I realise how terrifying a prospect that is and believe me when I say that it is not one made lightly. I promise you, however, that it was one made out of love, respect and care for every one of you, no matter your opinion of me. I have every confidence that my sister, aided by my faithful student, Twilight Sparkle, and her friends, will now carry out my responsibilities with more capability than I have recently been able to.

Entry 006 – Stable T-Thirty

“I’m not a bloody freak show to come ogle at!”

A dozen agog eyes were staring at me from the end of my comfy hospital bed.

I had woken to the sound of Dr. Ache gently trying to advise a group of foals and their adult that it was nice of them to come visit me, but that this was a hospital and not a zoo.

As soon as the kids saw I was awake, they began to interrogate me. Who I was? What had I come to the hospital for? When they asked why I was so different compared to them, I snapped. Mrs. Building Block, who promptly introduced herself as the teacher of this class, quickly defused the grievance.

“I’m sorry, miss, the foals were eager to meet the ponies who saved our Stable from Raiders!” The silly look I shot her must have spoken volumes, as a politely grimacing smile spread across her muzzle.

“I didn’t save anything. You saved me.” I explained my puzzlement.

“Oh no, you did save us. Your group raised the alarm to warn us that there were ponies who intended to take our Stable from us, just as Raiders had done to you. You were all so very brave.” Kudos to this mare. As she stood behind the kids, she had the patience of a saint with me.

I squirmed up in my bed, just glad to feel that my wing was not in as much pain as yesterday. Right then and there, I could have quite happily given the Doctor a beak job just to show my gratitude, even if he wasn’t my preferred gender. However, even in the Wasteland, that is not completely appropriate to do that in front of foals. It still happens, mind you, but I was not that kind of bitch griffon.

“Thank you. It’s pure berry just to know you’re all safe now.” When I used my full Trottish expressions, it was either because I wanted to confuse my audience, or because it was a little politer than telling them to buck off. On this occasion, it was the former.

“Do you think the foals could ask you some questions or hear a few stories? They’ve never known anypony come back from the Wastelands, and they did not know Griffons existed!”

I was a little different looking, but that didn’t make me anything special compared to any of them in my opinion, and I told them as much. Dr. Moon Ache deciphered this as me needing less company now. My healer asked that they move on so that I could finish my bed-rest, but the droopy heads and disheartened nickers cut me deeper than any knife had up to that point.

“Hold on, I suppose I can answer a few questions, aye?” The Mexicolt wave of smiles reassured me that the decision was a good one.

They were urged back into place by the ruby-maned teacher. She ushered the kids to listen to me as she queried where I’d come from and how I’d gotten here. I’d not had chance to collaborate with my fellow “Stable Fifty-Four comrades” so I tried to keep my answers vague and not go off script.

“I came from Stable fifty… fifty-something. I don’t remember, I was hit with some spell before getting here and it has made my head funny. Raiders killed my family, I’m pretty sad about that so, aye.”

The teacher and a few of the foals gave me a look of sympathy, whilst two of the others were wearing perplexed expressions. Thankfully, it wasn’t at my poor attempt at a cover story.

“Do you speak Equestrian?” a brazen little foal asked me, with a slow, patronizing tone.

“Aye, I’m speaking Equestrian right now.” I growled, grinding my beak.

“I have no idea what she just said.” He turned to his fellow classmates and shrugged.

“She speaks Equestrian, she just sounds funny,” the filly beside him educated her class, pushing her spectacles up from the end of her nose.

“I speak Trottish! It’s where I’m from!” I couldn’t stop the words from spilling out of my mouth fast enough, “I mean, it’s where my folks came from, or their folks… Sorry, this confusion spell has really done one on me, aye?”

“Did you see any other ponies outside?” This filly got her eager question out before anypony could agree to let me off on the last one. At least I believed I knew the answer to this.

“Oh, aye! Lots of ponies hang about outside, but most of them are a bunch of bampots, you’re all tidy in here.” My smiled, my answer intended to reassure.

Uncomfortable glances between the ponies in the group seemed to suggest they’d not followed my unique slang.

“It’s a fucked-up world beyond that door. You’re safer inside.” I translated, nodding. There were several gasps and the colt with the big mouth whinnied that I’d sworn, overcome with a touch of awe. Mrs. Block clearer her throat.

“Well! I think that’s all for now…maybe we should~”

“Have you ever had to shoot a pony?” Squeaked the smallest pony. I grinned tremendously and leaned down to her. I should not have answered the question, but I could not help myself.

“I’ve made at least one’s head explode.”

It was right here that I started to discover Stable foals were not like Wasteland foals. A Wasteland foal from Flea Town might sound impressed and dream of doing that one day. Another Wasteland foal from Glascow might just shrug their shoulders and grunt that they’d already blown off five faces this morning before breakfast. It was a regional difference.

I wasn’t prepared for the tiny girl from Stable T-Thirty to tear up and dash behind the teacher. Nor the filly with the glasses excuse herself to be ill in a nearby trashcan. The adults glared at me for my confession.

“Whoa. Don’t flap, hen, I’m not going to hurt any of you. Not unless you cross me.” Innocently, I’d assumed this would be enough to stabilize the situation.

With a horrified gasp, Mrs. Block drew question time to a close abruptly, sending the foals out before they’d had a chance to say goodbye. I gave them a cheery wave, receiving similar only from little-big mouth.

Once gone, Dr. Ache seemed to decide I was not potential dating material. He pushed a stale cheese sandwich my way and a glass of water, then said I could be discharged within the hour.

Seeing the Overstallion outside the hospital ward was like a mare catching you riding her unfaithful cowboy for a husband. I puffed myself up to full height, prepared for more annoyance.

“Are you here to give me a bollocking now?” Skeptically I padded along the corridor towards him. His mane glided with its own physics when he shook his head, and his wry smile put me off-guard.

“I have no idea what that means, Miss Crow, but I assume my answer ought to be no. I am here to offer you each the olive branch of friendship between our two Stable communities. You are the last new arrivals that I personally wished to check on. How are you settling in?”

“Kind of hard to tell you, I’ve only seen one room so far. Nice whiskey in this place though. So, you’ve got that,” I complimented genuinely, making him chuckle.

There was something unsettling about this stallion. I couldn’t put a claw on it, he was friendly, but something other than the strangely clinical nature of this leader made me uncertain about him.

“The Hopscotch family do make a lot of good whiskeys. We have a lot of comforts here that I’m sure even your Stable was lacking...”

My feathers fluffed as I asked whether I’d heard that right. They make whiskey here?

“Whiskeys,” he affirmed, “they have several flavors. However, there will be plenty of time for that. I’m certain you’ll be eager to get a warm bath or a shower and into fresh jumpsuit, after being out of one for such a while. We’ve commissioned one to be tailored just for you.” They’d made me my own Stable suit? I wasn’t sure whether to feel honored or grossed out. Those uniforms were not exactly the most tactical things to dress up in.

“Thanks. Sounds great,” I lied, then let out a squawk with a start.

A hulking stallion had managed to get into my personal bubble, without a single sound to alert me to his presence. Only after I’d collided with his brick-wall chest and nearly broken my beak did Overlook think to point him out.

“This is Chief Officer. Procrustean, the chief of the Stable Guard here at Stable T-Thirty. His duty is to ensure you and your fellow Stable Fifty-Four citizens are safe and secure here.”

The security here must have been tighter than my fellow Raiders had suspected. I had wondered why there hadn’t already been fresh chaos ensuing from a hostile takeover attempt. If these guards were all going to be as ugly, muscular and mean-looking as Chief Officer Procrustean, then our modest band of crooks had little chance of overthrowing the residents.

I gave him one of my most friendly greetings and offered a paw to be shook. He chose to ignore it, which I silently remembered. If he wanted to be an asshole, I could beat him in a ‘Assholes Got Talent’ contest, any day of the week.

“Allow me to show you through to the local bath house. Then the Chief Officer will show you around the rest of the Stables, particularly the warehouse where you’ll be staying. You friends are already there, I’m sure you’ll want to get back to them.” Completed the Overstallion. I let out a hollow laugh.

“We’ll see whether they deserve my presence,” and then, because I was thinking about it, “did you get a chance to talk to a pair of ponies, err… a green mare with a cutiemark of a garden path and a…. a lesser green mane? She might have been with the stallion, a black coat, a cutiemark of sticks, I think, and a brown mane.”

Overlook thought about it for a moment, before pulling his mouth up to the corner of his muzzle.

“The mare I recall. Garden Path. She is being looked after by a mare with an eggplant coat and a golden mane, decorated with ribbons of all colors. Jinxed Breath?” He suggested. I gave a long sigh.

“I don’t know what an eggplant is, but that sounds like Gypsy Breeze. Good, she’ll look after her... And the stallion?” We had begun walking now, following the lengthy, uninspiring corridor.

“I do not recall him. Chief Officer, can you check that this stallion been seen by our guard? I do hope he has not been locked up with the Raiders by mistake.”

“Sir, there was a stallion by that description earlier,” my wings instantly went over my ears as his deep voice shook us. He must have been the one making the command over the amplifier back at the Stable Door, “but we have not seen him since he was checked-in at the main gate.”

“Hmm, do you recall his name?” We paused briefly as Procrustean lifted his hoof, tapping at his own PipBuck for a brief check before giving an answer that he had registered as Brittle Sticks. The Overstallion began trotting ahead again as he deliberated on this problem.

“Have the guard keep a look out for him, ensure that he is safe and not in harm. We do not want a stallion walking around Stable T-Thirty without a clue where he is.”

“It’s not like he can go too far though, right?” I interjected, “We’re in a Stable. There’s a limited number of places he can go.” The pair stopped and looked at each other, Overlook grinning whilst Procrustean just looked annoyed. I came to learn that this was his default face and mood.

“We will take the scenic route to the closest bath house then,” offered the humble leader as he turned and flashed me an enigmatic pose. I followed along with a blow of air between my beak. The Chief Officer marched behind me.

The corridor we walked through began to look like more gray walls occasionally lashed with Stabletec’s blue. Only when we quickly reached a sliding glass door ahead did I start to get the hint that this was not the same.

It was not the same at all. Nothing like the old, broken-into Stables infested with the Wasteland horrors. Nothing like the soaked, rotten corridors and eerie, festering halls that we’d raided in the past. This was different. This was new.

As the glass doors slid apart, I hesitatingly crept through them, expecting my body to drop from the catwalk as soon as I stood upon it. It may have seemed strange that I had been worried about falling, but even us winged few do not want a solid floor to disappear from beneath us. I know it is difficult to believe, but heights were not my strong point. If I was on anything higher than a ponies head, I’d be sweating like a pig on bacon day.

Mr. Smug and Mr. Angry remained at the doorway as I shuffled awkwardly along the platform, cautiously rested my paws on the railing and finally allowed myself to recover just enough to fully take in the view.

Below me stretched an underground city. Not a Stable, not Stable T-Thirty’s atrium as I had been expecting, but an entire subterranean municipality, with all the sounds and smells and even tastes that came with it. I’d been to several of the remaining ‘Jewels’ of Equestria, and this could easily have been any one of them. Only the steel ceiling above gave away of the illusion that this was just another busy town in the middle of the day.

I’d seen similar sights to this in soggy magazines and long-lost photographs of old Canterlot. Somepony, or ponies, had taken a lot of time trying to recreate what had been gone for a while now and preserve it.

Swashed in their navy uniforms with gold-leaf streaks, the other residents of the city went about their business without a fear or a worry. Some of these walked across many bridges like mine, whilst others cantered over different levels to this Stable-city. The floors, of which I counted at least five, were clad with cobble stones and street lamps. The rooms were made to look like clean, inviting thatched buildings.

Higher up, I saw that the Stable was lit by a giant orb of light. I imagined this was created to represent the sun, it even stung my eyes watching it. Someone had taken the time to detail it with triangular rays around the outside, but that was all I could notice before I really did have to stare away to the ground again. It took a few seconds for the spots to leave my eyes.

A shell-gray fountain sat in the heart of the huge, circular plaza, adorned by a pony, set in stone during the middle of a ballet recital. Her head was pointed to the metal sky with poise and grace, whilst she spat three jets of water constantly around her. I’d never seen a fountain like it, never mind one in working order.

Around that sat a ring of market stalls, dressed in their best clothes. Nothing like the sad and trashy markets of the Wastes. These were hole-less, bright canvases of many colors and invited all cheerfully in to see their wares.

Outside of the court, there stretched five extensive lanes, which disappeared into the ambient light before I could see the ends of them. Ponies were everywhere between the streets and levels. There was not one place beneath me where I would look and not see a blue minion wandering through my view.

I was lost for words. I might have watched the Stable dwellers move about their miniature set all day if Overlook hadn’t stepped in beside me and cleared his throat.

“Your fellow survivors told me that Stable Fifty-Four was far smaller than this, correct?”

“You could say that again. This… this is…” I could still not string a full sentence together.

“…This is your home,” he replied helpfully, “Come, follow me. I’ll show you to the bath house. I think you’ll enjoy this, the others did.”

Splash~!

Imagine bathing in pure sunlight, with the twittering of birds and the angelic song of some sweet, pretty mare strumming a harp. Sinking into the bubbled, steaming water felt exactly like that, in my mind.

My previous washes had been with chilly, cloudy water. It was many years ago that I’d managed to dip into a lukewarm tub, and even that certainly was not as clean as this. Heck, it even smelled good. A little minty, with another fragrance I didn’t recognize, however I was far from complaining at this point.

I ducked below the surface to immerse myself in the full cozy glow. My paws brushed the soap into my feathers and I relished the ideal of feeling cleaner than I’d been for far too long.

I gave a gentle sigh and relaxed slowly, closing my eyes with a ruffle of my feathers whilst the healing comfort soaked through to my core. I did manage to calm myself a little, except for the few odd reflections that slipped through the net, my fall out with Gypsy and the missing Snip being at the forefront of these.

Overlook had left shortly after delivering me to the bath house, claiming that he had important Overstallion business to oversee. He hadn’t entrusted me to be completely alone in this vast metropolis, having left the stimulating Chief of the guards to keep an eye on me. The excuse was that he could show me about town when I was done meditating in my bowl of joy, but I believed the true intention was to make sure I wasn’t here to cause trouble. The mien of utter disgust from the stallion watching me when I peeked seemed to confirm my theory.

I provided him with a glorious beam.

“I have to say, Pro… Procrew… Crusty,” Crusty growled at me for giving him a new handle, “you do not hold a conversation as well as your master does.” My body slipped down voluntarily into my moist, heated bed. Without deliberately doing so, my paw moved between my legs and took the pleasure to that easy to reach, and yet so pleasing, extra level.

“You shouldn’t be here,” he grumbled after a lifetime to think of a sensible comeback.

“Don’t be silly, the Overstallion invited me to come for a bath and I have to say it is~”

“You do not belong in this Stable.” He continued, raising his voice over me, although he didn’t need to do so, “None of you outsiders do, and when I have enough evidence to prove it, you will all be going back out into it. Whole or as dust, it matters not to me.” The memory of Rose Bed poofing into a pile of jade shavings jumped the queue of my concerns, causing my gleeful grinning to slacken.

“That’s not very friendly of you,” I sniveled effectively.

“I have no interest in friendship with any of you,”

“What happened to ‘the olive branch of kindness between our two Stable communities.’ Maybe you’d like me if you got to know me.” I’m not sure why that tickled my arousal in the way that it did, but making him seeth venomously it made me feel warm and fuzzy deep within my navel. I did not get chance to enjoy it.

His hooves smashed down by both sides of my head and he furiously demanded my attention, ceasing my wandering mind.

“You are not a Stable dweller. I know it, the Overstallion knows it, even if he infuriatingly denies it. A single griffon is one thing. But for you to retain your family accent, after living your whole life in a Stable with ponies who do not speak the same dialect, is an impossibility.”

“My family were murdered, Raiders d-destroyed everything…” until this moment, I had no idea I still had water works. Outside of my performance, I was impressed with my ability. ‘Crusty’ was not.

“I will find the evidence I need, griffon. Mark my words~” Something fizzed and dashed, then a fresh female voice rose from his PipBuck.

“Officer A-One-One-Three to Chief-Officer Procrustean, do you read, over?” He paused one last time over me to snort angrily, before he forced himself to step away. His magic lifted a wired clip from his Stable manacle and plugged it into his ear. He grunted an affirmative and listened to it from the privacy of one of his auricles. I didn’t try to follow it, I was still analyzing the threats he’d posed to me.

I did not realize he’d pushed a button that ended my orgasmic dip before I’d reached a satisfying climax until the chill reached below my fur. I had a film of bubbles draped over me as the water burped from the plug hole and my feathers still felt uncomfortably half-cleaned. I reacted too slowly to stop the towel slapping me in the face.

“Dry yourself now. I’m to assign you to a citizen who has offered to be your personal guide and, urg, ‘friend’ from the Stable. Hurry up about it,” Thankfully, he slipped out of the room after my orders so that I could dry in peace. I muttered a few angry words and lamented the orgasm I had been robbed of, whilst rubbing away the suds from my fur.

“Where the fuck is my stuff?” My complaint came as I tried to return to my armor and, predominantly, a beloved cardinal bandana I’d worn for a decade. Instead, it had been replaced with the bland wardrobe of Stabletec, with the device for my foreleg to complete the ensemble. The Chief Officer gave a dangerous growl, which I retorted. He did not know how much that bandana meant to me.

“It has been locked down to be checked. You’ll get it back in a few days,” came the response through locked teeth.

“You’re paying me in cats, you bastard!”

“What?”

“You’re cheating me from my stuff and I want it back.” I stamped my demand with a paw.

“A. Few. Days.” We declared a full war between our stares, which lasted a discomforting ten seconds before I eventually withdrew.

“Fine. A few days, but I do not wear your junk in replacement of my own.” I puffed myself up to height, only for him to sneer at me.

“Then you’ll walk Stable T-Thirty naked,” I found it amusingly unusual that he found the suggestion humiliating to me, agreeing cheekily to the terms.

“I don’t know why you imagine that to be a threat, we walk around with nothing on all the… what are you doing with your horn?” I noticed the light gleaming from the bone pointing out of the top of his helmet. It was too late to comprehend his plan.

Cli-Clack!

I felt the unfamiliar pressure around the cuff of my left foreleg and lifted the fully sealed PipBuck into view. He provided me a sadistic grin and tapped on the screen as it flared to life for the first time.

“It must go everywhere your leg goes, so do try not to lose that particular limb or else we will have to come find you,” he relished having the upper hoof on me with a deep whicker, then he turned to the door.

“Come on, griffon, let us see if the Stable’s nudist colony is accepting new members.” His magic snagged me around the middle before I could protest further, and I was dragged along behind him on my backside.

I began to feel the shame before we had even reached the destination Procrustean had in mind. This was insane, in the Wastelands there were no end of ponies who wandered with nothing but a saddle bag on if they were lucky. In Stable T-Thirty, this aspect was flipped on it head, and I was gasped at by the prudish inhabitants for not wearing the garments of their people.

At first it was hilarious, especially when heads spun away in revulsion and foal’s eyes were covered. Then it began to get creepy and unsettling. By the time we reached our destination, it felt demeaning and isolating to be different to every pony else. It felt like I had been born in the wrong set of fur and feathers.

Begrudgingly, I was thankful when Crusty led me through a set of double doors, out of the public viewing. Signs everywhere told me this was Warehouse Seven, a building as tall as any atrium I’d been in before, sparsely decorated and still spotless. Dull concrete walls with a line of windows before it reached the ceiling, and three walkways leading to other, smaller rooms. There were enough lights to see where you were putting your feet, but compared to the cityscape behind me, this felt cold and unwelcoming. I’d seen a prison once, and this reminded me of it, which was a perception I shivered at after the Chief-Officer’s earlier cautions.

I was somewhat uncomfortable seeing my own people in this room. The anxiety that one might accidentally lift the veil on our true identities grew with each passing minute that I was under duress of Mr. High-and-Mighty himself. I kept my head forward and kept padding along.

Bunk beds had been laid out around the perimeter, each looking pleasant compared to the tainted mattresses and solid floors outside, although none of them held a candle to the bed I’d had in the hospital ward. Shiny silver tables dressed the center of the main floor, filled with food that was already being devoured with the wasteland rats I’d been hanging out with for so long.

I could see that Overlook had paired my fellow ‘Stable Fifty-Four denizens’ with members of Stable T-Thirty. Although all were dressed in a singular costume, you could tell the ruffians from the innocents just by seeing how eager, happy and scrupulous they looked. Which pony was doing the most talking was another key factor, although one couple broke that mold and I was not surprised to notice who it was.

Elm watched me stride past as he continued to chat away to a subsurface native. I did not need to look at him again to know he kept glancing across at me for several minutes. He had every opportunity to join me, but I believe the reason he didn’t is because he knew exactly what I would have in store for him when he did.

“Your bunk,” my chaperon announced as we came to a stop in the corner. I examined it thoughtfully.

“No mint?”

“What?”

“I read in a book once that before the war they used to lay a mint on the pillow, aye?” I wasn’t prepared for Procrustean to give a grunt of cynical laughter at that.

“You read?” He didn’t give me time to answer before he turned to a fellow officer, who had been feverishly taking notes as soon as I’d stood by my bunk.

“See that she stays until a pony is assigned to her and- No!!!” The bark he made stopped me from inspecting my bed and made me spin sharply. I quickly assuming our cover had been blown and that the entirely good folk of Stable T-Thirty would shortly turn into a mass of fearful hellhounds, livid at our infiltration.

Instead, it was a mare who was barely past her teenage years, that had made the Chief Officer cry out in annoyance. She was happily levitating neatly wrapped parcels with sparkling pink bows to the newcomers. It seemed like she was talking or interrupting them in mid-conversation, but then I saw that she was pressing each box to their noses and mouthing “thank you” over and over until they said it back to her. Only when she received a polite response, would she squeeze out a toothy smile and carry on.

“No, no, no, no! Molasses Candy, what are you doing in here?” observing somepony else winding up my tormentor without having said a single word yet pleased me greatly, but it was short lived as she cowered under his shadow. Somehow, her voice still jingled like a Hearth-warming bell when she spoke.

“Treats! They’re new ponies and I wanted to treat them to some of my treats! Treats of treats which will treat them to~”

“Stop.” His foreleg pushed up his helmet to rub his forehead, “we do not need the… these ponies to spend their first days in our Stable suffering from irregular bowel movements thanks to your… concoctions.” The words were spluttered out like a bad bite of a spoiled apple. Those close enough to overhear groaned and spat out any of the ‘treats’ they’d been eating from their boxes.

Molasses’ ears tumbled.

“No, but, I’ve perfected them since then, they’re not bad ones anymore they’re~” She began, trying to patch things up between my colleagues and stallion with a hard-on for authority. His hoof lifted, and he blasted his orders for her to leave once more with the inclusion of imprisonment for the day if she did not. I could not watch any longer.

“Molasses Candy?” I asked, with a cheekiness risen in my voice, “isn’t that the mare the Overstallion assigned to be my Stable-pal, aye?” Crusty’s seething hatred returned to me, but I could handle it.

“No. She is not, griffon.”

“Oh, no, I’m plum certain she is, but aye, if you’re unsure, we could always go have a powwow with Mr Overlook, if you so desire it,” Lord Dickweed of Dickweedington knew I had him beaten there. With our party currently being treated like royalty, Overlook would have no choice to grant such a simple request and the Chief of security had no leg to stand on.

He looked between us with such sharp jerks of his head, that I heard the bones click in his neck. Finally, he gave me a wide, false smile.

“Very well. Molasses Candy! You are now assigned to be the representative of Stable T-Thirty for Ms. Crow. If you leave her side for one moment, you will both be imprisoned. Am I clear? Officer Bones, ensure this is noted down,” Before he left, Procrustean leaned in to me.

“I am sure I will be seeing you very soon, griffon.”

“Aye, I’ve had a blast. On our next date, we should feed the ducks followed by a nice candlelit dinner. And don’t forget my bandana!” I hollered after the uppity pony storming away. Sniggering, I turned around to crawl into my bunk.

A moving force snatched me clean from my paws and flung me to the floor. I rose my talons to defend myself, only to discover that my attacker was the chocolate colored mare with the caramel glazed mane that I had defended.

“YAY! Friendship buddies, forever!” she squealed at a frequency high enough to wake the dogs in New Appleloosa. I rubbed my auricular beneath my feathers and squinted at her.

“Get off,” she followed my demand as cheerfully as a baby goat but continued nuzzling as I got up myself. The aforementioned-officer Bones donated a rueful nod when I caught her gaze.

“My apologies for the Chief Officer. He can be bullish with, well, everypony.”

“Don’t sweat it, Boney.” I patted her shoulder and let her do her job, cautioning Molasses every time the chirpy little creature got too close to me. Unlike her moment of fear of the authoritarian stallion who’d put her down, she seemed quite content to let me berate her. Soon, the security personnel had done her job and even promised to see if she could return my bandana when I mentioned my gripe about it.

I have no shame in mentioning that I tilted my head to glance at her flank as she trotted away. It was tight, but I imagined that I could tease her to loosen it. With Gypsy now in my bad books, I had found during my bath that I was in sore need of new material for the wank bank.

My daydream was interrupted by my new puppy. Molasses was still desperately trying to give away the rest of her boxes of indulgences, but now the other ponies were refusing and even throwing them back at her.

“Hey, that’s not very nice, why don’t you~”

“Molasses! Come over here a moment,” saving her rear was fast becoming a new occupation for me as she skipped over with a friendly hello, as though the last twenty seconds had not happened. I collected one of her boxes and showed it to her.

“These ponies are used to being given poisonous things – no, don’t tear up, I’m sure these are fine, aye, hen? Instead, watch me and you might learn something…” I took the full tray from her and wandered out into the hall, speaking to Molasses as though I was expecting nobody else to be listening in.

“You sure I can have the rest of these, Mole? That’s so sweet of you. I’m going to put them under here so no pony else eats them.” I slid them onto a chair, pushed it under the table, and then returned to her. I had hardly shown my back to the tray when a sneaky thief was already pilfering the boxes I’d attempted to conceal.

Mole’s eyes were glittering in awe as I returned casually to her with a prudent smirk.

“That’s how it’s done. These ponies have had to learn to want what others have, so if they think it’s worth something, they’ll take it.”

“You called me Mole!” She bounced from hoof to hoof like a canine in dire need of a restroom break. The cry was so misplaced in my lesson that I could only give her a puzzled shrug.

“Nopony has ever given me a nice nickname before!” I could not stop her giving me yet another embrace, this one even including a peck on the cheek, before I pushed her off.

“Hey, now!” I wiggled my claw at her with a frustrated huff, “we need to set some ground rules here! No PDOAs, that means public displays of affection, aye? You do what I say, when I say it, and if I say zip it, you shut your maw. Got it?”

“Ooh! Roleplay!” She gave an infant’s giggle and saluted me, “Aye Aye, Captain!” Part of me wanted to laugh with her, but I just rolled my eyes and slinked into my bunk to lie down. Out in the wastes, if you weren’t moving, fighting, eating, shagging, or fighting a lot more, then you spent the time sleeping. There wasn’t much else to do out there.

“Why don’t you buzz off to find somepony else to bother for a while, aye? I’ll call when I need you,” I tucked my head under my wing and waited. The sound of hooves leaving never came.

“Are you deaf?”

“I am not allowed to leave you,” peeped the tiny voice, “Chief-Officer Procrustean told us so. We’ll get thrown in to jail.” I let out a long sigh and rolled over, staring at the springs above me for an idea to get me out of this. None came.

“Fine. Alright. Aye.” I sat up and slipped back away from the small piece of refuge I had. “What do you do for fun around here?” She attempted to pull all the air within the warehouse into her lungs.

“I know! I know! I know! I knooooow!” She skipped, hopped, twirled and scampered to the doorway, halting when she saw I was not racing after her. “Come on, Captain! Let’s skedaddle!”

Since the only other past-time I could suggest was seeing if I could punch Deadwood’s head through a wall, I decided to let my legs follow lazily after her.

<sub>Footnote: Quest Complete - Bed, Bath and Befriend
Quest Perk added - Mend a Friend - Healing potions are 10% more effective on party members

Quest Begun - Mole’s Hole</sub>

Author's Notes:

Want to discuss the story? Follow me to the Scoundrel’s Settlement on Discord...

Song for this chapter; White Rabbit by Jefferson Airplane

Imagine you finish writing a particularly dark chapter of a story. You're proud of it and excited about where it is going, but you also feel concerned that the tale you're going to tell will only get darker with the current characters that you have. You feel a sinking sensation as you wonder whether you are piling too much bleakness into a tale that you want people to enjoy.

That's where I was at with the "Way In" chapter. Then I get a message from a friend of mine. We used to play as members of the altered-six, and I would be Bubble Berry. I was reminded of the fun I would have bringing him to life, and how he would make me feel better after a rough day.

I was excited, but I also realized I couldn't introduce Bubble Berry into this story, i had to build somepony new with enough of his idealistic nature to be a unique character.

Enter onto stage Doomande. Not only have they been helping with some awesome feedback and nitpicks for me to improve upon, but they notes that there is another 'Little Birds' song the I had not known about. I listen to it, and one line stands out to me;
"Find molasses candy"

I had found her. From there, the little brown munchkin stepped into the light with a squeaky giggle and an encouraging sense of endearment.

I also have to thank my friend Private Joke, who let me introduce her and a few of the other cast member to gauge her reaction. I wasn't disappointed.

Thank you again for reading up to this moment. Ask me anything.
If this is when you leave us, goodbye and safe travels.

If you're still strapped in for the ride, see you in the next chapter.

All good things,
Duskhoof