NaNoWriMo2015 Oneshot Colletction

Going out for coffee with Mystic was not nearly so interesting as the five minutes in her lab had been, Then again, I wasn’t sure that was an entirely fair assessment, considering what had happened in those first five minutes. I don’t think much could be as interesting as, and definitely not more interesting than a lab exploding into orange.

We went to the local Moose Horton’s, and I ordered a trio of donuts and a tea. She ordered an extra-large, extra-black coffee. I didn’t even want to know how a pony was supposed to make a coffee ‘extra black’. It was probably one of those things that mortal minds best not ponder.

“Have you been in Canterlot for long?” Mystic asked me, smiling curiously across our table.

“Just got in last night,” I answered easily.

Mystic raised an eyebrow. “You didn’t take any time before to get yourself set up in the city?” she asked curiously.

I shrugged. I hadn’t really seen the need. I’d have time on the weekends. “No. there’s no need for me to. It’s just setting up my apartment, really, and I don’t have much I need or want right away,” I explained. “I’m not a high maintenance pony.”

Mystic frowned, but didn’t say anything, simply seeming to accept it. I was glad. I didn’t really want to explain why I needed so little time. I didn’t really have a whole lot, and hadn’t felt the need for it. A cloud bed and an alchemy set was all I really needed to keep happy.

“I can accept that,” Mystic said, her thoughtful frown turning into a smile. “It’s nice to meet a pony that doesn’t have the same need for status and stuff as most of Canterlot seems to have.”

I smiled in return, glad she’d let it go. “Um… if you don’t mind me asking, why are you taking on an assistant? You’ve been one of the top researchers in Canterlot without one, and using primarily your grad students, why are you taking on an assistant now of all times?”

The mare smiled. It was the sort of smile I really didn’t like. It normally came before a big reveal of some sort of project that was going to put me through some kind of trial. More than likely severely bruising to an alchemist’s ego and sometimes dignity. At the same time, I couldn’t help but return the smile. Those kinds of projects were almost always exciting, and usually either failed miserably or succeeded gloriously.

“Why, we’re going to be creating Liquid Emotions,” she said with a far-too-wide grin.

I snorted, raising an eyebrow. “You kidding?” I asked. Her grin remained in place. For a long moment I just looked at her, before my own smile twitched. “You’re crazy. And I’m crazy for going along with this, but it’s too good a possibility to resist,” I stated, already excited. This was going to do one of two things… I just hoped it was the glorious success.

Going back to the lab unfortunately meant clean up. The orange dye was easy enough to clean off all the surfaces, though my lack of magic forced me to use my wings, and that unfortunately ended up with me having about the first foot or so of my left wing brightly tie-dyed. Without a single elastic or string being used.

It was honestly kind of cool. Unfortunately, Mystic had no clue how long it would take to wash out or if I’d have to wait until I molted those feathers. I really, really hoped it wasn’t the latter. Have a foot of tie-dyed feathers would just be plain weird to deal with.

Once the lab was clean, however, Mystic started showing me around, showing me where to find everything, and letting me know about the various storage regulations for some of the ingredients and solutions. For some odd reason, it looked like Arcanex, a rather dangerous magical potion and drug in the wrong hooves, didn’t seem to quite meet all the regulations required of similar potions.

I figured it best to talk to Mystic about that later, however, since the rest of the stuff was so meticulously packed and stored. There might be a reason for it, though I couldn’t think of it off the top of my head. I figured it might be better just to talk to her in case of some kind of a misunderstanding.

The lab itself was fairly standard for an alchemy lab. There was about a half dozen work tables in the centre of the room, each one octagonal with a sink in one corner of them and plenty of workspace for beakers, flasks, burners, and various other alchemical tools. There was also a space at the front of the room for anything bigger that might be required for experiments of various types. Such as the big cauldron that Mystic had been using earlier.

I smiled as I looked around. I was a research assistant to a highly respected alchemical researcher and my first project with her was going to be something supposedly impossible. This would be awesome, I could feel it.

I walked over to the station Mystic had said would be mine for any side projects I wanted to run. I was surprised she was giving me that kind of freedom. I’d have expected her to keep a tight eye, and leash, on me for at least the first few months. That I was getting that kind of freedom already was amazing. I’d had a few things in mind that I’d really been wanting to try out for a while. Number one was just how effective it was to infuse Pegasus magic in various things.

These experiments would take a little while to set up, however, as it required materials I didn’t have ready access to outside of a lab. Not legally, anyway.

“Oh hey, there’s some left!” Mystic said happily. The one place we hadn’t really done much to was the cauldron, and that was what she was currently looking into. I walked over and looked down into it just in time for her to grab a beaker and dip it into the left over potion.

Unfortunately it seemed that the potion reacted to contact with magical auras. The stuff in the bottom of the cauldron exploded. I felt it spatter all over my muzzle, face and mane. I turned to look at Mystic, deadpan to see she’d just gotten the same treatment. She wore a slightly sheepish grin on her face.

I sighed, already seeing my employment under her would be interesting to say the least, and that wasn’t including the project she was about to undertake. I walked over to the sink and began to rinse the dye off my face. “I’m not going to look in the mirror. It will end badly,” I informed her as I began.

“Well, look on the bright side, it’ll make for a great story,” Mystic suggested, rinsing herself at another one of the workstations. I really couldn’t deny that.

I turned to see just what she looked like after the rinse down and snorted. I tried to hold it back, but in a couple of seconds, I burst into laughter. Mystic Sapphire was now, from the neck up on the front side of her head, a wonderful combination of orange, blue, and yellow tie-dye, to compliment her normal stripes of green on the rest of her. It was actually pretty hilarious to see.

“Don’t go laughing, Sky. You sure don’t look any better,” she informed me with a teasing smile of her own.

“Oh, but I’m not going to look into the mirror until tonight, so I’m going to be just fine,” I informed her cheerfully. She gave me a look, but didn’t continue the argument.

I smiled smugly as I went back to looking around my workstation, and getting familiar with the lab while I waited for her to give me my first real duty. I refused to go near the cauldron again. But somehow I knew, no matter how careful I was, interesting would be the absolute mildest way I would be able to describe my new position. Probably in a very short time.

And somehow, I was just fine with that.