The Off-Duty Bar and Grill
This was going to be such a normal night…
“Hey! Welcome ta Off-Duty. What can I get ya?” Always let the customer know that he’s welcome; the reason he’s drinking here is because he’s got problems to drown. Or she; civil war has a way of affecting everyone. Hell, even Princess Celestia was losing a few marbles.
This one’s different, though. She doesn’t have the eyes of the usual customer. She’s not some new recruit, over-excited because it’s her first time here. And she’s definitely not a veteran; she doesn’t seem to have any problems to solve. Her stance is very professional. Probably has some sort of business here. Meeting someone, maybe?
Oh great, now she’s looking at me with that “I’m going to pick your brains with a rusty spoon” look. Soldiers may be depressing, but at least they don’t probe. Wonder what she’s gonna hit me with today…
“I will have a Virgin Tropical Island Smoothie.” To-the-point, of course. “…And a few minutes of your time.” Yep, told ya she was gonna interrogate me. Let’s see if I can lighten her up a bit, make this process a bit less excruciating…
“I don’t know the ‘Few Minutes of Your Time.’ Does that have vodka in it?”
Dead-eyed stare. She is not amused.
“Virgin Tropical Island Smoothie it is, then.” Little bit fruity, kind of a party drink. Popular on cruises. Rich people, whether they’re minotaurs, griffons, dragons, buffalo, or ponies, go on cruises and drink fruity alcoholic smoothies. Just who is this mare? “Mind if I ask your name?”
“Selena. What is your name?”
“Browning Vineyard, but call me Vinnie. Everyone else does.” “What-is” my name? “I-will-have” a Tropical Island Smoothie? Her language is too precise to be normal. And what’s with the fancy dress out here in the desert? Blue unicorn named after an ancient Human moon goddess... She’s probably got ties to Princess Luna, or SOMEONE in the Canterlot Nobility.
It’s gonna be a looooooooong night…
“There’s your Smoothie for ya, Selena. Anything else?” Duh, of course she has something else for me. She flat-out TOLD me she wanted “a few minutes” of my time.
“Yes; I have a question for you.”
Is this one loaded? “Sure, ask away.” Please don’t. Please just take your drink and leave me alone. I can pretend to polish an already-clean glass; it’s what all bartenders do!
“My question is: What is it like to run a bar this close to a military base? Especially with the front lines just a few klicks east of us?”
Klicks. Military term for “kilometers.” She’s military. Tie her to Princess Luna and the nobility, and she could be someone in the top brass!
Sweet Celestia, I’m gonna be here until morning!
“Eh, I don’t really know. I run a bar that just so happened to be next to a military base. What’s the difference to any other bar in the Equestrian Badlands?”
“Well, ‘Vinnie,’ shall we start with the fact that the majority of your customers are soldiers? Particularly the ones that have sorrows to drown?”
She’s got me. She already knows that little not-secret. She just wants details. But since when does the brass care about the soldiers? Nobles just sit behind their desks and push pawns on a checkerboard, they don’t care!
There’s either something seriously wrong or seriously right with this mare.
“…Well, I try not to pry. I’m not gonna poke and prod at something somepony don’t wanna talk to me about. Make the situation worse, ya know?” Maybe if I scrub this glass she’ll get the hint and go away…
“Surely you must notice something? The conversations they have, the drinks they order, the look in their eyes? Something that sets the soldiers apart from the rest?
She’s absolutely right! I judged her when she walked in here and specifically noted that she didn’t look like a soldier because she didn’t have those quirks! Okay, Vinnie, calm down. She just wants to know what those quirks are. She’s got all the cards, but you’ve still got a poker face. Give her just enough detail to satisfy her without alienating eighty-five percent of your clients.
“They carry themselves differently. They walk a little bit different, they stay with the same groups, they talk about the same stories. I only get bits and pieces.”
“I would like to know what these ‘bits and pieces’ are.”
Careful, Vinnie… “They stand a bit straighter. Keep their eyes focused on their objective. They’re soldiers; they’re trained to do it. They tend to stick with what I assume are their squad-mates; closest thing to a friend they have out here…” Dammit Vinnie, I said CAREFUL!
“Do they seem lonely?”
Wait, what?
“I said, do the soldiers seem lonely?”
“…What exactly are you asking?” Note to self: quit accidentally saying things out loud.
“It seems to be a simple question.”
Not really! “This seems like a lead-in question. What are you getting at? What’s really on your mind, lady?”
“Selena. And ‘what’s really on my mind’ is the mental and emotional state of these soldiers.”
NO! ABSOLUTELY NO! That is a question that I can NOT answer!
She’s getting into really dangerous territory here; I can’t let her dominate the conversation anymore. Time to be a dick about it…
“Look, ‘Selena,’ I’m going to give you the best that you can ask of me, and then I’m gonna have to ask you to leave, alright? Now lissen up and lissen good.” Clink. I’ll put that over-shined glass away later. “These soldiers have the absolute worst job on the planet. They go out there and they kill people. When they’re not killing people, they’re training on how to kill people. When they’re not training on how to kill people, they’re getting haunted by the people they’ve killed and the people who have been killed next to them. When they get home, they’re getting shat on by the friends they used to have because they’ve gone out into the world and killed people. Their entire world is defined by how many people they’ve killed. It’s on their tattoos. It’s on the notches in their spears. It’s on their scars. It’s in their faces. It’s on the list of reasons they feel like they shouldn’t be alive. And they come here and drink, because despite all the people they’ve killed, they don’t quite feel like killing themselves yet.
“I serve those soldiers because damn it all, I respect them! They volunteered for the worst job on the planet, and not a single one of them is right in the head because of it. If they’re not a shell of who they used to be it’s because they’re psychopaths, and trust me, I’ve seen my fair share of them too. They chose to torture themselves like this, and for what?! So that guys like me – guys they don’t even know! – can have a better life than they do. I owe them everything they ask of me. The alcohol isn’t nearly enough for me to give, but it’s all they ask.”
Deep breath, Vinnie. Ya got a bit intense there, leaning over the counter and getting in her face like that.
“Does that answer your questions, Selena?” Please say yes, please say yes, please say yes…
“Yes. Yes it does.” Thank you so much! “I suppose I’ll be on my way then.” Thanks AGAIN! “Thank you for obliging me this evening; I hope this covers services tendered.” A hundred bit coin? For a smoothie and a bitching out? And where did she even pull this out of? “Have a good night, Mr. Vineyard.” Aaaaaaaand she’s gone! Wow! I should be a dick about it more often! Guess I’d better put that glass away and tidy up before anyone else-
“Hey, Vinnie!”
MOTHER F-! “Hey, Boom! What’s happening?” Always let the customer know he’s welcome.
“Well, I hope you’ve got a clear schedule for tonight; you’re gonna be busy.”
“How so?” Please don’t tell me you’re trying to impress that Selena girl with your oh-so-manly charms.
“Silver’s getting a ‘Glad You’re Alive Party’ in two hours.”
“Shit, I’ll start the grill!” “Glad You’re Alive Parties” usually translated to “you almost died today, let’s pump you full of alcohol and greasy food so that you don’t get a psychological disorder."
…Huh. That hundred bit coin was a misprint. Double-sided.
Two moons…
***
Confident that she was alone, Luna shook off her “Selena” facade. Having her wings back was comforting to say the least. They were still in no working order after the morning’s “events,” but at least they were still attached. She shook a bit in the coming desert night; it was chilling to think exactly how close she had come to permanent damage. But as it was, Sergeant Silver Tongue performed his duties admirably, and her deep pool of magic would naturally heal her wounds as she slept.
Her mind, desperate for activity, had started to replay the events of the past few days. Politics had always been the most taxing part of royal life, but organizing a royal escort to a military base during a civil war definitely “took the cake,” as it were. She never thought that convincing her elder sister to allow her into an active war zone would be the easy part of a process. Especially a war zone where there were so few ponies that terms like “everypony” were too exclusive to use in conversation, and had to be replaced with “people” so that you couldn’t be accused of racism. Having enough internationals in one place to cause a linguistic change wasn’t helpful when national loyalty was in question.
Celestia was right, this was a bad idea, but so many details had been glossed over by the Chiefs that she saw no other option but to see her military herself. She had to see the bases and the drills and the armories and a few operations herself, or the Chiefs would just gloss over it and assure her that “it wasn’t her concern.” She was a Princess of Equestria; EVERYTHING was her concern! ESPECIALLY a civil war!
Last week in particular had made things clear to her. The War Chiefs were definitely politicians; who else could dodge questions and hide answers behind such advanced but meaningless language? The way that they had attempted to undermine her authority – no, hers AND her sister’s – set her blood to boiling. If the “Queen Bitch of Everything” (as Sergeant Fletcher had put it) has asked you a direct question, were you not obligated to give a direct answer?! The temerity! The foolhardy, reckless courage! The NERVE! Astounding!
At least not everypony in the military was as pompous as the Chiefs; Silver had almost seemed jovial before… well, before everything else happened. And if Luna’s conversation with “Vinnie” was to be believed, the rest of the soldiers were… normal? Was that the proper adjective? Regardless, she decided that she would much rather deal with the lower ranks than the Chiefs.
Hm. Perhaps that can be arranged…
