RoMS' Extravaganza

by RoMS

Jun.-Jul. 20 - When The End Came To Town 9.2

“That was more personal than I expected,” Mare admitted.

“And wished?” Sweetie Belle asked with a wide smirk.

Mare blew air against her cheeks. Meanwhile, Cheerilee was nodding, eyes wide.

Pinkie chortled. “I’d forgotten I gave you that letter.”

“You never sent them?” Luster asked.

“Celestia gave them back to us after the event was finally resolved,” Mare said. “I just… I just put them in a box in the attic. I don’t think many ponies wanted to discuss the Wall at the time.”

“Weren’t there any celebrations when it was all over?”

Cheerilee stretched and yawned, brushing her hoof against her muzzle before speaking. “There were, don’t get me wrong. It’s just that —” She hesitated “— it was hard celebrating in a small committee when it was done and sent on its way. Ponyville had emptied itself. And the few parts that hadn’t been swallowed felt deader than a ghost town.”

“ What do you mean?”

“Let me take a guess. You’ve ever been to the South,” Sweetie Belle asked, to which Luster shook her head. “There are a few ghost towns there. Buildings are old, creaky, bleached by the sun without windows and constantly swept by the sun. You can see, smell and feel the age.” She reached her cold cup on the table with her magic and sipped what should have amounted to a teaspoon worth of tea left at its bottom. “Ponyville was different. Ponies were leaving left and right, leaving everything behind. It wasn’t a gradual process.”

Pinkie hummed her approval, and offered to continue. Sweetie Belle nodded. “Well, ya know. Buildings were pristine, well painted, and everything. From the outskirts of the town, you’d have not believed it was near empty. Well, if you tuned out the monster black hole looming over the town like a menacing ground-bound blimp ready to burst in flame! Anyway. If you didn’t find the lack of ponies weird, the issue would have become clear at sundown. Not a single light in any window. It was dead! Like everypony had disappeared. Packed up and left.”

“Which they did,” Cheerilee confirmed.

“How many were left there?” Luster asked.

“Not much.”

“I technically wasn’t there to see it.”

“Not many.”

“Barely enough to eat a cake! Can you believe it?”

Luster sighed, her turn to grab what was left of her tea and downed it in one small gulp. “And you didn’t go, Miss Mare, Cheerilee?”

Mare sputtered, a hoof on her chest. “How could I? I was the Mayor. I– I couldn’t. A captain sinks with its ship. Or waits for all of the passengers to leave first.”

And some wouldn’t leave. Luster got that. Cheerilee fell silent and looked down. A heavy weight visibly on her chest. She laughed, a grim chortle flying past her teeth. She threw her head back in exasperation and gave a set of fully cocked eyebrows to her wife. And a grin.

“You were such a mule. Still are.”

“Language,” Pinkie whispered.

Sweetie Belle laughed while Luster grimaced.

“How come!” Mare protested. “You stood by my side!”

“Only because I didn’t want to leave you.” Cheerilee shook her head, giving away a half growl. “If I’d been more assertive, I’d have chained you up and dragged you out of town.”

“But you didn’t.”

“Of course, I didn’t.” Cheerilee threw her hooves up. “I loved you even though we’d broken up. You felt more attached to walls than you were to me.”

“I’m sorry,” Mare whispered, shoulders slouched.

Cheerilee held her muzzle up and took her in her legs. “I know you are, but you can be stupid sometimes.”

“I know. I know.”

“Ahem.” Eyes reverted to Luster who smiled and waved. “Sorry to interrupt, but when did you get back together?”

“Oh, soon enough,” Mare answered.

“How soon enough?”

“Around a bottle of wine,” Cheerilee added.

“More than one for sure,” Mare said.

“Tell them I’m an alcoholic while you’re at it, sweetheart.”

“You and me both.”

“Yeah.”

They sighed at once, threw a glance at each other before turning to Pinkie Pie, lips puckered, a shadow lingering on their face.

“Yeah,” Pinkie whispered. “I’m okay talking about that evening.”

“What do you mean?” Luster asked.

“Oh, I was there when Mare and Cheerilee made up,” Pinkie said. “I just… wasn’t in the right headspace. You know, it comes and goes, those dark moments.” She chuckled. “We did drink a lot that night.”

Luster quirked an eyebrow at Sweetie Belle who shrugged. She was clueless too, and the slight hint of a grimace told Luster that she was wary of what had transpired while she’d been gone inside.

Damn, Luster so wanted to know what had happened inside the blob. It sounded cool, eerie, dangerous! Sweetie Belle didn’t look like the battle-hardened mare, though. And given her sister, she likely wasn’t the adventurer’s type either. The lack of scars or any distinguishing mark on her alabaster coat sure sold the deal for Luster. That story was going to be boring too.

She held back her sigh, hoof on her muzzle.

“Let’s get out,” Mare offered. “I have a place in mind.”

“Oh, come on,” Luster said. “This might be boring, but I want to hear the end of it now.”

“Sunk cost and all,” Sweetie Belle asked, a smirk on her lips.

Luster gave back the shrug and the grimace.

“Cicadas went to sleep so it must be cool enough to get a quick late afternoon stroll,” Mare said, smiling at Cheerilee and Pinkie as she grabbed a purse and stuffed Teacher Twilight’s letter in. “I’m sure getting some air will help clear the mind.”

Pinkie jumped to her legs and chirped a let’s go before locking her leg around Sweetie’s neck to drag her out to the hallway.

“Follow me!” she shrilled, a gagged Belle in tow.

Luster deadpanned at her hosts. “Does she know where you want to go?”

“Pah!” Cheerilee exclaimed with a wave of her hoof. “It’s Pinkie Pie we’re talking about.”

Right.

The sun had abated, along with the cicadas as Mare had hinted and while hues of ocres filled the sky, now covered with a few high wisps of clouds, a stronger activity filled the streets. Bars had put out open tables and many ponies enjoyed a cocktail or other kind of local beverages.

Mare and Cheerilee waved and smiled while Sweetie Belle and Pinkie Pie rushed to shake hooves. Known faces abounded for sure, but none that Luster could recognize. She wasn’t expecting any Canterlot denizens there anyhow.

Of course, there were the student bunches, with the agitation and excitation that Luster always avoided in Canterlot. But when in Canterlot, she would only see unicorns, there were a flurry of species to behold. Griffons, yaks, dragons even, hippogriffs. She hadn’t seen them on the way in.

“I guess classes are out,” Luster offered to whoever would hear.

“Yes!” Mare said. “Students are really the light of this town. As I told you, the world comes to us. After five, of course.”

A young yak tried to sit at a restaurant’s table and crushed the unsuspecting chair. Laughter flew while a waiter commandeered another for a stronger replacement.

Ponies and other creatures were happy, Luster realized. And it was genuine, without the restrained demeanour everypony had in Canterlot. She frowned, racking her brain for the right word to describe the town. She was about sure Teacher Twilight would ask her about her impressions. Ah, she had the right one now.

Frivolity.

“Here we are,” Cheerilee said, earning a yes from her wife.

“Here we are where?” Luster asked.

“Well, here,” Mare said, a hoof held out to show a low steep that led to a river that seemed to cut through the town.

A lonely stump rested at the foot of the steep, a beaten-path espousing it as it ran the length of the river. The stream was calm and near silent as no rock impeded its path. The river felt very much artificial to Luster. Like it had been either rerouted to that location a long, long time ago.

But she digressed and watched Pinkie Pie break rank to walk down to the stump. She poked at him, a pout on her face. She looked down at the dust that lay the path, kicked a few rocks and turned over as if to catch a sight. But to Luster, there was nothing.

“Is there something important to see here?” Luster asked. “I only see houses, a stump and a river.”

“Actually no,” Mare said, and Luster’s shoulders drooped.

“So why–”

“But that’s where it happened,” Mare cut with a smile.

Luster frowned. “What did?”

“When it all came down together.”