Chapter 1: Utopia
I've always hated train journeys. I've always hated traveling for that matter, it's long and boring and downright annoys me, I don't really know why it annoys me though. The view is nice though, really nice. It's kind of pretty watching poppy fields slowly move to leaves of grass blowing in the wind before going back to poppy fields again.
I'm traveling to a small village called Ponyville with my friend Lucky, he's sitting beside me in the last carriage of the train we're traveling in. He's asleep on the seat beside me, we're in the back row of our cart. Whilst I was staring out the window and Lucky was loudly snoring beside me, I seemed to hear a soft voice midst my friend's annoying snore, I turned around and saw it was the conductor.
The conductor was a light blue female Earth Pony, I'd say no less than about five years older than me. It's strange really, I never usually see female train conductors, at least on the few train journeys I've been on,
"Excuse me sir, but I need to punch your ticket" The conductor politely said to me.
"Oh yeah, sorry about that" I apologized, "Um, he's with me as well" I told her as I nudged my head towards Lucky, "I have his ticket as well"
I handed her the tickets and she punched them,
"Thank you sir" She thanked as she passed back the tickets to me.
"Do you know how long it is until we arrive?" I asked.
"About ninety minutes" She replied.
"Thanks" I thanked.
The conductor walked away from us. I then heard the sound of Lucky yawning as he woke up and stretched,
"Oh hey man" He said.
"Hey Luck" I replied.
"How long do we have left?" Lucky asked.
"Ninety minutes" I told him.
"Ah" He uttered, "Right"
"You can go back to sleep if you want" I told him.
"Nah, Caramel. I need to stay up" He replied.
"So you said you knew a guy who was willing to lend us an apartment?" I asked him.
"Yeah, at least the place'll be better than Manehattan" He nudged me jokingly.
"Huh, you as hell got that right" I chuckled slightly as I turned back to face out the window.
"Look man, I know Manehattan was a shit place, but we need to put that place behind us. The Lunar Runners, your parents in your case and the orphanage in my case, everything, okay?" Lucky made clear.
"Sure thing, Lucky" I replied.
"Hey, to cheer you up, I'll find us a bar and we'll get a few drinks" He said, "How about that?"
"Yeah, thanks man" I smirked.
By the time we made it to Ponyville it was around the early afternoon, I'd say about two o'clock. Me and Lucky exited the train and we saw the place, it didn't look too bad to be honest. A few small cottages, small apartment complexes and a large tree with a sign in front of it which I can just barely read, it reads "Library". Lucky took a few steps in front of me, then faced me and said,
"See, seems like a peaceful place, don't it?" He asked.
"Sure beats the griminess of Manehattan" I replied to him, "Where about is the guy you said you'd meet? Are we not meeting him at the station?"
"No" Lucky said.
"Then where are we meeting the guy?" I asked him.
"At the..." Lucky said regularly before it seemed like he realized something, "...at the place itself" He finished as he facehoofed himself.
"When we don't where the place is?" I made sure.
He nodded with embarrassment,
"Sorry, 'Mel, that was my fault" Lucky apologized.
"No biggie, man. We'll find the place, the town's not that big anyways" I reply.
We then begin to walk on the dirt pavements, it feels weird stepping on dirt, back in Manehattan, it was mostly a concrete jungle, so stepping on dirt feels much more comfortable than walking on stone sidewalks, there was of course a few parks in Manehattan with grassy grounds, but I never went to the parks much,
"So, what's the name of the place?" I asked as both me and Lucky walked on.
"It's called Utopia Apartments, there's only five of them" Lucky told me.
"I see" I said.
"The guy's name is Red Lazarus, apparently he's quite a character" Lucky told me.
"Have you actually met the guy?" I asked.
"No, Rico told me about him" He replied.
"Lunar Runner Rico?" I questioned.
"Yeah, he was cellmates with him in prison" Lucky explained, "Said he owe him a favor so..."
"HII!!!" A squeaky voice interrupted my friend.
We both stopped in our tracks as we a pink creature bounce in front of us, though I was relieved to see it wasn't a creature at all, but a pink Earth Pony,
"Em...hi" Lucky calmly greeted.
"Areyounewintown!?" The little pink pony asked very quickly.
"Pardon me?" I questioned.
"Are you two new to Ponyville?" She asked slower, but it was still pretty fast.
"Yeah we are actually...." Lucky began.
"GGGREAT!" She bounced, "It's always nice to meet new ponies. I'm Pinkamena Diane Pie, but most ponies call me....PINKIE PIE!" She told us her name whilst she bounced in the air again.
I like her, she's really nice. She's a thousand times nicer than most people you'd meet in most of my part of Manehattan. She's a little strange though and really needs to cut down on caffeine and sugar,
"Nice to meet you, Pinkie, I'm Caramel and this is my buddy Lucky" I introduced myself to her.
"Nice to meet you" Lucky nodded.
"Since you're new, do you want me to show you around town?" Pinkie asked generously.
"Actually, Pinkie. Me and Caramel are wondering where this apartment complex is. It's called Utopia Apartments. Do you know where that is?" Lucky asked her.
"Oh yeah, I know where it is. My friend Rarity lives beside there. I can you show you where it is if you want" Pinkie optioned.
"Thanks Pinkie, that's really nice of you" Lucky thanked.
"I'm hear to help" Pinkie smiled with glee, "Follow me"
Pinkie turned around and bounced ahead of us, leading us to where Utopia Apartments is. Lucky turned to face me with a slight smirk on his face which to me said,
"She seems nice"
Oh Lucky, you cheeky bastard. I think to myself as I jokingly shake my head.
We finally made to Utopia Apartments, next to a little place called Carousel Boutique, which is where Pinkie said her friend Rarity lives. The apartment complex looks a little crumby, but seeing as I used to live in an even more crumby apartment, I guess anything will do at this point. I mean, who am I to complain?
"Here you go. Utopia Apartments" Pinkie said.
"Thanks Pinkie" Lucky thanked her.
"You're very welcome, I'll probably see you two around town" Pinkie smiled, "Bye!" She said before bouncing away from us.
Lucky turned to face me with a sly smirk on his face after Pinkie was out of our sights,
"She seems nice, eh man?" Lucky asked.
"Don't even try man, she's like two years younger than you" I replied.
"So?" He questioned.
"It's not necessarily legal, you're nineteen, she's seventeen at the most" I told him.
"And how do you know?" Lucky asked with a hint of smugness in his voice, "Hmmm?"
"I don't. I just making an assumption, besides I thought you didn't like dates?" I replied and asked back.
"Well no, but she seems cute" Lucky told me.
"Forget it, man. Let's just see to our apartment" I spoke back.
We were in the main lobby of Utopia Apartments, it looked a little better on the inside than it did on the outside, but it was still a little bad. There was a stench of sweet mildew in the lobby, the wall looked like it was rotting, and I'm pretty sure the floor has insects scurrying underneath the floor boards.
Me and Lucky both approach the counter where we saw a red Unicorn pony sleeping on a chair, I must assume this is Red Lazarus. He looked like an older fella, in his fifties I think, he was kind of a plump guy as well. Lucky saw a bell to ring on someone, he rang the bell, waking up the Unicorn,
"Eh...eh" The Unicorn grumbled as he woke up.
"Hey man, me and my friend here are friends of Rico's..." Lucky began.
"Rico?" He murmured before realizing, "Oh, you must be that Lucky guy and Caramel. Yeah, Rico told me about you boys. So he told me you're wanting a room?" Red asked.
"Yeah, he told me you can give us one" Lucky replied.
"Well, you can, I'll be knocking at your door for rent. Rent's cheap anyways, because you're not really expecting a five-star hotel are you, so you guys should be fine"
"Well um....thanks man" Lucky thanked.
"If you ever write back to Rico tell him I didn't poison his food in prison please" Red told Lucky.
"I'll..." Lucky paused to ponder what happened in prison, "I'll be sure of that"
Red Lazarus then pulled open a drawer in front of him and chucked over a pair of keys to Lucky,
"You're in the best room" Red told us.
"Room No. 3" Lucky said, "This is it"
Lucky unlocked the door and then we both stepped inside the apartment. It looked awful, I looked around to see a couch with springs popping through it, no chance I'll be sitting on that, I then saw a few deck chairs beside it, they looked much more comfortable, there was also a frame on the rotting wall which read "Bless this Mess". I went into the kitchen and looked in there, I saw a greasy looking fridge, an oily looking cooker and oven and a single cupboard left out on it's own, I checked inside it to see nothing inside it except from a tipped over and open can of dog food which smelt of shit. I exited the kitchen and then went into the bedroom, where there was only two separate filthy mattresses with two dirty pillows on each mattress.
I then exited the bedroom and met with Lucky in the living room,
"Well, it's better than Manehattan" Lucky said.
"It's still awful, have you seen the bedroom?" I asked intensely.
"No, what's it like?" He asked, worried for what to hear.
"There isn't even a bed for us, just mattresses and pillows" I told him.
"Look, Caramel, buddy, we're probably not even going to stay here during the day, mostly we'll be here to sleep, eat and shower"
"Aw fuck, the bathroom" I sighed, "I'm scared to evening to go in there"
"We'll save it till morning" Lucky said.
"Want to go and get a drink or something?" I asked.
"Yeah sure man" Lucky replied.
We both then made it towards the door to exit this absolutely disgusting apartment,
"So, you got a general synopsis for this room?" Lucky asked.
"It's some fucking Utopia, that's for sure" I joked.
Lucky and I began to laugh. And then we exited the apartment to head to the nearest bar. Huh, despite the shitty apartment I don't think staying in Ponyville will be that bad. But hey, we'll just have to wait and see...