The rain had finally let up, allowing the continuation of the journey of Ocean Breeze. As a young earth pony stallion, he wasn't particularly fond of weather or long journeys, but he'd had quite enough of life in the heavily donkey populated Nebrayska, and had elected to try somewhere else instead. He walked mostly everywhere he went, and as such didn't tend to stay very long in one place. This left him with very few good friends, which bothered him.
Glancing at a sign up ahead as he walked down a worn dirt road, his heart quickened.
Ponyville. 3 Mi.
He hadn't heard of the place before, but it sounded like a decent enough place to catch a bit of rest. Perhaps even settle down if he liked it enough. It had made the Neighly Bugle a few times, but he'd never really seen any overwhelming reason to live there.
The road leading into town was more or less empty, a few scattered buildings here and there as he approached the town border. A quaint, charming little wooden house was erected near the edge of town, nothing fancy. The front porch wrapped around the main door, held up by square pillars connected to an overhead balcony. A young mare smiled at him as he passed by, and he couldn't help but smile back.
"Are you new here?" She asked.
"Just passing through," Ocean said, with every intention of continuing onward. Though something in her voice made him pause and look at her.
She had a gentle blue coat, nothing fantastic.
"How nice, it's always fun to get new visitors. What's your name?"
"Ocean," he said. "You?"
"Fiora," she said. "You wanna go out together?"
He felt absolutely stunned by this. He'd only just met this woman, and knew absolutely nothing about her. Never seen her before in his life. Maybe he'd heard incorrectly.
"Excuse me?"
"You know. Go out. You and I. You want to? It'd be fun."
Ocean really didn't know what to say to this. Ponyville had sounded, from the newspapers, like a fairly charming place. But he supposed every town had their oddballs.
"I don't think I-"
"Come on, please? Just once? Nothing fancy, we can go to the Hay Burger if you like. It's right down the street!"
"I... alright..." He wasn't even entirely sure what was happening anymore, but sometimes you just had to roll with things.
Fiora brightened up. "Great! You know where it is?"
"No."
"Right down the street, make a left at the market. Big bale of hay in the window, can' t miss it. I'll see you there soon." And with that, she disappeared inside the house.
Ocean just stood there staring at the door for a moment, trying to contemplate what had just happened. He'd gotten a date, apparently. With a foalnapper for all he knew.
Muttering, he continued his way down the street. Guess he'd find that Hay Burger place she mentioned. If nothing else he'd get some food in his stomach out of all of this.
"I knew I should've stayed inside... "
Several Hours Later
Ocean tried eating again, but despite being hungry, his heart just wasn't in it. His drink sat nearly empty in front of him, the only thing he figured his paranoid stomach could handle right now. He glanced up again, checking out the window towards the road. Still no sign of her. His gaze flickered over towards an unusual sight that had already attracted the attention of several other patrons.
An alicorn. One, unusually enough, who was completely stuffing her face with every scrap of food that was being brought to her. It was a dizzying display, though it seemed to be the highlight of the day to most of those present, judging by their faces. The only company she seemed to be in was that of three young schoolchildren, who listened with rapt attention to every word she spoke. This was a strange thing, considering she was going on about how important learning was.
His attention broke away from them and instead drifted to another set of young mares, seated together and going over what sounded to be some sort of proposed business venture.
"That has to be one of the most idiotic things I've ever heard, Berry," the blue one was saying. "Who in their right mind would ever buy wine flavored toothpaste? That's the whole reason ponies brush at all, to remove the stench and stain of wine in the first place."
"You're just jealous because you didn't think of it first," the other whispered back.
Ocean ignored them once more. Nothing interesting going on there, either.
He pushed around his drink a few more times, back and forth across the table. His ears pivoted slightly towards the sound of sliding plastic. A loud chorus of screaming and squealing made him jump so hard that the drink knocked over completely, spilling what little liquid remained inside it and sending ice cubes scattering across the floor. Glancing out the door with some annoyance, he noticed that the alicorn had been completely surrounded by screaming children. He sighed. Great. Just what he needed.
As one of the staff members arrived at his table to clean up the drink he'd spilled over, Ocean glanced up and happened to make eye contact with the younger stallion who was working.
"Lady trouble?" He asked. "I've seen that look before."
"I'm not sure," Ocean admitted. "Under the circumstances, I really wasn't expecting this to go very well. But I at least expected her to show up."
"Maybe she forgot," he offered kindly. "I'm sure she didn't mean for you to get left behind. It happens sometimes."
"Or maybe she's crazy," Ocean countered. "She doesn't even know me."
"And yet here you are."
"Yeah. Here I am."
"Look, I know a thing or two about crazy, trust me." He glanced pointedly over at an obnoxiously pink pony who was sweeping up the floor with her tail while singing quite loudly. "But don't let this get you down. How long you been waiting?"
"A few hours," Ocean said.
"Well, go get her then! We'll still be open when you get back! Is she important to you?"
"I don't even know her."
"But clearly some part of you wants to, or you wouldn't still be here. Go on, kid. Go get her. Worst case scenario, she's pulling a fast one on you. But at least you tried."
Ocean rose from his seat. "Yeah, I guess you're right. How much I owe you?"
"This ones on me. Don't worry about it."
"Hey... thanks."
"No problem."
Making his way out of the diner, Ocean returned back in the direction he'd originally come. The first encounter with the pale blue mare had been almost four hours ago, and while she had said she'd meet him soon, four hours was extensive even by a mare's standards. He rounded the corner to head towards the town border, and stopped dead in his tracks.
He looked away, then looked again. He had to be seeing things.
Ocean broke into a full gallop, completely disbelieving the sight that lay in front of him.
Overgrown weeds corrupted what had hours earlier been a fairly well trimmed lawn, hedges sprawling and flowering with neglect. The majority of the house itself was completely gone, blackened remains crumbling in on itself and leaving gaping holes in what remained of an originally solid structure. The balcony was scattered across the lawn in pieces, presumably having long since collapsed.
Ocean started digging through the remains, confused and worried.
"Fiora? Fiora!"
The only response came from the squeak of an annoyed family of rats who hissed at him as he turned over a large piece of wood. He was so remarkably distraught that he didn't even feel someone grab his tail until he was hauled backwards, staring into the face of the bright pink pony from the diner.
"Whatcha doin'?" She asked.
"This... house..." He gasped. "It was... I just saw..."
The pink pony frowned. "This place burned down a year ago. Whatever you saw couldn't have been any fun. That's why I try to stay away from it. Now come out of there, you're gonna get hurt."
"But there was just a mare here..."
"I doubt that. Nopony's been here since it burned down. Took the life of some poor pony, as I recall." The pink pony's mane actually deflated slightly. Ocean hadn't seen any mane do that before.
"It... what?"
"Yeah. It's really super sad. Happened right on prom night, too. Waiting for her first date. The whole thing was just awful."
Ocean felt sick.
"So... somewhere in all that, there's..."
"Oh, no no no. That was all taken care of ages ago. Gave her a nice quiet service and everything. But some ponies say sometimes she still waits out here, looking for a first date. It's creepy. Now what's this about you trying to find somepony you just met? Oh! I could do a singing telegram for you! Where's she live?"
Ocean stumbled forward, barely able to stand up. "Never mind. Just... never mind." He wanted out of this entire damn town. Reeling and dizzy, he pushed his way past the pink pony towards the road he'd come in from.
"Are you sure? I didn't even get your name! You didn't even get your welcome party yet!"
"Never mind!" Ocean turned to look back at her, and was briefly greeted by the sight of a regretful looking blue pony, standing on the porch of a small house bursting with flames. He blinked once and it was gone, replaced instead by the pink pony.
"Are you okay?" She asked. "You look like you saw a-"
"Don't even!" Ocean snapped, leaving the mare silenced with surprise.
He turned and ran, leaving Ponyville behind.
Author's Note
Dealing with a sudden breakup and a lot of unstable changes, so yeah. This is the first thing I've been able to write that hasn't ended with my killing off all the Mane 6 or going full emo or something. I'm in a weird place right now. So... something different.
