Making Progress

by Filler

Rating: everyone
Tags: My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Other, Slice of Life
Length: 5225

A collection of stories under 1,000 words.

A collection of stories under 1,000 words.

Published 2012-05-22 10:14:01 UTC
Last updated 2015-08-06 09:09:29 UTC

Making Progress

Screw Loose could feel it—she was getting better and better with each passing day. She sat in her cell, sitting on her bed and wondering just how long it would be until they would finally discharge her from the hospital.

She sat alone on her bed with a tired smile across her lips, watching the fluorescent lights above her head as they hummed their steady tone. Ever since a stray brick struck her on the back of her head, she was confined to the psychiatric ward of Ponyville General Hospital. Now, after much therapy and treatment, she was up and about again.

She heard a few knocks on the door to her room, causing her ears to perk up.

“Come in!” she called.

Doctor Stable, a brown unicorn colt in a lab coat and with a stethoscope around his neck, briefly appeared in the circular window on the door to her room, then walked through the door. He carried in with him a bowl of soup on a metal tray.

“Hello, Ms. Loose,” said Doctor Stable. “How are you today?”

“Just fine, doctor,” she replied, lying down on the bed. “I’ve done absolutely nothing all day. I sat here on my bed, watched the clouds outside float by, thought about how nice it’d be to get some fresh air...”

“I can relate, Ms. Loose. Oh, that reminds me! Your daughter told me to pass on a message to you before she comes to visit tomorrow.”

Screw Loose chuckled. “Is it Wednesday already? It feels like she came in just yesterday.”

“Time does tend to fly when you’re doing nothing, Ms. Loose. Let’s see; what was it, now...” Doctor Stable looked up at the ceiling, holding a hoof to his chin. “Ah, yes! Your daughter said she won first place at her school’s spelling bee.”

Screw Loose smiled. Her daughter had always been a studious, hard worker—the kind of child she wished she had been. Instead, she never moved past being just a grunt at the carpenter shop she worked at, and as a result, she could never quite give as much as her daughter often asked her for. She did, however, try her best to provide for her. As a single mother, it was the least she could do.

“She never ceases to amaze me,” she said, sighing wistfully.

“If you’d like, I can call her to tell her how proud you are of her.”

“Thank you, but no. I’d prefer to do it myself, in person.”

“If you say so.”

Doctor Stable floated the bowl off the tray and into Screw Loose’s lap.

“So,” said Screw Loose, “how long do you think it will be before I’m finally out of here?”

“Ms. Loose, you know that I can’t tell you that! There are procedures we doctors must follow, values we must uphold! There are still tests to run, evaluations to undergo! To simply tell you something like that would be a slap in the face of the entire practice!”

“So...”

“So about a month, if not less.”

They shared a laugh.

Doctor Stable turned to leave. “Well,” he said, “it looks like you’re doing quite well. You’ll be out of here soon enough. Try not to stress yourself.”

“Glad to hear it,” she replied. She held the bowl her lips, gently blew on the soup, and took a sip.

“I’ll leave you to your meal now,” said the doctor.

As the doctor left the room, Screw Loose held the bowl up to her lips again. The soup slid down her throat, making her feel warm inside. She couldn’t wait to get her life back.

*

Doctor Stable closed the door to Screw Loose’s room.

“How was she?” asked the nurse waiting for him outside.

He shook his head. “Not good,” he said. “She appears to be regressing. She’s in her own little world now, like a turtle drawing into its shell. I tried talking to her, but she just kept muttering incoherent nonsense to herself. I don’t think she even saw me.”

The two looked into the room through the small circular window on its door. Screw Loose was muttering to herself as she drank the soup, letting it dribble out of the corners of her mouth and onto her garb.

“At least she can feed herself,” he said. He sighed. “I’m not sure what to tell her daughter tomorrow. Barring some kind of miracle, I don’t think Ms. Loose will ever get better.”

The doctor and nurse walked down the hall and out of the ward. Screw Loose, still sitting on her bed, placed the bowl back on her lap and stared emptily at the fluorescent lights with a tired smile across her lips.

Fabulous

Okay. Y’got a moment to listen to my story? Well, it don’t matter, ’cause I’m tellin’ it to you anyways.

So, here’s the deal: My brother Big Macintosh is eloping! Hopped on a train and just upped and left. That’s all his note said. “I’m getting married, so I’m just upping and leaving.”

Why’s this a problem, you ask? I’ll tell you why—he ain’t ever said anything about a girlfriend! Not to me, not to Apple Bloom, not to Granny Smith—nopony! We’re heartbroken! I don’t know who his special filly is, and nopony I asked knew, either. Not even Cheerilee. All I know is that sometimes, when he goes into town, he hides a letter in his harness.

I followed him once. It was really weird, and I think he might’a noticed me. That’s why I only followed him once. But that’s not important.

What’s important is what he did that day. First, he went into Sugarcube Corner. That was weird, because I’ve never seen Big Macintosh eat sweets and cakes and the like. He absolutely hates the stuff. But, when I saw him walkin’ outta Sugarcube Corner that day, he was carryin’ two boxes of cupcakes on his head and a whole cake on his back. Couldn’t see what was written on them though; Pinkie decided to pop up behind me while I was spyin’ on him from the bushes, and when I looked again, he was gone.

So then I went lookin’ for him. Found him comin’ outta Rarity’s place with a bag. When I asked her about it the next day, she said that he bought some really snooty tux and that his visit was “most peculiar.” Big Macintosh wanted somethin’ fancy. Really fancy, or as she said how he put it, “Fancy enough for Canterlot.” I’m guessin’ that’s where he went.

After that, he went to the post office and mailed his letter along with the sweets. He wrote somethin’ on a slip’a paper and dropped in the mailing package, too. Apparently, he’s been doin’ this a lot, ’cause the mailponies joked about him “finally get’n to be with his special somepony.” Then he went home and told Apple Bloom that he’d been just strollin’ ’round town. For a few hours. And that was the last time he went out like that, a couple’a days ago.

He left in the middle of the night, and I found a buncha letters stuffed under his bed. Lots of big, fancy words and curled l’s and t’s and all that. Kept mentioning how well her “best of the best boutique” was doin’ as if whoever wrote the letter was like Rarity, ’cept more famous—a lot more famous. The letter I found with the most recent date told Big Macintosh to “look fabulous, so I can be seen with you on the streets and nopony will become suspicious.” Guess whoever wrote the letter doesn’t want to be seen with some country bumpkin. The signatures were unreadable—really curly, always messy.

So that’s that. Big Macintosh is gone, and I have no idea where to find him, ’cept he might be in Canterlot. But I’ll find him, even it means combing all’a Equestria.

A Last Meal

Last Request brought in the silver, domed dish and placed it on the table in front of the condemned inmate. Lifting the dome, he revealed a feast fit for a king: two succulent century moonflowers seasoned with saffron and thyme, fresh strawberries straight from the field, a glass of aged Cloudsdalean white wine, and a slice of chocolate cake the size of his hoof.

Cyanide Sweets craned down her neck and took a bite of the moonflower, chewed twice, and slowly swallowed.

"How is it?" asked Last Request, not showing emotion.

Cyanide Sweets pushed the dish away, and propped up her head with a hoof, letting her gaze fall downwards. She heaved a heavy sigh, then gave a dry, bitter laugh. "I should have asked for potatoes like Ma used to make," she said.

She stood up, rapping a hoof against the table, and told the guard, "I'm done here. Let's go."

As the guard took her down the hall to the needle room, Last Request put the dome back on the dish and carried it back to the kitchen.

Author's Note

Copied and pasted from an old Ponychan thread.

Taken

After hours of breathing the rancid air that could only be left by rotten potatoes, Prince Blueblood finally had the old burlap sack lifted from over his head. Much to his chagrin, however, his horn was still laced with countermagic and his hooves were still tied together like a pig’s.

He peered around the room—no, the dungeon he was now in. It certainly felt like a dungeon. It had no windows, the air was dank and stagnant, the walls were made of uncut cobblestone. It wouldn’t have surprised him to learn that hundreds of spiders made their homes in the crevices of this place. There was one door, made of what had to be solid steel, at the other end of the room. At its top was a small slot, and when he tried to peer through it, it slid shut. There was no handle. The room-dungeon had one light, a lamp, shining in his face, and blindingly so.

“Untie me at once!” he shouted. Or tried to shout, as he also had his mouth taped shut, so it came out as “Mmph mmph mm-mph!”

And with that, a glow of magic surrounded the tape and tore it off, causing the prince to let loose a colorful stream of expletives.

The standard thoughts that one thought after being kidnapped went through his head. First, who grabbed him? The last thing he remembered was riding his aunt’s new chariot back to the castle, crashing it somewhere, stumbling about the eastern quarter drunk out of his mind, and emptying the contents of his stomach into some unlucky sod’s bird bath. Second, why was he grabbed? The answer to that, of course, depended on the answer to the first.

“Who are you?!” he demanded.

But there came no answer from the door. He shouted again, but the door remained silent as the stone in the walls. He pondered who it could have been. The last two times he was kidnapped, it was for ransom, but he was released after the kidnappers learned that nopony at the castle was willing to pay for his return. It couldn’t be for ransom. An old flame, perhaps? He didn’t leave many of them on good terms.

“Twinkleshine? Is that you? Moonbeam? Poppy Dreams?”

No, it couldn’t have been them. If those three were willing to kidnap him, they’d be willing to kill him. That also ruled out about nine others.

He hummed pensively. “Heartlace? Marigold? I’m pretty sure you were the ones I didn’t infect.” He hummed again, then bit his lips.

“Are you... Pierce?”

Silence. Perhaps not.

“Cloverleaf, if it’s you, I’ll pay all those tabs. I’ll pay! My aunt’s the herself-damned princess; you know that! I swear I’ll pay!”

More silence.

He squirmed around on the ground, his hooves still tied, the light still in his face. He had no idea who was behind that door. Whoever it was—he knew this much—had something against him. Something personal.

And until he found out who it was or whoever it was was satisfied, he would keep shouting blind apologies into the emptiness.

*

Atop the observation tower, Princess Luna stepped away from the scrying orb. Princess Celestia and her new intelligence force kept watching.

“Surely,” said Luna, looking down at the royal dungeon, “there must be a better—or at least, a more ethical way to test new interrogation techniques.”

“Perhaps,” replied Celestia, “but I find demonstration and hands-on experience to be as enlightening as it is rewarding for both myself and my students. Now keep listening; I want to know what he did to my new chariot.”

Author's Note

Originally written for TacticalRainboom's April Minific Writeoff. Second place out of twelve. Whoo!

The controls were smashed by the falling debris...

The controls were smashed by the falling debris. Every alarm sounded off in the bridge, but Apple Bloom paid attention to none of them--she knew what they all meant, and there was nothing she could do about them.

Outside was the enemy ship, void of activity. Every soul on it--pony, griffon, deer, zebra--had already been lost. The vessel was an empty husk of its former self. The dreadnought that Apple Bloom and the rest of Ponyville had feared for so long, the Night’s Phoenix. From the ashes it would be reborn, Twilight would tell her. She’d seen it herself time and time again; it coming back after they thought it had been destroyed. But there was no rebirth here, this time. It was grey and decrepit, its paint long worn off. There were no lights, no sparks among the cinders.

The nanoplague had gotten to it, and now it was getting to her.

Her crew had already evacuated when they realized it. It was hardly noticeable at first--there was a leak, a small one, in the sixth boiler room. Scootaloo tried to seal it off, and that served them well enough, or so they thought. When Scootaloo returned to the leak an hour later, the plague had worn out the amalgam she used along with a stretch of the pipe, and the floor became a lake of scalding hot water.

Scootaloo had chalked it up to it being the pipe being old and worn, as it had been, but the amalgam had worried her, as the investigative team found no trace of it on the floor. At least she had some suspicion that something else was going on; had they tried to head back to port, they would have spread the nanoplague as their lifeless ship crashed into whatever was in its trajectory.

It wasn’t until the reconnaissance team found the Night’s Phoenix that they realized what had happened. They tried to warn the rest of the crew, but by then, the nanoplague had spread to the living quarters and the engine. The ship had barely enough power to launch its pods. Whoever could leave safely did so. That was everyone except Apple Bloom.

Now Apple Bloom sat in the captain’s chair, watching her screen flash red and yellow with tiny little exclamation points in triangles pop up repeatedly, warning her of what she already knew and telling her to do what she’d already tried and failed to do. It was only a matter of time before the air supply ran out--or worse, before the plague ate through the ship’s hull.

She went through her options. The ship was drifting forwards, towards the Night’s Phoenix. Her engine was almost dead, and the ship was inoperable anyways. The distress signals were already sent out. But waiting was out of the question; the ceiling had already given away and the glass was almost certainly the next to go. There was nothing for her on the Phoenix and barely anything left for her here. What was left of the escape pods were either destroyed or infected, and she couldn’t risk spreading it. The fabrics of her suit were starting to fray.

Her screen turned black, the alarms shut off, and the lights went out. Save for the stars around her, everything was dark.

Delusions of a Long Forgotten Dream

Princess Cadence awoke with a start. She jolted straight up in bed, her chest heaving, cold sweat running down the back of her mane. It was dark. The moon was still rising in the sky, or so she could see through her balcony window, illuminating the skyline of Canterlot’s western residential district.

Her husband, Shining Armor, quietly lay in bed next to her, still fast asleep.

She put a hoof to her head. What was that? she thought. It was... strange, to say the least.

She looked around the room. The balcony window latch remained fastened, as did the double doors to their bedroom. Two suits of armor, fitted for royal guards, solemnly guarded the sides of the entrance. The grandfather clock standing against the wall read a quarter past three. There was no draft in the room, no movement, no sound. She looked over the side of the bed, but there was nothing under it save for errant motes of dust.

Was it a dream?

If it was, her memory made no note of it. Cadence was never one to remember dreams or nightmares. The land of fantasy and reverie was wondrous, to be sure, but she much preferred the tangibility of the real and material world. But even so, she had just woken up. Surely, she had to remember something had she been dreaming.

She sighed outwardly and lay her head back on her pillow. Whatever it was, it didn’t come from inside the bedroom. She wouldn’t let herself lose any sleep over it.

The next morning, Cadence found herself walking past Princess Luna in the castle’s Grand Hall. Luna had been consulting her advisors on recent domestic affairs, and now she, accompanied by two bat pony guards, was walking towards the breakfast hall that Cadance had come from.

“Good morning, Luna,” said Cadence.

“As to you, Cadence,” replied Luna. “You’re up early,” she added. “The sun came up no less than half an hour ago.”

Cadence smiled weakly. Last night’s interruption had left her with insufficient rest, and she had pondered upon what caused it for too long before she could fall asleep again. If it wasn’t evident in her slower walking pace, it could be gathered from the bags under her eyes.

“Yes,” said Cadence. “Sorry if I’m bothering you, but...” She looked around the hall, checking its doors as if somepony were eavesdropping on the two of them. “Might I request your counsel on a matter...?”

Luna paused, then dismissed her guards. They gave a bow and left the same way they had came. “Now, then,” said Luna, “what might be ailing you? For you to address me so formally, I can only assume that it is important.”

“Luna, can you look into the dreams somepony’s already had?”

Luna hummed. “Already had, you ask?”

“Yes. You see,” continued Cadence, “I had... I’m not sure if I can call it a dream.”

She began to walk towards the breakfast hall, and Luna followed.

“What ails you?” asked Luna.

“It’s, uh, strange. You see, last night, I woke up in the middle of the night for what seemed to be no reason.”

“Yes,” said Luna, walking through the doors of the breakfast hall. “It happens quite often to ponies, particularly to those experiencing pain, illness, anxiety, or hunger.”

“I had none of those. I wasn’t particularly hungry before breakfast, and I’m not hungry now. Nothing’s weighing on my mind except for what happened last night, and I’m not sick.”

“Did you need to use the loo?”

“No.”

Luna looked around, as Cadence had before. The breakfast hall was empty save for the chefs preparing meals. It was still early; the morning rush wouldn’t be for a while. “You and Shining...” whispered Luna.

“Yes?”

She leaned in. “You’re not pregnant, are you?”

“No!”

They sat down at the royal table, across from one another. Sunrise’s light beamed in from across the horizon, barely peeking over the rooftops of the city. The breakfast hall was round with a moderately tall ceiling, enough for pegasi to maneuver around comfortably, and rectangular tables--theirs included--sat in long rows, all leading the front doors to the kitchen in the back.

Luna chewed on a blueberry muffin as she took out a report from her advisors. “Then, Cadence, what do you think it might be?”

“I... I don’t know,” said Cadence. “And that’s what concerns me.”

Author's Note

An old writing exercise from Apr 2013, from Dublio's prompt.

Chiron Beta Prime(-ish)

Dear Princess Celestia,

Today, rather than giving you a friendship report as I normally would, I would like to give you instead a homely report on the events around Ponyville. You may have noticed that I sent no reports lately. This error of mine I must apologize for, as Spike is no longer with me to take my letters. More than likely, you will have received this letter from our nation’s fine postal service rather than your fireplace’s ventilation shaft. But more on that later. I’d first like to shed some light on the current state of everypony’s affairs here.

Keeping in mind our old mayor’s sudden upset in last month’s election, you should know that Ponyville is currently going through major reforms. A new party influenced by a new wave of thought from our less leisure-inclined neighbors of Stalliongrad has taken power, and they’ve passed many new laws and legislation in their short time in office so far. All the citizens of Ponyville, after hearing the newcomers’ expositions on ways to make Ponyville more prosperous, almost unanimously voted for the new party, defeating our long-standing mayor, and excitedly dove right into executing these new plans.

So, onto their plan: They intend to specialize Ponyville and focus all of its capital and means of production into a few products to export to other parts of Equestria. Everypony was gathered by talent in town hall two weeks ago. I, along with many other unicorns, have been assigned to gem prospecting, kiting our economy towards brighter days, or so we hope. Other ponies have been reassigned to similar ends, too. For example, many earth ponies have been made farm workers or moving things about town.

Housing for Ponyville’s citizens has also changed significantly. No longer does a pony have to worry endlessly about having her house foreclosed, as we now live in communal housing units. The party has leveled what was previously the theatrical district for these new houses. We won’t need them anyways; ponies these days are having too much fun growing carrots or mining gems. You should try it sometime.

Unfortunately, due to my new situation, I have not seen my old friends in quite some time, but I’ve made some new friends in my unit. Perhaps when I can write more reports, I’ll write about them instead.

Your faithful student,
Twilight Sparkle

P.S. Don’t worry about Spike, even if he won’t be with me again anytime soon.

Snails the Snail

It wasn't every day that Snails had a brilliant thought, and of course, today was no different. As clouds lazily drifted across the blue sky above him, he lay on his stomach on a grassy field, watching a snail slime its way through the dirt.

The snail itself wasn't very descript--it was just that, a greenish-brown snail with a spiral shell, crawling over some pebbles, around a clump of topsoil, and over a blade of grass. It wouldn't be special to anypony else, but to Snails, there was nothing else in the world but him and the snail in front of him. He watched it crawl, crawl, and crawl as his eyelids slowly fell...

*

Snails looked around to see giant blades of grass surrounding him. To his left was a giant clump of topsoil, and to his right were a few pebbles. He looked down at himself. He was a snail now.

He looked around some more. Right in behind him was himself, or rather, who he thought was himself. Snails, the big pony Snails, lay in the grass towering over him, watching him slowly crawl around.

But to snail Snails, it didn't look like pony Snails was going to do anything to him but leave him to his own devices. He was, after all, just a snail. He crawled around for a little while, took a few bites out of a dry leaf nearby, and felt struck by a sudden feeling of tiredness. As a bird cawed, Snails closed his eyes and drew back into his shell...

*

Snails opened his eyes again to the sound of a bird's caw and saw the snail on top of a dry leaf in the dirt, holed up in its shell, unmoving. He lay on his belly in the grass, as a pony.

Did Snails dream that he was a snail, or did the snail dream that he was Snails? Was Snails the snail? Was the snail Snails? Was there even a difference the two?

Nah, he thought as he shook his head. Snails was Snails, and the snail was a snail. With that, Snails resumed watching the snail as the clouds rolled by.

It wasn't every day that Snails had a brilliant thought, and of course, today was no different.

Eventually

Rarity opened the drawer on the far side of her boutique and pulled out a large pair of scissors. She inspected it, turning it about as its steel glimmered in the flickering candlelight. Wrong scissors, she thought. Too big. She needed the pinking shears, not the all-purpose ones.

Wiping a rogue bead of sweat from her neck, she looked at the clock. It was a quarter past four, two hours past the time she expected to have completed. She looked at the dress, or rather, what was finished of it. She had fabrics arranged on a dress form covering the torso and the back, and a large flowing piece on the rear. Only the torso was done. On its white cloth, gold lace trimmed the features and swirled around the center in a heart-shaped symbol, the one specifically requested by her client. She didn’t want to think about how much time she’d spent on it. If the client loved it, then it would all be worth it.

After all, that was the most important thing: the client loving it. Good dresses didn’t get attention; they had to be great dresses if not perfect. Simply pleasing the client wasn’t enough. And, of course, it was in her nature to please. That’s what drove her, that’s what she lived for.

It was quiet throughout the night. There were no lights in the town’s windows at this hour save for her own. There were no insects chirping, none that she could hear. It was tranquil. It was calm. The only sound was the slow and rhythmic snip, snip of her shears at fabric as she cut a similar design for the nape.

She lay on the floor and set her shears on the nearby table. She needed the rest, just for a little bit. She’d been working for hours. Just five minutes. Maybe ten. After that, she’d be up and ready to finish the dress, all before the client came in. The client would be happy and Rarity would be happy, and that thought put a smile on Rarity’s face.

Her eyelids drooped, and her breathing steadied...

She jolted to her hooves. No. She could rest later. For now, she had to finish the dress, the skirt, the ensemble. The client would be in here at noon today, in just a little over seven and a half hours, and she absolutely had to have the dress done by then. Lateness was not an option.

She looked out the window again. The faint silhouette of the trees outside began to stand out against the increasingly blueing sky. She could hear the birds begin to chirp outside.

Would she finally be able to sleep? Eventually, with any luck.

But not tonight, not now. There was still much work to be done.

Blight

While Angel and Tank were playing in the middle of Fluttershy’s cottage, Rainbow Dash had asked Fluttershy a question:

“Why do you still water that thing?”

It was a simple question, really, with only seven short words. Rainbow had asked it distractedly, not expecting an answer. Her attention was on the pets and their merriment. Yet, setting the watering can aside, Fluttershy in the back room paused to ruminate on it. Why did she still water this thing?

The plant she watered was unremarkable in all respects. It sat on a windowsill alone in the back room of the cottage, where no passerby would be able to see it. She wasn’t sure exactly what kind of plant it was, but it was short with broad leaves. Most of its leaves were green with streaks down the middle. Some were dotted here and there with spots of soft grey fuzz.

That was what Rainbow Dash was referring to when she asked the question, presumably. Why she didn’t just throw the plant out. The plant had blighted, and it was more of a hassle to maintain the plant than to simply get a new one.

And she could just throw it out, safely dispose of it so that the blight wouldn’t spread to the rest of her plants. Keeping it would risk spreading it to her other plants, this she knew. A new plant would cost her a couple bits at Daisy’s Home and Garden, plus maybe another couple bits for a new pot.

This plant, however, she had to take care of. She needed to make sure that the water didn’t splash all over the leaves—the blight thrived in damp environments. Any leaf that showed signs of greying needed to be excised from the plant, and the trims she used to do so needed to be thoroughly washed after each use. Circulating air could kick up blight spores, letting it spread. Only powder from Zecora could combat the blight, and obtaining it wasn’t easy. It would be much easier to throw the plant out.

But that would feel wrong.

Fluttershy knew it was just a plant—but she couldn’t leave it just because it was weak. She knew what that felt like. And besides, she was perfectly capable of taking care of the plant, even if it was a hassle at times. If she didn’t take care of the blighted plant, then who else—?

A blue hoof came waving into Fluttershy’s view. Rainbow Dash had flown in from the other room.

“Hey,” said Rainbow. “Is something up?”

“Hm?”

“I asked you why you still water that thing, and you kind of just spaced out for a bit.”

“Ohh.” Fluttershy tapped her hoof against her chin. “Well, because it needs me, I suppose.”

Rainbow didn’t seem too happy with that answer—in fact, she might have been happier without any answer at all—but that was okay. With a smile, Fluttershy watered the plant again, carefully letting the water seep into the soil.

Author's Note

Written for the March 2015 Minific Writeoff.