Pinkie's Guide to Greater Equestria

by GrangeDisplay

Ch 8: The Tower Crumbles

When Cranky and Pinkie returned to the town center, they found a disturbingly different scene than the days prior. Something strange had contaminated Dodge Junction. It seeped in through the cracks and festered there, infecting the unsuspecting inhabitants one at a time.

The first thing Cranky felt was heat from the fires that illuminated his surroundings. The smoke stung at his eyes and nostrils. The windows of various storefronts were left exposed, with shattered glass littering the area. The inhabitants ransacked and destroyed everything in sight.

Cranky did his best to dodge stray hooves from a nearby brawl. Around them, mobs engaged in all-out war. They fought and berated each other seemingly without cause. Whether they were drunk on substances or sheer hysteria was anyponies guess. All anypony knew was that there was a rising madness, a mass panic that spread like wildfire.

Cranky knew he had to run, but he had no idea where he could go. Whatever was causing all this was impacting him too, distorting his senses into an indecipherable mess. He was overstimulated and irritated. Only his fear placated him. He tried to navigate the blur with uneven steps, only finding direction in subtle pushes and pulls from Pinkie.

“Look, it’s Mayor Drudgery,” Pinkie mumbled weakly, breaking her longest silence yet, while pointing at Drudgery and Shorty.

The mayor and sheriff were just as bewildered by the pandemonium as Pinkie and Cranky. Although, Drudgery’s expression was much more determined while Shorty’s nerves were clearly getting the better of him.

“A-a-ah don-t understand,” Shorty bemoaned. “How could this happen? Everything was good! The bans were lifted, and all of us were happy!”

Shorty’s words were simple, but they elicited an intense reaction from the mayor. The older stallion grabbed Shorty by his vest and pulled him close, frustrated by his lack of courage.

“I ain’t ban those things because I’m a stick in the mud! I banned them because these ponies are fallible! There is something out there! You want to be sheriff? Then play your part and be the sheriff, help them!” Drudgery growled, pointing Shorty in the direction opposite of where he was heading.

They split up, running to whatever problem they could address first. Shorty blew past Cranky and Pinke, leaving the pair to feel hopeless and helpless. To make matters worse, Tramway soared out of the alleyway, zeroing in on Pinkie and Cranky. His white wings carried him over the flames and directly into a stray punch from none other than Buffalo Bull.

Buffalo, despite his beaten state, immediately recognized his mistake and quickly tried to help Tramway up. He pulled the bulkier stallion to his hooves, giving him a pat on the back.

“I’m real sorry about that. I’ve been having a bad day. I let it get the better of me. You could hit me back if you li-”

Buffalo’s attempt to make amends was cut short by Idler, who had wrapped his periwinkle hooves around Buffalo’s neck.

“You thought you could run from us? I won’t let that happen! You’re coming with me!” Idler ordered ferociously, lacking any of his characteristic composure.

“Leave him alone, you meanie!”

Cranky cursed himself as Pinkie stood defiantly on his back, having spoken those words before he could stop her. All of Idler’s, Buffalo’s, and Tramway’s attention was on the donkey and filly standing awkwardly to the side of their confrontation.

Idler slowly released Buffalo’s neck and pointed to Pinkie and Cranky, counting out, “One. Two. I saw two in the dark. There were two witnesses.”

Pinkie swiftly grabbed a hold of Cranky as the donkey booked it down the road. Idler and Tramway were hot on their hooves, leaving Buffalo deeply confused with a sore neck.

The only good thing about the crumbling of Dodge Junction was that it was easy to get lost in the chaos. Even Tramway, a pegasus and highly trained royal guard, failed to catch the elderly donkey and foal in the haze. Cranky used it to his advantage, weaving through the mobs until he saw the heavenly visage of one of Dodge Junction’s new deputies.

Crossobowjohn was holding his crossbow once more and was fiercely guarding a business with its door ripped from its hinges. Anypony who came close was threatened with an aggressive jerk of his crossbow. He stood alert, looking around wildly as Cranky ran to him. Before Cranky could even speak, Crossbowjohn made it apparent that he wasn’t going to be helpful.

“There you are!” Crossbowjohn shouted, approaching Cranky with his weapon. “Stop right there. Get on your haunches and put your hooves in the air!”

Cranky stopped in his tracks, giving Crossbowjohn a confused look. His mouth hung open as the deputy made it apparent that he wasn’t joking. Cranky wanted to run, but Crossbowjohn’s weapon was dangerously close to his face. He could feel Pinkie hesitantly letting him go as he lowered himself to the ground.

“Criminals always come back to the scene of the crime!” Crossbow announced. “You done went and started all these fires, and now you’re gonna pay!”

Idler and Tramway arrived while Crossbowjohn was tying Cranky up with rope. The disheveled unicorn looked at the pair with a mixture of disdain and mania. He brushed his disheveled mane back with a hoof and stepped beside Cranky.

“I must say, it is a pleasure to see an officer of the law do his job. This rotten burro and this little delinquent have been terrorizing me and my colleague here,” Idler stepped closer to Crossbowjohn, giving him a winning smile. “You know, perhaps we can take them off your hooves? I assure you that you will be…compensated handsomely.”

Crossbow stepped back, eyeing Idler suspiciously. “I ain’t ever seen you before. What you mean by that? You trying to bribe an officer of the law?”

“No, no!” Idler dismissed with a laugh. “I simply want to make a deal with you.”

Crossbowjohn scoffed, placing the rope over Cranky’s head as a makeshift lead. He immediately began tying two new slipknots. He sneered at Idler, clearly disgusted by the unicorn’s audacity.

“Like I’d trust a silver-tongued snake like you! You wanna make a deal? Deal with this, y’all are under arrest!”

Idler and Tramway looked completely flabbergasted as Crossbow tightened the lead around their necks. He gave the rope a test pull, smirking at the sight of three stallions bending to his will. He began tugging on the rope gang until he felt a pair of tiny pink hooves pushing against his chest. Crossbow looked down with scorn at the little filly staring at him intensely.

“He didn’t do anything! If you’re gonna arrest him, well you’re gonna have to arrest me too!” Pinkie squeaked out, enraged by the injustice.

Crossbowjohn gave the filly a quick look before matter-of-factly declaring, “Fine then, you’re under arrest too little filly.”

He hastily made a tiny lead, and placed it around the little filly’s neck. As he fastened the miniature restraint to Cranky’s, Pinkie’s ears folded back in dismay.

“Awww,” she whined with a pout and a hoof stomp.

The deputy pulled the group along, using his crossbow to threaten anypony who got in his way. Cranky tried not to look at his fellow prisoners since half of them wanted him dead, and a quarter of them was unintentionally going to get him there.

---

Cranky had been imprisoned a few times throughout his life. He had to admit, a few of those times, it was very much his fault. But, usually, it was the product of an unfair system. At the moment, he wasn’t sure where this stay fell, but it definitely felt unique.

The first thing he noticed was the relatively small size of Dodge Junction’s jail, its lack of equipment, and the absence of an actual booking system. It was understandable since Dodge had a small population and wasn’t even a town a few years ago. Like most small territories, discretions were probably punished with exile up until now.

Two small cells took up a majority of the one-room building. They were separated by a brick wall. Aside from the cells, the police station had a single desk and a window, allowing one to hear the continued mayhem outside.

Another thing Cranky noticed was that he was jailed with Pinkie. Not that he was complaining or anything. Even Pinkie was better than two ponies actively trying to murder him. The tension between the four was noticeable enough that Crossbowjohn decided to split them and put two in each cell.

The deputy didn’t stick around too long after tying up Tramway’s wings and placing a spellbinder on Idler’s horn. Cranky feared these measures might be inadequate since highly skilled unicorns could easily fry a spellbinder, and royal guard members had intensive training.

Cranky’s suspicion was only half correct. After Crossbowjohn left, Tramway flexed his massive frame and freed himself, while Idler proved himself to be an averagely unskilled unicorn. Cranky couldn’t actually see either of his adversaries, but he could definitely hear them.

Tramway considered finding a way to escape, but Idler approached the situation with his usual arrogance and laziness. He hoof-waved the problem, ensuring Tramway that somepony, whether it be Stagecoach or Ferrous, would free them soon. To him, it was better to be behind bars than out in the streets, and Cranky, strangely enough, had to agree.

There was a nauseating sense of calm in those jail cells, like the numbness one gets before going on a stage or public speaking. An anxiety and nervousness slightly alleviated by the understanding that the hard part is yet to come.

In this case, the hard part was what happened when all the prisoners were released from their cages. It was a dire situation, and Cranky, who had survived a great deal, wasn’t sure how to make it out. Pinkie didn’t seem much better.

She lay not too far from where he sat, hiding behind a curtain of her own straightened mane. She was so still that he couldn’t tell if she was awake. She fidgeted occasionally, twitching randomly as flashes of orange and white poured in from the window.

Cranky closed his eyes, hoping to find some peace in the bleak circumstances. A part of him wanted to fight, but it was hard to muster the strength to do so. In retrospect, perhaps this was all inevitable. He always considered previous misadventures as something to be proud of, but maybe it was all an omen.

An omen that he was a failure.

An omen that he should give up.

An omen that it was never meant to be.

It was becoming harder to see a method to all the madness. To understand why he continued searching if it left his life in shambles. If there ever were a reason for this, he really needed the universe to send him a sign. But if life had taught him anything, it was that the universe would never care about something as small and insignificant as him.

“Now, how did y’all two rascals end up behind bars?” questioned a sweet, but exasperated voice.

Cranky and Pinkie looked up to see the dirtied but memorable face of Cherry Jubilee beaming at them through the bars.

“What are you doing here?” Cranky questioned as his heart raced.

Cherry laughed lightly, playing with a strand of her mane. “I saw somepony bringing y’all in. I thought this might be a safe house for foals and geezers. Imagine my surprise when I saw y’all was getting booked!”

“Trust us, we were just as surprised as you,” Cranky admitted, he came as close to the bars as possible and whispered. “Any way you can get us out of here? The two fellas next to us are nothing but trouble, so we gotta be careful. We saw Buffalo on the way here. We can all get out together.”

Cherry’s expression flattened as she listened to the desperation in Cranky’s voice. She suspiciously eyed the adjacent cell, understanding it was best not to be seen by those inside. She gave Cranky a resolute nod before crouching and sneaking out of sight.

Idler’s smug tone wafted from the other cell. “Who's that? A friend of yours? Here to rescue all of us I hope.”

Cranky sneered at the comment, suppressing the urge to respond with an equally snarky comment. He gripped the bars tightly until Cherry returned with a key.

“Leaving so soon?” Idler bemoaned with mock disappointment. “You could at least tell us your name before you go. Or maybe you could let us get a good look at you without all that dreadful smoke. Anything to remember my new friends with.”

Cherry glanced warily at the adjacent cell as she finally opened the door. “I see what ya mean. That fella talks too much.”

As they came upon the front door of the town jail, Tramway began slamming against the bars in an attempt to escape. Cherry led the way with Cranky close behind, but Pinkie suddenly stopped. She looked on aimlessly as the chaos swelled around her.

Cranky, against his better judgment, turned around and spoke urgently, “Come on kid, we gotta go!”

With her brows furrowed and frown apparent, Pinkie shook her head defiantly, “But Cranky! How come we get to leave? I mean, I didn’t like being in there, but it's not fair! I think we all need to talk to the deputies, especially those stallions!”

Cranky could feel his heart racing but ignored his trembling to place a comforting hoof on Pinkie’s shoulders. He spoke as sweetly as his gruff voice allowed, “Listen kid those stallions are no good. They deserve to be in jail. Heck, they deserve to be under the jail. We gotta get away from them, so let’s get the Heck out of Dodge.”

Cranky stared into Pinkie’s eyes, waiting to see if she understood the situation. Her expression was blank, the words seemingly failing to resonate before she swallowed and nodded.

Cranky nodded back and looked around, they were missing somepony. “Where’s Cherry? She was just with us a minute ago! We need her.”

“Hey!” The pony in question shouted from a distance ahead of them, having continued on while Pinkie and Cranky stopped. “What are y’all doing! We need to move!”

“We know that! Hold on a second!” Cranky shouted as he tried to goad Pinkie along. “Come on kid. Let's go.”

But Pinkie refused to budge. She placed her hooves on Cranky’s chest, trying to stop him from moving. “We can’t. Somethings going to fall, Cranky!”

Cranky looked at the filly with disgust, having lost all his patience. “Wha- What the hay is wrong with you! Can’t you see that we’re in danger! Ain’t it enough that you got us into thi-”

“Sweet Celestia, you two look out!” Cherry warned with a blood-curdling scream.

The jarring proclamation silenced the old donkey, leaving him stunned and confused. But, Pinkie was already on the move, crashing her tiny body into the donkey. The two of them were hurled clumsily to the ground, causing dirt and smoke to enter their lungs.

Between the sound of Cherry’s screaming and Pinkie’s powerful shove, Cranky finally had to sense to look up. His jaw dropped as he lay paralyzed. The entire front frame of an unfinished and burning townhouse was coming down on them.

He ducked his head as he felt Pinkie ineffectively cover him. A massive cloud of dust and embers erupted around them. When the dust finally settled, they were curled up in a fetal position, thoroughly shaken yet safe.

Cranky looked on in awe. Pinkie had thrown them in the best position given the time, a cutout in the fallen townhouse where a window was yet to be installed. Had Cranky been anywhere else, he would have been crushed. How Pinkie could have possibly responded so decisively was a mystery to him.

Cherry was equally surprised; she slowly lowered her hooves from her eyes. She was on the verge of running to them when she was swept up in a mob of ponies fleeing.

“Run, run! Sompony disturbed the geese, somepony disturbed the geese!”

Cherry looked toward the fleeing crowd and spotted a flock of geese with canine-like teeth and serpentine necks and tongues. The creatures flared their wings, revealing feathers as sharp as razor blades. They followed the crowd, nipping at their hooves as they honked at a deafening level.

A kind bystander pulled Cherry along, sweeping her into their retreat. If that wasn’t enough disorder, from the smoke escaped a trio of ponies. One of them was none other than Rusted Peddler, who carried more goods upon his back than he arrived with.

The stolen loot was stacked high on the trio's backs and threatened to spill from their saddlebags. The salespony and his cohorts galloped past Cranky and Pinkie, but he took the time to call out.

“Move it weirdos! I’ve got bills to pay!”

Rusted and his gang disappeared again, but their crime hadn’t gone unnoticed by the law. Somehow, they had brought the worst possible pony with them. Crossbowjohn fired a warning shot after the three as he came upon the fallen townhouse.

The deputy’s pursuit of the thieves ended as soon as he locked eyes with Cranky. He pointed his weapon at them with a scowl.

“Now how did y’all escape? Y’all are real bad apples ain’t ya. Maybe that snake and his muscle head were right. We don’t need any more troublemakers making a mess of things!”

Crossbowjohn only got a few steps closer to the pair when a stallion tackled him at full speed. They wrestled atop the debris, giving Cranky and Pinkie the perfect opportunity to run.

The pair bolted away, moving as fast as their sore bodies could muster. In the distance, they spotted more deputies trying to corral a group away from Town Hall. Thoroughly disillusioned, the two chose to hide, darting into a nearby alleyway.

As they waited, a shadow appeared on the wall, frightening Cranky and Pinkie to their cores. Cranky did his best to look big and in control, standing firm and ready for battle. The owner of the shadow was beaten and covered in soot, yet his eyes were still kind.

It was the pony who had tackled Crossbowjohn. It was a Buffalo Bull. He spat forcefully and wiped his brow with a reddened hoof.

Buffalo nodded at Pinkie and asked, “Y’all two saved me right? It was mighty brave of you to speak up. Sorry that meanie chased after you and your friend. I’m fixin to get outta here, how about y’all come with? I got a wagon I can pull y’all in. How about it?”

---

Pinkie rested her head against the paneling of Buffalo Bull’s cart as it hurtled across the uneven terrain. She would have preferred to run alongside the stallion, but he had insisted that she and Cranky rest while they could. This left her with nothing to distract her troubled mind, forcing her to replay the many things she had seen that night.

She studied her hooves closely, seeing numerous blisters and cuts, but not feeling any of them. The physical pain couldn’t amount to things she struggled to comprehend.

Something dark and cruel was emerging on the horizon of her mind. Like the sunrise, it shrouded all things in its tinted colors, framing and reframing everything she saw and perceived. With each uneasy thought, memories replayed repeatedly.

In her mind, marbles spilled, littering the floor over and over again. Pinkie shook violently at the sound and covered her ears to make it stop.

“I-I left them, I left them behind… my marbles.”

Cranky looked at Pinkie in bewilderment. That is what she cares about, he thought cynically. He was tired, so incredibly tired. Yet, he was forced to put up with this kid.

“You can just get new ones.”

“No.”

“No?”

“No. They can’t be replaced. My little sister made them just for me, they’re special! Special things can’t be remade. Once they’re gone, they’re gone forever,” Pinkie insisted out of breath.

She recalled the sight of her marbles scattered across the floor. And with that recollection came the memory of what else lay there. Discarded, forsaken, alone. The figure of Clipper Ship was splayed out in the darkness.

She remembered the sobering sound of Clipper Ship’s cries. They echoed throughout, piercing her breaking heart as she reimagined his suffering from the shadows of his demise. She fought to penetrate the silence that threatened to suffocate her.

“It was all so bad! I don’t understand it! Why wouldn’t they stop? Clipper Ships is… he…Cranky…is Clipper Ship,” the words faded as Pinkie’s expression darkened.

Cranky knew what she meant, it was written all over her face. It was a grief she was never meant to bear, not yet at least. Cranky didn’t want that for her. He would have done anything to still see the world like she did.

Her life was filled with endless excitement and boundless possibilities. She had hope and an immense love for those around her. Everything was new and wonderful to her.

That needed to be protected, and Cranky needed to be protected too.

Cranky swallowed, he finally had an opportunity to choose after days of being forced into situation after situation. In this life, there are many choices to be made. The choice to leave home. The choice of what path to take. The choice to do wrong. The choice to be complacent.

As Pinkie looked up at Cranky with desperate eyes, placing the weight of her very innocence upon his jaded shoulders, he made his choice.

He lied.

He shook his head, smiling softly at her. “No. You couldn’t see too well, but he was still breathing. That’s why we have to leave and find somepony trustworthy, to get help for him. They were just roughing him up to teach him a lesson, you know?”

Pinkie looked up at him with watery eyes, reaching into Cranky’s very soul in search of the truth. He gave his all not to shudder, not to let the truth slip. They studied each other, and Cranky watched as she accepted his narrative.

She looked away, with her innocence protected and childhood salvaged. Pinkie, his greatest liability, believed him because she thought it was always worth it. She nodded slowly, trusting the only friend she had ever had outside her family.

“Okay Cranky,” she accepted as her mane began to curl. She waved a quivering yet triumphant hoof in the air and proudly declared. “We’ll go somewhere and get Clipper Ship help!”

Cranky did his best to smother the cringe invading his features. She spoke with such confidence. A hero on the verge of an epic quest. But Cranky knew better. There were no heroes here, and there was nopony left to save. Cranky sighed deeply, wondering how long it would take for Idler to give up on finding them.

Pinkie gasped, sitting upright. “Oh no, Cranky! We left Cherry! We have to go back! Buffalo doesn’t know she loves him too!”

The realization struck Cranky too, eradicating all of his other worries for the moment. He hadn’t seen Cherry since their separation at the townhouse. Once they found Buffalo, they fled without another thought. She was probably still searching for the three in the chaos.

Coward. He thought before answering, “Don’t worry. I’m sure she’ll be just fine. If she and Buffalo really love each other, they’ll find each other.”

“You think so?”

No. Cranky thought bitterly before lying again, “Of course. Even if they don’t. She’s tough, she'll survive.”

Cranky swiftly looked away, more troubled by this deception than any lie he had told up to this point. A new silence arose between the two. In the absence of speech came the ambient sound of a new day rising on the horizon.

There was an emptiness that burned away with Dodge. It was accompanied by an indescribable sense of loss. The loss of something which could not be recovered or fixed.

Perhaps this new day would bring about better circumstances for the town as the smoky sky cleared and the sun shined down anew. Maybe, the inhabitants would awaken to their own barbarity and rectify the mistakes they could.

But for now, all that Cranky and Pinkie knew was that they could never return.

Comments

[sirenc0re]

INSANE!!!