Be Careful What You Wish For

Be Careful what you wish for

Chapter 8 – ‘I guess it’s only fair right?’

The past two weeks seemed to be a bit of a blur.  There was a moment when I wasn’t certain how I felt about declaring my permanent residence in Equestria, but then again it wasn’t like I had completely lost my citizenship.  The local American Foreign Service Officer, located in the Earth Embassy, had told me that officially my citizenship with the good old U.S. of A. would be solid for seven years.  I’d still have to pay a few basic taxes, but until that time was up I was fine and dandy.  I had considered telling him not to worry.  Then again if Lyra got cleared to visit Earth it wouldn’t hurt to have someone with her who was not only a native, but who was also a citizen.

Seeing that as the selling point I decided to agree, and the FSO handed me a set of papers for my employer.  I did a quick scan of them and realized that it was basically a mixture of royal and US Federal tax papers.  From what I gathered it basically reduced what I used to pay in for my Federal taxes down quite a bit.  Instead of a solid ten percent of my wages I was only getting deducted a mere five percent.  Apparently the US Government had decided to cut most of the humans migrating to Equestria a break in order to keep getting the revenue from them.

That had been last weekend.  The following week had been hectic at work.  Mr. Rich decided that since it was possible to repair the cassette tapes before refunding for them then that was what was going to happen.  I knew the problem that was happening.  It had been something that was pretty common up until Compact Disks had become far more affordable.  It wasn’t with the tapes themselves, but rather with some of the players.

Brands like Jensen, Kaizer, RCA, and Soni didn’t mess up too often, but cheaper brands had a tendency of eating cassettes.  It wasn’t a problem to fix the tapes, and soon I was working on the players themselves.  It wasn’t that hard, but I had to stop and remember all of those old tricks for cleaning the heads, getting the spindles to work correctly.

But it was getting off of work that more than made up for it.  I was pretty much living the dream.  That might sound a bit conceited, but it felt that way.  I was happy, and this weekend I was even happier. It seemed that all of Mr. Rich’s businesses paid their hourly employees weekly instead of biweekly.  I walked into Trotting Tech Central and headed straight to the back.  I found Gum Drops working on the schedule for the next week.

“Don! How are you enjoying your weekend off?” she asked.

“It’s actually pretty good, and the day’s just getting better,” I said.

“Here to pick up your pay huh?” she asked.

I nodded and watched as she pulled out a drawer and seemed to nose through it for a moment before pulling up an envelope and handing it to me.

“Don’t go spending it all in one place,” she said.

I opened it and looked at the check.  I had expected to be paid in bits, but then I had to consider that once the Ponies noticed the ease of some of our monetary system they most likely would adapt to it.  Three hundred and forty bits was printed across the face of the check.  I grinned and walked toward my new bank.

The Royal Treasury Bank of Equestria looked like most of the buildings in Ponyville before the gateway opened.  It had a medieval charm to it.  That ended the moment I walked inside of the building.  Outside it looked like it belonged in the renaissance fair, but inside it looked like any normal bank in a small town would have looked.  I walked up to the counter and presented my check.  I quickly signed my name using a ball point pen, something the bank still had signs up declaring they were now using for their customers’ convenience, and passed the check to the teller.

“Do you want the bits in single bits, or would you like three Luna bits and sixty normal bits?” she asked.

I couldn’t help it.  There was a part of me that squealed with delight at the thought of carrying a bag full of gold.

“All normal bits please,” I said.

She began counting them out, and then she pushed them into a small canvas bag.  She pulled the draw string closed and pushed it toward me.

“Thank you,” I said.

“You’re welcome, but Mr. Riker, have you considered making another deposit?” she asked.

“I will, but not this week.  This week I wanted to do something special,” I said.

“Very well sir, enjoy your weekend,” she said.

I walked out and headed down the street to Lyra’s and my place.  I stopped when I noticed a large pony trying to work on something in a wagon he had been pulling. I walked over toward him and noticed that it was Big Mac.  He seemed to be intently working on something.

“Need some help?” I asked.

He looked up to see me and gave a half grin.

“Eeeeyup,” he answered.

I took a look at what he had been messing with and realized that he was trying to hook up a set of speakers and a normal cassette deck to the wagon.

“Mind if I set this down on the wagon for a moment?” I asked.

“Nope,” he said.

I nodded and sat my bits down on the wagon while I went to work on the project in front of me.  It didn’t take long to figure out what had happened.  Mac almost had everything together, but he had forgotten to hook up the power supply.  I checked the battery and then I looked under the wagon to make sure that the charging generator was hooked up to the wagon.  Seeing that it was together I quickly hooked up the radio for him.  He passed me a cassette, already out of its case, and I slipped it into the wagon’s now functioning tape deck.  I picked up my bits and watched as he turned the radio up to a listenable level.  The sounds of Billy Idol’s Dancing with Myself began to play.

It surprised me a little.  I had guessed that he would have been into country.  Instead he seemed to happily nod his head back and forth as he pulled his wagon toward the market place.  I held my bag of bits, glad that I had grabbed them, and walked on toward Lyra’s.  I arrived just as Derpy Hooves was making the mail rounds.  I watched as the wall eyed mare stopped and grinned at me.

“DON!” she shouted as she gave me a quick hug.

I returned the hug and watched as she handed me something.

“You got a letter all of the way from Amareica,” she said.

I looked at it and realized that it was from Louis.

“Thanks Derpy!  How’s Dinky and Sparkler doing?” I asked.

“Oh, they’re both doing good.  Dinky has a little colt friend, but she doesn’t think that I know, and Sparkler got her acceptance letter!  She’s getting to go to school in your world!  I’m so proud for her!  It’s somewhere called Yell or something like that.  All I know is she’s really excited!” she said.

I couldn’t help but smile.  Derpy had that ability around anyone.  She was just so bubbly that it was hard not to smile around her.

“Would you like something to drink or a snack?” I asked.

“Maybe later, but I’ve got to finish getting the mail out.  Old Swifty will be mad if I don’t finish my route,” she whispered.

“Oh!  I’m having a congratulations party for Sparkler, and I wanted to invite you and Lyra,” she said.

“Where are you having it?” Lyra’s voice asked.

I turned to see my marefriend coming outside.

“Well, I thought I could have it at home, because I’m trying to have enough money saved back to make sure that we can get Sparkler everything she needs for her new school,” she said.

“Could we have it here?” I asked.

Lyra nodded and then before either of us could say a word we were gathered into a tight hug by the Pegasus.

“Thank you both so much!!!!” Derpy exclaimed.

“It’s fine really,” Lyra managed to get out before we were released.

Derpy pranced around happily for several seconds.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” Derpy asked.

“Let us take care of it all.  We’ll make sure that it’s a good party for her,” I replied.

She smiled, hefted up her mailbag, and began to trot down the street.

“I don’t think that we could have made her any happier,” I said.

“She deserves it,” Lyra said as she stepped back inside, “Wait…  We didn’t get when she wanted to have it!”

Lyra bolted out the door and I ran after her.   After a few minutes we caught up to Derpy, who also felt embarrassed that she didn’t even think to tell us when she wanted to have the party.  She explained that she wanted to have it tomorrow night if at all possible, and Lyra agreed that we would list the entire place as reserved for the party.  Derpy smiled, hugged us both again with enough force I thought my eyes were going to pop out of my head, and started to trot back down the road delivering the mail.

We walked back to the bar, walked inside, and I sat down my first bag of pay before opening the letter.  I took it out and unfolded it.

Yo Donnie Boy,

Are you freaking kidding me? I have to break in a new drinking buddy now? I mean geesh, I knew you were all gaga over the ponies and shit, but going native seems a bit much even for you. Next thing you know you are gonna tell me you are banging some pony chick, or dude. You never really were clear on which team you were batting for, with all that pink and rainbows.

I'm kidding of course, calm down. I am not in the least bit surprised that you managed to find some happiness over there in rainbow horse land. Got a job and everything eh? They must be really hard up for hand jobs. (hah, get it? You got a job using your hands!) Speaking of jobs, the boss is gonna have an aneurism when I tell him. He's been really cranky and twitchy since you bugged out, and they have me training some asshat that doesn't even know how to do a virus removal. Little fucker can sell his ass off though, so it leaves me alone to do the real work.

Don't worry about your stuff, just send me a list of what you need. Pinkie says she can use her connections to get it all sent over as a diplomatic package. That means no customs inspections! (hinthint) Maybe I can get some of my uncle's special imported Jamaican ganj and you can show the locals how to really dance on rainbows. Can horses even get high?

So tell me how things work out, stay in touch, and don't make us humans look bad. I don't wanna have to come over there and kick your ass or anything.

Peace,

Louis

P.S. Pinkie says she’s happy now that she has another excuse to try and get me to visit her home town. No promises though. She also says steer clear of some chick named Lyra, "She's a Man Eater!"

No, seriously. She did the entire fucking "Maneater" song, with choreographed backup dancers. Turns out that waitress we talked to used to date her, and she’s some sorta human obsessed freak. Then again, that doesn't sound any different than Pinkie to me. (Fuck, now I have Superfreak stuck in my head) Peace!

I grinned and shook my head as I finished the letter.  I knew that I needed to go ahead and make that list before too long.  I could go ahead and do it.  I started to think about it when Lyra stood on her hind legs and pulled me into a hug.  I returned the hug and smiled.  She pulled back and looked at the bits on the counter.

“So, what do you want to spend your bits on?” she asked.

A grin crossed my lips.  I really wanted to take her out, somewhere nice, and the first thought was Canterlot.  I knew she had been there before.  She had been in Princess Cadence’s wedding, but I figured there would be something we could do together there that we couldn’t do here.  Of course I also thought about taking a trip out toward Apploosa, Manehattan, or somewhere else, but I stopped myself.  I had the money for the tickets, but I didn’t want to blow it all on that.  I wanted to do something special for her, and then it occurred to me what I would like to do.

“Lyra, how would you feel about us having a picnic?” I asked.

She nodded, and before long the two of us gathered a few things together and left.  I had an idea of where we could go.  I had seen the place a while back.  I figured that I wasn’t the first Brony that had come to Ponyville, and I was certain of it when I visited the lake.  On the other side of it, near the woods, was a small cabin.  Any fan of the series that had read My Little Dashie a Threequel would recognize the cabin.  It had been carefully made exactly like the story had depicted, and even outside of it someone had put up a mailbox with the name Mr. Brian Dash painted on it.

I had seen the cabin the last time Lyra and I had walked by here, and I had to explain to her what it meant.  She stopped, wrapped her head around the idea that someone had wrote a story about Dash ending up in the human world, and then she asked if there was one featuring her.  I left out some of the more, ummm, cloppy stories and instead told her about a My Little Dashie Clone that was written with her being the main character.  She seemed to like the idea that she ended up on Earth, but she wondered why they wrote her having to come back.

That had been the previous weekend, and I knew that going out there this weekend would be fun.  We stopped by Sugarcube corner, and the market square, before we headed out.  Once we were out there we spread out the blanket, set out some of the food we had gotten, and were getting ready to enjoy a little time alone.  It was nearly perfect, or it would have been right before we heard the sound of a muffled scream from the cabin.

We looked at each other and both of us ran toward the cabin.  I tried the door and found it unlocked, which was weird because whoever had built it had left the building locked.  We stepped inside and found two adolescent fillies standing off against each other.  They looked upset, and one of them looked like their cheek was swelling.

“Hey, what’s going on in here?” I asked.

They both turned toward me and I reconized both of them.  I had met Diamond Tiara before, but the other adolescent filly was Silver Spoon.  She looked beyond angry, and behind Diamond standing off to the side, while looking guilty, was a light gray Pegasus colt with dark hair.  The one thing that was different from the show and how he stood now was a small cutie mark showing a storm cloud with a lightning bolt through it.  I reconized Rumble, and I could tell that something had certainly happened here.

“Nothing,” Diamond said as she tried to walk out.

“It wasn’t NOTHING!  I…  I can’t believe you did this Diamond!  I thought we were friends!” Silver Spoon screamed.

“Silver, please,” Rumble said before she shot him a glare.

I watched it unfold and I realized what had happened.  Apparently Lyra realized what happened as well and she shook her head.

“This is low,” she said.

“Why do you care?  It’s not my fault that he practically begged me to come out here,” Diamond said.

I knew there was going to be a fight and I stepped toward them both.

“Okay, we’re stopping this right now.  All three of you need to come out and we’re all heading back to town,” I said.

The group looked at me like I had sprouted another head.  Diamond started to say something, but Lyra’s horn began to glow, and she quickly decided to quiet down.

“I’m sorry about our date,” I said.

“It’s fine, we can always do this again.  Maybe we can even spend a night in here,” she suggested.

We walked behind the two fillies and lone colt.  I knew there was going to be something said at some point, and I hated that Filthy Rich was going to be pulled in on it.  He was quite a bit like the show depicted him, but regardless this was my boss’ daughter, and I was a little nervous about letting him know what we had found.  When we finally arrived back at town it didn’t take long to find somepony, Cheerilee actually, and explain what had happened.  She looked at them and I saw her look at Silver Spoon very sympathetically.

“Don’t worry I’ll take care of it.  You too go ahead and finish your date,” she said.

We looked at each other, nodded, and decided to head back out to the lake.  When we got there it was starting to get night.  Lyra had already let everypony know that the bar was closed for the evening, so we decided to spend the night in the cabin.  If the attention to detail on the outside was amazingly close it didn’t even come close to matching the attention made to the inside of the cabin.

The firepit, Brian’s bedroom, Rainbow Dash’s bedroom, the living room, even a painting of a field with a rainbow hung on the wall.  The entire cabin had been a tribute to a story that was just that.  It was a story.  I knew the real Rainbow Dash was on Earth somewhere.  I didn’t know what she was doing, other than the fact that she had visited Louis and Pinkie for a while, but I couldn’t help but wonder what she would make of this.

We found the bed that Rumble and Diamond Tiara had used and stripped the sheets.  Lyra said she would take them back home with us, wash them, and we could bring them back out here.  We ended up getting a fire going in the fire pit, sitting together, enjoying the meal we had put together, and soon we simply curled up beside each other near the fire.  I ended up putting it out, and the two of us made it up to the unsoiled room, and checked the bed out.  Once I was sure that we didn’t have any surprises waiting on it, or in the room itself, I quickly undressed and crawled into the bed with her.

She snugged close to me as we lay in the cabin.

She turned toward me, and captured me in a kiss.  It was sweet, wonderful, and led to a fantastic moment between the two of us.

“We’ve… we’ve got two sets of sheets to clean now,” she said while she giggled.

“Yeah, but it was fun,” I said.

She snuggled against me and the two of us quickly fell asleep.  When we woke up I crawled out of bed and found my pants.  I had gotten so used to having my phone to check the time that I knew a regular wrist watch was something I wasn’t going to ever really get used to.  Instead I had bought a pocket watch.  I fished it out of my pants pocket and shook my head.  It wasn’t late, not yet, but we had to hurry if we were going to get everything ready for Sparkler’s party.

I quickly got Lyra up, we gathered up the sheets, I dressed, and we headed back toward Ponyville.  Once we were there the two of us went about getting the bar ready for the party, and I had Lyra go take a shower.  When she came back she had me go do the same.  I rushed through the shower and came back down to find Lyra finishing up getting everything set up.  She gave me a happy smile before I started working the grill.

Within a few minutes dozens of ponies began arriving and standing off in the corners and being quiet.  I got what was going on and Lyra and I both got in on the fun.

“Mom? What’s going on?” a young mare asked from outside.

We watched Derpy lead Sparkler inside and once inside I could tell that she was confused about what was going on.  She got about six steps inside before there was a collective “Surprise!” from around the room.

Sparkler made a very quiet squeak before she removed the blindfold.  She looked around to see dozens of ponies she reconized.  It wasn’t long after that we began serving everyone.  The entire mood was fantastic.  It wasn’t long after that everypony began to give a small gift to Sparkler.  Most of it was stuff that she could use in college, and while I hadn’t bought anything I did have something.  I walked over to her and handed her a card I had in my wallet.

She floated it over and looked at it.

“That’s a Fee-bay gift card.  I don’t know if you’ll need it, but it has about ten thousand credits on there.  That’s enough to get a couple of your text books for free,” I said.

She smiled and gave me a quick hug.

“Thanks!” she said.

I walked back and watched the family together.  Dinky, who had walked in behind Derpy earlier, had gotten tired and fell asleep against the table.  Derpy was supporting her with a wing while she told Sparkler how proud she was of her.  Then she said something that made the young mare blush.

“Remember, if you meet a nice stallion or human stallion you’ve got to test the goods first.  Don’t saddle up to anypony if you don’t know what they’re like in bed,” Derpy said.

“MOM!” Sparkler exclaimed.

I couldn’t help but let a small laugh escape.  Finally, the party began to end, and one everyone was gone we began cleaning up.  When we finished I found a piece of paper and a pen.  I figured now was as good of a time to write Louis.

Louis!

Seriously man, thanks, and please tell Pinkie thanks too.  Most of my electronics in the apartment won’t work, although I do have my parents old as the Earth itself VCR and television.  They’re working on getting VHS over here, and I figured we could be trend setters if we had one before everyone else.  So, if you don’t mind to ship those two items.  I also have a pretty large collection of comic books in the closet that I would like to come over, and of course all of my old clothes.  By the way man… I don’t think that they can get my car through the gate.  I’ll get it when I get back, but if you and Pinkie need to borrow it there’s a spare key in my apartment.  Drive it in good health.

About Lyra… to be honest that’s who I’m with.  I’m guessing that we just kind of fit together.  Oh, man…  Say, if you both go into the apartment there’s a video saved on my computer that you might not want Pinkie to watch.  I had intended to delete it off when you told me about Pinkie living with you, but it completely slipped my mind.  Anyway, don’t let her watch it.  I think that it would really bother her.  Sure, it’s fake, but I’d hate to think that something I had saved on there would hurt her feelings.  Before you say that you doubt she could find it remember this is Pinkie Pie we’re talking about.  Everything you’ve told me only enforces that rule.  So, please, delete Cupcakes HD by MisterDavie.  And I wouldn’t suggest you watching it either.

Thanks man,

Don.

PS: How in the hell did she get backup dancers in your house?  Wait… First rule, this is Pinkie Pie…  yeah, got it.  Still… That’s insane man.

I finished the letter, put it into an envelope, and sat it down.  I stretched, yawned, and walked up stairs to our bedroom.