Twilight rose to her full height and raised her nose. "Excuse me, sir, but your device was already lost at sea."

The pony raised a brow. "Ya don't say? And here's a part of it." He thrust a hoof at Cherry and her curious belt. "How do you explain that?"

Spike rolled his eyes and grumbled softly, words lost.

Cherry tilted her head at the angry stallion. "Was that thing yours? It was buried in sand when I found it." She pointed at Twilight. "It was missing a hoof."

"Yes! It is mine!" He came closer, hooves stomping through the sand towards the water. "I demand you return it this moment, and who's going to pay for the machine?"

Twilight raised a brow. "Your machine broke before it even reached the bottom of the bay, to say nothing of how far out to sea it ultimately ended up. The way I see it, you owe me the price of the rental."

He stopped his approach of Cherry and turned to Twilight. "What?!"

"You didn't deliver the agreed upon services." She raised a brow. "This is a fairly simple request. Now, according to salvaging rights, it is hers, but since the original owner is present, she is obligated to offer it to you, for the proper price. She rescued a piece of your equipment."

"It's worthless! Look at it! It's in pieces."

"Oh, well then." Twilight smiled. "Then you don't have to pay her anything, and our business is concluded. Good day."

The stallion blinked owlishly a few times before he opened his mouth to speak, only to suddenly receive a spray of briny water across the face. He fell back sputtering as Cherry gave an innocent grin even as a few dribbles of seawater dropped from her snout. "Did she just..."

Twilight glanced at her new friend and the irate stallion. "Oh, that's... just a sign of admiration by her people."

The stallion recoiled with confusion. "W-what? I... uh..." Dazed and confused, he began to backpedal. "Who's going to pay?"

Twilight lifted her shoulders. "If you think you can develop a model that doesn't break so easily, you may find patronage from one of the royals."

It clicked, as if he realized Twilight was one of those. "O-oh, yes, I mean... Yes... I'll work past this and make something worthy of the Equestrian Seal!"

Cherry watched him retreat and turned her eyes to Twilight. "That's not how we say we like ponies."

Twilight shook her head quickly. "Oh, I was pretty sure it wasn't. Please forgive me, I was just trying to defuse the situati--" Her words were sharply cut off as she received her own spray of salty water across the face. She coughed and sputtered as Spike burst into laughter at the sight of it.

Cherry grinned at Twilight. "Now we're even. You dry ponies sure do react funny to water."

Spike hopped off of his perch to his feet. "Nah, just when it's sprayed at them like that. How do you do that anyway?"

Cherry shrugged a little. "I'm full of water. I'm a wet pony, just like she's a dry pony." She dipped her head under the water and came back up with a soft gasp. "So what's it like having four hooves?"

Twilight shook her fur and feathers dry. "You seem to be well on the way to having four yourself." She thrust a hoof at the sand. "Can you come out of the water?"

Cherry stiffened at the idea. "Do I have to?" She eyed the dry ground. Dry and hot... It seemed perfectly designed to cook her.

Spike beckoned with a smile. "C'mon. We'll be here for you if anything goes wrong. You want to see what's up here, right?"

Cherry frowned a little. She did. She really did. "Sorta..." She reached out a hoof and put it in more-shallow water, tantalizingly close to where the surf allowed the sand to touch air at times. Her eyes darted over the beach and she spotted a pony sprawled out under an umbrella. "Can you get one of those things?" She pointed at it. "Then it won't be so hot."

Twilight suddenly smiled. "I have an idea. Rarity would be so proud." She turned and trotted off with an energetic bounce only to return moments later with a cap held in her magic. "Here. It's like one of those that you can carry with you to keep the sun off." She floated it over to Cherry and put it gently on her head. "See?"

Cherry tried to look up and could see the green rim of the cap. The sun couldn't glare into her eyes unless she looked directly at it. It was a little thing, but she already felt just a little better. A smile spread across her snout. "That's really nice. Thank you." With the gift emboldening her, she reached again and pulled herself along the sand towards the shore. The abrasive sand caught her new belt and pulled it down, letting her fins free to wave and wriggle.

They caught Twilight's eye. "Are those fins? Do you use them to swim?"

She looked back at her fins. "Huh? Oh! They help me steer." She splashed at the water with her powerful tail. "This is what gets me moving. No wonder you swam so slowly, your tail is tiny." She squinted at Spike and Twilight's relatively tiny tails. "Is that why you use your hooves?" A thought seemed to tickle at her. "Oh! Could you show me how to do that? I'd like to see how a dry pony swims."

Twilight smiled gently. "Alright, we'll do that. We'll spend some time in the water, but in return, you have to spend some time out of the water." She took a step back from the edge of the sea. "We'll protect you, just like you protected us from that big squid."

"Octopus," corrected Cherry before she swallowed and took another slow slide forward. Her hoof finally touched warm and dry sand. It was... strange. Her wet hoof made it wet and clumpy, but feeling around drew the moisture away and then she could feel the soft siltiness of the sand and it wasn't quite like sand at the bottom of the ocean. It was new, strange, and a little exciting. With one more slide, she emerged from the waters, only the end of her tail still within.

Other ponies began noticing the pony Twilight was speaking to wasn't exactly a normal pony. Staring and gawking were had in equal measures as curious murmurs spread through the forming crowd.

Spike gave an emphatic thumbs up. "See, all good!"

Twilight clopped her hooves together. "Even better than good. You're doing great!" She began to look around quickly. "Now how to get you home..."

Spike raised a brow. "You're not seriously considering taking her that far, are you?"

Twilight turned to him. "How else am I doing to examine her."

"Examine?" Cherry shrank back towards the water.

Twilight spun back to Cherry. "No no no no! I don't mean anything untoward, promise! I just want to learn everything I can about hippocampi and my equipment is at home to do proper observation."

Spike shook his head. "I think something here might work better."

Twilight raised a hoof. "Let's not be hasty in either event. Cherry, for now, let's just enjoy ourselves and get to know each other."

That sounded far better than examinations, and Cherry bobbed her head. "Alright. So..." Her eyes wandered over the crowd. "I think I might be surprising all the other ponies." Not that she was much less surprised. So many kinds of ponies. Unlike Twilight, some only had horns and some only had sky flippers, and some had neither, but none of the others had both. None of them had a proper tail like her either.

Spike gave a dismissive little wave. "Don't worry about them. They're just being curious. You're the newest pony in town!"

Twilight nodded in agreement. She turned to the crowd. "Attention fillies and gentlecolts! This is Cherry, a hippocampus come to see our fair kingdom." The crowd erupted in curious ooos and ahhs. "She comes in peace, we should endeavor to welcome her."

A colt suddenly darted out of the crowd, his little horn shining brightly as he levitated a small inflatable pool with him. "She can borrow this!"

Cherry smiled brightly. What a great thing that held water even in dry places. She dipped a hoof into it, feeling the captive water before she slipped in. "Thank you, this is very nice of you." Maybe her visit to The Dry wouldn't be nearly so bad if all the ponies in it were as nice as these.

Author's Notes:

What are the odds that all the ponies she meets will be just as nice?