//-------------------------------------------------------//
               Summer Heat's Ongoing Travels               
                   -by TacticalRainboom-                   
//-------------------------------------------------------//
//-------------------------------------------------------//
              Spring Blooms (vs Spring Blaze)              
//-------------------------------------------------------//
Spring Blooms (vs Spring Blaze)
A brown-on-maroon earth pony still wearing her animal team jersey greeted Spring Blaze with a wave as they crossed paths. “Nice job today, Blaze!” she said, swerving to avoid a freshly melted puddle.
“You too, Broad Leaf!” Spring Blaze said with a firm nod. And then he smiled. The chilly evening air—the chilly spring air, as of tonight—was perfect for cooling down after the hardest workout of the year. The streets were emptying out and windows were darkening as Ponyville collectively turned in for a well-earned rest.
However, sleep wasn’t on the night's agenda for Spring Blaze. This year’s Winter Wrap-Up had fallen on his birthday, and some good friends from the weather team had invited him to what they called an “after-party” that he was now old enough to be allowed into. So, after a short rest at home, Spring was on his hooves again and ready for whatever it was his friends were planning.
“What took you?” Autumn half-shouted.
Autumn Flare had a stocky olive-furred body, a red-brown-yellow striped mane to match his namesake, and one of the widest, most impressive pairs of wings on the Ponyville weather team. He was a Winter Wrap-Up powerhouse who made every job go by faster, and he had been a good friend since Spring Blaze’s first day in Ponyville.
Spring shook his head at that question, and answered a bit too quickly. “Just doing some drawing.” Then he cleared his throat and spoke up. “What’s going on in there? Is… is that the ‘after-party’ you told me about? Where’s the rest of the team?”
“I told them to go in without us. Besides, you only need one wingpony. No need for a whole squad.” At that, Autumn’s usually guileless grin turned just the slightest bit crooked. “You’re officially a big pony as of tonight, right? Come on!"
Before Spring could ask any of the hundred questions that sprang up in response, Autumn Flare trotted right up behind, placed the top of his head against Spring’s rear end, and started pushing.
Standing guard next to the door was a heavy-set green stallion wearing a formal vest and a pair of mirror shades. When he spotted Spring, he grinned. “Happy birthday, Spring Blaze,” the bouncer said with a nod. When he moved, his green plant team vest peeked out from beneath his neat black collar.
Spring waved back with an awkward smile. “Nice to see you, Whetstone,” he said, just before being pushed through the door and into the strobing darkness of the club.
The music had already been noticeable from two streets away, and inside, the volume level was downright violent. Spring Blaze felt each pounding beat with his chest instead of his ears, because his eardrums were busy being assaulted by a blasting synthetic wail, alternating between soaring harmony and grinding dissonance from beat to beat. It was almost pitch dark, but angry flashes of white and darting pools of colored light gave a chaotic, flickering view of how the room was filled from wall to wall with swaying, twisting, bouncing pony bodies. “Dancing” was a misnomer; the contents of the club were flailing and gyrating against each other as if the music was forcibly moving them like so many marionettes.
Spring Blaze felt Autumn Flare sidle up next to him, so close that their wings brushed against each other.
“Come on!” Autumn shouted in his ear, barely loud enough to be heard. Spring felt the heat of his friend's breath against the side of his face even though the air was so damp and hot that the walls themselves seemed to be sweating. "Let's get to the stage!" Autumn forged ahead, into the crowd.
Spring had attended untold dozens of parties in Ponyville, but as he squeezed through the churning chaos, occasionally bumping his head against Autumn’s side or wing in order to stay close, he realized that his heart was pounding with the intoxicating energy. A thought crossed his mind that made him chuckle: it was one heck of a way to commemorate his first night as an official “big pony.”
Autumn came to a stop at the foot of an incline in the wooden floor that rose to an oval-shaped plateau, along with a full ring of mostly stallions whose attention was on the mare who had claimed the small “stage” as hers.
As Spring took his place at the perimeter, the mare on the stage reared up and extended her hooves to the ceiling. Her dark mane fell in dramatic waves as she bent her spine backward, leapt into the air, and landed on her forehooves in a show of freakish strength and flexibility. The onlookers cheered, their voices in unison overpowering the music and causing more heads to turn and see the show. The dancer’s rear legs flew up and over in a neat arc, and then she hurled herself backward again, repeating her acrobatic stunt with perfect, fluid momentum. This time, when she landed, she lifted her forehooves and bicycled them in the air while throwing her head back and whooping along with her rapidly growing audience.
Spring leaned in to talk into Autumn's ear. “Is this what we’re here for?” was what he started to say, but before the second syllable left his mouth, the speakers drowned him out with five synthetic "D" sounds in rapid succession. The dancer started to trot a slow circuit around the edge of her island, bobbing her head with the escalating intensity of the treble. As she started her second lap, the music grew to a percussive rapid-fire of monotone D-D-D-D-D sets in a constant, frantic stream, and the heartbeat of the song accelerated to an aggressive quadruple time, and every light in the club went into a violent, synchronized strobe pattern as the dancer closed in on Spring--a pink foreleg dipped toward him, hooked him by the front knee, pulled him onto the stage--
She allowed him to stand face-to-face with her, breaking the flow of her dance for a few precious seconds. The lights, the music, the ponies surrounding them, everything was throwing itself into a manic, delirious build to a climax, but the dancer, seemingly unaffected, stared into Spring's eyes with a gaze as hard as sapphire.
The music suddenly cut to a sharp silence, and the club was plunged into opaque darkness.
“Hey there.” she said. Her voice was a low, smooth tenor.
The club’s pent-up energy detonated into a bone-rattling climax.
The cheers of the crowd were audible even over the consuming roar of the speakers sending out a blast so powerful that Spring thought he could taste it. He felt her warmth as she glided her head, then neck, flank, haunch, across his chest, finally flicking his nose with a vertical up-down flip of her tail. The crowd whooped. They had started to stomp rhythmically, a hungry boom boom boom beneath the pounding bass and the relentless treble, as the dancer settled into a grind against Spring’s chest.
“Uh--” said Spring Blaze.
Spring glanced around for where Autumn would be standing at the edge of the incline, but the lights made it impossible to see much of anything, let alone individual faces. He felt her lifting him into an upright stance, and he was staring into her eyes again as she guided him into a whirl, making him part of her dance and part of the music itself with her just-firm-enough grip. After three turns, she released him for just one and a half beats of the song, long enough to pivot a half-turn on two legs, reach behind her, and steady him in place by taking his hooves and holding them against her body. And then she was dancing with him, rolling and stroking her body warmly against his chest and belly with catlike fluidity.
“Wait--”
Spring Blaze’s partner either heard the protest or sensed it, because she reached up to loop her wrists behind Spring’s head, stretched her neck so that she could rub her cheek against his, and spoke to him in an intimate whisper.
“Don’t worry. Just leave it all to me.”
She dipped away again, letting Spring fall forward onto her back as she dropped to all fours. The crowd cheered again as she backed up underneath him, gyrating gently with her rum and sliding into a position with Spring mounting her...
Something lurched in Spring Blaze’s stomach. “No... I...”
She must have heard that, because she turned her head to look up at Spring’s distressed, shifting expression, and then frowned. On the next downbeat she bucked violently, like a rodeo bull, so hard that it sent Spring airborne for exactly one beat. When he came to a four-point landing, she was already on top of him in a lazy embrace, laying her forelegs across his back and locking eyes with him again. The sultry performance was gone, at least from her face, replaced by something like worry. She kissed him on the cheek, then pushed off of him, hard enough to force him to take a step backward--which almost made him fall into the crowd, because she had pushed him off of the stage’s plateau.
When Spring looked up, she was thrashing her head and tail and stomping a lap around the stage. This time, the pony she chose was stocky, olive-furred, well-muscled and every inch a desirable pegasus stallion, whose red-yellow-brown striped mane made for a striking contrast in the flashing colored lights as he was welcomed onto the stage. Something stirred in his chest as he watched the way Autumn's tail flicked with excitement--he could imagine the way he must be breathing hard, his breath coming in hot bursts, confidence and power rolling off his body with every shake of his head and stomp of his hooves.
He turned his back on the stage and headed for the door, weaving his way back through the chaos, alone this time.
Lovely weather on the day after Winter Wrap-Up was always a guarantee. Warm, breezy, partly cloudy with a chance of brief showers. It was Spring Blaze’s second favorite day of the year, and that was why he was doing game-design work outside at one of the cafe’s tables, instead of locking himself in his room and refusing to let anyone in under any circumstances. The best of both worlds, he reasoned--this way he could sit and be absorbed in his personal work without missing out on the weather. For now, though, his charcoal and sketchbook were sitting inert on the table while he contemplated the rough surface of his fresh alfafa sandwich.
“Hey.” Her voice was a dark tenor, low and rich.
His throat tightened as he looked up. Even though he knew who he would see, meeting her brilliant blue eyes still made his gut twist.
“... hey.” He lowered his head and picked up his sandwich in his teeth.
“You’re the birthday boy from last night, right? You have fun at your birthday party?”
Spring Blaze took a moment to chew and swallow before answering. Then he gave a long, exaggerated shrug. “It wasn’t really my birthday party, was it? It was a Winter Wrap-Up party.”
“It was your birthday and you were out to have fun,” she said. When Spring looked up, he saw that she was leaning on the counter and resting her cheek on one hoof. “Besides, it’s a pretty cool coincidence, having the start of spring happen on the day you were born."
She shrugged lazily. "Besides, I really did want to dance with you. Was all set to have you be the one I took home, too.”
Spring leaned away from the table and folded his forelegs across his chest. “Yeah, well, I’m not like that. I’m not into... that kind of thing.” The words came out harder than he meant.
She raised an eyebrow. “Into what? Sex?”
“No!” Spring snapped back. “I mean the party! The whole... thing! It’s all so pointless. I don’t want to do it that way. I’m better than that.” He realized that he was glaring. He scooted back toward the table and reached for his sandwich.
She grimaced at that, but she didn’t take those dark blue eyes off of him. “Better, huh?” she said, as if she had never heard such a thing before, and needed to contemplate it. “There something wrong with what all your friends and neighbors were doin’ in there? Seemed to me like they were havin’ a lot of fun. Everyone lets that energy out somehow, honey.” She was smiling, not angry, by the end of her statement. In fact, she even managed a surprisingly genuine laugh.
Spring rested his hooves on the edge of his plate. Suddenly, defending his position against this mystery mare was more important than eating his sandwich. “Well, I don’t,” he said, still glaring. “I draw for my game, I play the drums, and I work hard for the weather team. I don’t need to do that stuff.”
Again she appeared to contemplate Spring’s words.
“An artist, huh?”
He nodded firmly. “I’m going to develop a game. In fact, I was doing some good concept work right before you showed up.” He pointed to his notebook.
She nodded slowly, then gestured toward the notebook. “May I?”
He mirrored her gesture, more forcefully. She reached for the notebook, picked it up, and opened to a page near the middle.
"Who's this guy?"
She placed the open notebook back on the table.
“His name is Captain Ironshod," said Spring proudly. "He’s going to be a major NPC. That's short for 'non-player character.' It means--”
“He’s wearing bondage gear,” she interrupted, leaning forward to look closer. Then she gave a low whistle. “And just lookit the muscles on him...”
Spring grit his teeth. The glare came right back, and he barely kept from shouting. “It’s armor, not bondage gear! The straps are for--ugh, you wouldn’t get it.”
"He looks kind of like the stallion you were with last night," she said. "Except even more buff. And with leather straps."
Spring opened his mouth, then closed it when the proper expression of outrage wouldn’t come to his lips.
"Don't worry,” she said, still smiling. “You're a good artist. And that stallion you were with was pretty sexy. He told me all about you."
The silence lingered as the dancer shook out her mane, scooted her chair back from the table, and made to leave. She placed her hoof on Spring Blaze’s shoulder as she walked past, and then she was gone.

//-------------------------------------------------------//
         Summer in Stalliongrad (vs Iron Curtain)          
//-------------------------------------------------------//
Summer in Stalliongrad (vs Iron Curtain)
The bartender looks up from his work as a grinding squeak from the front door’s aging hinges alerts him to my presence. The aging grey unicorn’s eyes flick rapidly over my face, my hat, my coat, my face again— before even crossing the few steps between doorway and counter, I am appraised in detail.
“Fine evening to you, comrade,” he says with a frown and a raised eyebrow. "It is rare that we entertain government stallions here. Are you here to drink with us, or to investigate us?"
His words draw alarmed glances from the few ponies seated at the bar. Most, however, are gathered around the lamplit room's mismatched collection of tables and chairs, too occupied by food, drink, and company to notice my entrance.
I quickly remove my ushanka, and am sure to open my coat before reaching into my inner pocket and retrieving a golden coin, which I lay on the counter. "A round of your finest," I say, loudly enough to be heard by the nearest tables.
The bartender snatches the coin with a sweep of his foreleg. He smiles, albeit dryly, then places a hoof to his lips and fires off a piercing whistle.
The sound summons a lime green pegasus mare who reports to the counter with a nasal "Eh?" and a stretch of her wings. The bartender barks orders at her in husky Pegastan pidgin— I hear the words do 'em big and 'round the house, but little else.
"'Kay!" the server says, nodding once. Then she leaps over the bar with a flap of her wings and disappears into a back room, leaving me to survey the room.
At first glance, the pub appears to be like any other; only a cultured eye would detect anything out of the ordinary. The ponies crowded around the tables are Stalliongrad born and bred, but the specialty food of the night seems to be kabocha from Neighpon, the music playing on the room’s lone gramophone is a lilting crystalflute ballad, and the bottles that the server mare is distributing are unmistakably filled with red wine from southern Prance.
"My friends refer to this place as ‘the trade show,’ and only in hushed tones,” I say to the bartender. “Was it you who invented this name?”
He chuckles. “A fitting euphemism, don’t you think? See how proudly our comrades raise mugs of imported spirits, toasting the health of the very leader who would outlaw such disloyalty. They are good and honest ponies, most of them, and they enjoy the thrill of the forbidden as much as they do the taste of imported food.”
The serving mare places a goblet before me and fills it with wine. I nod to her in thanks as I lift the glass, then swirl it. The smell is dry, very dry, with surprisingly complex undertones— the kind of wine usually reserved for connoisseurs and collectors. I take the first sip, and am not disappointed.
The aftertaste unfolds on my tongue as I nod my approval to the bartender. “Fortunate for us, then, that not all foreign pleasures are outlawed just yet.”
A soft laugh, almost a giggle, comes from my left.
“Please. I’m ‘exotic,’ not ‘foreign.’”
I turn, and find myself looking into a pair of smiling eyes, deep blue and reflective like the glass resting against her lips. Her mane is full and wavy, almost black in the uneven lamplight, and her coat is a hot tulip-pink. As she lowers the glass, her mouth curls into a smirk.
“So you’re the big spender, huh? Fancy tastes you’ve got.”
“My tastes are, in your words, exotic,” I reply, rotating to properly face her where she sits with her elbow resting on the counter. “A result of a long career in foreign diplomacy. But such is the reason for coming here tonight, is it not?”
She tilts her head to the side and spreads her hooves for a long, exaggerated shrug. Her words come out in a rolling singsong. “I’m nothin’ but a passer-by who knows a party when she sees one.”
“Ah, but not just any passer-by,” I say, mirroring her smirk. “I recognize well the sound of an Equestrian accent such as yours. You are very far from home indeed.”
She shakes her head, but still holds onto a small smile. “Long as there’s good weather, good drink, and good company, I’m not far from home at all.”
“Respectable words to live by.” I raise my glass.
Our goblets make a delicate ding, like the chime of a bell, as the rims touch. Her eyes close as she takes a long, slow drink.
"Tell me, then,” I say as the sharp taste fades to its finish, “is Stalliongrad a home for you?"
She places a hoof beneath her chin and purses her lips in a pose of mock contemplation. "Well, let’s see. The weather was nicer in the Fillypines, the drink was better in Germaneigh... and it took me until tonight to find any Stalliongrad ponies who can appreciate something exotic." At the end of her statement, her eyes are half-lidded and her smirk has returned. “I think I’m gonna need some convincing.”
An involuntary grin comes to my face. The intent of her words is unmistakable, and I puff out my chest to meet her advances with confidence. “Such admirable honesty!” I say, laughing between words. “I think it must be love for our Motherland that prevents my comrades from speaking their minds about Stalliongrad weather and Stalliongrad vodka. Perhaps Stalliongrad ‘convincing’ will be more enjoyable?”
Initially, she grins along with me, but her expression falls gradually until her brow is furrowed in an expression of vague concern. Instead of replying, she leans several inches to the left, as if I were blocking her view of some unfolding sequence of events.
It is then that I notice the pony-shaped shadow looming over me, along with the distinctive smell of cheap vodka.
“Enjoying yourself, comrade?” booms an all too familiar voice, inches behind my head.
The confidence that I had been enjoying melts like a snowbank beneath a flamethrower. My heart pounds as I snatch my ushanka from where it sits on the counter, place it on my head, pivot in place, and straighten my neck to stand at attention. With my gaze locked straight ahead in proper posture, I am treated to a good view of my superior’s broad chest and muscular neck.
“Greetings, Comrade Iron Curt--”
“Sorry for interrupt, comrade.” His voice booms from his chest, dangerously calm and decidedly unapologetic. “You had words about Stalliongrad vodka?”
"Yes! Ah, no! This young mare and I were simply discussing--" I turn to gesture toward my companion, but her place at the bar is empty, showing no trace that anypony had ever been there. Even her glass of wine has disappeared.
I turn back around, and see Iron Curtain holding my own glass up to the light, squinting at it with his good eye.
“Legally imported wine, comrade," I say hastily. "I have no reason to suspect this establishment of--”
Iron Curtain ignores me as he lowers the glass to his nose, sniffs loudly, then lets out a harrumph.
"What is this weak, Equestrian drink?"
"If I may correct you, comrade, the wine is from--"
"In Stalliongrad we have real Hooviet drink!” Iron Curtain roars. He raises one hoof, then brings it down on the counter like a sledgehammer, so hard that my drink jumps in place. “Bartender!”
The bartender, who has likely been watching from a distance from the moment Iron Curtain opened the front door, appears all but instantaneously.
“Yes, comrade?”
Iron Curtain flicks his hoof toward my hardly touched glass of wine, as if it were all he could do to keep from hurling it instead. “Remove this watery swill and bring vodka as powerful as Communism!”
The bartender glances at my glass, then frowns. “I will fetch the vodka, but allow our friend to finish his glass, perhaps? I hate to see it go to waste.”
Iron Curtain slowly, slowly turns toward me with a bone-piercing chill in his eyes. When he speaks, he forms each word with deliberate, icy precision.
“My comrade is finished with his wine.”
The bartender shows no reaction save for a terse nod as he takes the more than half-full glass of fine wine and carries it with him into the back room. I watch it go with some regret, only to be shocked out of my wistful mood by another explosive, spittle-flying roar.
“Have you no shame? No pride in our great Motherland? Were you not taught to fight for beloved Stalliongrad? Peace has made us weak and lazy like tiny baby foal!”
My ears are left ringing, and nearly every patron in the bar is watching. Some of them are gathering their things, preparing to flee.
“I lost right eye fighting capitalist pigs, and now with left eye I see comrade who drinks foreign, capitalist poison and lusts after foreign, capitalist zhopa!”
“Oh please. My zhopa speaks a universal language. Sounds like you need a drink or five, comrade.”
Her Equestrian accent momentarily vanishes as the word comrade rolls off her tongue with near-perfect pronunciation. Every eye in the bar falls upon the lone mare leaning against the edge of an unoccupied table, smirking as she tilts back the last of her wine.
Every eye, of course, except for one. Iron Curtain continues to glare at me, letting the mystery Equestrian mare speak to his back. It is an ingenious way to berate me while also replying to her taunts.
“I see no drink here, only thin juice harvested by slaves of exploitative regime and left to rot!”
“Easy fix. You want vodka, right? I’ll get the first round, if you drink with me.” Despite Iron Curtain’s menacing bulk blocking most of my view, I can see her turn toward the bar with a wave and a nod.
“I do not drink with capitalists!”
Again I am uncertain of whom Iron Curtain means to berate more— me, or the mare challenging him.
“Oh c’mon,” she replies, all too sweetly. “How about a game, then? Friendly round of table-jumping?”
The gramophone plays a few more bars of Crystal Waltz, then cuts off with a warbling scratch as somepony pulls the needle from the record. Moments later, the silence is broken by the clomping of Iron Curtain’s hooves as he finally turns his back on me and faces her.
“You dare challenge a Stalliongrad stallion to great Stalliongrad tradition of table-jumping?”
Even from where I stand, the deviousness in the challenger's crooked smile is obvious. She answers the question by trotting a tight circle, stepping onto a chair and then onto the table as easily as if climbing a set of stairs.
“Finally, somepony who knows how to have fun!”
She rears up and shakes out her mane with a long whoop. The audience starts to murmur.
“Typical Equestrian arrogance!” Iron Curtain shouts.
“Just don’t go easy on me!” the mystery mare replies.
“You! By the magnitofon!” Iron Curtain snaps, and the pony nearest to the gramophone stands at attention as if he had been physically yanked into position.
“Play song worthy of glorious Hooviet victory!”
There is an awkward silence as the target of Iron Curtain’s order shuffles through a cabinet set against the back wall. When a song finally starts playing, it is a driving piano march with a brass and accordion accompaniment, the sort that must have accompanied Hooviet propaganda films in the days of Iron Curtain’s youth. Underscoring the music is a faint dry crackle, betraying the age and condition of the vinyl.. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MRFDnfCPzpU)
Iron Curtain charges down the center of the room at a full gallop, causing ponies to shove and jostle each other to get out of his path. He mounts the farthest table in a single powerful leap, and stares across the battlefield of cleared-out tables.
On one side stands Iron Curtain in coat and ushanka, his brow creased into a steely one-eyed glare forged in hardship, hardened by battle, and refined by age to project a presence like the living avatar of Winter itself.
Across from him stands a nameless young mare from a faraway land, wearing nothing but a smirk. Her stance has a lazy sway to it, neither kowtowing before Iron Curtain nor standing in opposition; it is as if the glint in her eye creates a pocket of warmth immune to his icy fury.
“In Stalliongrad rules, if falling off table or spilling drink, then is losing immediately! There will be no second chances, no helpers, no outside interference--nopony to save capitalist scum from her folly!”
Iron Curtain starts pacing back and forth while shouting with the full force of his basso voice, like a general giving a speech to his troops. As he does, the server trots from table to table, laying out shots of vodka on each one.
“After jumping to new table and drinking, we are stomping with music sixteen counts! In this time, opposing side must make own jump and swallow entire drink! We continue until capitalist scum falls behind, falls from table, or falls victim to own foolish attempt to drink against proud defender of Stalliongrad! Now..." begin!”
Iron Curtain backs up by a half-step, then surges forward and leaps, easily launching himself over the heads of the crowd. The gramophone blares out chords like the battle cry of the Revolution as Iron Curtain's bulk comes down with a crushing wham! such that the heavy wooden table shudders beneath him.
Whooping cheers rise from the audience as everypony in the room starts stomping to the tempo of the music. Without realizing it, I find that my own forehoof has started to tap as well, carried along by the rising thrill of traditional alcoholic warfare.
Iron Curtain bends down, picks up the shot in his teeth, throws the contents to the back of his throat with a jerking motion, then drops the empty glass. He looks expectantly to his adversary with chin raised in challenge as he begins stomping along with the rest of the crowd.
The mare hardly spares Iron Curtain a glance. She sways happily to the music for fully half of her allotted sixteen counts, then crosses the gap to the nearest table with a kind of bounding leap. Unlike Iron Curtain, she snatches the shot with her hoof before rearing up and knocking the contents back.
“Nice jump!” she shouts. “Don’t tire yourself out, comrade!”
The music drives on, and instead of stomping out the sixteen-beat countdown, the unnamed competitor sways and bounces to the music as naturally as if dancing were her normal mode of movement.
Iron Curtain makes his next jump and drink with plenty of time. He strikes his commanding stance once more. “No simpering Equestrian capitalist is a comrade of mine! I am unstoppable, like Stalliongrad winter!"
The pink mare, still paying more attention to the bystanders than her opponent, prances a lap around the rim of her table, winking and blowing kisses. She makes the next hop barely in time to twirl like a dervish and sweep up her shot before being disqualified by the sixteenth beat.
Iron Curtain barely waits for her to swallow before he takes off on his next launch. “I am mighty, like Stalliongrad bear! I am General Winter, and you are lone spring flower before fearsome blizzard!” He jumps, and his hooves dig indents in the next table as he pounds into it.
The ‘flower’ on the table across from Iron Curtain spends precious hoofbeats rearing up and extending her forehooves into the air in a come-get-it stance. She calls out in a pitch-perfect mockery of Iron Curtain's accent:
“General Winter? Ha! I am seeing only 'floppy like Stalliongrad pierogi' and 'depressing like Stalliongrad hangover!'"
An uproar of laughter mixes with a surge of cheering and whistling as Summer takes off at a full gallop, launches herself onto the next table--then bounds off to another table on the next beat. On the third table, she doesn't just run; she plants her forehooves, flips head over heels like a tumbling acrobat, and flies across a gap easily twice the size of any crossed by either her or Iron Curtain thus far. By the time she lands, the cheers have become deafening and the rhythm on the floor has been nearly lost in the excitement.
She nicks the shot from the table between the fourteenth and fifteenth beats, then swallows and drops the glass on the sixteenth.
"Ever met a capitalist who can do that?"
Iron Curtain's nostrils flare and his eye burns in its socket like a lone coal in a snowed-over firepit.
"You think to impress me with such foalish circus feats? You are nothing! All will witness true show of Communist superiority over capitalist swine!"
He rears up, then roars at the top of his lungs as he charges full-force toward the edge of his table.
"For the Motherland! URAAAAAAA!"
It takes some time before I am able to nudge and squeeze my way through the still buzzing crowd, but as soon as I am able, I hurry to the disaster zone on the far end of the room. Finding Iron Curtain is easy enough; neither he nor the collateral damage from his spectacular last stand have moved at all.
I kneel down next to him.
“ty poryadke, comrade?”
“Ish sad day for Communisht party,” Iron Curtain slurs. The words are barely audible thanks to how his cheek rests on the floor.
“You fought valiantly, comrade,” I say, patting him on the shoulder. He reaches up and brushes my hoof away.
Somepony trots up behind me. "Friend of yours?"
"Co-worker," I reply, rising to all fours.
"He okay?"
"He has hurt nothing except his pride, I think. Now, as for us--another drink, perhaps?"
She snorts in amusement. "Only if you let me get this one. I wanna see how you do with Equestrian bourbon."
Iron Curtain groans something into the floor as the two of us leave him, but the only intelligible word is "pierogi."

//-------------------------------------------------------//
              Runaway Train (vs Quick Study)               
//-------------------------------------------------------//
Runaway Train (vs Quick Study)
“Acting like a lovestruck colt, you say?”
A distant smile spread across Cliffhanger’s face as he stared at the far corner of the ceiling, straightening his neck as if there were an invisible movie camera positioned to capture a low-angle profile of his expression. Quick Study was certain that her old friend was either reliving the events of the previous night, or mentally editing faint shafts of light and slowly drifting sparkles into the scene. He might also have been trying his best to shed a single tear.
“Of course I’m acting ‘lovestruck;’ what other name could I give to the lightning strike that struck my sleeping inner colt in that tiny, smoky tavern?”
Quick Study could hear the low grr-rr-rrk of her own teeth grinding. “Listen to yourself! How are you going to write your book on this trip when you can’t even put a proper metaphor together? Hurry up and grab your bags!”
“My dear friend, I couldn’t possibly write a single word while tormented by the need to learn her name."
He didn't place the back of one hoof against his forehead, but he might as well have.
"Alas, I'm afraid I will not be joining you after all."
Quick Study felt her glare hardening until her brow started to ache from the strain. She pressed her lips together, closed her eyes, and took a deep breath. It didn’t help.
“I can’t believe this. You’re canceling your plans, wasting the money you paid for your ticket, and making me explain to the association that they set me up with a double room for no reason, all because of a mare that didn’t even tell you her name?”
There it was again, that ridiculous glassy-eyed look. The look of an oblivious romantic who couldn’t acknowledge the fact that he was head-over-hooves stupid in love with somepony who had probably forgotten all about him by now and was probably named Easy Mark or One Nightstand.
Cliffhanger rolled his eyes, and his tone flipped from brainlessly melodramatic to brainlessly excited. “The passion that flared between us that night revealed far more than words ever could. This is real, Quick Study! She promised me that we would meet again! If I lose this chance at true love, I may never—”
“That’s enough,” Quick Study snapped. “I have a train to catch. Go ahead and ruin your life by chasing some tart who doesn't give two horseapples about you. I’m sure you’ll be able to tell me all about it when I get back from Canterlot.”
The train was a smog-belching dinosaur that smelled like old wood despite the new carpet and thin coat of fresh paint. It also had walled compartments instead of rows of seats, and Quick Study was lucky enough to find an empty one and claim one side with her saddlebags. Then she sat on the bench herself--uncomfortably, because the cushion was thin from age--and used the moment of privacy to slump against the window and let out a growling sigh.
The cool glass felt good against her face. When the spot she was resting against got warm, she leaned back by an inch and thumped her head into a different spot. Her horn tapped against the glass with a light click, and when the train jolted into motion, it vibrated against the surface with a rattling noise.
Quick Study didn't realize that she had dozed off until she was woken by the low rumble of the door sliding open.
“Other side's empty,” Quick Study grumbled.
Outside, grassy suburbs had turned to craggy mountains, and the train was tilted in an uphill climb--they would be arriving in Canterlot soon.
The door rumbled shut again. "Sorry to intrude," said a mare's voice, from inside the compartment. "They told everyone in my car to find different seats. Figured it was best not to ask why." There was a pause. “You look like you could use a drink."
Quick Study peeled herself away from the window and righted herself against the backrest. "Do I, now?"
The pony who’d joined her was a young mare, pink, with a warm chocolate mane. She had already taken her seat, and was busy digging through a pair of reinforced, multi-sectioned bags that looked to be nearly as heavy as their owner and twice as old.
"Sure do. I know that look. Here. Trust me.”
The mare pulled a metal flask from her pack, flipped the cap open with her teeth, and extended it across the gap between seats. Quick Study picked it from her hooves with magic and levitated it closer, peering at what she had been offered as if it were a puzzle box.
“Don't worry; I don’t have Whinnybola. Unless that's why they chased us out."
“Very funny. Whinnybola is only contagious once you start displaying symptoms anyway."
Quick Study lifted the flask parallel to her muzzle as she tilted her head back--and then she coughed, hard, when the liquid within rolled over her tongue and into her throat, burning the whole way down. Drinking cider now and then at the occasional book club social hadn’t done a thing to prepare Quick Study for whatever had been in that little metal bottle.
She could hear chuckling coming from the other seat, followed by a “Feel better?”
Quick Study swallowed hard in an attempt to quench the chemical sizzle. It didn't work. Still, she forced a smile as passed the flask back; the gesture from a friendly stranger was quite welcome, even though it had been the wrong one.
“Well, no. I appreciate the thought, though. My name's Quick Study."
A nod. "Good name for an academic."
Quick Study folded her arms and raised an eyebrow. "I'll have you know that thirty seven percent of unicorn names are not explicitly descriptive of cutie mark identity."
That just made the other mare smile wider. “Pfft. Am I wrong?”
“I’m just saying--”
“What, is the book on your cutie mark not explicitly descriptive of your cutie mark identity either?"
“Well, for your information, as many as forty five percent of unicorn cutie marks are symbolic instead of explicit!”
Quick Study folded her arms and frowned as her fellow traveler giggled.
Maybe it was the liquor, or maybe the stranger's special talent was an infectious laugh, but eventually Quick Study couldn't help but laugh along despite trying to pout. "Well. Well, I'm only a scholar on my own time. My official title is 'Scribe and Keeper of Books.'"
"Sounds important," the mare said, only a little teasingly.
"I like to think so," Quick Study said. "They’re bringing me in for a restoration project. How about you? What’re you doing on a train to Canterlot?”
"For now, what I'm doing is getting to know another traveler on a train to Canterlot." She grinned at the way Quick Study rolled her eyes, then cleared her throat and continued. "Honest answer, though? Not sure whether I'm staying in Canterlot for a while, or just taking a pit stop on the way to Los Pegasus."
"Los Pegasus, huh? That's... very far away."
The other mare shrugged, seemingly undaunted by the prospect of crossing the entire continent by train.
"Nowhere is 'far away' once you get there. Besides, I’d been in Baltimare too long. It was starting to feel like home."
Quick Study tilted her head. “So... where's home for you, then?”
There was a brief pause.
“My home’s wherever I can find good drink and good company.” As if to illustrate, she took another pull of booze, or tried to--the bottle turned out to be empty. With a click of her tongue, she started to dig through her pack, pulling out the odd article of clothing in search of, presumably, something to refill her flask with.
Quick Study abruptly straightened as a glint of metal caught her eye.
"Oh! Is that a… fencing blade?"
“This? Yeah.” she said, pulling it from the deep bag that it had been wedged into.
The object in question was a thin metal shaft that came to a point, covered by a rubber nub. At the base was a scratched and pockmarked steel dome—perfect for protecting the hoof, but positioned in a way that would make standing on all fours impossible.
“Met a stallion in Prance who fancied himself a ‘master equuscrimeur.’” The word master had audible quotation marks around it.  “Nice enough guy. Bit self-absorbed. Wanna hold it?"
Quick Study’s voice leapt at least an octave. “Aah! You trained with a real Equuscrime master? I’ve been meaning to learn more about Equuscrime for years!” Already she could envision crossing out one of the oldest entries in her ‘learn-about-later’ notebook, and the idea made her giddy. She leaned forward to grab the weapon with her hooves instead of her magic. It was surprisingly heavy, and the guard's dull steel surface was covered with scratches, no doubt from use in many furious battles.
The already comely mare sitting across from Quick Study suddenly looked very attractive indeed.
“Do you know any of the history? Which styles did you learn? Was it anything like in The Alicorn Bride? I mean, of course it wasn’t all that much like the movies, but—“
Quick Study cut herself off only when she noticed that her would-be source of knowledge was laughing again.
“S-sorry. I get excited. I really do want to hear about it, though.”
The mare shook her head. “Nah. Never asked him that kinda stuff. I just learned enough basics so that I could play around in practice bouts. Was fun, but I'm no expert."
“Oh.”
Quick Study sagged slightly.
"Sorry. Know what, though--you should hang onto that, since you're interested."
Quick Study’s heart jumped as she looked with widened eyes at the weapon she was holding, then at the one who had given it to her, then back down to the weapon.
“I... no, I couldn’t...”
“I insist. Haven’t used it at all since then anyway.”
Quick Study turned the little metal tool over and over between her hooves. It felt both right and wrong to hold it as her own; every scar and dent was evidence of an unspoken story that Quick Study wasn’t part of.
“But... you said it was a gift from that stallion in Prance..."
“So now it's a gift from me to you. Like I said, I don’t need it, and memories weigh less than souvenirs."
“Memories weigh less than souvenirs,” Quick Study echoed, still examining her new possession. “Ha. You sound like my novelist friend when he’s feeling philosophical at three in the morning.”
"Novelist friend?"
Quick Study grimaced darkly. Talking to this stranger had been a such a welcome distraction.
“Mm. He's a really old friend, actually. Even if... even if he’s a real idiot sometimes. His name's Cliffhanger. I wouldn’t expect you to know his work."
The other mare reacted in the most unexpected way imaginable: with a sudden burst of laughter.
“Knew your name sounded familiar! Hold on. It's in here somewhere."
From the depths of one of her bags, the mare unearthed an all too familiar looking yellow hardcover.
"This is him, right? Damn if that ain't a coincidence! Haven't started reading it yet, but here, look."
The mare pulled back the front cover and leaned forward to offer the book as she had done with the flask and the blade. Quick Study craned her neck to look without touching or lifting it this time.
The book was open to the dedication page, which was supposed to read "with thanks to Quick Study and Soft Spoken, for all that they did to make this book possible." As for this copy, though, everything after 'they' had been obliterated by the start of a whole paragraph of heavy black marker. Most of it was illegible—even more so than Cliffhanger’s usual hoofwriting—but the last line made the message clear enough.
As long as Celestia’s sun burns in the day, as long as Luna’s moon guides us through the night, as long as the world gives us earth and sky, let our love never die.
-Cliffhanger
Quick Study leaned back in her seat, pressed her lips together, and placed her hooves in her lap, calling upon every lesson that Soft Spoken had ever given her on managing impulses. Breathe deep. Don't jump to conclusions. Stay rational. Irrationality is the mind-killer. Maybe this mare just met him at a book signing. Yes, that’s it. There was that book signing two weeks ago, and--
“Yeah, met him at the bar just last night! Really sweet guy, liked him a lot. Can’t hold his liquor, though.”
Soft Spoken's rules and mantras were instantly purged from Quick Study's mind.
“You! You’re her? He wouldn't shut up about you! He was a good writer until you came along and now just look at that drooling nonsense that he wrote for you! I’ve been talking to you this whole time and riding this train with you when the whole time it was you!”
Quick Study realized that she was on her hooves, and that her volume had risen to a full-scale bellow, and that she was glaring down at a seated pink pony who was leaning away with an almost comical expression of wide-eyed shock.
The pink mare’s blue eyes flicked toward the window, then the door, then back to the window. “Uh. Gonna have to slow down for me. Sounds like some kind of mistake.” She sounded confused. To Quick Study, her confusion sounded like a sham.
“You’re the one who—who did whatever you did with him last night, and you promised you’d meet him again, and here you are on a train, skipping town for Los Pegasus! He deserves better than you! Better than somepony who’s going to stomp all over his heart like that!”
Cliffhanger’s mystery mare put on a glare of her own. “Hey! I was nothing but good to him! Matter of fact, I gave him the time of his--”
The practice blade rolled off of Quick Study’s seat and onto the ground with a gentle clatter. Quick Study picked it up with magic and threw it down onto the bag it had come from, hard enough so that it bounced and nearly fell onto the floor again.
“No wonder you keep moving all the time! You had one in Prance, you had one in Baltimare, and now you're off to add Canterlot to the list, you sleazy, cheap--”
There was a loud knock at the door, and then it opened to reveal the frowning face of an attendant. "Is everything okay in here?"
The object of Quick Study’s fury, who had been trying to avoid eye contact, immediately looked up with a charming smile as if nothing more serious had happened than a dispute over seat space. She reached for her bags and started to close them up. "Yeah, we’re all good in here, I was just about to--"
Quick Study fired a searing, lethal, evil glare at the attendant.
"We are perfectly fine. Now GET OUT."
The door handle glowed briefly, and then the compartment’s door slammed shut with a BANG that left Quick Study’s own ears ringing. For a moment, she just stood facing the door, trying not to tremble with anger.
“Nice try,” she said icily.
The reply came in an insultingly disarming lilt. “Look, I’ve seen enough to know for a fact that he's fine. Even if it seems like he’s going to have trouble...”
Quick Study whirled, reared up, and all but exploded with anger. "Don’t you dare tell me that you know more than I do about my foalhood friend!"
“I didn’t say that. I just meant--”
“You think you know about him and ‘getting over it?’ Well, I know that the last time a mare dumped him, he didn’t do anything but listen to sad songs for months. He wrote poetry that even he’s embarrassed to show anypony. And he still avoids so much as walking past the cafe where he met her. Two years later."
Now the other mare was the one wearing a grimace. "Everyone has to deal with--you know, with loss, and painful memories. That's just his way of showing it. His way of dealing with it, you know?"
“And just what does that have to do with you toying with my friend and then walking away like nothing happened?"
The mystery mare didn’t reply to that, except by staring out the window while Quick Study glared at her.
"Well..."
A whistle sounded from the front of the train as it started to slow down.
“I’m going to send him a telegram saying that you'll meet him at the park next to the library. Four o'clock tomorrow."
Silence again. Outside the window, the platform was coming into view.
“Did you hear me? I said, you are going to meet him at the park and fix this.”
Quick Study thought she saw the mare's shoulders move in a sigh.
"Yeah, I will. Promise.” She was still looking out the window.
“Really. Is that the same kind of ‘promise’ that--”
The train came to a stop, and the whistle sounded again. Before Quick Study could get another word in, she was alone in the compartment.
It took a few moments of and seething for the realization to strike: she hadn't gotten that mare's name.
At four o'clock the next day, a pink mare with a red-brown mane was standing on a platform and waiting for a train.
The familiar rumble of an incoming engine didn't give anything like the feeling of relief that it usually did. After all, the last train ride she'd taken had included being trapped with an angry and persistent scholar-librarian who refused to relent on something that was supposed to have stayed in Baltimare instead of following her all the way to Canterlot.
Well. But now the train was here, and with it, a chance to put that mess behind her as well.
She had made a promise, after all.
The train screeched to a halt and the doors opened, letting out a load of passengers. Cliffhanger, that was his name--he was the first one off the train and onto the platform. He found her eyes almost immediately, and all but sprinted the short distance between them.
"It's... it's you! It's really you!"
"Sure is," said Summer Heat, forcing out a sad smile. “C'mon. Let's go somewhere we can talk."

//-------------------------------------------------------//
            Playing it Straight (vs Haystacks)             
//-------------------------------------------------------//
Playing it Straight (vs Haystacks)
There it was, right on cue: the priceless face that only came at the very moment when pleasure was spiked with a surge of pain. Mango had seen it countless times on countless ponies, but Summer Heat's expression was particularly exquisite. It started gently: only a slight grimace at first, then a clenched jaw, then eyes squeezed shut, and then Summer Heat threw her head back with a tight-jawed “Nnnnngh!”
Her mane waterfalled across her face and over her shoulders as she braced herself against the bench with one forehoof and pressed the other against her temple. A full-body quiver rippled through Summer Heat's neck, shoulders, flanks, and haunches, locking her in place with muzzle upturned and face scrunched as if in exertion, until her lips parted in a shuddering gasp.
Mango Leaf whistled. "Hoo! That was a good one!"
Summer Heat finally loosened her muscles and huffed out a sigh of relief. Then she shot Mango Leaf a sidelong glance and rolled her eyes. "Very funny. Glad I put on a nice show.”
"Ha! You just ate too fast, tha’s not my fault!” Mango Leaf said through a gigantic grin. “For real though, one of the best things about selling to tourists? Watching 'em get brain freeze like that."
“Yeah, I hear I make good faces,” Summer intoned. "You calling me a 'tourist' now?" She gestured to where a herd of ponies were rambling down the street, all of them brandishing cameras and wearing garish floral-print shirts.
“Well...”
Mango Leaf turned around and busied himself with packing up his frozen yogurt cart. Securing a spot here on the main beach walk had been a stroke of luck, but now the hottest part of the day was over, and the tourists were starting to move on to dinners and shows instead of shopping and sunbathing--might as well pack it in.
"... Kinda hard to call you kama'aina after only a couple years. How come you came back, anyways? You were talkin’ like it was aloha for good."
Summer Heat replied by pouting her lips and batting her lashes. "Maybe I've been craving your delicious yogurt. Just about broke my mouth!"
Mango pressed one hoof to his face as he bent forward in full-voiced laughter. When he recovered, his easy smile had returned. "Well actually, speaking of tourists, my cousin's comin’ from the mainland to visit tomorrow. Maybe you wanna meet him?"
Summer shrugged. "Sounds fun. Actual cousin or the other kind?"
"Other kind. Actually, I just saw him a coupla months ago..."
“Cousins don't shake hooves. They hug. Now come here, you big lump.”
It took a moment before Haystacks hugged back, but when he did, Mango felt himself being wrapped in the restrained power of a born and bred workhorse.
“...You missed me, then?” Mango breathed into Haystacks’ ear.
There was a delay.
Haystacks replied just before Mango would have started tickling him to get him to talk. “Of course I did.”
The power-built country boy’s voice was low and smooth; doubly so when lowered to an intimate murmur. It was the kind of voice that could make anything sound good, even the succinct phrases that Haystacks usually spoke in. A little flicker of coltish excitement passed through Mango Leaf’s gut as he tightened his hold and squeezed their bodies together just a bit harder.
The night was warm, and Haystacks’ coarse coat was even warmer, so the body heat between them was barely within the bounds of ‘pleasant.’ The same could be said of Haystacks’ scent--with his face buried in Haystacks’ shoulder, Mango could smell faint remnants of a long hot day’s worth of dry crops and damp exertion.
“Me too, bud,” said Mango Leaf. He let go of the hug after lingering for just long enough to feel Haystacks fill his broad chest with another deep breath.
Summer Heat had been listening with a hoof-tip resting against her lips. A contemplative frown spread from behind her hoof as Mango finished talking.
“Anyways, uh... so that’s my cousin Haystacks. He’s just one of those really nice guys, you know? It had been a really long time before that, so it was nice.”
Summer nodded slowly. "Sounds like he’s a really, really good guy.”
Mango nodded back, more enthusiastically. “Oh yeah, he really is. I’m lucky to have him as a--”
“You are gonna make your move when he comes, right?" Summer Heat detached her hoof from her mouth and turned it face-up toward Mango. Her voice and her eyes were utterly serious.
"Uh.” Mango Leaf felt his eyes widen. “Now I’m thinkin’ maybe I said too much..."
The smirk on Summer’s face turned into a full-on wolf grin. "Uh huh. Should’ve seen your face while you were describing him. I know that look. ”
"I mean... but...” Mango Leaf waved both hooves in circular gestures, illustrating nothing in particular. “He's pretty much family. I can’t just spring that kinda thing outta nowhere, you know?"
Summer rolled her eyes and made a dismissive “pfft” sound. "So don't! Meet him at the station, maybe bring him one of those what-do-you-call-em flower things, give a nice big hug when you put it on him. If he’s not into stallions, then you have a problem, but I haven’t heard you say that yet.”
“So, what, I should start flirting as soon as his hooves touch the ground? I told you, we’re like cousins, what if--”
Summer hardly slowed down. “Basics of the basics: say stuff that shows how you're looking at him as a STALLION, not a cousin." She jabbed her hoof toward Mango’s chest. “What, worried about ‘making things awkward?’ You’ll regret it if you don’t try, and you know it.”
Mango slumped into the bench’s backrest, contemplating the truth of those words. The sun was sinking behind the high-rise hotels and boutiques, and it was getting dark--time to either go drinking or go home.
"So,” he said, without turning to face Summer Heat, “I guess you fancy yourself a professional at this kinda stuff, huh?"
Summer pushed off the back of the bench, propelling herself so that she landed on the paved walkway with all four hooves. "Please. Professionals get paid. I prefer ‘artist.’ Just make sure you tell me how it went when I come back for more yogurt tomorrow."
Haystacks took a deep, deep breath as he stepped off the last rung of the flimsy portable staircase and onto solid ground. Before yesterday, he had hardly even known what an airship looked like, let alone set hoof inside one, let alone spent all day and all night trapped inside a cramped metal box hanging off the bottom of a balloon that was suspended thousands of feet in the air and vibrating from the force of three massive engines, with nothing but vast ocean beneath for as far as the eye could see.
Haystacks had spent more sleepless nights than he could keep track of on convincing himself to go through with this trip, then several more making arrangements for the time he would be gone. His mother had been soul-rendingly supportive. She had scolded him for worrying about her. Told him to bring back souvenirs. And then beckoned him closer to the hospital bed so that she could kiss him on the cheek and wish him a safe trip.
That was how Haystacks, the country boy who averaged two days away from the farm in a typical year, had up and flown across an ocean and most of a continent to stay on a tiny volcanic island for an entire weekend. That was insane. Impossible. But it had happened. All because of--because what, again? Was there really a reason sufficient to justify it all?
It was too late, of course. He had climbed off the airship, walked into the airship depot, crossed through the airship depot’s departure gate area, and exited onto the streets of a strange city named Hoofolulu. There was an emboldening rush to it, as well as a weakening chill: he had made a great accomplishment, or a great mistake.
“Hey! Who’s that big lump over there who looks exactly just like somepony I know?”
The sound of Mango Leaf’s voice was unmistakable, and it was the first pleasurable thing that Haystacks had experienced since being locked inside the cramped hellhole that was the airship’s cabin. Haystacks turned to face where the voice had come from and--yes, there it was--just like before, the mere sight of Mango Leaf’s warm colors and warmer smile were enough to bring on those feelings of friendship and familiarity; enough to soothe Haystacks’ frayed nerves and make it as if their last meeting had been only yesterday. Today, Mango Leaf was wearing a string of yellow-fringed white flowers as a long necklace, easily reaching mid-chest. Strange, thought Haystacks, but fitting for a tropical island.
“Oh. Nah, nevermind, sorry,” said Mango Leaf as he coasted to a stop in front of Haystacks.
Haystacks opened his mouth and furrowed his brow in confusion. Confusion, and--and maybe he ought to be offended?
Before Haystacks could formulate an objection, Mango spoke again with a dismissive wave.  “The stallion I’m lookin’ for wouldn’t stop working if you offered him a million bits and a date with the sexiest fro-yo vendor in the world.”
Mango Leaf leveled a flat stare at Haystacks for just long enough for the words to sink in, and then he lunged with both hooves outstretched. Before the inevitable hug, something light and slightly itchy was dropped over Haystacks’ head and onto his shoulders. Oh--Mango had given him the flowers. And then they were hugging, of course they were, because cousins didn’t shake hooves.
“I’ve been counting the days, Hay.” Mango Leaf peeled away from the hug and gave Haystacks an odd look. Longing, was that the word? “I just... I’ve been thinkin’ about you a lot since last time.”
Haystacks smiled, though he didn’t know quite what to say. Knowing that he had such a good friend in Mango, well, that felt good, to be sure, and in more ways than one. But Haystacks wasn’t good at accepting flattery, so he just smiled. Then he raised a hoof to his collar and looked down at the odd, organic adornment hanging from his shoulders. “Why did you give me this?”
“It’s called a lei,” said Mango. “And don’t bother making a pun--we’ve all heard the get lei’d joke a million times.”
Haystacks rolled his eyes. “I came to see a new place and spend time with my cousin, not get lei’d.”
Mango appeared to falter just a bit, before laying the flattery on even thicker. “Big strong country boy with looks like yours, I bet you have mares and stallions lining up down the block,” said Mango with a mockingly coy lilt. “Wouldn’t blame them.”
“I haven’t met anypony. You know that.” Then he smiled again. Whether Mango knew it or not, the teasing and compliments were a welcome distraction from the stresses of travel. Just one more of the many reasons he was so glad to be near Mango.
“But if I end up with a stallion, I hope he's just like you," said Haystacks. "Cousin," he added.
The answer to that was a brief silence. In fact, they walked side by side without speaking for more than a few seconds. Haystacks felt a sudden twinge of guilt, followed by a deep plunge of worry; had he made Mango Leaf uncomfortable? Haystacks stopped and turned toward his old friend, opening his mouth and trying to find the right apology, but Mango spoke up first.
“Yeah, well, I hope so too, cousin.” Mango Leaf was looking straight ahead and still walking, but at least he was showing teeth with his smile. “C’mon--the place I was taking you for dinner closes early. We should hurry.”
"So...?"
Sure enough, Summer Heat was back for more yogurt. She was early this time; Mango Leaf had barely finished setting up. The mare had a bright, eager expression when she trotted up to the stand, which fell gradually as she got a better look at Mango’s own face.
"He said he’d love to be with a stallion just like me someday."
Summer Heat nodded slowly. Once... twice.
“...Ouch.”
Mango Leaf reared up and leaned on the stand’s counter with both forelegs. “Uh huh. So what kinda fro-yo for you?”
Her eyes flicked across the long list of flavors, lighting on names at random instead of scanning in any kind of pattern. “How long did you say he's here for?" she said, almost absentmindedly.
"Only until monday," said Mango Leaf. “I’m gonna take the weekend off for him. Still wanna meet him?”
Summer Heat didn’t break eye contact with the yogurt menu. "Monday? That’s plenty of time. What’s he up to tomorrow?"
“Hey, I told you, he said...”
Summer raised a hoof, silencing him. “You boys give up so easily. What is he up to tomorrow?”
Mango raised both brows at Summer’s no-nonsense attitude. “Uh.”
Summer continued to scrutinize the menu board for its secrets. “Well?”
“He’s doing some... some tour thing with a group. Today they’re sightseeing, and I think tomorrow is a day at the beach.”
Summer bobbed her head in a single firm nod. "Perfect. Perfect. All right, I’ve got your battle plan. But first?"
She finally looked up from the menu board with a hardened gaze, and spoke with flat conviction.
“Maple-bourbon. Two scoops. Chop-chop.”
White sand, clear skies, vast ocean, and blazing sunlight: Summer in Haywaii. The kind of scenery that pamphlets, artists, and novelists would classify as “beautiful” with almost obligatory ease.
Summer Heat found her rented beach chair, put her new pair of designer sunglasses on, and reached for the bottle of juice that she had left on the little side table. Good--it was still cool to the touch.
There they were, the tour group, all wearing matching green lanyards and setting up the volleyball net, but where... ah, there he was. Mango Leaf’s orange mane and shockingly yellow coat, incoming at top speed from eleven o'clock, were impossible to miss. Which meant that the monotone khaki-tan fellow that he was making a beeline for could only be...
Summer nodded approvingly as the blaze-yellow unicorn intercepted his “target” with a surprise hip-check, which was answered by a stumble, a confused look, and then a playful elbow jab. The two started talking--their words were drowned out by the insistent rush of the ocean, but even from a distance it was clear that they were smiling. Soon, they were chased off the court so that the games could begin.
Volleyball, as it turned out, was a sexy game.
A jet-black stallion reared forcefully, then hopped from his rear hooves for extra height on an overhead spike. His wild seafoam mane was thrown wildly by the breeze and his sinewy haunches strained for every ounce of jump power. He loaded an attack by pulling one forehoof to his shoulder, then whipped an arcing strike up and over his head in one coordinated snap of motion, sending the ball into a lethal line drive.
But the other team--a pair of pegasus mares--would not be so easily defeated. One of them dove for a desperate save, hurling her toned body across the sand and extending her long, lithe limbs as far as she could. The black stallion's spike shot hit her outstretched hoof instead of the sand, and the ball bounced high into the air as she slid a few inches and then picked herself up.
Not all of the competitors were quite so impressive, of course, but all the same, Summer Heat was glad she had decided to watch.
It took several matches before Mango Leaf and the pony who could only be Haystacks got their turn on the court. It was plain to see that Haystacks was reluctant--Mango all but dragged him into position--but it was equally obvious that where Mango went, Haystacks would follow.
Mango took his place on the back line and started the game with a clean overhoof serve. Not that Summer didn't already know about Mango Leaf's body, but his coordinated flowing form showed that there was a fine physique beneath that blinding coat.
The opponents returned with a long lob that landed in the sand directly behind Haystacks.
To Haystacks’ credit, his skills improved remarkably quickly as the match progressed. Soon, instead of watching balls fall, he was hustling to lead their paths and positioning himself to return or set-up. He and Mango were still losing, of course, which made it all the more fortunate that the turning point happened when it did.
Mango and Haystacks both dove to save the same spike, resulting in a painful-looking full-body collision. Haystacks picked himself up without too much trouble, then pulled Mango to his hooves, only to be thrown forcibly back to the ground as Mango locked him into a wrestler's grip and used the element of surprise to yank the larger stallion off his hooves.
"Nice," Summer Heat muttered.
Haystacks reversed Mango and took the top position with a sudden surge of strength, forcing Mango onto the sand with his belly facing the sun. As the larger stallion pressed down onto his kicking and arching "cousin," Summer placed the bottle of juice to her lips and took a long, slow drink. Immoral though the thought was, she found herself wishing for a camera. Or at least some popcorn.
The blue-orange-grey of the evening sky was suddenly obscured by the head and torso of a smirking earth pony mare leaning into Mango Leaf’s field of vision.
"Had fun today?" Summer Heat said.
“Somethin’ like that,” Mango Leaf said, rolling off of the bench where he had been reclining. “The group went off to see a show, but he’s with me tomorrow, then I’m puttin’ him up for his last night before going back. It’s perfect!”
“Well, well. So much confidence. What changed?"
Mango snorted. “Oh come on, do you think I’m blind? You were watching the whole time. You sure like watching big sweaty stallions jumpin’ around and divin’ for balls, huh?"
Summer turned up her nose in mock offense. "I was only there in a professional capacity, rest assured."
"You said you were an artist, not a professional,” Mango returned. “Or, what, are you saying that you wanna be paid now?"
Summer tapped her lips with a hoof. Her eyes fell onto the yogurt menu.
“One extra large, half honeydew-mint and half lilikoi, with condensed milk on top, and we'll call it square."
"Hoo, that’s one hard bargain you’re drivin’ for your services. Two flavors and the condensed milk?"
Summer clicked her tongue. “You want the best, you pay for the best.”
Mango Leaf smiled at her, then turned his back to get to work on her ‘payment.’ It wasn’t until he was leaned all the way into his cart that a question from before started to tug at his mind.
"So, you know... I was just thinking.”
“Don’t hurt yourself.”
“Ha.”
The lilikoi was easy enough, but the honeydew wasn’t a popular flavor. Mango Leaf had to stretch in order to reach it.
“Like I was saying. You came back, you tracked me down, and then you... well, you know, you did all this for me, even though we hadn’t talked in years. It kinda doesn’t make sense?"
Summer Heat didn’t reply immediately. When she did, it was without her characteristic sass.
“Something wrong with that? Seems like it worked out for you.”
“Oh yeah! You’re like a cousin I didn't know I needed.” With both flavors of yogurt scooped and ready, he finally leaned back from the cart’s refrigerated interior and turned toward his basket of toppings. “It’s just, I didn't think you were the type to, you know... care.”
There wasn’t an answer from Summer through the entire time Mango Leaf spent drizzling condensed milk for her.
“I mean, sorry if that sounds harsh, but--”
“Sorry, are you talking to me?” said the green unicorn standing at the counter.
Some distance away, a cutie mark depicting a sprinkle of flower petals folded itself into a crowd, and then was gone.
Bottle of top-grade 'okolehao set on the table like a centerpiece. Check.
A record of the closest approximation of mood music that Haywaii’s local musicians had to offer. Check.
Scented candles perched at random around the perimeter of the living room. Perhaps a bit frivolous, but check.
Lights turned down low. Laundry shoved in the closet. Bedroom cleaned. Head full of alternately heart-melting and blush-inducing images of the night to come. Check, check, check, check. Buying time by “heading to the store for some things” and instructing Haystacks to bring home the take-out once it was ready had definitely been a good move. Rude for a host, perhaps, but Haystacks wasn’t the type to get uppity about such things, and with any luck, it would all be worth it.
Now, though, Mango Leaf was afraid that he might have bought himself too much time; the anticipation was threatening to shake his resolve.
Eventually, Mango Leaf managed to stop pacing around his house looking for something else to prepare or clean up, and stepped out through his front door to stare up at the stars--something that always calmed him. Really, it should have been obvious: Summer Heat hadn't done a thing to help seduce Haystacks. What she had done was convince Mango Leaf to find out if Haystacks felt the same way, after all this time.
Ten minutes passed. Fifteen.
It was then that Mango Leaf first smelled the smoke.
“Hey there.”
“...Hey.”
The air-conditioned interior of the depot was mercifully empty, with only a few travelers and inter-island commuters standing at counters and waiting in lines. Even through the concrete walls, the thrumming of gigantic propellers could be heard whenever a ship came in for a landing. Haystacks was going to be boarding one of those ships.
"Here to see him off?"
See him off. The words fell heavy on Mango Leaf’s ears, full of oppressive finality. That was it, then. Haystacks was about to board an airship all the way back to his home in the heart of mainland Equestria, and there was no telling how long it would be until the next chance to see him again.
“Already did.”
Summer Heat didn’t speak up for a few seconds. Waiting, maybe. Mango didn’t oblige her. If she had taken the trip out to the depot just to hear the report, well, he didn’t feel like sharing right now.
"That bad, huh?"
“Mm.”
Mango Leaf failed to muster the effort of explaining how he and Haystacks had been forced to crash at an auntie’s house after Mango had accidentally set his couch on fire with a scented candle.
"The whole thing didn’t really happen. Sorry. I know you wanted to help.”
The worst was realizing, in hindsight, that he could have gotten a hotel room, could have brought Haystacks out to sleep beneath the stars, could have, would have, should have... but it didn’t matter now. At the time, Mango Leaf had been too exhausted, too devastated, and too guilty to think of doing anything except seek out a solution the best way he knew how: by calling upon his ‘family’ of friends.
And that was it. Mango Leaf had missed his chance, likely the only one he would get for years. Years that he would spend wondering if Haystacks felt the same way.
“Don’t be sorry. Hey.”
Mango was dimly aware that a small weight had been laid across his shoulders. He didn’t respond.
“You love him. If he loves you, that won’t change no matter how long you’re apart, no matter how much you both change. No matter what.”
“No matter what...”
The change was instantaneous. Mango Leaf yanked Summer Heat into a rough hug, planted a peck on her cheek, then turned and bolted off in the direction of Haystacks’ departure gate.
He left so quickly that he didn't see the expression on Summer Heat's face as he ran off, or how she watched for a little longer than necessary before turning back to the ticket counter she had been standing at before talking to Mango.
"Aloha, Mango Leaf," she said softly.
“...But don't worry. If we think about it together, and walk the same road, then I'm sure we'll make some sense out of it. But you promise you'll chase your dreams, right?”
Haystacks didn’t answer right away, so Mango gave him a nudge. “No matter what happens.”
When Mango Leaf tried to lock eyes with Haystacks, he saw that Haystacks had his eyes squeezed shut, and was nodding as hard as he could instead of talking.
“Whatever they might be,” Haystacks finally said, once his eyes were dry. There was only a slight waver to his voice. “I promise.”
The doors opened. The stairs were wheeled into place. The airship loomed in all its terrifying immensity.
Welp.
It had been a good trip, all told. The simple fact of how decadent it felt to take a real vacation had been one of the greatest new experiences of all.
And he had gotten to spend time with Mango, even if that time had ended with an unpleasant surprise and an unintended adventure. Not a failure, no, but... unsatisfying, really. More than a little unsatisfying, since he never would have come here if not for...
“Haystacks! Haystacks!”
The voice alone caused Haystacks’ breath to catch in his chest. Then the voice’s owner knocked the rest of the breath out of him by ramming into him with a forceful, almost desperate hug.
“What I said last time,” Mango said breathlessly, “The campfire. That’s why you came all the way out here. Because I made you promise...”
Haystacks swallowed hard, and nodded harder. It came all at once, the feelings, the memories, the warmth, all of it, and suddenly the thing that Haystacks had been hiding from everypony, even himself, was hard--impossible--to contain. “D-dreams,” he choked. “No matter what happens.”
“No matter what happens.” Tears brimmed in Mango Leaf’s eyes as he curled one hoof around the back of Haystacks’ head. “Whatever they might be.”