Dear Diary,

Today was a bit more exciting than yesterday. It all started off with this really weird nightmare I had, where I was dreaming that I woke up around one or two o’clock in the morning and I went down the hall to get a glass of water, even though the faucet in our bathroom works perfectly fine.

I opened the door to room 237, but instead of another hotel room I found a grand gilded ballroom, filled with tables and chairs and set up for a party, but completely devoid of any guests. There was, however, a bar, which I started walking towards. Aside from the echoes of my own hoofsteps, the only sound in the room was a soft jazz song playing from one of those old-timey phonographs.

When I reached the bar, I slumped down into a stool and buried my face in my hooves for a while. When I brought my face back up again, I saw—of all things—a unicorn bartender standing behind the counter.

“Ummm…. Hiiiii,” I said in an awkward attempt to break the ice. I looked around the room to see if any other ponies had mysteriously appeared out of thin air, but the two of us were alone. I turned back to face the bartender and asked, “A little slow tonight, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it is, miss Silver,” he replied.

How did he know my name? I pinched myself and, feeling nothing, was reassured that it was all just a dream.

The bartender stepped forward and spread his forehooves on the counter, then asked, “What’ll it be?”

“I’m awfully glad you asked me that,” I replied, “Hair of the dog that bit me. You can do that, can’t you?”

“Certainly, ma’am,” said the bartender, and he set about to preparing the drink.

“Good pony,” I said congratulatorially. “You set ‘em up and I’ll knock ‘em back, one by one.”

The bartender set the drink down on the counter in front of me. I looked closely at the drink, sniffed it, then gave it a small sip to see if it was actually bourbon. It was.

“How much?” I asked as I took out my wallet. A moth literally flew out of it and I frowned heavily.

The bartender held out a forehoof in a stopping motion. “No charge to you, miss Silver. Orders from the house.”

“Sweet,” I said, and, being the kind of pony who never passes up a free drink, I downed the whole thing in one long gulp.

Setting the empty glass back down on the counter, something suddenly clicked in my head.

“Wait—” I asked the bartender as he reached back for the bottle, “You’re not going to card me either?”

“Your identity’s no good here,” he replied, pouring the bourbon, and passing the glass back to me.

I gazed into the glass for a while, trying to comprehend what he just said. Then I looked back up at the bartender’s face and asked,

“So, what do they call you around you here?”

“Grady, sir,” replied the bartender. “Lloyd Grady.”

I took a sip of bourbon, then proceeded to ask,

“You a married stallion, Mr. Grady?”

“Yes ma’am.” Said Grady. “I have a wife and three daughters, ma’am.”

“Interesting,” I replied. Then after another sip, I asked, “Where are they now?”

“Oh, they’re somewhere around the lodge,” said Grady. “I’m not quite sure at the moment, ma’am.”

I looked at my Pipbuck and noticed that the little clock in the corner of its screen read 4:20 A.M.

“I uh…. Have to go,” I said, getting up. “Maybe I’ll see them around.”

“Take care, miss Silver,” said Grady. “And have a good night’s sleep.”

Upon leaving the unnaturally calm room 237, I felt a bit more relaxed in the darker hallway, although this feeling wouldn’t last for long. The hallway was somewhat cold, which was reasonable for a hotel like this in the mountains. I got halfway down to our room when I stopped and saw three fillies—an orange pegasus, a yellow earth pony, and a white unicorn—all about the same height and age, wearing matching blue dresses. They stood in a line blocking the hallway and they stared at me blankly. The one on the left, the pegasus, looked like a younger version of…

“…Scootaloo?” I asked, perplexed.

“Hello, Silvie,” the three fillies said in unison. “Come play with us.”

“Forever…” added the unicorn.

“…And ever…” added the earth pony.

“…And ever!” said the Scootaloo-like pegasus.

It was at this point that I awoke with a scream. And believe me, I never scream. Only if something is really, really scary will you ever hear me scream. And sweating all over, too!
Needless to say, I stayed awake until the crack of dawn, jumping at every sound and clutching my combat shotgun for dear life.

Grapevine was the next pony to wake up. She woke up around 5:30 or so, with a drowsy, “Hey, Sugarcube,” followed by a yawn that lasted the better part of a minute. Then, after wiping the sand out of her eyes, she began jumping around like she’d just had seven cups of coffee. Dmitry was awoken by Grapevine’s jumping around and tried to go back to sleep, but the ever-cheerful Grapevine ripped the two of us out of bed.

“Grapevine, can’t you let us go back to bed?” asked Dmitry. “The sun won’t be up for at least another hour.”

“Ah know, but ah’m a mornin’ pony!” she whined. “And besides, doesn’t Siler Bullet here wanna get on the road as soon as possible?”

“Only if we can see where we’re going,” I responded. Then I gave a great big yawn.

“Why were ya up so early then?” Grapevine asked.

“I had a nightmare, I couldn’t sleep,” I said. “Did either of you happen to have any… weird dreams?”

“Well, now that ah think of it,” said Grapevine, “Ah had this weird dream that ah was explorin’ a never-endin’ hedge maze.”

“And I had a dream that I was sitting in front of a typewriter, but couldn’t think of what to write,” said Dmitry. “But it wasn’t just your ordinary writer’s block—it went on for hours and hours and hours…”

“And what about you?” Grapevine asked me. “What did YOU dream about?”

“I had a dream…” I began, “That I was alone in a big ballroom with this bartender who gave me free booze.”

“And how old are you?” asked Grapevine.

“Seventeen,” answered Dmitry. “I helped plan her birthday party back in the stable.”

“Do ya normally dream about these kinds of things?” she asked me.

“No,” I replied.

“Ooookie dokie lokie,” she said. “Maybe we all ate something last night...”

“Like the mystery meat?” asked Dmitry.

“Yeah, like the mystery meat,” said Grapevine. “Or maybe it was laced with somethin’.”

Since it was still too early to hit the road, we returned to the kitchen to get some breakfast. And sure enough, there was a pot on the stove, and a meal already prepared for us.

“Spaghetti?” Dmitry asked, looking at the pot’s contents. “Spaghetti… for breakfast?”

“Hey, it’s free food,” I said. “This is the last hot meal we can expect for a while guys, so we might as well eat it now.”

“But what about all the weird dreams we had last night?” asked Dmitry. “What does our resident chemist have to say about it?”

“Well,…” said Grapevine, “Given that most effects of benzodiazepines subside within the first twelve hours after consumption, we shouldn’t get any bad dreams from this stuff if we eat it now.”

“I don’t understand any of what you just said, but I’ll take your word for it,” said Dmitry.

We grabbed plates and began eating.

“Still, it isn’t ours,” said Dmitry. “Somepony else made it, and they might come back.”

“Yer complainin’ about this now, after all that stuff we looted from the Stable?” Grapevine asked.

“It wasn’t looting!” said Dmitry defensively. “We were merely borrowing it.”

“How can ya ‘borrow’ seven boxes of Fancy Bucks’ Snack Cakes?” asked Grapevine.

“We would have eaten them regardless of whether we left the stable or not,” said Dmitry. “And besides, you took almost as many as I did!”

“Guys, shhhhhh!” I hissed. “There’s somepony coming.”

They shut up. We heard a door being thrown open and heavy hoofsteps plodding through the dining hall. We crawled behind a counter as the intruder approached. Then he barged into the kitchen, revealing himself to be a thick, beefy unicorn stallion covered in blood and dressed, literally, like a barbarian from a movie or a comic book. He levitated a rusty shotgun in front of him. I could smell him from behind the counter, and I thought I even heard a few flies buzzing, as if he hadn’t bathed since the apocalypse… or earlier.

“When I find you, I’m gonna eat your spleen!” he said in a gravelly, hoarse voice.

“Actually, there’s three of us,” said Grapevine, loud enough for him to hear us. Before I could stick a hoof in her mouth to keep her from saying any more, the raider corrected himself, saying,

“When I find you guys, I’m gonna eat your spleens!”

“Awww, can’t you leave some for us?” whined a hoarse mare’s voice from the dining hall.

Two more barbarian ponies, equally as dirty and blood-stained entered, a unicorn mare levitating a rusty desert eagle pistol and an earth pony stallion wielding a giant battle axe in his mouth. The axe looked comically large and almost unreal, in a size and style you could only find at a comic con.

“When we find you guys,” the first stallion corrected himself, “we’re gonna eat your spleens!”

As the barbarians stalked towards the counter, we crawled behind another counter further away, and when they stalked towards that one, we crawled for a third. When they reached that one, we had no more counters to escape to, so we just ran for the door.

“Let’s split up!” I suggested when we got back to the lobby of the hotel, and so we did. I headed up the stairs to the second floor and down a corridor, and soon found myself being chased by the axe pony.

Unfortunately, the corridor didn’t give me any corners I could lay an ambush from, so when I reached the end I was trapped with no way out. There was a stairwell, mind you, but the windows were all boarded up and some sadist had carefully glued a cascade of thumbtacks down the entirety of the staircase. I contemplated sliding down the rail, but a hoarse “You like the sight of your own blood?” rapidly brought me to the conclusion that I didn’t have time.

Instead, I ducked into one of the hotel rooms and locked myself in the bathroom, hoping the raider would just give up and go away. He didn’t. Instead, he rapped his hoof against the door.

“Little pig, little pig, let me come in!” said the raider, with what I could only imagine was the most psychotic of smiles.

“Not by the hair on my chinny-chin-chin!” I replied, then added, “Or for my damned fetlocks, for that matter.”

“Then I’ll huff,” said the axe pony, “And I’ll puff, and I’ll blow your house in!”

Then he began to swing his battle axe at the door. Despite my initial impressions, the axe was actually very effective, and had broken a huge hole in the door after only a couple of swings.

Either that, or the pony was just really strong.

Then the pony stuck his head through the door, mile-wide grin and all, and said,

“Heeeere’s Redrum!”

Then craned his neck downward to undo the door lock with his mouth. However, I was prepared. I grabbed a sawed-off shotgun from my saddlebag and fired it at his skull, point-blank.

“Aaaaaaahhhhhhh!” he yelled, stumbling backward.

I stuck my gun through the hole in the door and shot him a few times more. When I was sure he was dead, I unlocked the door and looted the body before going back to find my friends.

I found them back in the lobby, Dmitry and Grapevine were already waiting for me, having saved themselves through their quick thinking and ingenuity: Dmitry got the shotgun stallion caught in a bear trap that was lying in a hallway for some reason, and Grapevine blew the mare to pieces with a grenade. The three of us then decided we should leave the lodge immediately before anything else happened.

The rest of the day wasn’t nearly as exciting: just hiking, hiking, and more hiking. I think the weather was just a little bit warmer and clearer than yesterday, but there was still no sun. After lunch, my companions started arguing over whether raiding our stable’s pharmacy for combat drugs was really necessary, with Grapevine insisting that it was and Dmitry remaining skeptical. They went at it for at least half an hour before I made them both shut up.

We spent the rest of the afternoon talking about the weather, mainly Dmitry and I naming off various locations across Equestria and the Crystal Empire, and Grapevine calculating the temperature at which merely stepping outside of one’s home would turn you into an ice block.

Then I said, “Tartarus,” to which she replied, “When it freezes over,” giving us all a good laugh.

Then Dmitry asked if she thought Tartarus was already frozen over, and Grapevine replied, “Hmmm… nah,” then tried to lecture us on the thermodynamics of volcanoes. Then Dmitry cut her off and said,

“But wouldn’t it be great if it did? Then that would eliminate the risk of any of its inmates ever getting out.”

“Not necessarily,” replied Grapevine. “It might be kinda nice if we had a fireball-spewing centaur to keep us warm.”

Dmitry laughed. “Not if he insists on enslaving everypony. I’d much rather have a pet phoenix.”

They then spent the next hour debating whether a phoenix or a dragon would make a better pet, with Dmitry arguing for the phoenix and Grapevine for the dragon. This time the argument was playful and more subdued, and ended with an agreement that the question of which would make a better pet depends on whether the owner needs a speedy mail delivery system or has a horde of gems that they don’t want to be eaten.

By evening, we finally reached the edge of the forest, and found a village along the highway where we could spend the night. Strangely, the village was entirely deserted, which was disappointing, but not as disappointing as being unable to find food in any of the houses. We resorted to eating some of our own food, microwaveable mac and cheese that we had to cook in a fireplace because none of the houses had working electricity anymore. The good thing is that we can now spend the night in a nice little cottage free from blood stains, dream-altering foods cooked by ghost chefs, and sadistic barbarian ponies.

I’m just about done with this entry and ready to hit the hay. Once Grapevine finishes praying to ‘Corey Powell,’ then we can blow out the candles and go to bed.

Level up!

Level 2: Stable Neophyte

Thief: ‘Good Natured?’ Horseapples! You know how to steal things and when to do it. It’s almost as if the blood of a thief runs in your veins! You gain an immediate +5 bonus to the ‘Sneak’ and ‘Lockpick’ skills.

Stats:
Ponies Led: 2