Chapter 6 ~ Dashing Desperados

It was only when Daydream had went past the ponies and the fillies, who had just woken up, and back into the wagon that she realized what had happened and how she had reacted.

There were two things on her mind as she climbed into one of the beds.

1.) She just had unintentionally put forth what had sounded like a confession to Thousand Miles of all ponies.

2.) She had completely and utterly overreacted.

When you overreact on such an occasion, does that mean you have feelings for the other pony? Can a pony truly have feelings for an egotistical, narcisstical ball of “I love myself”?

Was there any chance in the name of Celestia to rectify this mistake?

She sighed, looking around the room. The decor was simple, an old carpet from New Hoofington in the middle and a lamp that was always shining in a soothing blue light. The wagon had a number of four bunk beds and by each lower bed was a small window. So there was a total of eight beds. That was one of the reasons why the fillies had the same time to sleep and most adults another. Most adults meaning aside from Three Strings, who slept whenever the hay he wanted. Being the only real musician he had that right considering the most he slept in a night would be three hours before somepony’d wake him for a song. For some reason that always happened.

The fillies each had one of the lower beds for themselves when they slept. It was better that way in case of an emergency, they could get out to the guard wagon pretty fast. Unlike the southerners it was typical in the equestrian lands and the northern realm that the guards had one or, if it was a bigger caravan, more wagons which could serve as mobile fortresses to act as safehouses during fights and ambushes. It made for a safer feeling and had saved many lives, even though the added weight meant that at least one earth pony was needed to pull one of those small forts.

Still, it wasn’t that kind of emergency that made her think. When they had drawn straws who would sleep in what bed she had gotten the same one as Bittersweet and that was the youngest of fillies. Until now only Whistle had gotten her Cutie mark, which was a hundred twenty-eighth note. Even with that, they were all close, between Whistle and Bittersweet was only half a year. Still it was an open secret that the filly still had a problem keeping the bed dry. It happened and they were rich enough to afford enough spare bed linens, even though the mattress had suffered over the time. Not to say anything of washing. But that wasn’t much of a problem to anypony. Anypony but the one she shared a bed with. Still, the bed was dry for once so that wouldn’t be an issue.

Still, she sighed, “How the hay did that happen?”

“What?” came a small voice from across the room and as Daydream looked, she found Golden Bit crawling out from beneath the bed across the room. The unicorn filly had a long, rose mane and a yellow coat with rose patches. Her eyes were lavender and reminded Daydream of sparkling gemstones, always filled with such great curiosity. She wore a dark green cloak with a small coat of arms on it. A cloaked golden filly on a bright blue background.

The sign belonged to the ‘Cutie Mark Crusaders’. It was an ancient tradition for northern blankflanks to actively search for their Cutie Marks, mostly because that way they could still have fun in the wasteland and socialize with other caravan ponies. Nopony knew when exactly the whole crusading had started but that didn’t diminish it’s importance as an equestrian tradition.

The little filly came out, only to put her head beneath the bed again and then dragged a small suitcase plastered with paper with her name on it forth. Everypony in the caravan had such a suitcase beneath their bed. They had gotten them on Diamond Dust's behalf, to ensure thieves didn’t get the emotional valuables mixed up with the stuff in the storage.

Daydream leaned forward, looking at the filly, “Why aren’t you outside?”

“Why aren’t you answering?” the filly asked, spitting the suitcase’s fastener out.

“Adult stuff, nothing you should care about. They’re singing a song, you know.”

Golden Bit looked, pointed at the opened window by her bed, “I’m not stupid, I keep the window open.”

That was half a lie, Daydream knew. Golden Bit kept the windows open because outside there was fire. The little filly was afraid of the dark, not just because of the darkness itself, but because of the childish thought that cinderwolves and other beasts waited beyond it, only to be shied away by the warm fires the ponies lit in friendship and harmony.

“Still,” Daydream said, trying to get away further from the original topic, “shouldn’t you be outside.”

Golden Bit shook her head, “I’ve got another bit for my collection.”

The proud tone in her voice was indicator enough for Daydream, this was the safe route, the route away from her blunder with that dark blue pegasus. Golden Bit loved telling ponies about her collection. “What have you added now, can I see?” she asked, standing up from the bed.

The filly looked at her, a grin spreading across her face, “Yes, yes!” she said out loudly, hopping around the suitcase enthusiastically. That was how Golden Bit was. The filly had an affinity for gathering things and it didn’t matter what, as long as they were beautiful in her eyes. She opened the suitcase and revealed her prized treasures.

Daydream spotted various things. There was a shard of glass, which the filly had proclaimed belonged to an old cider bottle that she had found. Not just any cider, though, but one that had been made with the apples growing beneath the sun. Then there was a snowglobe with a rainbow colored castle in it and a tag on it saying: ‘Where we’ll meet again’. Also there was an ominous piece of paper, stating:

Remember

The Songs in Silence

They-

Then, there was a piece of an insect wing, old and dried out. She had told her that it was a changeling wing but there weren’t any changelings anymore, so that was that. There were some bits from different eras. Some had pictures of two princesses on them who clearly had way too much fun posing, then there were some with only one princess,  then with two and then there were coins with lots of different ponies, probably all important. Aside from the coins with obvious royalty on them she counted 7 different pony faces on the coins.

Of course it didn’t stop there, there was also a black piece of metal, which Old Shield had once used as a good luck charm. He told her it worked wonders. Also a red feather with an orange tip, which everypony thought belonged to a phoenix, which was even more ridiculous than the whole changeling-theory since phoenixes were gone with the princesses and/or belonged to the realm of myths and legends.

Golden Bits last addition, the one she had been given a few days before the trio had joined up with the caravan, was a griffon feather. She had told the three that it had belonged to Rendrik Sturzflug, Champion of the fifty-three Wind Clans, the greatest hero of griffon-kind. Daydream had never ever heard of him, so that griffon had probably been lying about his importance. She found that griffons did that.

Those were the treasures she had seen and if you took all the stories away, which were probably either lies or plain wrong anyway, each and every piece of it was junk. Still, she smiled for the filly, trying to look excited as anything was better than talking about the life and lovings of Daydream the earth pony.

The filly got the piece out. “I found it yesterday before we stopped. Right on the way and I just looked at it and though ‘Wow’ and then I went to it and looked at it for a moment then Old Shield shouted something and I picked it up in a hurry and then we stopped and I totally forgot I had it then I went to sleep and it fell out of my pocket and then I woke up and then I just had to put iz to the others and then you came in and now I am showing it to you.”

Daydream nodded and took a closer look at the thing. It was a string, like from a music instrument, made of pure gold. The thing looked old, how old she didn’t know and somehow, Daydream felt not very good looking at it. No, that was wrong. She felt like her eyes were seeing the string and yet her brain was telling her it wasn’t there. It gave her a headache.

“It’s cool, right. I bet it belongs to a ghost.”

Daydream knew a pony with a golden instrument, but she doubted the singer to appear here. That would be bad. Where the singer appeared bad things followed. So she reassured herself that it didn’t belong to that pony and just nodded.

“It’s...nice,” she said, fumbling for the right word. She hadn’t found it but what she had proclaimed would have to do. At least now she had forgotten whatever she had come here for in the first place. That was positively positive.

She let Golden Bit lock her new treasure away and then they went out to join the singing. Luckily for the earth pony Thousand Miles was nowhere to be found, probably still sitting on her roof and thinking about blue skies and grey rainclouds.

Then they went packing their things and putting the lanterns on. Lemon Cake, being a unicorn and all, knew but one other spell, that had taken him years of studies. A magical fire, enlightening the lanterns in the bright and diverse flames. It spared them using all the candles up and looked prettier than any normal flame. Only after all the lanterns on all the wagons were lightened and every piece of attire that was able to make sound made loose enough to constantely produce sound they could start pulling the wagons and move towards the Oaktongue.

The job of setting everything in the storage wagon straight fell to Daydream and, of course, Diamond Dust. The ponies entrusted everything considering organisation to the unicorn and Daydream could understand why. It had been a disorganized mess before and within three days after their arrival Dimey had organized and categorized everything the ponies carried around. If there ever was a pony she’d trust with putting order into chaos, it would be that mare.

Even now it was basically just folding up blankets, putting them in the right position - so the green ones and the blue or red ones wouldn’t get mixed up -and then marking it on the checklist. They wouldn’t be here for much longer but Diamond Dust made it a thing to leave the ponies they stole from in a good position. It was a kind of courtesy she applied to make herself feel better and for Daydream it worked.

“So, she’s got a golden string now? Sounds neat,” the unicorn said uninterested as she counted the stacks of firewood.

“Yeah,” Daydream answered, hoping for more of a clarification. “It seemed valuable, too...somewhat,” she then added and took a good look at her comrade, who still hadn’t stopped counting.

“They don't need to restock. Not at Oaktongue. Hay, we don’t need to stop at Oaktongue at all, actually,” the elder of the two ponies remarked, before she looked in Daydreams direction. “And no, I didn’t make them separate the stuff that was important to them so we could go after stuff they hold with a personal value. You know how it goes. We steal from them, doesn’t mean we have to hit them hard. We only need enough to get through next week until then we’re sure to catch up with another caravan.”

Daydream smiled. She knew the words perfectly. ‘They’re going to betray us at one point, so it’s better if we do it first. At least then they’ll know we would never really harm them.’ That was the code they followed, the code they would always follow. Daydream looked over the organized thing, spotting three packed saddlebags.

“Is that?” she asked curiosly.

“Ditzy was asking me why I was separating stuff, so I told her that I hadn’t yet categorized the stuff in the bags. Ditzy being Ditzy, she believed me. I felt so bad I gave her my own treasure after that.” The unicorn sighed. Even she had taken a liking to Ditzy, it was weird. Everypony felt kinda attached to that clumsy, somewhat half-witted pony. And giving her her treasure, Daydream understood the gesture, because she had done so before, too. Dimey’s treasure was an old, broken pocket ley-clock. It was worth more than the entire caravan, Diamond knew but would’ve never admitted it. She never even tried to sell it and Ditzy being Ditzy, she’d never try to sell it, too. In fact she would stash it away and probably look at it every night, just dazzled at the beauty of the mechanics that once were overflowing with magic.

“Do you think they’ll hate us?” Daydream then asked.

“I dunno. I like these ones well enough, so I’ll keep track of them however I can. One day I’ll return and repay ‘em double.”

“Yeah, best get some mattress protection as well. Bittersweet will be so happy,” Daydream suggested.

To that, Diamond turned her head, again with the slightest hint of a smile. “Reminds me of that one Nightmare Night when I and Riverside went to the-”

“NO!” Daydream yelled. That was a story she wanted to be never ever mentioned again. Diamond just grinned, although she knew that by just bringing that story up she had effectively ended the small talk, or every talk. She could live with that, though and went back to accounting.

The rest of the packing went underway smoothly. As said before, as long as Diamond was in charge, there wouldn’t be any other possibilty. So they saddled up and moved farther. The group had a total of two unicorns capable of navigation: Lemon Cake and Diamond. Even though the latter was better, she had always told Lemon Cake to do the job, because he was the leader and the leader doing the navigation was always a good thing, even though he feared a diamond dog assault. Everypony did that close to the Oaktongue, Daydream found. The actual number of attacks was below the average. You had to expect two caravans a month passing by and once every two years one would get attacked, statistically. At least that’s what she got from the mathematicians up by the Green Spoon.

Still, even with statistics backing up that the possibilities of an attack were close to zero percent, the job of a caravan guard was to be paranoid, as Old Shield put it. So both he and Ditzy treaded carefully by the sides of the wagons, the lamellar bardings strapped on, covering their bodies completely down to the legs and hiding their faces. Old Shield always looked particularly funny in armor, since he tied his beard together so it looked like reins, like the ones that had been used by the first diamond dog knights during the legendary sack of Canterlot. They went on about their way. Being an earth pony, Old shield walked between the wagons and checked if anything beneath them was amiss. Ditzy took to the skies. The wagons were pulled by Book Binder and Streamline, who walked besides each other, either giving the other the evil eye. The guardwagon was pulled by Lemon Cake, who earned her name ‘Strong Lady’ for no other reason than the obvious one. She was the only pony who was still able to pull that coach.

The other ponies straddled by the sides of the wagons. Thousand made it a hobby to help out the guards. Even though she was very obnoxious about it, they gladly accepted their help. Diamond talked with Lemon Cake, with her sitting on the stairs of the storage wagon and him walking beside her.

Three Strings was sitting on the remaining wagon and plucked happily on his violin, adding a small melody to the cacophony of metals ringing and hammering and scratching each other, while Whistle laughed to it and tried to make up lyrics on the spot to the mess of a soundtrack. To put it mildly, she failed. Hard.

Storm Cloud being a young pegasus and all tried to fly but only managed to hover a few inches above the ground for several seconds, earning some laughter from the remaining two fillies. Thus, again flapping her wings with rapid speed, she chased after them, leaving a small cloud of dust behind them. Bittersweet turned around a corner and jumped unto Daydream’s back, laying still. Storm, focusing only on the ground, chased past them, then locked Golden Bit as target.

The grayish green earth pony called Bittersweet giggled, her curled, bright orange mane bouncing up and down. She looked at Daydream with her bright blue eyes, which where referenced often by Book Binder when he talked about the color of the sky.

“Sorry, evasive maneuvers had to be taken,” she laughed and jumped down to the ground after making sure the coast was clear. Bittersweet was a nice enough pony when she was happy but make her sad and she’d make sure you’d notice it.

Before Daydream could answer, somepony else added herself to the conversation. “You sure look like you had fun,” the voice sounded light-hearted enough to identify the speaker before she landed on the ground.

Ditzy Dare, the most famous and notorious guardpony on the westside of Canterlot landed with her front hooves first, only to get the angle wrong and one second later hit the ground face first. She always hit the ground first with either her head or her posterior. Nopony quite knew how she did that but everypony was sure that she should never give flying lessons to anypony.

“Yeah, Stormy failing is always funny!” the little filly proclaimed. Ditzy, standing up quickly and trying to look like the fall never happened, laughed at that, childish as she was. Daydream found her motherly side and tried to speak as softly to the filly as possible.

“She’s young, she can’t fly that good yet,” she said. Ditzy nodded to that but on the other hand, there weren’t many topics Ditzy didn’t agree on with every party involved.

“She says she’ll be a guard one day,” Bittersweet then said, trying to sound mocking again but Daydream shot that down immediately.

“That’s wonderful, then she can protect all of us,” Storm was fine enough to be a guard. The earth pony didn’t know whether she had the killing down, but on the other hoof, as far as she knew everypony could do it. Stooping so low was hard for all of them, but they could do it and guards, they had to do it. Since there were many things out in the world that aimed to kill.

“I hope she doesn’t need to become one,” Ditzy said, “It’s hard work, I slept like for, like, only six hours in the last few days and Old Shield said I can’t eat sweets for breakfast anymore.” The pony frowned, “He’s so unfair sometimes.”

“Considering we bought all the sweets they had from the last caravan and they’re nearly gone again I kinda see his point. You eat far too much Candy," Daydream said and Bittersweet giggled at the guard being scolded by the newcomer. At least Daydream interpreted the giggle that way.

The armored mare grumbled beneath her helmet, “It gives me energy and it tastes good, also, we didn’t just buy candy, we bought toothpaste, too. If it weren’t for me nopony here would care about tooth hygiene.”

Daydream raised an eyebrow, somehow Ditzy brought this up in every direction. First candy, then brushing of teeth. It was pretty much THE thing she prided herself with. Normally, Daydream would’ve made a rebuttal but this time she decided against it.

“Yeah, you’re right. Sorry.”

Ditzy smiled proudly and flapped away again, for once getting the recognition she deserved. Bittersweet looked after her, “Brushing your teeth isn’t that important,” she decided and then walked off again.

And that, Daydream found, was her last talk with those two. A normal, simple conversation. It made her feel even worse. Still it had to be done, sooner or later somepony was going to betray the other and they had to be first. And they’d repay silver in gold. That’s what they would do. She would go back and work together with Book and everything would be fine. That’s what Daydream decided, that’s how she would do it. This wasn’t the last time but this time she had found a direction for the everafter.

She would work together with Book, she’d tell him then, when she had given back all they had stolen. No, she'd tell him when they had given them treasures twice as much as what they had stolen. Then they could settle down and do what they dreamed of. Everything would be fine and nopony would have to be afraid on the ruined roads anymore. Yeah, that was how she wanted it to be. The singer probably, too. Why had she led them away from Manehatten if not to give them a chance for the happy ending they had always dreamed of but not dared to hope for.

That was the moment. The sign they had given each other had been simple. First, Diamond would make sure that the distance to the Oaktongue was correct and the approach was the right one, too. Then she told Lemon Cake that she had to check on something in the wagon. The next thing that happened was that Thousand Miles flew towards Daydream and gave her instructions to what appeared to be a prank. Then she lifted herself up over the roof of the storage wagon and unto the front, giving the others a sign to ignore her. They all knew they were friends and good friends pranked each other sometimes. Daydream moved around the side to the other end of the storage wagon. It was the only one with two doors. Most moving storages had them, since accessibility was the most important thing with these things. They listened in and as planned, the moment Diamond reached the number ‘3’ inside, they both opened the doors quickly and closed them behind them.

“That’ll never work,” Daydream heard Bittersweet say behind her but the filly was now in her past and hopefully future.

Inside the three met up by the saddlebags. Diamond had spent the end of their accounting job adding things they would need for the time they’d spend alone again. Wood for fire, blankets to sleep under, food to eat. The basics really. Southerners wore clothing all the time, Daydream had heard but clothing was only baggage in their line of work. They couldn’t afford to wear armor or even a coat. These things would hinder them when it would come to the most important thing about stealing.

“Do we need to do this?” Daydream asked one final time, like always and like always the others interpreted that as a question reaffirm their morale. This time, though, there was doubt in Diamond’s eyes.

“We pay silver back in gold you two. We’ve written the letters,” Thousand Miles said.

The letters, ah yes. Daydream had forgotten. They had prepared the letters after the first week. Letters of apologies and promises and over the time, they had gotten longer and longer. Daydream knew hers was now one huge confession to Book Binder that she’d definetely go for a professional relationship with him when she felt ready to trust somepony outside her friends and when they didn’t need to do this anymore.

She had confessed all her thefts in it, all her lies and truths and doubts. Still, she had decided not to tell anypony about the singer. Nopony ever talked about the singer. Talking about him would only bring about bad luck. That was what they didn’t need in a situation like this.

“Okay,” the earth pony said finally and looked over the unicorn and the pegasus. They were the perfect team. They trusted each other, they liked each other, they would never betray or lie to each other. When something was said between them, it was honest. They would repay the kindness done to them, truly. But not now, now was the time to act first.

“Then, Ladies, saddle up!” The order came quick and everypony took a saddlebag.

That was the last moment. Three ponies in the dark, surrounded by the sounds of a life they all longed for. Daydream knew. A blue sky above, steady roots beneath and whatever the unicorn wanted. These things could be found here, in a way. But there was also another way. A true blue sky, real roots beneath. The singer was calling and they had to follow, only then they could achieve true happiness.

“Friends trust each other,” the cyan unicorn pony with the indigo colored stockings and an indigo and blue mane with three indigo spots on each side of the face said. Her dark blue eyes shined with forming tears.

“Friends walk down the same path,” answered the dark blue pegasus with the purple, wild mane and the brass goggles. For once her smug smile was replaced with an expression of anxiousness and possibly fright.

“True friends are never apart,” she said. She had an ice blue coat Book Binder found dazzling and her hair compassed of two shades of aquamarine. Also, she had bright blue eyes, often said to be the color of water. As they positioned themselves before the exit that led to the front,she knew why.

She didn’t want to leave the caravan.

Yet, Thousand managed to snap her out of it, “But we’re not just friends, we’re more,” she said and her grin returned.

They’d return silver in gold.

Why?

Because they were magnificent ponies who could do that. This trio had a long standing record on opening debts and paying them back later. Sure, it was all with stolen goods but in the end that didn’t matter. The only thing that mattered was the thing they had told everypony they ever met when they were asked what three beautiful fillies were doing alone in the desert.

They had the time of their life.

With that, the unicorn kicked the door in. Every available gaze turned to them. In that moment, she felt it again, the reason why they were doing all this. The unicorn had positioned herself in the middle, standing on her hind legs, one hoof stretched to the sky. The Pegasus was to her right, spreading her wings. Daydream found herself on the left, standing with all for hooves firmly on the ground. All were posing and then they yelled to that pose.

“We’re the Dashing Desperados!”

VI

~Dashing Desperados~

End