Equestria: The Afterlife

by Timzocker201

CH75: Dawn Patrol

“Vinyl? Vinyl, how long did you plan on blocking the bathroom? Vinyl, please, I really have to go for little fillies! Vinyl?!”

It was early in the morning, in a small thatch-roofed hut in the outskirts of Ponyville. The inside of said hut was exactly split into two very different halves. One side was set up like a modern studio, while the other looked more akin to a stage in an operahouse.

“Vinyl, I’m coming in now!”

Of course, only the entrance and main living area were decorated that way. The other areas of the house shared their design – mostly. There were, of course, a few key differences in the respective ‘turfs’ of the two inhabitants, but only wherever it made sense. The more ‘standard’ facilities were left untouched. Like the bathroom, which a rather distressed mare was currently tentatively opening the door of.

“Vinyl? Vinyl, are you here? Ugh, dear Celestia, if I’d known that, I would’ve gone in hours ago!” Octavia cursed to herself, as she entered and placed herself on the throne. However, just when she was about to start her business, she spotted a small bat hanging from the ceiling and staring at her.

She sighed. “Vinyl, you do realize that peeping is utterly pointless, as we are always naked anyways?”

“I know, but doing it still feels kinda scandalous.” The bat replied.

“If you like scandals then you should’ve probably become a journalist and not a DJ.” Octavia pointed out.

“Eh, I don’t know. As a DJ, I got to see more than enough scandals. Granted, I caused most of them, but hey, still counts. As for the journalist… while I might be always the first on the scene, overall there isn’t really much journalism to be done at night, so…”

“Speaking of which, why have you volunteered for the dawn patrol together with me? I thought you would want to take the night shift, with your vampirism and such.” Octavia asked.

“Truth be told, it would most likely be easier for me, but… I did promise you to finally adapt my sleep schedule to match yours, so this would probably be a good start. That and I can’t really pass up an opportunity like this to spend a whole morning just with you.”

“Hmm, you do realize that it would’ve been easier if I had just dropped out, as then we could’ve spent the morning together here at home, do you?” Octavia chuckled. “Still, that is very sweet of you, Vinyl, thank you. Now, come on, let’s get going. I think we are already a bit behind our schedule.”

As she said that, Octavia flushed and got up, making her way to the bathroom’s exit.

“W-w-wait, what? You’re done already? How did that work?” The baffled Vinyl-bat stammered.

“Heh, it would seem my distraction worked. Now, come on~. We need to get going.” Octavia chirped.

Vinyl-bat groaned in frustration, before turning back into her pony form and following Octavia out of the house.

Outside, one could see the artificial sun slowly creep up on the horizon. The real sun had probably never set, as well as the moon. Sadly, the two warring alicorns were both unwilling to lower their respective celestial body, so Twilight put up a gigantic dome-like shield around their controlled territory, which emulated the day-night-cycle as good as it could. Sadly, magic isn’t 100% light-proof, even if you paint it like the sky, so the nights weren’t really dark anymore. It was still better than nothing, though.

One thing that Twilight sadly couldn’t emulate was seasons. The pegasi were all busy either fighting in the war or trying to not get killed between the fronts and the few weatherponies that were stationed in Ponyville couldn’t do much, without resources from the weather factory in Cloudsdale. There had been attempts to harness the rampant energies from the Everfree Forest, but that only sufficed for minor snowfall that dissipated after only a few minutes. The snow that fell didn’t stay anyways, as the ground was still too warm.

Thus, it had been late summer to early fall for half a year now. A very off-putting predicament, especially since heat-season was coming up soon and nopony – especially nomare - knew if their bodies would just follow their internal clocks or if they would orient themselves more on outside influences.

Nevertheless, Vinyl and Octavia were starting their dawn patrol with good morale and a smile on their muzzles. This only mildly too bright morning was bound to be a good one, after all!

Their first waypoint was the southern orchard of Sweet Apple Acres. There, most of the refugees had found shelter. The overall mood in the camp was tolerable. Sure, they weren’t in a terrily good mood, but who would be, after they had to leave everything behind? Still, some of them were more than willing to fight to end this war, funnily enough. Especially, when taking into account that most of them fled to avoid being drafted in the first place.

Octavia and Vinyl went through the rows of tents and small sheds that had been built from spare building materials that Applejack and a few others had donated. It wasn’t much, but at least it created a few small safe spots to store supplies for the refugees, or even construct a more robust shelter for a few of them.

After ensuring that there were no major fights between the refugees or other bad things going on, the two continued their patrol. Their second waypoint was Sweet Apple Acres itself, where Applejack was currently busy tending to her trees.

The non-changing seasons had probably hit Applejack the hardest. Since it had been early fall this whole time, her trees had all shed their leaves and were now all waiting for spring to hit, to regrow them. This would, however, only happen, once the war had been resolved and the alicorns rid of their nightmares, which could very well take up to another year, if not more. As such, Markus had already suggested to Applejack that she should try to grow a few of the apples she had into saplings, so she at least had a headstart, should the unthinkable happen. Of course, he had also promised her financial aid, once all was back to normal, however he also made it clear that there were other orchards throughout Equestria that were already in worse shape than hers would be.

Still, despite these grim outlooks, Applejack cared lovingly for her trees. So much so that she almost didn’t notice Octavia and Vinyl waving at her and needed a branch to hit her on the head to even get her to look at them for a moment.

She quickly waved at them, but didn’t interact further. Instead she almost immediately focused on her trees again and continued her work. Octavia and Vinyl shrugged once at each other and decided that it was probably for the best if they continued their patrol.

Their next waypoint was the main plaza with the town hall. On the way there, they passed by Carousel Boutique, which was currently closed, as Rarity was currently more than busy with a major order that filled a top priority spot on her list.

They reached the marketplace and the town hall and circled a few times around the large pavilion-shaped building. It was still rather early in the morning, so barely any market stalls were open. Only the true early birds were already up and preparing their shops, although with the very limited supply lines, very little was actually for sale. Food was rationed, as were most essential goods, thus leaving rather little for the merchants to sell. As such, the flower girls and Filthy Rich were largely the only shopowners to be open. There were a few smaller market stalls and shops, but nothing worth of note, really. Even Sugarcube Corner had to close for the duration of the war, as the rationing Markus put in place was very strict.

“It is sad though.” Vinyl pointed out. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, I know that it`s necessary, but… It seems like he’s overreacting a bit.”

“Yeah, I know what you mean. Conserving every little bit of food that’s not needed immediately may be necessary from time to time in our situation, but really conserving everything is a bit harsh… thank goodness he has freed all closed shops from taxes for the duration of the war. Else, Sugarcube Corner would probably soon be bankrupt.” Octavia thought out loud.

“Yeah. Good thing water isn’t rationed. That would be a true pain in the bum, if we had to count the seconds we spent in the shower and stuff like that.” Vinyl said.

“Yes, it truly is a blessing that there is a river running through the town. We would very likely have a very hard time without it.”

The two continued on their patrol to the guard base. They didn’t enter though, as their patrol route only led past it. They did however catch a glimpse behind the gates, where the remnants of the lunar, solar and royal guards that fled here were currently training those refugees that wanted to fight into a militia, with uniforms that were of course provided by Rarity. Although these uniforms in particular were not of as high a quality as the regular Shadow Guard Uniforms were, in order to save material and work time.

The training the refugees received wasn’t on par with that of the proper guardsponies. Given that they weren’t supposed to be frontline fighters anyways, they received only enough training to properly handle their weapons and know how to act in a few basic situations.

Speaking of weapons, of course they weren’t fitted with the same weapons as the shadow guard either. Mostly because they were considered too valuable to risk damaging them during exercises, but also because the guardsponies that were training the militia didn’t have any qualifications on those weapons themselves. As such, the milita was only fitted with the standard guard spears and armor that Markus had kept in stock by order of Princess Celestia.

Vinyl and Octavia continued their patrol around the base and got to the rear entrance, which was apparently reserved for the large factory that was uncharacteristically placed within the base. From here, they could see Mystic talk to two very familiar-looking Captains, one of the solar and one of the lunar guard, respectively.

She and the remaining Alpha Company had been tasked with some sort of special mission in the Everfree Forest, though what exactly this mission was is only known to Alpha, the prince and apparently also Flim and Flam. Although, there have been unconfirmed rumours that there were regular transports of large equipment into the Everfree during nighttime.

Vinyl and Octavia finished their round around the base and continued onwards towards the castle, where they found Markus and Twilight talking on the balcony. They tried shouting up and greeting them, though whatever they were talking about seemed to absorb them so thoroughly that they either ignored or just didn’t notice them.

After their short visit to the castle, they finally came to their last waypoint, which was their own home. They filled out their patrol reports, which they had already prepared and placed on a table behind the door, so that they could do that the moment they entered.

“I just wish I could join the fight, you know? Like, go to Canterlot together with the prince, beat some butts and save Equestria.” Vinyl lamented.

“Vinyl, you know I would like that too, but you also know why we can’t.” Octavia replied.

“Yeah, I know. The lunar guard and I are our aces in the hole, in case Nightmare tries to attack us at night and the same goes for you and the solar guard during the day.” Vinyl Mumbled.

“And?”

“… and we don’t know if whatever state we find Canterlot in might trigger some unwanted memories.” Vinyl finished.

“Exactly. To be honest, I probably like it just as much as you do, but… in all honesty, I don’t know if I could kill a pony… again.”

“Octy, that was an accident and you know it! Don’t start to feel guilty for your parents again. They were total buttfaces anyways.” Vinyl huffed.

“Buttfaces? Heh, really Vinyl, sometimes you come up with the most hilarious insults.” Octavia giggled.

“Hey, as long as it cheers you up, I will do whatever you need.” Vinyl assured.

“And I am really thankful for that, Vinyl. Though, for now… let’s just lean back and relax a little, okay? After all you really deserve it after getting up so early just for me.”

Octavia gave Vinyl a loving kiss on the cheek, before both walked over and laid down onto the couch, where they spent the next few hours cuddling and enjoying each other’s warmth.

Comments

[Munro]

daaww ^^

[MikiStenbeck]

10961152
yes, removing that is one of stupidest things Shining has done.