A Duet of Hearts

Another night, another dreamless slumber. Vinyl sat up from the crude makeshift sleeping mat she’d cobbled together over the two weeks or so prior using anything remotely warm, soft, or fluffy that was to be found in the small storage locker. She blinked the sleep from her eyes, and in her half-dazed state could only fathom a single thought;

Oh, buck, it’s cold!

She tried to nestle under her covers a little further, desperately trying to warm up. As secure and well-lit as the locker might have been, the bare concrete blocks that formed the walls didn’t allow for much in the way of insulation, and neither did the flat concrete roof. As she attempted to retreat into a nonexistent haven of warmth beneath her covers, her mind began to wander.

First, it went somewhere comfortable; home. She thought of Ponyville, that quaint little town where everypony knew everypony else. Of course, it wasn’t a little town. It was quite sizeable, as towns go, but the culture of the earth ponies - the significance of family and roots - was heavily ingrained, giving the impression of a far smaller settlement. She thought of her old house and her brother, Longplay, whom she’d left behind when she came to Manehattan. And she thought of Pinkie Pie; her best friend, who she had also left behind in Ponyville. Suddenly, Vinyl felt very empty. She missed home, and her stomach churned, though she couldn’t tell whether it was from hunger or homesickness.

Next, her mind began to paint a picture of what should have happened once she’d arrived in Manehattan. She should have been able to keep her apartment. She should have been able to live like a normal pony for a few months, maybe a couple of years. She should have then been discovered and finally been able to make a name and living as a professional DJ and music producer. This brought her to a simple conclusion.

My brain can be a real jerk.

Finally, her mind forced her to stop daydreaming and leave the covers, which of course meant unintentionally looking at her surroundings again. The locker was dark, illuminated only by cracks in the wall. Even so, Vinyl knew the locker was cramped because of her belongings. Vinyl closed her eyes and looked up. She channelled her magical energies into one particular spot on the ceiling and cast a glowing orb onto it, flooding the small room with a serene pale blue light.

The light allowed her to see her shades lying on the concrete beside her makeshift bed. She reached out mentally and levitated the shades onto her face; they helped to block out the unwelcoming interior of the locker. She then looked at the clock on the floor which had previously rested on her bedside table;

09:30? Ugh. Time to find a job, I guess. Because that’s worked before, right?

Enveloping the locker’s door in a blue aura, she threw it open and bathed the cold room in sunlight. As she stepped out and closed the door, she threw her saddlebag upon her back and extinguished the light she’d created earlier. As the door closed, she resealed it with her magic using a locking spell her brother had taught her. He’d also taught her how to bypass it, naturally. Sighing, Vinyl began to trudge into the town centre.

******

As the ornate clock on the wall struck five, a pair of hooves slammed into the wooden desk.

“How?! How in all the world is it even remotely possible that nopony wants a cellist? There’s probably a garden party per day in Canterlot and yet I am to believe that there is not a single pony looking for a cellist?” asked an indignant Octavia, visibly flustered and with loose hairs sticking out of her mane at every conceivable angle, and foul-tempered after a day-long staring contest with her phone, which she’d lost.

The brown stallion behind the desk stepped backwards and lowered his gaze, his half-moon spectacles sliding slightly down his muzzle as he did so.

“W-well, M-miss Melody, I don’t really think it’s that nopony is looking for a cellist, m-more so that anypony who doesn’t yet have a full band would rather not have you there,” the fear-stricken stallion stammered to his infuriated client. Octavia’s left eye twitched.

“WHAT?!” Octavia yelled, slamming her hoof into the wooden desk, causing the poor stallion behind it to recoil in shock. Octavia felt as though she might burst.

Of all the things to kill one’s career, assaulting a pompous noble? Infuriating! It’s not like everypony else wasn’t thinking about doing it!

“Y-you do have a rather terrifying strength, Ms. Melody, and a temper to boot - you assaulted a regen-” Octavia’s agent stopped talking. He could have sworn he could see something in her snap. Octavia had gone deathly silent; her amethyst eyes burning with the fury of a raging forest fire. She fixed her baleful glare upon the stallion opposite her, feeling an inexplicable urge to inflict unimaginable pain upon the herald of her career’s demise. Fortunately, Octavia’s good sense was still in control, and it managed to convince her that beating a stallion to death would probably be a poor decision - though it did concede that it would certainly be enjoyable. No, another assault certainly wouldn’t help her cause. Instead, Octavia swallowed her rage and forced it down, turning to walk away.

An audible sigh of relief came from the poor agent behind the desk as Octavia stormed out of the office, down the stairs, and out onto the street. Thoughts raced through her mind, not a single one of them coherent, as she walked down the crowded thoroughfare.

She made a right down an alleyway and cursed Blueblood’s name with every step she took until she found a convenient dumpster; convenient because it made the perfect target upon which to unleash her fury. There was a loud metallic thud as her rear hooves slammed into it, and she screamed her rage to the skies. Tears began to roll from her eyes and suddenly, she felt the strength drain from her. Feeling that she could no longer stand, she sat and stared downcast at the floor beneath her, allowing the tears to stream from her face now onto the dirty concrete.

******

Vinyl had been walking for several hours, and to her it felt like an eternity. It was hot in the city - a last hurrah of the dying summer - and she hadn’t eaten a proper meal in a fortnight. Instead, she’d been subsisting on scraps and whatever she could take without anypony noticing. She trudged down a thoroughfare that, even in the evening, was relatively busy, with pedestrians and carriages travelling up and down it. The last time she’d seen a clock, it had been around five.

At least I’ve lost weight, the part of her mind that enjoyed black humour said. That part was then promptly beaten up by the rest of her mind, because the truth of the matter was that simply walking was proving to be a feat of enormous strength. She’d gazed into the windows of countless establishments by this point hoping to see something that would hint at an available job, but to no avail. She could feel the heat radiating from the stone below her hooves, her throat was dry and it felt as though her brain was about to actually burst out of her skull. As she walked, she kept her mind occupied by contemplating the events of the past fortnight, if only to help ignore the feeling of sickness mixed with hunger in her stomach.

Since the encounter with Octavia at Blue’s, very little had changed in Vinyl’s life. Every day, she’d ventured to the city in an attempt to find a job; anything, as long as it was enough to get her a train home. But nopony wanted to pay her for just a day so she could go home. More than once, she’d considered other ways to get money, all of them shameful and of varying degrees of legality. She stopped outside an office building, she sighed.

I could really use a drink right about now.

Vinyl’s mind drifted back to Blue’s again, taking the thought of a drink as its cue.

Wait. What was it Octavia said?

“This is my address. Come by sometime, we can have another drink. I‘ll pay, of course,”

It would be nice to see her again.

And with that, Vinyl decided. Even though it meant another wound to her pride in that Octavia would once again be paying for her to drink, Vinyl summoned the energy to reach for the clasp on her saddlebags. Her head still splitting - and the magic worsening the pain - she fumbled around her bag with a pale blue tendril until she felt a small square of cork near the bottom, which she reached for mentally and pulled from the bag, along with the city map she’d acquired shortly after moving to Manehattan, searching for the street Octavia had written. She found it, then got her bearings from the plaque on the office building, which had the address written on it. Apparently, it was a talent agency, and the street she was on wasn’t too far from Octavia’s apartment. Vinyl thanked Celestia for that small mercy. She turned - perhaps too quickly - and her head began to spin.

Whoa. Maybe turning a little slower would have been better.

After regaining her balance, the feeling in her stomach worsened. But she paid it no mind. At last, she had a destination. A goal. And she was going to reach it. She began to trudge to the nearby alleyway through a stream of ponies walking down the street, and turned down it, passing a dumpster before following the alleyway left. Another dizzy spell as she turned caused her to lose her footing and stumble into a building to her side. Her vision went blurry.

What’s happening?!

Fear spurred her onwards; she turned right, panting as she walked from both fear and exertion. But then she slowed, and her vision blurred even further. Even in spite of this, she could see the carriages and ponies on the street at the end of the alley, all going about their own lives, rushing in all directions. She felt as though she were about to throw up, and colour began to fade. She was going to pass out; she could feel it. A stack of cardboard boxes wasn’t far from her. Her legs were unstable and she was stumbling like a deer fawn that wasn’t yet sure how to walk, but she continued. Then she faltered and swayed a little too far, losing her balance. She landed in the cardboard with a flump, but that didn’t matter anymore. Her vision had already faded to black.

******

The tears had stopped a while ago now; Octavia had simply sat in the alley sobbing when they dried up. She looked up from the ground slowly. Shakily, she got to her hooves. Her head felt heavy and her head ached from the crying.

I want to go home. I think I have alcohol somewhere. Alcohol is always good.

She slowly continued homewards down the snaking alleyway. She rounded a corner. Then she stopped dead in her tracks.

Oh sweet Celestia...