The guard scrambled to his hooves, blinking at what he saw. There was Trash Prince with a pile of floating bits of metal, glass, and other things. It was all junk, much of it crushed and starting to rust. And the smell...

Behind him was a massive rabbit-like creature, its back heavy with another collection of random trash. "Hey, no pets." When all else failed, he went to the policy that was the most direct and hardest to argue, in theory.

Trash inclined his head a little. "We don't have that relation, man. She's a friend."

Angel nodded in agreement, stepping in over Trash into the new building that would be her home. "Different."

Noticing her speak, he shook his head slowly. "Making a mess gets you charged for cleanup."

"We'll get out of your mane." Trash advanced forward, going right under Angel and past her to the stairs. "This way. Don't drop anything."

The guard watched the two of them ascending towards Trash's apartment, rubbing his head light before he leaned over his desk to see if anything had been dropped. The scent, thankfully, was passing with them. "Huh..." He floated out a pen and scribbled something on his clipboard.

Inside Trash's apartment, his door swung open and he floated his finds inside before gesturing for Angel to follow it. She stepped forward right into the sides of the door, hugging her tightly. She dug her claws into the ground and pulled herself, sliding bit by bit until she popped free and tumbled into the room.

He followed after her, though she took up a considerable amount of the space. He closed the door and turned towards her. "This is our new, uh, den as you called it."

"Small den." She wriggled in place and the pack of things began to slide. She caught it easily and soon had it on the ground. "Easy protect. Cozy." She firmly nodded, seemingly approving of it, at least until her expression turned mildly to confusion. "Where shinies?"

"Shinies?" He set his own pile down right beside the pack she had worn. "I have to make those."

"No." She rubbed her cheek, thinking of words. "Shinies. Trash shinies." She suddenly thrust her hand right in his face, wriggling the finger that still had his ring perched on it.

"Oh, my old shinies..." He sighed softly as he glanced away. "Celestia took them."

Angel thumped the floor with a scowl, her tail lashing back and forth. "We take back. She did me." She pointed to her chest. "Took shiny. Took shiny!"

Trash held up a hoof gently. "Calm down now. Storming in there will just cause a lot of trouble, for us mostly. I'm angry too, but that isn't how we'll fix it."

"How fix?" She leaned in closer. "How?"

He inclined his head towards the collection of debris they had brought with them. "With my specialty. We'll show her how great trash magic is. I figure we'll know we won when... she shows up, buys something, and wears it." He tapped gently with each step of the revenge.

"Buy?" That was not a word she was familiar with and she went in, thumping her forehead against Trash's, their horns jostling. "What?"

"That's when one creature gives another creature coins." His horn began to glow as a bit floated into view from his last supply. "And the other creature gives them something for it. Like I'm giving coins to a pony to have this den."

"Den ours." She reared up and spread her paws over the expanse of the small apartment. "Ours."

"Only so long as we pay for it. If we stop paying, they'll chase us out." He reached for a long bit of metal and his magic grabbed a scrubber from across the room, starting his work of getting the rust clear of what would become art. "We don't want that, right?"

"No chase. Our den." She nodded softly. "How get?" She pointed at the still floating coin. "Want hunt? Hunt for." She glanced towards the window and her head canted a bit to the side. "Small..." She abandoned the former topic instantly, approaching and pawing around the edges of the window. "Small." One could almost see her measuring how likely it'd be that she could pop out through it. The odds didn't look to be in her favor.

He set the metal aside and reached for an old toy that had once marched stiffly, but had its motion long since beaten out of it. His magic wrapped around it, starting to undo screws and pull parts free of one another. "I'll give you another chance to make ponies smile..." The thought put a little content smile on his own face. "Won't that be nice?"

Angel let her hand fall away from the window that would not fit her easily. "Nice?" She turned away to see him working with the doll. "Trash magic." She clapped her paws together with a paff of pads. "How. How get." She pointed at the still floating coin. "Tell how."

"We make things ponies want." He slowly assembled piles of different parts, organized in a sliding scale of how rust-free the metal was and how rotten any scrap of cloth he pulled free happened to be. "The ponies will want them. They give us those." He nodded towards the floating coin. "We get bits. They get shinies. Everyone wins."

She frowned softly, puzzling it through. "But... Shinies." They had so little of it anymore. "Keep shiny?"

"Not if we want coins, and we do." His magic let the coin go and it fell to the floor. "Make shiny, trade for coins."

"Trade for coins," she softly repeated, holding up her hand and splaying her fingers, making the ring on it visible. "Trade..." She grabbed one hand with the other, pulling the ring free with a few soft grunts as she worked it free. "Trade?"

"Woah, hey, no..." He raised a hoof and pushed the ring away even as she tried to give it to him. "No... That's for you, Blingmomma. I made it for you."

"But..." She curled her fingers around the ring even as she gestured at the piles he was making. "Make more shiny, trade. Keep den. Angel make trouble. Angel help." She opened her hand, showing the ring. "Trade."

"That's... sweet." He leaned in as if to take the coin, but he kissed the largest pad of her paw instead. His magic moved the ring right back onto her finger. "Keep it, and help me make more shinies. That'd be more helpful." He pointed to the pack Angel had worn. "Start pulling it apart, and put the shiniest stuff on this side." He pointed a hoof. "And the dirty and rusted stuff on this side." He pointed to the other side of the line. "If you're not sure, ask."

"Ask..." She pulled open the pack and emptied out half of it, starting to sort through it with a dedicated look. "Shiny... shiny..." Soon she was adding to the piles. Without being told, she matched metal to metal and cloth to cloth. She even seemed to understand the different kinds of metal, adding copper to the copper piles and steel to the steel piles and even different kinds of cloth ended up forming their own stacks at her discerning touch.

Trash's work slowed, watching her sort, a smile growing on his snout. "Hey, wow... you're good at this."

Angel paused, blinking at him. "Good?"

"Yeah, good. You're good at this part. Keep going." He gently waved her on. "I'll do the next part of the trash magic. You have this under control." He clopped his fore hooves once. "Oh, if you're not sure, really, ask. It's cool, babymomma. We're all confused sometimes."

"Sometimes." Her own expression brightened as she got back to work. She was good at something. She was helping with the trash magic. She was helping her friend and mate. The day had taken a positive turn and she eagerly threw herself at the task. It was surely a different kind of hunting than she was used to, but she was good at it. She knew she had to be, Trash told her. And he knew a lot.

The shinies began to happen. In the glimmering crucible of his magic, metal was melted and shaped, combined and pulled apart. He watched it with half-lidded eyes, calmly overseeing the forging of new from the old. Bracelets came first, simple bands as if warming up, then a crown, bits of glass and plastic studded in swirls and fractal patterns to draw the eyes if one didn't notice, or mind, the fact that they weren't real jewels.

He gently set it aside with a satisfied nod. "Let's make a new toy."

"Toy?"

"Toy," he echoed as he began drawing new material, metals first. He made the rough skeleton of a creature with two obvious horns jutting from its head. "Something ponies will like." The cloth began to swirl in as if he were painting muscles and sinew onto that skeleton, wrapping around the skeleton and slowly giving shape to things. The great ears were where Angel abandoned what she was doing and began watching with a hung jaw.

He was forming a tsuki all of his own, with bright glass eyes and big hanging ears and a little tail. Bright horns jut from its plush forehead and big eyelashes marked it as a female of the species. Angel began to clap in approval, watching each detail be put into place. "She smile," she noted with a big grin of her own. The little doll had a little happy smile and was sitting on its haunches, though it was also floating in the air. "Not shiny?"

"Not shiny, but I bet ponies will want it." He set the toy down carefully. "You don't know it, Angel, but ponies think tsuki are big and cute."

"Ponies small and cute," she retorted, pointing at him before reaching right in and mussing his mane gently, fingers playing over his ears. "Very small, very cute."

"Very large, very cute," he lazily replied, allowing her to pet him as he reached for more materials. "That's cool. We both see each other as cute. It could be worse than that. You can be my big cute angel."

"You small trash prince." She nodded once firmly, patting him in a series of quick pat-a-pats before drawing her hand away. "Cute," she added as if she had forgotten it a moment. "Make pony?"

"Mmm. I could..." He was making another skeleton that looked already more like a tsuki than a pony. "Other ponies make ponies, ya dig? I'll be the only one making tsukis. We'll get the coins. That's how we'll hunt."

"Hunt..." She nodded softly, wrapping her mind around it from that angle. Too many ponies hunted pony dolls, so there weren't many coins left to be found there. They'd hunt something new, be clever, get lots! "Yes. Yes yes. Good hunt." She began to nudge the bits he needed forward just before he reached for them, as if she had learned the order and which materials were used on the last one already. "Make good toy. Trade coins. Lot coin. Keep den."

"Yeah, you get it." He took up the materials as she offered them, working them into place carefully as his smile deepened. "You get it... And no trouble. No one will be mad at us for this. We don't have to be sneaky. We don't have to be fast. We just have to be smart, and make good things to trade."

"Good things to trade." She turned back to her pack and grabbed inside, resuming adding to the piles. "Angel helps."

"Angel does help," he gently agreed as he worked. "You are a great helper."

Sure she had also caused him to have to do it in the first place, but, at least in that moment, he didn't feel very upset about it.

Author's Note

I like this chapter. It was all positive really. They are setting up for a new hunt, now with at least 90% less laws broken in the process! What kind of doll would you make, had you this ability?

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