A New Start

by Black Hailstorm

A Trip Gone Wrong

The lull of silence that awkwardly spread following Season's departure was enough to make Cozy feel like she should scream. She had wanted things to go smoothly for her departure, but life always seemed to have other stupid plans.

First the argument about convincing her to drop out of the program she'd been working so hard for on the train ride over, then this little surprise after meeting the head chef.

Her father's obliviousness to Saffron Masala's obvious crush on him made her want to reach across her mother's side and shake him. His obliviousness in many ways, reminded her of some of the colts of her early 1st Categorial years. Colts and fillies that sided with the cool kids or the rest of the herd so easily were so annoying. It had been one of the struggles she'd dealt with when trying to persuade the more annoying colts that sided with the equally petty fillies that were merely manipulating them (like she was, honestly) to ditch the mares fellating them and join her side; when the name picking and the insult to her natural good looks came like harsh rain from the Everfree.

Those had been difficult times, at least till she had to drop her cute antics for more devastating methods to Clear Skies and her attention whore brigade of the 1st class.

She wanted to face hoof at how completely ignorant he could be sometimes in certain social settings (even if she did love him, still)-- but she took solace in knowing that her mummzie was a good sport and decided not to bring up the matter.

Even though, had she been in her mother's shoes, she would have; just to see if there would be any sweat or shifting eyes.

Furnace, or Uncle Furnny as she called him, broke the silence that had lingered for almost three minutes now and muttered something about Pierce's "wuss choice in drink." Cozy inclined herself to agree as she tuned in, though she never voiced it. Not with mother here and not when the stallion was somepony she needed to please-- but seriously why couldn't he have gotten something a bit stronger? It wouldn't have hurt to see what her supervisor would be like cutting loose a bit more, especially if it meant getting some answers on what she was to be expecting tomorrow.

Even if his decision was wise. Sunny T though? Ugh.

Then again her first choice of drink had been downing an entire keg of Blackberry Fire on a dare during her fourteenth party when they went to Las Pegasus and then playing off the nausea and vomiting she succumbed to hours later from going on too many rides with her friends. That had been tricky but she'd played it nicely. A bad case of spicy hay burgers -she vaguely recalled telling mumzie and daddoo- and if memory served well, that's exactly what she had regurgitated on the night rush to the bathroom.

"I'm just saying Pierce, you chose Sunny T over Crisp Cinders."

"I told you I can't drink heavy today, remember? A splitting headache tomorrow wouldn't help when I have to be up early and off to Canterlot with Cozy."

"Speaking of which" Torch said, "you said your guys would get the equipment to the hotel safe, right? Spent a lot of bits wandering around with gumdrop over here through those apothecaries."

"Daddy!" Cozy hissed.

"What? I'm asking a honest question here. Pierce, we're both off duty, they aren't taking that stuff to the actual hotel we're at are they?"

"No." Pierce shrugged. "It'll be heading to Canterlot ahead of us."

"See, knew it." Furnace commented.

"So, how long do we get to see my little gumdrop here before the gates close fo good?"

"Five more days under Sun and night, then it's four moons of intensive training with no outside contact."

"You be careful!" Mery pulled her daughter into her embrace and squeezed her while all Cozy simply did was roll her eyes and give her mother a squeeze back with only a second of delay. "Ooooooohhh, we're going to miss you!"

At this Cozy smiled just a little. "I'll miss you too mom" she said earnestly, spotting Seasoned Pinch trotting up with drinks and some sides.

"And we're damn proud of you too spark plug!" Furnace toasted raising his beverage as he took it.

Glasses, mugs, and cups raising into the air, Cozy spotted her father looking at her with a sad smile as he too raised his mug of Apple cider into the air.

"Be safe gumdrop. Itsa messed up world out there. And if you're joining you know what, then all I ask is you try not to come back--" he gestured to his scar, "mucked up like me. Else", he shot Pierce a glare who merely smiled as he sipped his own mug, "no S. M. I. L. E force" he whispered, "in the world or police department this side of Equestria or beyond will stop ol' Biggs."

Feeling an odd warmth around her eyes, Cozy was grateful for the afford hoofkerchief her mother produced from her purse. "Thank you" she sniffed, "daddy."

"Anything for my clever little candy."

A satisfying clink filled the air and Furnace Raiser rose, lifting his hoofheld mug high above the others. "To Cozy Glow. Wishing all the best."

And the drinks were downed by all in one go.

---

Food was served and the devouring had begun in earnest.

Manehattanites were often considered slobs because of how they chowed down. Loud banter, sometimes even loud belching --no 'excuse me' involved, with every attendee cutting loose and getting into the friendly groove that usually involved expletives at each other but were all in good humor. Cozy glow dug into her cheesie veggie mix with a fork in one hoof and slurped silently from her twisted, silly, crazy straw.

"Mmm- I'll be right back" she said slipping out of her seat, dabbing at her muzzle with a brown napkin. "Bathroom."

Pierce and her mother merely nodded then returned their attention to the heated conversation they were watching Torch and Furnace engage in over what type of cider was superior to the other.

Uncle Furnny refused the challenge that Crisp Cinders was not top 10.

Rolling her eyes with a mild smile Cozy trotted off, turned the corner around the table, then spreading her large wings took off down the hall to the neon sign indicating the restrooms at a glide.

As she entered the hallway a tingle ignited somewhere around her flanks but Cozy ignored the itch. Blowing up at her curls to get the bangs out of her eyes as she trotted in the lit hallway. With a flip of her head her curls went back enough for her to see clearly and then, she pushed the steel gray colored door open and walked in.

Almost immediately, something felt off once her hoof crossed the black line that separates bathroom from light green floor.

---

Weight training had been a part of her exercise routine when preparing to take the Selective Candidate Exam or (S.C.E) that all those interested in joining a specific agency had to take, based off the agency's rules for said exam.

She recalled the times when her friend Drop Count, a rather athletic pegasus she'd met in 5th year around the same time she'd meet Clear Skies, advised her to start slow even though she had wanted to start with the heavier weights and argued with her on the matter till she conceded. The victory had been a petty thing, a small moment of triumph Cozy had savoured like when she had sown the cracks in the relationships of those that had tormented her.

A victory it had been, a mistake it also was. She recalled how difficult it had been to move and how her feeble muscles had strained to move an inch forward. How the weights felt like they were pulling her down, even though she could barely get a hoof off the ground.

The weight in the bathroom was exactly like this, all without the stench of a bad salad or bean stew leaving behind its smelly results. It was an assault on her senses, both physical and paranormal. Something that felt oh so familiar.

Images of that colt, Zipper Pace, flashed into her mind when she recalled how just being around the demon carrier, trapped in his own mind, had made her feel just being around him.

At least till she'd gotten her cutie Mark in the same instance and then everything started getting weird.

The senses were key, that had been her first lesson in magic. The mind sorted reality into appropriate chunks that could be processed to manipulate ambient magic particles in the manner one desired. When tapping into magical energy for the purpose of creating effects on reality the brain tweaked the perception of one's world to allow for the complex manipulation of magic/ spell algorithm, at least as far as theory understood.

This was what allowed unicorns the ability to sense or pick up on magic easier than any other specie and why they were virtually the only ones of the known present, outside of a few other races, to not require the taxing measures of magical items to do their magic. Their horns were like old radio antennas that sent signals through the aether to punch results into reality or recieved them when magic was being manipulated at high levels by powerful casters or odd entities separate from this world. They were attuned to it in the very same way the Crystal ponies were attuned to the Crystal heart, similar to how Earth ponies were connected to land and pegasi the sky.

Cozy felt her secondary and tertiary feathers tremble in tune with her primaries before shifting to a weird rhythm that was subtle enough it made her look like she was shifting her wings. The tingling sensation that travelled through her wing muscles and the feeling of being weighed down was all too familiar yet also felt so terribly different in a new way. It was like coming back from a good work out and feeling the burn in reforming sinews but also feeling the satisfying exhaustion that came with it.

If she hadn't felt this experience when the she-demon the centaur prince had unleashed on Equestria went rampaging through her school in the body of a colt two years older than her, she probably would attribute this strange body reaction to some sort of chill from the a/c.

But she was a pegasus, and pegasi were built to handle the cold of higher altitudes, unless that chill came from unnatural magic.

She blinked, struggled to draw in sweet sustaining air, and her necklace gem briefly glowed a seering red-orange before fading as all of a sudden the entire weight that felt like gravity trying to pop her, vanished. Cozy breathed deeply through her nose, eyes dilating and eyelids fluttering rapidly till the adrenaline released into her bloodsteam subsided with the seconds of her steadying heart.

Shite! she swore mentally as she gasped and took a step back, tushie pressing against the cold door that opened inwards. In a restaurant? Really?!

The unpleasantness at the possibility something insidious lurked in the bathroom stalls was more irritating than anything else. The problem was there were too many bystanders here- and most importantly, she wasn't supposed to be dealing with this kind of stuff till 4 months after her training had been completed as a S. M. I. L. E agent. What the fuck was that? And why the fuck did it feel like it was coming from in here?!

"Celestia's departed spirit why is this happening to me now?!" Cozy whispered in that soft, worried, sweet submissive voice she used when she was trying to earn brownie points with egotistical cockroaches to lower their guard, only in this case her concern was more genuine and she wasn't feigning fear.

A sudden urge ran through Cozy's body in this same instance and in a second she recalled why she came to the bathroom at all.

Crud! taking a deep breath the small petite pegasus paused, styled tail falling between her hindlegs.

Carefully she looked around the twelve different stalls that lined the wall, ears straining to hear something. The sound of some sort of shifting, breathing, a 'dunk' in the toilet, maybe even a grunt from someone pushing out a big one-- anything!

There was nothing. Just her, and it made her feel creeped out.

The oppressive presence that had been in the air was gone as soon as she had picked up on it for what was literally faster than should have probably been normally possible for a magical sensitive tier one entity to even process, but for some odd reason despite hearing nothing and seeing no signs of movement behind the stalls Cozy felt that there was somepony here or something was coming. She wasn't sure how she knew or why it felt that way despite the bathroom being deserted. All she knew was that something was here, or something was coming.

Okay she sighed, maybe whoever was here is already gone. This could have been residual magic for all I know. Why anypony would use a public bathroom of all places to commit low level dark magic or whatever that was is beyond me...But... I should probably tell Agent Pierce after I'm done, and ask daddy to warn the owners that something is seriously wrong with these bathrooms here.

Satisfied with this thought Cozy pranced off to a random stall, finding as she neared the ones in the middle she smelled something off that wasn't there before. Like somepony had eaten bowls of chilli all day and dropped a massive one without flushing.

"Ugh" she grunted, a sour look on her face. "Disgusting!" waving a hoof away to gain some measure of clean air Cozy quickly moved to the fartherest stall on the left and entered.

The nagging sense that she wasn't alone persisted and seemed to grow worse even as she moved away from the stench.

Grumbling Cozy did her business while ignoring this, got out of the stall and went to the sinks to wash her hooves. Seconds later she grabbed a few paper towels and was done. Never before had she had a stronger urge to flee a bathroom so quickly hit her, but hit her it had.

Some part of her resisted just bolting out the door as she neared it. That nagging growing stronger as her ears perked, like prey being hunted and vaguely aware the predator was near.

And then something happened.

The bathroom floor started shaking, it was brief, barely noticeable even and probably wouldn't have been noticed at all if her senses hadn't just heightened. The vibrations went up her frogs, through her body and for one brief second Cozy felt the world shift around her as she gained the sense that something bad was about to happen and it would happen right behind her.

A thought of some kind, similar to when she'd noticed something off with Zipper rushed forward.

If she didn't use magic in the next few seconds, she would be severely wounded if not dead.

"Fuckin-"

Three toilets spewed geysers of toilet water out of their stalls in response to that expletive and into the tall ceilings above, at the same instant several small blobs of green that stunk with filth launched out of each stall, bathroom bowls shattering and things breaking as they launched into the ceiling and landed with a cracking thud above.

The atmosphere was riddled with the popping sound of a balloon, like teleportation had just been used except on a larger scale and matter had gotten in the way of the teleportee, thus ripping a new one to give way to the dimensional walkers.

Cozy Glow's eyes widened as four bathroom stall doors buckled under atmospheric pressure and pushed violently outwards, shaking everything nailed to the ground. The stall doors ripped open with a sudden violence, the walls briefly twisted and turned under the glow of magic before retaining form, and the stall doors were flung completely off their hinges; flying outward in her general direction--

Without even thinking, on pure instinct, her large wings flared, her gemstone glowed, her collar flashed lines of green color from the gemstone, outward-- and a curved shield enveloped her.

The second the shield went up, Cozy felt several small impacts, one strong strike that made her stumble and the sound of glass being broken filled the air.

"Hunggie!" shrieked a raspy voice through her ringing ears.

Scowling, her eyes now bleary, Cozy looked up.

"Eh-hehehehehe! Hunggie! Hunggie!" the little gremlins wearing tattered cloth and rat bones as makeshift armor chanted as they danced circles around the ceiling.

"Finally free!" one sewer gremlin stated.

"Real food at last!" another shouted.

"Taste ketchup, we shall!" the third shouted.

"Mustard, best sauce!" shrieked voices below from a small hole where a toilet had once been.

"Mayo best is!" cried others from another stall.

"Oh brother" Cozy said in worry as she dropped her shield and lifted a hoof up carefully to step around all the jagged bits around her.

"Ketchup is better!" shrieked one of the gremlins on the ceiling, breaking away from the three he had jumped with and then pointing in warning at the traitorous stall that spoke of mustard.

"No!" one of the other gremlins shouted on the ceiling, approaching it's cousin. "Mustard is bestest!"

"Liar!" the first growled and his companions cheered in their rough scratchy voices in concurrent.

"Double liar!" the second responded, shoving his companion off the wall they were leaving filthy footprints on and into another stall.

The gremlin lost its footing, toppling over and losing whatever strange ambient magic allowed it to wall crawl like a disgusting spider, it fell backwards and screamed as it fell into one of the gaping holes where the toilet should be and then "oofed" loudly as they fell on top of some unfortunate wretch that didn't move out of the way.

Two voices groaned from the hole.

Cozy slowly made her way to the door while the heated disagreement of condiments waged on, mindful of the argument and the things that could pierce her frogs.

"Mayo" said the third gremlin farthest from the two, "is true sauce."

"Fool!" the second shrieked at the third, other tiny gremlins slightly bigger than a foal joined it, leaping out of the stalls and organizing into sides.

"Hey!"

Hundreds of tiny yellow eyes looked over at Cozy with confused looks as if noticing for the first time that she was there.

"What about hot sauce?" she asked, head poking out the female's door.

The gremlins all went 'ahh' as if remembering this then went silent in contemplation.

"Me thinks mayo is actually better," a voice sheepishly broke the silence.

"Traitor!" screamed one gremlin tackling the idiot right next to him and then the whole bathroom was filled with yelling and shouts as the gremlins about two feet tall all began attacking each other.

Quickly trotting out Cozy ran to go call Pierce.

"Thank goodness gremlins are so stupid!" she whispered.

In the distance she could still hear the scream of one saying "ketchup is best!" as she ran down the long hall.

Author's Note:

Sewer gremlins.

I spent days before the first chapter's publishing figuring out how to end this story. It was initially meant to be a one shot but I scrapped that when i split the chapters.

Sewer gremlins came to mind and i just rolled with it. On some level I blame kudzuhaiku for the idea, but yeah. This is a thing now.

It's going to get weirder even if it is just a few more chapters.