Chapter 1 ; Behavioural science
Quantico, which is what some of the workers called the merryland brothel so as not to remind themselves where they worked, was a cold, forgetful place at night. But the face on the pillow, rosy in the firelight, is definitely that of Lilly Starling, and she sleeps deeply, sweetly, in the silence of the night. Lilly Starling was not her real name, she changed it a short time before arriving at merryland, her real name was Clear Starlight, but as much as she tried she could not bring herself to keep some part of her name. Lilly woke up as soon as the warm rays of the sun began to warm the back of her neck. She opened her eyes and could see little but candlelight shining through the crack at the bottom of the door. Merryland was one of the best towns in the wasteland, it can still be located in the heart of a desert, no one remembers exactly where. Everyone finds that once you've gotten to maryland, you want to forget the world outside and your life before, Lilly was no exception.
an hour later she was sat at a long table eating the breakfast someone had been kind enough to bring her, Lilly can never tell who is the breakfast deliverer. She had a problem with her brain and our poor Lilly could not tell apart individuals, their faces and bodies distorted into a blur. After knowing someone for a while she could tell certain things about them, their size became familiar, their voice became distinct from others, she just wished the breakfast stallion was more unique.
Maryland was a strange town, from the farms outside the high walls flew pegasi to deliver meals to each building on the inside every mealtime, this had come to occur after the mayor wanted to make ponies have to buy their food from him but the owner of the farms, who everyone called Bill, disagreed, moving his farms outside the walls with a great display of magic from the unicorn farm workers and sending each building their meals each day, this did mean that each building had to keep a steady track on numbers and requirements, allergies and such, and so the unicorns at the farm now work doing that. The mayor let it go easily, happy with the arrangements and impressed with the speed and ingenuity. There were not a huge number of buildings in Merryland, there were certainly no shops as they had no need for money, they worked, recieved their meals, had free time in the recreation grounds and buildings, then they slept, they could love and laugh to their heart's content. there were very few who were allowed to sit back and do no work, or no apparent work. Those who did not work adequately were sent either to the farms or the desert. The total population was one hundred and four.
There was the Politikos, the mayor's home and where all major decisions for the town and town meetings took place. there was the farm building, built into the wall where the workers slept. There was the hospital, the use of which should be obvious. And only a few other buildings, including a military building and the Brothel. The brothel doubled as a place to stay, not enough people stayed temporarily to warrant a hotel yet they still came, so up on the second and third floors visiting ponies could rest their heads for a night or two, or three. You would think some of the less moral ponies would take advantage of being so close to these girls but it was rare, as they could get what they wanted on the first floor anyway.
The large iron gates of the town opened and closed on a regular basis, letting in and releasing travelers, unless they wanted to stay of course, traders and whatever else was deemed non-threatening that wished to enter.
Every day Lilly would sit at the breakfast table and wondered when it would all come crashing down. She believed that the wasteland did not allow for happiness, and the contentedness she felt at Merryland could not last. She imagined the walls burning to the ground, smoke filling the eyes and minds of everyone and fire burning at their bodies. But soon it was time to go to work, she worked as a waitress for the tables, she walked between the blur of ponies and other species, unable to discern them. She took orders and prepared drinks more effectively than anyone else but was, of course, unable to remember who the orders were for, which made finding the tables significantly harder. A week after she joined the Boss, Crowfeet, introduced a system of table numbering, after this her job became easier and she could easily slip into the monotony of it, broken up by the occasional minor harassment. It's to be expected in this establishment, though.
For two years she did the same thing every day. Got up, ate, worked, ate, worked, ate, worked, slept. She slept well and was content, but on the exact day marking the two year anniversary of her arrival, bleeding, malnourished and close to death, at the gates of Merryland, someone caught her eye. This may seem minor to you, the reader, but for someone to whom all look the same to have their eye caught is a major event. She recognised burn marks on this pony's flank and they were adorned with clothing she had never seen before. she saw them around a few more days during meal times coming to collect his meals and figured that this pony was staying in one of the rooms, yet she did not see him