he. He had fallen asleep on the couch with his daughter in his forelegs and Miss Oddbody beside him. Sniffing, he realised that somepony needed changing and he needed a shower. Copperquick’s head was thumping and his lips felt dry.

On the other end of the couch, Miss Oddbody was stirring. “And the cloud… goes into… the butterchurn… for super fluffy butter—SNORT!”

Held in her father’s embrace, Esmeralda made her feelings known with a couple of mewling cries, little warm up cries to let everypony know that she meant business. Food was needed, now, and a change was in order. When no warm bottle seemed forthcoming, she let out an ear piercing siren’s wail that caused Miss Oddbody to rocket straight up off of the couch and into the ceiling.

A moment later, the pegasus came back down to earth and crashed upon the couch.

“Oooh, birdies,” Miss Oddbody said as she sat cross eyed.

“I have regrets…” Copperquick tried to sit up but his spine decided to punish him for sleeping in such a manner. “AaaaaaaaeeEE!” There was a loud crackle from his back, like a bunch of celery being twisted in half. “Miss Oddbody… help. Take foal now. Please.”

“Hang on, help is coming, but I’m not sure which you is you.”


Mornings would never be the same. Ever. Struggling to even walk, Copperquick made his way down the busy street with a stabbing, burning pain in his spine. He had the bags, but Miss Oddbody had the foal. His exhaustion was now an all consuming sort of thing, it felt as though he hadn’t slept at all. Last night, he didn’t study and he feared that his grades would take a hit.

At least Esmeralda Verde seemed happy. She had slept for a good portion of the night and now, she was bright eyed and bushy tailed. The foal seemed to enjoy exploring the world while hanging from a foal carrier. She bounced and kicked about, cooed, giggled, and let out happy ear skewering shrieks at random intervals.

It was here, when Copperquick was feeling at his worst, when he smiled. His daughter was happy. He was coming undone, miserable, in pain, in dire need of real sleep, but all of these things paled in comparison to the needs that little Esmeralda had. He was an earth pony and he would endure.

The Ministry of Agricultural Surplus was across town, near the castle, in the Old Towne Historical District of Yesteryear. It was almost eight hundred years old and Miss Oddbody had told him that there were rumours that there were catacombs beneath the building where loyal, dutiful bureaucrats were filed away for long term storage. Miss Oddbody had also told him that Mrs. Velvet had told her stories that at least one bureaucrat had transformed herself into a lich and now roamed the bowels of the building, doing her job for an eternity.

Copperquick decided that it couldn’t possibly be true. It was just an urban myth. A ghost story told to scare office workers. There couldn’t possibly be any undead bureaucrats, that was preposterous, and far to terrifying to be true.

“Weeee. I have spit up running down my front legs and my neck.” Miss Oddbody’s voice held none of its usual enthusiasm. “Hooray. This is the highlight of my internship. I feel accomplished. This is what I’ve chosen to do with my life.”


Feeling almost dead on his hooves, Copperquick craned his head and looked up at the Ministry of Agricultural Surplus. This ministry served too many functions for Miss Oddbody to even list. They gave away extra food, sometimes, they determined the price of grains and cereals based upon surplus projections, and with a single pen stroke they could make or break a farmer.

The building was unremarkable, for the most part. Plain grey-white stone. Tall narrow windows. A sheaf of wheat and a sheaf of corn were carved into the stone above the door. The doors were plain wood, well polished, and the brass trim had a fine patina. Off to one side, a train of supply wagons hauled goods into the building through one door while empty wagons exited through another.


“Hoi!” a stout pegasus bellowed. “You here for food?”

It took Copperquick several seconds to realise that he was being spoken to. He nodded and turned to face the pegasus, who was wearing a pinstriped blue blazer and a flat cap. The pegasus nodded a bit, flapped his wings once, and then headed over.

“Hoi, lucky day and all that.” The pegasus tipped his cap. “Hoi, Miss. Right good looking foal you have there.” The pegasus produced a clipboard from beneath his wing. “Hoi, sign here, please. Springtime liquidation of the leftover winter storage. Hoi, summer is coming, it is.”

Miss Oddbody went to work, signing the paper on the clipboard, and Copperquick was thankful for a stroke of good luck. He watched the wagons going in and out while thinking that this day wasn’t going to be a total loss. Something in his stomach squelched and he thought about a big platter of scrambled eggs.

“Hoi, it’ll be really busy in a bit, the train is due from Ponyville, and lots of ponies will come for the free grain. You did good getting here early. You get one sack of oats, forty pounds. One sack of pinto beans, forty pounds. One sack of corn, dried, forty pounds. And last but not least, one sack of rice, forty pounds. An agent can help secure the bags to your back and lash them on tight.”

It took several seconds for Copperquick to register what was said. He nodded, not wanting to turn down free food. Frowning, he thought about the fact that he didn’t have a wagon to carry this sort of load and he wasn’t sure if he could haul this much home. What could he do?

“I don’t look like much, but I am a stout hearted little filly that grew up on a farm. I’ll carry the foal stuff and one of the big sacks on my back. Copperquick, do you think you can take the other three or do we leave some behind?”

Looking down at the plucky little pegasus, Copperquick worried that her skinny little legs would snap like matchsticks under a load. After a moment, he answered, “I’ll manage the other three.”

“Hoi, good business then. Let’s see if we can get you fine folk loaded up and ready to go!”

Author's Note:

Upon request, a tag has been added.