Hours passed, the sun set and the moon rose and fell. Derpy snored on an on waiting for the Manehattan bound train. "CHOO...CHOO!" It was the Manehattan train!

"Ugh, so loud." Derpy was half awake as she swung up from the wildly uncomfortable seat.

The doors of the train opened with a whoosh and a tall stallion with a long white burly beard peered his head out and took a deep breath, "ALLLL ABOARD!" Derpy, stumbling over herself, slowly made her way to the train whilst wobbling to and fro.

"You alright there, Miss? Need some help?" Before Derpy could even answer, she slammed herself straight into the side of the shiny train, dropped all her belongings, and left an impressively detailed faceprint on the side of the train. The Conductor, needing no further invitation, helped her up and took her to a seat. "That was a mighty fine face slam back there, maybe the best one I've seen in my career." For some reason the Conductor looked proud of this, "No need to fret at all my dear, happens alllllll the time. You wouldn't believe how often ponies ram straight into the side of this here train."

Derpy slowly coming back to reality after a not so wonderful time in dreamland shook her head frantically like there was a bug she was trying to scare off. "Oopsies." She would have said something like "I'm oh so sorry mister," or "I'm so grateful for your help!" followed by a charming smile that no pony else could reproduce, but she was so dazed that even 'Oopsies' was far too taxing.

The Conductor got the message, somehow, and carried along to the front of the train. "What a delightful young mare." Chimed the burly bearded Conductor on his way out.

With a start of the engines the train was off and Derpy was finally grounded in reality and ready to tackle the day. "If only I didn't tell that mare about three-day delivery," She was still mournful over what she saw as a ridiculous mistake. "The train is only just now leaving the station and that means I'm barely making it out of Ponyville... of all the worst things to happen this takes the muffin... or is cake... oh I'm so frazzled I don't even know anymore!"

A half hour of smooth "Chug's and Cho's" later a snack cart rolled by and Derpy bought out the trolly pony's stock of cupcakes and muffins, as she sees it cupcakes are just fancy muffins. Just as she goes for a bite there's a loud screech and the entire train halts, "NOO! My MUFFIN!" Unfortunately the sudden stop absolutely decimated her muffin. "I-I will never forget you!" The other passengers on the car could not tell if she was acting or not, but regardless they all scooched just a tad bit further away from the pony who was bawling her eyes out over a muffin.

With a loud crackle a microphone turned on "Hello, Fillies and Gentlecolts! This is your conductor speaking, we have a minor issue, the track ahead has been damaged and is being repaired, so we will be stopping at Foal Mountain. We should be back on track within the next two hours, meanwhile feel free to stretch your legs."

Derpy's eyes widened and jaw dropped as she nearly dropped every single sumptuous pastry she'd bought just minutes before. She thought to herself, "I can't wait two whole hours! I'll never get this envelope there on time at this rate!"

She pulled out her map from her satchel and plotted the best corse. "If I go straight through here I can make it just in time, only problem is... Hollow Shades." The legends say Hollow Shades is a town contained within a thick forest with an unbelievably dense canopy. Nobody dares to enter but the desperate or the foolish, or at least that's what they say. Derpy may be foolish at times but as of now she's just desperate.

Author's Note

Hope you enjoyed the second chapter, can't wait to see how this goes !

This follows a slightly non-canon version of Hollow Shades.