Broken Strings and BPM's

Broken Strings Chapter 13: Overtension

"What do you mean, they're going to be on the tour?!" I was as furious as I was shocked, and honestly, I'm glad Ivory wasn't around to see me like this.

"Sorry, Bass, but my hooves are tied. This tour was organized by the record company, not me. If I had the choice, they wouldn't have even known about it."

"Then, I'm sorry, Treble, but count me out!"

"Bass, please. Don't be that way. I don't want to see you pass this up all because Vinyl and Flats are going to be on the tour. I mean, think of Ivory, instead of just yourself, here."

"I AM thinking of Ivory! I don't want to see her get into it with Vinyl again! Do you even know how worried I was about her?!"

Treble rubbed her forehead with a hoof. "Okay, okay. You can stop yelling, now. Look. If anything happens like that, again, I'll push for them to be kicked off the tour. But please don't drop out, Bass. It would be nice to have my brother by my side on my first major tour." She smiled sweetly at me, then completely shifted her expression, and gave me her begging eyes. "Pleeeeeeeease, Bassy?"

I rolled my eyes, and crossed my forelegs across my chest, leaning back in my chair. "Fine. You win, but your means of negotiation is going to have to change, eventually. The whole 'pretty please' look isn't going to work forever."

Treble giggled. "It doesn't have to."

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It was early evening, and I was heading to the Dual Core to meet Ivory, so we could go to dinner after her set. When I touched down outside the club, Ivory was sitting on the steps, waiting for me. I'll admit that the neon lights of the club's sign only added to her radiant beauty. I almost plowed into a street light, I was so distracted. After all, she was the kind of mare that I could stare at for hours on end. After I touched down, I trotted over to her, and smiled. "Good evening, miss. Perhaps such a beautiful mare would like to accompany me to a fine meal?"

She blushed, giggled, and moved a lock of hair away from her face with a hoof. "I don't know. What will my stallion think?"

I smiled, and kissed her on the cheek. "I think he'd want you to be well taken care of, if even for just the evening."

"And how would you know that, kind sir?"

"Just a hunch, my dear."

After a few more moments of witty banter, we finally started making our way to the nearest restaurant. "So, what's it like?"

"What are you talking about?"

"You know… flying."

I smiled at my travel companion. "It's nothing special, really."

"Well, for you, I could imagine it's not. You're a pegasus. You do it all the time. My hooves have never left the ground for more than a fraction of a second."

"I guess I never really thought about it that way. Well, I guess I could show you what it's like."

"How would you do that?"

I spread my wings, and took off, hovering a few feet off the ground. "Like this." I quickly flew up, just above Ivory, and wrapped my forelegs around her upper body, then gave a few heavy flaps, taking off toward the sky.

"Wow! Everything looks so small from up here!" Honestly, I had never seen flying as much of a feat. Maybe because it was such a common occurrence to me. I will admit this: Her enthusiasm was kind of starting to get to me. For the first time, I actually admired the beauty of the city below. It was stunning.

After our short flight, we slowly touched down outside a decently fancy looking restaurant. I looked at the sign, which read "The Blushing Rose." It seemed a fitting place to take my Blushing Ivory for a decent meal… and to break the news about the tour to her. Somepony I met a while back, who served in the Royal Equestrian Navy gave me the idea. It was called bad news food.

"Bass, are you sure you can afford this?"

"Of course I am, babe. Don't sweat it."

We walked into the door, and were greeted by a greeted by a pale red mare with a styled purple mane, sky blue streaks running from root to tip. "Good evening. My name is Melody, and I'll be your hostess and waitress for the evening. Party of two, I presume?"

I nodded, and the mare led us to a table adorned with a rose, and two lit candles. I definitely made the right choice in restaurants, and I knew especially from the look on my date's face.

The moment we were seated with our menus, and the waitress had walked away, Ivory finally returned to Equestria from her state of amazed shock. "Wow, Bass. This is a really nice restaurant… what did you do, or apologizing for?" I could tell she was joking, since she giggled after saying it.

"I didn't do anything, baby. I just thought it would be nice to take you somewhere romantic is all."

After a few minutes of waiting, our food had arrived, accompanied by a bottle of wine. Mid-meal, Ivory and I started talking about our day.

"I swear, babe. He literally took a bite out of the record. So, how was your day?"

Well, time to bite the lightning. "Well, Treble and I got in a rather heated discussion this morning."

"Oh, you two aren't arguing, are you?"

"No, no, not at all. In fact, she pulled out her secret technique."

"You mean the puppy dog eyes?"

"Yep."

Ivory nearly burst into laughter, then slowly let the laughter die down to a snicker. "Wow, if she had to pull that, it must've been pretty bad. What were you discussing?" Ivory them scooped a forkful of her meal into her mouth.

Show time. "Well, Vinyl and Flats are going to be on the tour, as well." I probably should've waited until she swallowed her food to say that.

Ivory dropped her fork to her plate, and began patting her hoof to her neck. Thank Celestia I knew the hooflich maneuver. One extremely awkward moment later, Ivory was drinking down a glass of wine to soothe her irritated throat. I waited until she was done drinking to tell her about the rest of the conversation. Probably a better decision.

"So, if Vinyl comes at me, they're off the tour?"

"That's the deal."

"Well… as long as she keeps a decent distance from both of us, she just might leave this with her life."

"Sounds perfectly fine to me."

((Author's note:)) There's a reference in here, somewhere. If you've read Haunting Remix by Valorousspectre on fanfiction.net, you'll spot it instantly.