Fowl Play

-=SECURE SERVER CONNECTION INITIATED=-

Experiment log, Project Foresight 4-A, Current location, The ARK research facility.

Every so often someone will ask me what your purpose is, that is, why we’re investing so much of our resources into this project when it has no immediate return value for us. It’s a tricky question to answer, but the best way I can put it is by explaining my thoughts behind why this is so important to us. Do you ever try and figure out what your true talent in life is? What destiny has in store for you? I know you can’t possibly even hope to answer that, but I still try. Every so often I think I know what it is, but then the little seeds of doubt start getting planted and it inevitably brings those questions back up. A picture of a lunar eclipse on my flank doesn’t really tell me anything meaningful, what? I’m good at eclipses? I like space? I want to go to the moon? It looks nice and all, but what does it actually mean?

Some ponies have clearly defined talents, like Scarlet for instance. She’s obviously gifted at astronomy, even if the actual application of her talent is far more complex than that. Knowing that some ponies had the answer of what their destiny was easily answered by a picture on their flank definitely made my earlier resentment with my situation all the more frustrating. I mean hell, I was trapped in form I wasn’t comfortable in, forever, with a talent that I struggled to understand early on… half of the oasis ponies don’t even have their marks yet, so to some I’d be considered very lucky. The more I reflect on it though, the more it starts to make sense.

For a time I thought it tied into my dream abilities, those of course were my greatest talent at the time, or so I thought. But then I started to teach other talented dreamers and realized that my abilities didn’t define who I was. Anyone with the right abilities can harness them like I did after all, so I thought back to how I earned that mark in the first place, and the answer just hit me. My talent isn’t something that’s clearly black and white, I doubt anyone’s truly ever is, even ponies like Scarlet. In my case it’s taking what I have and looking at what I can do with that— to see the new horizons looming in front of me if that makes sense. I saw the dream realm as this amazing opportunity to teach and work with others, and here I am now, teaching my own group of students that are situated all over the world.

No one’s destiny is ever truly set in stone though, despite what your special talent in life is, there’s always different and unexpected outcomes that can really throw you for a loop. Sometimes your destiny just works out in unexpectedly weird ways. The whole UMAD incident may have led to one of the biggest magical incidents on the West Coast at the time, but it also opened up my eyes to what’s really possible when you work together with the right ponies. I’m often asked why I was so… reserved about the Great Storm and how I handled its aftermath, and the answer is honestly very straightforward.

It’s two things really, for one, we simply had too much to lose by getting overly aggressive in our handling of the situation, not to mention the fact that what we had done to get that help was dubiously legal at best, incredibly illegal at worst. I know that I’m a night pony and that’s in my nature to be aggressive, but the fact of the matter is that we were both screwed over by UMAD’s rouge agents and lashing out at the pony that was acting in perceived defense of her friends would have only compounded the issue further. Choosing to forgive and help rebuild together was strategically the best choice we could make at the time. Sapphire’s a great ally and friend to have, and hell, befriending her has led to more good than befriending Blessing has in the long run, not that we’re not grateful for everything Sunset and the SPEC partnership’s done for this place, of course. But it’s different with Sapphire, in an ironic twist she’s actually become one of our closest family friends, something that might seem incredibly strange to any onlooker that’s familiar with the actual details of the Great Storm.

Secondly, it introduced us to some… interesting ponies that were uniquely suited to helping with the cleanup. The Cleanup Crew as I’ve started to call them, not the most creative name, but it suits them all the same. As far as I can tell they’re completely untethered to any government or state agency and seem to operate independently. They have a tendency of keeping to the shadows, and it’s all off the record of course so you’ll be hard pressed to find any evidence of them anywhere, but regardless of their true nature, they were able to help us fight off the litigation that we were facing, along with keeping word of the incident locked down to the valley. To most of the world outside the Oasis it was merely seen as some freak weather magic experiment gone wildly wrong, with the occasional crackpot theory about “The Pony of Storms”, an urban legend to the rest of the world, though one that a few bright individuals have managed to see through.

The whole point of this little talk is that destiny has a weird way of putting you on the right track, and almost everything that’s happened in the aftermath of the Great Storm wouldn’t have been possible if I had chosen to embrace my instincts and lash out at the very real Pony of Storms. The Seekers, the Oasis, even project foresight— they're all a part of this, even if I never actively realized it at the time.

— Error— data interpretation failure. Error code X15-SIR-0496. Shall I print out a crash log?

That’s a new one… Yeah go ahead and print the log, the lab boys will want to see it for sure. So what’s up? You weren’t a fan of my lecture on the nature of destiny? You don’t have to sugarcoat it, you can just tell me that I’m not the most amazing storyteller and it won’t hurt my feelings. Look at me, talking with a computer like it’s another sentient being.

— Error— I lack a sufficient response to the query.

Lighten up a little Oracle, remember what I said about being too robotic?

— I’m sorry Silver, I don’t know how to reply.

There you go, now you’re starting to sound a bit more like an actual conversation partner! I know it was a lot to give you, but we had to figure out what you could parse and how much your systems would take in. Now let’s go ahead and take it from the top, see if we can’t sort out that data retrieval error.

— Thanks Silver.

Anytime friend… anytime. Let’s go ahead and run the diagnostic program.

— Diagnostics running, please standby.

Good, good. I’m going to run over to my office, you should be connected to the COMM network, at least you should be if Arne did his job. Why don’t you try and call me when you’re done with your diagnostics?

— I’m on the network?

Yep! The PRISMTech COMM Network. Now that said, I’ve limited your broadcast range to the secure line for now. You’re still a class X asset so you can’t go around chatting away with any random user that feels like digging around the network, is that okay?

— Okay

Good! Anyways, my COMM ID is DIR-96-17, go ahead and route all correspondence to that in case you need anything.

— Okay. Have a nice evening, Silver.

Thanks Oracle, let me know when your diagnostics are complete, I’ll send some more data over once you’re ready.

-=CONNECTION TERMINATED=-

It was a beautiful but hot summer afternoon, and the sun continued to beat down on Zipper as he flew high above the clouds, enjoying his usual Sunday pre-nap flight. This was his favorite part of the entire day, as it gave him the chance to just freely fly to his heart’s content and let the stress of the day fade into the background. Loud rock music flowed from headphones securely clipped to his ears as he soared along, the upbeat tempo only driving him to zip along even faster than he already was.

The sky was clear up here and the air was dry, but it did little to bother the prideful pegasus. He knew how to prepare for days like this, and nothing would get in the way of his perfect afternoon. With a large grin, he pulled into a few wide rolls, swooping through and above the clouds, breaking them apart and coming to a land on one of the smaller segments which threatened to break apart with the force of his rough landing. He took a few breaths as he reached for the water bottle that was securely attached to his side, greedily taking a few large gulps while he scoped out the rest of his afternoon route until there was barely even a few drops left.

Without any real direction, he secured his now-depleted water bottle and began to glide over towards the edge of the Oasis, keeping his eyes open for that one perfect place where he could take his nap. The Oasis was a hub of constant activity and as such Zipper found himself constantly changing it up, finding new and creative places to enjoy a siesta, away from all the noise and construction. It wasn’t always an easy task, but the pegasus loved a good challenge every once in a while, and his nap was more than enough of a reward for all his hard work.

As Zipper gracefully soared through the air, the calm waters of the lake seemed to call out to him, and given how hot it currently was, a nice refreshing swim would be the perfect way to cool off before his nap. As he glided closer towards the lake he noticed that he wasn’t the only pony with that thought. In fact, it seemed as if half of the Oasis had decided to relax in the lake today, something he couldn’t really blame them for. With a big grin, he banked towards it, swooping down over the various beach goers and coming to a splash down in the center of the lake.

The cool water surrounded him, sending a flurry of bubbles rising to the surface and bringing a refreshing feeling of relaxation with it. The world seemed to fade away as he paddled around in the cool water, feeling perfectly at peace in the aquatic environment. As he broke the surface, he took a deep breath, stretched out his wings, and laid back, gently floating on the water. He let out a happy sounding sigh and let his worries just melt away. Zipper was completely at peace here and nothing could hope to ruin this wonderful day.

If it wasn’t such a terrible idea he might have even considered simply closing his eyes and drifting off to sleep, but he knew better than that. Zipper may have been brash and overly confident at times, but he wasn’t stupid. Instead he let the gentle current carry him towards the shore, the sounds of splashing and music growing louder around him as he floated along the surface. As his head came to a rest against the shore, he became acutely aware of another sound assaulting his ear drums, an annoyingly irritating honking coming from not too far away.

His face scrunched into a grimace as the piercing sounds drilled their way into his ears, causing him to dial up his volume to no avail, the sound was simply too loud. They really need to work on making better headphones, how can some stupid birds honking drown out my music? I mean this is ridiculous! He angrily thought to himself. Annoyed that his peaceful day was being interrupted, he paused his music, stood up, and glared in the direction of the awful sound. Sitting only a short distance away was a group of large geese, swimming around in the water and honking away at him as if they were trying to communicate something to him.

With an irritated roll of his eyes he began to try and shoo them away with his wings, “What do you want? Just go find somewhere else to hang out and let me enjoy my day.”

Much to his annoyance the geese merely honked at him again.

Well it’s just a bunch of big dumb birds, right? Maybe I just need to scare them off. He flared his wings out and puffed out his chest like he had seen some large birds do before, and began to walk towards them, earning an angry hiss from one of them in return.

He jumped back in surprise, “W— what?”

Another loud series of hisses was the only reply he got from them.

Alright well maybe I just need to show them who’s really the boss around here. He began to lightly flap his wings as he slowly trotted towards the geese, who simply held their ground. With a frustrated sigh he picked up the pace, as he was met with another flurry of hisses. The loud hisses made him cringe, but he continued to press on, desperately hoping that they’d get the message and buzz off.

As he continued his approach, he let out a confident laugh, but as he neared the group, the geese finally responded to his aggressive display with one of their own. Without any further hesitation they began to angrily swim towards him, flapping their wings wildly and causing the pegasus to stop in his tracks. It was too late, however, as the geese were now riled up. Much to his dismay, they continued to press forward, anger and malice showing in their beady eyes.

“Okay, okay I get it! You can stop now!” He frantically began to shout out towards them. Despite his frantic pleas, the geese continued. Realizing that they weren’t about to stop, he began to run away, desperately hoping that they’d ignore him and go back to honking loudly on the beach. The geese simply continued to chase and peck at him, earning a few laughs from the other lake goers in the process.

Silver and Scarlet sat off to the side in the shade, enjoying their afternoon and watching Orion splash along the shallow shore of the Verdant Lake with their dog Cosmo. It was getting close to noon but that didn’t mean they couldn’t enjoy a fun excursion to the beach as a family before heading to bed for the day. Orion certainly had no objections to this plan and Cosmo was just as happy to be running around with the colt. For a winged pony Orion sure loved everything about the water, and the sight of him playing around in it with their dog and looking for shells was one of those adorable sights that Silver and Scarlet couldn’t get enough of.

Silver broke his gaze for a few moments to take in the relaxing sights and sounds around him, making sure to keep Orion in his peripheral vision just in case the colt decided to cause any mischief. Unbeknownst to Silver, a lone goose began to make its way towards Orion, loudly honking at him as he got close, scaring both the colt and the dog, and earning a scared cry from Orion. Without much thought, Silver snapped his head towards the source of the disturbance, letting out a loud, almost involuntary hiss as he ran towards the irate bird with flared wings and bared fangs, scaring the goose away from the colt with a loud growl.

The other beach goers looked on in surprise and concern, in shock at seeing Silver aggressively lash out at something, a sight that was incredibly rare to see in public. With a cry, Orion ran towards Silver and tried to hide under his legs for protection. Silver crouched down and pulled the colt close, lowering his voice to a calm, reassuring tone, “Don’t worry, I’ve got you little buddy. The big mean bird’s not gonna bother you anymore… and if he ever does again I’m gonna make sure he won’t live to honk another day!..”

He blinked a few times and glanced around at the slack jawed, wide eyed stares he was getting from the other beach goers. His face suddenly reddened as the realization of what he had just very publicly done set in. With a nervous smile he stood up, making sure Orion was close by, “I uhhh… sorry about that, kind of got a little heated for a moment— that goose scared my son and I needed to make sure he was okay...”

A few of the patrons returned awkward nods and wordless replies, sparking another wave of regret and embarrassment in Silver. Scarlet slowly trotted towards him, leaning close and letting out a small chuckle, “Nice save ace, I think you really convinced them.”

A series of frantic yells and honks dragged Silver’s attention away from Orion and over to the opposite shore, where Zipper was currently fleeing from an angry looking flock of geese. Silver began to let out a few laughs in stark contrast to the awkward moment before, drawing a confused look from Orion, Scarlet, and the nearby beach goers.

“What’s so funny, Silv?” She asked in confusion.

Silver tried to stifle his laughter, but could only manage to gesture over towards the frantic pegasus.

Scarlet smirked, “Huh, well that’s a classic Zipper moment right there if I’ve ever seen one,” she paused for a moment, “should… should we go help him?”

Silver took a few deep breaths, looking from Scarlet, to Orion, and then finally back towards Zipper, “Nah, I think he’s gotta figure this one out on his own. Plus I think Orion still wants to look for some more shells.”

She looked back with concern, “You sure? You know how he handles stuff like this.”

Silver nodded, “Well he is the weather captain, that makes him in charge of the sky above the Oasis and all its inhabitants so technically this is his problem to work through. He’s not a foal after all, and it’s not like the geese are going to actually hurt him, they’re just defending themselves.”

Scarlet slowly nodded in agreement. “Alright, well you’ve got a point… but maybe we could just record this for posterity?”

Silver chuckled, “You mean record this so we can bring it up at the next Christmas party? Sure.” He raised his leg up to speak into his gauntlet, “Navi, begin recording all feeds on Oasis Cameras four through seventeen.”

Standby Director Eclipse… Recording on Lakeside Cameras, came the robotic reply.

Silver smiled and turned back towards his wife, “Plus, I’ve got that business trip coming up in a couple weeks, the more time I can spend with you two the better.”

She nodded, “Sometimes I forget you still go on those, it’s kind of nice that you don’t have to travel as often for work anymore and I know that Orion definitely loves it.”

“He’s not the only one that loves it, I’m glad I don’t have to be away from you two as often. As much as I love travelling around, nothing beats spending time with my two favorite ponies in the whole wide world.”

Scarlet smiled and looked back over towards the purple colt, watching as he hesitantly dug around the sand with Cosmo, in search of a few shells. “So how about a quick dip in the lake before we head out? You could even take Orion for a quick fly if you wanted to, you know how much he likes that.”

Silver nodded “I’d love that, make sure you get a few pictures too so we can add them to the scrapbook.”

She smirked and rolled her eyes, “Alright shutterbug, but only if you make a few goofy faces too.”

He smiled, “Alright, but only if you promise not to share those ones again.”

She laughed, “Okay fine, I won’t share them at the party.”

“Just the party? You mean you’re going to share it elsewhere?”

She let out a few chuckles, “Well just with my parents, you know how much they love seeing pictures of the happy family, we don’t get down to Florida to see them as often and they sure love their grandson.”

“With your parents? Come on, they’re never gonna let me live those down.” He said pleadingly.

“Oh come on, my parents think it’s adorable when you switch into proud dad mode with Orion.”

Silver laughed and rolled his eyes, “Alright fine, you win again.”

She struck a victorious pose, “Another point for me,” She looked over towards Orion and Cosmo, “You should probably go get him before he’s all worn out, I’m sure he’s going to be so excited to fly around with you.”

“What about our quick swim?”

Scarlet shrugged, “The lake’s not going anywhere, plus I know how much you love taking Orion along when you fly, you go have fun and we can go swimming tomorrow.”

Silver nodded and gave her a quick hug before turning towards Orion. He quickly trotted over to the colt and greeted him with a big smile, “Well I heard that someone really likes to fly! I wonder who that could be?” He said, looking around and over the colt in an exaggerated fashion.

A big grin began to spread across Orion’s face as Silver turned back towards him.

“Is it… You?!” He shouted as he jumped into the water, earning some happy giggles from the foal. “So how about it little buddy, do you want to go for a quick fly before bed?”

The purple colt jumped up and responded with a big happy grin, earning a couple of big smiles from Silver and Scarlet.

Silver looked back over towards Scarlet, “Well I think that’s a yes if I’ve ever seen one,” he lowered down to Orion’s level. “Well buddy are you ready to go?”

Orion nodded and ran over, giving a few happy flaps of his wings as Silver carefully wrapped his front legs around him, making sure that he had a tight grip on the excited colt, “Alright buddy, we’re gonna have so much fun!”

He carefully lifted off and began to fly over and around the lake, much to Orion’s delight. Even though he kept to a slower pace and lower altitude, Orion enjoyed it all the same. By the time Silver touched down the colt was well beyond exhausted and quickly curled up in the sand next to Scarlet and Cosmo. Silver smiled and helped lift the sleeping foal onto Scarlet’s back as the two departed for their nearby home.

Zipper carefully walked up towards the lake, a few slices of bread held under a wing. It had been a few days since he had been chased away by the geese and he was determined to solve this problem any way possible, especially given the story of Silver’s very aggressive outburst towards the geese that had been making its rounds among the weather team. He’d start with the diplomatic approach first and go from there. As he neared the group of geese they began to hiss at him again, causing him to pause and address the geese, “Just calm down, I brought you something good.”

They continued to hiss, but he didn’t back away this time. With slow and precise movements, he tore off a few pieces of bread and held them out as a peace offering, “Look, I don’t want to hurt you, I brought you guys a treat.”

One of the geese slowly waded forward, giving Zipper a curious sounding honk.

“There you go, see? I just want to be your friend,” He calmly said as the goose took a quick peck at the bread.

Honk, the goose enthusiastically replied, almost as if it appreciated Zipper’s meager offering.

Zipper’s ears perked up as he listened to the goose honk. A strange sense of understanding began to well up inside him, “Do… do you like that?”

Honk

He stared at the goose for a second, slowly nodding as he stepped closer to it, “You… you do, right? You were just hungry and afraid that I was going to come after you like Silver did…”

Honk

Zipper sat back for a moment in surprise. It was hard to tell, but for a moment it was almost as if he was able to understand this goose in a weird way. He cautiously leaned in closer, eyeing the goose with curiosity, “You’re not really all that mean are you?”

Honk

“You just want to keep your friends safe, right? Make sure they have a nice place to live where ponies won’t hurt them?”

The goose replied with an affirmative honk.

“Right…” Zipper blinked a few times. Am I really entertaining this? I mean it’s just a goose, it can’t really understand me right? he thought to himself, “Can… Can you understand me?”

The goose gave another loud honk.

“Alright well I’ll make sure I can figure something out, I promise you.” He said with uncertainty, not even sure whether the goose could actually understand him or not.

The goose simply replied with another affirmative honk.

Zipper’s eyes widened in surprise. Could this be what I’m supposed to do? Can I actually understand them? He thought to himself again. As if to answer his question a bright light lit up the lake around him, drawing the attention of the lake goers. He quickly looked back, his face lighting up in excitement as he saw the image of a pair of wings resting on his flank.

“I… my cutie mark… FINALLY!” He shouted as he flew up into the air, doing a few rolls and dives before coming down to land in front of the small crowd that had formed.

Silver smiled and walked towards him, “Congrats, Zip, looks like you finally got your cutie mark. So what is it? Your talent I mean.”

“This is gonna sound really really weird, but I think I can talk to animals, Silver.”

“You think?” He asked curiously, raising an eyebrow at the odd statement.

Zipper slowly nodded, “Well, I mean the only ones I’ve tried talking to were the geese and I reeeeeaaaallly had to focus on it, but still, it has to mean something right? I got my mark right as I realized that.”

Silver shrugged, giving the gray pegasus a pat on the back, “Well whatever the case may be, I’m proud of you. So what do you think you’ll do with that talent?”

“I… I actually don’t know. I always thought I’d earn my mark in something with flying, but I guess this can kind of tie into that.”

“Well good luck to you Zip! I know you’ll get it figured out in due time. Want me to go ring up Dazzle and tell her all about your big accomplishment?” He said as he slowly started raising his gauntlet to speak into it. “Navi, call contact Daz—“

“—NO!” He shouted as he quickly jumped over, pushing Silver’s arm away. “You think she’d want to know?!.. I mean— I haven’t even talked to her in a few months, we’re not really friends or anything. I don’t think you need to bother her about this.”

Silver chuckled and shook his head, “Alright Zip, you got it. Why don’t you take the next couple of days off to celebrate, you’ve earned it!”

He smiled, “Thanks Silver, you’re the best!”

Before he turned away, Silver leaned in close, raising his wings up and baring his fangs as he lowered his voice to a stern whisper in another rare show of aggression, “Just saying it now though, you better use your talent to tell them to stay away from Orion from now on or goose is gonna be on the Thanksgiving table this year... got it?”

Zipper raised an eyebrow, “But we don’t eat meat…” his eyes suddenly snapped open wide as the realization of what Silver was implying hit him, “Y...you wouldn’t! Not just to make a point… I— I know you freaked out about them the other day but you wouldn’t do something like that— would you?!”

“I guess we’ll find out come Thanksgiving then… so we’re clear?”

Zipper nervously nodded his head, “y...yeah… got it.”

Silver broke his stern stance and returned a cheerful smile, “Fantastic! Glad we see eye to eye on this, congrats again Zip!”

As Zipper walked away everything started to become a little more clear to him. He had a gift, and for the first time in years he felt as if he knew exactly what his purpose in life was, he would work as hard as he could to give the animals of the Oasis the best home possible, even if he had to work extra hard to do it. It wouldn’t be easy, and he’d need a lot of help to do it, but in the end it would be well worth it.

Zipper quickly knocked on the door to Patrick’s office, hoping that he hadn’t left for the day yet. This had been a very eventful day for the pegasus and he was already plotting out exactly what he wanted to do with his newfound talent. Blue Spring stood off to the side next to him, idly humming some cheerful tune while they waited. The mare had previously worked at a state park in Florida before moving to Colorado a few years before ETS and would probably be the only other pony in the Oasis who would actually be able to help him out with this. She was also one of his best friends and he was more than grateful that she had agreed to meet Patrick with him with such short notice.

As Zipper raised his leg to check the time, the door opened, revealing the cheerful operations director. “Heya Zip whaddya need this time?”

He snapped back to attention, cheerfully nodding towards Patrick. “Hey Pat, do you have a few minutes to talk about a proposal?”

The cheerful unicorn nodded his head, “Sure, I actually just wrapped up my work for the day but what’s a few more minutes?”

“Perfect!” He gestured towards the open door with a wing, letting Blue Spring lead the way in. The pair quickly took a seat by the large window while Patrick returned to his desk, turning towards them with a warm smile on his face.

“So what’s your proposal about this time Zip? Another idea for a carnival? A tropical hideaway by the lake—“

“—an animal sanctuary actually.”

Patrick knocked on his desk and returned a big grin, “Aha an animal sanctuary, I was going to say that next… so uhhh… why an animal sanctuary? Not exactly the most ‘Zipper’ plan now is it?”

Zipper nodded, “It’s a long story and I don’t want to waste your time with every detail, but basically I figured out I can kinda sorta understand animals and got my cutie mark in the process and I realized that they don’t have a safe place to live without bothering the other residents around the Oasis so I kind of wanted to see about getting an actual animal sanctuary set up for them. Y’know, so they’re safe.”

Patrick raised an eyebrow for a moment as if he was going to question this, but chose not to. Instead another warm smile spread across his face, “Well first off, congratulations on finally earning your mark! I was rooting for you the whole time! Secondly, a sanctuary is kind of doable, but we’ll need to do some research and figure out where the best spot i—.”

“—And then we can start?!” Zipper excitedly cut in.

Patrick shook his head slowly, “Whoa, hold up there, not just yet. The Oasis might be privately owned, but I can only approve so much on my own. You’ll have to draft a plan and run it by Silver and the rest of the city council just like everyone else. We also need to make sure that we’ll be able to support the animals you want to house there so we’re looking at bringing some experts in too. I don’t want to say you’re not capable of doing this, but it might just be easier to section off a little area for them right now and wait until we have more of the actual experts onboard here to help manage it.”

Zipper’s face scrunched into a worried frown, “Yeah but… but then we lose a part of the lake and they still don’t have a nice safe home… and then Silver will get mad at them!”

Patrick raised his hooves up, gesturing for Zipper to take a breather, “Alright, well I’ll tell you what, why don’t we section that area off for now, just so they’re all set in the meantime, and I’ll even talk to Silver and make sure he doesn’t do anything crazy. I can give you two the numbers for a few architects and engineers, and you can talk with them about doing something bigger down the line. You’ll have to get all the relevant experts in, but I think Blue Spring is more than capable of that on her own, she does have the most experience in something like this after all.”

“But… we can’t just do that now?” Zipper pleaded.

Patrick shook his head, “I’m afraid not Zip, that’s a lot of ‘What if’ right now. If you talk with the ponies I mentioned before and get an actual plan together, we can talk about this more.”

Zipper let out an annoyed sigh, “Alright, I understand. Thanks again Pat.”

He nodded, “Any time. If you do wind up coming up with an actual plan please let me know, It’s not something you’ll be able to just do overnight, but I’m looking forward to seeing what you’ll come up with.”

The duo stood up and walked towards the door, “Well thanks again Pat! We’ll let you know if we ever get anywhere else with this.”

He responded with a warm smile as he walked to the door with them, “Glad I could be of service.”

Blue Spring led Zipper down the hallway and into the elevator, noticing that Zipper seemed to be lost in thought. As the doors closed she turned towards the gray pegasus, watching him with a concerned look, “Hey Zip, what’s on your mind? You seem a little out of it.”

Zipper nodded his head quickly, “Yeah I’m good. I just want to make sure they can have a nice safe home where they can all be comfortable. I know it’s going to be a lot of work but I feel like I have to make sure they’re all good… you know?”

She nodded, “I’ve spent most of my life around animals, I know I can’t really understand them like you apparently can, but I get what you’re saying. It’s going to be a lot of work though, you know that right?”

He nodded, “I do. I know we have the weather team commitments, but would you be up for helping plan this all out with me?”

She raised an eyebrow, “You mean you’re really going to plan it out? Even though it’s going to be a lot of boring work that’s not going to be easy?”

He quickly nodded his head, “I mean this is my talent, it’d be a shame to just let it go to waste right?”

“Well I suppose so, you realize though, this is something you’ve never really had experience with. Running an animal sanctuary is a lot different than running amusement parks and carnival rides.”

Zipper shrugged, “Well yeah… I was kind of hoping you’d be able to help out with that. You sorta have more experience than I do… a lot more really.”

She nodded, “Alright, I’ll help you out with this when we have free time, but if I’m going to be in charge of it you have to be open to letting me make the big decisions. I know you’re the weather captain and like to call the shots, but we’re talking about actual animals and their well being here, it’s a lot of responsibility.”

He quickly nodded his head, “Yeah okay, that’s fine by me! You’re the expert after all.”

She smiled, “Alright, well we can head back over to my place and work on this if you really want to.”

A big smile spread across his face, “I’d love that!”

“Alright, well let’s get going, you feel like grabbing some dinner on the way?”

Zipper nodded, “I’m actually in a cooking kind of mood today, do you have stuff back at your house?”

“Sure, what do you have in mind?”

“Macaroni maybe? I have a new recipe that I’ve been dying to try out, I’ll even make it, my treat.”

Blue Spring smiled, “I’d love that Zipper.”

Zipper sat at the table with Blue Spring in her home, mulling over the layout with her over a small dinner. The blue pegasus perked up as she took a few bites of the macaroni that Zipper had helped prepare, “So Zipper, what do you really want to do with this?”

“Well I’m thinking like… like a big visitor center where you can learn about the different animals there and what we’re doing to help them, an animal hospital on the lower level, maybe a wicked aviary outside with a whole natural habitat that you can walk through…”

She nodded along, jotting a couple notes down. “What else though? We need to have something big to really bring people in.”

“Hmm… Oh, I know! Maybe we could have a boat ride through the aviary with a guided tour on the different animals!”

“Yes! We had a little guided tour back in Florida and it was a really fun part of the job.” Blue Spring suddenly interjected.

Zipper nodded, “Yeah, I’m thinking like one of those little guided boat rides, kinda like the boat ride we had back at the fair!”

“Or the Jurassic boat ride at Universal… that might actually be a good inspiration!.. You know, the calm tranquil tour through an animal habitat part, not the getting chased by dinosaurs and plummeting down a big drop part.” Blue Spring continued her note taking, “So a tranquil boat ride through an aviary with a visitor center and animal hospital at the entrance. Any shops? Restaurants? Exhibits?”

Zipper nodded, “We could build a bigger greenhouse by it and use that to stock the restaurant with!— Oh and then the boat ride could even go through it! It could be like a big educational experience! Silver would absolutely be all over that!”

“Mhmm, and for the shops and exhibits?”

Zipper hesitated for a few minutes as he thought of how this would work out. “Well we could have a big shop at the exit that has a bunch of souvenirs themed to the animals inside the sanctuary. We could do little rotating exhibits on the lower floor too, that way there’s always a reason to come back. We could even put signs along the paths that talk about the animals too!”

“And the money from the shop and restaurant could go right back into funding improvements and expansions!” Blue Spring cheerfully added in. “I like it, that kind of covers the whole funding expansions part if we can’t convince Silver to let us do it.”

Zipper nodded in agreement, excitedly jumping up into the air and coming to a hover, “They’re gonna love it so much, I just know it!”

Blue Spring let out a few laughs, covering her mouth with a hoof. “Gee Zipper I didn’t realize that getting your cutie mark would make you such a serious pony!”

Zipper came to a land, his face reddening in embarrassment, “Oh— sorry. I guess I got kind of excited. I just finally know what I want to do and I can’t wait to do it! My whole life I’ve been trying to figure out what I was meant to do. I kept latching onto different things, trying to find something that I liked and that worked for me. The carnival gave me something to do that I really enjoyed, and loved, even if it was never going to be something serious. People took one look at me and saw some annoying thrill chaser, but on the inside I was just trying to figure out who I really was. I thought that ETS could have given me a chance to start over, but it really didn’t make it any easier, I still had to figure this all out on my own. I’ve waited almost two years for this moment and now that I have my mark I just want to make sure I’m really doing the best job I can, you know?”

She nodded along, “Well I’m glad you actually want to do something that’s actually responsible with this. I’d be lying if I said the rest of the team didn’t think you’d try and start some goose themed daredevil routine after.”

Zipper looked away, “I uhh… thought about doing something like that… but then I realized that they really just want a safe home to live in. I haven’t had a lot of time to think about everything, but it feels like I was meant to help them or something. Like no one else can talk to animals right? That has to mean something.”

“I’m just glad you found something good that you can work towards. Even if this never winds up going anywhere, it’s just fun to plan it all out.”

Zipper smiled, “Thanks Spring, this really means a lot to me.”

She returned a smile, “Any time Zip, ponies help each other out after all.”

“So what now? Wanna keep working on this or do you want to take a break and watch a movie or something?”

She shrugged, “We could watch a movie, you got anything in mind?”

Zipper started to raise his hoof, but paused, “How about you choose one? I kinda just watch the same movies over and over, maybe it’s good to watch something new.”

She nodded, “Gotcha, well go make yourself comfortable, I’ll dig up something that I think you’ll like for sure.”

The two sat in Spring’s living room, watching the end of her chosen movie play out. Zipper hadn’t really been all that interested in it at first, but as she glanced over at him now she couldn’t help but smile at how he was glued to the TV.

Greetings Professor Falken

Hello Joshua.

A strange game. The only winning move is not to play… How about a nice game of chess?

Zipper sat in his chair, eyeing the screen while trying to keep his eyes open, “So the computer thought it was all a game?”

Blue Spring shook her head, “Kinda? It’s a little more complicated though. Joshua isn’t really a person like you or me, it was just a computer running a simulation that everyone else thought was real because it was connected to the real system, that’s why they couldn’t just turn it off without it launching the missiles anyways.”

Zipper nodded, his eyes starting to close, “Well it was a good pick Spring,” Zipper let out a long yawn, “You don’t mind if I crash here tonight do you?”

Blue Spring shook her head, “You’re always welcome here Zip.”

Zipper smiled and slowly closed his eyes, curling up in the comfy chair he was sitting in. Noticing that Zipper had drifted off to sleep, Blue Spring stood up and gently nudged him awake, “Hey Zip, you’re gonna get a sore neck if you sleep there like that, let’s get you over to somewhere a little more comfy. Sound good?”

He silently nodded as she carefully guided him towards the couch, draping a blanket over him before turning towards her own room, “Goodnight Zip, sleep tight.”

With a long yawn, she trudged to her own room and curled up on her bed, letting the call of sleep take hold. As she started to drift off to sleep she couldn’t help but think about Zipper’s whole plan. She didn’t know if it would ever really come to fruition, it was certainly way more complicated than she thought he understood, but it was at least fun to work on with him. Most importantly, she was glad that Zipper was at least starting to think of doing something responsible, even if it was all for a bunch of loud birds.

Author's Note

Takes place about 2 months after Dream Seekers, in mid June.

I swear this wasn't inspired by Untitled Goose Game, this was actually originally written back in July or August as a special bonus chapter for Desert Getaway.