Building Walls, Burning Bridges

by MonolithiuM

[ARC II] Chapter 24- Did I Say Making a Unicorn Cry Was Hard?

"I like Doritos. I'm usually watching 'The Biggest Loser' eating Doritos." -Halle Berry

“I have way too many things going on at the same time,” I said to myself while the griffon stitched my new clothes together. I was entirely and utterly bored, the Crusaders were on a field trip which I was exempted from when I detonated a depth charge in the school bathroom (a story for another time), and I was just now wondering how I would wrap up the plethora of background projects I had in the works.

“On the list of shit I have going are: pens, Doritos, sports championship, music production, meeting Flim and Flam, building nuclear power, harvesting raw ore for future products, and seeing Shining Armor in a dress.” I couldn’t have been more disappointed in myself. I needed to keep a clear head if I wanted to get somewhere with my business, and with the Harmonious Sports Championship just a week or so away, I needed to seriously get some organization together.

I felt as if some fucking asshole kept screwing with the flow of time and fate, keeping me from achieving any semblance of success in this pretty pony clusterfuck. I let out a sigh and thought back to two days ago, a day after I had asked Rarity to get me a griffon seamstress.

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“Mono, darling, so good to see you are awake!” Rarity’s voice pierced my eardrums like sirens, worsening my already sour mood. Mornings were usually fine, unless I had been soaked in dragon fluids the previous day. Other than that, I’d be solid.

“Yeah, I’m half asleep, what is it?” I rubbed the drowsiness from my eyes and slid down the sloped roof of the schoolhouse, landing in the dirt. Rarity took a half-step back, no doubt shocked at my shambled appearance.

I lacked a coat, shirt, hat, and pants. This left me in underwear and dress shoes. And mittens. I would have felt uncomfortable if it wasn’t for the fact that I couldn’t care less about what these ponies thought of me. Sure, it might have been bad for future business relations, but my previous comment stands.

“Mono, you are certainly, um… well, to be frank: you’re lacking clothes.” This comment earned absolutely nothing from me, so I didn’t even bother responding, I just cut to the chase.

“So I guess you found a griffon seamstress already?” I asked her. Even though I seriously doubted that she had, I would be very grateful for it. After all, a Nucleosis always repays his debts. Confirming my guess, Rarity used her magic to drop a business card into my hands- which still had mittens on them, curiously.

“Madame Bereau: Master Seamstress.” I nodded. “How’d ya get her so fast?” I asked while examining the card.

“Well, she was conveniently in town for the week making clothes for Mister Penchant. She had been hired for the creation of a simply fabulous suit and tie that I really do adore; he just looks simply ravishing in it. Since her business was not currently needed elsewhere, I asked if once she was finished she could assist you.” She gestured with her hoof. “And now we are here.”

I nodded again and began walking to the address hastily scribbled on the back. “Thanks Rarity, I owe you one. If you ever need anything, just reach out to me. Later,” I said with a wave.

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I had quickly found the seamstress and paid her with a few smaller diamonds. Because of my ‘generous’ payment she insisted on adding a set of formal clothes along with the jeans and shirt I had commissioned.

She was also able to wash out the dragon-stink from my hat, much to my relief, and I would have my clothes before the end of the day. You may be asking yourself why I would want to hire a griffon seamstress instead of just asking Rarity, but by now that would be a stupid question, because I’m pretty sure you know how I roll by now.

But back to the topic of sorting my shit out. I needed a foolproof plan, one that included a goddamn calendar, because I couldn’t tell what day it was if it was screamed into my face. And so, once again, I had found myself planning another fucking excursion for personal gain. I wasn’t exactly a practitioner of the seven habits of highly effective people, so piss off.

At this point I had a pair of jeans and a white shirt. I would need to swing back an hour or so later for the rest of my shirts and my coat, but at the moment it would do. Pulling my hat down over my messy black hair, I shook out my bangs and stepped outside. “I’ll be back later,” I called back to the busy griffon, shutting the door on my back.

“Ah, Ponyville…” I took in the brightly shining sun, the smiling ponies, the chirping birds and babbling brooks. It did well to brighten my mood. “Yeah…” I thought to myself, watching the butterflies and clouds float cross the sky.

A young colt trotted up to me, reaching a hoof up toward my cheek while I stared into the sky with a contented smile on my face. “Well,” I said, my sudden words making the colt’s hoof stop.

With a swift crescent kick sending the eight-year-old pony careening down the road and into a trash bin, I took out The List without pesky toddlers watching me and peered at the scroll with a viciously determined grin. “Time to make some motherfucking Doritos.”

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“Well, what did you think children?” Cheerilee asked her small group of students. “A fun trip before Summer Vacation did us well, wouldn’t you agree?”

The students cheered and ran out from the train, their trinkets, souvenirs, and collectibles clinking and clanking in their goodie bags. They all talked incessantly of the various things they had seen at the Museum of Pony History; from the ancient Cave Ponies to the rather modern invention of the Magically Powered Textile Machine.

The only three slightly miffed were the Crusaders, upset that Mono hadn’t come along. There was hope for other Crusaders, though, if what Mono had been telling them about alternate universes would prove substantial.

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Somewhere in an Alternate Universe

“What are you all so worried about? It’s just a thawed-out Cave Pony!”

“NEEEEIIIIIIIIIIIGH.”

“Help me! He’s foalnapping me!”

“Relax, you’re just gonna be his mate.”

“Oh~! The horror!”

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On second thought, perhaps him staying in Ponyville was for the best at the moment. He certainly had been acting out in more spectacular and destructive ways.

“Maybe Mono’s better after the dragon incident?” Sweetie Belle had some genuine concern for Mono. She had a gnawing feeling that the dragon’s fire had melted the human’s brains. “It would be terrible if he wasn’t.”

“Aw, don’tcha worry Sweetie, I’m sure he’s fi-“

Applebloom’s hillbilly hodgepodge hoedown stupid-talk was instantly silenced by the state of chaos Ponyville was in. Gold bits flowed down the streets, and ponies violently fought one another for the stray currency.

Hooves flew and teeth followed, mares and stallions alike knocking the air and senses from one another. No ribs were safe, no testicles were secure, hell, not even the ovaries were sacred in this scramble.

Each blow made the school children wince, while the gold continued to stream from somewhere in town.

Cheerilee had found that during Mono’s stay, shit happened. Far more shit than what usually happened with the Elements. What was different from their case, however, was that Mono was usually the exact piece of shit that started all other shits; like the Father of All Shits.

Fed up with the Father of All Shits’ shit, she stopped giving two shits and stomped off into town to stomp the shit out of the Father of All Shits.

It was going to be a shitty day.

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I threw away another deluxe-size cast iron pot in disgust. More fucking gold. I couldn’t have been as cursed as the guy in the commercial, I had done everything perfectly. I even had on the fucking goggles and I looked legit as a motherfucker.

Especially in my fancy new clothes, I must say. My hat and jacket were cleaned and looking far more vibrant and feeling much softer than before, the new jeans I had were slim-fit and damn comfortable, and my shirt was made of some kind of layered silk that had the effect of ecstasy every time it brushed against my chest.

I wiggled my body at that moment just to gain some semblance of happiness.

“OH, GOD YES.”

Shivering, I glared at The List again and grit my teeth. “Now this is some bullshit. I have everything I need: the Staff of Anubis, the Philosopher’s Stone, a rubber hammer, rubber nails, moon rock salt, Archimedes’ Screw, a harpsichord, a parachute, a Blank…”

I checked on the struggling shadow monster across the room, a metal tap poking out of its forehead. I would send it back to its story after.

“…a Bag of Holding, cloud mist, elven joy, a lucky penny, a love song, an erlenmeyer flask, a macroscope, a sense of wonder, some Blankety Blanks, a temporal glitch…”

The vibrating mass of static in the corner of the room might leave a mark… in the universe. Yeah…

“…a haiku, Nots, Sweeps, Beeps, Deeps, Sneeps, Reeps, some winks, memories, fireballs, congratulations, laughter, lightning, star dust, rings of a tree…” Thank you, Sweet Apple Acres. “…a mother’s approval, mountain air, cheesiness…”

I looked up, having to physically pause to block out the cheesiness of Twilight’s joke. “Oh my fucking God, why has she not committed suicide yet?” I cleared my throat and continued with my listing.

“…inspiring footage, smiles, secret ingredient, smell of morning, Love, two dashes of an Autumn breeze, unicorn tears, and half a horse’s whinny.”

I glared at the paper in my hands, my gaze threatening to burn a hole through The List. “So what the fuck am I missing?!”

Suddenly, the door began to slowly push against the copious mountains of gold, forcing the money back with a slow but resilient determination. A dull fuchsia snout popped out from behind the wooden door, pants and grunts coming from it.

Before long, Cheerilee pushed back heaps of gold and the door swung open. She came to stare at me, and her mane started to smoke. Blinking, I apologized while my glare died down. “Sorry there, Teach, almost set your hair on fire.”

“Mono! What have you done to the Schoolhouse?” Cheerilee practically screamed at me, so I put my green little hands up in defense.

“Woah there Cheerilee, don’t shit a brick.” Her eyes snapped into a more heightened state of anger.

“Don’t use that word.”

“What word?”

“Shit.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t know, I’m just tired of it for some reason.”

“Okay, so we need some synonyms, no big deal. Uh… We’ve got poop, crap, turds, dookie, cowpat, dump, scat, stool, doo-doo, poo-poo, cahckie, dung, excrement, feces…”

“Mono?”

“Yeah?”

“Shut the hell up.”

“Kay.”

Cheerilee let out a sigh while she placed a hoof on her temple to try to alleviate whatever anger was swelling in her head. Although how could anyone be that mad when they were literally chest-deep in bonafide fucking gold? Well, except for me, of course.

“Cheerilee, I just can’t get it right! I’ve tried to alchemize Doritos more times than I can count, and I just keep getting gold!” I zipped into her personal space and gestured to the obscene amounts of money.

“WHAT AM I GONNA DO,” I screamed in her face, “WITH ALL THIS GOLD?”

Cheerilee’s face was obscured by an ominous black shadow, her features hidden from my view. She trembled while her head rose, revealing two pin-prick glowing white orbs of blazing hot, maddening fury.

“I’ll tell you exactly what you can do with all this gold…”

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Cheerilee’s class stood in the midst of a world gone mad for money, passing the time by tossing bits into ponds and fountains and watching ponies dive for the currency. Mono had done what the fillies and colts thought only Discord could do: make chaos look fun.

The Cutie Mark Crusaders sat around in a circle, playing Jacks while they waited for their teacher. Sweetie Belle threw the ball up and gathered three jacks before the ball landed, failing to match Scootaloo’s triumphant four.

“Aww, nuts,” Sweetie Belle complained. A cough from Scootaloo, accompanied with an outstretched hoof, made Sweetie’s frown deepen and her eyebrows knit together.

Scooping up a hoof full of bits from the ground, the small white unicorn paid the victorious Scootaloo her prize of ten bits.

“Do ya think Miss Cheerilee found Mono?” Applebloom asked her friends.

The answer -like a gift-wrapped message straight from the heavens- came in the form of Mono’s sneaker colliding with the earth filly’s head… again. “Move it!” Mono called out as he took off down the golden streets hauling some serious chibi ass.

Cheerilee, a blur of purple and white, tore after Mono at unbelievable speeds, even managing to keep pace with the human. A strangled scream and a crash that reverberated through Ponyville signaled the anticlimactic end to the short-lived chase.

Cheerilee soon dragged Mono back to the children by the collar, her mouth foaming and her eyes underlined with tired bags. Mono’s unconscious form lay slumped over her back, his eyes literally swirling while his mouth lay open listlessly.

“Children, you are dismissed,” she proclaimed in an icy tone that froze the hearts of her students.

“Thank you Miss Cheerilee,” they all droned in frightened unison, taking off as soon as they finished their respectful farewell.

Cheerilee looked back at the human draped across her barrel. Her eyes narrowed on his form before she sighed.

“You’re lucky we need you,” she mumbled, stalking off back into Ponyville toward Princess Twilight Sparkle’s home.

Author's Note:

Back to the ridiculousness BwBb was meant to be. The Championship approaches.

Comments

[Capt TeK]

Obligatory video post of obvious and awesome reference:

[FlyingKitsune]

Wait...Mono succeeded in creating Gold using alchemy?

And has no idea what to do with Scrooge McDuck levels of money?

FUUUUUUUUUUUU!

[MonolithiuM]

3817952 My favorite commercial of all time.

[FattBoy94]

*Reads over The List* ...You forgot the salt, Mono.

[MonolithiuM]

3820815 Mono: "AW FUCK." *facepalm*