I swear, my little ponies, that what I’m telling you is true. We really fought a bunch of ninjas in the middle of Mexicolt City and everyone can confirm that. Right?

“Right. I shot one in the arse... Fun times.”

“I wasn’t that drunk. It’s just my fighting style.”

See, kids? Sometimes truth is weirder than fiction. And no, kid, we didn’t make it up. Whose kid is that, anyway? Yours, Trixie? I knew it. Tell her to go to sleep, since it’s getting kinda late and we still have a lot of story to tell. No time for dealing with little brats. Can someone give me another whiskey? Thank you dear.

So, most of our travel to Maneaus was rather boring. You know, those were times when you really had to stop in a few places to refuel, instead of flying directly anywhere you want. Most of those places looked exotic – a beach next to a platform, a small clearing in the middle of the jungle... Nice, but pretty boring once you got used to it. Not to mention that we were in each of them only for a few hours – enough to get fuel and some sleep.

“Hey, and I got laid in each of them too!”

Oh yeah. And Vinyl got laid in each of them too. Though I’m pretty sure bananas don’t count.

“It was only once!”

Nevermind. Before we all gross you out with old mares’ sexual habits, I’m gonna tell you that before we reached our last stop before Maneaus, we were really, really bored...

When I was drinking in Cloudsdale,
I met some pretty colt;
He had a long and fluffy tail,
and was a Wonderbolt!

And then I went to Hoofington,
for vodka and roll in the hay;
I wanted both and I got none,
So I went to the Horseshoe Bay.

In Baltimare I went to a pub,
where I met a little runt;
my kitty could use a gentle rub,
so I showed him all my stunts.

“Could you be a little quiet?” I ask, clenching my hooves on the stick. “I’m trying to land us here in one piece.”

Vinyl rolls her eyes. “Hey, you sung with me and Lyra for the last two hours!”

“Exactly,” Inkie mutters. “How many verses does this song have? I stopped counting after the Ponyville one, in which colts behind the mill could give you a thrill, or something like that.”

“I’m pretty sure there’s one or two for every town in Equestria,” Lyra replies. “At least that’s what Bonnie told me.”

“Wow, that girl from the song really gets around.” Vinyl smirks. “And about the mill... It’s totally true. Same with Trottingham.”

“Well, that one was a little saucy, considering the fact that we have a filly on the deck,” I mutter, looking at the ground. Another tough landing in the middle of the jungle, infested by chupacabras and other stuff that looks like a work of a drunk amateur taxidermist. And probably nopony speaks Equine.

“Oh, please,” Ruby mutters, appearing suddenly behind my back. I need to tell that little drongo to stop doing this, or else we’re gonna crash. “I know some more verses of this song... Some of them pretty saucy.” She stands straight and sings:

In Appleloosa, all the guys,
went out and got lost in the corn;
I met a filly with yellow eyes,
and we played with her horn.

“I really hope there’s nothing about my rock farm,” Inkie says.

“Then you should make one,” Vinyl replies. “How long till we land? I wanna smoke.”

“Fifteen more minutes,” I reply, ignoring the fact that Inkie starts humming the melody.

“You know, I invented a verse once,” Daring Do says. “It takes the song beyond Equestria.”

“Oh, please...” I mutter, but she’s already singing.

In City of the Thousand Suns,
I once walked through a temple gate;
when I walked out, holding my buns,
I couldn’t really walk straight.

“City of the Thousand Suns?” I ask. “Where is it?”

“In Maretonia,” Daring Do replies. “The ruins of the temple are a home of a rather foul-mouthed demon. I barely managed to save my ass.”

“Was it a handsome demon?” Vinyl asks.

Daring Do shrugs. “His idea for a romantic date was strapping me to the altar, cutting my heart out, and using the wound as a–”

“Enough,” Ruby says. “Auntie Minuette’s gonna soon put her hooves on my ears and she needs them to pilot the plane.”

“Clever girl,” I say. “Now, go back to your seats and fasten your seatbelts. This may be a rough landing.”

I circle above the airstrip. Our current destination is a small village of lumberjacks who are plowing their way through jungle, providing exotic wood for countries which don’t have it. Personally, I think oxygen is more important, but since you can’t bottle and sell it, ponies have to look for jobs elsewhere.

When I lower the flight, I notice something strange. It’s the middle of the day, yet nopony is working there. The machines are standing in the middle of piles of fallen trees, but the whole place is devoid of ponies. Maybe they all got drunk? Or maybe they’re hunting a chupacabra? Not sure why – those things are only dangerous to goats.

“I don’t like this,” Inkie mutters, watching the ground. “What is that airstrip covered with?”

“Mud, I’m afraid.” I look at the ground. “One wrong move and the whole plane will be arse-over-tits. We’ll do that gently.”

“Last time I heard that, I couldn’t walk for three weeks,” Vinyl mutters.

“We’re not interested in your anal experiences,” I say. “Go and fasten your seatbelts because I’m not gonna scrape you from the ceiling.”

“Who said anything about anal?” Vinyl asks. “That’s what a surgeon said when they were fixing my ankle.”

“What is anal?” Ruby asks.

I poke the stick slightly – enough for the plane to twitch in a way making everypony think about their lives. “Go to your seats and fasten your seatbelts, girls,” I say when they stop screaming. “Last thing I need when landing is you watching my hooves. Ruby, remember the joke about the Neighponese golfer Vinyl told you despite my protests?”

Ruby nods. “So that’s how it’s called!” She winces. “Gross.”

At least they finally leave the cockpit. Inkie and I look at the controls. Everything looks normal, but it doesn’t change the fact that we’re trying to land on a muddy clearing in the middle of the jungle, and our engineer has a hangover.

“You okay?” I ask Hexie, who’s sitting on her seat with headphones on her ears.

“I get that no one’s there, but can’t even catch them on the radio,” Hexie replies. “It’s like nopony’s home.”

“Strange,” Inkie says. “Everywhere we landed so far, the locals were watching us all the time. I can’t even see anypony on the ground.”

“Not like it’s a bad thing,” I mutter. “Remember that kid at the previous airport? If our brakes were a bit worse, the wing would cut his head off.” I switch on the radio. “Hello. Anypony there?”

The only reply is silence, interrupted only by light static.

“We’re going to land in the middle of that brothel you have here,” I say. “I think you should know.”

Still silence.

“Fuck you, I’m landing.” I steer the plane towards the clearing. Landing in such a place is like... well, imagine that your partner’s parents invited you to a dinner. Landing in here can be compared to a situation in which you have a seizure while peeing in their bathroom. No room for a mistake.

I set the flaps in the landing position, pull the throttle lever and take a sharp nosedive right after the trees disappear below us. For a moment we’re flying straight into the ground, but then I pull up sharply. My stomach decides to travel from my throat to my ass, but after a while I see the sky appearing in the place where it should be – above us. A stall warning blinks at us, but at the same moment the wheels touch the ground.

Inkie brakes hard – it usually takes us about two hundred metres to stop completely, but I’d rather not ram into some big friggin’ wood-cutting thingy someone put one hundred and ninety nine metres from the place where we touched the ground.

“Well, bugger,” I mutter, feeling how the tyres bury in the mud. I turn off the engine, but we’re still going.

“We’ll either slide and crash into the trees or catch some hole and collapse,” Hexie informs calmly. “Let’s hope nopony in the back needs to go to the toilet.”

The brakes screech and I’m thrown at the control panel. After a while, the force disappears and I feel that we’re slowing down. Something splashes on the windshield – after a closer examination, it turns out to be a cluster of bananas. The propeller cuts through some leaves and we stop right in front of a large tree. It must be ebony or something.

“Everypony fine?” I ask.

“Vinyl threw up!” Lyra yells from the back of the plane.

“Again?” Inkie asks. “Come on, this landing wasn’t that bad.”

“It was perfect.” Hexie shrugs. “We can still use the plane.” She unfastens her seatbelt and stands up. “Now, let’s see what’s going on in here.”

“There’s something wrong here,” Daring Do says, stepping out of the plane and straightening her wings.

I shrug. “Their radio is off. It’s probably nothing.” I follow her and look around. “Though it doesn’t explain why there’s nopony in here.” I scratch my head. “Okay, let’s face it: the situation seems more fucked up than Late Night with Trenderhoof.” I put on my shutter shades. They’re a bit campy, but I simply lost my regular sunglasses somewhere.

“Hey, maybe something came from the jungle and ate them, leaving no trace?” Ruby asks, smirking and taking the BB-gun off her back.

“I was on Late Night with Trenderhoof once,” Vinyl says. “Also, Minuette, you just lost the right to poke fun at my sunglasses.”

“Shut up. At least I’m not wearing them all the time.”

“There’s always a trace,” Daring Do mutters, picking up a leaf. “There must be. And Trenderhoof gave up on me after I told him to get lost for the fifth time.”

“Well, some things that come from the jungle don’t mind traces.” Lyra stretches her hooves and trots through the clearing, watching the empty huts.

Daring Do turns to her. “Yup. Like that tribe which lives in Maregentina. They nail their victims’ guts to a tree and make them run around it till it all unfolds. And they place bets on how many laps you can run.”

Inkie stops in her tracks. “Maybe we should find some other place to refuel?” she asks.

Daring Do shrugs. “Well, it’s unlikely they wandered here…”

“Still, I’d prefer my guts to be inside.” Vinyl spits on the ground and levitates a cigarette. “Can I smoke here? They’re already cutting down this forest and I’d rather not burn it or something.”

“Don’t worry. It should rain in a few hours.”

“Pegasi senses?” I ask. “Nice to know. I still have to bother with atmospheric front and the fact that some members of the weather team are little cu–“

“There are no weather teams here,” Daring Do says. “Not enough pegasi and the whole area is huge. The climate’s warm and there are lots of plants here, which means high humidity. You don’t have to be a pegasus to know that there’s rain every evening.”

“Well, it may clear the atmosphere a bit,” I say. You know, this whole place smells. All that plants Daring talks about release pollen, rot, try to attract insects, and do other things plants usually do. As a result, the air has a not very subtle odour of a junkyard in the middle of a hot Summer. The fact that we’re sweaty and it’s hard to take a shower on a plane only adds to the unique flavour.

“Kurwa,” Hexie mutters under her breath. Due to millions of years of evolution, she has a thick fur, useful in cold climate of southern Ponyland. ­Unfortunately, evolution didn’t predict that ponies may want to travel more. “Are we gonna stay here for long?”

“Dunno,” I reply, standing in the middle of the clearing. “What should we do about the fact that the whole settlement of lumberjacks apparently evaporated?”

“Steal their fuel and get the fuck out,” Ruby mutters. “And check the huts for their stuff. It’s not that they’re gonna use it anymore.”

“Hmm…” Vinyl looks around. “Split up and investigate?”

Interestingly, it’s not me who smacks her. Daring Do’s wings connects with the back of Vinyl’s head before I can even raise a hoof.

“I split up once,” Daring Do says. “Seventy ponies died.”

“Okay.” Vinyl shudders. “Let’s investigate together.”

“Let’s start with those guys’ huts,” I say. Like Ruby said, the lumberjacks apparently won’t use their stuff anymore and I can’t let that little shit get all the cool items before me.

“Is there anypony out here?” Lyra yells, her voice echoing through the village. “Hello?”

“Shut up,” I whisper. “Do you really want to see how many laps you can go with your guts nailed to the tree?”

“I found a hammer.” Ruby levitates said tool and turns to Daring Do. “You may be onto something with those guys.”

We walk between two huts – Lyra and Ruby are with me, while Daring, Inkie, and Hexie search the other alley. Meanwhile, Vinyl ducks behind one of the huts, probably to take a leak.

“What if we really meet some cannibals?” Lyra asks.

“They won’t take us alive.” Ruby swings the hammer. “That’d be ironic if we ate them.”

“We’re not eating anypony,” I say. “Even though they seem to have eaten the lumberjacks. How could an entire village disappear anyway?”

“Maybe we’ll ask that strange mare over there?” Lyra asks.

I look in the direction she’s pointing at. There’s indeed some mare there. She’s green and has a red mane which has apparently reached the stage of self-consciousness some time ago. I bet that even if Ruby hit her with a hammer, she wouldn’t feel anything.

“Namaste, wanderers,” she says, raising her eyebrows. Damn, those eyebrows. She can probably hide a small civilisation in them.

“Hey, I know her,” Lyra whispers. “She was at the Grand Galloping Gala a year ago.”

“What?” I ask.

“You know, when a pissed-off draconequus tries to send someone to another dimension, you usually remember their face, y’know.”

“No, I was wondering what were you doing at the Gala,” I reply.

“Sherclop Pones invited me.”

I roll my eyes. “Okay, if you don’t want to–”

“No, really. He was investigating something about Bo–” Lyra pauses suddenly. “Hey, maybe we’ll just ask her what she’s doing here?”

“Okay.” I turn to the green mare, who looks at us with that certain expression of mild interest Vinyl usually has when she’s stoned and someone does something retarded in front of her. “G’day, luv. What such a sheila is doing in this big scary jungle, all alone?”

“Auntie, stop talking like some Oatstralian creep,” Ruby mutters. “Let’s just smack her and make her tell us everything she knows.”

The green mare smirks. “Like, we heard that some ponies are cutting this forest down and we arrived here as soon as we could...”

“We?” I ask. “There’s more of you?”

“All the righteous ponies, dude,” she replies. “Strawberry Fields, Sky Diamond, Moonchild, John Lemon... We’re gonna, like, put all those Babylonians in cages and help them, like, learn about peace and love, and other gnarly things...”

Gnarly? I last heard that word when I was, like, nineteen. I start to think if it was before some mysterious moron knocked Berry Punch up, but I’m interrupted by a familiar voice.

“Sorry, Minuette, but it turned out that I had to do the number two too,” Vinyl trots to us. “And banana leaves are really bad when it comes to– Tree Hugger!”

Tree Hugger? Really?

“Vinyl?” Tree Hugger opens her eyes a bit more. “What are you doing here, naughty filly?”

Oh... shit. Like, a whole load of it.

“You two... know each other?” Lyra asks.

“Righteous,” Tree Hugger replies. “Vinyl has, like, some really interesting aura... I’m, like, really digging her vibe.”

Aura, yeah. Mostly the aura of cheap cigarettes and, as of late, old frying oil that has never been changed.

“She means that we had sex,” Vinyl says, quite unnecessarily.

“How... When...” I rub my temples. I demand answers, dammit!

“Remember how a few years ago I went on a journey to look for myself?” Vinyl asks.

I sigh. “I don’t know if you remember, but guess who carried your sorry ass to the hospital after accidentally finding you in a ditch near Hoofington? When they cut your mane, they found that the civilisation living in it discovered the wheel. Not to mention that when they took a sample of your blood, it melted the syringe.”

Tree Hugger nods. “Hoofington. So that’s where we lost you...”

Ruby clears her throat. “A propos: maybe we should find the rest before they fall into a ditch or something.”

Suddenly, the air is torn by a mighty scream. “Daring Do’s never gonna let some dirty hippies to capture her!”

“Nevermind,” Ruby says.

“What were you doing for all this time?” Vinyl asks Tree Hugger. “My memories are kinda fuzzy.”

“Protecting natural environment,” Tree Hugger replies. “And finding our inner selves... Spiritual journeys were never as easy as they are now...”

“Yeah,” I mutter. “Listen, my dear friend, we’re kinda in a hurry. You’re apparently the hosts of this place, right? Give us fuel and we’re out. Then you can find yourself till hair grows on your hooves.”

The absent look on her face tells me that I didn’t quite manage to get the message across.

“Fuel,” I say. “Blue barrels, get it? To feed our big iron bird...”

“Oh, the aircraft?” Tree Hugger asks. “Groovy. Come with me.”

I look at Lyra, Vinyl, and Ruby unsurely. Vinyl smiles widely, Lyra looks at Tree Hugger and scratches her mane, while Ruby’s face immediately reminds me that she’s Berry’s daughter: it’s the same face I’ve seen in the days of my youth, every time some poor, unsuspecting wanker spilled her beer in a pub. What usually followed was a symphony of broken jaws, black eyes, and property damage.

Good thing Ruby is only eleven. But I already told Berry that she should start gathering some cash for her: either for anger management classes or bails. It’s not like we want kids to repeat their parents’ mistakes, huh?

Yeah, right.

We follow Tree Hugger to a smaller clearing with a watchtower built in the middle. Well, at least there’s no wicker mare there, but all along the watchtower there are wooden cages with some ponies – judging by their red flannel shirts, they’re lumberjacks. In the last of the cages there are Daring Do, Inkie, Hexie, and some lumberjack wearing a flannel skirt – seems that their meeting with hippies didn’t went as smoothly as ours. A couple of ponies sit around the campfire – one of them seems to have a bird’s nest on his head. He’s sitting next to two mares who probably don’t have any contact with reality. The others are also quite a colourful bunch.

One of them is that musician, John Lemon. His band kinda appeared out of nowhere. Like, one minute there was no band and five minutes later the band existed for ten years, made a few hits, and split up due to creative differences. My cutie mark is about making watches, not bending time, but even I smelled something fishy.

“Blessings,” Tree Hugger says to the group. She takes a quick look on the cages. “Who are our lovely guests?”

The guy with a bird’s nest on his head points at Inkie. “She broke Helter Skelter’s hoof and apologised. And this pegasus has, like, a really bad aura surrounding her...”

Daring Do replies with words which her publisher would rather edit out of the newest book.

“This is kind of a bummer.” Tree Hugger nods and walks to the cages. “Reveal to me why did you break Helter Skelter’s hoof?”

“Daring yelled something about us being attacked and I panicked...” Inkie mutters.

“I sense righteousness in you,” Tree Hugger says and her eyes focus on Hexie. “And who are you, silent stranger?”

“I repair stuff,” Hexie replies. “While we’re at it, whoever put such a durable padlock in a cage that can be smashed with a kick, is an idiot. Also, they used nails which have smaller heads than the holes in the hasp, so–”

“Hexie, shut up,” Daring Do whispers.

“Excuse me,” I say, walking to Tree Hugger. “As I said before, we’re in a bit of hurry and–”

“No worries,” Tree Hugger replies. “There’s, like, no problem.” She walks to Vinyl. “Radical to see you again, my sister. Do you know that I still have your novel?”

“You two are sisters?” Inkie asks, resting against the grating.

“Vinyl wrote a novel?” Daring Do raises her eyebrows.

“We’re not sisters,” Vinyl replies. “And yes, I wrote a novel. I thought someone used it as emergency supply of toilet paper, though...”

“Excuse me.” I step between Vinyl and Tree Hugger. “But the fuel...”

“Why are you, like, so agitated?” Tree Hugger asks, wrapping her hoof around me. “Like, this fuel has been used to cut down trees. We want to, like, spill it all...”

Okay, I get it. When in Griffonstone, do what griffons do. “You can’t spill it!” I exclaim. “Like, it will poison the whole jungle and you’ll get bad karma...” I’m not sure if that’s how her religion works, but I need to go on. “You’ll reincarnate as a lab rat if you do that.”

It takes Tree Hugger a while to process my words. “Okay,” she says. “We’re not spilling the fuel.”

“Okay, so will you give it to us, so we can get rid of it on your behalf?” I ask.

“No.”

“Why?” I ask.

“I can see bad aura around you and that machine,” Tree Hugger replies. “Like, it manifests itself in an erratic way, disrupting the harmony of the world.”

“Okay, I get it,” I mutter. “I guess you’re not freeing our friends either...”

“Now you gave her that idea.” Daring Do sits in the cage and sighs. “Can I at least see Vinyl’s novel? Out of morbid fascination, if nothing else.”

I look at her and when our eyes meet, I notice that she’s blinking at me. Okay, it seems that we have a plan. Too bad I have no idea what it is.

Vinyl, however, has no second thoughts. She trots to Tree Hugger and sits on her back, letting our new green friend carry her to one of the ragged tents standing nearby.

Ruby pats my back. “Don’t you think auntie Vinyl should get off her high horse?”

I resist the urge to facehoof. “Ruby, dear, why don’t you go to auntie Daring and ask her what the fuck is she planning?”

“Okay,” Ruby whispers and walks to the cages while I sit next to Lyra. After a while, Tree Hugger comes back with Vinyl, who is holding a book.

Well, “a book” is not a good word for that. It seems like it was made out of loose sheets of whatever paper was available in a hippie commune during a travel across Equestria. The cover is made of a piece of an old hay mat, and individual pages used to be Mayor Mare’s old posters, torn advertisements from Manehattan, a list of ticket prices of steamship company from Hoofington, old cigarette packages, napkins, and beer labels in their previous lives.

I’m not even done staring at it when Ruby trots back to us and whispers something into Lyra’s ear. Lyra turns to me and whispers, “We have to pretend to be interested in it and wait till they all get stoned and fall asleep. They’ll open the cages, free the lumberjacks, and take over the camp.”

“Okay,” I whisper back, smiling at Vinyl. “So, why don’t you share your talents with us?” I ask her.

Vinyl levitates the book and gives it to me. “Read it,” she says. “You have a good voice for such stories.”

Me? Since when? I’m not sure if I would be able to narrate a long story. I open the “book” and take a look at the first passage.

It was about 3 AM when drugs wore off and I found myself lying in the tent, Bush Embrace’s warm breath ruffling my mane. The air smelled of love, sweat, and smoke. I could still hear the echo of our ejaculations, not so distant in time; it could be an hour ago, but this moment could also be centuries away from us.

The air was still spiralling around me in colourful passages swirls so I stood up, leaving Bush Embrace snoring gently on her old, rugged mattress. I looked at her and at the mattress. So full of life.

I get out of the tent. Fresh air causes the world to spin around me, raindrops falling on me my head. I feel like having another cigarette, so I levitate it from behind my ear and light it with my magic and inhale the smoke, thinking about how the situation is and how long we will be toghe together and what will happen when they finally get us. I must’ve had not enough drugs in my system, because such things are like worms creeping in my brain whenever this happens and they keep digging small holes through my grey matter and I worry so much and feel like there’s no tomorrow, because what tomorrow can be there if there is no way there can be one?

I stood over the sad remains of the bonfire and lifted my tail. A hot stream flows out of me when I experience the pleasure of cigarette and emptying bladder, both at the same time. The wet bonfire hisses, steam rising from it, bathing me in a pungent smell of poison coming out of my body...

I raise my head and tilt it.

“This is, like, life-changing, isn’t it?” Tree Hugger asks.

“I’m not sure what is life-changing about the passage about taking a leak, but maybe I can’t comprehend true art,” I reply.

“Also, you switch tenses,” Daring Do says from her cage. “Stick to one, for Azathoth’s sake!”

Vinyl gives her a grin. “Well, it’s not me who’s in the cage now.” She sticks her tongue. “Read more, Minuette!”

I open the book in some random place. “It’s written in blank verse...” I mutter, flipping the pages. “And this looks like twenty pages written without a single punctuation mark.”

“I was high,” Vinyl mutters.

Tree Hugger hugs her. “There’s nothing to be ashamed about, sis. I read it quite often. Sometimes, I open it at random place to, like, find wisdom.”

“I need to try,” I mutter, flipping the pages. “How about this one? Everypony has a story to tell. Even if it’s a story of your bowel movements. That’s deep...”

“I can, like, see what we should do now,” Tree Hugger says. “Gather round the bonfire, everypony! We’ll tell stories.”

“Can we get out of the cage then?” Inkie asks.

“No.” Tree Hugger turns to me. “If you want, I can work on your energy fields... Can’t you, like, feel how impure your chakras are?”

“Well, I always thought it was a gastric ulcer caused by my crappy diet, but the doctor said that I don’t have one.”

“Speaking of doctors,” Ruby says, sitting next to the fire. “Can I tell a story about how Dinky sat on a potato?”

“No,” I reply. “I have quite a few stories to tell. Lyra, remember how Lemon Hearts got her head stuck in a beaker?”

“Oh yeah...” Lyra smirks. “It was when we were both in magic kindergarten...”

I never expected that I’d tell that story to a bunch of hippies, but, as The Book of Vinyl Scratch says, one has to adapt or end up in a plastic bag at the bottom of the Horseshoe Bay. After that one comes another school story, about how one of the dosimeters in the High Energy Magic Lab changed colour and my class had to spend a week there in case there was a leak. A few guys in hazmat suits brought us food and mattresses and we were sitting there, a bunch of sixteen year old troglodytes, hoping that nopony would sprout wings.

Of course, I had to explain to those uneducated stoners that magic, especially high-energy magic, is all about probability. You know, there’s some small probability that a fork would start to fly, but magic channeled by unicorn’s horn raises probability to the point it actually does.

Now, imagine a whole building full of magical stuff, with some of the devices leaking pure essence of raw thaumic force. A trip to the toilet could’ve ended in a conversation with your long-dead grandmother, flipping a coin was usually ending in fifty tails in a row... Hell, when I went to the library to grab some book, I found a monkey at the typewriter, writing complete works of William Flankspeare. Apparently the chance that a grown dragon would materialise out of thin air in the middle of the lab was at some point like one to ten. After that revelation, we all told Twilight Sparkle to shut up.

There was, however, one good thing in that: I could easily convince my friends that having ten royal flushes in a row was an effect of the unusual circumstances rather than my cheating.

Of course, as usual in my life, there were also bad things. For starters, Twinkleshine realised that having sex in such a place may result in really weird things, including your great-grandson appearing to kill you. Also, as my classmate learned, when you’re in a room with background magic level so high that anything you say comes true, ‘gag me with a spoon’ is not the best thing to say. Even many years later, when she gave that spoon to her daughter, it caused the poor kid to get a spoon cutie mark and a slight spoon obsession.

After that story, Tree Hugger is utterly convinced that my bad aura is caused by my repressed sexuality. That’d actually explain why Vinyl, despite her, to put it mildly, unhealthy lifestyle has karma of a newborn foal.

Anyway, after me, Lyra tells some absurd story about a group of secret agents fighting mutated seaponies. I’m pretty sure that she made it up. Then Ruby charms the hippies with an innocently vulgar story of Dinky Hooves and a box of crayons, and in the end Vinyl tells them about the exploding outhouse.

Finally, it gets dark and only some hippies still have contact with reality. I finish off the remaining ones with a long report of the financial state of my company – probably the only time this shit happened to be useful. I’m slightly buzzed myself – Tree Hugger’s idea to clean my chakras was to blow smoke from burning weed on me, along with muttering some mantras. I’m not sure if my aura got better, but I feel, like, groovy.

Suddenly, I hear the sound of the cage door being kicked out. Seems that Daring Do got tired of sitting inside and decided to free herself. I stand up and trot to them. Whoa... Walking got, like, a little bit difficult. What’s worse, it seems that I’m alone – Ruby fell asleep, Lyra is more stoned than me, and Vinyl disappeared somewhere.

Finally, I reach Daring, Inkie, Hexie, and the lumberjack with a skirt. “Okay, girls,” I whisper. “The hippies are, like, asleep. Let’s free the lumberjacks and give them their axes. Does anypony have something to eat?”

“What?” Inkie asks.

“Munchies. You won’t understand.” I look around. “I’d eat a dozen pinecones...”

“I’d eat a pizza,” Lyra mutters, standing next to me and propping herself against Hexie.

“Maybe later,” Daring Do says. “Let’s incapacitate those dirty stoners and get out of here.”

“Not so fast!” somepony exclaims. “Stand still and we’ll find a solution.”

Behind us, the hippies wake up. It takes me a while to process the sudden turn of the events and recognise the voice guiding them. Daring Do is faster, judging by the fact that she suddenly gives out a roar and pulls a long, richly-ornamented knife from somewhere. Like, gag me with a spoon if I know where she usually keeps it. When I look at her, she’s drooling like a rabid animal.

“Treason!” Daring Do yells, a vein pulsing on her forehead. “I’m gonna eviscerate her!”

Lyra puts a hoof on her back. “Chill out, professor, or you’ll get a stroke. Like, one has to know when to calm down...”

“I’ll calm down when I give that treacherous grimalkin her eternal reward!” Daring Do tries to charge forward, but Hexie trips her. Halfway to the group, Inkie gives her a gentle poke in the back of the head, which is enough for Daring to fall asleep as calmly as Ruby.

“May I talk now?” Vinyl asks, trotting to us. “I don’t know what plan you had, but I think I found a peaceful solution.”

“What solution?” I ask. I’m slowly sobering up and I just got the message that we basically knocked Daring Do unconscious for some unclear reason. “Does it involve smoking a joint of peace?”

“No, bisons never use their pipes to smoke weed,” Vinyl replies. “Tree Hugger will give us fuel and let us get out of here.”

“How about the lumberjacks?” the guy in the skirt asks. “Does anypony think about the lumberjacks?”

“Oh, they’re gonna be sacrificed to the spirit of the forest,” Vinyl replies. “We’re invited to a blood drinking ceremony.”

“What?” I raise my hoof. The only blood I can feast on is of the ones I defeated in an unfair fight. Because if the fight was fair, I’d, like, have to drink my own blood.

“I was joking. They’ll be set free and escorted to the nearest town,” Vinyl says. “But they won’t be allowed to cut down the jungle anymore.”

I’m starting to have a feeling that either I’m more stoned than I thought, or some weird shit is going on here. The best proof is that I didn’t uppercut Vinyl for her dumb jokes. “That’s... unusual,” I say. “You and diplomacy?”

“Oh please.” Vinyl rolls her eyes. “Diplomacy? I simply gave Tree Hugger a blowjob so great that she sucked the bedsheet into her ass. In fact, I think she owes me one. Goodnight, girls!” She trots to Tree Hugger’s tent.

“What are we gonna do now?” Inkie asks, her jaw almost on the ground.

“Sleep,” I reply. “By the way, you’re piloting tomorrow.” I levitate Ruby and put her on my back. “I’m gonna go to the plane. There’s, like, food there.”

“Food?” Ruby moves on my back. “I want food. I haven’t eaten, like, anything since those dirty hippies gave me brownies.”

“Brownies?” I ask, suddenly feeling that deep inside of me there’s a responsible pony. Or rather, despite years of denial, I’m totally like my mother. “What was in those brownies?”

“Dunno, but I can see, like, colours now,” Ruby replies. “They’re beautiful... And the world is, like, turning.” She chuckles. “I feel retarded. Like, now I know how Dinky must feel...”

“Dinky isn’t retarded,” I say. “And you’re going to sleep.”

We walk to the plane. The rest goes with us, Daring Do loudly complaining about her bones hurting after spending most of the day in a cage. Hardly heroic, if you ask me.

“You know what?” Hexie asks, helping me to climb to the plane. “This whole marihuana thing used to grow around my house, back in Ponyland. But when we learned what it was, it turned out that it was some weak samosiejka.”

“Yeah,” I mutter, completing the difficult task of getting on the plane and putting Ruby in her sleeping bag. “So, no buzz for you?”

“No.” Hexie sighs. “But let’s say that part of the reason why I moved out to the Griffon Empire was a long story of poppy straw compote, mushrooms, and a blues band whose stuff I was repairing.”

I lie on my bunk. “Remind me, why did I hire you without looking at your CV?”

“I saved your ass. Also, it’d be hard to get references from those guys. One of them sung that whisky was his wife... and he meant it.”

“Okay, I see.” I yawn. I tell Hexie goodnight more or less automatically. Or maybe I only dream about telling her that? Not sure. My mind switches to the image of Big Macintosh bucking apples. Ahh...

The next morning is shitty. And I’m not exaggerating it at all.

For starters, it turns out that both me and Lyra react badly to getting stoned. As we roll out of the plane, gasping for fresh air, the first thing we encounter is Vinyl staggering out of Tree Hugger’s tent, lifting her tail, and taking a leak on the campfire. A joke that she’s probably gathering materials to her new book barely appears in my poor brain when Lyra throws up for some unknown reason. Such view, of course, prompts my stomach to join her.

“Okay,” Vinyl mutters when we’re done. “So, if we already presented our bodily fluids to each other, I’d like you to come with me. Tree Hugger wants to talk.”

“Does it involve getting stoned again?” I ask. “Because I don’t want to.”

“Me neither,” Lyra mutters. “And professor Yearling says that her spine hurts.”

“Oh, we can do something about that,” Vinyl says. “Wake up the rest. We can’t leave without a proper goodbye.”

I get back on the plane. Out of our crew, only Inkie functions well. Hexie is half-asleep over a cup of coffee dark like Tirek’s soul. Daring Do complains about her bones. I’m not sure about Ruby, but judging by the fact that she mistook me for Dinky and told me to fuck my mom in the eye socket, the magic brownie didn’t agree with her much.

“I really need to fetch some soap,” I tell her. “Also, I’m not Dinky.”

“Oh, it’s you,” Ruby mutters. “I had a wonderful dream: I inflated my sleeping bag with my farts and flew on an adventure.”

“That’s a bit more than I wanted to know,” I say. “Frankly, I’d expect something like that from Vinyl.”

“Drugs ruin your life,” Ruby replies. “That’s what Ms. Cheerilee says.”

“Wise words.” I nod, thinking that I have to buy Cheerilee something nice when I get back. “But now we have to go.”

Cursing and limping, our groups rolls out of the plane and walks to the clearing where hippies have their camp. On our way, we meet the lumberjacks walking slowly through the forests. The one with the skirt greets us as we pass by them.

“May I ask you something?” Lyra asks. “Why are you wearing that skirt?”

The lumberjack looks at her and facehoofs. “Because I’m a mare?”

“You are?” Lyra stares at the lumberjack unsurely. “There are mares-lumberjacks?”

“Don’t be silly, Lyra,” Vinyl says, joining us. “There must be. How else would they reproduce?”

“You guys are barmy.” The lumberjack shrugs and walks away. The rest of the group follows her.

“Barmy?” Lyra asks. “At least we weren’t caught by hippies... Well, not all of us.”

“Oh, shut up,” Daring Do mutters.

When we get to the clearing, the hippies are already gathered there. It’s interesting that they managed to recover after yesterday’s party so quickly. I guess they just train more.

Tree Hugger walks to us. Judging by her expression and slight trembling of her hind legs, she must’ve had a great night. I barely stop myself from asking how she got rid of the bedsheet.

“Blessings,” she says. “It’s sad that you couldn’t stay for longer, but I understand that your quest to bring back the balance of the universe is far more important.”

Wait, what? What did Vinyl tell her?

“Yeah...” Daring Do grits her teeth. “I especially liked the putting in the cage part.”

“Sorry about that.” Tree Hugger puts her hoof on Daring’s back. Daring flinches, but suddenly, her muscles relax a bit.

“Hey, it doesn’t hurt!” Daring exclaims, stretching her wings. “How did you do that?”

“Energy gathers in certain points of the body and it’s like, a cosmic force that–”

“Okay, I get it.”

“Do you also cure headaches?” I ask. “Also, I’m pretty sure I emptied our fridge at night and my stomach didn’t handle it well.”

Tree Hugger gives me a small bracelet made of colourful stones. “This will protect you from the negative forces.”

“Does it count as a hangover cure?” I ask.

“No.”

“Damn.” I put the bracelet on my hoof. It looks a bit campy, but if it’s supposed to give me invulnerability or other stuff, I shouldn’t complain.

Meanwhile, Tree Hugger walks to Vinyl and pulls her into a hug. I look for Ruby in case they wanted to give us a show of public indecency. But no, Tree Hugger backs away and gives Vinyl some neatly-bound typescript. “I had it rewritten,” she says. “I’d rather keep the original, but I guess that you’d want it to guide you too...”

“Thanks.” Vinyl grabs the book and opens it on a random page. “The poppies were everywhere. Tempting. Asking me to join them. I wanted to rip my veins out of my hooves,” she reads. “Who knows what does it mean?”

“You realised that home-made heroin is the fastest way to put on the wooden overcoat?” Ruby asks. “That’s what my mom says.”

“Blessed be the children, for their words are honest and their hearts clean,” Tree Hugger says, walking to Ruby and patting her mane.

Well, I’m not sure how Tree Hugger, with her ability to detect auras, can’t see that Ruby is a source of negative energy manifesting as a desire to shoot ponies with a BB-gun. Especially since Ruby doesn’t usually like being patted, touched, levitated around, and generally treated like a kid.

Okay, maybe Tree Hugger sensed something after all, judging by how fast she moves to Lyra. “Something bothers you,” she says. “Some dark secret...”

“Currently, my poor stomach,” Lyra replies. “And I don’t have any dark secrets, thank you.”

“Then one of your friends has a dark secret,” Tree Hugger says. “It affects your aura too.”

“Cheap psychological trick,” Lyra mutters. “Also, I know my friends’ dark secrets.”

“Well, if you say so...” Tree Hugger smiles sheepishly and walks to Hexie. “You... A mechanic from a country far away from here...”

Hexie chuckles. “Eeyup. What future awaits me?”

Tree Hugger shakes her head. “I can’t tell the future. But knowing Vinyl, it’ll surely be, like, crazy...”

“Well, it was in my job description,” Hexie mutters. “Even when I stay behind, sooner or later I have to give wpierdol to a bunch of ninjas...”

“Ninjas?” Tree Hugger raises her eyebrows. “I’m not high enough to, like, find a common wave with that.”

“Not only you,” Hexie replies. “Okay, can we get to the part when you give us the fuel and we fly away? Honestly, I hate the jungle.”

For the first time I see Tree Hugger’s eyes opening completely – they’re usually half-closed. “Do you have something against trees?”

“No, I love trees,” Hexie replies quickly. “But the smell, rain, and temperature make me want to drink till I pass out. And I can’t do that because it’s too hot.”

“Whatever floats your boat, then,” Tree Hugger says. “Okay, friends. Bring the barrels to the plane!”

Refueling takes a while – not surprising since half of our ground crew is stoned, the other hungover, and they all do that for the first time in their lives. Luckily, Hexie is good at managing them – she just yells a long string of curses, along with some hints how to do the task well. Halfway through I fall asleep, too tired of this shit.

I’m awaken by a turbulence. I get up, slamming my head against the ceiling, and look around, but there’s nothing unusual in there.

“Whoops,” I hear Inkie from the cockpit. “I think we have some branches stuck in the back.”

“Told you to wake Minuette up,” Hexie mutters back. “She’d either miss the trees completely or crash into them. Either way, I wouldn’t have to clean this.”

“Oh, please.” Inkie’s voice disappears in the roar of the engine as we’re getting higher. I turn to the wall and fall asleep again.

When I wake up, I feel that my headache is gone. Good news, finally. I roll out of my bunk and trot to the cockpit, where Inkie and Hexie are listening to the radio.

“What’s up?” I ask. “Why are you circling?”

“Maneaus International Airport,” Inkie replies. “We’re not an airship, so they’re not sure what to do with us.”

“Tell them to think of something, or else we’ll run out of fuel, fall on their heads and explode,” I reply. “Or wait, I’ll tell them myself.”

“How can we explode if we run out of fuel?” Hexie asks.

“Nevermind,” I reply, grabbing the radio. “Is there anypony in there?”

“It’s Maneaus International Air–”

“Yeah, I know,” I reply. “We need about two hundred metres of even terrain to land. I see that you have airstrips here, just tell us where can we land without hitting anything important.”

My interlocutor consults with somepony. After a while, he replies, “The airstrip number seven is free. Do whatever you usually do. After landing, everypony on the deck have to go to the customs office for inspection and passport control.”

“Do whatever you usually do?” I ask. “They have no procedures for us, or what?”

“Apparently not.” Inkie slows down, lowering the flight and aiming at the airstrip number seven. I sit in my seat, but I’m only watching her – we have a lot of space, so it shouldn’t be hard to land.

A few minutes later, our wheels touch the ground gently. We’re taxiing to the hangar, where Inkie turns off the engine.

We’re finally in Maneaus! There used to be nothing but jungle here, until someone realised how many rubber trees were there. Soon, it became a small settlement, but as the demand for rubber increased, the ponies here got richer and, as it usually happens, more blasé. Thus, they built a port in the middle of the continent – the river is deep enough for even big ships. It brought them more money, so they built the most beautiful opera house in the country. Musicians from around the world would kill to get here and sing for a large sum of rubber money.

For our plane, it’s kinda a sentimental journey – after all, we commissioned the tyres here.

“Hey, is it true that we’re in the world’s capital of condoms?” Vinyl asks. “Which reminds me that my last seven partners were girls. Time for a change.”

“Vinyl, please...” I grab the documents from the compartment and get out of the plane to meet a couple of ponies in suits, waiting for us.

“Clipe de Papel,” one of them says. “Customs Officer of Maneaus International Airport. Five passengers and cargo, right?”

“Right,” I reply, giving him the papers. One of de Papel’s assistants looks at us and whispers something to his boss.

“Why there’s six of you?” Clipe de Papel asks. “There should be only five...”

“Wha– oh, damn,” I mutter, looking at Ruby. “You don’t happen to have a passport, do you?” I ask her.

Ruby sighs. “Don’t worry,” she replies. “Do you think I’m stupid?” She produces a small card from her saddlebags and gives it to me.

“‘Berryshine Ruby Pinch, born 14th January 994 after Discord... The holder of this ID is entitled to a 50% discount on every train in–’” I read. “Are you kidding? That’s your school ID, moron!”

“Whoops...” Ruby smiles sheepishly.

“Wait,” Vinyl says. “Your first name isn’t Ruby?”

“My mother is more vain that you think,” Ruby mutters. “But call me ‘Berry’ and you’d better sleep with one eye open...”

“I’m wondering more about the fact that you were born exactly eleven months after Hearts and Hooves Day.” Lyra chuckles.

“Excuse me,” Clipe de Papel says, completely unaware of the fact that Ruby is about to bite through Lyra’s carotid artery. “But what is that filly doing here?”

“She hid on the deck,” I reply. “And we couldn’t fly her back home.”

“Is she vaccinated against malaria?”

“She is,” I reply. “Also, I’m kinda her legal guardian and if that’s not enough, we can contact her mother.”

I really am. That is, if Berry ever kicks the bucket, I’ll be one. For that reason, I pray every day for Berry’s good health.

“We’ll check everything,” Clipe de Papel replies. “In the meantime, you’ll wait in our room for suspected terro– I mean, ponies waiting for being let into the country.”

“Just great,” Daring Do mutters. “Another few hours lost.”

“Oh, shut up...” I whisper.

We’re led to the small room. There are already three ponies there: a bored mare, a large stallion with an eyepatch, and a donkey whom I wouldn’t want to meet in a dark street.

“Hello,” the guy with an eyepatch says. “Why did they put you here?”

“Papers,” I reply. “How about you?”

“Those idiots are checking our weapons,” he says. “As if a paper stating that we’re certified dragon slayers wasn’t enough.”

“You’re certified dragon slayers?” I ask. I was never a certified dragon slayer, but I was once pretending to be one.

“Eeyup.” He points at the mare, who’s now talking with Vinyl. “She’s our certified virgin. She gets lots of bits to protect her virginity and serve as a bait for dragons.”

Okay, that’s not a job for me. “How about you?”

“Well, I can shoot a dragon in the eye from a mile,” he replies. “And Fuse is our explosives specialist. We came here on vacation before going to Johaynesburg.”

I nod. “Not bad. I’m just a humble delivery pony.”

“You delivered something you shouldn’t?” he asks.

“Well, my friend’s daughter delivered herself with us.” I look around and see that Daring Do goes somewhere. I hope she doesn’t want to bribe that guy. That’d be not cricket, not to mention that last thing I want is getting into a local prison. Unlike Vinyl, I’m not into extreme experiences. Just being close with some guy and occasional play with duct tape, whips, and leather is enough to get me off.

Ten minutes later, Clipe de Papel comes to us. “You’re free to go,” he says. “We got that filly’s documents.”

Daring Do, you bloody shit-stirrer! What have you done?

“Did you bribe him?” I ask as soon as we leave the airport and walk through the crowded streets of Maneaus. The air is hot and we can barely breathe; it is still a few hours till the evening rain.

“Of course not,” Daring Do replies. “Turns out, he really likes my books.”

“So?” I ask.

“I promised that he’ll be in the next one if Ruby gets a temporary passport.” Daring Do shrugs.

“That’s still bribery,” I mutter.

“Oh, come on,” Vinyl walks to us. She left the airport last, smirking for some reason. “Like, we’d be deported, or arrested, or thrown into the sea...”

“We’re in the middle of a jungle,” I say. “There’s no sea here, just the river.”

“You get my point,” Vinyl says. “Anyway, what are we gonna do? When are we going to look for adventure?”

“What?” Daring Do asks. “You brought me and Lyra here. Your job is done.”

“We’re not going with you?” Vinyl’s jaw drops. “B-but...”

“Lyra and I are professionals,” Daring Do replies. “You guys do a lot of mess. That’s not archeology when you keep blowing stuff up, or beating ninjas, or–”

“Well, I had an impression that those ninjas were after you,” I mutter. “Besides, how do you want to deal with ninjas professionally?”

“By being sober in the first place.” Daring Do takes off. “I’ll come to you later.”

Lyra shrugs. “I’m sorry. Since it all started, she’s kinda stressed.” She runs behind Daring Do.

“Well, when I’m stressed I’m not a cunt!” I yell behind her. A few of the locals – probably those who know Equine – look at me.

“You kinda are,” Vinyl replies. “Remember that whole thing with della Morte? You were mostly yelling at me, or beating me, or–”

“Hey, I wasn’t that bad!”

“You were, a bit.” Inkie blushes. “And you were swearing a lot.”

Ruby chuckles. “Oh yeah. When auntie’s pissed, fuckers got nothing on it...”

“Shut up, kid,” I say. “What are we gonna do?”

“Same thing as usual?” Hexie asks. “Getting drunk and doing stupid things?”

Oh, no. Last time I got totally drunk was after our first big delivery. I’m not sure what I was doing with Berry Punch and Cherry Berry, but we apparently visited a hairstylist, because later we all woke up with, quite appropriately, airstrips. And I don’t mean on our heads...

This train of thoughts leads me to wondering whether Tree Hugger also has dreadlocks there. Vinyl probably knows.

“Minuette...” Vinyl mutters.

“No, I wasn’t thinking of Tree Hugger’s pubes,” I reply absent-mindedly.

“She has dreadlocks there, but that’s not the point,” Vinyl says. “Can you see that building on the other side of the street? This big, awful thing?”

“What?” I turn to see the building and suddenly it hits me. “Oh, fudge...”

The building is indeed big, and looks like a pony who designed it had a sense of style of an average noveau riche from Hooviet Union. This is, however, not the most important. The most important thing is a large neon above the door.

“Oh fudge, indeed...” Vinyl mutters, pointing at the sign, adorned with a picture of the owner of this place, and a flashy inscription which, in a few languages, tells us: