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2570 14.22 KB 152
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>Despite your hopes of having a meal with your new host alone, Bombshell did not leave when it came time to eat.
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>She did, however, foot the bill for all three of you.
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>Conversation between the taciturn mare and Anon was certainly an interesting experience.
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>As she got more booze in her, Bombshell would veer drunkenly in the vicinity of a couple topics she did not seem interested, or even able, to bring up.
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>There were troubles back there, of a kind you couldn’t discern.
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>Anon, for his part, was also avoiding certain things, but he was able to maintain an easygoing demeanor while doing so to a degree that reminded you of certain nobles, even if it felt like his life experiences led him there from a totally different direction.
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>Your empathic sense was not telepathy; you could not glean what they wished to avoid speaking about.
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>All you knew was down those paths lay a great hurt for Bombshell, and uncomfortable topics for Anon, based on what bled through their emotional states every time such topics threatened to come up.
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>What interested you more than anything was not what your emotional sense told you, but what your social experience did.
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>These moments of discomfort aligned too readily in the conversational flow.
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>Whatever these topics were, they were related to each other.
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>But the two of them did not realize how closely they may have shared some common experience underlying them.
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>Your mother’s impulses called to you, and that of your aunts.
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>There was some latent Harmony here, and you burned with a desire to see it come about.
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>Its existence is probably why these two apparent loners got along so well.
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>But you’re not here to play those games of court life and friendship.
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>You’re here to learn how these folk experienced the world, to better your understanding of your own subjects.
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>You can’t afford to start messing with their lives until you have that figured out.
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>It doesn’t help that you’re not sure how subtle you can be.
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>You’ve never actually tried it before.
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>Oh, you’ve been privy to your mom’s work. You’ve seen her do it countless times, and she’s explained her various tips and tricks for you.
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>But watching it and doing it are two very different things.
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>It will certainly be a challenge.
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>But you need to take things one step at a time.
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>Learn their lives, first.
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>That was your original mission.
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>After that, you can start tweaking them for the better.
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>As long as you don’t let it get in the way of their ordinary living.
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>But it would be a fitting test of what you’ve learned, and would help you prove to yourself that you really do have what it takes to improve the lives of common ponies.
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>The mere thought is exciting!
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>But that’s precisely why it’s dangerous.
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>One step at a time, right?
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>And your next step takes you out into the night’s air.
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>You shared meal took long enough that the sun is well below the horizon.
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>Well, you and Bombshell’s meals.
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>Anon did not eat much, despite his size and the day’s labors.
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>Curious.
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>Perhaps he has something else for himself back in the store.
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>Which you three now approached, across the main dusty street from the saloon.
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>You look up at its sign above the porch before you enter.
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>45 STARS GENERAL STORE.
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“Hey, Anon?”
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>He turns to face you before entering, leaving a mildly annoyed looking Bombshell holding the door, a post-meal toothpick lolling between her lips.
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>For all her apparent attitude, her emotions are now comfortably blunted by alcohol.
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>”Yeah?” he prompts, when you don’t immediately continue.
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“Why forty-five?”
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>He looks up at the porch’s ceiling, as if looking through the wood to the back of the sign above him, before shaking his head and turning back to walk inside. “It’s not even the right number, being honest.”
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>You follow him in, with Bombshell bringing up the rear and closing the door behind her.
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“It isn’t?”
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>”Should be forty-eight, but the flag I…”
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>While his stride did not, you could tell his thoughts stopped.
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>There’s one of those uncomfortable things he wants to avoid, lurking under his emotions.
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>”…served under had forty-five stars, and that’s how I’m choosing to remember it.”
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>Whatever the topic is, it does not itself upset him.
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>He just doesn’t want to mention it.
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>Floorboards creak under your hooves as Anon continues to the back of the store.
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>”There’s one last thing I need to show you about this place.”
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>He pulls a keyring from a pocket hanging from his broad belt, and inserts one into a door in the rear.
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>Is that really a pocket?
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>It hangs off his belt separate the rest of his clothing, so it’s more like a saddlebag analogue, even if it’s on the small side for that job.
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>But rather than a more practical shape, it looks like a flattened cone, with the wide end at the top, open.
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>There’s no flap to close it, just a strap, the end of which snaps to the outside.
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>That strap had been through the keyring’s loop until he removed it, with the keys inside the pocket itself. Almost like it’s designed for keys, but surely the strap-and-snap alone would suffice for that job, like what pegasi collars feature for just that job.
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>And the whole thing was leather, a most exotic substance for Equestrians and Imperial denizens’ wear, far more rugged than a simple key-holder would require.
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>All in all, a curious article of clothing.
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>With the door unlocked and open, Anon beckons you inside with a sweep of an arm.
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>The caustic and acrid stenches – and an underlying cloying sweetness – of the back room hit you immediately, even before you can take in its size.
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>It’s easily as large as the shop itself, and twice as tall the ceiling is elevated to the level of the second floor, where over the shop floor is the building’s living space.
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>The center of this large room is dominated by a series of large vats and tanks, connected by pipes all manner of sizes and shapes.
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>The entire contraption burbles and whistles away with some sort of pressure and steam, and seems to be where most of the offending odors issue from.
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>Along the walls, however, are a series of workbenches, with sacks of different materials underneath and alongside, flasks and vials and funnels on top.
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>Other barrels and tanks occupied the surrounding areas, though not all interconnected as the ones in the center of the room, and these appear dormant.
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>In the far corner along that wall is a big crate of cotton, but the rest of the materials you cannot readily identify.
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>The benches are stained with a dark grey powder residue, though you can tell significant effort is made to keep them clean, by the streaked patterns in the surface.
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>Above all this, built into the elevated ceiling, is a series of tubes radiating outward from an in-roof cistern at its center, the tubes running out to the walls, suspended over the entire area.
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>Alongside each are crystals, with gentle beams of light emanating from wall-mounted one towards ones mounted where each tube emerges from the cistern.
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>You’ve seen fire suppression constructs like this in certain buildings in the capital.
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>It’s a rather sophisticated system for a town so far off the beaten path like this, though.
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>And judging by the configuration of the beams and the distance they travel, it’s an exceedingly sensitive one.
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>”Ah, Monty! I thought you’d be upstairs.”
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>The slender stallion was nosing around some of the pipes on the far end, where you can see a back door to the outside.
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>There’s another door back there too, on an adjacent wall, and by your rough mental picture of the building’s layout, that doesn’t go outside, though without any windows in that door or even along that wall, you can’t be sure.
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>Monty’s head comes up – a stallion’s height allowing him to see over the room’s central piping easier than any mare shorter than yourself – and looks towards you three.
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>With Anon right in front of you, and Bombshell right behind, even the strictly limited empathic sense you’re left with after your horn’s sealing can discern good detail.
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>Anon considers Monty as a ward. Not quite his son, but something very close, something between that and a protege.
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>Bombshell definitely sees him as a younger brother, though that’s filtered through some of the baggage she was avoiding at dinner, whatever that may be.
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>The three of them make some sort of awkward pseudo-family, then, with the young stallion – or old colt, Monty looks to be right on the line – as the fulcrum.
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>You can work with that.
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>At your distance to Monty, however, you can only get the vaguest impressions.
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>He cares about Anon and Bombshell both in return, but in what ways you cannot discern.
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>”You were taking too long,” he says. “I decided to look into the problem myself.”
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>Anon walks over to him quickly, leaving you and Bombshell near the door. “Did you find it?”
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>”Yeah. It’s-” Monty spreads his wings, angling them this way and that, then pointing one at a particular valve,“-there. Loose fitting.”
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>”Ah, not a problem,” Anon says, then ducks out of sight behind one of the tanks.
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>When he comes back up he’s holding a wrench. He tightens one side of the valve’s fasteners, and one of the whistling tones drifting through the room quiets.
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>”You’re right, it did smell a little strong, huh?”
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>Monty nods, folding his long wings against his barrel again.
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>He really is quite the unique specimen.
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>Maybe you can find someone for him too.
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>No, Flurry.
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>Uh, Kissy.
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>Focus.
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>Meddling can come after you’ve settled in.
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>One step at a time.
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“So, uh, what is this place?”
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>”This,” Anon says, spreading his arms to indicate the room, “is our production floor. In front of me here is the still. That stuff there-” he lowers one arm, using the other to point at the workbenches next to you, “-is for a different useful substance out here.” He flashes a grin. “No unicorns out here, so we gotta make do for certain applications of force.”
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>Bombshell grunts in agreement behind you.
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>Anon’s grin falls away. “It’s probably best that you don’t play around back here. We have some pretty dangerous stuff we work with. So I won’t be giving you a key for the back door; even Monty only has one for coming and going and so he can check on stuff when I can’t.”
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>”Not that I can’t do the work,” Monty says, somehow sounding like a nonchalant muttering despite being clear across the distance, “just don’t want to.”
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>”Sure, colt,” Bombshell laughs. “Whatever you say.”
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>Monty squints at her, but as far as you can discern empathically, doesn’t take any offense.
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>”Now, then. Uh, here, Bombshell.”
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>Anon moves over to one of the closed-up sacks in the corner the crate of cotton occupies.
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>Bombshell moves to his side, and Anon carefully lowers the sack onto her back. “Your payment for the gems.”
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>She adjusts her wings under the sack’s weight to center its mass over her spine. “And I want my liquor.”
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>Anon chuckles. “Monty will bring it over tomorrow.”
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>”Gotta head out there to finish the weather work anyway,” the colt adds.
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>Bombshell nods. “We’re settled up, then. The colt took the thundergems upstairs already. Now if you’ll excuse us…”
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>She looks sidelong at you. “I’d like to speak with him privately.”
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>”Sure thing. Come on, Kissy.”
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>Closest to the door back to the shop floor, you reach it first, with Anon’s long strides getting him there close behind. Bombshell and Monty hang further back, stopping near the door where you and Anon leave.
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>He closes it behind him. “She likes to keep up with him. It’s a quiet enough town not much happens, but she likes to be on top of how he’s doing.”
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>You nod.
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>You’d make a comment, but you’re not sure how you’re supposed to have gotten the information you did non-magically.
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>Being around crystal ponies all your life, who are honest to their feelings to a fault, combined with how easy your empathic sense makes things, reading other ponies in mundane ways is a little harder for you.
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>Settle for something vague, then.
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“Good to hear someone does. He looks like he may be a fine stallion, with somepony looking after him.”
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>Anon laughs as the two of you head for the stairs. “Don’t let him hear you say that. He hates the idea of being a ‘fine stallion’. That’s most of why he works so hard.”
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>You follow up behind him.
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“Most?”
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>”Yeah. The rest is, well, who else is going to do what he does? At the end of the day, everyone needs to pull their weight out here like this.”
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>He pauses at the top while you finish your ascent. “So we’re going to make sure you can too. Take the rest of the night to relax; we figure out exactly how you can help tomorrow.”
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>You give him a smile and a sharp, eager nod.
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“I’ll do my best!”
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>He gives you a smile in return. “I like the attitude. Good night, Kissy.”
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“Good night, Anon. Thank you for the opportunity.”
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>You head opposite directions down the hall.
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>Your room is second from the end – the corner bedroom being Monty’s – and now clear of the excess furniture it stored, is fairly comfortable.
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>The bed’s a lot smaller than back home, of course, and the furniture isn’t as refined, but it’s very well-built and sturdy.
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>That’s quality craftsmanship of it’s own, even if not the kind you’re used to.
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>The room’s two windows look out across the street towards the saloon and postal station.
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>One’s clear, the other hosts a writing desk in front.
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>You open its top to find it well-appointed with paper, pencils, and even a capped inkwell with basic quills.
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>Quills you have no idea how to use, without magic.
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>You’re sticking to pencils for now, you guess.
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>Taking a seat, you pull out a page and a pencil.
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>Better get practicing.
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>You take the thick end of the pencil in your mouth, and try to keep it still.
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>Then, slowly, lower it to the page, and begin your painstaking efforts.
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Dearest Aunt Twilight,
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I hope I needn’t ask you to keep this correspondence from my parents.
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I apologize for the poor state of my script. I must practice doing things without magic, and I figure the best way to learn writing is to indulge in your old habit of writing letters to your friends and mentors. So, to those ends, let me practice by telling you about the many intriguing ponies I have met my first day here…
by E4-NG
by E4-NG
by E4-NG
by E4-NG
by E4-NG