“Hey, nice job, Dakota.” a stallion walked through a crowded hallway towards a mare. She closed the locker she was standing at and smirked.
“So, you heard the news?” She flipped her blonde mane out of her face as she turned around to look at the pony that she was talking to.
“Heard? I was in the room when your number was called.” He looked at Dakota with golden-brown eyes. “I didn’t get to tell you congrats before because you were so excited that you bought yourself a couple more glasses of cider. Remember? The boys had to drag you back to your room because you almost crash landed into a couple of tables when you took off.”
“Heh. Guess that shows how professional I am. They’re probably wondering what they got their selves into when they kept me in. They know my record.” Dakota smiled, remembering all the times she’s blown a simple experiment to pieces or guided another pony into a trap for laughs.
“The only thing that fiasco showed is that it doesn’t take much for you to get drunk.” The stallion patted Dakota on the back one more time. “Congratulations, again. This is a big mission.”
“Thanks for the effort, Bright, but telling me that is just gonna make me even more nervous.” She pushed his hoof off of her back. “It’ll pump me up even more if you tell me that’s it’s just like any other test.”
“How about if I just say ‘good luck’?”
“That’ll work, too.”
“Well then, good luck.” Bright waved goodbye before walking away. Dakota waved back before turning back around.
“Yeah,” she said under her breath. “Good luck.” The intercom made its usual pre-announcement tune. “I wonder who this one’s for.” Dakota knew that the intercom was typically used when somepony was in trouble. Many times had she heard her number over it.
“Employee number 4894736, please come to meeting room number 12.”
~~~~~
“I did nothing wrong this time, I swear. I only sprained one pony’s hoof last night.” Dakota walked into the room that she was called to. She knew exactly where it was and the fastest way to get there, considering the countless amounts of times she had been asked to go to that specific room. It wasn’t so much of a meeting room as it was a room where the troublemakers got to be scolded and, occasionally, punished. The punishment, however, normally happened in one of the testing rooms.
“We know you did nothing wrong, and the pony in question is already in the medical wing.” The dull mare behind the main desk in the room looked at Dakota. “Now, if you would please take a seat and let us explain everything.”
“’Us’?”
Portions of the walls slid open and four more ponies came out, two for each side. They each lined up in front of the desk, three stallions and one mare. They stared ahead, looking at the wall behind Dakota, as if they had practiced that exact stance. These four were met with a confused look by Dakota.
“Two of these ponies are geniuses. Can you tell who they are?” The mare behind the table gestured in a line at the ponies.
“Um, not really, Ms. Testing.” Dakota eyed the ponies with great concentration.
“Of course you can’t. They look just like normal ponies. For all you know, I could be lying and none of them are geniuses. Or maybe all of them are.” Ms. Testing got up from her chair and trotted over to Dakota. “You just have to trust me that two of them are geniuses. You have no other evidence to go off of, only trust. That’s kind of what I’m experiencing. You’ve been given this huge job to complete, but you’ve given me no evidence thus far that says you’re ready for it. I’m only running off of trust for you to finish it successfully.” She stopped right in front of Dakota and stared straight into her eyes.
“Do I make myself clear, Ms. Carol?”
Dakota gulped. “Crystal.”
Ms. Testing smiled coldly. “Alright, I think you can leave now.” She started walking back to her desk. Dakota was about to open the door when Testing spoke again. “Oh, and Dakota? It was the mare and the stallion on the left.” The four ponies departed after she said that. Testing smiled again, but this time it was not as chilling. “Best of luck.”
Dakota nodded with a straight face and closed the door behind her.
~~~~~
“Woah, really? Testing got on your flank for a lesson about trust?” Bright spoke from over a small basket of hay fries, if you could call them that.
“Yeah, apparently she has a lot of it if she’s letting me do this. It’s either trust or someone hypnotized them.” Dakota said while eating an equally as questionable looking plate of sautéed daisy petals.
“It’s more than likely the latter. You’ve screwed up enough times to lose the trust of everyone in the next town over.”
“Ha! What ‘next town over’?”
“Touché…” He started laughing when another stallion and a mare trotted over.
“Yo, Dakota, what’d you get called for this time? Switching the chemical labels again?” The other stallion sat down.
“Nah, you know I’m banned from the chem lab for the next month after the last incident.” Dakota replied nonchalantly.
“I’m surprised the committee didn’t ban you from the program after everything you’ve done.”
“I think Testing’s thought about it, but she’s probably grown on me too much.” she took a sip of her apple juice. “’Sides, I think they hate to admit it, but I’m one of their best subjects. That’s probably why they haven’t gotten rid of me yet.”
“You? One of the best? Hate to break it to you hon, but if you were one of the best, you’d be sitting over there.” The other mare pointed at a table with five ponies all wearing golden-yellow jackets. They looked like the self-centered cocky types, which was really a pretty accurate description. They always thought they were the best, and they were pretty good. The one thing about all of them, however, was that they had about the same amount of character as a damp board.
“If by ‘best’, you mean ‘most accurate description’, then you’re right. They’re the literal definition of ‘lab rats’.” Everyone laughed at this comment.
“So, what do you think this machine that you’re testing is?” The other stallion, who was a lightish blue color, asked.
“I don’t know, but I wouldn’t push it asking them. It seems like it’s a secret.” Dakota took another bite of her food. “And if it’s that big of a secret, Celestia knows what they’d do if word got out about what it is.”
“True. And I don’t think you guys will be able to survive without me here.” He flashed a goofy grin, to which everyone rolled their eyes and laughed.
“I think we’ll make due with you gone, Spartacus. Not that we’d want you to leave.” Dakota elbowed Spartacus in the side, sticking out her tongue. Spartacus wasn’t his real name, but that’s what everypony called him, even Ms. Testing. No one knew his real name, and if they knew at one point, they didn’t anymore.
“Yeah, you’re too annoying to let go.” Bright chortled and so did everyone else, even Spartacus. “Hey, Dakota. If you die on this mission, can I have your stuff?”
“Hey, I want some of that stuff, too.” Spartacus cut in.
“Guys, guys. I’m not going to die. It’s just another experiment, and if I haven’t died on the others, what makes you think I’ll die on this one? Plus, I’d probably give most of it to Puzzle.” She looked at the other mare and chuckled.
Puzzle giggled. “Besides, you guys probably wouldn’t want most of it. It’s mainly mare stuff. Like mane brushes,” she pantomimed combing her hair.
“Or hoof polish,” Dakota pretended to paint her hooves.
“Or sappy novels.” They both said at the same time, both bursting into a mock giggle fit afterwards. Dakota sighed as she wiped a tear from her eye.
“But if I do die on this job, I want you guys to throw a party in my honor. Make sure there’s not one sober pony there.” Dakota requested.
“Aye, aye, capt’n.” Spartacus and Bright both stood up and saluted Dakota simultaneously. Dakota saluted back and they sat down again, guffawing.
“Alright, guys. Break’s almost over. Let me finish my food.” Dakota looked down at her plate again, only to find that it was empty. “Hey! Who took my food?” She looked at Spartacus who had a mouthful of something.
“I dunno.” Spartacus lied through the stolen snack. He swallowed, only to be met with an angry glare. “What?”
“And you don’t look too innocent, either.” She pointed at Bright, who had a petal stuck to the side of his mouth.
“What? I have no idea what you’re talking about.” He noticed the leftover food on his face. He licked it up. “Heh. Caught red hooved, I guess.”
“Ya think?” Dakota raised an eyebrow and smirked. They laughed as the announcement came on to tell everypony to get back to work. “Well, I guess that means I won’t see you guys for a while, huh?”
“Yeah, but don’t worry. I bet that later today you’ll be back in this room, saying that whatever you tested was awesome.” Spartacus waved to her for good luck, a tradition that started when they had all just gotten their jobs. Dakota waved back, a signal that she accepted his good wishes. She didn’t move from her spot until everypony but one had left.
“Hey,” Bright came up to her and put his hoof around her shoulder. “Make sure you come back from this safely.” He looked her in the eyes. “I don’t know what I’d do if you didn’t.”
Dakota felt her wings rustle. Don’t you even dare… she thought. But she nodded and said the only thing she could say for sure.
“I’ll try.”
Author's Note
Well, first chapter of this posted! (By the way, anyone who's reading this after they read the chapter for the first time, I'm sorry about the delay of the author's note. I ran into a combination of time limits and forgetfulness.) This sure is going to be a wild ride, now isn't it?
First thing's first. The release of this story is not going to be like my last one. Instead of every chapter being released on a weekly basis, this one'll be whenever I can. Basically whenever I've finished the next chapter and have an internet connection. Time for me has always been kind of a... oh, shall we say, issue. So especially for something I'm new to as much as this (my dark side only comes out every once in a while, and even then it's not too dark), as much time as I can get can be very useful. I've also never written anything I have to use a teen rating on, so that's another step outside my comfort zone.
Trust me, it gets better from here. I'll also try to squeeze in as much humor as possible, although it'll be kind of hard with what I have planned...
