It was raining when Wayfarer awoke. He could hear the patter of raindrops against the window and the slight rustle of the tree's leaves even before he opened his eyes to see the dark grey morning outside. It wasn't exactly pouring, but he quickly decided he would need a coat or jacket of some sort before he left for the schoolhouse. Sighing, Wayfarer sat up from the couch and started reaching for his button up and overshirt, only to find that both were missing. He heard the shifting of hooves behind him and looked over the side of the couch to see Rainbow Dash wearing his clothes.

"Not gonna lie, these are pretty snazzy." She said with a smirk. "Sort of like those suits the con artist ponies wear in those stage shows. You aren't a con pony are you Wayfarer?"

"No." Wayfarer said, getting up and walking over to Dash. "But I do like to keep myself looking nice and presentable, so I'd like those back please."

Dash smiled and quickly got the outfit off. "You sound a lot like Rarity. Do you really care that much about how you look?"

Wayfarer took both articles of clothing, then took a moment to straighten the button-up's collar after Rainbow Dash had popped it for some reason. "To be truthful, not really. It's just a carry over from living life in the big city. Everyone in Baltimare likes looking prim and proper, It tells people you're capable of taking care of yourself on a regular basis."

Rainbow Dash shrugged. "Meh. Honestly I'd rather look cool than presentable."

"Duly noted." Wayfarer deadpanned as he slipped his forelegs into the button up. "So how are you feeling Rainbow Dash? Are you done sleeping like an Ursa in winter?"

"Oh yeah, definitely!" She responded while rolling her head and neck backwards and stretching out her legs like a cat. Wayfarer counted at least five joints cracking before she stood up straight again. "Been out of the air for way too long, time to put these babies back to work!" She flapped her wings a few times, causing a slight breeze to blow Wayfarers hair around.

"Sounds like a good idea to me." Came Twilight's voice as she descended the stairs, Spike right at her heals. "Especially seeing as you still have yet to really show me how to use mine."

"Morning Twilight. Morning Spike." Dash said. "And yeah, we've been putting off your Flying 101 classes for long enough!" She then leapt into the air, did a flip, and started hovering in place with a proud look about herself. "Dash is back, feeling better than ever, and ready to get a Princess flying straight by the end of the month!"

Twilight smiled sheepishly at that. "Actually, Rainbow," she said hesitantly, shifting her front hooves around. "I'm going to need to be able to fly by the end of this week."

Dash dropped a bit in altitude at that, but she still smiled none the less. "Not a problem." She said nodding to herself with conviction. "We'll just have to get started right away!" Then she looked out the window and remembered that it was raining. "Oh horseapples." She groaned as both she and her smile dropped to the floor.

Twilight laughed nervously. "Ehh, maybe we should discuss my lesson plan over breakfast? You must be starving, Rainbow Dash! You barely ate anything in the last few days."

Rainbow's stomach chose that moment to give a large gurgle in the affirmative. She prodded her belly gently to try and get it to stop, but the protesting moans would not be denied. She smiled sheepishly and ran a hoof through the back of her mane. "Yeah, a little breakfast would be nice right about now."

The four of them moved to the kitchen, where the library's other guest resident was already present. The sight that beheld them when they walked in was enough to make all of them stop and stare with wide eyes and gaping mouths. Celestia, in her towering alicorn form, was at the stove, cooking up a storm. Her magic holding onto two frying pans, one with eggs and one working on pancakes. Both had a spatula accompanying them as they stirred and flipped the contents of the pans. She was wearing a pink turtleneck that looked two sizes too big, even on her, and her usually flowing mane was tied up in a loose plait that hung at her side. To her left, ten empty glasses had flown out of the cupboard in her gold magic aura and were lined up in front of two cartons, one of milk and one of orange juice. The cartons alternated pouring themselves as they traveled down the line of glasses, until an equal number of them were filled with either liquid. The glasses were then joined by five sets of tableware as the entire assortment was carefully arranged on the dining table. The milk and juice cartons were placed at the center, followed by plates of pancakes and eggs.

Celestia turned around, turning off the stove, and gave the assembled ponies and dragon the biggest, most welcoming smile Wayfarer had ever seen on her. "Good morning, my little ponies! And good to see you up and about at last miss Rainbow Dash!" She walked over to the table and shoveled the eggs and last couple of pancakes on top their respective plates, and then placed the pans back on the stove to cool down. Finally she went to the icebox and fished out the syrup, butter, and a few assorted fruits. When she turned back around and saw that Twilight and the others were still standing there with their looks of surprise, she giggled. "Well come on! Breakfast isn't going to eat itself, no matter how long you stand there with your jaws open!"

'Surreal' was just about the only word Wayfarer could come up with for this situation. Celestia, The High Princess of Equestria and the most powerful being in the world, was in the kitchen making breakfast. She was acting like a mother would for her foals, as if it were just another regular occurrence. Deciding it would be better to just roll with it, he did his best to shake the surprised look off his face and took his seat at the table. Dash, Twilight, and Spike following after.

"Chalk this up on the list of things I would never have imagined happening to me." Dash whispered to Wayfarer when she sat down.

"Celestia, are you alright?" Twilight asked.

Celestia smirked and then sat down herself. "Yes, Twilight, I am perfectly fine. I just felt that after having you and Spike prepare all the meals around here, I wanted to take my turn at it." She helped herself to a few pancakes, a scoop of eggs, and a banana, all while smiling like a little filly who got away with stealing cookies from the cookie jar. "And it was the perfect excuse to stick it to my head maids and show them that I am perfectly capable of making my own meals."

"So this is an act of rebellion?" Wayfarer said with bemusement.

"Exactly." Celestia said, then took a swig of her orange juice before continuing. "Do you know how long it's been since I made breakfast for myself? Five years. Last time I tried, it was when I felt like getting a head start on a rather busy day. The head maids threatened to fire the kitchen staff for not being there when I needed them. Like I'd drag my poor cooks out of bed at four in the morning like that."

Wayfarer and Spike both picked up their orange juice and raised them in the direction of Celestia. "Fight the power." They said in unison.

That seemed to break the tension in the other two, and they all laughed together before digging into their morning meal. It was all delicious of course, and despite having work, Wayfarer took several helpings of Celestia's cooking. When he was finally done, he looked up at Celestia to see her smiling at him. Something in the back of his head tingled at that, like a memory trying to break its way through. But it passed as quickly as it came, so with a mental shrug Wayfarer stood and said his farewells before heading out the front door for work, only before remembering rather abruptly that it was still raining. Rainbow Dash quickly followed him however, with a rain poncho in tow.

"Oh, right." Wayfarer laughed as he took the tarp and swished it around himself like a cloak. "Thanks."

"Yeah, no prob." Dash said, scratching at the back of her head. "Listen, you think we could talk later? I-I mean when you find some spare time?"

"Me?"

"Well, and Twilight, Celestia and Pinkie too."

"Ah... Yeah okay, we'll find time to talk."

Rainbow nodded and smiled thankfully before heading back inside.

Wayfarer was at a loss of what to do after the students had arrived that morning. He'd cleaned and helped Cheerilee prepare the place as usual, but with the rain he would pretty much be stuck in either the classroom or the cellar. Cheerilee, rather than send him off for the day, decided to see just how good he was with children. She'd noticed him helping her students during recess with whatever math or science problem they had, and had been curious to see if they could capitalize on that within the class itself. To that end she declared what she called an 'Independent Study' day, which involved her pulling a large mobile bookshelf out of storage and letting the children have at whatever books they could grab. Wayfarer was then pulled in several different direction by fillies and colts asking him questions about this or that. He got stuck for an especially long time with the Cutiemark Crusaders, who had found a book on pioneering. By the time lunch had rolled around, he'd taught the three how to tie at least a dozen different knots and lashings.

"We could build an entire fortress with this stuff!" Scootaloo said excitedly as she and her friends pulled out their lunch boxes.

"Can you imagine how cool the clubhouse is gonna be with a lookout tower?" Apple Bloom replied with an equal amount of cheerfulness.

"We'll make it so tall we'll be able to see all of Sweet Apple Acres!" Sweetie Belle cried out.

Wayfarer smirked at the three. Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo, would probably get tied up in the rope if the tangled mess of string and linking logs they were using was any indication. Apple Bloom on the other hoof actually had a knack for it and had managed a successful tripod and A-frame. Wayfarer chalked that up to being from a farming family, she probably knew half this stuff before hoof.

"What else is in that book, Wayfarer?" Apple Bloom asked.

"Let's see here..." Wayfarer mumbled as he hoofed through the pages.

"Miss Cheerilee!" came a call from the other side of the room. "Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootaloo have been hogging Mr. Wayfarer to themselves!"

Wayfarer looked up and turned his head toward the direction of the call, seeing two little fillies waving over at him. He looked back at the Cutiemark Crusaders to see them with the most uncharacteristically angry faces he'd ever seen on them. Cheerilee must have noticed this as well because she walked over to them with a stern look.

"Now girls," She started. "Diamond Tiara's right. Mr. Wayfarer has got you on a good start it seems, let him go help out the other students."

"Yes Miss Cheerilee," the three girls said sadly as Wayfarer got up from their table.

Wayfarer hadn't had much experience with the two fillies who were now waving him over to them. He'd heard more than a few venom laced remarks shot at them from some of the other students, but so far he'd not had any trouble with them. When he sat down with them however...

"Bet you're glad to get away from the blank flanks for a bit, huh Mr. Wayfarer?" Said the one Cheerilee had identified as Diamond Tiara.

Instantly, Wayfarer felt a strong compulsion to get right back up and get as far away from these two as possible. They both radiated an improbable aura of bellicose, to the point where Wayfarer was convinced that these two could not possibly be real fillies. Normal foals could not make a pony dislike them this fast - with just one sentence - it just didn't happen. Taking a deep breath and swallowing the sudden buildup of bile in his throat, Wayfarer put on his best fake smile for the two.

"Do you two need help?" he asked politely.

"Yeah, umm, like," The other filly, Silver Spoon, started. "There's this word here we don't understand? And like, we needed you to translate it, or something?"

Nails dragged themselves down a chalkboard in Wayfarer's mind. He looked down at the book the two had, it was a History of the Manehattan Theatre. "Alright, what word is it?"

"Bohemian." Diamond Tiara said, turning the book to show Wayfarer the page. "The book says that the Manehatten Theatre has had several acting troupes use their stage. The biggest and most successful one is called 'The Tarot Actors,’ and the book says that they started out as a group of traveling Bohemians. So what's a Bohemian?"

Wayfarer took the book and read the page they were on for himself. It was an entire section on a troupe called The Tarot Actors, and how they came to call Manehattan their home. There was even a picture of the group when it was first founded ten years prior. All of the ponies, and a few scattered gryphons, were assembled in front of a large wagon. They all wore varied and eccentric clothing, and they all had a red bandanna tied around their left forearm. Wayfarer could barely make out the word T.A.R.O.T. on the bandanna.

"Bohemians." Wayfarer started. "They are people who don't have a permanent home. They travel around in wagons like the one in the picture. Some of them are merchants, and others are performers. These Tarot Actors probably got tired of wandering and decided to put down roots in Manehatten."

Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon looked at him with confusion before Silver spoke up. "So they're homeless ponies?"

"More like the whole world is their home," Wayfarer said, trying to make it sound more grand than these two probably thought it was.

"Yeah, homeless ponies." Diamond Tiara sneered before she snatched back the book and slammed it shut. "This is even more boring than usual, Silver Spoon."

"Everyone else seems to be having fun." Wayfarer said, looking around at the other foals pouring over their books while eating their lunch.

"No one asked you." Diamond Tiara said scornfully before waving her hoof in a dismissive way. "Aren't there some windows you need to clean or something?"

Wayfarer took that to mean they were done with him, so he got up and slowly walked over to the supply room. He found some of the bottled water Cheerilee kept in there and downed a good half of one in a single go. He then counted backwards from ten before downing the rest. Feeling considerably less annoyed, he exited back into the classroom and continued helping the foals with their studies, and keeping as much distance as possible from the two monsters disguised as fillies.

It was still raining when classes ended, so Wayfarer, lacking anything to do on the inside, was let go at the same time as the students. He ended up walking down the road alongside the Cutiemark Crusaders, who were all wearing matching maroon ponchos with a blue and yellow symbol on the side.

"Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon are the worst!" Sweetie Belle cried out when they'd put a good distance between themselves and the school house.

"It'd be unprofessional of me to say anything in response to that." Wayfarer said, though with a tone that made it clear he had quite a few things to say.

"Huh?" Sweetie Belle said, cocking her head to the side.

"It means he can't say nothin' about it or Cheerilee'll get mad at 'im." Apple Bloom said.

"Right." Wayfarer said. "So I would appreciate it if you three would just bring your concerns about those two to Miss Cheerilee. Honestly the fact that they tossed around a phrase like 'Blank Flank' so casually is disconcerting enough as it is."

"Disco what?" Scootaloo asked.

"It means unsettling, or not right."

"But we've told Miss Cheerilee!" Sweetie Belle said. "And no matter what she does those two never quit!"

"I'll ask her about it then, okay?" Wayfarer assured them.

"Really?" The three asked.

"Of course! Why wouldn't I? I'm the janitor! Got to keep school clean and presentable for you guys right?"

The Cutiemark Crusaders giggled at that and rushed Wayfarer for a quick group hug. "Thank you Mister Wayfarer!" They all chimed together.

"Wayfarer is just fine girls, no need to call me 'mister' or anything." Wayfarer sighed. He was starting to get a little tired of that.

"Sure thing!" Apple Bloom said as they let him go. "Hey, do you think you could come over to the farm and help us with more of that pioneer'n stuff?"

Wayfarer raised an eyebrow and glanced up at the steel grey sky. "I don't think you three want to do that in the rain, do you?"

"We could do it in the barn! There's plenty of room in there!"

"Yeah there's that." Wayfarer said, smiling. The Cutiemark Crusader's excitement at learning something new was, quite frankly, infectious. It didn't take much more than looking at their bright grins before his own childlike enthusiasm kicked in and he laughed. "Alright, I've got a couple hours to spare. Lead the way!"

When Wayfarer got back to the library, soaking wet and covered in mud and hay, he found much of the front room in disarray. It was like something heavy had been flung against the walls and bookshelves. A moment later, Wayfarer flinched as said 'heavy something' came out of the corner of his vision and collided with the couch. The couch flipped over with a loud crash and a moment later, Wayfarer heard a groan that could have only belong to Twilight. Rainbow Dash was hovering over head with a despairing look in her eyes.

"Well, I guess a crash landing is still a landing." Wayfarer closed the door behind him and hung his poncho on the coat rack, then scraped as much mud off his hooves as he could on the welcome mat.

Twilight groaned again as Celestia tipped the couch back upright. Several books were in Celestia's magical grasp, obviously trying to keep up with whatever chaos Twilight was causing.

"How's she doing, Rainbow?" Wayfarer asked as he too started to pick up shattered bits of the clock he'd just got fixed and books Twilight had displaced from the shelves.

"She can get in the air now," Dash said as she brought a miserable looking Twilight back to the center of the room. "It's staying in the air that's a problem. She either isn't flapping hard enough and she just falls back to the ground, or she flaps too hard and sends herself in some random direction."

"I'd say take her up to the clouds and teach her Baby Bird style," Wayfarer said with a chuckle. "But the clouds don't look particularly friendly right now."

"That's what we would have done and will probably do tomorrow. But like you said, I'd rather do that when we don't have to deal with the rain." She sighed and then gave a very irritated grimace at no one in particular. "I swear, I'm gone a month and the Weather Team falls to pieces."

"I'm sorry, but, 'baby bird style?'" Twilight said with confusion.

Rainbow Dash's frown disappeared and she smiled excitedly at that. "We're going to take you up to the clouds when it clears up and drop you off them a few times! You'll learn how to fly like a champ in no time!"

Twilight looked like she was going to faint at the idea of being dropped from hundreds of feet in the air. "Oh... fun..." she murmured.

"Don't go Fluttershy on me Twilight!" Dash said, lightly punching her friend. "Me and Celestia will be right there with you the whole time, we won't let anything bad happen to ya!"

Twilight looked over at Celestia, who smiled and nodded reassuringly. Twilight took a deep calming breath and nodded to herself. "If that's what it takes to get me flying by the Summer Sun Celebration, then so be it."

"That's my winged egghead!" Dash cheered. "Now come on, let's see your take off again!"

Wayfarer stayed in the front room long enough to watch Twilight take a few more falls before he decided he might as well get dinner started for them. Spike was way ahead of him though, so all Wayfarer did was lend a hoof here and there until it was time for the other three to join them. All in all, it was a pretty uneventful night.

Author's Notes:

Two updates a week in a row! How many wanna take a bet how long that'll last!

I'm going to start trying to do more short chapters, mostly because I feel my problem is that I'll start writing a chapter and then I don't finish it for a long time. Shorter chapters might help with that, but we'll see.

Thanks again to Red Sage for editting and putting up with my inability to punctuate dialog correctly.