‘It’s another beautiful morning...Just like last time.’

I thought as I opened the curtains of the kitchen window. I stared outside as I saw the sun peaking over the hills and birds flew off into the sky searching for the early worm.

I kept my eyes focused on the horizon, watching as light stretched over the freshly cut grass. My heart began to beat a little faster as the light came closer to the household. My breath got caught in my throat as the light hit my face causing me to shy away from the brightness. For a moment I felt all the senses around me drop into the abyss. The beating of my own heart told me that I still was there, anchoring me to the physical realm. My hands on the counter began to quake as I controlled my heart slowed down from it’s rapid fire, the blood in my veins lessened from pressure as they disappeared from view. My head fell forward exhausted from the adrenaline rush as the rest of my body felt the biting cold crawl over my skin like thousands of slimy insects.

‘Why do I do this to myself?’

I never had the answer.

Best left alone.

‘Move, you fucking rabbit.’

My hand instinctively grabbed the hot tea as I walked around the kitchen. Avoiding the table that came up to my groin I walked to the double wide steel refrigerator grabbing whatever was cold as I took inventory on what was needed to refill. As I sipped the hot tea I looked at the clock to see the hands rest a little after 7 giving a few minutes to stuff the cold food down my throat as I walked to the backdoor.

The door opened up to a fenced lumberyard with wood of all different kinds stacked neatly in piles. I walked over to a small warehouse that looked more like a garage with the main doors halfway open. Ducking my way inside I heard someone talking.

‘..That’s why we need to cut out the piece by an inch overwise the edging won’t have enough room to fit when we install the cabinet.”

The other person was about to talk when he spotted me, “Morning Gabriel! How’s it going?”

I just clicked my tongue as my head tilted sideways as I walked past them with my hot tea nearing the bottom, “Aww you know how it is, another day another box needed to be put together.”

Nodding his head along he gave me a look, “I was talking to Woody over whether the floor space will have enough room when we install the cabinets.”

Arching my eyebrow I set my tea down on the tool table, “Let me see the plans.”

A magical glow encased a clipboard hovering in front of me as I took it. I flipped a few pages to read the diagram and numbers as I added the numbers in my head.

“Yeah you don’t need to cut it.” I turned the clipboard around showing Woody the page I just read, “you see when we make the base wood to rest the cabinet on we shift them all to one corner and screw in the cabinet in the back. We don’t need to cut off another inch overwise the edging to keep the cabinets pressed to one side, we’ll need longer screws if we make the edging two inches instead of one.”

His brown hoof tapped lightly against his head, “Right, how can I forget about that?”

I chucked a bit, “It’s only Monday, the week is just starting.”

“Yeah how was your weekend?”

I shrugged, “Not interesting, just walked around the forest and did some digging to see if I could find some

The grey unicorn smiled knowingly, “Anything else you did?”

I looked at him suspiciously, “Well not much else but I found an old arrowhead that I think was used back when the sisters used to live there. Not sure that they are but it was an interesting find.”

He huff in disappointment, “I mean did you go see the firework show over Ponyville?”

Oh right, that one that celebrated the defeat of those changeling things he heard that attacked Canterlot and the wedding of the Captain of the Royal Guard and a pink Alicorn princess.

I shrugged my shoulders as I got to work, “Saw it from my window, good stuff.”

Blaze looked at me funny before letting out a sigh, “You know one day your going to have to show your face to somepony else.”

“Blaze please, that day will come when trees grow golf balls.”

“That Discord fella could have made it happen.” Shushing up his fellow pony Blaze looked around frantically before letting out a huff before sending a glare Woody’s way, “We don’t speak his name.”

Putting up his hooves up defensively, I went back over to my tools and began to sort out what I need to use for the day.

My magic screwdrivers in hand I placed a drill bit and cross head for the other, “The capital just got attacked I don’t think they would take well when I just stroll up in there and expect them to welcome me in so easily.”

I gave them both funny looks, “Besides you two didn’t even go, so why did you think I would?”

“Well that’s because I went camping with my boys at Winsome Falls and Woody did his own thing.”

Woody shrugged his furry shoulder, “Well I actually had to do some work on my house. The floors in my kitchen were beginning to wear out so I had to tear them out and rebuild new ones. But I was able to see them up close when I finished up.”

I hummed a little before balking, “Isn’t your kitchen floor like..big?” I said as I spread my hands apart.

He nodded, “Yeah but I had some help from my son, his Cutie Mark is in the building like his old man. So it was a good experience for the both of us.” He smiled fondly as he recalled his time together with his son.

“Right your guys but marks...I'm glad that I don’t have anything like that.”

Woody was already moving a few finished drawers to make room for us to walk in, “Why’s that?”

“I would be spending the rest of my days thinking about how I’m not in control of my own destiny and I would be branded with a tattoo that I definitely can’t show off unless I want to get reported as sex offender.”

Both laughed at my light dark humor as we worked around the shop.

We heard as the doors to the front opened and our boss walked right in with a tired look on his face, “Honestly, I wasn’t expecting you guys to be here after all that happened with the attack that could’ve ended our lives, but hey! We got work that needs to be done.”

We stopped what we were doing to see our boss Truffle Shuffle walking tiredly to my table, his hooves dragging across the floor lackadaisical like some child going to places he didn’t want to be, the bags under his eyes weighed heavily as his head sank a little lower than usual.

“Jesus you look like shit.” I said as he sat on a stool as his wings adjusted themselves accordingly.

“Still don’t know who that is, but yes Gab I probably feel worse than I look right now.”

Concern was passed around as we stopped what we were doing to hear what he had to say, “Well the wedding wasn’t all that bad, sure there was the insect attack that I had the privilege of participating in and getting chased by look alikes but somehow I managed to escape and wait long enough to see the pink light blow every bug away. Then what followed as the best party I’ve ever attended as I danced into the night with enough booze to kill a minotaur.” He said with a pained smile as he gripped his stomach, “Then it was a matter of going home only to discover another after party for the welcoming of Ponyville’s heroes which I also joined for whatever reason I can’t remember and woke up with my head feeling like it was about to crack open like an egg and my breath tasting so bad I had to drink some mouthwash to get rid of the taste of last night out of my mouth.”

We all gimanced as he folded his hooves to prop his head up, we all looked at one another as we silently relayed the same message ‘He needs to go home.’

“Hey, Truff?”

The boss tilted his head over to Blaze who wore a sympathetic look, “Maybe you can take the day off and get some rest? We got everything handled over here, the job for Cherry won’t be finished until tomorrow afternoon.” Blaze held his eyes on Truffle all the while as the boss man pony didn’t put up a fight. The huff that came out as a raspberry made me think about how horses would make and messaged his forehead “Yeah, yeah… I just got to do a few things before going home.” No argument from them as he headed to his office to do what he needed to do for the day.

“Sounds like he had a fulfilling weekend.”

“Made me glad I wasn’t there.”

“No use thinking about it.” I said as I grabbed the tools I left beside me, “What already did happen, no use thinking about it when it was outside our control.”

Both pony’s gave each other a look before looking at me, “Are you at least worried about what could’ve happened?”

I shook my head quickly as I glued together another side of the cabinet, “Nope. All I care about is that Trufle is ok and nobody was hurt. A hostile invasion failed and everyone there lived, laughed, sang and got happily ever after.”

I quickly said as I worked. Both pony’s didn’t say anything back as they worked in silence. I contemplated turning on the radio when somepony ran the bell to the front desk, I listened in as my boss walked up to the front desk talking to somepony when a firm voice cut him off.

“Where is he?”

Author's Note

Not sure where I’m going with this. Continue? Maybe...Dunno...