Threats don’t worry me at all.

Seriously, if they did, I’d be buried in the desert outside Las Pegasus. Judging by the fact that I’m talking to you, you can figure it out.

Funny thing, Bacio della Morte, currently jailed ex-boss of Las Pegasus mafia, once tried to send an assassin to kill me. All he achieved was proving that you can’t spell “assassin” without “ass”.

After what I just said you won’t be surprised by learning that I’m currently preparing Little Cadance for her longest flight so far. Additional fuel tanks, checking the engine, cleaning the interior and straightening everything – this will take a while. The girl is also getting a bit heavy, with all the stuff Daring Do started to bring here. I wish we already had Hot Coco.

Speaking of her, Hot Coco will soon start tests. I take a look at it while standing on the wing of Little Cadance. It now has more of its shell. Vinyl is painting something on it, while Cherry Berry is checking something inside.

“Excuse me!”

“Da– I mean, Moose Kiss?” I ask, seeing a disguised pony. “I told you not to come here...”

At least she’s not wearing a dark cloak. But still, a suit, sunglasses, and a fake beard are not what I’d call a good disguise. Silver Spanner, one of our mechanics, already looks at her askew while pretending to work.

“I just wanted to see the progress,” Daring Do replies, looking at Little Cadance. “How long will the journey last?”

“You could’ve sent Lyra,” I say. “She’d look less suspicious here.” I lower my voice to a whisper. “My workers probably think you’re a bill collector. Last time one came here, they tried to drown him in the outhouse. Just saying.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” Daring Do trots to the plane and looks inside.

“By the way,” I say. “I checked how far it is from Ponyville to Maneaus. Hot Coco would reach it and refuel only once, but Little Cadance... At least six landings. And the last place we can buy fuel is in the Badlands. Later we’ll have to carry it with us. Considering the fact that Little Cadance’s maximal cargo capacity is a bit less that two tons...”

“Not much,” Daring Do mutters. “Me, Lyra, crew of three...”

“That’s why I wanted to wait for Hot Coco,” I say. “It’s bigger, faster, more comfortable, and can land on water.”

“If you could make it faster...” Daring Do mutters. “I see that it’s almost ready.”

“Ready, but not tested,” I say, pointing at Cherry Berry who just emerged from the plane’s guts. “Would you trust her with your life?”

“Okay, I get it,” Daring Do mutters, watching Cherry knocking at each propeller tip three times with her left hoof and two times with the right one. “But we really need to hurry. You said they already talked to you...”

“Don’t worry,” I say. “If we can’t fly to Maneaus, they probably can’t either. They’re either going there by ship or they took a train to the Badlands and are going to go through the desert and the jungle by hoof. Which would be insane.”

“Or they’re already there.” Daring sighs. “It runs on kerosene, right? They have kerosene in the villages on the way, you know.”

“Well...” I mutter. Of course, we can go stealing kerosene from ponies’ lamps. If we get through the desert, we’ll have a lot of settlements on our way. The only problem is finding a place to land and that’s basically why Hot Coco will be a flying boat.

“I’ll cover all the expenses.”

“That thing you’re after is really precious, isn’t it?” I ask. “Or dangerous.”

“Both, actually.” Daring Do looks around. I don’t know why she worries. Nopony except of her wears an idiotic disguise, so we’re safe.

“Just great...” I mutter. I’m not afraid of old, dangerous artifacts. I just wish she told me what it is. I’m not gonna tell my grandkids that I teamed up with Daring Do only to find a golden toilet plunger.

“I have to go,” Daring Do says. “I’ll send Lyra here later.”

“Sure, whatever,” I say, thinking about the additional fuel tanks and planning our route. If we do manage to find fuel... I need to get some new map and check it for towns.

“Minuette!” Vinyl exclaims, turning away from something that looks like the bigger, colourful version of the sketch of Coco she showed us on my birthday. “I need to ask you something...”

“No,” I say, glaring at her angrily.

“Can I go with you?” Vinyl makes puppy eyes. “Please?”

“I said no.” I walk out of Vinyl’s zone of cuteness proximity. It doesn’t really work since Vinyl kinda stopped being cute after hitting puberty, but I still rather not be there when she tries.

“And who will save your ass?” Vinyl asks. “I know, Daring Do is with you and all... But listen...” She leans closer to me. “There’s a lot of weird shit outside Equestria.” She waves her hoof around. “And who knows more about weird shit than me?”

“Leave your CV in my office,” I reply, furrowing my eyebrows. “We’ll call you back.”

“Okay!” Vinyl walks away. Or rather jumps like Pinkie Pie when she is excited. Some ponies never change, really.

Speaking of ponies, it seems that I’ll have another problem. From the shadows in the corner of the hangar emerges a little filly, who is generally one-third of hatred, one-third of contempt, and one-third of manipulativeness.

You know, sometimes I think that Berry Punch had a short, yet quite intense relationship with a chihuahua.

“Hello,” Ruby says, staring at me with indifferent expression. “I’m looking for Dinky.”

“I haven’t seen her here,” I reply. “And we didn’t have any serious accidents, so she’s probably not here.”

Ruby shrugs. “That’s not proof.”

“How about Sparkler?” I ask. “She should be taking care of you, shouldn’t she?”

“She’s looking for me and Dinky. Or rather, she’s currently looking for her ass.” Ruby sighs.

“Don’t use such words. Your mom is always mad at me when she hears it.”

Really. When Berry heard Ruby calling some colt “motherfucking cuntnugget”, she went to me, asking why did I spoil her daughter. I replied quoting some of her best drunken rants. She didn’t want to talk to me for a week.

“Anyway, I have a business,” Ruby mutters.

“If you want to go with us, ask your mother,” I reply dryly.

Ruby looks me directly in the eyes. It’s kinda uncanny – on one hand, she’s a cute little filly, but when you stare long enough, you can see the abyss, and hear the screaming ponies nailed to the trees as demons were burning them with hot iron. “That was low,” Ruby says and walks away. I’ll sleep with one eye open tonight.

I walk out of the hangar and watch as one of our helicopters lands gently on the airstrip. It’s easy to guess who was piloting it – most of our pilots drop heavily on the ground without any style or a single thought about the costs of repairs. Inkie is different – when she pilots a helicopter, it barely touches the grass upon landing.

“Hi, Inkie,” I say, trotting to her. “How was Fillydelphia?”

“Good,” Inkie replies, stretching her hind legs. Few hours of pedalling is always tiring, though I guess no more than few hours of flapping wings for a pegasus. “They paid.”

“Without any, umm... suggestions?” I ask. Good client is hard to find. You wouldn’t believe how hard.

“Nope. They took the package and gave me money.” Inkie gives me bits and we walk down the airstrip while Silver Spanner and Hexie pull the helicopter to the hangar. On the other side, another helicopter starts – Apple Dumpling goes to Hollow Shades with a few crates of apples.

“Let’s get that to the safe,” I say, levitating the bits and heading to the office. Inkie follows me there, talking about Fillydelphia. Apparently the guy we sent a dozen of chairs is a good client.

Berry Punch, luckily sober, is sitting at the reception desk, talking to another of our mechanics, Mjölna, a coffee-coloured mare who happens to be our electrician. Dinky and Ruby are sitting in the corner, playing draughts. They use two different kinds of screws as pieces. I hope they don’t end up sticking them in each other’s eyes.

“Hello, Berry,” I say, walking to the safe. You know, I once accidentally cracked it open, forgetting that I know the code. “How’s work?”

“Mjölna says that we may have a power outage soon,” Berry replies. “Also, Bitta Blues didn’t want to fly Number Thirteen.”

“Tell Bitta that if she wants to work here, she must get herself together. Helicopter Thirteen isn’t cursed in any way. Not at all.” I sigh. What the hell is wrong with those ponies? This helicopter is perfectly okay. There are legends that it attracts lightnings or that it got rammed by pegasi a few times, but they’re not true.

Okay, the only bad thing that happened to it was when three fillies stole it, trying to get flying cutie marks. After a while, they crashed into Berry’s house, making a big hole in the roof. The helicopter was only slightly battered and one of the fillies soiled her seat. I won’t tell you which one, but I can tell you that her sister made us a new, fabulous upholstery. The other filly repaired Berry’s roof later, so nothing really bad happened.

“Also, what’s going on with that power outage?” I ask Mjölna.

“The wiring is old,” Mjölna replies. “The lights in the hangar use a lot of energy and may overload the whole network, causing fuses to fail. Also, I discovered that someone connected an additional wire to our network. I don’t know where it leads.”

“I think I know,” I reply. “Berry, if you meet Vinyl, tell her that I’ll rip her a new one. Mjölna, change all the stuff that needs changing. Now.”

“Management by perkele again?” Mjölna asks. “There may be a blackout.”

“The shorter the better,” I say. “We need to get the planes ready.”

Damn Mjölna and her insane work schedule. Or rather damn me and my insane work schedule. Mjölna quite logically deduced that the best time to turn everything off is night, when it’s dark anyway. The problem is, I was sitting in the hangar for quite a long time, trying to figure out how to repair the jammed aileron. Even Hexie went to sleep in her hammock and she usually stays awake till, like, 3 AM, making plans of taking over the world or something.

Anyway, I find myself in complete darkness. The lights in the hangar are off, the lamps outside too. I light my horn, but even then I can barely see the way to the door. Damn. I consider teleporting to my house, but it’s outside my range and teleporting more than once at a time usually makes me dizzy. Hell, I even defeated a griffon that way once.

I sigh and walk to the door. Only after walking out into the cold night, I realise how tired I am. I’ll just go to the Vinyl’s bar and teleport from there. It’s exactly eight hundred metres – as the crow flies – from my house, which is the upper limit of my teleportation. Well, I can technically teleport for over a mile, but bleeding from all the orifices isn’t fun, thank you. Definitely not worth getting home a few minutes earlier.

I walk down the path, whistling some old tune I learned in the army and jumping from time to time to keep warm. I really hope nopony sees me. Well, Inkie wouldn’t mind – she lives in Sugarcube Corner with her sister and nothing can weird her out. It is lonely away, from the fillies and all... In the Badlands at night when the changelings call... It’s sad in Frozen North, when you shit ice cubes... Away from your girl who has large cro–

I pause, hearing some noise on my right. I look there, but of course I can’t see shit. “Mjölna?” I ask. The noise starts again – I can even hear something that sounds like a curse cut short. “Who are you? Identify yourself, or they’ll find your balls in Maretonia! And then the guards will arrest your sorry ass for trespassing!”

The silence gets really suspicious. It’s not the “nopony’s there” kind of silence, but rather “somepony’s there waiting for you to walk away” kind. Time for a clever trick.

“But there’s nothing in Equestria half as lonely and drear...” I sing.

“As to stand in the bar of a pub without beer!” the voice finishes. Well, it’s not Vinyl or Cherry Berry. But they’re on a similar intellectual level. I aim my horn in the darkness and conjure a flash of bright light.

“Aargh! My eyes!” I hear as I dart forward. In the afterglow, I can see two silhouettes, cowering on the grass.

Well, victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors first go to war and then seek to win. Those guys didn’t even go to war yet, while I’m ready for my favourite part: intimidation.

“I will make your entrails extrails!” I exclaim. “I will fong you till your insides are out and your outsides are in!”

The first of the guys levitates something that looks like a can of petrol. I dodge it, ramming into his companions and tripping over him. The can-wielding jackass throws it at me. Ouch! My head! I stand up and charge at him. “I’m gonna rip your hippocampus from your head, motherfucker!” I yell.

Of course, I miss. After getting a can of petrol to the face, my aim is a bit off. Meanwhile, the guys realise that there’s two of them, while I’m alone. The element of surprise went to fuck itself, I’m afraid.

I roll on the grass, kicking one of them in the ribs when he runs past me. Time for another trick. After all, every war is based on deception.

“Girls!” I exclaim. “The third square! Fire at them!”

“Get down!” one of the attackers shouts.

“She’s lying,” the one who earlier complained about his eyes says. “There’s nopony here but us... Aargh!” His voice drowns in the gunshot. He collapses, yelling swears and something about salt in his ass.

I can hear the sound of reloading the shotgun. The other guy runs away into darkness upon hearing that.

“Minuette?” The voice definitely belongs to Vinyl. “Is that you?”

“Yeah, it’s me,” I reply. “Watch out, there may be more of them here...”

“What’s going on?” Vinyl emerges from the darkness, levitating a shotgun. She looks at me and the guy who clutches to his butt, muttering some nasty things about Vinyl’s mother.

“Mr. Sore Arse and his mate were trying to burn down the hangar, I think,” I reply. “I’d totally beat the crap out of them.”

“You were calling for help,” Vinyl said. “I heard you in the pub.”

“It was a trick.”

“Yeah, right,” Vinyl mutters. “I saved your ass again. Now you have to take me with you.” She looks at the guy and shrugs. “I think we need to take this guy to Redheart. Or to the guards, if you wish.”

“If I were you, I wouldn’t leave the pub,” I say. “They may try again...”

“They’re not after my pub,” Vinyl replies. “Also, our best client is there, disguised as a potted plant. Don’t you think she’s a bit paranoid?”

“Maybe...” I mutter. “Though after meeting those two, I’m not sure.”

“Right...” Vinyl aims her shotgun at our guest. “Okay, dude. Come with us or I’ll shoot you where it’ll hurt much more.”

The guy gets up and winces. “You’ll pay for that...” he mutters, rubbing his arse.

“Okay,” I say. “Tell us who to send a check to.”

“Ahu– I mean, I won’t tell you,” he replies. “I want to go to the guards. I’ll feel safer.” He gives Vinyl a nervous look. I’m actually not surprised.

I hear somepony coming to us. Vinyl raises her shotgun while I try to blind the newcomer with the light of my horn.

“It’s me, Mjölna!” The pony stops in front of us. “What’s going on? Some guy just ran past me and got tangled into old wires.”

“Is he alive?” I ask.

“Don’t worry, they aren’t connected now,” Mjölna replies. “He mentioned something about psychos shooting at him, so I figured out that he must’ve pissed off Vinyl or you, boss, so smacked him with a wrench.”

“Why did you hire her?” our prisoner asks, looking at Mjölna and raising his eyebrows.

“She’s good at deduction,” I reply. “And she thinks outside the box. We’re currently hiring, but I’m afraid you wouldn’t fit the image of the company.”

The guy sighs and slowly goes with us towards the guards station. Of course, its door is closed and the windows are dark. Guards in Ponyville think that criminals sleep at night and work from Monday to Friday, from 8 AM to 3 PM. Interestingly, they’re mostly right.

Vinyl knocks on the door. “Is there anypony there?” she asks. “I know you are! You arrested me so many times that I can’t count them!”

“Eight,” I mutter. “They arrested you eight times, usually for getting drunk and singing songs about your cunt in the middle of the night.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Vinyl replies and knocks on the door again. “Guys? We have a prisoner for you!”

The doors opens immediately. A young guard walks to us and gives us a weird look. I’m not surprised. I already got a reputation when I teamed up with Cherry Berry and we started to scare pegasi with our flying blenders. It’d never catch on, they said. Yeah, but it can carry more stuff than a pegasus, while flying just as fast.

Vinyl, of course, is known among the guards. Mjölna isn’t, but the fact that she’s with us, watching the guy who looks like he has a lot of salt in his ass automatically makes her a suspect.

“What did he do?” the guard asks.

“Trespassing,” I reply. “Also, an assault, though he wasn’t very good with that.”

“Why is he walking so funny?” the guard asks. He doesn’t even bother to invite us inside. Maybe for fear that we’d blow the station up or something.

“Long story,” Vinyl replies.

“Do you have a licence for your ‘long story’?” the guard points at the shotgun Vinyl is levitating next to her rather carelessly.

“Of course,” Vinyl says. “I passed all the psychological tests and whatnot.”

Yeah, sure. By banging the psychologist, I guess.

“Also, it’s not even mine.” Vinyl tries unsuccessfully to hide the shotgun behind her back. “It belongs to my ex.”

I hope she doesn’t mention that her ex is currently a guest of Las Pegasus Correctional Facility, where he learns about the joys of rock farming and plots a bloody revenge on us.

“Okay, nevermind,” the guards says. “We’ll take this guy.” He yawns. “Could you come tomorrow to tell us exactly what he did?”

“Sure,” I reply. “I think he had a friend. If we catch him, we’ll bring him to you too. And bring him some doctor to get salt out of his ass, okay?”

“Yes, ma’am,” the guard replies.

You may say that the guards in this town are kinda insane, but there’s logic behind that: Ponyville is a small town and, apart from occasional visits of spirits of chaos, pony-molesting vines, and gigantic centaurs, nothing interesting happens here. The guards have to do something, or else their bosses from Canterlot will be very pissed. To bump up the statistics, they catch fillies for jaywalking, drunkards for drinking in public, Vinyl for basically anything... Sometimes they have give parking tickets to each other. Ponies in Ponyville generally like their guards, so they sometimes volunteer to spend a night in a comfortable cell and play poker with them just to support them. An actual criminal rarely appears in town, so they waste no occasion.

“So, what are we gonna do now?” Vinyl asks when we walk back to our homes.

“Sleep,” I reply. “Tomorrow, we’ve got some planning to do...”

One of the things about Vinyl’s pub I like is that she thought of a small room which, when you look at the blueprints, seemingly has no purpose. It’s in the basement, surrounded by thick walls, with a single, oaken door. The door has a few strong locks and can be hidden behind a shelf with wine bottles if needed.

You probably think that it’s a perfect place to talk business. And by business I don’t mean selling apples to a carrot vendor or selling carrots to horny fillies, but, well, business.

We’re sitting around a heavy, old table: me, Inkie, Vinyl, Lyra, Hexie, and Daring Do, who is still disguised as a potted plant. Nopony at the table is bothered by that; we’ve seen stranger things.

“So, I ordered twenty crates of Buck to the Moon whiskey,” Vinyl says. “Once they’re here, we’ll be ready to go.”

“Whiskey? Why?” Lyra asks.

“It’s a perfect cover,” I reply. “From what I know, Maneaus is a town in the middle of the jungle, inhabited mostly by natural rubber producers and ponies who work for them. Transports of luxurious goods rarely can get there, so twenty crates of whiskey is a perfect cover.”

“Exactly.” Vinyl nods. “Also, I’m buying them for forty bits per bottle. In Maneaus I’ll sell them for a hundred. Even if we find shit, we’re gonna be rich.”

“Disguised as a transport of whiskey,” Daring Do mutters, writing something in her notebook. “Perfect plot device, though I don’t know if my editor agrees for that. Kids read those books...”

“Kids would be okay with that,” I reply. “Have you ever met Ruby Pinch?”

“My publisher has a different opinion on that.” Daring Do shrugs. “Anyway, how’s the plane?”

Hexie clears her throat. “It’s almost ready. Still, even with additional fuel tanks, we’ll have to land six times to get fuel.”

“Six times?” Vinyl asks, smirking. “I wonder if I can get laid in all those places...”

“Vinyl...”

“What?” Vinyl shrugs. “I’m still pretty and young and I have some needs, not like some spinsters here...”

Interestingly, Daring Do gives her a nasty glare before I manage to do the same. Well, it shouldn’t be surprising – if I first read her books when I was ten, she must be well in her forties, I think. Hard to say, since she looks not much older than me and I guess she’d be able to break Vinyl’s leg easily, if she wanted to.

“So, we can go to Maneaus in a few days, right?” Lyra asks, seeing that her boss also thinks about doing nasty things to Vinyl’s limbs.

“Once you put your junk in Little Cadance,” I reply. “We need to stuff her with whisky, hide your luggage under the crates and we can go. Officially, Vinyl goes as a liquor vendor. Nopony knows that you’re with us.”

“Exactly,” Lyra says. “Even Bonnie thinks I went to the Crystal Empire to dig stuff from the pre-Sombran era. She even told me to bring some torture device if I find one.”

“Okay,” I say. “If that’s settled, pack your stuff, girls. We’re leaving as soon as possible.”

“Vinyl?”

“Yes?”

“You wanted to find ponies to get laid with on your way, right? Then why do you need those?”

“In case there are no ponies to get laid with.”

I put the box on the ground next to Little Cadance. “We’re not taking those. They’re too heavy.”

“Then what am I supposed to do?” Vinyl levitates another few boxes, suitcases, and bags.

“I’ll buy you a cucumber.” I sigh, watching the gear of Little Cadance. It doesn’t look like it’s going to crash under the weight of our cargo, but you never know. “Also, you don’t have to go there, really. This whole thing seems fishy.”

“I’m not gonna tell you what else seems fishy.” Vinyl looks back and sniffs the air. “Also, I’m going with you. I wanna do something adventurous again.”

“Learn calculus,” I mutter, checking the propeller. “This will be adventurous. Also, if you’re worried about sex tourism, we’re gonna visit some big towns on our way. Tijuana–”

“That reminds me.” Vinyl opens a suitcase and takes some small, pulp brochure. “Do you think Daring Do will sign it for me?”

“Shh, no one knows that she goes with us,” I mutter, taking the brochure. Daring Do Tijuana Bible – Everything is a Dildo If You’re an Adventurer. Of course. “Don’t show it to her. She’ll throw you out of the window.”

“What if I show it to her before we start?” Vinyl asks.

“She’ll drop one of those on your head,” Inkie says, walking to us with a crate of whiskey. “They’re heavy...”

“What?” Vinyl looks at the crate of whisky and then back at me. “They’re heavy and they can go, but my box can’t?”

“They’re our co–” I pause seeing Hexie trotting to us. Judging by the look on her face, we’re fucked.

“Mamy przejebane,” Hexie says in a clever attempt to use a foreign language to tell us how fucked are we exactly. Or rather it’d be clever, if any of us knew her language.

Actually, I caught a few words when we were teaching Hexie to speak Equine, but still it doesn’t solve the situation, since she literally said “we’re fucked” and I already know that.

“How big is our problem?” I ask. However, another mare walks to the hangar behind Hexie and I realise that it’ll be difficult. For starters, it’ll need subtlety.

“Hello, Raven,” I say to the Mayor Mare’s secretary. She’s generally a nice pony, but still, she works for the government.

“We need to talk,” Raven says, showing me some curious volume of forgotten lore. The title says International Shipping Rules and Regulations, so the book is probably full of some eldritch stuff that will fill me with fantastic terrors never felt before.

“What’s going on?” I ask unsurely.

“For starters, your mechanic is from Ponyland, judging by the language in which she said that you, umm... have a problem,” Raven says. “Does she have a work permit?”

“Excuse me,” Hexie says. “I have dual citizenship. From what I know, citizens of the Griffon Empire don’t need a work permit in Equestria, right?”

“You don’t look like a griffon...” Raven mutters.

“It took a lot of paperwork.”

Raven nods, apparently knowing something about the griffon’s love for bureaucracy. “So, you were living in the Griffon Empire and you moved to Equestria to work here?”

“I regret it every time I look at my medical insurance,” Hexie deadpans.

“Okay, Raven, cut the crap and tell me what’s going on,” I say. “You didn’t come here, tapping at my hangar door, with a book that is longer than everything Vinyl’s read in her entire life just to prove that my mechanic is not a griffon.”

Next to me, Inkie gives Raven a look saying, “please, don’t make her mad, or else I’ll have to beat you and I really don’t want to. Don’t worry, I’ll apologise.”

“Well...” Raven says. “We received information that you’re trying to smuggle a large transport of alcohol outside Equestria, so–”

Vinyl clears her throat. “Shouldn’t you be more concerned if we tried to smuggle something to Equestria?”

“I think so,” Raven mutters after a while.

“So, no problem.” Vinyl smirks.

“No, I don’t think so. Equestria is a member of the International Anti-Smuggling Alliance and other members would be very displeased if we let something like that happen...” Raven glares at Vinyl, who raises her sunglasses.

“But I want to sell it legally,” Vinyl says. “According to International Shipping Rules and Regulations, chapter 7, paragraph 2, I can legally sell up to twenty crates of whiskey anywhere, provided that I pay the tax while buying them, pay another tax for transporting them, and that the buyer pays tax in their country. Of course, it works only when I have licence to sell alcohol, which I have.”

“I’ll check that,” Raven says. “May I see all the documents?”

“Of course,” Vinyl replies, walking to one of the crates and grabbing some papers from it. “Here.”

Raven takes a look at the papers and blushes. “Daring Do Tijuana Bible – Everything is a Dildo If You’re an Adventurer,” she reads.

“Whoops, wrong paper,” Vinyl mutters. “It’s this one.”

Raven examines the papers for a few minutes. “Seems that we were misinformed,” she says finally. “May I keep that one?” She shows us the Tijuana Bible.

“Sure,” Vinyl replies. “I have one more. By the way, page six is kinda sticky...”

Raven doesn’t listen – she walks out of the hangar, humming some happy tune. I sigh with relief. It’s not like we have anything to hide. But I always feel like we have.

“Do you think they’ll try to send the officials to us again?” Vinyl asks.

“Nevermore,” I mutter. “How did you know those paragraphs?”

“My ex was in prison,” Vinyl replies. “He learned all the laws by heart. Mostly those about parole, but some international law also rubbed off on me.”

“Good to know,” I say and levitate a crate of whiskey. “Now, help me put that in Little Cadance.”

Vinyl levitates the crate, which squeaks suddenly. Inkie and Hexie look at each others unsurely.

“What the hell?” Vinyl mutters, shaking the crate.

“I think I know,” Inkie says and walks to the crate. “Pinchy, get out of there, or we’ll tell your mom that you’re trying to sneak on the plane...”

“Don’t call me Pinchy!” the filly yells. “And I’m going to throw a tantrum!”

“If you were going to throw a tantrum, you’d just do that,” I say calmly, levitating Ruby out of the box. “Get out or I’ll tell your mother that you’re trying to run away from home.”

Ruby tells me to go and do some nasty things to a baseball bat.

“Oh, please,” Vinyl says. “I’ve been there, kid, and I’m pretty sure Minuette did that too. Baseball bats are simply too tempting...”

“You’re all nutjobs and wankers,” Ruby mutters, walking away. “I hate you.”

Inky shakes her head. “Was I like that when I was eleven? I don’t think so.”

“No, you were just clopping to the Wonderbolts posters or watching Minuette sleeping,” Vinyl replies, smirking. “I was always wondering... She’s nothing like Berry. Who is her father?”

“Dunno, but he must’ve been the worst scum to ever walk on earth,” I say, grabbing another crate and securing it in the plane.

“I blew up my school when I was eleven,” Hexie mutters, helping us with a crate. “Those were fun times...”

“We’ve been there,” I say with a sigh. “Luckily, she’s not that skilled in making explosives.”

“Right,” Inkie says dragging the last crate into the plane and securing it with ropes and straps. “I think we can tell Lyra that we’re ready to leave tomorrow and that she can tell Dar... that is, Moose Kiss, that she can stop pretending to be a potted plant.”

“She is an armchair now,” Vinyl mutters. “It’s kinda creepy.”

“Okay.” I kick the tyre of our plane. “Tell the armchair that we’re leaving tomorrow.”

Unlike Bon Bon and her six personalities, Lyra is more or less sane. Well, sane for someone who works with a famous archaeologist, looks for remains of ancient civilisations, and thinks that a pre-Celestial tribe that made a pile of balls of their defeated enemies after a battle was awesome, but still, sane. However, when we dragged Little Cadance out of the hangar, she changed into a foal in the candy shop.

“What does it do?” she asks, pointing at an aileron.

“It’s an aileron,” I reply. “We use them to steer the plane.”

“Cool. And why does it have four wings?”

“They are actually two wings. It’s a biplane,” I say, opening the door. “Your seats are in the back.”

“I still don’t know how it flies,” Daring Do says. “Pegasi flap their wings, but this...”

“Hexie, explain this to her...” I mutter, walking into the airplane. Inkie is already in the cockpit, checking the gauges. We have a lot of fuel in additional tanks and we’re kinda heavy, but it should work.

“When the propeller turns, it generates thrust, just like your wings,” Hexie replies. “Little Cadance is a biplane because it has greater lift and smaller wingspan. Thanks to that, it’s much more maneuverable. Of course, it makes us slower, but we needed a cargo plane. We’re not racing with Rainbow Dash yet...”

“By the way, Cherry once built a flying machine with moving wings,” I say when Hexie, Vinyl, Lyra, and Daring Do sit in their places. “We called it ‘The Clockwork Bat’. Its service ceiling was about three feet, and Cherry crashed it into Berry Punch’s window, landing in the living room.”

“That’s certainly interesting,” Daring Do says, looking around nervously. Either she’s looking for spies or she’s afraid of flying, despite being a pegasus.

“Wait till you see Hot Coco,” I say. “By the way: no smoking and no flying in the plane.”

“Why?” Daring Do asks while Vinyl makes an expression of a sick puppy. “Wouldn’t it make the plane lighter?”

“Not really, since the air from your wings still pushes against the floor,” I reply. “Also, flying in a non-inertial reference frame–”

“Stop talking physics to me,” Daring Do mutters. “I’m a writer.”

“Can I be in the cockpit when we take off?” Lyra asks.

“Maybe later,” I reply. Through the windshield I see Coco, Berry Punch, and Cherry Berry walking to us. Inkie mutters something and rushes to Coco.

“We’ll start in a minute,” I say. “I’ll just say goodbye to the girls.”

The girls are trying not to look at Inkie and Coco kissing each other. Or at least Berry tries not to look. Cherry isn’t bothered by anything.

“There are only two mistakes one can make along the road to truth,” Cherry says, staring into my eyes. “Not going all the way, and not starting.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Berry mutters. Judging by her frown, she’s sober. “Take care of yourself and buy me some tequila while you’re there.”

“Sure,” I say. “I’ll catch you on the radio later. I’d rather know everything about the company.”

“I’ll be writing reports to you every day,” Berry mutters. “Where each of the guys went, what did they carry, and how much did they get paid.”

“That’ll be enough,” I say and turn to Cherry. “Inform me when you start the tests of Hot Coco, okay?”

“All aboard!” Cherry exclaims. “Flying thingy flies, radio thingy radioes.”

“That’s what I meant.” I sigh. “Okay, so... See you girls. Take care of yourself. And of Ruby.”

“You too,” Berry Punch replies.

“Let’s go, Inkie.” I trot back to the plane. Our passengers are already in their seats in the crammed cargo hold.

“... fifteen years later, they both started to fuck her daughter.” Vinyl laughs. “And each of them kept saying that she was the daughter of the other one!”

“Eww...” Lyra winces. Meanwhile, Daring Do is taking notes.

“It’s not that uncommon,” Vinyl says. “For example, I know a pair of twins...”

“Interesting,” Daring Do mutters, scribbling something in her notebook. “Did you ever think about writing an autobiography?”

“Of course.” Vinyl smirks, stretching on her seat. “I already have some notes. It’ll be called ‘DJ Pon3 – The Mare Who Wubbed You All’.”

“Mine will be called ‘Self-Made Mare,” I say. “Fasten your seatbelts. We’re taking off.” I trot to the cockpit.

Inkie is already sitting in her seat, while Hexie is staring at the blinking lights on the wall. Probably trying to make them blink in sequence or something.

“By the way,” Hexie mutters. “My autobiography will be called ‘Hexagon Nut – Without Me You’d All Be Screwed’.”

“Great.” I sit in my seat and put on my goggles. “How are the rudders?”

“Working smoothly,” Inkie replies. “The weather’s fine, slight headwind...”

“Fuel and oil levels are fine,” Hexie says. “Ignition...”

The propeller moves slightly, but nothing else happens.

Hexie hits the button again. “I said ‘ignition’, kurwa jego mać!”

The engine roars, causing the floor to vibrate slightly. Technology is a strange thing – sometimes yelling at it makes it work.

I grab the radio. “Is the runway clear?” I ask.

“Sure,” the guy from the tower replies. If I recall correctly, we hired three brothers to work in our control tower: High Frequency, Medium Frequency, and Joe. It’s probably Medium Frequency, judging by the voice.

“Brakes,” I say, pulling the handle. “Taxi speed – five kilometres per hour...”

We turn slowly and crawl towards the runway. Hexie checks the temperature of the engine and other stuff, while Inkie and I are getting ready to start.

“No pegasi or helicopters nearby,” Medium Frequency says. “You can start, boss.”

“Got it, we can start,” I mutter. “Throttle.”

The engine roars louder and we ride down the runway. Little Cadance isn’t exactly subtle when it comes to smoothness of the start, but our cargo doesn’t usually complain. Inkie pulls the stick towards herself and we watch as the buildings in front of us disappear, replaced by the blue sky. Soon, we’re circling above Ponyville, climbing at two and half thousand metres – no reasonable pegasus ever flies there and I’d rather not wipe bloody chunks from the windshield.

I push the button of the intercom. “It’s Minuette here,” I say. “We’re at two and half kilometres or eight thousand two hundred feet. Heading southwards. Next stop – Badlands Airship Base.”

The choice of our first stop was obvious. Their commander, Major Minor is my old pal from the army. We often borrow each other fuel, not to mention that I’m often the only link between the airship base in the middle of nowhere and civilisation with all its benefits, such as food, books, and cheap pornography.

“Open the cockpit door,” I say to Hexie. “Let’s see how our passengers survived the takeoff.”

The passengers are alive and well. It seems that Daring Do got a little less nervous since we finally left Ponyville. I guess the closer we are to the golden toilet plunger, the happier she’ll be.

“Then, I was with a really weird guy,” Vinyl says, while Lyra and Daring nod. “He couldn’t get hard unless I was dancing covered in oatmeal.”

“Reminds me of my editor,” Daring Do mutters. “He got hard when he saw my golden shower...”

If I was drinking something, I’d spit it on the gauges. I didn’t know Daring and I have some, umm... common interest... Well, probably that’s not the fact an author of the books for teens and pre-teens would want their fans to know.

“That thing cost millions.” Daring Do sighs. “And hiring guards to take care of it also costs a lot...”

“I know that feeling,” Vinyl says. “I bought Octavia a silver necklace once...”

“What happened to Octavia, by the way?” Inkie asks. “Haven’t seen her around for a while...”

“She’s on tour,” Vinyl replies. “We’re still together, kinda...”

“Yeah, and you’re planning to get laid in every place we visit on our way...” I mutter, staring at the ground in front of us. The green meadows are slowly replaced by hills and steppe.

“It’s an open relationship, okay?” Vinyl blushes. Or at least I think so, because I can just turn around while piloting five and half tons of duralumin.

Hexie chuckles. “You’ve been dumped, haven’t you?”

“Not exactly,” Vinyl mutters. “But yeah, I was a bit dumped.”

“It’s like being a bit pregnant,” Lyra says. “Or like being a bit normal, though I must say that Bonnie–”

“–has six personalities and some of them are a bit normal,” Vinyl interrupts. “We know that.”

I sigh, trying to focus on piloting. Luckily, Inkie is much more immune to Vinyl and Lyra’s shenanigans, so she’s actually looking at the controls. I take a look at the landscape below – there’s some village there, in the middle of the prairie.

“I know that place,” Lyra mutters. “It’s that village that used to be terrorised by a gang of cows.”

“Bulls,” Vinyl mutters. “Canter Creek, right?”

“No, it’s another village.” Lyra shrugs, stretching her muscles. “Anyway, the villagers got annoyed and the cows were never heard of again.”

“Bullshit,” I say. “Pun not intended. I’ve heard ten different versions of that story, including one in which those bulls were sold to griffons for meat, and one about Princess Twilight’s personal intervention.”

“Well,” Inkie says. “When we started the company, ponies were also saying that it’s bull... well...” she blushes and stares at the speedometer.

“Yeah.” I smile. “The same guy realised later that a plane with a crew of two is a cheaper way of transporting fifty barrels of wine from Manehattan to Las Pegasus than hiring fifty pegasi.”

“I remember the protests,” Daring Do says. “I especially liked the articles of that pegasus who was convinced that invention of a helicopter would cause pegasi to go extinct.”

“Yeah, I wrote to him that trains are around for years and earth ponies are still alive and kicking,” I mutter. “I don’t think it convinced him. I think he’s now telling everyone who wants to listen to him that kerosene causes cancer.”

“Someone should tell him about lamps,” Vinyl says, shrugging.

We slowly leave the prairie behind. I wonder what we’ll see in the desert – the stories about giant antlions are probably an exaggeration, but we can still accidentally hit a high-flying changeling. As if wiping guts of dead bugs from the plane wasn’t annoying enough.

“Hey, look!” Vinyl exclaims, watching something through the window. “A butterfly!”

I take a look. Holy crap. The “butterfly” is as big as a half of our plane. Luckily, it flies just above the ground and doesn’t look like it wants to eat our machine. Or fuck it.

“It’s a giant antlion,” Daring Do says. “The adults are harmless, but if you fell into a pit dug by a larva, it’d suck you dry.”

Vinyl purrs, wiggling her eyebrows.

“Literally,” I mutter. “Brain and everything.”

“Too bad.” Vinyl sighs.

“I see the oasis,” Inkie says. “There are some tents around it and one, two... Three balloons. Is it the base?”

“I think so,” I say, turning on the radio. “Hello? Is there anypony here?”

“Well, since we’re in Equestria, the correct term is ‘cienega’,” Daring Do says. “Oases are in Zebrica.”

“Is that the only difference?” Vinyl asks. “If so, I don’t give a damn.”

“Shut up,” I mutter, turning back to the radio. “Badlands Airship Base? 56th Bomber Squadron?”

“Affirmative,” the voice in my headphones says. “Identify yourself, or we’ll shoot you down.”

“It’s me, Minuette,” I say. “Major Minor knows me; same with all the guys getting stuff from me. I’m flying south and I need fuel.”

“It may be a problem,” my interlocutor replies. “We have guests from the intelligence. They’re checking if we’re all loyal to Celestia or some similar bullshit.”

“Damn,” I mutter. “Can we at least land here?”

“Yeah,” the soldier replies. “If anypony asks, you’re here to take the cows back to Equestria.”

“What cows?”

“Well, actually it’s a bunch of bulls. They were trying to rob some village or something. We had to remove buckshot from the ass of one of them.”

“Fuck it,” I say. “I’ll talk with the major when we land.”

We circle around the oasis, while the soldier tells us which runway we can use. As we lower, sand hits the windshield. The wires holding the wings together make alarming noises. I hate this place.

“Flaps are fine, speed is fine,” Hexie says. “Just don’t crash us into an airship...”

Thud! The whole plane shakes when the wheels hit the ground. I turn off the engine quickly – I’d rather not deal with sand inside – and push the brakes. The plane rolls to the end of the runway and stops.

“Okay.” I stand up and trot to the door. “Time to ask Major Minor what’s going on...”

I jump on the runway and walk through the clouds of dust. It’s everywhere – a thick layer covers my goggles. I can either take them off and face the bright sun or walk around blindly.

“Welcome to our base.” The voice is familiar. However, it’s not Major Minor. I haven’t heard that voice for, like...

Damn. For two years. I take off my goggles and face the “guests” from the intelligence.

“Hi, Minuette,” Flitter says, grinning widely.