Venture Capital was going down! It was the first day of the new fiscal quarter and they had failed to turn a profit on their latest invention. Using the souls of unwanted orphans for a power supply, what were they thinking?
Through a dummy corporation I had managed to purchase twenty percent of their stock and at precisely noon today I would strike and all of their assets would be mine. With my newly acquired company the world would be my oyster and Diamond Tiara its finest pearl.
My darling daughter was all of the best parts of me and my wife old what’s -her-name. I couldn’t think of it. It didn’t really matter. The head of a school board meant nothing, only being a princess mattered. Diamond Tiara would be just that, a princess. She would have all of the finest private education I could muster, Saint Olga’s school of Princesses would be where she’d learn and rub shoulders with interdimensional royalty. After all, if a purple librarian and a babysitter could become princesses why not my daughter with the proper education?
The clock read 10:30. That was plenty of time to grab a cup of coffee and look like one of the regular ponies. It would foster good will among the public. I left my office at a brisk pace as my secretary called out to me, “Filthy Rich don’t forget about the meeting at noon.” That was ridiculous. Of course I wouldn’t forget the meeting, even if this princess business bothered me.
I was half way to the coffee shop when it hit me, “Princess Celestia is a lying, manipulative changeling queen,” and she had to die.
Changelings. The only way to defeat a creature with a lot of holes in it was to put more holes in it. With enough holes the only things they would be able to resemble were the pockets of the urchins that lined the street. “Get away from me,” I shouted at the urchins and tossed several bits in the air, they scrambled about trying to collect them while I made my purchases of a crossbow and a fake beard at the local Bow and Beard Emporium.
I couldn’t believe how no other pony had come to the same conclusion I had about Celestia, especially when it was so blatantly obvious. However, when you’re a pony on a mission, a pony of destiny, you don’t question these matters. You simply shove your way to the local train station’s ticket counter, throw your crossbow on the teller’s desk and say, “One ticket to Canterlot, I am the chosen one,” which I did.
I turned around to wait for the ticket to be processed and that’s when I saw her. Call it kismet. Call it love at first sight but, as she sat there on that bench I felt something come to life within me that I had long since believed to be dead.
I tore the beard off of my face and approached the grey furred beauty. Her short blonde mane glistened in the sun as she nibbled on a muffin, lemon surprise by the look of it. I looked into her eyes and as I did one of them slowly slid to the side. She was my light in the darkness, my Melchior at the end of time seeing all that had been and ever would be. The lady who would create and rebuild my world a hundred times over with each gentle breath she took. With her we would raise my daughter and our foals to be kind and love would reign supreme.
She smiled at me. I smiled back. I was about to ask her name the loud whirring of a nearby vacuum echoed in my ear. I turned my head and watched the pony work. It looked like fun!
I wrestled the machine away from the custodian and shouted triumphantly. With the vacuum now in my possession I began my dance. It was a basic waltz, forward, backward then spin and keep sucking up loose dirt with your cleaning apparatus of choice. It was the Dance of the Cleaning Crew. One that I had seen performed I know not how many times. None ever applauded their performance, but then again, manual labor was its own reward.
On my third spin I saw them, a swarm of flying insects that fluttered on the breeze. I watched as the other ponies, obviously struck in fear’s hypnotic trance froze as the fiends flew closer. I kicked the vacuum into overdrive, released the wand and pointed it at my nemeses. They struggled but, were unable to escape the wand’s suction and were soon captured within.
My victory secure, I reinserted the vacuum’s wand into its slot. Just as I did so, a yellow pegasus swooped down in tears and wrestled the vacuum away from me saying something about it being, “Breezy.” No matter it was hers. She could play with the vacuum all she wanted for as I looked across the train platform I saw a certain somepony that made my blood boil.
I galloped faster than I ever had before in my life at that unaware jerk. Without warning I leaped and land fully on his back knocking him to the ground. I wrapped my forelegs around his throat and began squeezing as he squirmed under my weight.
Time Turner had a lot of nerve showing his face around Ponyville again. My poor sister wept for weeks after he dumped her in order to join the phone company. Please, nopony joins the phone company; you’re born into the phone company. The nepotism is high there. To this very day the mere mention of his name still makes her sniffle and now it was time for payback!
He grew weaker under my onslaught struggling less and less by the second so I climbed off of his back and prepared to deliver my finishing move, the Equestrian Destroyer, a maneuver so powerful that its mere mention turned stallions into bawling babes. I reared up placed his head between my back legs and clutched him about the torso when I noticed his cutie mark.
I had made a mistake. It wasn’t Time Turner at all. I shoved the broken pony away from me. “Oops,” I said as I dusted myself off. To be fair though, he really did look like Time Turner.
I was exhausted. It had been a long day. The only thing I really wanted to do was go home, drink some fine champagne and possibly hire a masseuse to get a nice rub down before turning in for the night. Looking about the train station I saw a brand new phone booth painted a deep blue and decided to call my driver. For a moment I thought it was odd that a new phone had been installed between the time I’d arrived at the train station and the time I fought with the fake Time Turner, but I bore it no mind and opened the door.
Upon entering the booth I realized that this must have been one of those new foreign payphones that were much bigger on the inside than they looked from the outside. An entire family could live quite comfortably in there. It was however, inconvenient because it took a bit of a search to find the phone in there. Once I did I made my call.
“Hello sir, I’m glad you called,” said old Mobile upon his arrival ten minutes later.
“Thank you Mobile,” I said as I took my seat.
“So, where would you like to go today sir?”
Saddle Arabia, land of enchantment and home to the cradle of equine civilization. Here, a pony with enough cash could live out his life like the sultans of old. I sat quietly watching the vassals shake there tassels, the end of a narghile hung precariously from my mouth as I smiled. I removed the pipe and sipped my tamar hindi as I continued to watch the performance.
I felt at ease in this exotic land where living was not simply being here, but it was a state of mind. It was very zen. Slowly, I reached for one of the dates that sat in the little bowl on the table and as I looked up I couldn’t help but smile again as I watched one of the dancers undulate like the sea at night, dark and mysterious but always moving in its rhythmic ways.
I must have swum for hours before the tide carried me the rest of the way in. I had every right to destroy that cruise liner. All you can eat buffet indeed. When a pony asks for more rodent meat, one simply does not deny said pony their rodent meat! That is poor customer service and for that you go to the bottom of the ocean. It’s the law of the sea!
I looked about the yellow sand beach. Then I looked toward the skyline. It looked thick and brown. That’s how I knew I was in Los Pintos. Well, that and the smell, you never forget the smell of Los Pintos. As I scanned the beach I noticed a small bungalow and wearily dragged myself to it. I opened the door and laid down on the floor just inside the entrance.
As I nodded off I kept thinking that I was forgetting something important. Oh well, it probably didn’t really matter. I’d remember it in time. Things have always had a way of working out for me. Always have, always will.
