Finding Your Place With the Outcasts

Chapters

Chapter 2: Fowl Play
Chapter 3: Finding Purpose
Chapter 4: Justified Anger
Chapter 5: Finding a New Direction in Life
Chapter 6: Brokering an Uneasy Peace
Chapter 7: The Price of Forgiveness
Chapter 8: Offloading Some Thoughts
Chapter 10: Reflecting on the Past, Preparing for the Future
Chapter 11: Booting Up
Chapter 12: Dinner With a Friend
Chapter 13: Growing Pains
Chapter 14: If At First You Don’t Succeed… Get Your Frustration Out With Some Games?
Chapter 15: Not Giving Up
Epilogue: Level Complete
Chapter 1: Finding a Friend
Chapter 9: Planting Roses, Picking Brains

Chapter 2: Fowl Play

It was a beautiful but hot 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 view from above was a sight that Zipper hardly paid any mind to, but for as brash and over the top as he could be, even he knew that he was lucky for the chance to experience something like this every day. As much as he loved to be the center of attention, the real truth was that genuinely enjoyed these brief moments of solitude, even if they often brought back the bitter memories of his youth. For a moment the teasing voices calling him out for being the weird kid filled his ears, causing him to grimace and flinch back at their echoes, but his music quickly helped drown those out.

As much as he tried to pretend otherwise, his past still bothered him. Perhaps not for what it reminded him of, but for what it made him think about and what that meant for the whole identity he had tried to craft for himself after ETS had seemingly given him a fresh start. It wasn’t as if he didn’t know himself… but sometimes he questioned whether he was genuinely the pony he tried so hard to be, or whether he was simply hiding behind a mask and shutting out a more honest part of himself. Who was the real Zipper then? It was a hard question for the young pegasus to answer, even more so for one who had spent so long trying to craft a persona that simply wasn’t real.

To the Oasis, Zipper was the brash daredevil that thought he was every mare’s dream… but was that the real Zipper? Or was he really the shy pegasus who didn’t truly know what or who he liked? As strange as it was, the pegasus almost didn’t know how to answer sometimes. He knew that the crush and feelings for Dazzle, the mare that had captured his heart when he had first gotten his weather training were genuine at the time, but her rejection hadn’t stung him as much as he had thought it would. That in itself made him question what he was really looking for. Sure he liked mares, but the idea of having some emotional connection with a stallion wasn’t the worst thing in the world either. Did that make him gay? Bi? What even was it that he was looking for? Was that emotional connection even something that could be romantic… or was it just his longing for friendship and companionship? Did any of it even matter? He had never held any long-term relationships, wasn’t as smooth as he pretended he was, and to his own reluctance, he honestly didn’t know what that meant for him. Maybe he could just be happy with a close friend or two.

As much as he painted this picture of a suave pony that knew how to say anything, the obvious truth that was plain to probably everyone was that he was simply playing a part. When left alone those memories and thoughts could be depressing reminders of the bullying and teasing he had faced so often in the tender years of his teens and early adulthood, but up here in the sky? Well up here there was only him and the clouds, and that was more than enough to distract him from the past that haunted him. Not wanting to answer those questions or ponder on them any more than he had to, Zipper shook his head and continued his flight through the clouds, wanting to push those intrusive thoughts away to the back of his mind for the time being. It was something he knew he needed to come to terms with, but now wasn’t the time or place.

Instead, he focused on the adrenaline he felt and the rush it gave him. 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— not even the deep personal thoughts that had already cropped up. He had banished those after all, and now it was time to really get his day started off right. 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 while his music cut off. This would have earned the mild panic that came with jumping into the water with your earphones still in, but Zipper’s were clipped to his ears and specially designed for this kind of active use, one of the perks of working in a place where experimental tech was developed and thrown around. 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.

In an act of desperation, Zipper leaped into the sky, but the geese were unrelenting in their chase. For a bunch of big dumb birds, they sure had a temper, and it was obvious that they weren’t going to back down until they got what they were after. Unfortunately for Zipper, he was their target, and this meant that he’d have to take some evasive maneuvers.

With a well-practiced precision he swooped into a barrel roll and dove down to the side, but the geese were undeterred. He considered himself a flying ace, but they were clearly right on par with him, and as he glanced back a surge of fear gripped him as he noticed that they were actually gaining on him.

“Wait no, you’re not supposed to close in on me! Just buzz off, won’t ya?” He shouted back in frustration.

The geese didn’t care though, they were out for blood and nothing would stop them…

An idea popped into Zipper’s head, and as he started to near some of the lakeside buildings, he saw his perfect window of opportunity. Pulling down into a very sharp turn, he momentarily shook the geese, letting out a loud cheer of victory as they failed to match his sharp descent. However, his victorious cheer was misplaced, as he failed to notice that he was now on a direct collision course with the ground and one of the nearby buildings as well.

Glancing up ahead of him, he caught his tactical error, but alas it was too late. Without even a moment to course correct, he skidded across a soft flowerbed and into a wall, cracking it and probably a few bones upon impact. Somehow though, through some miraculous stroke of luck, he was mostly unharmed outside of the nasty cuts and a very probable sprain that he’d be feeling in the morning and for the next few weeks knowing his luck. Unfortunately for him however, he had just skidded through another pony’s prized garden… and this pony was not the kind who would take it lightly.

Standing up in a daze, he looked around at his crash site, and cringed back in fear as the door next to him was unceremoniously kicked open.

Time seemed to slow down as the mare took in the sight of the damage, and with the silent narrowed glare she was giving him, Zipper could have sworn that she was about to burst into flames.

“I can deal with dumb loud ponies waking me up, I can deal with humans knocking at my door for something. I can even deal with crying foals,” she looked around her broken yard, “But you have got to be fucking kidding me.”

“I—“ he stammered out.

“NO!” She shouted, “I don’t want to hear your bird brained excuses. I want you to pay for this and clean my yard.” She looked over at the Zipper sized dent in the wall, narrowing her gaze even further. “And for all of the repairs you’re going to make to my house. And I want you to do this today.”

“Sine I…”

“What did I tell you about excuses? Do you know how much time I spent on that garden? Or how much that all cost me? What about you damaging my home too?”

Zipper felt a very deep sunken feeling in his chest, and even more frighteningly enough, he could hear the loud honks of the geese in the distance growing ever closer. Caught between an angry flock of geese and an arguably angry night pony, Zipper did what he did best. Let his instincts tell him what to do.

Spreading his disheveled wings, he briefly winced in pain before letting out a rushed response.

“Sorrygottagobye!” He shouted as he took off into the sky, the loud honking and the angry shouting fading into the distance as he made a beeline for his home.

Chapter 3: Finding Purpose

Zipper carefully walked up towards the lake, with 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. The welfare of a bunch of big dumb birds usually wouldn’t be much of a concern for Zipper… but every attempt to fly back towards the lake resulted in him being chased off by the vengeful creatures. Whether he snuck around them or flew towards them full force, they were evidently smarter than they looked, which led Zipper towards his current plan. It was simple, and truthfully not much of an actual plan, but it was something at least. He’d start with the diplomatic approach first and go from there, and if it didn’t work out? Then well… who knew. Zipper wasn’t about to lose his favorite hangout, especially not to some dumb geese.

As he neared the creatures, they began to hiss at him again, causing him to pause and address the wild fowl, “Give me a break and just calm down for five minutes, will ya? I brought you something good, and hopefully, we can bury the hatchet, okay?”

They continued to hiss, and a few of the stockier birds stood up and spread their wings in a show of intimidation, but Zipper scowled at them and held his ground, slowly reaching for the bread. With slow and precise movements, he tore off a few pieces and held them out as a peace offering, “Look, I don’t want to hurt you; I brought you guys a treat.”

The group didn’t seem to care, though one of the geese slowly waded forward, giving Zipper a curious sounding honk. The creature slowly craned its ugly head towards the pegasus’ outstretched wing and snatched up the tasty morsel with a peck of its bill that almost threatened to take a few feathers with it.

Zipper flinched at the sudden motion, but much to his own relief, the bird hadn’t made off with anything more than the bread.

“There you go, see? I just want to be your friend,” He calmly said as the goose took another 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.

As weird as it was to say, this wasn’t the first time that Zipper had sworn he understood an animal before. It wasn’t actual words he was hearing, but something inside of him caught onto the animal’s mood. He often got this kind of vibe from his pet parrot, though he usually assumed that it was simply his familiarity with the old bird and its tastes.

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. Is… Is this what I’ve been missing? Can I actually understand them? He thought to himself again. As if to answer his question, the goose began to honk again and waddled up next to Zipper. The evil creature sat down beside him and rested its head against his side as if Zipper was somehow its mother.

The pegasus laughed and gently patted the goose with one of his feathered wings, shaking his head. “I already have one pet bird, and he’s enough of a handful. We can still be friends, though, as long as you’ll pass along a good word to your friends.”

The goose looked back towards his menagerie and honked a few times, and much to Zipper’s brief horror, the gaggle of geese had stormed towards him and quickly surrounded him. Loud honks rang out, and Zipper closed his eyes while bracing himself with his hooves and his wings… yet instead of the painful pecks and jabs, all he felt was the feathery embrace of two dozen geese snuggling up next to him.

“Made some friends, I see,” came the cool voice of Silver Eclipse, who had been watching Zipper’s attempts at a peace negotiation from his home a short distance away.

“I uhh…” Zipper looked around at his court of geese and chuckled. “I guess so.”

“That’s good. I have to ask, how on earth did you manage to sweet talk them, though? I’ve been sitting at home watching you get chased off for days, and I was about ready to call animal control… but it seems like you figured something out.”

Zipper shrugged. “I’m gonna be real boss; I have no idea what I did. I have a couple of guesses, though.”

“Lay em on me then, because this is kind of a miracle,” Silver laughed. “I thought it was gonna get ugly real quick.”

“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, thinking back to the day I got my cutie mark, it only showed up after I was talking to my parrot, Gordon.”

“Your talking parrot?”

Zipper rolled his eyes. “Well, he was just squawking when it showed up, and I’m going to guess that maybe it’s because I could kind of understand what he needed right then… kinda like how a parent understands their kid.”

Silver nodded. “I get you, so you think that’s it then?”

Zipper shrugged again. “No idea, to be honest, but it’s my running guess. I reeeeeaaaallly had to focus on it, but I kind of understood what one of them was feeling, I guess? I’m going to just assume that my crappy offering of day-old bread I got from the bakery wasn’t the real key to my success.”

Silver shrugged, patting the gray pegasus on the back, “Well, whatever the case may be, glad you solved your goose problem, let’s just hope it stays solved.”

“You can say that again,” Zipper replied.

Before he turned away, Silver leaned in close, raising his wings and baring his fangs as he lowered his voice to a stern whisper in another rare show of aggression, “Oh and one more thing, your new friends chased after Orion the other day, and I was not happy about that. Just saying it now, 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!”

As Zipper walked away, everything became 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. Maybe this was jumping the gun a little quickly, but his new followers needed something from him, and as long as he was able to, 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 the city planning manager hadn’t left for the day yet. This had been a very eventful day for the pegasus, and he was already plotting out precisely 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 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’re 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 if I focus really hard on it, 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, 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? Because let me tell you, if we give them their own place to hang out, it’s going to make everyone’s lives a hell of a lot easier.” 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…” his thoughts drifted back towards Silver’s uncharacteristically aggressive display earlier. “and then Silver will get mad at them, and trust me, you do not want to know what that’s going to entail!”

Patrick raised his hooves, 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.”

Zipper nodded in understanding. He knew things wouldn’t be solved in a day, but at least they seemed optimistic.

The gray pegasus smiled and nodded his head. “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 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 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, “Truth be told, I feel like I’m constantly being typecast as the dumb brash idiot around here and what I learned about myself today is just one part of a bigger realization. I’ve been hiding away a lot of myself for so long, and I think realizing what my talent in gave me the reassurance I needed to accept that maybe I don’t need to be this bold flying ace that everyone looks up to. It’s a way more complicated thing, but I can’t just let this chance go by, 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 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 want to do with this?”

“Well, I know this is all just some blue-sky idea, and we’ll probably never get all of it off the ground, but I’m thinking like… like a 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 cool aviary outside with a whole natural habitat that you can walk through….”

She nodded along, jotting a couple of notes down. “What else, though? We need to have something big to 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!” Blue Spring cheered. “We had a little guided tour back in Florida, and it was an entertaining 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 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 great 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 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 didn’t make it any easier; I still had to figure this all out on my own. There’s still a lot I need to figure out, but I want to do something good, you know?”

She nodded along, “Well, I’m glad you 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 that was just some dumb idea and that they just want a safe home to live in. I haven’t had much 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, “That’s exactly what I think. Best case scenario, at least we get to make a cool park for them,” He smiled. “Thanks, Spring; this 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 rest of the evening had gone by swimmingly, and all Zipper could think about was that he was finally going to make an effort to be authentic and genuine. He didn’t know if it was his own hesitation and clouded thoughts lately or the self-discovery he had found earlier… but what he did know was that there would be no more hiding behind a mask. The world was going to see the real Zipper sooner than later, even if he still had a lot of self-discovery left to do.

Chapter 4: Justified Anger

Sine Wave angrily stormed down the walkway and towards the small single story abode that served as both Ink Rose’s home, and her tattoo parlor. Like many other pony homes in the Oasis, hers was decorated in bright colors that made the place a little more personal. Unlike most however, Ink Rose’s was clearly still a work in progress and was notably darker than her neighbors’. The walls had been given a base coat of dark red, reflecting her coat color, with little black trim accents that reflected her mane running across the second floor, but dotted along the walls were outlines of art that was still to be painted, and in a weird way, seeing the personalized touches helped clear Sine’s head a little bit. The last few days had been full of her burying herself in her work to distract from the frustration and anger that was building up inside of her, but that kind of offloading could only do so much. As much as she didn’t want to be, Sine was still very much angry about what had happened with her garden, and it would take a lot more than some cute personal touches to a house to break her out of this. She would have normally made the effort to not look as mad as she was, but what Zipper had done personally struck a nerve with her— and it wasn’t like anyone who’d get scared off by an angry night pony was out and about right now anyways.

As calm and non-comparative as the Oasis night ponies were, openly expressing such anger was still accepted as just another norm. Sure they didn’t get into as many physical fights and jabs as you’d see in other larger night pony communities, but night ponies were still naturally more aggressive, so no one who’s as around would bat an eye if Sine was grumpier than usual. However, there was one night pony that Sine didn’t want to show off this side of herself to, and that was Ink Rose— the pony who had quickly grown into one of her closest friends. Granted, Sine didn’t have a ton of close friends, but that didn’t mean she was incapable of it.

Taking a very deep breath, Sine gently knocked on the door and did her best to put on a cheerful face.

“So who pissed you off today?” was what she was immediately greeted with.

Sine dropped her forced smile and followed Ink Rose inside. “Who said I was pissed off?”

“You did.” She commented. “Err, your body language did at least.”

“You’re that good at figuring that stuff out?” Sine asked in a surprised tone.

“Sure am. When you spend time doing the kind of work I do it isn’t hard.” She patted the usual low couch that she did her inking at. “Come on, take a seat and tell me all about what’s got you up in a rage today.”

Sine slid her saddle bags off and let them drop to the floor unceremoniously, hopping up onto the soft couch. “You just want to get started or do you actually want to hear about my day?”

Ink rose hesitated for a moment, looking away from Sine with an almost regretful look on her face. “I…”

Sine furrowed her brow and reached a hoof out towards her friend. “What’s up Ink? Everything okay?”

The mare weakly nodded but kept her gaze averted. “Yeah, I’m just…” she let out a deep sigh and looked back at Sine. “I just…”

“Just what?” Sine asked in concern, involuntarily flexing her sore wing.

“It’s that…” Ink Rose pointed to the wing. “I’ve been thinking a lot about that.”

“Oh…” Sine closed it tightly. “You have?”

The other mare nodded. “I know I said I was going to just have to live with it… but I just can’t stop thinking about what my family and friends would think or do if they found out.”

“Hey, it’s alright,” Sine tried to console her, “You didn’t do anything wrong though, I was the stupid one that didn’t think about what breaking some norm from your hometown would mean.”

“It’s not alright,” Ink Rose replied. “I’ve had stress dreams and had to awkwardly navigate that with the wardens and even my mother.”

Sine’s eyes widened. “Your mother figured it out?”

Ink shook her head. “She popped in after the dream ended, but pressed me why I was so uneasy. I had to just dodge the subject and make something else up.”

“I…” Sine froze, a few tears starting to well up in her eyes. Without thinking, she pulled Ink Rose into a hug and shook her head. “I’m so sorry! I made such a stupid decision and now it’s just ruining everything.”

Ink leaned into the hug and sniffled a little. “I feel so stupid for getting so worked up about this, but it’s been eating me up.”

Sine relaxed her grip and nodded. “It’s not stupid, you’re the one that has to deal with my stupid mistake, and it’s been bothering me too if I’m going to be completely honest.”

“It has?” Ink Rose looked up at her.

Sine nodded. “I don’t have very many friends here, and I felt that I just ruined ours before it even really got started. I can’t tell you how late it’s kept me up and how much it just left a pit in my stomach. I don’t ever share this side of myself with others, but you’re different than most others, and I wish I could make things up to you somehow.”

Ink weakly nodded again and took a deep breath. “So what does this mean? Where does this put us?”

Sine raised an eyebrow. “In terms of what?”

“Our friendship I guess,” Ink replied. “I don’t really want to let one thing torpedo it all. Ponies forgive right?”

Sine shrugged. “Ponies forgive when it’s not something that can completely ruin their lives.”

“It’d be different if you weren’t so remorseful about it,” Ink pointed out. “Truth be told, I didn’t think you’d be as shaken by it either, and I didn’t know if you really understood why it was such a big deal…”

“Believe me, I did,” Sine Wave sniffled.

Ink Rose looked at Sine’s running makeup and offered her a nearby tissue box. “Why don’t we try and work past this? I know you weren’t trying to be malicious, and well, you even said it’s been getting to you too.”

“You really still want to be friends after what I did? After putting your whole life in jeopardy?”

“I think it’d be best for both of us. Otherwise, we’ll never move past this and it’ll keep eating us up forever,” Ink responded as she started getting her tools out. “You need to relax a bit and I need to get my mind off of things too.”

Sine Wave smiled, pulling Ink into another tight hug. “I think we can do that. But I’m not going to ask or let you tattoo my wings again.”

“That’s fine by me,” Ink agreed. “But maybe I could tattoo something else?”

Sine raised an eyebrow. “Like?”

“Well, you’ve got four more limbs, so take your pick.”

Sine looked down at her right hoof and offered it up. “I guess I could go with this.”

“Mhmm,” Ink nodded. “So what’ll it be then? Some more retro ideas?”

“I could go with that,” Sine agreed. “Maybe you could surprise me?”

Ink Rose cocked her head “What do you me?”

“You said you had a passing fascination with old retro games, right? Why don’t you run with whatever your favorite stuff was? I think it’s only fair that you just give me something unexpected and permanent, consider it some free practice I pay you for, and another mark of my sins.”

Ink shook her head, “You’re a nerd, you know that?”

Sine shrugged. “I guess you could say that. But I still owe you a ton, so consider this part one out of… I don’t know, I guess if you ever need a canvas to practice on I’ll be it.”

“That’s fair. Let’s just talk things through and figure out what happens next. For starters, why don’t you tell me what’s been bugging you, outside of the tattoo stuff? I can tell when something’s bugging a friend, and I like to hear about their days, even if they evidently weren’t the best.”

Sine let out a sigh, relaxing her muscles as best as she could in the process. “It was that dumb bird brain.”

“Zipper?” Ink asked. “Guess I can’t be surprised. So what’d he do this time?”

“You wanna take a guess or do you want me to just spell it out?”

“I probably have an idea,” Ink gave a sly smirk. “But just for kicks, why don’t you spell it out for me. Just get all that anger out and all that.”

Sine rolled her eyes and let out a frustrated sigh. “Well, he was doing some dumb trick or something and basically ruined my roses and put a nice dent in my wall.”

“And that’s what’s got you in such a fury?” Ink asked as she pulled more of her supplies out. “Doesn’t seem like it’s so bad.”

“Oh it’s not the end of the world, but what really pissed me off was his half hearted oops I’m sorry that he dished out before he flew off. Plus those roses were a gift from my mom and those aren’t cheap to replace.”

“No kidding? Did he at least explain himself or something?”

“What do you think?”

“Gonna guess he didn’t,” she cocked her head to the side. “How long ago was this again?”

Sine raised an eyebrow. “Couple of days. Why?”

“Well, that bird brain apparently had some big epiphany the other day. That probably happened after I’m guessing.”

The mare let out another sigh, “An epiphany over what? For ruining other people’s stuff or something?”

“Wouldn’t that be something, eh?” Ink shrugged. “Maybe he felt bad and wanted to own up to it.”

“So are we just going to congratulate him or something? I mean good for him if he finally figured out that he can’t just goof off all the time, but he still broke my shit and didn’t bother asking if he could help fix it or help repay it,” she dropped her voice into a low growl and tensed up. “And you better bet that if I see him again I’m going to tear him apart.”

Ink Rose let out a few snickers and shook her head.

Sine sat up and scowled, “What’s so funny, Rose?”

“Oh, this is just ironic,” the mare let out some snickers.

Sine seemed a little more agitated, “You wanna tell me or what?”

Ink let out a few more snickers and shook her head again, “You’re the mare that said you guys don’t get all aggressive and angry out in public here, but here you are threatening to rip apart a pegasus for ruining your flowers.”

“Yeah? Well I’m mad because he ruined my flowers and scuttled off like some dumb bird brain, if he had offered to help fix what he broke then it’d be a different story. ‘Sides, we’re not in public so your comparison doesn’t make sense.”

“Fair enough I guess,” she shrugged. “But hear me out, maybe finding what he’s good at gave him a sense of purpose? I know he didn’t earn his mark, but I guess it tied into his talent or something. Didn’t you feel that when you figured out why you got your mark?”

Sine was about to argue back that that didn’t really change anything about the situation, but she hesitated. Ink Rose had a fair enough observation, because earning her cutie mark had at least given her some sense of her place in the world, even if it wasn’t anything she could do a whole lot with right now. Still though, having that idea of what she was meant to be had been the thing that changed her from the snarky and sarcastic mare she had once been and into the less snarky and sarcastic mare who had a clear idea of what she wanted to do that she was today.

What that was? Well, it was complicated, to say the least. But if Sine had her way, someday she’d bring the whole world together with her games.

“I guess. But I’m still not convinced, I’ll believe it when I see him actually own up to what he did.”

“Guess we’ll have to wait and see then.” Ink Rose gently laid a hoof on Sine’s forehoof. “Okay deep breath, this is gonna sting again.”

Sine took a deep breath and winced back in pain as the needle made contact. This should have been routine by now, but having a sharp metal instrument jabbed into a very sensitive part of your body still never ceased to earn a few muttered curses.

Sine gently flexed her sore forehoof and held back a few gasps of pain. As much as she wished she’d be used to this by now, having an experience that she could best describe as feeling like a cat scratching sunburned skin made it hard to ignore the pain. What she needed right now was a nice strong drink and a night alone with her games. It wouldn’t dull the pain entirely, but it’d certainly distract her well enough.

“So got anything planned for tonight?” Ink Rose asked.

Sine couldn’t help but let out a mental groan, not because her friend was seemingly asking to spend time with her, but because it meant she’d have to put on her best I’m not exhausted from talking to people today act. As personable and playfully sarcastic as Sine could get at times, the truth was that nowadays she felt like an introvert playing the part of an extrovert. She could hold long conversations and loved spending time with her few close friends, but she was most comfortable on her own in a nice quiet place.

Unsure of what to say, and not wanting to let her friend down, Sine shook her head. “Honestly, no. I was just gonna head home and probably get drunk and play a few games or something.” She smiled. “What about you?”

Ink Rose seemed to tense up for a moment. “Oh not much. Probably just go home and relax for a bit, maybe watch something on tv or something…”

“Wanna come over to my place?” Sine asked in an upbeat tone.

She didn’t want to jump to conclusions or anything, but it didn’t seem like Ink Rose had very many friends around here, and as someone who knew how crushing loneliness could be, Sine was willing to put aside her desire for a quiet evening to herself if it meant that a good friend wouldn’t have to feel alone.

“Huh?” Ink asked. “You don’t mind?”

Sine shrugged. “Truth be told? I could go for a long nap after this, but I know what it’s like to be alone all the time, and it isn’t fun. So I'm down for hanging out with an awesome friend if you are too.”

Ink smiled. “As long as I’m not a bother or anything.”

“Trust me, you’d never be a bother.” Sine waved her along. “C’mon, I don’t live too far from here.”

Ink Rose trotted alongside Sine as they walked down the lakeside path. There wasn’t an amazing amount of activity, which was surprising enough for this time of night, but there were still other night ponies and even the odd human or two walking around. This particular part of the Oasis had become one of the only hubs of nighttime activity since the Great Storm, so it was unsurprising that it’s where most of the night owls spent their time. Surprisingly enough, despite living in an experimental pony and human centered city there were still very few things that catered to night ponies.

It’s not to say that those types of businesses didn’t exist, but it was hard to find any that’d stay open at night with any regularity. You basically had the makeshift theater that occasionally ran late-night movie marathons when there was a night pony or human to run it, the saloon which was open on weekend nights, and the caverns, which as the name would imply, were the large underground grottos beneath the Oasis. As the first settlers had been told, they were mostly remnants of the old mining operations in town along with natural cave systems, but others, like the large central grotto where most of the night ponies that visited it spent their time, were more recent excavations that had happened after the storm. Nowadays they mostly served as another hotspot for night pony activity, and had became especially popular once the population had grown as large as it had. As it turned out, big underground caves were just right for night ponies, and more than a few dozen had even elected to live down there rather than in traditional homes.

That’s where most would go after work, but Sine wasn’t the biggest fan of that kind of thing. As fun as the sparring matches that took place down there were to watch, the experiences could get boring over time, especially when you weren’t interested in fighting or betting on who would win each week. Sine preferred to keep to herself and entertain herself with her own hobbies, hobbies that she admittedly wished she could share more, but inviting people into her home on the regular was just a little too far out of her comfort zone.

As the two neared a block of small colorful houses, it became plainly obvious which one was Sine’s. Her neighbors had opted for bright cheery pastel colors for the walls, and nice complimentary color for the railings that ran along the flat roof’s landing area, but Sine on the other hand had gone for a different color scheme. Deep purple walls that matched her coat were accented with a bright neon pink line that broke up the flat color. A bright neon railing circled the top, and dark shade structures broke up the small park-like landing area that she seldom used. It wasn’t visible to either from their position, but if they had taken a walk around the side that faced the lake then they’d see the still wrecked garden that Zipper had still avoided responsibility for.

“Let me guess,” Ink Rose started to chuckle. “It’s the dark moody neon house?”

“How could you guess?” Sine snickered.

“Call it intuition maybe? Or maybe it’s just so plainly obvious. I mean would any other house be yours?”

Sine raised an eyebrow. “I dunno, don’t be so quick to judge a book by its cover. What if mine’s one of the bright pastel homes?”

The other mare let out a loud guffaw, “Sine, you’re like one of the only night ponies I’ve actually befriended since moving here, I think I can tell what your tastes are, and just by the way you looked away from the bright pastel ones… I’m pretty sure I know it’s not them.” She smiled proudly.

“I should just do what my neighbors suggested,” Sine started with a smirk.

“Which was?”

“Which was paint it bright pinks and blues to fit in better with their homes.”

“Not a fan of that idea? I think it’d be cute… but maybe I’m biased.”

“Oh it’d be a cute combination, but it wouldn’t be my colors. Wouldn’t feel like my home as much anymore.”

Ink Rose shrugged. “That’s fair enough.”

Sine pushed open the door and led Ink Rose into her small home. She trotted towards the small kitchen and left Ink alone in the den area. Normally Ink would follow or make herself comfortable somewhere but right now she was just enamored with how Sine had chosen to decorate her home. It was decorated about the same as any pony home was, but with less family photos on the wall and with the trademark night pony lack of lights being used. Surprisingly enough for a night pony though, Sine did have a few dim lights illuminating some of her vintage movie posters and other wall decorations. They weren’t bright enough to hurt her eyes, but still illuminated the posters enough for her to see them clearly.

The walls themselves were painted in a lighter lavender, and the space on the walls in between her posters were crammed full of memorabilia that ranged from old video games stored in shadow boxes to vintage records that she had collected over the years. The small section above her fireplace was clearly where the bulk of Sine’s sentimental belongings were. Ink Rose stepped forward and stole a glance at the family photos and other small belongings before turning back towards her friend.

“You’re really into the retro stuff, eh?”

“Surprised?” Sine asked from the kitchen.

“No, not at all. It’s cool though, I don’t think I’ve ever met another pony that’s been into this stuff like you are.”

“It seems a little more rare, but there’s at least one or two others out here that are into that stuff. They’re all day ponies though.”

“No night ponies around that are into retro hobbies then?” She asked with a hint of disappointment.

Sine shrugged. “There’s a few, but they’re all into retro movies or music or theme parks… not so much into retro games though.”

“I guess it’s lucky for you that I am into that stuff.” She glanced around, noticing a few discarded arcade boards stacked near an older looking computer and a second surprisingly modern looking computer. “What’s up with the motherboards?”

Sine peeked over and smirked, “Oh those. Call it a special project of mine. A little home brewed experiment if you will.”

“You’re making games?” She guessed.

“Kinda. Guess I’m learning how some of the oldies worked in the process too.”

“Uh huh… got anything playable then? Or is it all just a big work in progress.”

“Big work in progress.” Sine answered back. “So you’re into this kind of stuff? Like not just as a casual conversation starter but as an actual interest?”

“Well I haven’t played in years,” she admitted. “But yeah, I used to seriously dig this stuff back before ETS. Have you actually figured out how to play it as a pony?”

Sine trotted over to Ink and smiled. “You could say that.”

The dark purple mare set down the glass of water and a bowl of snacks she had thrown together and flipped on the old CRT TV that sat in her living room. Slowly the television flickered to life and cast the room in a bright glow that hurt Ink’s eyes. Reaching around the side of the TV stand, Sine produced an old Japanese famicom system and carefully set a cartridge into it before offering Ink one of the controllers.

“Huh?” Ink questioned Sine as she awkwardly grabbed the offered controller in her hooves. “What’s up?”

“I need a player two.”

“I haven’t played in years though,” Ink explained again.

“Guess it’s time to dive back into it then,” Sine replied with a laugh. She tapped the side of her gauntlet with her free hoof and a set of little fingers popped out.

Ink had seen a few other ponies sporting gauntlets with this ability, but as far as she knew those couldn’t actually move much on their own. “What’s up with the claws?”

“Makes it easier to hit the buttons,” Sine replied, sliding Ink a spare gauntlet.

The mare picked up the unfamiliar piece of technology and stared at it for a few moments. “I uhh… dumb question but how does this work?”

“You never wear one of these before?”

“No,” Ink shook her head. “I just always used a pony strap or my modded tattoo gun…”

“Well today’s your lucky day then. That there is a prototype Mark Five utility gauntlet, which is the first that has these little built in fingers. Now, Tinker’s grouchy assistant wasn’t very happy that I made off with two, but at the same time, I helped design them so I don’t care if he’s grumpy about it.”

“What do you mean it’s my lucky day?” She asked in confusion.

“Well you didn’t get a gauntlet yet so now you have one. It’s a real special six of a kind one too so take good care of it, because now you’re one of the only other ponies here who has one like that.”

Ink seemed enamored at the gift for a moment, but shook her head. “I can’t accept this, that’s too much.”

“Sure you can! In fact, I insist.” Sine grabbed the gauntlet and helped slide it onto Ink’s foreleg. She quickly tapped a sequence onto a few of the buttons on the side and the gauntlet started to hum to life.

System reset complete, new user registration initialized, Came a mechanical voice.

“What did you just do?” Ink asked while looking down at the dimly lot screen on the device.

“Entered the master factory reset sequence which booted up the new user registration interface.”

“Which means?”

“Which means that I wiped my info from that particular gauntlet, unlocking it from me, and now you can enter your info in. So no givebacks now,” She smirked.

Ink blinked a few times and shook her head, “I’m gonna pay you back for this sometime, I hope you know that.”

“Uh huh, well you can do that after we play. If you want to just skip registration for now we can set that up later. Just hit the little button on the side there and it’ll open the fingers.”

Ink nodded and did exactly what Sine had instructed, and sure enough, her own set of little spring loaded fingers popped out of the sides. She looked over to Sine only to see that she had already started up a game of balloon fight and was quickly navigating through the menus with a well practiced ease.

“We’re actually gonna just jump right into one versus one?”

“What else would we do?” Sine countered as she tossed her the second controller. “I always found that the best way to get into something was to just dive right in. You said you used to play this stuff back in the day right?”

Ink fiddled around with the controller. “Uh huh… but that was years ago when I was still human.”

“So?” She laughed. “It’s like riding a bike. Trust me.”

Ink Rose rolled her eyes and shook her head, but as she picked up the controller and awkwardly pressed a few buttons she realized exactly what Sine was saying. The game wasn’t complicated by any means— in reality, you just pressed a few buttons and barely even had to think about moving around the screen, and even despite the fact she had hadn’t played in years, she felt that she was able to fall into a slight rhythm… as clunky of one as it was.

“Okay, maybe you’re right…”

“See? Don’t doubt me, I’ve been doing this for years now.”

“Probably a good way to blow off some steam then, eh?”

Sine laughed as she dodged around the screen. “Oh you don’t even know the half of it. A lot of night ponies out here go to the fight clubs in the grotto, but I don’t personally get into all that stuff. I prefer venting stuff this way.”

“That’s totally fair.” She briefly lost focus as her little character lost its second balloon. “You’re too good at this.”

The mare shrugged. “You’re just out of practice. If you really like this stuff then I wouldn’t be against playing again some more if you’re down for that.”

“Oh I’d love to. I just wish this was a bigger thing around here, seems like the kind of thing that’d bring ponies together, you know?”

“Oh believe me, if I had my way that’s exactly how things would be out here.”

“Yeah? You’ve got a big plan or something?”

“Maybe I do, maybe I don’t.” Sine laughed. “Let’s just say I don’t want to just play games, and maybe somewhere I’ll be able to bring people together with them.”

“Well whatever happens, I can’t wait to see what you do!”

Chapter 5: Finding a New Direction in Life

Zipper and Blue Spring trotted along the lakeside path on their way towards the weather team’s office. The pair didn’t actually have any weather duty today, but they still needed to file some paperwork and saw no reason to skip out on their usual daily walk. These were some of Zipper’s favorite moments of the day, it was the time he could spend with his best friend just chatting about whatever came to their heads, and while some might have found the routine boring, Zipper treasured it.

The sun was just barely above the horizon and the sounds of birds chirping filled the air, seemingly casting a peaceful aura over the entire Oasis. As Zipper trotted along his ears would pivot slightly at every little animal sound, pulling his attention away from his companion’s conversation as if he was picking up on some piece of recognizable background noise.

“— it was honestly one of the most beautiful places I think I’ve ever been, we honestly need to take a trip down there sometime, maybe during the winter when it’s nice and chilly out, that always brought in a ton of manatees. Oh, and the walk along the boardwalk is just so peaceful too, you can even get right down by the river in some spots and the manatees are so much fun to watch...” Blue Spring paused for a moment, staring at Zipper who had seemingly zoned out. With a light nudge she tapped his shoulder with a wing, “Earth to Zipper, you there?”

The gray Pegasus shook his head and nodded towards her, “Sorry, I thought I just heard something again.” He twitched his ears again and glanced towards the lake, closing his eyes for a second.

“Is there something wrong Zip? You’ve been so quiet on our walks lately, it’s like you’re not yourself sometimes.”

Zipper shook his head again and sighed, “I’m fine. It’s just, I keep hearing bits of pieces of something I can understand. You hear honking and chirping but I can’t help but hear something else in between.”

“Can’t tune out the animal sounds eh? I obviously can’t understand everything you’re going through, but trust me when I say that it’s normal for this kind of stuff to linger once you actually catch onto what your talent truly is. Some of us get it easy, others need time to adjust. Hell, it took me a couple of months to get used to that whole nature sense I had. It’s like I could just see the air currents around me and everything, I still even feel like I get distracted by it every now and again but you’ll learn to let it fade into the background.”

Zipper nodded, “It’s just… weird. I don’t really know how to put it any better way.”

Blue Spring paused her stride, “What’s it like? Is it seriously that big of a change to get used to?”

“It is,” Zipper nodded. “Like you said, now that I’ve heard something recognizable I just can’t stop hearing it. Do you know how a background conversation can pull your attention away when you hear something familiar? It’s like that. Ever since I got my mark it’s like I just can’t turn off the part of me that can understand the animals. I can’t even explain what it sounds like, and it’s so frustrating sometimes. It’s like they’re talking to each other and I can just barely make out the feel of it.”

“The feel of it?”

Zipper nodded, “Yeah, like I said it’s hard to explain but I can kind of understand what they want and what they’re feeling like.”

“So is it just like when someone else talks to you? Like what we’re doing right now?”

He shook his head, “It's not like they’re actually talking to me, but I can understand what they’re trying to get across. It’s hard to explain but the best way I can put it is like how when a foal cries and the parents can kind of understand what kind of cry it is… just a little more fine tuned to animals.” He glanced off towards the lake, letting out a tired-sounding sigh, “It’s hard to get to sleep sometimes, I can just hear them talking away at night.”

“And they can understand you too?”

“Yeah. I guess it just works. Cal said that there’s a magic spike whenever I talk to them, but it’s like a passive ability most of the time.”

“Well I’ll take your word for it. Does it bother you that much though?”

Zipper nodded and continued to trot along, “It’s just, I don’t know… I feel like I have an actual purpose now, like I was given a gift and I’d just be wasting it by doing nothing, but it’s hard to focus on anything right now.”

“You’re still thinking of making a sanctuary aren’t you?”

“It sounds stupid, but yeah. I know it’ll be a lot of work, but the animals just sound so scared sometimes, it’s like I can’t help but want to give them a safe place to live.”

Blue Spring nodded, “That’s good, I’m glad you care so much about them… but what about your job now? What about the rest of the team?”

“Well… I guess I’ll have to train that replacement I’ve been meaning to train for a while now.”

“That’d be a smart idea… Do you know who you have in mind? And please don’t tell me it’s me.”

Zipper stopped for a moment, “Well of course not—” His eyes widened in embarrassment for a moment as he started to break into a frantic explanation, “I mean it’s not that I don’t think you’re good for the job, I just— well you always seemed like you were busy— oh you know what I mean.”

Blue Spring let out a series of laughs and shook her head, “I’m not the prime candidate Zipper, I know. Trust me, I don’t even want to run the team, it just seems like too much stress you know?”

Zipper nodded, “It is… I’d be lying if I said I didn’t love the job but it’s gotten so frustrating lately, you know, just with everything.”

“I know… look I think it’s fine to step back for a while, just make sure you know what you’re doing first before you make such a drastic decision, okay?”

“Of course, that’s why I’m going to hold a meeting later with the others, I think they’ll understand too.”

“So who do you have in mind?” She asked with a raised eyebrow, earning a smile from Zipper.

“Atlas, isn’t it obvious? I mean no offense to the others, but he’s always been a step above the rest when it comes to stuff like this. He was one of the only ponies that helped with dealing with the Great Storm at first and I think he’ll be a perfect fit as captain.”

Blue Spring slowly nodded her head as she gazed out towards the lake again, “Atlas… Alright, I can see that. Do you think he’ll be up for the task?”

Zipper nodded, “I guess we’ll find out. I talked with him a little bit about it before but it was never a finalized thing.”

“Well, maybe you should talk to him a little more when we get there? We’re only a few minutes away and he usually doesn’t get started with weather duty for another hour, that gives you plenty of time to get it all sorted out.”

“Alright, but do you think I’m maybe overthinking it?”

“Zipper, I mean this in the nicest way possible, but you rarely think things through. I think if you’ve put so much thought into this then maybe you already have your answer.”

The gray pegasus gave a quick nod, “Okay, I’ll talk to him then,” He paused, “Thanks Spring.”

“Thanks? For what?”

“For everything,” Zipper added with a smile, “I don’t think I say that enough, but it means the world to me.”

A smile began to slowly spread across her face, “Anytime Zip, that’s what friends are for. So what do you think Patrick’s going to say?”

“Patrick?” Zipper perked up, “Oh I’m sure he’ll have some choice words for sure.”

The two broke into a fit of laughter as they stepped into the office, earning a confused glare from Golden Atlas, who was in the middle of dictating an email.

“I’m sorry, what?! You’re just quitting out of the blue?” Patrick replied in surprise, “The big hot shot is giving up?”

Zipper looked over towards Blue Spring and shook his head, “Not out of the blue, and it’s not me giving up, I just need a break to pursue some other projects, you know? I’m going to finish training Atlas over the next couple weeks and he’ll take over as weather captain for a few, I’m not quitting permanently, at least just yet, just taking a leave for the time being.”

“And he’s okay with this?”

Zipper shrugged, “Yeah, we had a long talk about it a few hours ago, he could tell I was starting to lose focus and believe me, he’s more than ready to take over. I trust him too.”

Patrick slowly nodded his head, “Right… Okay, so he’s taking over, that’s fine. But what about you? What’s your whole plan? Just go ahead and run this by me again.”

“I want to start taking my talent seriously, and part of that is talking with you and River Breeze and figuring out what needs to be done if I want to get the whole animal sanctuary thing off the ground. I wish I could just explain my side of this in a better way, but I can hear the animals around the Oasis and it’s going to sound stupid, even from me, but they just want a safe place to stay.”

Patrick cleared his throat and started jotting down a few notes, “Alright, so you still want to make an animal sanctuary. Do you know your starting point? I mean I know you had some ideas on paper, but have you sat down and actually thought over the logistics behind it?”

Before Zipper could respond, Blue Spring cleared her throat, earning a confused glance from Zipper, “Yes, we have. At least I have. So back before ETS I was a park ranger in Florida, it wasn’t quite the same as running the kind of thing that we want to do now, but it’s pretty close to what we want to at least start with.”

“Mhmm, so a nature preserve type thing?”

“Yep!” She replied with a quick nod, “And I’ve got River Breeze with us on this too. She’s got a lot of the important stuff figured out and she’s willing to help if it means that she’ll be able to upgrade her facilities.”

Zipper leaned close to her and lowered his voice to a whisper, “We do?”

Spring nodded, “I’ll tell you more about it later.”

Patrick began to speak up again, “Right, and do you guys have funding in mind for this? It’s not going to be cheap if you’re still planning on building the whole visitor’s center thing like you were before.”

“Blue Spring and I have an idea in mind and I think we have what we’ll need for now, and I’ve got something in mind for covering some of the future costs but we won’t have those for a while.” Zipper added, perking up in his seat.

“Okay, so what exactly do you want to leave here with today then?”

“Well, obviously I’m giving you my two week notice on this, but an office space wouldn’t be bad either… you know, so we can have a dedicated space to plan all this all out.”

Patrick looked at Zipper with a smirk, “An office space? Why do you need that?”

Zipper nodded his head, “Yeah! So, that way we can manage it better and be more independent. Right now I’ve just been thinking of everything in my freetime and writing it all down, but we don’t actually have anywhere official to run this whole operation from.”

Patrick let out a chuckle, “An official office building then… I’m going to be real, I didn’t think you’d actually be so invested in this project.”

“Well like I said Patrick, I just want to do something responsible with my talent.”

“And you’re not just asking me now because Silver’s been too busy to run these meetings, right?”

Zipper shook his head, “No, it’s just coincidence, I promise.”

The unicorn nodded, “Alright, I’ll tell you what. I’ll lend you two a spare warehouse down by the lake that we’re not using, and if you actually get this business off the ground and submit formal plans I’ll let you stay there. It’s not an official office building but it’ll probably serve you better than it’s serving me right now.”

“For real? You’re just going to give us a building for free?”

Patrick shook his head, “Okay, maybe not for free, but we can work out payment. It’ll at least be a heavy discount, probably just the basic utilities for now, but that could change later. I’ll go ahead and draft up an official contract, but you two are free to head over there whenever you’re ready.”

Zipper jumped up and excitedly hugged the surprised unicorn, earning a giggle from Blue Spring, “Oh my gosh, thanks! You don’t know how much this means to me Patrick! I’m actually going to do something productive for once!”

Patrick quickly nodded his head and wiggled free, “Okay Zip, I’m glad you’re happy but you wanna give me a second to breathe?”

The pegasus backed off and flashed a nervous smile, “Uhh… sorry about that, I guess I just got a little too overexcited…”

The unicorn stood up and walked towards a large cabinet, opening it with his magic and fishing around in the drawer, “Right, so about that warehouse, I guess it’d be helpful if I actually gave you the keys and told you where you’re going.”

Blue Spring let out a laugh, “Yeah, that might be useful.”

“Mhmm, now let’s see,” He hopped out of his chair and walked toward a filing cabinet on the far side of his office, “I think I have it filed away in this section… aha!” Patrick excitedly exclaimed as he levitated a folder with a set of keys clipped to the side out of the cabinet. “82 Lakeside, It’s a bit smaller, but I think it’ll work just fine for your needs.”

Zipper picked up the folder and smiled, “I think it’ll be perfect.”

The unicorn nodded his head, “Let me know if you need anything, we can discuss all the paperwork later, and some of the extra costs for if you do actually get a business set up, does that sound fair?”

Blue Spring nodded, “Yeah, that’ll be fine. You won’t charge too much I hope?”

“Of course not, just utilities most likely. The building’s relatively new but like I said, it’s just been sitting there empty ever since we built some of the newer infrastructure.”

“Well we really do appreciate this Pat, it means a lot.” Blue Spring added, offering an outstretched hoof towards the unicorn.

He met her gesture and smiled, “Of course. I might be the boring facilities director, but I genuinely want my friends to succeed, and it’s no trouble to me. Just make sure you know what you’re doing before you get started with this. It’s not going to just be a simple walk in the park.”

Zipper smiled, “Oh I know, but it’s going to pay off in the end, I just know it!”

“Oh I’m sure it will, please keep me posted on how everything goes.”

“We sure will Pat, thanks again for everything!”

The unicorn smiled as the two pegasi stood up and left his office, excitedly whispering to each other as they exited.

Chapter 6: Brokering an Uneasy Peace

The two pegasi excitedly trotted alongside the lake, heading towards their newly acquired warehouse, a loud flurry of honks drowning out most of their conversation.

Blue Spring flicked her ears a few times before turning towards Zipper, noticing that his ears were pivoting around in all directions while he looked around with a blank expression. She paused for a moment and stepped closer to him, “Hey, Zip, you holding up?”

The gray pegasus shook his head for a moment and glanced back towards her, “Huh?”

“You’re doing it again.”

His face reddened for a moment, “Err— sorry, I guess I just keep getting distracted again.”

Spring nodded, “You’re doing that a lot more than usual; you sure it’s not bugging you?”

He shook his head, “It’s annoying, but I just need to get over it.” Zipper waved over towards one of the large geese, “I was trying to understand what he’s honking about now.”

“Any luck?” Blue Spring asked with a raised eyebrow.

Zipper shrugged, “I don’t know; guess I can try and ask him?” The pegasus trotted towards one of the larger geese, eyeing him with both curiosity and slight concern, “Heya Gustav how are you doing today? You sure are honking up a storm lately...”

The goose replied with a simple Honk.

“Still feeling a bit under the weather?”

Honk

“A...Alright, I guess I’ll have River Breeze take a look at you later if she’s not busy with the other animals at the clinic.”

Gustav replied with a cheerful sounding honk.

Blue Spring watched on in confusion, “I’m sorry but I don’t think I’ll ever get used to this. It’s just so different.”

Zipper nodded, “It’s… I don’t think I’ll ever be able to get used to it either, trust me.”

“You never know Zip, I’m sure you’ll get it all figured out in time.”

The pegasus shrugged, “I hope you’re right, It’s just so hard to even hear myself think sometimes.”

“Well if you ever need a nice relaxing place to get away to I might know a few, it’ll be hard to fully get away from any animal noise though.”

Zipper smiled, “Maybe I’ll take you up on that offer sometime.”

The two resumed their walk, passing the geese and heading towards a large building that sat near an inlet. Blue Spring fumbled with her saddlebag for a moment as Zipper walked towards the shore. The mare squinted as she glanced up towards the vacant warehouse, the sun’s light shining brightly in her eyes, “82 Lakeside Street, I think this is us.”

Zipper nodded, “It’s perfect! We’re so close to the geese so if we set up a little area for them over there they won’t have to move too far at all!” He excitedly shouted, gesturing towards the inlet with a wing.

“It’s not bad, it will need a little work if we actually want to set up the sanctuary here, but at least there’s not too many buildings around so we won’t have that to worry about.”

“Mhmm, it’s a bit far from River Breeze’s too so that might be an issue… what was that whole thing about earlier by the way?”

Blue Spring raised an eyebrow, “What do you mean?”

“Well you said you talked with her about this before.”

Her face softened, “Oh, well I work with River on the weekends sometimes, it’s not like she’s super busy but she’s definitely in need of some upgrades. I kind of dealed her into this if you don’t mind, I figured it’d work out a lot better if we had an actual vet on our side, no offense to you or anything, but she’s the brains we need for our operation.”

He walked up to the warehouse and pushed the door open, holding it open for Blue Spring, “I guess you have a point, I can’t keep them safe if I don’t even know how to properly do that. It’s probably the best option we have.”

“River’s the only option we have,” She corrected.

As they stepped through the door Zipper flipped on the lights, letting out a sneeze as he breathed in the dusty air, “Man, I can see why Patrick is letting us borrow this place, it must have been sitting here empty for a long time now.”

Blue Spring nodded slowly, “Gee when we asked for an office I wasn’t expecting to get something so…”

“Empty?” Zipper completed for her.

“Yeah,” She shrugged back towards him, “I mean it’s nice and all, but we didn’t need this big empty space. What are we even going to do with all of it?”

“Maybe River Breeze could find something to use it for?”

Spring shrugged, “I don’t really see what she could do with it, we’d have to spend a ton just to get it set up for anything she’d do.”

Zipper pointed up to the loft that overlooked the warehouse floor. “Well we’ve got an office up there it looks like.”

“Alright, well that’s good at least. But still, what are we going to even do with the rest of it? It’s just us three right now, maybe we’ll get a few more sets of hooves helping out eventually, but even then I don’t think we’ll ever outgrow this anytime soon.”

“Well… I guess we could try and find a good use for it in the meantime.”

Blue Spring raised an eyebrow, “What kind of use?”

Zipper shuffled his hooves around, “Well, the Oasis doesn’t have any good nightlife does it?”

“Let me guess, you want to make something to fill that void?”

The gray pegasus shrugged, “Maybe not permanently, but it could certainly be a good way of bringing in some extra revenue, and driving up interest, you know?”

Spring let out a laugh, “So what is it? A nightclub? Bar?”

“An arcade.”

“An arcade…” she shook her head, “Zipper we don’t have hands, and there’s like a dozen humans here against what, three times as many ponies?”

He nodded his head and looked away, “Yeah okay, good point, but think about it. Classic arcade cabinets use buttons and joysticks right? Stuff that’s big enough to work well with hooves— and it’d give us all something that we haven’t been able to do in years.”

“Okay… but where do we start with this? I mean we’ll need someone to help get us the cabinets, make some designs, a sign or two? You know the big stuff that the two of us can’t do.”

Zipper smiled, “Hang on, I have an idea, I might know a guy that can help us out… at least with the design part.”

“Design part?”

“Well we’ll need signs and stuff right? Something flashy to bring people here.”

“Yeah… Where are you going with this?”

“Well Silver hung up some ads in the town center, one of them was for a graphic designer he knew.”

“And you’re just going to trust some random pony from an ad?” She asked with a furrowed brow.

Zipper nodded, “Silver did. And you know how he gets with other ponies.”

Blue Spring nodded, “Alright, I guess I’ll let you lead the way on this one… this should be interesting.”

Zipper held up his gauntlet, “NAVI call Stardust Designs”

Calling Stardust Designs… warning, user has specified quiet hours, would you like to continue anyways?”

“Yep! It’s important.” Zipper responded with a gleeful nod.

The comm began to dial for a few minutes before the pony on the end answered with a long yawn an annoyed sigh, “Go for Stardust… can I help you?”

“Hey Stardust… it’s Zipper, from the Oasis. I kinda needed help with something and Silver still had your ad hanging up around here so…”

“Uh huh, Zipper…. zipper, I uhh… sorry I can’t place a face to the name. I’ve only been out there twice, you’ll have to forgive me.”

The pegasus looked towards Blue Spring before turning back towards his gauntlet, “You know. I’m like one of Silver’s best friends, I was the weather captain too.”

“One of Silver’s best friends… right,” Stardust paused for a moment, “Okay, well uhh… Zipper was it?”

“Yeah.”

“Right, well Zipper what did you need exactly?”

“Okay so uhh, well we’re making an arcade and I kinda needed a logo… and some signs ... and I’ll need tokens too!” Zipper excitedly answered.

“Okay okay just slow down for a second. So I can do most of that, but you need to keep in mind that I’m an entire state away from you right now so I’m going to have to make a trip down with my team and that’s going to drive the price up a bit. If that’s okay with you then we’re in business. So with that in mind, what kind of signs did you need, and do you have an actual idea for the logo?”

Zipper looked towards Blue Spring and then grimmaced. “I honestly don’t really know yet… Is that going to be a problem?”

“Well it kind of is. You’re not really giving me much to work with here.”

Zipper froze for a second, “I.. okay, I guess you’re right.”

The pegasus wracked his brain before Blue Spring gave her own suggestion.

“What about the Starcade?” She offered.

“Yeah! That could work!” Zipper cheered.

“Okay then. Any fonts or layouts you want?”

Zipper shook his head. “Not really… I guess I’m not very creative with this kind of stuff.”

The line sat quiet for a few moments until finally Stardust spoke up, “Okay, so normally this would be one of my least favorite kinds of orders to get just because I have to try and figure out what you want, but seeing as how a lot of people around me don’t like dealing with night ponies, I’m open to helping you with this. What kind of feeling are you going for with it? It’s an arcade so something modern, something futuristic, maybe something retro—“

“—Yeah! Something retro would be awesome!” Zippier excitedly shouted into the Comm.

Stardust let out a small laugh, “Okay retro it is, now what kind of sign did you have in mind for it?”

“Well I was thinking of a neon sign maybe, and probably some posters and banners… how much do you think that’ll be?”

“Right. That’s gonna be a little more pricey but it’d also look cool too. I guess we’ll figure out the finer detail once you have an idea for the name. Banners and posters shouldn’t be too terribly expensive though, and I even know a guy that can do them in house so that’ll keep it a bit lower.”

“How much is a bit lower?”

The stallion paused while the sounds of a keyboard carried through the line. “I wouldn’t know until we get the actual details worked out.”

“I guess that makes sense,” Zipper excitedly shouted back, earning another annoyed sigh from the tired night pony.

“Uh-huh… soooo… was there anything else you needed?”

Zipper blinked a few times. “Oh uhh, not really. So I guess I’ll just give you a call later and we can talk the designs over?..”

“I have a better idea,” The stallion replied. “Weird question but do you know when you’ll probably be asleep next?”

“Uhh… tonight? Maybe around nine-ish?”

“Okay cool. I’ll stop by your dream and show off a few design ideas and we can go from there, it’s honestly the easiest option given how far away we are…” Stardust paused for a moment, “Have you ever had anyone dreamwalk to you before?”

“Uhhh no, not really? You can do that?” Zipper paused for a moment, “Wait, won’t you be awake by then?”

“Probably, but Silver’s been teaching us all about waking dreams… it’s kind of amazing, the dude’s on vacation and still won’t take a break from his work. Trust me though, it’s a lot of boring night pony stuff that you wouldn’t understand so don’t worry about it. Just don’t be confused when you’re suddenly aware you’re in a dream, it’ll make the design process a lot easier for both of us, okay?”

Zipper nodded towards the Comm, “I guess I’ll take your word for it… can’t wait to see what you come up with!”

“Mhmm. Just give me a call if you need anything else I guess, see you in your dreams.” He finished as the Comm went silent.

Zipper looked up towards Blue Spring and smiled, “I think this means we’re one step closer to getting there.”

She nodded, “And what about the games? Do you have anything in mind for that? Because it’s probably not going to be easy or cheap for us to do on our own.”

Zipper paused for a moment, “I uhh…”

“Didn’t think of that. That’s what I figured,” Blue Spring said, finishing his sentence. She sat in hesitation for a moment before perking up, “What about that night pony that’s been trying to get some more nightlife off the ground too? Wasn’t she the one that got a few old cabinets into the rec center? Maybe she’d know where to start.”

“You mean Sine Wave? I’ve barely said two words to her, I don’t think she likes me very much.”

The blue pegasus let out a laugh, “Well Zip you kind of crashed through her wall when you tried out that goofy spiral maneuver again while she was asleep, you ever see a tired night pony? How about one that you just scared awake. I think anyone would be more than annoyed if they got woken up and had to deal with repairing that kind of damage.”

Zipper’s face reddened in embarrassment, “Okay maybe that’s a good point,” he looked back towards her, “but do you think she’d really be onboard to help us with this?”

Blue Spring shrugged, “Well we won’t really know until we ask. So how about it? You want to go stop by her place later and see if she wants to talk about it over some drinks or something?”

He nodded, “Sure, I guess if she’s our only bet then we might as well give it a go…” he paused for a moment, clearly unsure of whether it was a good idea or not.

“Still afraid she’s mad at you? You shouldn’t be. Don’t you remember how much Silver emphasized how important it is to forgive? Most of the night ponies here look up to him, including her. She’ll probably be more than happy to help out once you explain the whole idea.”

“What is that bird brain doing here?! I thought I told you to stay away!” The dark purple night pony hissed as she bared her fangs at Zipper, ignoring the small salad she had prepared for herself.

The gray pegasus shrunk back in fear at the aggressive display, letting out a scared whimper as Blue Spring pushed her way past him, walking towards the other end of the table, “Hey now, calm down Sine! We’re here because we wanted to ask you something.”

The night pony shook her head, idly picking away at her meal, “I don’t want anything to do with him. He knows what he did and he better know that what I said I’d do wasn’t a threat… it was a promise.”

Blue Spring rolled her eyes, “Okay look, remember what Silver said about forgiveness? Because I think if he was here right now he’d have some choice words to say to you.”

Sine slowly nodded her head, letting out an annoyed sigh, “Yes, well Silver isn’t here. But fine, what do you want then?”

“What I want is for you to listen to something that we think you might be interested in, and hopefully we can end whatever drama’s going on between you two. So how about you put this behind you for a little while and we can deal you in on what we’re working on, because I think you’re the only pony in the entire Oasis who can really help us with the hardest part.”

“Look, I know what Silver said, but I don’t care. I’m not going to forget about this until the bird brain apologizes for ruining my garden.”

Blue Spring nodded, “And he will. Isn’t that right Zipper?” She asked as she turned towards him, flashing a stern glare.

The gray pegasus meekly nodded, “I… Yes.”

“Okay then, let’s hear it.” Sine responded with a smirk.

“I… I uhm, I’m sorry.” Zipper quickly replied back.

“That’s it?!”

The pegasus recoiled in fear again, “I…” He let out a deep sigh, “Look, Sine, I’m sorry. I’m bad at this kind of stuff but I’m really sorry I ruined your garden. I promise I’ll make it up to you sometime.”

“Oh you will now? So you’ll help me replant all my flowers then?”

Zipper shuffled his hooves around, “I… I will.”

“Wonderful. And you’ll pay for all of it then? Including the broken wall that you crashed into that’s still broken?”

Zipper’s eyes widened, but before he could protest Blue Spring chimed in, “Yes he will. Isn’t that right Zipper?”

Zipper flashed his friend an annoyed look, but didn’t protest further. With an annoyed sigh he turned towards Sine, “Yes. I’ll pay for all of it. How much do I owe you?”

Sine paused in consideration for a moment, “How about we work on everything and I’ll give you the bill when we’re done, k?”

The gray pegasus slowly nodded, “Alright. It’s a deal.”

“Wonderful! I forgive you.” The night pony cheerfully replied, “Now that we’ve got that out of the way, what’s your big crazy idea?”

“Well, Zipper, River, and I are trying to build an animal sanctuary. Zipper here had the bright idea of making an arcade to get some side cash to fund some of the annoying permits that we’ll have to get.”

“And it’ll give the Oasis something fun to do at night! Plus we can get a lot of positive attention that way!” Zipper excitedly chimed in.

“An arcade…” A smile slowly began to spread across her face, “Well to tell you the truth I thought this was going to be some really dumb idea, but I think I can actually get behind you on this one, bird brain.”

“Sine! He said he’d promise to pay you back, what happened to forgiving him?” Blue Spring protested.

The night pony smirked, “Well I forgave him, but that doesn’t mean he’s not still a bird brain," She turned towards Zipper, taking a few bites of her salad, "So tell me bird brain, what’s the plan? And please tell me you haven’t gotten any cabinets yet.”

Zipper picked away at his own plate for a few moments, taking a small nibble before nodding, “Right. So we haven’t gotten any cabinets yet, but we do have an idea in mind for some of the design aspects.”

“I hope that doesn’t mean you have a layout planned out? Because I’ve got a rad idea in mind that I’ve been itching to execute if you catch my drift.”

“Is that a yes then? You’ll help us?”

“Well, what about it? Would you be okay with me calling the shots on our design then?”

“Well, as long as it isn’t the signage then I think we’re good.”

Sine Wave smiled and dug into her salad, “Well then bird brain, and friend, I think that makes us business partners.”

“So I’m going to go ahead and assume that answers our unasked question, about whether you’d be able to get us some arcade cabinets?” Blue Spring asked in between her own bites.

The mare nodded, “Yep. It won’t be hard at all, trust me.”

“Perfect, so uhh, I hope this isn’t part of what I’m paying you back for… is it?” Zipper asked with a twinge of concern.

The mare let out a chuckle, “Don’t worry bird brain, it’s all taken care of. I know a guy down in Phoenix that’s been trying to offload a bunch of surplus cabinets. No one’s buying them right now, go figure, so I kind of scooped up as many as I could… not like I’m really spending that much on anything else.”

“So you already have the cabinets?!” Zipper excitedly asked.

Sine nodded, “Kinda. Kal has them in storage, said he could hold them for me for the month but if I didn’t pick them up then he’d wind up selling them off to some guy out in California. I take it you two have a space to house all these?”

Blue Spring nodded, “Yep! Pat had an old warehouse down by the lake, said we could use it as long as we needed it.”

“Ah, the one down by the inlet?”

Zipper nodded, “That’s the one!”

“Perfect,” she glanced at the clock on her wall and turned back towards the pair, “I need to make a call or two, mind if I stop by in the morning? I should know everything I need to know by then.”

“Sure. Thanks again for the dinner, Sine.”

The night pony nodded, “Breakfast, but I guess it’s dinner for you two. Thanks again for promising to fix my garden, bird brain. I’ll be sure to get a whole list of things I need you to do all made up in the meantime.”

Zipper slowly nodded, “It’s… alright. See you in the morning.”

She smiled, “Nice seeing you too Spring, thanks for teaching bird brain some manners.”

“Any time.”

The two walked out of the night pony’s house and started on the short walk back to Blue Spring’s home. Zipper couldn’t help but listen to the distant animal sounds, his sensitive ears picking up on every call and chirp.

Before long the two were nearing Spring’s small home, and as Zipper walked Spring up to her door he turned and smiled, “I just want to say thanks again for everything Spring, I really appreciate all the help. It means more to me than I think you realize.”

The blue pegasus smiled, “Of course. It’s something this place needed, and I can’t wait to see what happens from here on out.”

Zipper raised an eyebrow, “The arcade or the sanctuary?”

“Both,” She answered as she opened her door, waving towards the entrance with a wing, “You staying over tonight or flying back home?”

“I think I’ll head home, I need to get some chores done.”

“Sure you don’t want to sit down and watch another movie?”

Zipper shook his head, “Nah, I’d love to but I also need to go clean up Gordon’s cage. He’s been driving me crazy.”

“You can hear more than just him squawking?”

The pegasus nodded, “Yeah. It’s like he’s talking to me and actually talking to me. It’s hard to explain but yeah you already know that.”

Blue Spring smiled, “Good luck with that Zip. See you in the morning?”

“Same time, same place.”

She smiled, “Great, see you then.”

“See you when I see you, have a nice night Spring.”

With a final hug goodbye, Zipper took off towards his own home, excitement carrying through him as he saw his dreams finally becoming a reality.

Chapter 7: The Price of Forgiveness

Flickers of a fragmented dream ran through Sine’s mind as she slowly started to near the point of returning to the waking world. In contrast to most dream walkers, Sine Wave would often split time between exploring the dreams around her and letting her own play out. While this might have been strange for most other ponies that could use dream magic, Sine preferred to channel her dream magic in different ways that could better suit her creative endeavors. Today that meant going to bed with a clear problem to solve in her mind, and with any luck, her dream would reveal the answers she so desperately sought. In most cases, it gave her an idea to work through in the afternoon when she awoke. Today, however, it was disjointed memories of friends and peers replaying in her mind. One moment she witnessed Zipper crashing through her garden, the next, she was back in the first Dreamwarden trial. In another, she was back with Ink Rose in the aftermath of their first tattoo session. The memories playing back to her seldom ever lined up chronologically but rather were chained together with loose threads comprised of anger, fear, and regret.

Those fragmented memories would soon come to an end, however, for the afternoon sun had just started to dip in the sky, and with it came the irritating blare of Sine Wave’s usual alarm clock. The mare stirred in her admittedly small (for a pony), yet more than a comfortable bed, and disabled the alarm. A few lingering memories danced in the peripherals of her sleepy eyes, but the moment she opened her eyes, they quickly faded. She let out a loud groan and rolled over, glancing at the time again before letting out a small sigh. Usually she might sleep in for a while longer, but today was a special day. With Zipper’s promise to make things right, she knew that the day would likely be more entertaining than usual. Not wanting to waste a moment, she hopped out of bed and began to run through her morning routine.

First was the nice hot shower, one of the few luxuries she had in her home, the one that she arguably cherished most. As a human, she didn’t care either way what her showers were like. They could be cold, hot, or even just lukewarm. It was never more than just a momentary part of her daily routine. However, being a pony almost seemed to exaggerate her creative side, and considering the level of thinking involved with the hobbies that she would frequent, the shower was the perfect place for some creative brainstorming for her various homebrew projects. The hot water running down her back and the loud noise it brought with it gave her the perfect environment cut off from all distractions. With how connected the Oasis was and how social ponies were, this was one of the few places where she was truly and utterly alone in the world. As cliche and corny as it probably sounded, her afternoon showers were one of the only places where she was completely alone in the world, and in there, it was easy to lose track of time and drift off to her mind’s world. Today, however, proved slightly different. As the hot water ran down her neck and back, her ears twitched as the loud ringing that came from her doorbell.

Ughhh, Sine let out a long sigh and flipped off the shower.

Stepping out, she grabbed a large towel with her wings and draped it over herself, taking a moment to dry her mane off before heading to her room’s computer. In any normal circumstance, she’d take the time to carefully style her mane before even starting her day proper, but the sudden interruption forced her to leave her long mane down for the time being. There were worse problems to have though, and plus she personally thought she could rock the style just as well as her usual getup so what was the harm in leaving it natural for a day?

Tapping a couple of keys on her keyboard, Sine let out a small snicker as the unmistakable form of Zipper greeted her on screen. Guess the bird brain is keeping his end of the bargain after all, she thought to herself.

“Give me just a sec, Bird Brain,” she called out through the intercom. While she didn’t normally like to leave her guests waiting, she still had to dry off, and wasting Zipper’s time was the least of her concerns today. She might have already given her own conditional forgiveness to the wild pegasus, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t give him a hard time. While she didn’t like to be outright mean if she didn’t have a reason to be, Zipper had still done little to actually make things right, so a haste response was simply something he hadn’t earned yet.

A few quick passes with the towel were more than enough to dry her off in the dry climate, and with a spring in her step, she cheerfully trotted towards the door. A mischievous smirk spread across her face as the rumblings of a plan started to form in her mind. With Zipper (begrudgingly) offering to help her out today, she knew that he likely wouldn’t be up to putting in a full effort, but that didn’t necessarily mean much to her either way. She could easily tend to her garden— and oftentimes that was one of her favorite hobbies, so the quality of Zipper’s work wasn’t what was most important to her. As long as the pegasus was forced to confront his mistakes then she’d be happy, as shoddy as his work would likely be.

Without so much as a warning, she swung her front door inward and inadvertently startled the young pegasus with her unceremonious greeting.

“Hey bird brain. Ready to work?” She asked rhetorically.

Zipper composed himself and nodded. “Uh huh… so uhh, what do you want me to start with?”

“Come in first, we’ll get to that in due time,” she invited him in with an extended wing.

The pegasus followed her beckoning wing in, and stood in the dimly lit space, eyes squinted so he might see better. The room itself was as dark as it could possibly be save for some black light posters and a few blinking lights from Sine’s currently idle workspace. Under normal circumstances, a day long visiting would necessitate the lighting of a few candles or even flipping the lights on, but neither of them would stay in this room long enough for that to be much of a concern.

“So what’s up then?” He asked again.

“Eager to work eh?” Sine laughed as she looked at Zipper absentmindedly glance around the dark room.

“I’d just rather get this over with as soon as possible,” he answered.

“Right,” She took a second to slide her sunglasses on and then gently nudged him towards her home’s back door. “Alright bird brain, here’s the deal. We’re gonna start nice and easy, you’re going to go till the soil and clear out the dead flowers. After that we’re gonna go on a little shopping trip so you can buy replacements for me. Then you’re going to plant those for me and you can be on your merry way as if nothing ever happened.”

“It’s really going to be that easy?” He asked.

“More or less,” Sine replied. “This isn’t going to be as easy as you think though, but I’ll help you out if you absolutely need it. I don’t want to torture you after all. Diving through a bed of roses was probably painful enough.”

Zipper winced as he clearly replayed the whole ordeal in his mind. “It’s not my brand of fun but a deal’s a deal. If it means you won’t rip my throat out and that you’ll help out with the whole arcade thing… then this is more than fair.”

“Of course it is. You’re fixing a big mistake by doing it after all,” she reminded him. Sine paused for a second and opened the door, trotting out onto the patio and grabbing a few items from the nearby shed. “Here’s some basic tools, they aren’t super fancy but they’ll get the job done. I’m going to sit back and relax but if you need anything feel free to ask.”

Zipper slowly nodded. “Okay, I guess I’ll get started then. Anywhere in particular you want me to start first?”

Sine gestured towards a patch of completely crushed and wilted roses. “Go sort those out first, then we can take a look at the others and go from there.”

Zipper nodded and grabbed a small shovel from the collection of provided tools. “Mmmkay, I guess just give me a holler if you need anything.”

“Likewise,” Sine replied.

With a small leap, Zipper hopped up onto the damaged flowerbed and began to dig away at the crumpled and ruined flowers. Pausing for a moment, he looked back over to Sine. “Hey do you have a bin or bag for these? Or do you just want me to trash ‘em?”

Sine pointed towards a compost bin near the side of the garden. “Just toss them over there, that should be fine for now.”

Zipper nodded and started to organize the dug-up flowers into neat little piles that he could easily carry over to the compost bin. Minutes seemed to fly by as he worked through the first task, and before long he was standing in a rough bed of soil. It took a bit longer than Sine would have normally taken to clear the wilted flowers out, but he had done his job so she couldn’t complain. Perhaps it was his own interest to get the job done as soon as possible, or some inflated sense of duty that was driving him to act so differently, but whatever it was, she hoped he’d keep it up. If it wasn’t for the fact that he evidently had his own personal explanations for the sudden attitude change, she would have assumed that he had been replaced by some alien doppelgänger. For all things considered though, if this was a small taste of what the new Zipper was like then Sine was almost eager to work with him and Blue Spring on their arcade project.

“I have to hand it to you, bird brain. You’re off to a pretty good start.”

“Mhmm. So what’s next then?” We go get some flowers or something?”

“Well before we can do that, I think you need to clean up the flowerbed. That means leveling the dirt out and maybe tilling it into some neat rows so you can plant the new flowers when we get them.”

The pegasus let out a small sigh and shrugged. “Gotcha. Any particular way you want me to do that?”

Sine shook her head. “Just focus on making the dirt level, we can figure out the finer details after that.”

“Alrighty,” came the pegasi’s indifferent response.

“How’s this look, Sine?” Zipper asked as he took a step back from the newly leveled out soil.

“Hmmm,” Sine stepped forward and inspected his work. “It’ll do.”

“Is that good?” Zipper raised an eyebrow.

“It’s as good as packed down dirt can be,” Sine nodded. “So how about we move onto the next task, unless you think you need a break?”

Zipper considered this for a moment, but in a move that surprised her more than anything, he simply shook his head. “Let’s go get the flowers first. I can rest for lunch or something.”

His reply surprised her more than anything, but she wasn’t going to turn down a swift job. “Alright, if you insist. You wanna walk there or fly?”

“Up to you, I’m good either way. The sooner I get this done though, the sooner you don’t have to deal with me.”

“Who says I don’t want to deal with you?” Sine asked, raising an eyebrow.

The pegasus looked away. “I just uhh… guessed you probably wanted me out of your hair as soon as possible.”

Something about the way he said that just struck something in her. “Hey, you apologized, and while it might not have been the best apology in the world, you’re here helping me now and that’s what’s important. The second you showed up to help, whatever hatchet we needed to bury was buried. So don’t feel like I hate you or anything, because I don’t.”

“You don’t?” he looked back at her. “I mean, everything’s fine just like that?”

Sine shrugged. “You’re evidently not the bird brain I thought you were originally, and from what I’ve heard around, people are noticing that too.”

Zipper nodded. “I uhh… I guess I’ve had a few days to do some soul searching and decide to do things a little differently.”

“A little? You’re doing things a lot differently. I mean you just did an hour’s worth of manual labor and you didn’t argue about it, half-ass it, or try to get out of the work. That’s a lot different from the way you acted when you ruined everything the first time around.”

“I guess figuring out what I was meant to do gave me a wake-up call?” he offered.

“It sure sounds like it,” Sine commented. “So tell you what, let’s go get the rest of this done and we can get something to eat after, I’ll treat you because you’re being so generous and buying new flowers for me.”

“Yeah… generous,” Zipper replied. “I just hope this won’t run me dry, you know?”

“Oh it’ll be expensive, but that’s a part of owning up to your mistakes.”

He closed his eyes and nodded. “You’re right. Let’s get it over with so it won’t sting as much.”

“Sounds like a plan bird brain. Just follow me, it’s not too far.”

The market in question was about a minute’s flight from her home, and to Sine’s own relief, the establishment was fairly empty save for the lone proprietor and a couple of earth pony mares who were browsing the selection. Sine Wave wasn’t one to openly share this, and in fact only her closest friends really had an understanding of it, but she was the kind of pony that preferred to keep to herself and avoid large gatherings. It wasn’t a crippling fear or anything too abnormal, but she just simply felt most comfortable when she could be relatively alone. Petals and Thorns was one of the few places Sine could be considered a regular at, and if you weren’t in the know, then you probably wouldn’t even expect a mare like her to enjoy gardening on the side. Something about the hobby was just so relaxing to her, and as much as she didn’t like the outdoors, she loved her little slice of the world that she (and now Zipper) had built for herself.

“So what are we getting?” Zipper cut in as they passed a few brightly colored displays.

“SINE WAVE!” A jolly voice boomed from behind them before Sine could give a response.“It’s always great to see you ‘round here!”

“Afternoon, Purline, how’re you today?” Sine warmly greeted the earth pony stallion before them.

“Just as good as always! And yourself?”

“I’m good, maybe a little sleepy but otherwise okay.”

The green stallion smiled. “That’s better than bad, and it looks like you brought a friend along too eh? What’s the occasion?”

“Glad you asked!” She smirked. “Bird Brain here damaged some of my flowers, and graciously offered to replace them for me.”

“Did he now?” The stallion grinned. “So what’ll it be then?”

“Uhh…” Zipper stammered as he looked towards Sine, who just grinned back. “What’s on sale?”

“Flowers that’ll probably be out of season soon. So I can’t recommend those,” Purline looked over at Sine, “So what did he trample anyways?”

“Just some damask roses that my mother gifted me the last time she visited. Nothing special.”

Zipper seemed to catch onto something, but before he could reply, Purline’s loud booming voice cut in with a hearty chuckle, catching him by surprise yet again.

“Oh no, those are pretty pricey… hope you brought your wallet along,” he teased. “You’re in luck though, I special ordered some not too long ago and had a customer flake on me, so I just so happen to have some coming in for you.”

“You do?” Sine cheerfully replied. “This is why you’re the best Grapevine.”

“Grapevine?” Zipper asked.

“Yeah, bird brain,” Sine replied. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Right…” he started, “So uhh… what’s the price for them?”

Purline leaned close and whispered something into Zipper’s ear, and his immediate reaction almost made Sine feel sorry for him… almost.

“Wait, they’re that much?!” Zipper choked out. “That’s more than any other flower I’ve ever bought.”

Sine shrugged. “I said those flowers were special, didn’t I?”

“Yeah, but who’s mom just gifts them something like that?”

“Mine does,” Sine retorted. “We don’t get to see each other often, and she was the one that got me back into gardening so those were a special gift from her.”

Zipper sighed and nodded. “I can see why you were so mad at me now.”

“It’s alright though like I said, we’re all good now,” Sine reassured him. “But that doesn’t mean I don’t get to have a little fun with this.”

“Uh huh,” Zipper begrudgingly held up his gauntlet, “Just go ahead and charge it on this.”

Purline nodded and held up his own gauntlet to Zipper’s and a few moments later the transaction was marked with a cheerful ding.

“Thank you very much for the generous purchase today, I hope to see you again soon!” The stallion cheered back.

Zipper let out a sigh and rolled his eyes. “Anytime…”

“Thank you bird brain,” Sine lightened the mood with an unexpected hug. “I really do appreciate your help.”

“I’ll go ahead and get everything noted down, I should have those in a day or two. If you’d like I can drop them over at Sine’s place once they get here.”

Zipper looked up at the stallion and gave as sincere of a smile as he could muster. “Thanks, that would be lovely.”

Art by: https://twitter.com/ProfessionalPup

Chapter 8: Offloading Some Thoughts

BZZZZZT

Sine winced as the needle touched her foreleg.

“Sorry about that,” Ink Rose apologized. “The first touch is always the worst for me.”

“Yeah? Me too,” Sine retorted. “It’ll dull soon, though.”

“If you need a break at any time, just let me know.”

“That makes it worse,” Sine pointed out.

Ink Rose nodded. “For a lot of ponies, but I still have to make it available if you need it.”

“Mhmm,” Sine nodded. “I appreciate it.”

BZZZZZZZTTZZT

Sine winced and let out a small yelp again, cursing under her breath.

“So… what’s new with you?” Ink Rose asked, clearly realizing she needed to distract Sine from the painful needle running against her sensitive foreleg.

“Not a whole lot,” Sine replied through clenched teeth.

“Not a whole lot?” Ink Rose pressed. “I heard you didn’t rip out bird brain’s throat, so I’m guessing something productive came out of that.”

“I guess you could say that,” Sine started to relax as the sting of the needle started to fade into the background. “He apologized to me and helped me do some yard work, offered me a job too to boot.”

“Offered you a job? Doing what? If you don’t mind me asking.”

“I don’t,” Sine shook her head. “I guess he’s ditching the whole weather team thing and wants to make an arcade of all things.”

“An arcade?” Ink Rose continued running the needle across the stencil’s design. “Seems like a weird choice for him, but a great opportunity for you.”

“It’s better than a great one,” Sine agreed. “Let’s me move my stuff out of the rec center’s back room and into a proper place.”

“And you can move some of your collection out of your spare room,” Ink cheerfully pointed out.

“Mhmm,” Sine nodded. “That too… Not all of them, though.”

“I didn’t say all of them, just some of them,” she stuck her tongue out. “You gotta keep the best for your own personal arcade.”

“It might even give me a chance to pick up some other collections I’ve been eyeballing.”

“More cabinets?”

“Yeah,” Sine confirmed. “Don’t worry though; I’m not gonna pick them up until bird brain shows me the place and gives me the go-ahead to keep them there. I gotta be responsible with my obsession; otherwise, I’m a hoarder.”

“That’s fair enough,” Ink agreed. “What do those things run you anyways?”

“Not as much as you’d think. The auction I’ve been watching doesn’t have mint or even gently used cabinets. They’re kind of run down, but a lot of them look fixable, and the ones that aren’t… well, I can use them for my other hobby.”

“Your homebrew projects?”

“Bingo!” Sine smiled. “Bird brain’s covering the new flowers and some more of the repair costs for what he broke, which means I get to use my hobby budget for more fun endeavors. If we’re opening up an arcade, then I’ll need surplus parts and materials, and cheap arcade cabinets are a good way to source those… ‘sides; what else am I spending my money on?”

“Food, utilities, insurance, tattoos….” Ink listed off. “And probably more outside of just hobbies.”

“That’s what my hobby budget is for,” Sine smirked.

“I guess I can’t argue with that. I’ve got my own hobby stuff I dig into too.”

“Like what?”

Ink lifted the needle and looked away, shaking her head. “It’s nothing amazing.”

“I didn’t ask if it was amazing or not,” Sine continued. “I rattled your ear off about my hobby stuff, so it’s only fair for me to let you do the same. So try me.”

Ink looked back at her. “I’ve got a whole room here that’s just a private library. I didn’t bother showing it to you before because that’s my own personal escape from reality,” The mare admitted, clearly seeming embarrassed by that admission.

Sine paused for a moment, a big grin crossing her face. “Seriously?”

“I know, I know,” Ink resumed her tattooing. “It’s such a nerdy thing, and I always feel like such a geek when I share it.”

“It’s incredibly geeky, but it’s awesome.”

“Really?” Ink’s ears perked up. “You think so?”

“Of course,” Sine nodded. “We all need our escapes, and reading isn't all that different from my games when you think about it.”

“What do you mean?” She raised an eyebrow.

“Well, stories and games both let you check out of reality and go off on a fun adventure for a while. They’re even both two sides of the same coin if you think about it.”

“I…” Ink Rose started. “You know, you’ve got a good point, and I guess I never put much thought into that before.”

“I don’t think a lot of people do— at least not right off the bat. I don’t think the first thing that runs through anyone’s mind is that both mediums serve the same purpose.”

“They technically don’t, but it’s probably more complicated than I understand,” Ink admitted.

“It depends,” Sine said. “You could say they serve different purposes, and they honestly do. Not every game is designed to have a compelling story that transports you to a different world, but I think the end result is still the same in a weird roundabout way— even for the most simplistic things.”

“Like Tetris,” Ink giggled.

“Yeah, basically,” Sine replied with a chuckle of her own. “There’s not a story there, but it does take you out of the real world for just a bit. I guess in a way what my hobby is is a way for me to merge what I like from both of those mediums.”

“I think I understand,” Ink replied. “So what’s your goal with your hobby then? Tell compelling stories through your arcade game projects?”

“Something like that. I don’t think I’m the best writer ever, but I love making a big world to set something in, and my hobby is an extension of that. I’d love to tell a great story inside of that too, but who knows if it’ll come off that way.”

“I see,” Ink focused her attention on lining one of the remaining parts of the tattoo. “That’s kind of the most fun part if you ask me.”

“Making a world?”

“Making a world and telling a story in it. A playable story told through an arcade game sounds like a very cool way to tell a story.”

Sine perked up. “You’re a writer?”

“I dabble,” Ink Rose grinned proudly. “I write fanfiction sometimes, but I also want to make something original sometime.”

An idea started to pop into Sine’s head, and she couldn’t help but smile in excitement.

“Would you want to help out with my game?” Sine candidly asked.

Ink looked up from the outlined tattoo. “As in, help with the story?”

“Yeah,” Sine shrugged. “I think it’d be a lot of fun… if you’re interested, that is.”

Ink glanced towards one of the closed doors that led further into the house. “I’ve never collaborated with anyone before.”

“The offer’s on the table if you ever do,” Sine smiled as she glanced down at her half-finished tattoo. The tattoo wasn’t the most complicated thing in the world— just a rolling wave surrounded by a sequence of mathematical equations that Sine had picked out. Currently, it was just a basic outline, but Sine could already tell that the end result was going to be amazing. “You’re doing great with this.”

“Thanks,” Ink said. “I’ll be able to finish it tomorrow if you want, or whenever it works best.”

Sine looked back at the tattoo, then at the other designs that Ink had already made for her. “I’ve got another day of work with bird brain, so let me get back to you on that.”

Ink Rose wrapped up Sine’s hoof and turned away to put her supplies away but was sure to still follow along. “That’s all fine by me. So what’s next on your agenda then?”

“Not much, to be honest. I’m probably going to go grab a bite to eat on the way home; you’re welcome to join me if you'd like.”

“You want me to go along?”

Ink seemed to zone out for a brief moment, and something about the way she carried herself read to Sine as if she was lost in deep thought.

She didn’t take it negatively, though, considering she probably did the same just as often, if not more, when she was rambling about her hobbies and likes. Choosing not to read too far into it, Sine smiled and continued. “Only if you want to; it’ll be my treat. I went there with bird brain, and it was a nice place. I hate going alone and would love to have a friend to go with.

Ink Rose seemed to snap out of whatever she was in and hesitated for a moment. Seemingly embarrassed, she looked back at Sine with a small smile and nodded. “That would be lovely.”

Something about the way she hesitated and the subtle way she tensed up surprised Sine, but she shrugged it off. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah, just got lost in thought for a moment,” Ink replied. “Why don’t I finish up, and then we can head over there?”

“We could do that,” Sine paused for a moment. “Or… maybe you could show me your library?”

Ink stopped her cleanup and looked back over at Sine Wave. “Wouldn’t you rather just go get a bite to eat? That’s probably going to be more entertaining than some dusty old books.”

“Maybe, but they’re your dusty old books. ‘Sides, they can’t be that boring and dusty.”

“Okay,” Ink shrugged. “They’re not dusty, but they’re probably still pretty boring.”

“Hey, it’s your call, but I think it’d be cool to see. I got to show you my nerdy hobby stuff, and I’d love to see what kind of stuff you’re into too. If you’re not comfortable sharing it, then that’s okay too.”

Ink Rose considered this and then finally nodded. “Okay. Don’t laugh at me, though; I have a lot of trashy romance novels too.”

“Trashy romance and old classics? Interesting combo.”

“Mhmm,” Ink waved Sine towards the door. “Guess I have some weird tastes, eh?”

“Not really,” Sine replied. “You like what you like; there’s nothing wrong with that.”

Ink pushed the door open and gestured to the tall shelves that lined every wall. “Welcome to my own personal oasis.”

Sine Wave couldn’t help but marvel at the pristine collection of tomes as she stepped in. “Gotta say,” She started. “You’re giving my nerd stuff a run for its money.”

“Am I?” Ink Rose asked.

“Mhmm,” Sine leaned in to inspect a few of the collected volumes. “I wish I could have a collection set up like this.”

“You kind of do, don’t you, though?” Ink asked, referring to Sine’s vast collection of vintage games.

“I do,” Sine admitted. “But this looks so much more refined than my setup.”

Ink perked up and replied with a goofy grin. “You really think so?”

“I do,” Sine confirmed. “It’s genuinely cool to see what kinds of hobbies others have.”

“I appreciate it, but I can’t take all the credit for these,” She looked through one of the shelves and picked out one particular book containing an assortment of Japanese art. “Stuff like this? Art and concepts… sure. I’ve bought plenty of them. But I can also blame my mom for building up a lot of my collection.”

“I see,” Sine smiled. “I bet it’s a good hobby to bond over.”

“It is. She’s a schoolteacher in Riverview, so she’s always been the kind of pony that loves to get her hooves on rare books. It’s something we did bond over and still do, but obviously not as much as before I moved here.”

Sine Wave gently ran her hoof over some of the leatherbound books. “It seems like a special hobby, for sure.”

“It is,” Ink Rose joined her. “Mom always loved to read; I always loved to collect big volumes of concept art and just art in general. We didn’t share a lot of common ground, so having something that bridged both of our interests was great. It’s also something that’s given me a lot of inspiration whenever I needed it or felt creatively dry.”

Sine looked down at her wrapped up hoof and then towards Ink’s nearby art book. “I can see that. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t do the same from time to time.”

“It’s not a bad thing,” Ink said as she set her art book down. “There’s a lot of great ways to take an existing concept and make it your own. That’s my job a lot of the time, and I’m going to guess that it’s yours too…” she paused. “But I think that’s enough of my dorky hobbies for tonight, I’m starting to get peckish, and you did offer to treat me to dinner, so maybe we should skip away to that.”

Sine Wave smiled. “Maybe we can chat some more about our dorky hobbies then?”

“We could,” Ink smirked. “You offered to let me work on your game with you, so perhaps that’d give us some good creative ground to bounce ideas off of?”

“I think you’re onto something,” Sine chuckled. “Let’s get going then, and we’ll see what happens next.”

Chapter 10: Reflecting on the Past, Preparing for the Future

A long day of hard work was never Zipper’s particular idea of doing something fun… yet the time spent with Sine Wave was— as embarrassing as it had been for him towards the end. Thankfully, Sine had been more than gentle with him, and much to his surprise, he had evaded a barrage of teasing and jokes that he might have encountered had he been hiding behind his mask.

The interactions that he had had with Sine throughout the day could most definitely be considered his most genuine interaction with someone outside of Blue Spring, and as proud of himself as he was for completely abandoning it for even a short while, the trip back home was nonetheless full of self-doubt and second-guessing. For all the personal leaps of faith that he had been taking, shedding that mask and casting it aside was still something that he was anxious about, as stupid and silly as that might be.

What’s stopping me from just being completely honest with myself? He thought as he pushed the door to his home open.

Squawk! Came the cheerful birdcall of his beloved pet parrot, Gordon.

Setting his saddlebags aside, Zipper smiled and trotted over to the bird. “How was your day, friend?”

Squawk

“Mhmm, I see,” He held out a hoof, and the bird excitedly hopped up before resting on Zipper’s back as he had often come to do since Zipper had discovered his talent.

He usually wouldn’t consider letting the bird have free reign of the house… however, his talent helped him set some ground rules that the parrot surprisingly took to heart without too much trouble. Together, they climbed up the short flight of steps that led up to Zipper’s small loft, and without needing to be told what to do, Gordon hopped into his cage and settled down for the night.

Zipper was grimy, dirty, and most of all, beyond tired, which is why he decided to simply rinse himself off and call it an early night. He had already gotten dinner for himself, so rather than cook up a meal of his own, he simply set out some food for Gordon and made a beeline for the large and very comfortable bed.

I don’t know why this is so hard… he mused as he flopped onto it and snuggled under the covers. I just have to be… me…

But was it really as easy as just being himself? Could he even say that he knew who the real Zipper was?..

Gordon Squawked again from his cage, distracting Zipper from his thoughts and bringing a smile to his face. “Thanks Gordon, you always know what to say when I’m feeling blue.”

The bird didn’t reply outright, but Zipper knew he got the message. While he might not have been able to literally speak the bird’s “language”, he was still a natural at picking up the context clues and piecing together the possible meaning, and in this case, Gordon’s silence usually meant that it was bed time, and that the time for talking was over.

Wrapping himself up in the covers even more, Zipper closed his eyes and let out a long yawn, turning toward’s Gordon’s cage. “Nighty night, see you in the morning.”

It wasn’t long until Zipper found himself in a very vivid and familiar dream.

“Do you have any kind of plan for what you’re going to do someday, Travis?”

He looked up towards the sound of the voice, shaking his head, “Kinda? I mean I want to do something cool, but I guess that’s all the thought I put into it.”

The counselor nodded, pausing for a moment as she took a few notes, “Something cool… well do you have any specifics on what kind of jobs are cool? That could be a very broad range of careers.”

Travis shrugged, “Well, I like animals.”

“Animals, okay. So what kind of job could you see yourself doing with animals? Training them for movies? Working in a shelter?..”

“Well there’s an animal exhibit at the carnival I work at,” He answered back, “I always thought that was kind of cool.”

She nodded, “Well, that’s a good start. Have you considered talking with the supervisor there to try and see if you could transfer to their department?”

“I guess I haven’t. I’ve always been a thrill seeker, and the stuff they do in that exhibit is just so cool. They’ve got a lion that’s trained to do tricks, a couple of tigers— all of the cool animals.”

“Right… so why don’t you go talk with that supervisor next time you go in for work.”

“I… I mean I guess I could, I just feel like I wouldn’t fit in there.”

The woman paused for a moment, before looking up towards him, “You’re a bright student Travis, but I think your problem is that you don’t apply yourself. You’re saying that you don’t think you’d fit in there, but I think you could if you gave it a solid try.”

He raised an eyebrow, “You think so?”

The counselor laughed, “Travis I’ve been a counselor at this college for about 15 years now. If I didn’t believe in my students then I wouldn’t be a very good one right?”

“I… guess so?”

“So why don’t you give it a go tomorrow, I’ll look over what kind of programs you could get into here that could help you with that, and we can talk again the same time on monday if that works for you.”

Travis nodded, “Okay, I’ll give it a shot.”

The woman smiled, “That’s all that I ask. I believe in you.”

“Thanks… I appreciate it.”

He blinked his eyes shut and when he reopened them he was carefully stepping into an empty tent, watching the handlers with their animals from afar. The carnival had been closed for more than an hour at this point, and normally he would have gone home, but something called him to this place and he couldn’t help but stand there now. The conversation with his counselor came back to his thoughts, bringing a small smile to his face as he contemplated asking the question that was burning in his mind.

“Martinez!” Came the shout from the area’s supervisor, causing the young human to quickly turn towards him, “The rest of the carnies all left an hour ago, what are you still doing here?”

“Well, um… I just wanted to see what you guys did here.”

The supervisor raised an eyebrow, “We train and take care of the animals. You know this.”

He nervously nodded his head, “Well yes, but…” He paused for a moment, turning away and looking back towards the handlers, “Okay so I guess this has been a long time coming, but I’ve just been too afraid to ever talk about it. I know it’s a long shot but do you think there’s a chance I could transfer over here?”

“You mean work with the animals?”

Travis nodded, “Yeah. I guess I’ve just always thought it was cool, but I never thought it was something I could ever get into.”

The supervisor paused, clearing his throat for a moment, “Look… you’re a good kid, but I’d be lying if I said I thought there was a chance you could fit in here… I mean it’s no offense to you, but you need a lot of training and education to do what they do,” He waved towards them with a hand, pausing for a moment as he turned back towards Travis, “I’m sorry, but I don’t think you’re in the kind of position to join our team yet.”

A hollow feeling welled up within Travis, but before he could form a reply an idea came to his head. He looked up towards the supervisor and nodded, “I understand. But… would there be any chance that I could at least shadow a few of your guys? Even if it’s just on my days off? I know it’s a long shot but this is something I’d love to learn more about.”

The supervisor hesitated for a moment, leaving the two of them in silence for a few seconds. Just as Travis was about to prod further the man nodded his head, “Okay. When’s your next day off?”

Travis’ face lit up in excitement, “Tomorrow actually!”

“Okay. I don’t think this is technically in line with policy, but why don’t you stop by tomorrow before opening and you can shadow Lopez.”

“Danny’s going to be okay with that?”

The older man shrugged, “No clue, but I trust him to show you the ropes more than anyone else. He’s been doing this since he was your age so I figure it’s better than throwing you in with one of the other handlers.”

He nodded, “Okay, thanks again!”

“Of course. Just do me a favor and try to keep out of his way, Lopez has all of the training for this job, you don’t and the last thing I need is for you to wind up hurt or injured because you got kicked by a horse or something.”

“Keep my distance, listen to Danny— got it!”

“You better go get some sleep then, we start our days early here and that’ll be the first test to see if you’re ready to start learning about what we do here.”

Travis excitedly nodded his head and made towards the exit, squinting his eyes shut as the bright flood lights outside momentarily blinded him.

“Martinez right? Travis Martinez? I’m Daniel but you can just call me Danny if you want.”

“Yeah that’s me. We met a while ago at one of the big all hands meetings but I don’t think we ever interacted that much.”

“Good. So I’m guessing Alex told you everything then?”

“Yeah, said to let you take the lead and to keep my distance so I don’t cause a liability issue.”

Danny nodded, “Okay good,” He waved a hand towards the stables, “My job’s real simple, check up on all the horses and make sure they’ve got water, check up on them, that sort of stuff.”

Travis looked toward the stable, “Well lead the way. I’ll keep quiet but if you need help or anything just ask.”

“Noted,” He pushed open the door and stepped in, flipping on some additional lights, “Have you been keeping up on the news at all Martinez?”

Travis nodded, “Kinda, not as much as I probably should but it seems like it’s starting to get a little crazier out there.”

“Well… that’s certainly a way to put it. Stuff seems to be okay for now but I just can’t help but have a bad feeling about this flu season, I mean they say it’s business as usual, but it’s not going away or getting any better,” He leaned down and picked up a brush, waving Travis towards one of the horses that had peeked it’s head out of the stall to greet them. With a smile he walked over and started brushing it’s mane, “I’ve got friends out in Colorado who say it’s getting kind of bad, infections seem to be rising, lots of people are sick— not a whole lot of deaths though which is strange… I can’t even begin to imagine what might happen if it evolves or something.”

Travis stepped closer to the horse, “Mind if I give it a try?”

Danny nodded, passing him the brush, “Be gentle, Stetson here is usually calm but if you snag it on his mane he might not like that too much.”

Travis began to slowly brush the horse’s mane, pausing for a moment, “You don’t think it’ll get that bad do you?”

The other man shrugged, “No clue, I’ve got a bad feeling about this all though… It’s just so unusual. What I’m more worried about right now is what’s going to happen to these guys if it gets bad enough to force a closure.”

“Don’t you guys have a plan in place for this kind of thing?”

“I mean we have a loose plan, Alex’ll cut back hours, but make sure there’s enough staff in rotation to keep their welfare in check. We’ve got about 4 full time veterinarians here that can make sure the animals are taken care of, but that doesn’t bode well for handlers like us.”

“Hopefully it never gets to that point…” Travis closed his eyes for a moment, and in an instant everything seemed to get much worse, the weeks passing in a flash as the world around him changed both literally and figuratively. Before long he was sitting in a familiar shelter with the same human as before, though by now there was hardly any humanity left in them.

Zipper let out a snicker as he nudged the pegasus next to him, “Oh wowwww did you hear that Ocean? A unicorn’s gonna show us a real magic trick, I wonder how he’s gonna do it?!”

The unicorn up on stage smiled and gestured a hoof towards him, “Aha, it seems we have a volunteer! Please come up, don’t be shy!”

A few hoofstomps rang out, earning some annoyed looks from the human volunteers around the shelter. Zipper hesitated at first, but the encouragement of the crowd gave him that much needed push, both figuratively and literally.

As Zipper stumbled up next to the unicorn, he greeted him with a warm smile, “Well hello there! What is your name?”

He nervously shuffled around as he looked around at the slowly growing crowd. “It’s uhhh… Zipper.”

“Zipper! Now there’s a unique name if I’ve ever heard one,” the unicorn dramatically announced to the assorted ponies in the shelter, “Now I’ll take it that that wasn’t your human name?”

He quickly shook his head, “Nope, that name wasn’t cool enough for me anymore. I’m Zipper now and that’s all that matters.”

The unicorn let out a few laughs, “Well that’s certainly a ‘cool’ name. Now Zipper, I’m going to need your help for this next trick, do you think you can do that?”

His eyes widened as if the unicorn had insulted him, “Well yeah, of course I can!”

The unicorn chuckled, “Aha, there’s that’s the spirit I was looking for! Now I’m going to perform a feat of magic that has yet to be seen, I will transport you from one side of this meager stage and appear on the other… with magic!”

“Pfff you can’t teleport, nopony can!” Zipper retorted.

“Ah, but that’s where you’re wrong dear Zipper. Anything’s possible with a little magic, you just need to believe!”

Zipper rolled his eyes, “Uh huh… well I’ll believe it when I see it.”

“Now ladies and gentlemen, who’s ready to see some real magic?!”

The crowd began to cheer as the unicorn led Zipper towards a large cabinet, “Go ahead and step on in, you’ll be perfectly safe, I promise…”

“Have you even done this before?” Zipper sarcastically asked as he rolled his eyes.

“Once or twice… the rat seemed fine enough anyways so you have nothing to worry about.”

“Uh huh… righty well maybe you could stop talking and actually start showing us this ‘amazing magic’ huh?” Zipper suddenly squinted his eyes shut as a bright flash of light enveloped him. Without any warning he found himself suddenly tumbling backwards into a smoky abyss, and in an instant he found himself in a location that was all too familiar to him.

“The two racers are neck and neck!” Diamond excitedly called out as he carefully trailed the two pegasi.

The memory of the big race between him and Dazzle played out in his dream again as he speedily soared high above the clouds, dodging and weaving between an increasingly narrow and complex field of cloud barriers, nearing the final stretch of the race. It was clear that Dazzle was the more experienced flier, but Zipper was simply too prideful to give up now, and that was his biggest mistake.

As the two racers entered a narrow stretch of clouds, they were forced closer together. As Zipper slowed, Dazzle took the opportunity to speed ahead, cutting past him in a blur of color and disorienting him for a few brief moments. His eyes widened in shock as she took on each obstacle in rapid succession, causing the prideful pegasus to desperately increase his pace. Seeing no other option, he decided to use his head— literally, crashing through the cloud obstacles in a flurry of barrel rolls.

Much to his dismay Dazzle passed through the finish line, winning the race with an impressively decisive lead.

“Dazzle wins!” Diamond cheerfully called out as the team let out an excited cheer.

Zipper came to a clumsy land, feeling a complicated mess of emotions that ranged from embarrassment to frustration. Still feeling up to fighting for his pride, he began to shout over to her in between his pained breaths, “That’s… that’s not fair, you knew that turn was coming up!”

The pegasus turned towards him and slowly walked forward, “Yeah? And so did you, I had no hoof in setting up the course past making obstacles. You’ve got the same two eyes as me,” Dazzle said with a smug smirk and sounding barely winded.

“I…” Zipper wheezed out, deciding to wisely stay quiet before he could make the loss even worse for himself.

“Listen, up north we didn’t just choose our names, we wanted to earn them. Maybe you earned yours by needing to zip your lip.”

“I… No...” he said, lowering his ears and turning away.

“Oh? Well do me a favor and try it out some time. You might think yourself a fancy flyer, but you’re part of a team, so work on building them up rather than showing yourself off.”

Zipper could only slowly nod his head and back away, feeling a wave of embarrassment wash over him. With a dejected sigh, the pegasus flopped over onto the ground as Dazzle flew off, taking in deep breaths and trying to give his tired wings a brief respite from the heavy workout he had just put them through.

The sound of hooves in the sand caused his ears to perk up, and as he looked up he saw Blue Spring standing over him with a bottle of water held under a wing.

“That sure was some race eh? You should drink some water, that looked like it was probably more than an intense workout.”

Zipper sat up and took the offered bottle, nodding as he started to greedily take in large gulps of water, letting out a content sigh as he finished, “Thanks… Spring right? Blue Spring?”

The mare smirked and nodded, “Yep, that’s me. Seems like it’s a little late for an introduction doesn’t it? We’ve been on a team for what? A few months now?”

Zipper shrugged, “Better late than never I guess…” he paused for a moment, “So uhh… what did you think of the race?”

Blue Spring laughed, “Well, it was interesting, that’s for sure, and that goofy spin maneuver at the end sure was something else, you might actually be able to do something practical with that if you practice a little more.”

“Y—you think so?” He stammered out, “I mean it was just a spur of the moment idea, I barely even thought about it.”

“Sure,” she shrugged, “maybe it’s not the most useful thing to us now, but I could see that becoming a pretty cool stunt move. It just needs some polishing.”

“T—thanks, I’ll have to try that sometime,” he stood up and passed the bottle back to her, “thanks again Blue.”

She nodded, “My pleasure. Now why don’t we go back with the rest of the team and see what’s next on the agenda.”

“Can’t I just rest a little longer?” Zipper asked, almost pleadingly.

She let out a small laugh, “Oh come on, you can rest when you’re back home. I don't think the middle of the desert is a very good place to rest.”

Zipper nervously shuffled his hooves and looked around, “yeah… maybe you’re right. Lead the way I guess.”

Zipper looked up towards the sky as Blue Spring began to trot forward, squinting his eyes as the bright sun entered his field of view. In an instant he was back in the lake, surrounded by a warm glow of light, one of the happiest days of his life— the day he finally earned his cutie mark.

As he glanced down at his new mark, he smiled as a sense of belonging welled up inside him. The last few years seemed to come flooding back to him as he thought back to everything he had tried to do before ETS had changed everything. His ambitions and dreams all seemed so much more possible now, and for the first time in a long time it finally seemed as if his life had an actual direction to go.

“A pair of wings… Kind of fitting eh? So does this mean you’re gonna be a stunt flier or something?”

Zipper looked up towards Blue Spring and pulled her into a tight hug, “I don’t know yet, but I’m just so glad that you’re my friend, you’ve believed in me when others didn’t and I could never thank you enough for that.”

The mare smiled and nodded her head, “Of course Zip, you’re a bit wild at times but you’ve got a good heart on the inside.”

“This genuinely means more to me than I think you’ll ever know, I just want you to know that.”

“Anytime Zipper, anytime.”

The dream suddenly froze as another voice started to fade in, “So uhhh… this wasn’t exactly the kind of dream I had in mind when I hopped over here.”

Zipper snapped towards the sound of the voice, pausing in surprise as he noticed the dark blue night pony with a purple mane walking towards him, “You— how…” he asked as he cocked his head to the side.

Stardust looked around at the dream version of the Oasis, “It’s a dream. Remember what I told you earlier?”

The Pegasus paused for a moment, “That you’d show up in my dream… that’s what this is then.” His eyes widened, “Wait! How much did you see?!”

“More or less everything, Travis,” he added with a smirk, “Don’t worry though, none of this will ever leave this dream, unless you allow it of course.” Stardust calmly replied as he walked towards the edge of the lake. He glanced down at the calm reflectionless water as the memories of his own close friendships came to mind, “Maybe it’s sappy but I think it’s sweet that you value your friendship with her so much. That’s not something everyone can say.”

Zipper trotted up next to him and sat down at the water’s edge, “You don’t think I’m uncool for it?”

Stardust looked at the Pegasus and shook his head, “Hardly. Having a close friend, or a good handful of them in my case, is a nice thing to have in the otherwise boring and miserable world we live in. Me and my close friends, we’re well, closer. Like a small tight knit family. We’ve been through the thick and thin together, always there to support each other when we need it most, and it’s something that makes you appreciate how much you have. It always brings a smile to my face when I see others getting to experience something similar.”

“I never really thought about it like that.” Zipper gazed out towards the horizon longingly, ”I’ve spent so much of my life trying to fit in and be cool, that I guess I just never actually thought about what others thought about me.”

“Aside from hoping they’d think you were cool.” The night pony added with a chuckle.

Zipper smiled, “ha, I guess so.” He stood up and looked around at the unfamiliar buildings that made up the dream Oasis in the distance.

“It’s weird eh?”

Zipper looked towards him, “What is?”

“The dream. I bet you’ve never seen your own dream like this, there’s lots of weird details that you’d never even remember when you woke up, and stuff that feels like it shouldn’t make any sense— because well, it doesn’t in a dream. You get used to it though.”

The pegasus looked around slowly and shook his head, turning back towards the night pony, “I guess so… so what’d you wind up coming up with?”

“For your signs. Right, sorry for the personal detour, I guess I’m just a sucker for that sort of stuff. Mind if I grab the wheel here? Change your dream and all that?”

Zipper shrugged, “it’s not like I can do anything here. So go for it.”

Stardust smiled and nodded, gesturing for Zipper to turn around, “You’ll have to excuse the crudity of the facades, I don’t know what your arcade actually looks like and it’s hard for me to change other ponies dreams like Silver can, so bear with me.”

As Zipper turned around his face lit up with glee as he took sight of the mock-ups that the night pony had prepared. Five separate logos and signs adorned some flat, undetailed buildings, all ranging in design and shape.

“I hope you don’t mind, I took some creative liberty with the suggestion. The “Starcade” just felt too… bland, you know? Like it was some kind of chain movie theater’s arcade,” He replied with a smile.

The pegasus paused for a moment, taking in everything with an unreadable expression, “Zipp’s Starcade… it’s—”

“Kind of a placeholder?” Stardust shuffled his hooves. “I know, I don’t always nail things on the first try but I was hoping we could use this a starting point and go from—”

“It’s perfect!” Zipper gleefully interrupted, his eyes darting from each different design, “I mean there’s just so much to choose from, but they’re all perfect in their own special way.”

The night pony smiled, “I’m glad you’re happy. I don’t want to be a downer though so I’d suggest you pick one, neon isn’t cheap, especially when we have to ship it all the way to Arizona.”

Zipper nodded, “I uhh… guess you're right. So what would you suggest then?”

“I’d suggest you pick whichever one calls out to you most. This is your place after all, and considering we don’t need to get proper city permits, you basically have free reign on this… so just pick whichever one you believe lines up with your creative vision.”

“I see… I need to pick the coolest one then,” for a few long minutes he carefully scrutinized each and every sign, jumping between them while Stardust looked on.

“Might I offer some advice? If you’re having a hard time choosing then you might want to close your eyes and just clear your mind for a second, try and get a feel for which one is calling out to you. I know it sounds dumb but hey, it’s worked well enough for me so far.”

“Does that really help?”

“Sometimes,” Stardust replied. “I know it’s not the most orthodox environment for you to do this kind of planning, but it’s more genuine in my honest opinion.”

Zipper nodded and closed his eyes for a few moments. When he reopened them he turned towards one of the smaller designs, a sign that simply read the arcade’s name in blue and green neon. With a hoof he pointed towards it, “That’s the one! Simple and easy, gets right to the point, nothing too complex or complicated.”

The night pony smiled, dispelling the remaining signs, “Option three it is, now um, this is the annoying part, getting payment info. So the way we handle this in my business is taking 50% of the final price as a down payment, obviously I can’t do that in a dream so I’ll send you a message when I wake up and we can discuss that then.”

Zipper nodded, “Sounds like a plan. So… I guess this is it then? We’re all done?”

Stardust shrugged, “If you have no other questions then we’re pretty much done here, like I said I’ll leave you a message and we can figure the rest out later.”

“I think we’re good then,” He ran up towards the night pony, pulling him into a tight hug before breaking it with an embarrassed smile, “Thanks again for all this!”

The night pony slowly nodded, “My pleasure. See you when I see you Zipper.”

Without any further word he vanished, leaving Zipper alone in his dream once more.

Zipper opened his eyes and let out a groan, groggily rolling over in his bed. He peeked over to the clock on his end table and let out another sigh. It was still dark out and he was tempted to close his eyes for a few more minutes, but as much as he wanted to be lazy today, there were more important things to do. Like check his gauntlet for instance. The pegasi’s eyes opened wide as he hopped out of bed and ran towards the charger, fumbling with the arm band until he was able to secure it. The screen lit up and a warm robotic voice greeted him, Good morning, please provide vocal confirmation.

“Zipper one nine nine five,” Zipper replied back, pausing as the gauntlet chimed in recognition, the embedded screen lighting up.

Welcome ZIPPER, You have one new message from user: Stardust. Would you like me to read it?

Zipper nodded, “Yes please.”

Standby... A cheerful chime rang out as the message began, “Zipper, I went ahead and forwarded an invoice to your gauntlet, go ahead and fill it out and we can start work on your order. If you have any questions drop me a line and I’ll visit your dreams again. — Star.” Message has an attached file, would you like me to forward it to your terminal?”

Zipper looked toward the electronic table, “Sure.”

A small chime rang out and the gauntlet screen went dark, leaving Zipper alone in the darkness again. His ears started to pivot around as they picked up the bird call from nearby, bringing a smile to his face, Guess Gordon’s awake too, he thought to himself.

“Good morning Gordon!” He cheerfully greeted the bird, who excitedly flapped his wings and waited for Zipper to open the cage. Upon doing so, the bird hopped up, and walked his way over to the railing.

Zipper smiled and nodded. “Ready to race?”

The bird excitedly squawked and leapt off the railing, breaking into a glide as Zipper slid down the nearby ramp that ran along the stairs. There was a soft thud as Zipper landed on his cushion, and a very loud squawk from Gordon, who landed gently on Zipper’s head.

“Wanna call it a tie?”

The bird ruffled his feathers and hopped off, almost seeming to nod his head.

With a spring in his step, Zipper trotted toward his bathroom and kicked on the lights. With a smile, he turned the shower on, extending some of the fingers on his gauntlet and picking up his toothbrush. This was how Zipper almost always started his morning, well except for one very important step. Pausing for a moment, he tapped a hoof to his gauntlet twice and smiled as his music playlist began to play throughout the house.

He began to brush his teeth as the room filled with steam, bringing a feeling of relaxation to him as he cheerfully hummed along to the music. As he finished, he turned the faucet off and hopped into the shower, scrubbing himself down with shampoo and falling into the routine he had grown accustomed to for the last couple of years. While this might have been tricky as a pony at first, like anything, he had learned to adapt to it. The time flew by in an instant, and before long Zipper was done.

With a happy sigh, he flipped the shower off and hopped out, taking a few minutes to dry off and brush his mane into its trademark messy style. Pleased at his appearance he grabbed his saddlebag and danced and sang along to his music, smiling as he caught sight of Gordon who was currently bobbing along to the upbeat music.

Zipper let out a laugh as the bird excitedly squawked at him, “Feeling hungry Gordon?”

The parrot replied with a loud squawk, causing Zipper’s ears to fold back momentarily.

“Okay, no need to yell,” He trotted toward the cupboard and extended his gauntlet’s fingers, using them to reach for some of the seed that the bird normally ate. With a cheerful spring in his step he trotted back toward the cage, opening it and laying out some of the seed for his feathered friend, who excitedly squawked back in response.

“Glad you like it, I’d love to share some breakfast chatter with you but I gotta go to work, Springy’s going to help me get everything in the arcade set up with Sine today, and then I’ve gotta go get some payment stuff figured out for some bat.”

The bird squawked back a simple reply, earning a laugh from Zipper, “Glad you understand, enjoy your breakfast buddy.”

The parrot squawked again as Zipper trotted out the door, pausing so he could clip his earbuds in. With a short running start he leaped into the air and took flight, rising sharply before evening out and gliding around the home he had grown to love over the last few years.

The pegasus continued to fly through and around the city, weaving between the tall buildings and pulling into a few loops, much to the dismay of the ponies and humans who were walking around below. While Zipper might have been one of the best fliers in the Oasis a few years ago, it was clear that he was slowly being outpaced by some of the others the more they trained.

It’s not that he was a bad flier, he just had a tendency to try and pull off stunts that he clearly wasn’t ready to attempt, the end results usually ending with a crash landing and a few angry curses from whoever was unfortunate to be in his landing zone.

Zipper felt a mix of emotions as he thought back to the turn his reputation had taken in the oasis. While he wasn’t as brash and obnoxious as he had been when he first moved there, people still only seemed to think of him as the annoying bird brain who kept trying to do something until he was finally able to. The pegasi’s determination was both his greatest asset and his biggest weakness.

He was determined to make that change, earning his cutie mark had given him a new direction to follow in life, and much like the stunts he tried to pull off before earning it, he wouldn’t stop trying to make the best of his talent no matter what the others thought of him.

As the buildings around him started to grow shorter he dipped down in altitude, slowing his speed as he began to approach the lake and the nearby warehouse that would become his arcade. Right away he noticed something off about the scene, a large truck was parked out in front of it and the dark purple form of Sine Wave could barely be made out in the dark environment. If it wasn’t for her neon colored mane he probably wouldn’t have even been able to spot her from this high. He glanced toward the horizon and frowned. The sun was just barely rising and Zipper figured that it would be better to figure out what all the commotion was before the poor truck driver had to deal with a grumpy night pony who wasn’t a big fan of the sun.

As he dove down toward the pair, her annoyed complaints starting to become audible to his well trained ears, “What happened to being careful? I thought I paid you extra for that!”

The human shrugged, “I told you, I only hit a few bumps on the way here.”

The night pony let out a hiss, “Then can you explain why three of the cabinets have chipped sides? Do you know how hard that’s going to be to repair?!”

“Are you sure that they weren’t already like this? I mean these things are practically dinosaurs as it is. Plus didn’t you say you didn’t care about the quality when you put the bid in?”

Sine flared out her wings, taking a more aggressive stance, “It’s not about what I said, it’s about what they were sold as. I bid on gently used cabinets that were a little scuffed up but still in decent condition. I noted down exactly what the damage was and where when I inspected them. I can tell you right now that those chips weren’t there before… So are you actually going to sit there and call me a liar?!”

“Sine take it down a few notches!” Zipper shouted down as he came to a careful landing between the two.

She flashed him an annoyed glare, “Not now bird brain, I’m dealing with something.”

Zipper nodded, “I can see that, and I’m going to ask you to tone it down before it gets ugly.”

“He damaged my property, it’s already gotten ugly.”

“Sine I’m sure we have people that can repair them, now why don’t we just get these unloaded and work on getting everything set up… okay?”

She let out a growl, “He’s still paying for the damages.”

Zipper stepped closer to her, “Go take a breather, I’ll handle this.”

“You better,” She replied back, not breaking her angered gaze.

Zipper trotted toward the bewildered human, waving him to the other side of the truck and out of her gaze, “Okay look, I know whatever happened was an accident, just pay her back for whatever damage she thinks you did and I’ll pay you back.”

The human slowly shook his head, “You think that’s going to stop her? She seems pretty miffed.”

“I know, but trust me. I’ve had to deal with this once before, she’s not going to cool off until she feels like the damages have been repaid.”

The human just rolled his eyes, “I swear this is the last time I work with a pony. You guys are either way too social or way too abrasive— sometimes both!”

“I understand, just go say you’ll pay whatever she’s asking and you’ll never have to deal with us again… Please?” Zipper flashed him a pleading look, earning another sigh from the human.

“Okay fine.”

Zipper breathed a sigh of relief as the human started to head back toward the irate night pony.

“Is everything okay, Sine?” He asked calmly.

“Does everything look fine?”

“No, not really,” Zipper chuckled. “But at least you’ll get some payment for the damage. If you want too, maybe fixing them up could be one of those friend get-togethers we talked about yesterday?”

The mare’s temper started to cool, and she nodded. “Maybe. Sorry I’m being an asshole, it’s just late and I didn’t need to deal with this crap before bed.”

Zipper nodded. “It’s all cool, your hobby is special to you, and you don’t like when people are careless about the stuff you like— especially when there’s a lot of money involved in it.”

The mare cracked a smile and softly chuckled. “So you did learn your lesson after all.”

“Did you doubt me?” Zipper grinned. “I thought we already went over this.”

“Want the honest answer? I didn’t,” Sine admitted. “I just had to make sure though.”

Chapter 11: Booting Up

While Zipper and the mover continued to unload Sine’s cabinets, the mare in question was now happily napping in the corner with a wing draped over her head. Before knowing her, Zipper might have been one to complain, though with the context of everything he had learned lately… and given her earlier outburst, maybe it was for the best that she just rested. Zipper knew better than to get between a tired night pony and their sleep.

Blue Spring had thankfully stopped by shortly after the work had begun, and with her help, it didn’t matter much whether Sine was napping or not.

The human however, didn’t seem to share the same sentiment, and he was more than vocal about his displeasure. “So she’s really going to raise such a commotion over a few small chips and then just nap while we do all the work?”

Zipper shrugged. “You ever piss off a tired night pony?”

“Does today count?”

“No, because you got her to calm down by apologizing about it. Trust me though, it could have been a lot worse.”

“I’m guessing you’re speaking from experience then?”

“You could say that,” Zipper smirked. He held out a hoof. “Name’s Zipper. Guess we didn’t get an introduction before.”

“Marshall…” he awkwardly bumped a fist against Zipper’s hoof. “Is your friend always like that then?”

“Depends on the time of day and whether you’ve wronged her during that. She’s actually pretty cool though, believe it or not.”

“Uh huh,” Marshall nodded and pulled the back of his truck closed. “I don’t plan to stay and find out, so unless you need anything else then I’ll head out.”

Blue Spring trotted out from inside the future arcade and looked around. “So we’re all set then?”

Zipper nodded, “Yeah, I think so,” He glanced over to Sine, who was quietly snoring, “Think we should wake her?”

Blue Spring shook her head, “I do, but I don’t think it’s a good idea… but the ball’s in her court now and I’d rather not mess with this stuff without her input.”

“That’s fair enough. Tell you what then, why don’t you go up to the office for a few minutes and I’ll test the waters. If you hear some grumpy shouting then you’ll know it didn’t work.”

Blue Spring stifled a laugh and shook her head. “As smart of an idea as that is, I think I’m going to stick it out here just in case you need backup… she can’t be that bad, can she?”

“You saw what happened when I wrecked her garden, I’ll let you be the judge.”

Blue Spring simply shrugged and stood her ground. Taking this as an affirmative, Zipper nodded and slowly trotting toward Sine. The mare was fast asleep, and a part of Zipper almost didn’t wan’t to disturb her. There were important discussions to be had though, so with a nervous gulp he gently shook the night pony awake, taking a few cautious steps back as she began to stir.

“What’s the deal bird brain?” Sine groggily asked.

“We’re all unloaded and set up,” Zipper explained. “Also, don’t worry. That mover guy is gone and Blue Spring’s here now.”

The sleepy mare slowly opened one eye and glanced toward Blue Spring. “Hello Spring.”

“Hello Sine,” Blue Spring replied. “Sorry to wake you right now. We’ve got everything set up though, all you need to do is hook it up.”

Sine let out a long yawn and nodded her head, “Got it. Do you mind if I do that later? I don’t think I’ll have the energy to get through it right now, not unless you’ve got some seriously strong coffee on you.”

Spring shook her head, “I wish I did. Unfortunately for you, that means we’ll have to get this done later.”

“Setting this up later works fine for us,” Zipper cut in. “So don’t worry about it. You’ve been a huge help so far and there’s no rush. It is a passion project between a few friends after all.”

Sine smiled as she started to rub the sleep out of her eyes. “That’s a good way to look at it. I’ll still get things set up ASAP though.”

“Want us to grab you anything from Ahab’s before you head home?” Blue Spring offered. “Zip and I were going to head there for lunch.”

The mare paused for a moment, before returning an appreciative smile. “Well… I wouldn’t mind a bowl of his famous mac and cheese… as long as you’re offering.”

Blue Spring returned a smile of her own. “Of course. We’ll see you back here tonight then?”

“That sounds like a good plan,” Sine stood up, reaching into her saddlebags and putting on a pair of sunglasses, “Gives me a chance to rest, and then I can do all my diagnostic stuff overnight so it’ll be ready for tomorrow.”

“You’re thinking about opening this tomorrow?” Zipper exclaimed.

“The sooner the better,” Sine nodded. As she began to trot toward the door, she paused for a moment and turned back toward Zipper, “For the love of all things that are good in this world… do NOT touch my cabinets until I get back, I don’t need anything else happening to them while I’m gone.”

“Don’t worry, I learned my lesson once,” Zipper laughed. “We’ll go ahead and lock things up so no one disturbs them. We’ll add you to the security panel so you can unlock it with your gauntlet later.”

“That works for me,” Sine yawned loudly and glanced down at her gauntlet. “Right. See you later.”

As Sine started out the door, Zipper glanced down to his gauntlet to glance at the time, “Ahab’s shouldn’t be too busy right now, mind if we take the scenic route?”

“I don’t see any issue with that, Blue Spring shrugged. “I’m guessing you’ve got a lot on your mind?”

Zipper trotted toward the door, opening it up and letting the bright sunlight in, “Yeah, I do. That night pony stopped by my dreams last night and we agreed on what the sign is going to look like. He sent me an invoice, I haven’t filled it out yet, figured I’d wait until you were around to see it too.”

“You want me to take a look at it?”

Zipper nodded as he led the mare outside, “Well yeah, you’re like my business partner, I think it’s at least fair to get your approval on anything big that we do.”

“Well if you insist on that then I guess it’s not a bad thing… what about Sine?”

“She’s handling the interior stuff, we're both in charge of this at the end of the day so it falls into our camp.”

“Alright well that sounds fair enough to me, why don’t we talk more about this over lunch?”

As if in response to her question Zipper’s stomach let out a loud growl, earning a laugh from the pair, “does that answer your question?”

Blue Spring let out another series of laughs and nodded, “I’d say it does Zip.”

The two pegasi started to trot down the path, in no real hurry to get to the restaurant.

The pair trotted through the carved wooden door and into Ahab’s restaurant, the moody atmosphere of the place giving it a peaceful and relaxing feel. Tropical music played around the cozy dining room, and the peaceful ambience worked it’s magic. It was almost impossible to not smile and feel at ease in the cozy restaurant.

Hearing the clip clop of new hooves on the wooden floor, the earth pony behind the bar turned around to greet them. “Aha, Zipper and Blue Spring, my two favorite customers! Here for your usual?”

Blue Spring nodded as she trotted toward her usual booth. “Yeah Cast, we’ll take a bowl of mac and cheese to go too, for Sine Wave.”

The pony nodded. “Gotcha, anything to drink today?”

“I’m good with water, how about you Zip?”

The gray pegasus looked over toward Perfect Cast and smiled. “The usual.”

“Rockin’ Punch?”

He nodded. “Yep!”

The earth pony nodded. “Coming right up,” He quickly pulled a few empty glasses toward the fountain, pouring their drinks. In a well practiced move that would have surprised any other pair of ponies, Perfect Cast slid the drinks onto a tray and carefully balanced it on his back, trotting toward the pair and dropping the glasses off.

Blue Spring smiled at the earth pony. “Thanks Cast,” She took a few sips and looked into the nearby aquarium, smiling at the fish that were swimming by. She turned back to her companion, “Well Zip, I’ve gotta give you credit, it’s really all starting to come together nicely.”

The gray pegasus nodded. “Yeah… it really is, isn't it?”

“Do you really think Sine will have everything all set up by tonight?”

Zipper shrugged as he looked around the cozy dining room. “I guess we’ll have to wait and see. It’d be nice if she can get that up and running though, we could start doing a soft opening soon and really drive up the hype!” He answered back in an excited voice.

Blue Spring laughed. “You’re really itching to open this I’m guessing?”

He replied with a laugh of his own. “Is it that obvious?”

“A little,” She paused for a moment. “So what’d Silver think of it?”

“I uhh…” He shifted his gaze around, earning a sigh from Spring.

“Zipper…. You have talked to him right?”

“I was going to… I’m just worried about what he was going to say.”

“Zip, you somehow coordinated a makeshift arcade that you’re planning on opening the second you can, and you haven’t thought about asking one of the main city planners if that kind of thing is okay to do?”

He looked away from her. “I… Look, I’m not a smart pony, I just want this to work.”

“Hey I never said you were dumb, you just have your own way of doing things. You should tell him as soon as possible though, preferably before we open and light the place up like a beacon… You’ve already got money set aside for a sign, but maybe we should hold off on that part for a few more days until we can make sure that we’ve got the right permission for this.”

“But Patrick seemed okay with it.”

She nodded. “Patrick might be okay with it, but Silver’s one of the main ponies in charge here, I think it’s only fair if you ask him too. He kind of has a right to know after all.”

“I…” He began to protest, letting out a sigh. “Okay, you’re right. I don’t think Sine’s going to stop the setup though, but at the same time I don’t think she really cares about the arcade’s operations as much.”

“You don’t think so?”

He shook his head. “She wants a place to house her collection, I think running it as an actual arcade is just a neat bonus.”

Blue Spring shrugged. “Well then I think we can wait until we get Silver’s blessing to run it.”

“Right… Well I’ll give him a call tonight when he’s awake.”

“Sounds like a plan. Don’t get me wrong, I’m excited to get this up and running, but we also need to make sure we’re not going to just get shut down the second he’s back home.”

Before Zipper could reply, Perfect Cast returned with a tray of food balanced on his back. With carefully practiced precision, he slid the plates in front of the pair, smiling as they looked down at the pasta dishes. “Everything look good?”

Blue Spring nodded, hungrily looking at her meal. “Yep, looks great as always Cast.”

The earth pony smiled. “Glad to hear, drop me a line if you need anything else, I’ll go get Sine’s started.”

“Thanks, Cast!” Zipper cheerfully replied back, grabbing the nearby fork with his gauntlet’s fingers.

Without much further conversation, the two happily dug into their meals, and before long, and much to their dismay, they had finished. Perfect Cast had dropped off Sine’s takeout, and Zipper had paid for the meal. Feeling relaxed and in a good mood, the pair stood up and trotted toward the door, thanking the earth pony on their way out, promising that they’d be back at the usual time next week.

The pair had taken the scenic route back to the warehouse, chatting about their future plans and just genuinely enjoying their company. Zipper had earned a few more laughs when he stopped to talk to the geese, and before long, the sun had begun to set.

As he pushed open the door, he was immediately greeted with a few muffled curses from the dark night pony who was working away on some of the cabinets. “Is everything alright Sine?”

A muffled thud was heard, followed by more curses. The pony backed out from behind one of the cabinets, brushing back her disheveled mane with a sigh. “Yeah no, everything’s all good here now. About time you two decided to show up.”

Blue Spring tossed her a bag, earning a happy squeak from the night pony. “Sorry we’re a little late, had to grab your dinner— er, breakfast?”

The night pony nodded. “Sorry I got a little snappy, I’ve just been getting this stuff set up for a while now.”

“Pulling an early day?” Zipper asked as he surveyed her handiwork.

Sine nodded, digging around the bag and pulling the still warm food out. “Mhmm,” She hungrily looked down at the mac and cheese. “Yeah, it should all be good to go soon, just need to get a couple more things hooked up.”

Zipper trotted toward the half-covered jukebox, pulling the cover fully off. “No way, you got us one of these too?”

The night pony suddenly snapped up from her plate as Zipper began to reach toward the choice selection. “STOP!”

He jumped back in a panic. “What?!”

Sine lowered her voice. “Sorry, didn’t mean to yell… Look, let me just get the last couple things hooked up and we’ll be good to go.”

“Why does he need to wait, Sine?”

The mare looked over toward Blue Spring. “It’ll be so much cooler when everything’s all lit up at once, trust me on this,” She quickly finished her meal and trotted toward the cabinet she had been working away on, poking her head behind it and fiddling around in the back of it for a few minutes. Seemingly satisfied with her work, she closed it up and stood up, taking a moment to collect herself.

Blue Spring looked toward her again and nodded. “Everything good to go now?”

Sine Wave slowly nodded her head, turning toward Zipper. “Hit it.”

The gray pegasi’s eyes lit up in excitement as he trotted toward the breaker box on the wall, reaching for a lever and excitedly pulling it. In an instant the whole room flickered to life with the sights and sounds of the cabinets turning on. Without a word spoken, Sine Wave quietly trotted toward the jukebox, flipping through the selections before settling on her desired song. Classic rock music rang out through the speakers she had meticulously wired up.

Zipper hovered up into the air, looking around at the seemingly magical place, a huge smile plastered across his face. “It’s… Perfect!”

Chapter 12: Dinner With a Friend

It had been a day since Sine Wave had finished hooking up her cabinets, and it wouldn’t be long until the arcade was fully ready for its soft opening. Even in the unfinished space, Sine could still imagine what the final product would be like, and the thought of being a part of something like this made her want to squee in delight. This wasn’t her first physical arcade-like space; she had set up the soon-to-be-obsolete rec center game room after all. That endeavor paled in comparison to what this would be like, however. After all, this arcade would be nearly ten times the size of that little room, even if it was only the size of a tiny school gymnasium at most. That was still a lot of space to work with, though, and much of Sine’s work so far had been determining how to utilize it the best. Thankfully for her, each of the arcade cabinets had been fitted with lockable castors that made moving them around infinitely easier.

As she locked down the last wheel on the machine she was adjusting; she took a moment to fly up into the air and gaze down at her hard work. A few neat rows of arcade games were broken up by the air hockey tables that she had previously kept in the rec center. On the outskirts of the room sat a few couches and chairs, and taking up a large portion of one of the side walls was a gated-off annex that had served as the warehouse’s general office space. Presently Zipper was only using one of the loft office spaces which overlooked the entire arcade, leaving the general space empty and without a purpose. If it weren’t for the fact that Sine was using the other loft space as her office, then the floor-level space would have served that use.

It didn’t need to, though, and without a ton of extra staffers, that empty space almost wasn’t worth the effort of cleaning up and reworking. In time it would likely become a snack bar or some kind of private room, though truthfully she didn’t quite know what to do with it or whether it’d even factor into her final layout. Perhaps if they hired on more work it might find a second life, but for now it was destined to stay locked up with the most clearly defined lounge area set up in front of it.

The lights were dim and as far as Sine was aware, she was the only soul in the building presently. All of that would change in an hour or so when Zipper and Blue Spring showed up to do their nightly prep work, but Sine would be long gone by the time that happened. Loud beeps and boops filled the room, and while this might have normally been an overwhelming cacophony of sounds to others… to Sine? It was perfect.

“Don’t worry my beauties, soon enough you’ll all get the love you deserve.”

The machines didn’t reply of course, but Sine didn’t mind. As much as she liked the companionship of her close friends, sometimes it was nice to just be alone with your hobby for a while. Dusting herself off, Sine stood up and made for the door. There was still work left to be done, but she could finish that up tomorrow.

“Alright, I think it’s time to call it quits for today. Now promise to be good for bird brain, okay?”

The machines still didn’t reply, and while others might have worried about looking dumb or goofy, Sine simply didn’t care. Perhaps indifferently ignoring any criticism and calls for conformity was a bad idea, but Sine a free spirit that liked to branch out and do her own thing, even if it meant that she was an outcast to others.

As she gathered up her few belongings and made for the door, she took a moment to look back inside one last time. This wouldn’t just be frivolous wish fulfilment for her. No, she fully intended for this to be the first step in her ultimate goal of following her dreams. Would it be easy to sell games to ponies? Definitely. Arcades were old and outdated after all, but just from her small scale tests at the rec center, she could see a budding potential that perhaps others did not. It would always be a struggle, she surmised, but what was the fun in just immediately succeeding at something?

Not wanting to dwell on her future goals lest she jinx them, Sine closed and locked the door and started to trot back towards her humble abode. The walk wasn’t too far, and truthfully she could have simply flown back home in a fraction of the time, but sometimes it was nice to just take a relaxing stroll after a hard day’s work.

“Hey bestie!” Came a cheerful voice from afar.

Scanning towards the direction of the greeting, Sine was pleasantly surprised to see Ink Rose flying towards her. The other mare swooped up into an arcing barrel roll before gently coming to a landing with a soft thud.

“Afternoon Ink,” Sine greeted her. “Fancy meeting you here, eh?”

“This the big thing your bird brain friend was inviting you to be a part of?” She asked, gesturing to the future arcade. “I’m sorry for dropping by out of nowhere, I just finished up a session a lot sooner than I thought and figured I’d stop by and see how things were going.”

“It actually is,” Sine grinned. “I’d offer to let you inside, but I already locked up for the afternoon, and there’s still some stuff I wanted to finish up before the soft opening.”

“It’s all good. Can’t spoil the surprise, right?” Ink replied.

Sine expected her to be disappointed, and a part of her was almost regretting replying as she had. But much to her surprise, Ink Rose didn’t seem distraught at all. Was she genuinely interested in seeing the arcade, or was there more to her meeting?

Curious at her demeanor, Sine decided to test the waters and prod a little further. “That’s a good way to look at it, Inky. I’m sorry for kind of dashing your plans here, if you really want to see the arcade I’d be more than happy to show you.”

“It’s really okay,” She shook her head. “I know how much you like this kind of stuff and how important it probably is to you,” She paused for a moment. “Truth be told? I honestly just wanted to hang out. It sounds so depressing to say, but you’re my only real friend here, and it’s just nice spending time with someone who shares interests, you know?”

Sine knew this feeling all too well, and Ink’s response painted a way clearer picture of what she was actually wanting.

“I do,” Sine smiled. “Tell you what,” She hesitated before coming up with the perfect idea. “I was gonna go get a bite to eat before bed. Would you want to tag along? It’s gonna be boring, but hey, we could be boring together if you want.”

Sine was no expert on body language— being a solitary creature most of the time tended to make one miss out on some more common social cues, but by the way that Ink seemed to relax and carry herself, Sine knew she was more than happy at the thought of that idea.

“You wouldn’t mind?” Ink asked though the question was more a formality than anything else.

“You’re really gonna ask me that?” Sine replied with a stern shake of her head. “Look, I know I’m this big scary solitary grump most of the time, but I’ve always got time for my best friend. So how about it? We could do dinner at my place or at the usual, I’ll let it be your choice.”

Ink Rose thought about this for a few moments before smiling. “How about your place then? It would be a nice change of pace for once.”

“My place is it,” Sine smiled. “Wanna go the scenic route or just soar over?”

“We’re doing things differently today, so why not cut right to the chase. Gives us more time to chat.”

Sine grinned. “I like your style, I ever tell you that?”

“If your excited squeeing over my art is anything to go by, then I would say so,” Ink laughed. “Let’s get going, if you throw a few more compliments my way then maybe I’ll help with dinner.”

“Maybe? I’m gonna need an awesome assistant chef to keep me company while I work so I really hope it’ll be more than just a maybe.”

Ink grinned again. “That’s a start. Why don’t we get going and see where things go?”

Sine Wave was about as far from being a chef as she could possibly be, though cooking with a friend made her skill (or lack thereof) negligible.

“I’m glad you said you were in the mood for pizza,” Sine laughed. “Because that’s all I’m good at making on short notice.”

“I’m glad you like pizza,” Ink replied. “Because that’s my favorite.”

“Seems like we’re both winners then, eh?”

“Of course,” Ink nodded as she started to stretch the dough for the pizza. “So how have things been going lately? Get everything sorted out with bird brain?”

“Better than expected. Bird brain got everything wrapped up here and now we’re just getting the arcade all set up. Like I said earlier, I really need to bring you in some time. Bird brain’s been getting super excited over everything and it’s honestly kind of cute to see.”

“Really seems like he had a total change in personality,” Ink Rose reached for the pizza sauce, but was stopped by Sine.

“I got this,” Sine smiled. “And yeah, he did. It’s like he’s a different pony, and I swear I got to see the real him for at least a little while.”

“Oh yeah?” Ink watched as Sine started spreading the sauce onto the dough. “So who is the real Zipper then?”

“A surprisingly kind and shy pony. I’m so used to seeing him put on this awkward macho persona and it almost gave me whiplash when he asked me out and got all embarrassed and shy. But in a good way, you know?”

Ink Rose smirked but seemed to zone out as if there was something more on her mind. “So he’s a romantic then eh? So should I start planning the wedding or…”

“If you’re asking if we’re a thing, we’re not,” Sine clarified. Something about the way that Ink’s demeanor changed as she joked around seemed to hint at something deeper, and Sine couldn’t help but feel a little anxious. “I was flattered by it but I felt like I was just barely getting to know the real him.”

The more Sine sat and thought about everything, the more she started to put the pieces together. She was traditionally terrible at reading ponies, but it was obvious that Ink Rose was something closer than just a casual friend, at least that was the vibe that Sine got from how Ink had responded to certain things lately. What Ink’s feelings truly were was hard to place, and honestly none of Sine’s business. If Ink saw her as just a friend or harbored deeper feelings then she would come forward when she was ready— if that was even the case.

“That’s understandable,” Ink replied, seemingly more upbeat. “It’s kind of hard to bond with someone if you don’t really know the real them…”

“Exactly,” Sine smirked. She reached for the bag of cheese and started to spread some over the pizza before continuing. “I didn’t want to discourage him or make him feel bad or stupid for asking me out, so I suggested we spend more time doing things as friends before we go anywhere else.”

“Oh? What kind of stuff?” Ink opened up the oven and with Sine’s help carefully slid the pizza in.

“I was thinking a computer club maybe?” Sine replied. “It’s dumb and geeky but it might be fun… and hey, you can even join with us too.”

Ink Rose smiled. “That would be fun…” She trailed off again and paused. “Do you think that’s something that would lead to… you know, the two of you getting closer?”

Sine shrugged. “To be honest, I don’t know. I’m open to dating a day pony but I guess it might get lonely at night, especially if our time is split so much. I’ve never been a die-hard romantic, but I like making that emotional connection and bonding a bit more, and realistically only having a third of the day to spend with someone seems daunting.”

“I feel you there. I dated a pegasus for a little while and it just didn’t work out because we both wanted different things in the relationship. She wanted someone she could spend every moment of the day with and I just couldn’t do that as much as she needed me to.”

Sine slowly nodded. “That kind of stuff’s hard. The last guy I dated was a similar case I guess? He was nice enough but I didn’t have that kind of emotional connection that I felt I needed and we both just agreed that things weren’t working out. Ended on a good enough note at least, but it hit harder than I thought it would.”

Ink frowned. “We really did draw the short straw when it came to stuff like this, didn’t we?”

Sine chuckled. “I guess you could say that. Life kinda sucks but hey, at least things seem brighter now, eh?”

Ink Rose met her gaze and smiled. “I’d say so.”

There it was again. Sine didn’t quite know what it was, but Ink’s smile and demeanor seemed to hint at something deeper.

“Inky, can I ask you something?”

“Mhmm, what’s up?”

Sine didn’t exactly know how to word her question, so she did what she did best; blurt it out and hope things didn’t come off too awkward. “What are we?”

Ink Rose was taken aback and almost seemed a little flustered. “I uhh… I dunno if I’ll be honest. I like to think we’re best friends but… this is gonna sound weird, but sometimes I feel something a little more.”

Before she could recoil, Sine pulled her into a hug. “It’s not weird. We’ve both opened up a lot to each other and that makes our relationship a lot more personal. I’m not good at reading ponies, and I just wanted to make sure we could be honest with each other.”

Ink loosened up and nodded. “Would that even be on the table?”

“Us dating?” Sine asked.

“I uhh… maybe?” Ink was clearly flustered again. “Sorry if it’s kind of pushing any boundaries or something.”

“Don’t worry, it isn’t pushing anything,” Sine reassured her. “Truth be told, I like you, but I look at this like how I look at Zipper asking me. Obviously, I know you pretty well but I don’t want to rush anything either and I still feel bad about getting you to tattoo my wings when it was obviously a touchy subject. I guess what I mean is that I don’t want to make anything awkward or weird and I don’t want to cross any more lines.”

“What about Zipper? Would you be worried about hurting his feelings or anything?”

“Of course, I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings but he’s also an adult and this is a part of adult life. I guess I didn’t think I’d have an emotional talk tonight, but I’m really glad we did.”

“Me too,” Ink smiled. “I’d be lying if I said I didn’t think about it sometimes, but I think you’re right. Maybe we just keep doing what we’re doing and see where things go?”

“I’d like that,” Sine hugged her again. “If you ever just need to chat about anything I’m always here.”

“Thanks Sine, you’re the best.”

“You too,” Sine smiled.

Before the pair could get any more emotional the oven’s timer dinged letting them know that their hoof-made dinner was ready.

Her ears perking up at the sound, Sine broke the hug and trotted towards the oven. “Now, I don’t know about you, but I’m starving and I can’t wait to see how we did.”

“Me too!” Ink cheered.

While Sine Wave didn’t quite know where she and Ink Rose would go, she was happy that the two had talked, and she was curious to see where things would lead. Whether they were lovers, friends, or even something else, none of it changed the fact that Ink was one of the closest ponies in her life, and she’d treasure every moment spent with her no matter what they were spending it as.

Chapter 13: Growing Pains

While Sine Wave’s evening with Ink Rose had been a genuinely enjoyable visit that no doubt strengthened her friendship, her work in the arcade had seemingly called her name. For normal ponies, jumping back into work without a nice solid stretch of sleep in between was Ill advised, but Sine Wave was very clearly not like most other ponies. This is why Zipper wasn’t surprised in the slightest that the first sight he saw when entering the Arcade was the dark purple mare who was once again toiling away at her prized machines.

“You’re back here again?” Zipper nonetheless asked in astonishment. “You did go home right?”

“Mhmm, nope,” The mare nodded, “There’s still a lot left to do so I’m sorry if I’m not really in a chatty mood today, I’m trying to get my share of the work done before noon and I wanted to bring a friend along so she could see what we’re doing.”

“Morning bird brain!” Came the cheerfully upbeat voice of Ink Rose, who Zipper hadn’t even noticed in the dark. “My name’s Ink Rose! We bumped into each other at the market a while back and Sine’s been telling me all about you.”

“Oh uhh, hi! Nice to meet you!” He replied. Truthfully he was still getting used to giving friendly greetings that didn’t sound snarky or abrasive, and considering the mare hadn’t given him any weird looks… he was seemingly succeeding, even if he probably came off as a little awkward.

“I hope you don’t mind,” Sine began talking again as she closed up the cabinet she was working on and dusted herself off. “I know this is late, but I wanted to say sorry if I was a little grouchy yesterday. I know I got a little riled up and lost my temper at that bozo running the deliveries and—“

“It’s okay,” Zipper cut in. “We got it all sorted out now, and hopefully it’s easy going from here,” He looked over at the clock above the door and shook his head. “Just yell at me if you need help with anything, okay? It’s late for you and I don’t want you getting sore from falling asleep in a game.”

The mare smiled, something Zipper would have never thought he’d see from her had he not started to get to know her better. “Sure thing Zip, I don’t know what you’ll be able to help with, but I appreciate the offer.”

“I know I’m not all techy like you are,” Zipper admitted. “But even if it’s just moving these things around I’ve got you.”

“Well if you want I can give you some pointers on the techy stuff later,” Sine offered. “I’ve been meaning to ask you, but I wanted to set up a computer club or something— you know, as a way to build up some interest in this whole niche market we’re trying to corner. Would you want to help out with that eventually?”

Zipper’s eyes widened as a big grin spread across his face. “I uhh, yeah! That sounds like a great idea!”

“I’d be down to join up too,” Ink Rose added. “I'm not the best with all that, but I would love to learn.”

“Well then, we’ve got a good group in the making,” Sine smirked. “By the way, a couple of your friends trotted in not too long ago, you might want to go see what they’re up to. Their yammering was getting too annoying so I turned the tunes up, but it sounded pretty important… whatever it was.”

“Huh,” Zipper mused. “Guess the sound system’s a lot better than I thought it was.”

“Of course it is, I’m not gonna cheap out on such an important part,” Sine replied in mock offense, earning a laugh from Ink Rose.

“I’d never doubt you,” Zipper laughed. “But you have a good point so I’ll let you get everything settled for now.”

“Take care bird brain,” Sine yawned out.

“Nice meeting you, Zipper,” Ink said as she bid him her own farewell.

With a nod, Zipper flew up along the stairs and into the office that overlooked the warehouse, smiling as he noticed both Blue Spring and River Breeze standing there, mid conversation.

“Operationally this is going to be a nightmare, you know that right?”

“I do, River. But that’s why you’re a part of this, because you’re the pony we need to temper our expectations and plans with…”

“Good morning you two,” Zipper cut into their conversation. “I didn’t realize we were having a meeting today.”

Blue Spring looked toward him and nodded, “It was a last minute thing. I did some thinking and wanted to get a more seasoned pony to share some of their expertise,” she turned toward the other pegasus, “Would you like to get him caught up River?”

River Breeze nodded. “I’d love to. Spring sent me some of your plans and rough ideas last night, and I wanted to discuss a few things so we’re all on the same page. Specifically, my concern is how your operations are planned out because they’re… ambitious to say the least.”

Zipper nodded, “What’s up?”

“Well for one I’m a little concerned with how it’s going to be organized. It feels like a zoo meets Jurassic park for geese… and honestly, I want to make sure this is done with the highest amount of care possible. These animals aren’t just for show, they need proper care, adequate habitats, and a properly trained care staff to make sure that they have the best quality of life possible.”

“I see,” Zipper replied. “Well, I can understand where you’re coming from. I want them to have the best life possible too— I mean that’s why I got so hung ho about doing this kind of thing. I know it’s not going to be perfect on day one, but we have a clinic listed in the plans, and this isn’t meant to be like a zoo. I know it sounds flash, but the idea is just to set aside an area for the animals that are already here. Not to bring in any others, especially ones we couldn’t care for.”

“Perhaps I worded that wrong,” River apologized. “I can appreciate the clinic plans, but it also feels a little too small for this kind of project, especially when I’ve already been wanting to upgrade my facilities. I know you only want to care for the geese right now, but if you want to get this off the ground you’re going to need to give it more utility and function, otherwise planning and development is just going to laugh at this and deny it.”

“Gotcha. So what do you propose then, River?” Blue Spring asked.

“That I take a more active role in the development process. I’m not going to shoot down every idea you have, but I sincerely think we need to future proof and sell it as something that’s an important care, conservation, and research facility that just so happens to also offer some passive entertainment in the form of giving people something to look at around here.”

“So the higher ups look at it as something valuable instead of just another entertainment complex. That’s actually really smart,” Zipper laughed. “Okay then, so what kind of ideas do you have in mind?”

“I’ve given you my general suggestions, so I want to stick to that. You pitched it as a sanctuary, right?”

“Right…” Zipper replied. “With a focus on education.”

“Good. I don’t know what you said to them, but that’s going to plant some the seeds for our next stage which is going to be drafting up a proper plan and submitting that. That’s going to be our chance to really wow them and say look, this isn’t some half assed low quality zoo, this is going to be the headquarters for a whole new branch of PRISM.” River gleefully exclaimed.

“You want to head a new branch of the research institute?” Blue Spring raised an eyebrow.

“I’d be lying if I said no, but it’s a good outcome for all of us. This allows me to expand my facilities and get a proper care and research team trained, allows us to branch out into a new field and show the world that pony researchers can do something valuable too, and it gives the animals you want to protect a better quality of life.”

Zipper’s eyes widened. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of any of this. I just wanted to keep them happy, but it sounds like you want to go a whole other step up.”

“I’ve been in this industry a long time,” River replied. “I’ve worked at great zoos and I’ve worked at really awful ones, and I want the same thing you do— just from a different standpoint. Right now pony doctors and scientists are starting to finally get taken seriously, and this sanctuary could really be a way to step it up a notch.”

“And you think the planning department is going to see that too?” Blue Spring asked.

River Breeze nodded, “I do. Right now PRISM is trying to branch out into new fields so they don’t have to be so reliant on SPEC funding, and this is going to look like a perfectly wrapped present to them. There’s also an added benefit of being able to bring multiple budgets together instead of having to self-fund or rely solely on donations, which doesn’t sound like a hassle but this is going to speed things up significantly.”

Zipper blinked a few times before nodding. “Okay, I like the idea but I feel like this whole thing is getting way bigger than what I was imagining.”

“Welcome to the world of business Zip,” River laughed. “It’s going to be complicated, but if we pool together and tackle this as a team then it’s going to turn out better in the long run— for all of us. The more we work together, the better chance we’ll have at fulfilling all of our goals, whereas right now that might not be doable on our own.”

Blue Spring gave a short nod, “What’s a good starting point then? I know you want to draft up more formal plans, but how do we do that and who do we need to get in touch with?”

“Let me handle the next part. I know some very qualified experts who would definitely be interested in this sort of thing, and they’ll be able to help rework the plans and get it all out together in a way that works for us, keeps the animals safe, and most importantly, makes sure that whatever we do is up to standard so we don’t run into any trouble on that front.”

“Okay,” Blue Spring smiled. “I’ll let you sort all that out, then we can all meet up later and hash the rest of this out. Does that work for you?”

The veterinarian nodded, “Sounds fair to me.”

“Right, then it’s set,” she looked at Zipper. “We're officially a team now.”

Zipper smiled, “Oh this is just so exciting!”

River stifled a small laugh, “I’m glad you’re excited for this, I am too. Now…” she looked down at the unfinished arcade space. “If this is our makeshift office for now… you’re going to let me play a few rounds in the house, right?”

Zipper raised an eyebrow, “You’re into this kind of stuff?”

The mare shrugged. “I was. Just because I’m a veterinarian doesn’t mean I have to be this boring no nonsense pony, I like to enjoy my time off just as much as you do.”

Zipper held up his hooves and shrugged. “Hey, no worries. I guess I just didn’t expect you to be into this kind of hobby.”

“Oh you should have seen me before ETS, I ruled the tiny arcade in the mall next to my clinic. Even bartered a few checkups for the owner’s dog in return for some free play.”

“Color me surprised then,” Zipper laughed. I’m glad to see someone else is excited for this thing. I wish I could tell you when we’re opening, but you’re gonna have to ask Sine. She’s kind of like the arcade’s version of you… the very experienced expert.”

River grimaced. “I’ll take it that she's the night pony that got a little irritated with me when I started asking questions?”

Blue Spring nodded, “You’ll have to excuse her, River, she gets a little grouchy when it’s this close to noon. She’s not like Silver, has no need to put on a cheerful face when dealing with the day ponies.”

River nodded, “I see… Would you two mind leading the way then? I feel like I didn’t exactly give off a good first impression with her and you’ll probably have better luck than I would asking that question.”

“That’s probably for the best,” Blue Spring laughed. “I think I’m the only one that hasn’t annoyed her yet.”

“You should have seen her yelling at the poor truck driver yesterday, I thought it was going to get ugly,” Zipper added.

“I thought it was going to get ugly when you crashed into her garden too Zip, but it all worked out in the end.”

River Breeze nodded, “I'll have to just take your word for it. I’m sure she’s pleasant to be around once you get to know her.”

Spring nodded and opened the door. “She is, trust me.”

As the trio began to trot down the stairs, they were greeted by an odd but not entirely out of place sight; Ink Rose playing on an arcade machine next to a sleeping Sine Wave, who had clearly stayed up too late past her bed time.

Zipper looked toward Ink Rose. “Bed time?”

Ink nodded. “I tried to get her to fly home but she said she’d just take a quick nap.”

Blue Spring trotted towards Sine and gently tapped her on the shoulder. “Hey Sine, you dozed off again.”

The sleeping pony stirred slightly before covering her head with a wing, “Just five more minutes.”

“How about you head home and sleep there?” Ink hopped down off of her stool and joined the pegasus. “It’s got to be a lot more comfortable than the floor.”

Sine Wave let out a groan. “You’re probably right,” she peeked open an eye and smiled. “We’re getting close bird brain. I promise I’ll have this done soon.”

“That’s great,” Zipper cheered. “But you really need to get some good sleep otherwise you’ll burn yourself out. If you want, I can walk you home?”

The night pony gave a quick nod followed by a long yawn, slowly standing up onto her hooves, “You just want to spend more time with me, eh?”

Zipper looked away and nervously chuckled. “I guess that’s one way to put it.”

“Mind if Inky comes along too? I’ve been meaning to introduce you to her.”

Zipper slowly trotted toward the drowsy mare, unsure of whether he should try and steady her or just let her start on her own. “Fine by me. A friend of yours is a friend of mine.”

“Need a hoof, Sine?” Ink Rose asked.

Sine shook her head. “No, just sleep.”

Zipper nodded. “Gotcha.”

As Sine stretched out, she paused and began to rummage around in her saddle bag, clearly trying to find something and only getting more frustrated the longer she went on. With an annoyed sigh she turned to Zipper. “Can you dig my sunglasses out? I don’t feel like dealing with that today.”

Without further hesitation he reached into her bag and before long had dug her sunglasses out, offering them to her with a smile. “There you go, one pair of sunglasses for the tired bat.”

She grinned slightly, slipping the glasses onto her face, “You know, you’re not so bad bird brain. Inky was right to get me to give you a second chance.”

“I try my best,” he laughed. “So do you need anything else?”

She shook her head, “Just conversation to keep me awake.”

Zipper smiled and looked at Ink. “If you’re introducing me to your friend then I can definitely do that.”

“Of course!” Ink cheered. “I’ve heard so many stories about you already, guess it’s time to see how true they all are.”

Blue Spring cleared her throat. “Before you go I was meaning to ask you something. When do you think we’ll be all set to open?”

Sine looked at Blue Spring and shrugged. “Couple days maybe? All the cabinets are set up, I just want to make them look a little prettier. You know, clean up some of the scuff marks and manage the cables better.”

Blue Spring nodded. “Perfect, I’ll start getting some of the business stuff set up then. We’ll have to start advertising but that won’t be a huge issue at all.”

“Mhmm, anytime… see you tomorrow Springy, and sorry if I snapped at you earlier Doctor.”

River Breeze nodded. “It’s alright, no hard feelings. I’m looking forward to the opening, I’m sure we’ll see a lot more of each other in the future.”

“You’re a retro enthusiast?”

River smiled, “You could say that.”

“We’ll have to chat more when I’m not a walking zombie.”

“I can’t wait, now you have a nice day now.”

The dark purple mare returned a drowsy smile as she began toward the door, “Thanks, you too.”

With a small nod of his head, Zipper started to follow her lead, “I’ll see you guys later.”

Sine Wave let out a series of drowsy yawns as her friends helped support her while she slowly trotted along. She was alert enough to follow along in conversation, but for all intents and purposes she was in autopilot right now. Whether she had consciously planned this or not, the walk back home would serve as a good way for her two friends to break the ice with one another, and perhaps it’d help give her some clarity on where feelings were between the three of them. Sine was of course, still not the most romantic pony in the world, but even she longed for companionship. Whether it was romantic or platonic, she wasn’t quite sure what she wanted yet, but what she did know was that her friends’ feelings were a serious concern and this trip would hopefully help give her some extra peace of mind.

Was it smart to just take a problem and hope that life would sort it out for her? No, but she was admittedly clueless when it came to the finer dynamics of this sort of emotional intimacy, and the last thing she wanted was for either of her friends to get hurt feelings, even if they were all adults who shouldn’t let such things tarnish their friendship. If the walk so far was anything to go by, she wouldn’t be getting an answer anytime soon, but at least both Ink Rose and Zipper seemed to be warming up to each other.

“So Zipper,” Ink Rose started to ask as the trio walked along the sidewalk. “You were pretty resourceful at Sine’s place the other day, eh?”

Zipper meekly smiled and nodded his head. “You could say that. I just cleaned some stuff up and helped re-plant the flowers I ruined.”

“Don’t sell yourself short, bird brain,” Sine cut him off with a long yawn. “You also showed me that you were actually a responsible pony that could own up to his mistakes. That’s a lot more than just planting some flowers.”

“I was about to say, it really sounds like you two turned things around a lot,” Ink nodded.

“What can I say?” Zipper shrugged. “I didn’t like who I was pretending to be, and I guess that was the day that that whole fake mask started crashing apart.”

“Literally too,” Sine chuckled.

“I still feel bad about that,” Zipper nervously joined in the laughter.

“Don’t. We’re all squared away and now we have something fun to work on together.”

“Has Sine showed you her passion project yet?” Ink Rose asked, changing subjects.

Zipper looked up from the lake’s wavy reflection and paused. “I honestly don’t remember. Sine showed me some of the cool stuff in her house, so why don’t you refresh my memory.”

“It’s a homebrew game,” Sine clarified. “I don’t remember if I showed you any of it either, but it’s something fun I was working on and thought about beta testing in the arcade.”

“That could be fun,” Zipper smiled. “What’s it about?”

“A bat fighting her way through a broken apocalyptic world and coming out on top… or something to that effect. I hope you don’t mind, but I’m dealing Ink in on that part of the project too. She won’t do much in the arcade, but she was going to help me with the story part of it.”

“That’s right,” Ink smirked. “Hopefully I won’t get in your way at all.”

“Are you kidding me?” Zipper raised an eyebrow. “I think that’s awesome. The more the merrier, right?”

“Right,” Sine yawned again. “I know you wanted to get to know me better, and I felt like this would be a good way to do that, and introduce you to my other friend. I know we’re all pretty different, but I think in a weird way that might actually bring us closer together? You know?”

“Mhmm,” Ink Rose nodded. “I guess we’re the outcasts?”

“That’s a funny way to put it,” Zipper replied. “I’m sorry if this is out of nowhere, but where did you come from? Because you don’t seem like an outcast to me— neither of you do.”

“It’s okay to ask, I’m new here after all. This is how friends get to know each other, right?”

“Right,” Zipper nodded.

“I lived in Riverview from the time it was first set up until about a month ago. You’re not a night pony so you wouldn’t really understand the deeper dynamics of how our tribe does things, but needless to say… it got stressful living there.”

“Oh?” Zipper questioned. “How bad was it?”

“It wasn’t… bad… just different. I guess here you don’t really see the mares getting in fights all the time, and the stallions don’t seem to hide away.”

“There’s like four here,” Zipper started to reply. “One’s married and has a kid, another one’s engaged, and the other one is dating but I guess they’re not a big lovey dovey couple? I don’t know the ins and outs of night pony relationships, but I don’t think they need to hide.”

“That’s unique here. Back in Riverview— and other big pockets where our tribe is, you’ll still see married stallions having to fight off other mares who try to advance on them. It’s like everyone is so paranoid about keeping the tribe strong that they’ll just cross social lines that aren’t supposed to be crossed. And if you don’t want to deal with that then you… take a blessing that makes it so you don’t really have to worry about it, but even that has its own drama.”

“So you hit the reset button and moved here?” Zipper asked.

“Mhmm,” Ink replied. “I know it makes no sense to you, but when you’re constantly around that environment and don’t really want to deal with the drama then it gets emotionally and physically exhausting real fast. That’s why I’m an outcast, because I don’t fit into the norm back home. Night ponies are supposed to fight, it’s what we were made for and if you don’t conform then you’ll either get disowned, beaten up, or worse.”

“I know that feeling,” Zipper admitted. “I always pretended to be this big macho pony because I got teased a lot growing up. I liked art and stories and wasn’t ever really into sports or anything. I like mares, but never really stayed in relationships long, and that made me look weird to my friends. No matter how hard I tried to fit in, I was always the weird kid that got picked on, and right now I don’t always know who the real Zipper is. ETS changed some of that, but I still didn’t want to give up my persona. That’s why I’m trying to take all of these projects so seriously because maybe that’s going to help me figure myself out. You know?”

Sine Wave, as tired as she was, could still pick up on the fact that both Zipper and Ink’s demeanors had shifted, and this was the point where the conversation could either fall apart or they could strengthen their bonds together. Not wanting the conversation to dip into a more depressing territory, Sine instead put all of her remaining energy into pulling her two friends into a hug that stopped them dead in their tracks.

“Hey now, let’s look at the bright side to everything. Maybe life sucks for us, maybe doesn’t anymore— but you know what? We’ve got each other and I think that makes us better than anything else. Who cares what others think of us? Is it the nineteen fifties still? No. So let’s show the world that we don’t need to fit in to be cool.”

The speech was cheesy and tacky, but nonetheless genuine. Even if it made her look like a geek, she still meant every word, and no matter what happened in the future, she would always be there for her friends.

“I… You’re right,” Ink Rose smiled. “Thank you, Sine.”

Zipper leaned into the hug and held his friend close. “Thanks… I uhh… I know we don’t really know each other all that well, but I just needed to hear someone say something like that.”

“That’s how we get close, isn’t it? So let’s keep doing this. Spend time together, make an amazing game, and make an even more amazing arcade to show it off in. Does that sound good?”

The two others enthusiastically nodded and pulled Sine into a tighter hug. While their lives had collectively taken different paths than they perhaps wanted to take at one point or another, what Sine had said was true. They might not have fit in the best, but if they worked together then they would be able to follow their dreams no matter what… and that’s exactly what they were setting out to do. Whether the three of them knew it or not, their lives would begin to change even more, sooner rather than later.

Chapter 14: If At First You Don’t Succeed… Get Your Frustration Out With Some Games?

Walks along the lake with Blue Spring and Sine had become the norm for Zipper lately, but considering all of the recent developments for his two plans, he would have to say this was a complete win. As a pegasus there was an instinctive urge to leap up and soar around the sparkling Oasis, but the more he started to embrace who he really was, the happier he was for the little moments he got to spend with friends throughout his day. As fun as constant stunt flying was, there was more to life than showing off.

While it had only been a few days since they had had their talk with River Breeze and Sine Wave, Zipper could hardly contain his excitement, and just the prospect of opening up soon made him ramble off about the arcade to any pony that was unfortunate (or fortunate depending on your perspective) enough to make eye contact with him.

There was of course a lot of work left to do; the sign hadn’t even been finished yet, the snack bar was a complete mess, the sound system had a tendency to disconnect randomly, and not all of the arcade cabinets were up to the high standard that Sine had set. However, perhaps emboldened by Zipper’s excitement, she had agreed to host a soft opening tonight, and that would ideally give them a chance to work out off the remaining bugs so the grand opening could be as grand as possible. It would be hard work for sure, but none of that slowed Zipper in the slightest.

Blue Spring let out a laugh as she watched another flustered pegasus awkwardly agree to check out the arcade when it opened, this time a dark black pony named Void, one of the new weather team recruits who managed to get sucked into a conversation.

The gray pegasus cheerfully trotted back toward her, a giant smile plastered on his face, “This is going to be so awesome Springy! We’ve told so many people, and I just know that it's gonna be great!”

“That’s great Zip,” she shook her head. “I’m glad you’re so excited about this but maybe we should take a break.”

His expression dropped for a moment, “What do you mean?”

“Well… Zipper, you’ve told about thirty ponies this so far and I think you’re starting to scare some of them away.”

“You think so?” Zipper asked, raising an eyebrow. “I don’t think I’ve been that overexcited… have I?”

She stifled a chuckle. “A little… Why don’t we go talk to Sine and tell her all about the opening plans and we can go hand out some fliers afterwards. You know, give some of the other ponies a break right now.”

Zipper shrugged. “Okay, well if you think I’m annoying them then I guess we can do that,” He replied back with a tone that clearly exuded disappointment and self-doubt.

Blue Spring flashed a worried look before laying a hoof on his shoulder. “Hey, I’m not saying you’re being annoying, I’m just saying that maybe you’re getting a little excited about this. A lot of the ponies you’ve been stopping have either been on their way to work, or are brand new here and don’t know anything about you, so their first impression is seeing this wild maned pegasus that they’ve never met before fly up to them and excitedly asking them about some arcade in a city they’ve barely explored.”

Zipper slowly nodded his head. “I guess you have a good point.”

“Trust me, it’s not bad to share this, but I think we can get the word out in a less… forward way a little later once everyone’s off work and not trying to move around in a hurry.”

“Alright, I just want to make sure we really get the word out, I really want this to be a cool place for everyone.”

She nodded. “And I do too, but we don’t want to scare people away either.”

“You’re right, well Sine’s house is coming up, maybe she’ll have some ideas.”

“She might, it’s worth asking. Did you guys talk about that at all when you were walking her back home yesterday?”

Zipper shrugged. “A little, but we also took the time to chat together. I never really had a chance to talk to Ink Rose so that kind of became our ice breaker.”

“That’s fair,” Blue Spring replied. “So what did Sine suggest when you guys did talk about arcade stuff?”

“It wasn’t a huge part of the conversation, but she suggested asking some of the weather team to help out if they wanted to earn some free play. Even came up with the idea of having some of them try to write out the name in the sky, but I thought that was going a little too far.”

The mare let out a laugh. “You thought something was going too far?”

“What?” He confidently smirked. “I know I might have a bad rep around here but I have my limits on what I’ll do. It’s all a part of showing the world who the real me is, you know?”

“Huh, well I guess I didn’t know what to expect after your whole stunt flier phase.”

Zipper nodded as they neared the night pony’s house, “I get you though. I wouldn’t have put it past me either.”

“At least you’re learning from your past. Now do you think Sine’s awake? I know it’s a weird question, it’s the morning after all… but you never know with her.”

“She should be,” Zipper glanced down at his gauntlet for the time. “I mean she’s normally up until noon so I’m gonna place my bets on that.”

Blue Spring smiled. “Well that should be good then. I love talking with her but a tired Sine Wave isn’t a fun Sine Wave to talk to.”

The pair stopped in front of Sine’s door and held for a moment before Zipper turned toward Blue Spring. “Right then, shall we?”

“Lead the way, Zip,” Blue Spring gestures towards the door.

Zipper nodded, reaching forward with a hoof. He gave a few quick knocks and waited, and before long a voice came over a small speaker next to the door.

“Ah yes, Bird Brain,” Sine mused. “Oh! And Spring too, you guys can come on in, door’s unlocked.”

As if by magic, a click was heard and with a gentle push of the door Zipper gestured forward. “After you. Heads up though, she keeps the house dark so just watch your step.”

“I’m guessing you’ve tripped in here before?”

“Maybe,” He replied back with a smirk.

“Right…” She reached down to her gauntlet and flipped on the small built-in flashlight. “Guess I finally have an excuse to use this.”

“Flip it to the low settings, Sine’s not gonna be a fan of that. Trust me.”

“Gotcha,” She replied back with a quick nod, dimming the light as she meandered through the hallway.

As they entered the small den they took sight of the dark purple night pony sitting in front of a dim computer monitor, using a pair of gauntlets to better work the machine. Taking notice of the pair, she swiveled over in her chair to greet them, casually folding up the mechanical digits that she was using. “Springy and Bird Brain, how are you two doing today?”

“Doing well, how about you?” Blue Spring replied back with a smile.

“I’m doing good. Working away on some hobbies and I need to get some last minute things figured out before the soft opening. Speaking of which, how’s the advertising going? Bird brain said he was going to get on that.”

“It’s going well Sine,” Zipper smirked. “I told a bunch of ponies all about it today, hopefully that’ll start generating some buzz.”

“Yeah, you should have seen Zip,” Blue Spring laughed. “He was flagging down anyone that’d make eye contact with him,” Blue Spring laughed.

Sine Wave let out a small laugh. “Sounds like Bird brain. So did you get anyone hooked on it?”

Zipper smiled. “I had a few say they’d stop by, so hopefully they weren’t just pulling my leg.”

“That’s great to hear. I want to say we’re all set to go on my front too… but you never know.”

“Something come up?” Zipper raised an eyebrow.

“Mhmm,” Sine confirmed. “I was doing some last minute diagnostics and some of the cabinets turned out to be lemons, but I think I can find use for them besides being cannibalized for spare parts.”

“That’s got to be frustrating,” Zipper replied. “I know you went through a lot to get those.”

“I did. While I want to go wring that seller’s neck… I’m gonna be civil and look on the bright side of things. Like I said, I think I have a use for them that’ll make them even better than they would have been before.”

Blue Spring looked back toward the computer. “Is that what you’re working on now? Something to go in those cabinets?”

“You could say that,” she replied with a coy smile. “You didn’t think I was just working on the arcade stuff for nothing did you?”

“You’re making games, huh,” Blue Sprint guessed.

“Not yet,” Sine shook her head. “I still have a ways to go until this is polished enough for that… but I might have something to go public with someday soon.”

“So what is it now?” Zipper asked.

“Right now it’s a pile of code that kinda looks like a game, but it still needs a lot of love and care to mold it into a real game.”

Zipper’s curious expression started to twist into a gleeful one, earning a laugh from the other pegasus. “And the arcade’s a front for getting your games out to an audience?”

Sine Wave nodded. “Think of it like a public beta test— kinda like what we’re doing tonight with the arcade actually. We try them out here, see which ones the ponies like and dislike, and the ones that work out well get fleshed out and pitched somewhere else.”

“So you want to get into game development, I take it?” Blue Spring asked.

“Isn’t it pretty obvious?” Sine chuckled.

Blue Spring shrugged. “I guess I just never really expected a pony to get into that kind of thing.”

“Well then I guess I’m the first,” She replied back with a confident smirk. “Sure, I’m good with the hardware stuff, which is what got me a job here, but I’ve got my own plans for the future and you two just so happened to give me the perfect chance to jumpstart that.”

“So what you’re saying is that you’re going to give people an actual reason to keep coming back to the arcade?”

Sine nodded at Zipper. “You know, maybe you’re not as much of a bird brain as I thought you were.”

“That sounds awesome!” The stallion cheered. “Like Spring said, I told a bunch of ponies about the arcade so hopefully that’ll get a nice big group that can try out all your new games whenever you have them ready!”

“Well hopefully that’ll be sooner rather than later.”

Blue Spring nodded. “Why don’t you show us what you’ve got set up so far, I know you said it was rough but I’d love to see it.”

Sine turned back toward the monitor, flipping out a few digits. “If you’re so interested I think I could show off a little demo… just remember that it’s rough and it probably doesn’t look that good.”

Zipper smiled. “I’m sure it’s gonna be awesome Sine!”

“I appreciate the vouch of confidence, Bird Brain.”

“Anytime,” He replied back with a playful punch on the shoulder, earning a chuckle from the mare.

The chat with Sine Wave had been as productive as the two pegasi had wanted it to go, and now that that part of the job was done, they could get things rolling. The day itself had gone by in a complete flash… mostly because Blue Spring had managed to convince Zipper to take a rest. Once his alarm went off however, he had zipped to the arcade without a moment’s hesitation and eagerly unlocked the doors.

Sine had booted up the music— which thankfully hadn’t cut out yet, Blue Spring had loosely been manning the snack bar, and he himself stood by ready to greet whoever decided to show up first!..

Right out the gate, that had consisted of Radiant Phoenix, Midnight Sun, and Ink Rose— all of which were close friends. However, much to his surprise and relief, Void, the pegasus from earlier had shown up too.

He scanned around the room again, taking note of the other few ponies he had recognized, spotting Atlas and Ocean off to the side chatting away with Ink Rose, who must have just showed up.

He let out a small sigh as he trotted around the room, disappointment clearly carrying in his expression. Deciding to get a feel for how things were going so far, he started to make his way towards Void. With a somewhat forced smile he greeted the pegasus. “Hey… Void was it, Right?”

The pegasus nodded, not turning away from his game of Pacman. “Yep, what’s up Zipper?”

“Oh not much, just seeing what you’re playing.”

“Oh, well just Pacman for now. Might give some of the others a try out later. I used to play this all the time as a kid, it’s great that I have a chance to get into it again.”

Zipper smiled. “I’m glad to hear you’re enjoying it, it really means a lot to me that you decided to stop by.”

“Hey well glad you invited me, I was kind of getting worried that there was nothing else to do after work, so thanks for giving me something else to do.”

Zipper’s spirits started to lift a little, even though he still couldn’t help but feel a little disappointed. “Well I’m really glad to hear that, hope you stick around, Sine’s gonna make sure that the games are all rotated around every so often, just to keep things fresh.”

“Can’t wait to see that, I’ll definitely be back.”

“Well I’ll let you get back to your game, let us know if you need anything though.”

“Sure thing Zipper.”

Bolstered a little by Void’s cheerful demeanor, Zipper decided to trot back over to the door in hopes that more ponies would walk in. Aside from Golden Atlas and Ocean, no one else had stopped by yet. The night was young however, and they had only been open for around thirty minutes too. He just had to try his best to bury his anxiety and focus on the good stuff so far.

“So you guys really did get this going, huh?” Phoenix mused as he tapped a hoof to Zipper’s shoulder.

The stallion turned away from the door and smiled. “Yeah, took a lot of work but I’m really happy with how it came together. I’m so glad you guys came too!”

The yellow night pony chuckled. “After our adventure in the abandoned mines? How could I say no?!”

“I’m glad that didn’t scare you away,” Zipper laughed. “Are you guys having fun so far?”

“You bet we are,” Midnight Sun answered as she trotted over. “Got us out of the shop for a bit too which was great. As much as we both like old trinkets and artifacts, it’s nice to get a change of scenery every so often.”

“It sure is,” Phoenix agreed. “I gotta ask though, are you going to keep these on free play all the time?”

“For other guests, nah. We’re gonna offer time slots you get to play for,” Zipper leaned closer and dropped his voice to a whisper. “For you two though, it’s free whenever you want.”

“You don’t need to do that for us,” Phoenix shook his head.

“I don’t, but you’re one of my closest friends and you stood behind me when everyone else thought I was just some loser. That means more to me than you probably realize.”

Phoenix nodded. “That means a lot to us too, Zip.”

Zipper patted him on the shoulder and gestured back towards the games. “You guys go have some more fun now. Maybe we’ll do a tournament or two later.”

“Thanks Zip,” Phoenix thanked him, giving the pegasus another pat.

As his friends trotted back towards the fun, Zipper couldn’t help but feel a wistful longing in the back of his mind. He shook his head though, and with a warm smile he trotted on.

This time he decided to go see how Blue Spring was handling things. As Zipper neared the snack counter, Blue Spring flipped off her gauntlet and smiled. “Hey Zip, you seem in a better mood. I was starting to think you were going to be super bummed for the whole night.”

“You could tell?”

“Well your ears were down and you were just sadly looking around at everyone else. It’s kinda obvious when you’re not feeling one hundred percent.”

He gave a small nod in reply. “Yeah, I think I am now,” He let out a small sigh. “I just don’t know though, I mean we stopped and talked about this with so many ponies, and we’ve got like a handful that showed up… and River wasn’t even one of them. I just feel like we did all this work for no one.”

A small frown spread across her face. “I know Zip, but keep your chin up. It’s just the first day, and it’s a work night, wait and hold your final judgement until the weekend. River called me earlier and said that there was an emergency at the clinic and she had to cancel, so she’ll definitely be here with a few of her friends on Friday.”

He smiled. “You’re right. You’ve always been right, and I’ll keep that in mind. Why don’t you go see how everyone else is enjoying it, maybe they’ll let you know if they have any suggestions or feedback.”

He raised an eyebrow. “You think so?”

She nodded. “If anything it’ll at least show that you care about the place.”

“Right,” He confidently replied back. “I’ll go see what’s up, and who knows, maybe it is just too early to tell if this will work out or not.”

“That’s the spirit Zip, just go have some fun and relax, I know you care a lot about this place and the sanctuary, but that doesn’t just all hinge on the arcade being a success. Failure’s not the end of anything either, we can always learn from this and figure out what to do next with Sine.”

Zipper smiled. “Thanks Springy, I really appreciate it.”

“Anytime Zip.”

With a newfound confidence he trotted off toward Ocean, Atlas, and another pony who had seemingly walked in unnoticed during his conversation with Blue Spring. With a nervous gulp he trotted up to the three.

“Hey guys, having fun?”

Atlas gave a small nod. “So far. To tell ya the truth, games have never been my thing, but I love the music.”

“Add a little bar in somewhere and you might have a few more regular customers Zippy,” Ocean added.

Zipper nodded. “Well that would need a special permit and license, but I’ll talk with the others and see what I can do.” Because I totally want to bring in even more help… he silently thought to himself. Shaking his head, he turned toward the aqua colored pegasus, “And how about you? I don’t think I’ve met you before.”

“Oh,” the stallion replied. “I’m Star Seeker, Atlas and I go way back. And I’m guessing that you’re the Zipper that’s made such a big name for himself around here?”

Zipper slowly nodded. “Yeah… I used to be the weather captain but I uhh, just do this right now. I’m trying to get an animal sanctuary set up though, that’s one of the big projects we have planned out.”

“An animal sanctuary you say?” Star Seeker lit up as if he had heard some surprisingly good news. “Well that’s awesome! I was brought in as part of Scarlet’s astronomy program, but you wanna know a secret? I love diving into marine biology on the side, that’s actually what I got my cutie mark in. Do you think you’ll have any aquatic animals there?”

Zipper shrugged. “I’m not sure yet, but I can talk with Blue Spring and River Breeze about that. River’s the local vet and Springy used to work in a state park in Florida and she loves to talk about the manatees and fish there.”

“I’m going to wager a bet and say she worked at Blue Spring?”

Zipper let out a small chuckle. “Yeah, the name give it away?”

The astronomer nodded. “Yeah, I was actually interning down at KSC before ETS, I used to love visiting that place on my weekends.”

“KSC, what’s that?” Zipper raised an eyebrow.

“Kennedy Space Center. It’s where they used to launch the space shuttles. I got let go during the whole ETS fiasco and wound up working with some scientists up in Maine. Called themselves the Mariners.”

“Oh those guys!” Zipper’s eyes lit up in recognition. “Silver hired them to work on some ocean project or something.”

“The Sea Castle. That’s actually where I got my mark. Anyways their research kind of reached a point where they didn’t need me anymore and I got the opportunity to transfer down here. Go figure my old college room mate found his way down here too.”

Atlas smirked. “Great minds think alike.”

Zipper smiled again. “Small world, of all the places in all the world and you two wound up running into each other again.”

Star Seeker nodded. “kind of hard to miss when this place is like the only notable pony run science center on the west coast. It might not be Riverview, but it’s got its own special charm.”

“It does, doesn’t it?” Zipper paused for a moment. “I’ve never actually been down to Riverview, is it really all that and more?”

The astronomer shrugged. “It’s kinda the pony capital of the US, but it just wasn’t my place. I’m not into all the shimmerist stuff, and it’s hard to avoid that there when the mayor is one of the most outspoken shimmerists. Attracts a lot of devotees. That said though, you guys are almost like the West Coast Riverview in a way, cozy little pony buildings, a monorail running through the city, but it’s all so small and quaint— well small by comparison.”

“So I’ll take it you’re liking the place so far?”

“Yeah,” Star Seeker nodded. “It’s definitely a nice change of locale. Glad to see that there’s some night life too, I could definitely see myself hanging here on and off.”

“Well that’s wonderful to hear,” Zipper beamed. “I’ll let you guys get back to your conversation, but I just want to say thanks again for stopping by.”

The astronomer smiled. “Sure thing, and it’s nice meeting you again.”

Zipper nodded. “My pleasure.”

With a spring in his step he began to trot toward Sine Wave, who was playing away at a space invaders cabinet with Ink Rose. Every so often one of them would let out a small cheer.

Taking note of the presence near her, Sine turned away from her cabinet for a brief moment, waving Zipper over with a wing. “Heya Zip, how’re ya doing?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know to be honest, I just feel like it’s already a flop but it seems like the ponies that showed up are at least having a good time.”

“I’m having a great time for the record,” Ink Rose cut in. “Keep in mind it’s still early, and if the night ponies here are anything like the ones back home then I know we’ll see a few stop by sooner or later.”

“Look at it this way too,” Sine replied while still playing her game. “I put all the machines on freeplay for this week, that’s bound to bring in some more ponies before we open for real.”

“That’s a good point,” Zipper smiled. “I’m glad we were able to do this.”

“Me too Zip,” Sine replied. “I know you’re the floor manager but why don’t you go take a spin on one of the games, see if that raises your spirits. I know it definitely raises mine whenever I’m feeling blue.”

“Alright,” Zipper shrugged. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt.”

“That’s what I like to hear, just relax and have fun, let me worry about how this place does, okay?”

“You sure?” He asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Yep, these are my babies and believe me, I’ll figure out a way to drum up some hype so they get the love they deserve.”

With a silent nod, Zipper walked around the nearby cabinets, scrutinizing each of them with a curious gaze, pausing as his eyes landed on an old TRON cabinet. The cheerful music and racing light cycles seemed to catch his attention, pulling him in like a moth to a flame.

“This one calling your name?” Ink Rose’s voice rang in his ear, startling him.

“I uhh… yeah, it seems fun. How does it work though?”

Ink’s eyes widened. “Have you ever seen TRON before?”

“A long time ago,” Zipper nervously replied. “I always liked the arcade but I never got a chance to play the game.”

“Then it was meant to be,” She smiled. “Come on, give it a try and I’ll help show you the ropes.”

With a shaky hoof, he gently took hold of the joystick, pressing the start button and watching as the game began. Before long he was greeted with the unfamiliar main screen, watching as some counter in the center of a maze counted down. Without warning the game chose a mini game for him to play, and with a gleeful smile Zipper began to pilot a light cycle, quickly boxing in the enemy AI and letting out a cheerful shout as he won the level.

“Look at that,” Ink cheered. “You’re a natural. I didn’t even have to hold your hoof for that part.”

“That… was kinda fun. What’s next?”

“Go pick a spot, there’s a few other games to play.”

Zipper focused back on the screen and as he continued to play through the game’s levels he couldn’t help but feel his worries and disappointments melt away. Sine Wave was right, he just needed to relax and have a little fun, and Ink Rose being there right by his side made him even happier.

Whether it was her presence or the fact that he was having fun— none of it really mattered much to him. What was important was that he was having a fun time with friends, friends who accepted him for who he was and weren’t going to judge him. Maybe the arcade wasn’t the breakaway hit he had hoped it would be, but they still had a whole weekend to look forward to, and that meant that he still had time to advertise the place more.

As the game loudly played a tune alerting him to the fact that he had just won the high score, he couldn’t help but trot in place in glee.

“Look at that Zip! You got the high score!” Ink Rose cheered and hoof bumped him. “What else do you wanna try?”

A nervous excitement started to build up within Zipper, and he glanced around the room to find his next pick. Unsure of what to go with, he smiled and shrugged. “How about you pick one? Show me what you’ve got.”

Ink smirked. “I like it. How about a game of air hockey then? You’ve surely played that.”

“I was the Circus Circus break room air hockey champion three years running, I’ll have you know,” He confidently boasted.

“Then I think the game’s on,” Ink taunted back. “How about we raise the stakes? Winner picks something for the loser to do?”

“You’re on!” Zipper cheered back.

His mood had definitely improved, and in a twist of irony, a night that had started on a sour note was quickly turning into one of the most fun times that he had ever had. The game had just begun, and Zipper’s excitement and optimism had at least been partially restored. Time would only tell what would happen next, but Zipper knew one thing; he was excited to see what was on the horizon.

Chapter 15: Not Giving Up

As the days continued to pass, Zipper’s excitement only grew. The more time he spent with both Sine and Ink, the more he couldn’t help but feel a closer connection to the two. Whether it was the fact that he finally had a group of friends who enthusiastically shared his interests or the fact that the three of them were all ponies that didn’t quite fit in… he didn’t know. It didn’t matter much though, because, for the first time in a long time Zipper felt as if he truly belonged. Whether he was actively aware of it or not, there was a spark forming between the three of them, and the more time they spent together, the stronger their bond grew.

Zipper trotted through the busy street, a stack of flyers tucked under a wing. As annoying as he knew he was being, he still couldn’t help but hand one out to anyone that would make eye contact with him. This was all a part of his dream, and he’d work as hard as he could to make it a success, even if

He had been doing this for the better part of his morning and finally decided to sit down for a nice long nap, seeing no problem with just plopping down under one of the large trees that sat near the side of the lake.

The gray pegasus let out a happy sigh as he closed his eyes, making himself comfortable. Just as he was getting comfy, a voice called out to him, eliciting an annoyed sigh.

“There you are, there’s no escaping me!”

Zipper opened an eye and peeked over at the sound of the voice: a grinning brown night pony holding one of his flyers. The night pony trotted up to Zipper and greeted him with a warm smile. “Tell me you’re Zipper, otherwise I caught the wrong pony.”

Zipper slowly sat up and gave a short nod. “Uhhh, yeah, that’s me. What’s up?”

“My name’s Javarod, I was wondering if you needed any help with anything in the arcade.”

“Help?” He perked up. “What kind of help?”

“Well, what do you need? I’ve done a bit of everything, janitor, ride attendant, you name it, if you can teach it, I can learn it. Do you have a snack bar in there? I’m not a great cook, but snacks, hot dogs and that stuff I can do, and any good arcade needs a snack bar, no?”

“We do…”

“Perfect! Do you have anyone helping out with it full time or is it just something you jump into whenever someone’s there?”

“I uhh, well, no. Not really. We’ve kind of just agreed to take turns each day. Do you have experience in anything like this?”

The night pony laughed. "Running one? Nope, but I’ve worked in a few restaurants and delis.”

Zipper glanced down to the stallion’s cutie mark, giving a short nod. “You make coffee?”

“More like live on it, usually cold brew, it’s really smooth, and easy to make, just takes a pot, some water and some cheesecloth. Also started making donuts as a hobby before the change killed my job. Be happy to take over if you want, be easier than starting my own place after all.”

Zipper paused in consideration for a moment. "Let’s go talk with my fiend Sine, she’s running a lot of the actual arcade stuff.”

The two began walking down the path toward the arcade, trotting through the small crowd. The night pony glanced ahead and then back toward Zipper, raising his voice slightly. "Sine Wave? As in the night pony with the neon pink mane?”

Zipper nodded. "Yep, she’s the one that got us all of the cabinets. We’re kind of letting her run the arcade because she’s really passionate about it.”

“She’s not going to have any issues with me helping out with the snack bar then, right?”

Zipper shrugged. "I don’t think so. She gets really touchy about people messing with the arcade stuff, but she kind of left that part up to us… why? Are you worried or something?”

“Maybe a little,” he laughed. "Sine Wave kind of has a reputation amongst the rest of the night ponies here.”

“Let me guess, she gets grumpy and kind of gets snappy with you guys?”

“Ummm, kinda. Let’s just say that when she says don’t touch stuff, she means it..”

“Are you worried about that?”

He hesitated for a moment. "A little. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen her when she’s angry, but I can tell you that it’s not a fun experience.”

Zipper shrugged. "Believe me, I have. You just need to know how to get on her good side.”

The night pony raised an eyebrow. "And you know how to?”

“Well yeah. I’ve been spending a lot more time with her lately and it’s really helped me with getting to know her better.”

“Well what’s the secret then?”

“There is no secret. She’s into the same kind of nerdy stuff that I am, it gives us a lot to talk about.”

“Well lucky you then. You managed to do something that not a lot of other ponies have done.”

“Sine’s really that hard to make friends with?”

Javarod nodded. "She doesn’t make it easy, trust me.”

“Right,” Zipper gave a quick nod. "I’ll do the talking then. Sounds good to you?”

He nodded. "Sounds great.”

“Good,” Zipper paused for a moment, pointing toward the tall building. "She was working on one of her pet projects when I left her, moved her whole computer here and everything.”

“So what you’re saying is that I stand back and let you interrupt her, and then hope for the best.”

“Right… she shouldn’t be too grumpy at all, unless you did something to piss her off. You didn’t… right?”

The night pony shook his head. "Nope, I’ve steered clear after seeing how she performed in the fight club.”

Zipper raised an eyebrow. "You guys have a fight club?”

“Oops,” chuckling, “rule number one, never talk about the Fight Club.” Seeing Zipper’s unimpressed look, “Ok, I mean not officially, but a bunch of the night ponies hang out in one of the grottos every month and that’s kinda how we blow off some steam.”

“And you’re all okay with it?”

He shrugged. "It’s a night pony thing, don’t think too hard about it. Just be glad you don’t have to break up a fight, that’s happened more times than I think anyone’s ever wanted to deal with.”

“But you all seem so… calm around here.”

“Right, and that’s why. Anyways, should we get this over with?”

Zipper nodded. "Talking with Sine, right. Follow me and just let me explain everything.”

The pegasus pushed open the door and stepped into the dark interior, the night pony following close behind. As they stepped in, they both removed their sunglasses, slipping them into their saddlebags. On the far side of the room sat Sine Wave, who was clearly working on her programming project with Ink Rose.

“That you bird brain?” Sine asked.

Zipper trotted toward her, resting a hoof on her back. "Heya Bit Brain, how’s the programming going?”

“Better than yesterday, though one of my gauntlets failed and that absolutely ruined my workflow. Sprocket and Gadget said they’d fix it up for me so I should have a replacement tomorrow.”

“Shoot, really? Want to borrow mine in the meantime?”

The mare shook her head. "Nah, maybe it’s a good thing that it broke. I’m such a workaholic, having a catastrophic failure or two gets me to shut off the computer a lot more often. ‘Sides, it gave me more time to hang out with you and Ink.”

“And that’s a perk, right?” Ink Rose smiled.”

“I think so,” Sine agreed. “Ink’s been helping me out with the dialogue stuff, remind me to show you it later.”

Zipper laughed. “You’ve got a funny way of looking at things, but maybe you’re right.”

“‘Course I am. So how’s the advertising been going?”

“It’s been going well, I think Spring was right about waiting for the weekend, it seems like a lot more ponies are actually interested in it this time around.”

“That’s great to hear, told ya it’d pay to keep at it.”

“You’re absolutely right. Speaking of arcade stuff, I actually ran into a pony that wanted to help out with the snack bar. I know that’s not really your department but I wanted to run it by you.”

She raised an eyebrow and turned away from the monitors for a moment. "What kind of snack bar stuff?”

“Well, why don’t you ask him yourself?” he gestured toward the brown night pony. "This is Javarod, he’s already got some experience in running this kind of thing.”

The mare turned toward I’m and let out a small chuckle. "This is our new helper? Coffee Grounds?” getting an embarrassed look from Javarod who suddenly found his hooves very interesting.

Zipper shook his head. "No no no, his name is—“

“— Oh I know, that’s just my nickname for him, bird brain.”

The brown night pony gave a short nod. "It’s good to see you again Bodge”

“Good to see you too. How’s the eye?”

Javarod brushed a hoof against his eye for a moment. "If I think about that right real hard I can still feel the sting, but it’s never been better. How’s the rib?”

“Never better. It takes more than a few bruised ribs to knock me out of the ring, you know this.”

“Wait, you two fought each other?!” Zipper excitedly exclaimed.

Sine Wave shrugged. "Ehhh we burned off some aggressive energy more than anything else, it’s not really a fight fight. More like a convenient way for night ponies to keep their cool by beating the shit out of each other.”

Zipper nodded. "I see, well, Coffee Grounds explained the whole fight club thing already. I guess it just seems weird to me.”

“I’m not a fan of it to be honest, brings up some thoughts about the night ponies back home that I’d rather not dwell on too much,” Ink added.

“It’s not for everyone, but it’s way different than the stuff that happens over in Riverview. You should tag along with me next month bird brain, we can make it a little date if you want.”

Zipper’s face reddened slightly. "You… I… why don’t we talk about this later.”

The mare let out another laugh. "It’s adorable when you get all flustered, don’t worry, I’m just teasing you. But sure, we can chat later.”

Seeing his reaction, Ink couldn’t help but let out a chuckle.

Java, evidently confused by this, raised an eyebrow. "Are you two?.. you know, a thing?”

Sine shook her head. "Not really, at least not in the way you’re implying.”

“What can I say?” Zipper shrugged. “I just like hanging out with her, she doesn’t get bored when I talk about all of my dumb interests.”

“Yeah, who could have guessed that bird brain was as big of a nerd as I was? We’re just friends right now, but it’s nice hanging out with someone that can talk your ear off about obscure shows and movies from the eighties.”

“We kind of lucked out, didn’t we?” Ink asked. “The three outcasts of the Oasis teaming up and making a nice niche group.”

“I think so,” Sine agreed. “It’s kind of amazing how things just worked out. Who could have thought that you crashing into my home would have brought all three of us together like it did?”

“Definitely not me,” Zipper laughed as he hugged his two friends. “It’s pretty special.”

“So what does Coffee Grounds want to do now?” Sine asked, setting the conversation back on track.

“Oh yeah,” Zipper replied, turning towards the brown night pony. “So what kind of stuff did you want to do?”

Ink laughed. “What bird brain is probably meaning to say is, do you want this to be a small part of the arcade or something bigger that we might have to invest some more funds into.”

“What Ink said,” Zipper replied with a nod.

The night pony considered this for a moment before giving their reply. "I guess a little bit of both. I noticed you guys have that attached annex next door, do you think you’ll wind up using it for anything?”

Sine Wave smirked. "Let me guess, you want to open up an actual coffee shop there?”

“Mhm, maybe not right at this moment, but I could totally see that being converted into a nice cozy coffee shop at some point, maybe if the stand in here does well.”

The mare looked toward Zipper. "Well bird brain, you’re kind of the manager here, we’re just the hired help.”

“This is our project though, don’t you want a say in it?”

“Is any of his stuff going to mess with my area?” Sine pressed.

Zipper paused for a moment before shaking his head. "No, not really.”

“Then there’s your answer,” She smiled. "If it doesn’t mess with my stuff, then I’m fine with you guys doing whatever you want.”

Zipper nodded and turned towards Ink. “What about you?”

“What about me?” Ink Rose replied. “I’m just a tattoo artist working on a script for Sine’s game, so I’m not really invested all that much in this kind of decision making.”

“That’s fair enough,” Zipper smiled and turned back towards Java. "Well Mr. Coffee Grounds, there’s your answer then! Welcome aboard!”

“It’s that easy eh? So do you guys mind if I start playing around with the snack bar before opening? Need to see what I have to work with, and maybe even do a little redecorating. Definitely need to think about equipment to do what I want, prolly prosumer stuff or DIY to start.”

“Oh, right,” Zipper pointed toward the small counter. "Well she’s all yours!”

Zipper sat up on the loft and gazed down at the ponies below, a nervous feeling welling up inside him. He knew he should have been happy, but yet here he was, worrying about whether tonight would be fruitful or not.

Sine trotted up next to Zipper and laid a hoof on his shoulder. "You feeling okay bird brain? You look antsy again.”

“I am. But I mean what if they don’t like it?”

“Then we just remember that this whole project started as an offshoot of the thing we’re really working on.” Blue Spring added from the side.

“Right, the sanctuary,” Zipper nodded. "That’s still important too… I guess I just thought this place could also generate some good buzz for that.”

“Hey don’t feel down about it, bird brain,” Sine gestured down at the floor. "See that crowd down there? They might not be pushing us to capacity, but you’ve got at least fifteen happy ponies down there who decided to stop by because we’re giving them something fun to do.”

“I know I sure love it,” Ink Rose added. “I can see why Sine’s so passionate about it.”

Blue Spring nodded. "Me too. It’s just baby steps, Zipper. The night’s still young and we still have ponies coming in the doors. We already have support for the sanctuary, at the end of the day this whole place is you and Sine’s passion project, just have fun with it okay? It doesn’t need to be a giant success as long as you’re happy with it.”

“So how about it bird brain? I’d say I’m pretty happy with this place so far, and Ink likes it too. So how about you?”

Zipper let out a small sigh. "I think I am, but I feel like it could be so much cooler too.”

Sine slowly nodded. "I get you, and I want that too. It’s not going to be an instant success though. But we can help each other out, make this thing great for all of us.”

“Together?”

She nodded. "Together. What do you want from this whole thing, Zipper?” she asked, actually using his name for once.

Zipper furrowed his brow and pondered her question deeply. “We’ve got the killer sound system, the games, the food… Some neon might be nice I guess?”

“In addition to the neon sign we’re supposed to get outside?”

He nodded. "Yeah, like inside neon. You know, like they had in TRON!”

“Well, did you ever hear back from your little designer buddy? If he figured out the outside stuff then maybe he can figure out the inside too.”

“I did actually. He gave me a call right after we walked you back to your house and he said they should be by in a day or two to get the neon installed.”

“Good, we can finally ditch that flimsy banner and get some real stuff. Hit him up about the neon stuff and we can pool together some of the earnings to pay for it if it’s not too crazy expensive.”

“Well,” Blue Spring chimed in. “It seems like you guys have this all under control, and seeing as how my former station’s staffed for now…” she glanced over at the newly staffed snack bar. "I’m gonna go play some games with River.”

“Of course, Springy,” Zipper nodded. “I think he can cover that for tonight but we might need to hire on some more help whenever the other stuff starts taking off.”

“That’s perfectly fine, I’ll always be around to help if you need it.”

As the mare started to trot away, he called out to her again. "Blue Spring, wait!”

She turned back toward him. "What’s up Zip? Trying to keep me away from your high score?”

“Maybe,” he let out a laugh. "I have something important to say to you— to all of you actually.”

“What is it, bird brain?” Sine asked.

“Thanks— for everything,” He smiled. “For helping with this place, with the sanctuary… and just everything in general. I’ve never really had any long term friends and you guys have been really awesome.”

Blue Spring smiled. “That’s sweet Zip. The sanctuary’s going to be something special, and I know you’ve got a good creative eye for it.”

“You don’t have to thank us bird brain, who else would just let some grumpy old bat and her friend squat in their warehouse and set up a whole arcade?”

Zipper pulled the two into a tight hug. "You two are really the best, you know that?” The group nuzzled up for a moment before finally breaking the hug. A warm smile began to spread across the gray pegasi’s face. "I really don’t have a close family, and you guys are like family to me. I really appreciate everything you do, and I know I don’t tell you that enough.”

“Don’t tell me you’re getting all sappy on me now, bird brain,” Sine paused for a moment before letting out a laugh. "Don’t sweat it though, just keep being you, that’s what makes you great.”

“You don’t think I’m annoying?”

Blue Spring laughed. "Sometimes, but you can also be caring and sweet, and that’s your charm. You might have been overly showboaty and annoying before you got your mark, but you’re really rounding out.”

“They’re right you know,” Ink Rose smiled. “I remember when Sine ranted to me about how angry she was at you, and I think you’ve done a great job at making up for everything.”

He shrugged. "I guess I just decided it was time to start acting my age and stop pretending like I needed to be cool or something.”

Blue Spring gave him a pat on the shoulder. “You’re cool just the way you are Zip, and don’t let anyone ever tell you different.”

“Thanks Spring, I really do appreciate it.”

“Of course Zip.”

“So I hate to break up this sappy moment,” Sine interjected. “But we’ve got a whole arcade full of happy customers that we should go spend some time with. You know, so they spread all the word about how cool this place is and keep coming back.”

“Right, good idea Sine,” Zipper replied back. "Plus I can keep Springy from beating my high score too!” He replied with a smirk.

The blue pegasus let out a confident laugh. "Oh yeah? You’re really that afraid that I’m going to beat you, aren’t you?”

“Pshhh, nah. We both know that I’m the champion here.”

“So let’s go head to head then, see if you can’t defend that title.”

“Well I uhh…”

“No, I think Springy’s got a point, bird brain,” Sine chimed in. "A big high score contest could generate lots of good buzz here, unless you don’t want to do that—”

“ — Fine, I’m in,” Zipper replied back with a confident smirk. "You, me, TRON. Whoever gets the highest score wins.”

“What’s the grand prize going to be?” Ink asked. “Being able to win something might raise the stakes and really get people talking. Hell, maybe I’ll even give away a free tattoo session for anyone who wants it?” She offered.

“That’s a little… extreme,” Sine laughed. “How about a plaque on the wall though?” Sine offered.

“That could work,” Ink smirked. “So it’s settled then. Whoever wins gets a plaque on the wall until they’re beaten. That sound good for you two?” She asked both Blue Spring and Zipper.

“I think so,” Blue Spring replied.

“Absolutely!” Zipper cheered.

A large grin spread across Sine Wave’s face. "This gives me a great idea.”

“Oh? And what’s that?” Ink asked.

“What if we make this little arrangement a weekly thing? Anyone can join, whoever wins gets their face on the wall and a week of free play.”

The gray pegasus paused for a moment. "That’s… actually not a bad idea at all!”

“Plus it gives everyone something regular to do too, more of a reason to come back and practice,” Blue Spring added.

“Even better. So go on, get down there and I’ll make the big announcement, sound fair?”

The two pegasi nodded.

“Good.”

A small crowd had formed around the TRON cabinet to watch Zipper and Blue Spring’s small competition. Zipper had finished with a high score slightly higher than his previous, something he was more than happy to gloat about. After a short break, Blue Spring had taken the controls and had spent a good thirty minutes rising up to just under Zipper’s score. On either side of the pair sat Ink Rose and Sine Wave, who were hyping up the crowd and shouting their own commentary back.

“Better watch out Zip, Spring’s about to beat your high score,” Sine Wave laughed.

“You think so? I think he might have a fighting chance!” Ink Rose cheered.

“Let’s not speak too soon…” Zipper replied with a nervous gulp.

The lightcycles danced around the screen, their trails creating a tight maze that Blue Spring was carefully navigating with ease. The small crowd’s excitement only grew as Spring continued to chase down the computer, each breakneck turn eliciting small cheers and gasps from the onlookers behind her.

“What’s too soon about this? I’m just a few points away from the high score!” Blue Spring confidently called back as she briefly glanced over to her rival.

A few more turns and a couple close calls later, and Blue Spring had finally been cut off by the AI, ending the game with a triumphant cheer from the ponies behind her.

Game Over, your high score: 791,982 — please enter your initials

Zipper stared on in amazement as Blue Spring selected her initials, turning toward the gray pegasus. "Looks like I’m the arcade champion of the week.”

“That’s… I… How did you manage that?!”

The blue pegasus smirked back at him. "It’s all in the wrist Zip, better luck next time.”

“You still did great bird brain,” Sine smirked. “Just not as great as Springy here.”

Blue Spring looked back at Zipper, who was staring at the displayed score which almost seemed to be taunting him. "Don’t let it get to you Zip, I only beat you by a hundred points.”

“Oh it’s not getting to me, I’m just thinking of all the practice I’m gonna do to win back my title.”

“Oh? You’re that confident?” Blue Spring laughed.

“You know it!” The competitive pegasus replied back. "Enjoy your victory now, I’m gonna challenge you to space invaders next time.”

“He’s allowed to do that?” Spring asked as she looked over to Sine, who simply shrugged.

“I’d say it’s fair, anyone can challenge the champion to a game of their choosing. Makes it nice and fair.”

“Fine by me, better go get some practice in though Zip, you’re forgetting that I practically grew up in an arcade.”

“Well, I guess we’ll wait and see!” He cheered back.”

“Good game Zip,” Blue Spring held out a hoof.

He smiled and bumped the outstretched hoof. "Good game Spring. That was more fun than I thought it’d be.”

Blue Spring smiled and trotted off toward the snack bar, where River Breeze and a few other ponies were already cheerfully enjoying their cups of coffee.

“Great work bird brain, your score wasn’t half bad,” Sine replied with a pat on the shoulder.

“You think so?”

“I know so.”

“That was awesome Zip!” Ink Rose cheered, surprising Zipper.

Zipper smiled, “Thanks! Glad you had fun too. It really means a lot.”

“So,” Sine Wave started. “Do you think you’ll beat her next week?”

Zipper shrugged. "Maybe, I guess we’ll have to wait and see.”

“I guess we shall. Come on, I want to show you guys something you might like. Ink’s been helping work on… some of it, but I kept the real fun part a secret.”

“Oh? What is it?” Ink asked.

“Don’t worry,” Sine chuckled. “It’s something I’ve been fixing up for a few days and I need someone to help test it. I snuck away and set it up in the middle of the tournament so it’d be a fun surprise.”

“Is it a new game?” Zipper asked.

“Not new, but not original either.”

“I’m a little lost on this part,” Ink admitted.

Sine smiled. "Remember how I said I might be able to make use of the busted cabinets?”

Zipper laughed. “You didn’t… did you fix them up?”

Sine pushed the pair through a tall door and into the arcade’s back room. A disassembled cabinet sat in the corner next to her computer, the screen brightly flashing.

“I fixed something up,” she corrected. “Just trust me, it’s going to be fun for all of us.”

The game displayed was all too familiar to Ink Rose, though the manner it was being displayed in was completely new to her. To Zipper on the other hand, it was only vaguely familiar.

“Gauntlet?” He asked. "Oh man I remember playing this with my dad back when I was a kid.”

“Oh you might have played the original Gauntlet, but not this. New levels, pickups, and even some new monsters.”

“I had no idea you were going to set this up as an actual cabinet,” Ink said in astonishment.

“That was the hard part, I’ll admit. I kind of had to hack together some stuff but I guess that’s probably the easiest way to explain it.”

“Is it ready to play?”

“Considering all of the help that Ink’s given me? I’d say so. I’ve saved about a month of work and a whole lot of money that would have been spent on hiring a writer, and without that I wouldn’t have the alpha ready… So go ahead and give it a spin, let’s take it through its paces and see what it can do.”

Zipper gave a short nod and slowly approached the cabinet, stepping up onto the makeshift stool that Sine had shifted over. The muffled sounds of the arcade seemed to drown out a little as he rested his hoof on the joystick and pressed start, the game’s new title screen coming to life before his eyes.

”Cyberbat?” He asked. "What’s that mean?”

“It’s my own little take on the concept… just freshened up for today’s audience with a little help from Ink too.”

“Sine wanted to call it CyberGauntlet.”

“That’s not a bad name in all fairness,” Zipper replied.

As he held his hoof over the joystick, he couldn’t help but feel a twinge of excitement. This was a brand new game, and if Sine was as ambitious as she seemed to be, this could be the start of something really great for all three of them. Not wasting any time, he hit start and let out a happy squee as the menu dissolved away.

Neon colors raced across the screen as the game started, dropping Zipper into a dimly lit room full of metal walls and dingy sprites. "Okay, this is seriously cool. Is this a total conversion?”

“Of course, It’s not really finished but it’s getting close. Like I said, Ink added in the dialogue and made it sound good, instead of the crap I had there before.”

“Hey, it wasn’t crap!” Ink protested. “Your dialogue just needed some polishing.”

“Well, now we have a well written game and a pony to properly beta test it.” Sine smiled, “So what do you think so far, bird brain?”

As Zipper started to move through the dungeon he immediately began to notice just how much Sine had changed. Instead of the ghosts that he’d be fighting If this was the normal game, Sine’s had him facing off against what he could only guess were cybernetic ponies. "Cyborg ponies?”

“Ghosts and demons are so 1985.”

“And cyborgs aren’t?” Zipper replied.

Sine shrugged. "Not to me they aren’t. I think they’re cooler.”

“Can’t argue with that. Do you think other ponies will like it?”

“Let’s just worry about testing and finishing it first.” She looked at Ink Rose. “Why don’t you hop in on player two, Inky?”

“You’ve got that set up? I thought it was still buggy.”

Sine shrugged. “What do you think I am? Some kind of amateur? Of course I’d get the second player option set up so I could watch my two closest friends play together.”

“Is this supposed to be a date or something?” Zipper half-heartedly chuckled.

“Maybe?” Sine blurted out before quickly dropping into a hushed silence and looking away.

What the fuck am I doing?! She cursed to herself. Why did I have to blurt that out?!

The two other ponies froze momentarily, which only served to make Sine’s thoughts drift towards self doubt and more internal curses. Taking a breath, she continued. “I mean uhh… well, I know it’s really out of the blue but I like spending time with you two, and I wouldn’t really be all that upset if this was a date or something— I dunno, maybe I’m being dumb but I— I uhh….”

She began to stammer and before her conversation could revolve any further she squinted her eyes shut, and braced for the worst from this admittedly awkward situation she had created for herself. While it was true that she felt some sort of feeling towards both Zipper and Ink, this was not the right way to test the waters on such topics.

Her hooves started to tremble and for a fleeting moment she considered just jumping ship and scurrying off before either of the two could mock or tease her— or worse. Far from the usual cool indifference that Sine usually conveyed to the world, at this moment she was little more than a nervous wreck.

The teasing never came, however. Instead it was just that damned silence that seemed to drag on for an incomprehensible eternity. Finally Zipper made the first motion, and looked away from the screen and over toward her. At this moment, the game was clearly no longer his focus.

"I… I wouldn’t mind that either,” Zipper admitted. “Uhh, do you two have something going on though?— I mean if that isn’t crossing the line I just know you two hang around all the time and I uhh— I’ll stop talking, I’m being an idiot again.”

“Hey. You’re not being an idiot!” Ink Rose looked off to the side and shook her head. “But no, we’re just close friends.”

“I think we’re more than that right now,” Sine finally broke her silence, though the butterflies in her stomach were only growing more intense. “I don’t know what we are, but we’re not just friends.”

“What are we?” Zipper asked.

Sine would normally snarkily reply that she just said she didn’t know, but given the situation she had inadvertently started, she wisely chose to withhold such remarks. Instead she shrugged. “To tell you the truth, I’m not sure. Family? Close friends? I know you both had feelings towards me, and I would be lying if I said I didn’t feel the same towards both of you.”

“That’s… understandable,” Zipper nodded. “I still like you Sine, I just didn’t want to push anything. I was really bad with doubling down on that stuff before and I just didn’t want to be the same pony I was so— I… just bottled it up?”

“I guess I just made things extremely awkward, how about we just call it a night and forget I ever blurted anything out,” Sine cringed back at her own words. And then I skip town, change my name, and never show my face around here again…

“You don’t need to apologize for that,” Ink reassured her. “I know you didn’t mean to make things weird.”

“But I did,” Sine sighed. “It’s been a while since I’ve dated. A long while. You know what I’m talking about when I say it’s so hard for night ponies. I didn’t really feel anything towards other ponies here, until I started to hang out with you two. I just got carried away and overly excited and blurted out the first thing on my mind and now I’m probably going to drive away the only two close friends I feel I actually have.”

She clenched her eyes shut again and fought back the urge to just bolt off. That would only make things even more awkward. As if it could be any worse than it now was…

Silence. It was deafening at the worst of times, even more so when you just awkwardly confessed that you wouldn’t mind testing the waters on an emotionally intimate relationship with two of your closest friends. These were the thoughts that started to rush through Sine’s head even more, and it was only being compounded by her very loud heartbeat that only added to her anxiety. She was about to rush out an apology and say it was just her being foolish, but before she could blurt it out, Zipper started to speak again, giving her a momentary reprieve.

“What do you mean?” Zipper asked. “Is it really that different from other ponies?”

“Trust me, Zipper. You don’t even know the half of it.” Ink chimed in. “Dating for night ponies feels like a battle royale most of the time. The whole gender balance is so fucked beyond belief that you get mares fighting like crazy for the handful of stallions that are around. That’s kind of why I moved here in the first place. There’s way too much drama elsewhere but… not here.”

Sine took a deep breath. “Do we really need to bring this up any more?”

Ink started to speak in a calm voice. “We don’t but obviously something is bugging you and I don’t want things to get worse or for your mind to fill in blanks and draw conclusions that aren’t actually there,”

“Trust me, I was just being dumb.”

“Nope, I know you’re not a dumb pony. You don’t have to explain anything or talk about it anymore if you seriously don’t want to, but we’re your friends and we’ll be your friends no matter what.”

“Unless you’re telling us you’re a wanted jewel thief and we’re all gonna get jailed tonight,” Zipper nervously chuckled, earning a glare from Ink Rose. Blushing, he fumbled out a rushed addition. “I uhh— what I mean is that Ink’s right. We’re here for you no matter what.”

Sine sighed again and shook her head. “I guess where this is all going is that… I kind of like both of you. I know, it’s weird. But spending time with both of you has made things a lot better here, and I don’t know. I guess maybe I just need to talk things through now that the Bandaid’s ripped off,” she took a very deep breath and composed herself before continuing. “Zipper, it was cute when you told me your feelings, and I promised you I’d see how things went once we got to know each other more. I know Ink has feelings towards me too, and you both mean so much to me that I didn’t want to ruin any of the friendships we had. I didn’t know what to do so I just kept pushing it back until I could talk a little more… and well… I dunno, I kind of feel like I’d be okay having two ponies I’m close to.”

“That’s a big thing to just drop out of nowhere,” Ink replied. “I’m proud of you for saying it though, I just don’t know how to fully respond yet.”

“Is the fighting really a big issue? I mean don’t you guys already do that here for fun?” Zipper asked, clearly trying to salvage the conversation in his own clearly oblivious way.

Ink Rose shook her head. "That’s different. Our underground fight club is how we deal with aggression and stress, the fights you see in other groups of night ponies are deeper and more emotionally driven. No one wants to be alone and if you don’t kick someone’s ass and stake your claim you’re shit out of luck.”

He took his hoof off the controls and shook his head in surprise. "That sounds—“

“ — Awful, I know. It is, but it’s something we just have to deal with,” Sine Wave cut in.

“You don’t have to accept that you know,” Zipper replied.

The mare paused for a moment before turning to meet his gaze. "I mean we kind of do. It’s not a huge issue here, but there’s ponies back where Ink comes from that treat this thing like it’s some sacred tradition that makes up the core of how all night ponies should act and behave,which causes its own slew of drama that’s a pain in the ass to deal with.”

“Well it’s pretty damn stupid,” Zipper brazenly replied. “I mean why is being an asshole to perfectly nice ponies some big tradition?”

“It’s a lot more nuanced,” Sine shook her head. “Trust me. I don’t fully agree with all of it, but that’s just how things are.”

“It’s still stupid,” Zipper protested. “I know a thing or two about getting beaten up for not fitting in, and this sounds even worse.”

Ink shrugged. “There’s plenty of others that think so too, but they either can’t speak up or they have their voices drowned out by the ones who think it should be the universal norm for everyone. It’s just a part of being a night pony though.”

“It doesn’t have to be though,” Zipper held his ground. “It’s not how it is out here so why can’t we just make other ponies see that?”

“I like the optimism Zip, but that’s a hard thing to do because of what Inky said about ponies back home. “Sine flexed her wings and gestured to them. “Take this for example, I was a big dumb idiot and had Ink tattoo them because I was selfish and wanted to spite people who took this way too seriously. This is some big thing to ponies who took a magical blessing that changes a part of them, and because I didn’t take it, I could get really hurt if I let the more rabid ones know.”

“And that’s why you brought this up…” Ink replied. “I told you it was okay, and that it isn’t a big deal.”

“But it is!” Sine replied. “I still feel so guilty about it, and I know that a part of you is eaten up by it. I thought that maybe I could try to make everyone happy, but I don’t know, maybe I’m just being dumb.”

There was that silence again, that damn lack of anything that just beat down on her psyche and made her feel so small and afraid. She could handle a physical fight, take all the cruel mean insults in the world, but the awkward silence that was persevering right now shook her to her very core and made her feel like a little foal who was too afraid to do something.

“You’re not dumb,” Ink replied, resting a hoof on Sine’s back. “It’s just sudden— and caught me off guard.”

“I know, and I’m sorry,” Sine looked away from her.

“Don’t be,” Zipper reassured her. “It’s good you were honest with yourself and us. I know that’s a hard thing to say, but I felt the same way when I told you how I felt before.”

“Does this… ruin our friendship?” Sine somberly asked.

The silence crept back in, but this time it was only a momentary tormentor.

“No,” Ink shook her head. “Not at all. In fact, I think it’s exactly like how Zipper said. It isn’t easy to say what’s on your mind, but you have to. Otherwise you just bottle up your feelings and play pretend for others. I didn’t think that was a bad thing to do until I met you, and you have such a good outlook on things, even if you’re a little hot headed sometimes— but hey, who isn’t from time to time?”

A small smile crept across Sine’s face, and she looked back up at her two friends. “I guess that’s why I said it in the first place. I feel like both of you really made a difference in my life, and for the first time in a very long time I feel like I have ponies I can be close to.”

“I’m happy you can be so honest with us,” Ink smiled. “To be honest too, I don’t know what to really think. It’s not meant to be in a bad way or anything, it’s just going to be tough if we take this any further than a casual fling.”

“I know,” Sine said. “I didn’t say it with the intention of it needing to be anything more than us testing the waters right now. If that means we just hang out together and do what we’ve been doing then so be it, if it means we make our own little herd then that’s fine too. Just whatever’s comfortable for everyone.”

The other two sat wordlessly for a painfully long time to Sine, and her thoughts instinctively started to drift towards the worst. She knew it was an odd proposal, but the three truly had been growing closer together as of late, and ponies forming polyamorous herds wasn’t the most alien concept in existance, at least that was the vibe she got from her rather limited worldview of pony society— as little time as it had to really grow and form.

“It’s… not the most out there thing to ask,” Ink finally cut through the silence, much to Sine’s relief. “I mean there are a few other herds back home… It’s just not… the most common.”

“I’m not uncomfortable with it,” Zipper admitted. “If we get to do the things we’re doing and be closer, then I think it sounds nice. But how does it work though? I’m asleep half of the time that you’re awake.”

Sine shrugged. "I don’t know yet. Maybe it’s exactly what you said, maybe it becomes something more. I mean we‘re all probably the only three ponies in the entire Oasis that could spend so much time talking about retro stuff and still never get bored or tired of it. Maybe it’s just me being sappy, but you’re both so awesome to be around and I don’t want to break anyone’s heart by starting some love triangle.”

“That’s… really sweet,” Ink replied. “Like incredibly wholesome,” She then looked at Zipper and raised an eyebrow. “But what about Blue Spring? Aren’t you two close?”

“We are,” Zipper nodded. “But aside from liking animals and a few other things, I don’t think she sees me like that. She's my best friend, and I love her like family, but I don’t know if anything between us would ever work out because of that, and it’s okay. I’m happy being her best friend.”

“Maybe this won’t work out long term, maybe it will— I don’t know,” Sine started to speak again. “I know it won’t be easy but I’m willing to give it a try if you are, I mean worst case we just agree it doesn’t work and go our separate ways. I know that this might be a little taboo still so I don’t want to press anything if it’s not what either of you wants. I just figured that maybe it was worth giving it a try.”

"Okay,” Ink paused for a moment. "So let’s assume this works, we go to the next level and start some long-term relationship, we spend some time together… and I dunno. Maybe we fool around and somewhere along the way there’s a foal in the picture. How’s that going to work out? Is that something we want? Something we need?”

“I’ve never thought about being a parent,” Sine shrugged. “But if that’s what this heads towards, it’s something we’d need to talk about sooner rather than later. I wouldn’t be opposed to it if that’s what you’re looking for… so what are your thoughts?”

Another long silence followed, though based on the other two’s reactions, it wasn’t necessarily headed in a bad direction much to Sine’s relief.

“I’d be okay raising a foal together,” Zipper replied, breaking yet another silence. “But uhh… maybe not for a while.”

“Obviously,” Sine nodded. “And what about you, Ink? Is that something you’d want someday?”

“Maybe? But this whole thing… it’s kind of a stigma back home. I'm just giving you fair warning.”

“But we’re not in Riverview,” Sine replied. “This is the Oasis and here we have the chance to change the world and make something new. I know that’s a lot to say, but this place is bigger than a lot of other night pony centric cities on the west coast. Sure, it’s not Riverview, but it’s not tiny either. At the end of the day this isn’t anyone else’s choice but yours, so what do you want going forward? What would make you the happiest?”

Ink Rose sat and considered it for a while before smirking. “I wouldn’t be against starting a family someday. However, I’ve never had this kind of relationship before, so it’s kind of hard to say what kind of things I’d want just yet.”

“Of course,” Sine replied. “I know this is a big thing to just drop on you two. I just wanted to be fair and give my thoughts on it. I know it’s a lot to think about right now. I mean this is a lot to plan out for the future, you know?”

“We don’t need to plan it all out at once,” Ink replied. “And to be very honest, if it was anyone else other than you suggesting something like this then I’d probably shy away from it all together.”

“So you’re open to the idea?” Sine asked. “Of is making our own herd that is.”

“It’s a lot to take in, but if we go slow I think I’d be okay with it.”

“That’s all I’m really suggesting,” Sine nodded. “If we do this, we could give it a try and just see where it goes, and if it doesn’t work out then maybe it just wasn’t meant to be.”

“What about you, Zipper? What are your thoughts on all of this?” Ink asked as she laid a wing over Sine’s back.

“Yeah, what about you, bird brain?” Sine looked at him.

Zipper trotted up next to her and sat down. “It’s a lot for me too,” he replied. “I’m still learning who I am, what I’m comfortable with… but I know I trust you two a lot more than most other ponies,” he offered reassuringly, gently laying a wing over the mare as well. “So I wouldn’t mind giving it a try if you don’t. I mean we’re already the outcasts right? Who cares if we do this?”

Sine nodded, leaning into the mutual embrace and remaining silent for a few long moments. Finally a smile started to spread across her face. “You two really are some of the best ponies I’ve ever met. As crazy as our introductions were.”

“I like you too,” Ink replied. “It's hard to say where this is going to go, but it feels nice.”

“Me too,” Zipper nuzzled up next to the pair. “So what does this make us now?”

“Well,” Sine started. “I don’t really know yet, but I’d love to find out together. I know it’s not going to be easy, and maybe it doesn’t last long.”

“Or maybe it does,” Zipper smirked. “I guess we’ll just have to see what happens.”

“I guess so,” Sine smiled. “Thank you both for understanding and not being weirded out.”

“Thank you for being real with us,” Zipper replied. “It means a lot to me.”

“It means a lot to me too,” Ink Rose nodded. “It’s not easy finding ponies I trust, so maybe it’s a good thing we stick together.”

“Whatever happens, I’m just happy I can be with you two,” she breathed a loud sigh of relief as she finally started to relax. “I can’t tell you how many years this conversation shaved off my life, but it’s like I got a huge weight off my chest.”

“I bet,” Zipper laughed.

Ink rose chuckled and shook her head. “I love you guys, I really do.

With her true emotions laid out, Sine felt at peace. She truly didn’t know whether this kind of relationship would work out, but she knew she’d regret it if she hadn’t said how she honestly felt. For a pony who rarely made close connections, Sine couldn’t have been any happier to have made the two close friends that she had, and she was more than excited to see what the future would have in store for all three of them.

Epilogue: Level Complete

A non dream walker’s dreams were always strange… or at least that was the conclusion that Sine Wave had long come to. Despite there being no fundamental differences between them and the dreams of ponies who were granted that ability, something about the chaotic structure of a sleeping mind’s dream felt uncanny and borderline unnatural. Zipper’s dream was no different in that regard, and even though its narrative was very much rooted in its dreamer’s interests, it was clear that this was the dream of a dreamer who had rarely, if ever, dreamwalked. As she trotted through the twisted landscape resembling a bizarre carnival sideshow, she couldn’t help but stare at the missing gaps in the dream; gaps that simply existed because there was simply no reason for the detail to otherwise be filled in.

This would hopefully change sooner than later, and this is why Sine had ventured into her new companion’s dream after all. If their unconventional relationship were to stand the test of time then they’d need an avenue to better spend time together in, and the dream realm would serve as just that. The idea had been Ink’s, though it was Sine who had reached out to the dreamwardens, which was probably for the best. It wasn’t as if there would be any red tape to fight through or anything that really required Sine’s unrelenting tenacity, but with Ink Rose being less than thrilled at the prospect of conversing with the wardens, Sine was the most equipped for the task.

As she neared the open-sided tent she immediately zeroed in on Zipper, who was dressed up in a goofy ring leader outfit and was standing up on a stage looking over the whole sideshow. Nonsensical music filled the air, and Zipper danced along to it in a goofy fashion that was not at all out of character for him. The sight alone brought a smile to her face, and despite his lack of consciousness awareness, she already knew that she’d be teasing him about this for days.

As much as she wanted to sit and watch the dream unfold, there were other more important tasks to be done and only so much time to do them before they’d miss their window of opportunity. Letting out a laugh, she gently flew up toward his perch and shook her head. With another laugh, Sine gently touched Zipper’s shoulder with a hoof, making the gray pegasus aware of the dream around him.

“Rise and shine Bird Brain, we’ve got stuff to do.”

Zipper paused for a moment and began to look across the strange carnival that made up his dream. He looked around with a confused look on his face before his gaze finally landed on the night pony. "Sine? Is this…”

She nodded. “Yep, you’re dreaming.”

He let out a small breath. “I’m never going to get used to this, it’s just so…”

“Real?” Sine offered.

“Kinda?” he shrugged. “it just feels so weird. It’s like we’re really here but we’re not.”

“You’ll get used to it, trust me. And if you can’t then me and Ink will be there to help you get the hang of it.”

“Thanks Sine… So where’s Ink?”

“She’s waiting back in her dream, and you’re gonna help us get there when we get you set up.”

“I’m going to get us there?” Zipper raised an eyebrow.

“Yeah, trust me. It’s gonna come naturally to you. You’ve already got such a creative imagination so I think you’re more than set.”

“How do I even do this then? Is it like… do I say some magic words or something?”

“Well, first we’ll have to call a warden over. I don’t know who’s going to show up, but I’m going to try for Phobia. She’s a little scary but trust me, you don’t want to meet some of the alternatives. This’ll hopefully be the only time you’ll ever see them.”

Zipper nervously gulped. “Why is that not reassuring?”

“Because it probably isn’t,” Sine laughed. “You’ll just have to wait and see it, I guess there’s really no way to truly be prepared for it, but trust me, they won’t hurt you or anything.”

“I trust you.”

“So are you ready then? You can still back out of this if you really don’t want it, if you’re nervous or anxious then Ink and I can just dreamwalk to you.”

“No, I’m good,” he said with a confident nod. “I know how important this is to you, even if I don’t really understand it.”

“Okay,” Sine paused for a moment, looking back toward her stallionfriend and then toward the sky above them. “I call upon Phobia Remedy, Warden of Fear. I have a friend that is requesting the ability to dream walk.”

At first nothing happened, and then all of the light suddenly faded out of the dream as if something had simply sucked it all away, leaving an inky black void surounding them. From the darkness formed an ethereal cloud lit by an unnatural light and swirled with the souls of the damned. Lightning began to flash and thunder boomed all around, shaking both Sine and Zipper to their very core, though Sine was understandably unphased by this kind of thing. Finally from the center of the mass appeared two night pony-like eyes that no doubt seemed to gaze directly into Zipper’s soul, giving him more than ample reason to shiver in fear.

“Is that so?” the loud voice from the nightmarish entity boomed in response.

If Zipper was afraid then he was doing a surprisingly good job of hiding it. Nonetheless he still nervously nodded in reply. “I… yeah, if it means I can spend more time with Sine and Ink, then I’ll do it.”

The entity didn’t break it’s soul-piercing gaze, though replied back in a less frightening manner than before. “If I grant you this ability you’ll be subject to our rules, are you willing to accept that?”

“Of course,” Zipper replied, as he anxiously glanced over to Sine, who flashed him a confident smile. Seemingly bolstered by the fact that Sine wasn’t frightened at all, he nodded his head again. “Just uhh… lay 'em on me.”

The form didn’t shift or move in any way that would have implied an acknowledgement, instead the eyes simply blinked back at him before the Warden of Fear spoke up again.

“Very well, the rules are simple; You will never use dreamwalking to deliberately hurt another pony. Only the Dreamwardens dispense justice in the dreamscape, and it is not your place to seek out vengeance here.

you will never use information that you learn in a pony's dreams against them. Dreams can often show you a pony’s deepest vulnerabilities and it is your obligation to respect such secrets. Any information given or gained within a dream should be treated as a solemn secret unless you are otherwise given the allowance to share it.”

As Sine watched on, she couldn’t have been any more proud of Zipper for keeping his mouth shut. While it’s true he had taken great care to not be as brash and obnoxious as he had once been before, he still had the habit of interrupting in conversations. While she knew that Phobia likely wouldn’t punish him for disrespect as other wardens might, it was still for the best that Zipper was intently listening to everything being said.

“Three,” Phobia continued. “Your natural talent for understanding animals grants you a low degree of passive mind magic. Should it develop into a more active ability, you shall never use it in a malicious way to mind control or cause harm to anyone. Such an act should be reviled and will be met with punishment.

Last but not least, you will respect the Dreamwardens, our authority, and understand that violating these rules will result in consequences that you may not wish to experience.

Those are the rules, do you agree with them yes or no?”

Zipper nervously gulped, looking toward Sine before giving a quick nod. “I… yes, I agree.”

“Very well. Zipper, I hereby grant you the ability to dreamwalk. Keep mind of the rules and be sure to follow them at all times without question. Failure to do so will result in your banishment from the dream realm or worse.”

The last line was clearly meant to be more of an idle threat than anything, though understandably it was still something that Phobia still had to emphasize.

Given no further prompting, Zipper looked around for a moment, clearly expecting something more. “It’s just that easy?” He replied with a confused look.

“It is,” Phobia replied. “Your companions can probably answer any further questions, unless there’s a reason for me to stay here.”

Sine Wave shook her head. “I can take it from here. Thank you so much for doing this for us, it means a lot more than you probably realize.”

The entity naturally couldn’t nod given her nightmarish form, but with the more intense part of the interaction out of the way her voice dropped into a more normal and less booming tone. “I have a good enough idea, mixed schedule couples are fairly rare after all.”

“Well, thanks anyways,” Zipper stammered out, evidently caught off guard by the sudden tonal shift. “It was nice to meet you miss uhh… Phobia. You’re not nearly as scary as Sine made you out to be.”

“You wanted scary?” The Warden of Fear replied back with an almost playful tone.

Sine Wave quickly cut her off. "No, no I think we’re good,” she looked toward Zipper. "Trust me on this Zippy.”

Without further comment the warden vanished, leaving the pair alone once more. Sine let out a small happy sounding sigh as she pulled Zipper into a tight hug. "You know, this is going to be so much fun, I mean now we can all dreamwalk together.”

“Can we? I mean I still have no idea how this all works.”

“Don’t worry about it. What’s important is that Ink and I can dreamwalk to you when you’re asleep now, Silver’s been tutoring me and showing me how to do that while I’m awake, which means that we’ll never have to be so far apart.”

“Doesn’t that you know… get tiring?” Zipper asked

“Only if I do it for a long time, but the more time we can all spend together, the better. Even if it’s only a few extra minutes each night.”

“It really means that much to you guys?”

“Of course,” she replied with a happy nod. “Gives us all more time to geek out about nerdy stuff together.”

“I… I guess you have a point there.”

She let out a laugh. “Of course I do, you and Ink are the biggest retro nerds in the Oasis. If we spend more time together we’ll just build up our strength, you know?”

Zipper broke the embrace and snuggled up next to the mare. “It feels like there’s so much to learn…”

“Oh there is, but let’s just take it one step at a time.”

He perked up. “Kinda like a tutorial. eh?”

She nodded. “Exactly like one. Now you’ll probably have some trouble getting the hang of this at first, it’s kinda hard for regular ponies to get used to taking control over a dream. So I guess for now I’ll just pull you from it or have Ink do that too. But next time you go to bed, think about what you’re going to dream and what you’re going to do before you actually fall asleep, hopefully that’ll help you remember when you’re actually here.”

“That’s going right over my head Sine…”

“Don’t worry,” she laughed. “It always does. You’ll get it eventually, even if we need to help you out until then.”

Zipper smiled. “You guys are the best, you know that right?”

“Of course I do. That’s why we’re here together,” she gave him a quick kiss. “Now how about I show you how to find your way to Ink. It’ll be like one big game of dream tag.”

“Sounds fun, so what do I have to do?”

“Well I’m going to run around different dreams and you have to try to follow me. Just picture me in your mind and if it works then you’ll be able to follow me. Once you do that a few times then I’m going to have you reach out to Ink and do the same.”

“What do I think of?”

“You tell me,” Sine laughed. “What do you like about me? What do you see in your head when you see me and we spend time together? Think about stuff like what I sound like, what my personality is like, all the times we spend together in that back room— that sorta stuff.”

“That sounds complicated.”

“Mhmm, it is,” she jumped up and booped him on the muzzle. “Which is why we’re making it fun. So tag, you’re it!”

Before Zipper could reply she was off, leaving him behind in his dream, a confident smirk coming across his face as he closed his eyes and took off toward the nearest star that had appeared in front of him.

Zipper continued to chase the mare through another bright star, skipping from dream to dream in rapid succession, carefully focusing on her so he wouldn’t fall behind… again. This was definitely a work out, but he finally felt as if he was getting the hang of it, even if she was making it easy for him to follow behind. That was one of the things he liked about the night pony. As temperamental as she could get when she hadn’t had enough sleep, she was caring and kind the rest of the time. She cared a lot about the ponies and hobbies she was interested in, and had definitely made that clear tonight.

As frustrating as it was to get lost in someone else’s dream, Sine had made sure that Zipper didn’t feel overwhelmed, and had helped guide him along and offer advice on how to make things easier. It was something that made the whole situation a lot easier to understand to the uninitiated pegasus, and as strange as it all felt, he was already starting to feel at ease in the dream realm. He knew he’d never really feel at home there, at least not like Sine, Ink, and the other night ponies did, but he at least felt a little more comfortable there.

After what felt like hours, but had probably been a lot less, Zipper finally landed in a final dream, something Sine a Wave had no doubt put together. The dream definitely had her name written all over it. Without really knowing or wanting to ask the question, Zipper could only assume that the dreams they had both ran through were good reflections of the ponies dreaming them.

“Something you made Sine?”

She shook her head. "You my friend, have finally mastered the ability to hop into another familiar pony’s dream.”

“How’s our new dreamwalker been doing, Sine?” Came the voice of Ink Rose.

“It only took him a few dozen tries, but I think he’s starting to get the hang of it now.

Zipper shrugged. "I… I did? It just felt like I was jumping over to your dream.”

“What you did was follow her to mine,” Ink clarified. “It’s kind of like Sine was your waypoint and you were able to pinpoint where she was.”

Zipper still seemed confused. “That’s… I guess an interesting way to put it. I guess it’s just weird to me still?”

“Oh that’s not weird at all,” Sine smiled. "You felt it was my dream before you got here, right?”

“Kinda… it’s like I got this feeling that I only feel when I’m with you, or think of you.”

“Which is a good sign. That’s how you work your way around here, and once you get to spent more time with Ink and I you’ll start to pick it up even faster. We can go meet up with Silver, Scarlet and Phoenix some other time, just so you can get an even better feeling of how familiar dreams feel.”

“I’m guessing that they feel different?”

“Every dream will. Lovers, friends, family— those are the dreams that are most familiar though, and the sooner you get a feel for them, the easier it’ll be to find that dreamer when you’re here.”

“So if I’m ever lost I can find my way back,” Zipper finished.

“Exactly! Maybe you’re not as much of a bird brain after all. There’s some weird stuff that gets complicated too, like Silver’s dream hangout place. I’ll definitely have to show you around there sometime, but for now you’re doing really good.”

The three ponies wandered through the futuristic cityscape that made up Ink Rose’s dream, the bright neon on the buildings reflecting off of the murky rain puddles around them. Everything about this place seemed so real to Zipper, but at the same time it all felt off, as if he was just a ghost in the world and not actually there. Sine Wave had said this was normal for him, because he wasn’t used to dream walking, but no matter how hard he tried he still couldn’t get used to the feeling.

“I gotta say, you did good so far Bird Brain. Better than I thought you would. I only had to go find you, what, seven or eight times?” Sine Wave teased him from the couch she had summoned.

“Six,” he replied back.

“Hey six isn’t bad, especially for a first time dream walker,” Ink smiled. “So what do you think so far? Think you’ll spend more time here with us? Or do you want to go back to your regular dreams?”

The pegasus scratched his head for a moment. “It’s weird. But a good kind of weird I think.”

“Is that a yes or a no, Bird Brain?” Sine cut in.

“I think it’s a yes,” he said with a smirk. “but I hope you know that I’m going to be the kind of stallion you’ll have to show around more than once.”

“Doesn’t sound like a problem to me,” Ink Rose smiled. “It just means we get to spend more time together.”

“That’s more than fine by me,” Zipper nodded. “So what’s next? More hide and seek?”

Sine shook her head. "I was thinking of something more along the lines of cuddling up withyou two and relaxing for a bit. As much as I’d love to go on some big adventure, you’re still new to this and I don’t want you burning yourself out yet.”

“But we’re asleep, can’t we like do anything we want here?”

“Not quite,” Ink Rose answered. “At least not for normal ponies. Night ponies can do some crazy stuff because that’s how our magic works, you’re only able to dreamwalk in here.”

“Plus you’re still new to it,” Sine added. “I’m willing to bet that you’re going to wake up feeling exhausted even though you’ve been sleeping this whole time, just because your mind isn’t used to it.”

“So I’m going to be tired when I wake up?” He asked with a grimace.

Sine shook her head. “Not physically, but you’ll probably feel like you’ve been awake all night, because you kind of have been in a way.”

“And you promise I’ll get used to this?”

“Of course, would I lie to you Bird Brain?”

“Maybe?”

“Maybe? You wanna run that by me again?” Sine retorted back with a playful accusatory tone.

“Oh alright. No, you wouldn’t. I trust you. It’s just all so new to me.”

“And you’ll get used to it, trust us on this.” Sine Wave nuzzled up next to him. “Now how about we take it easy for a bit and just relax,” she patted the spot next to her. "Sit down, I don’t bite.”

Zipper nodded and took a seat next to Sine, nuzzling up next to her. "Can I tell you guys something?”

“Go for it Zip,” Ink nodded as she cuddled up next to Zipper and Sine.

“I’m actually really glad we did this. I knew it’d be hard to make this work, but this makes it so much easier.”

“I’m glad we did too bird brain. Like I told you when we started, it’s not going to be a cake walk, but I’m willing to try to make it work if you are, and I’m glad we can spend time together like this.”

“Everything you’ve done means a lot to me. The arcade, just spending time with me, being awesome all around… everything. You guys are the first ponies I’ve met that I feel like I can really understand. I know we’re still figuring things out and seeing where they go, but I really do love you two.”

Sine and Ink both cuddled up next to him, and after a short while, Sine spoke up. “I love you too, bird brain and all.”

“Me too Zip, it’s nice feeling like I can just be myself. I didn’t realize it before, but I was hiding a lot of myself in the past and it really means a lot that I can just do my own thing and be me.”

The trio could have continued dream hopping, but for now they were more than content to just relax together.

Back in the waking world, the trio sat in front of the now assembled cabinet that Sine had been working on for the last couple of weeks. It hadn’t been an easy task getting it put together and moved out of their back room, but with some trial and error, and help from their newly hired barista, they had managed to get it moved into place. Java had left them to return to his own endeavors at the cafe, leaving the trio to playtest the new game one final time before they officially opened for the evening.

And playtest it they did. It had only taken Sine a few minutes to get it all plugged in and booted up, and before long the vintage screen had flickered to life, displaying the custom title screen that Sine had worked so hard on. The rest of their time had flown by in an instant as they started to play, with Zipper excitedly following along as Sine navigated through the levels she had spent so much time crafting, levels that hopefully the arcade’s clientele would enjoy. This would be the ultimate test to see whether her dream would work or not, and she couldn’t be more excited for the evening opening.

“Wow you really worked the kinks out of this level, it doesn’t crash when you get to the core with the cyberpony boss anymore,” Zipper cheerfully exclaimed.

“Yeah that was a nightmare to get worked out. Programming is still kind of a pain in the ass, even with the gauntlets but I think I did a pretty good job if I say so myself. Ink’s writing also helped a ton.”

“That’s the power of collaboration,” Ink smiled.

“You both did a great job,” Zipper nodded. “So do you think it’s all finished then?”

“As finished as it’s going to get,” Sine Shrugged. “I know it’s a glorified ROM hack, but I think it was a good proof of concept and I definitely learned a lot from it.”

“And now it’s just a matter of getting ponies to play it.” Ink concluded.

“More or less,” Sine agreed. “and then the real fun can begin.”

“Ooh, what kind of fun?” Zipper asked.

“The see what works and what doesn’t so we can make something really awesome kind of fun,” Sine confidently replied.

“I like the sound of that. I know ponies are going to just love your games.”

“Hopefully, if this takes off then I think we’ll be in a good place for a while.”

“Good thing you’ve got a nice solid testing field for it now,” Ink smiled.

“And I can thank Zipper and Spring for that. Maybe not Spring as much, but she still had a hoof in this.”

It was now Zipper’s turn to add to the quips. “And I can thank you for making this whole thing a reality, we wouldn’t have been able to open it without your machines.”

“Our machines,” Sine corrected.

“Our machines?”

“Mhmm,” she smiled. "You might be the defacto owner, but we’re in this together. You, me, and Ink.”

“And Spring… but I guess she’s really only here for the sanctuary stuff.”

“Which is perfectly fine by me. This can be our little pet project while you work on your passion project.”

“I think this might turn into a passion too,” Zipper admitted. “It’s already been such a big project, and I’m excited to see where it goes.”

“Me too,” Ink Rose replied. “This could really become a big thing for us.”

Zipper glanced down at his gauntlet. “We should probably start getting stuff set up outside. I know we have a few hours left, but it’s gonna catch up quickly.”

“That’s probably a good idea,” Sine agreed.

“Wanna join us, or keep debugging?” Ink asked.

“Why don’t you two get started and I’ll pop out in a bit.”

“That sounds good,” Zipper smiled.

The prepwork itself was a lot simpler than Zipper had anticipated. Most of the hard work had been done weeks ago inside, and in terms of outside work, there was just a microphone to set up with some speakers, and the permanent sign that was due to be installed that day.

They’re cutting it a little close, Zipper thought as he glanced down at his gauntlet again. Ink Rose had gone back to watch Sine work on her game more, and even though it wasn’t necessary, Zipper had decided to sit by the door and wait.

“Greetings programs!” Came a voice from behind him, as if on cue.

Feeling a rush of excitement course through him, Zipper turned toward a dark blue night pony with a purple mane who was standing in the doorway. A small smile spread across his face as he slowly stood up from his place. “Stardust?”

“In the flesh,” the night pony replied back. “Sorry I didn’t give you more of an advanced notice, I kinda fell asleep on the ride over here and my assistant didn’t wake me up sooner.”

“Couldn’t you just do that dream walking thing? Sine’s been teaching me more about it.”

The night pony shook his head. "It doesn’t exactly work that way. Unless you’re like Silver or one of the other night ponies we ran into, you can’t usually visit someone’s dream while they’re awake.”

“But you just said you could do that with Silver.”

Stardust nodded. “Right. Silver figured out how to set up a dream space in his subconscious mind. He’s been teaching all of us how to do that but we haven’t lucked out yet.”

“I can give you the rundown tonight, Bird Brain,” Sine added.

“Right… I guess I still have a lot to learn,” Zipper looked out the open door and then back to the night pony. “So I’m guessing the stuff’s all done?”

“Yep, the guys are working on it now. It wasn’t easy to get it loaded in but thankfully I had a couple of friends that I could Shanghai into helping me.”

“Can we take a look at it?” Zipper cheerfully asked.

“Mhmm, they’re still unloading it and it’ll take a little bit of time to install, but you’re free to watch if you want. I can’t promise it’ll be all that entertaining though.”

Zipper nodded and called over to Sine and Ink. “Hey guys, the sign’s here. You wanna go take a look at it?”

Sine smiled and called back. “Not really, but if you really need me to come along I can.”

“Ditto,” Ink replied.

“Nah, that’s fine,” Zipper shrugged. “I know how the sun bothers you guys anyways. Besides, it’ll be better when it’s all lit up at night.”

Sine nodded. “Sounds like a plan then. I’m going to debug this a little more, just give me a holler when it’s all done, okay?”

“Of course,” Zipper replied back with a smile.

Zipper began to follow the dark blue night pony, giving Sine and Ink one last goodbye embrace.

The sun’s golden light shining over the entire Oasis made him smile as he trotted out. Already the night pony’s crew was hard at work attaching the sign to the building and Zipper couldn’t be any more excited.

“So what do you think, Zipper? Is it everything you had hoped for?”

The pegasus sat in silence for a few moments before embracing the night pony in a tight hug, catching him off guard. “It’s perfect! I mean it’s everything I wanted and more! When can we turn it on?!”

The night pony let out a nervous laugh. "Glad you like it… now uh, mind letting me breathe?”

The pegasus flashed him an embarrassed look and nodded. “I uhh… yeah, sorry about that, guess I just got a little overexcited.”

“It’s fine It’s honestly flattering that you like it so much. As for when it’ll be on, wait maybe ten or so minutes? My guys are just finishing up the install, then we can test it all out. That work for you?”

Zipper nodded. "Absolutely!”

“Great!” He cheered back. “Now I noticed that you had a coffee stand in there, mind if I go grab some?”

“Oh yeah, not at all. Java brews the best coffee in the arcade… I mean he’s the only one brewing it there, but he’s still the best!”

“Right, well lead on, friend.”

The Cyberbat Starcade

It was finally time… Grand Opening!

Zipper looked up at the sign and excitedly buzzed his wings as Sine continued to hype up the small, but energized crowd that had gathered outside the arcade. It had felt like months had gone by, but it had only been a couple of weeks. In that time, however, the trio of outcasts had grown even closer together, and despite the worries and fears that Sine had brought up, things were going as smoothly as they possibly could.

“Zipper you’re on,” Ink Rose tapped him with a wing, shaking his daydream apart and making the loud cheers of the crowd even louder.

“Huh? Oh my gosh, It’s time!” He cheered.

“You’re up bird brain,” Sine smirked as she hopped over to the side where he was standing. “You’ve got this.”

Together, the trio trotted closer to the entrance, though Ink and Sine stayed back. Zipper was the public face for this project after all, at least when it came to the regular operations. Whether it was just pure coincidence or good luck, Sine had managed to generate a fair amount of buzz online through her prototype game, and her carefully planned timing now meant that the opening day crowds contained ponies from outside the Oasis.

Zipper nervously cleared his throat and walked up to the microphone that Blue Spring had helped him set up earlier and smiled. “Good morning everyone! Are you guys as excited as I am?”

A loud cheer and many hoops and hollers were enough of an answer as any, and at that moment his nerves steadied.

“That’s great to hear! You guys are in for such a treat!” he cheered back to the crowd. As he looked around he saw both familiar and unfamiliar faces, bringing forward strong emotions that threatened to make him cry in joy. “I know it’s sappy, but I can’t tell you how much this means to me. He glanced back towards his two companions and smirked. “For all my life I’ve felt like an outcast, but that changed when this project started. I learned a lot about myself, strengthened bonds with the few friends I had, and made some of the closest bonds I’ve ever had with some new friends… even if there were a few ups and downs.”

The crowd was mostly silent, but it wasn’t for lack of interest. A frighteningly large amount of eyes remained transfixed on the young pegasus, and their silence almost seemed to urge him on.

“I have a lot of big dreams— I guess that’s a blessing and a curse sometimes,” Zipper laughed, being joined by a few others in the crowd. As things settled down more he looked over towards Blue Spring and River Breeze. “This arcade started as a small fundraising project for something even bigger— something I hope we’ll get to share soon someday too. But even though this wasn’t meant to be a big project, it quickly picked up steam and grew a whole life of it’s own, and I couldn’t have done it without the hard work of my friends.”

He waved down to the two friends in the audience. “I know they’re not a big part of the arcade, but I can’t thank Blue Spring and River Breeze enough. They helped me figure out stuff for this and I don’t think I would have gotten as far as I did without their help,” He looked back towards his two companions and waved them over. “I owe a lot to Sine Wave and Ink Rose too. This arcade is just as much of Sine’s baby as it is mine, and we wouldn’t even be opening today without her help.”

Sine gave both Zipper and Ink a hug and then took hold of the mic again. “You know, I don’t care about a lot of things, and for me this was just another way to put my collection to good use. I didn’t think an arcade could be something big here, and I didn’t need it to be either. This place became an interesting crossroads for day and night ponies, and probably even humans too. For anyone who doesn’t know, that’s kind of unusual. It doesn’t seem like such a big deal, but when you look at the kind of rep that night ponies get in places like Riverview and Lazy Pines, it stands out a lot. This might just be a fun place to relax and decompress in now, but who knows, maybe someday it’ll be the kind of thing that inspires others, and maybe it’s good that night ponies can have a place of their own to feel normal in?”

The significance of what Sine was saying was no doubt lost on everyone who hadn’t experienced even a shred of the societal drama that night ponies like Ink Rose had faced, but in her heart she hoped that it could be a way to breed a better sense of community and belonging. That naturally wouldn’t solve every single problem. Though perhaps if she and her companions could show what was possible with some creativity then maybe night ponies wouldn’t just be known for being the aggressive tribe with a gender imbalance bad enough to cause regular fighting. That was another issue in itself, an issue that wouldn’t be solved for a very long time. But she didn’t need this to solve every problem, just paving the way for a more accepting and kind society would be more than enough to make her happy.

Sine’s half-tattooed wings would always be a bitter reminder that there were things that some night ponies would treat as a sacred tradition that shouldn’t dare be disrespected, but for now, they’d have to serve as her motivation to be the change she wanted to see in the world… as much of a target as they painted on her back.

She gestured for Zipper to take his place at the mic once more, and with a gleeful smile the stallion trotted up to it. “I know this got really sappy and kinda emotional, but it does mean a lot to all of us. So I guess I’ll just wrap this all up with another thank you… to everyone who helped us, to everyone who showed up today, and to everyone who feels like sharing this place with others. I guess if no one else has anything to say, then I think it’s time to officially open up! Welcome everyone, to the Cyberbat Starcade!”

The crowd erupted into a burst of cheers, and as cheesy as it was, Zipper, Sine Wave, and Ink Rose came together to cut the ribbon that ran across the doors. With a bow, Zipper waved towards the door and the first official guests began to make their way in.

Silver lazily trotted into the arcade, smiling as the upbeat rock music flowed through his ears. The sights, sounds— all of it filled him with this deep nostalgic feeling that brought fond memories of him spending time in an old arcade with his dad.

He looked around, catching sight of the pegasus playing a game with Sine Wave and the other new night pony who had moved to the Oasis recently. A smirk stretched across his face as he slowly trotted up to the trio, pausing and clearing his throat.

“So this is the arcade that everyone’s been talking about, eh?”

Zipper snapped around and greeted Silver with a nervous expression. "Silver I uhh… how’s it going?”

“I’m good… everything okay Zipper? You seem a little nervous.”

“I just uhh…” he nervously glanced over to Sine who simply shrugged, and then back toward Silver. “I… to tell you the truth, I was afraid of what you’d think. I know you were working on budget stuff until we got the whole management team figured out, and I thought you’d shut this down.”

Silver laughed. "Shut it down? I think you’ve done something really awesome here.”

“I have?!” Zipper’s eyes flashed open. "I mean yeah! I just wanted to make something that everyone could enjoy here, there’s not really a lot of places you can just hang out at.”

Silver absentmindedly laid a hoof across the joystick on the nearby Pac-Man cabinet, smiling as the game cycled through its display mode. "And I have to hand it to you, it seems like you’ve done a good job of giving them something to do.”

“Wait, I have?”

“Mhmm. You’ve got a cafe, an arcade, and you’re even working on that sanctuary idea if the banner outside is anything to go by. Kinda seems like you have the makings of a whole little entertainment district here. And one that might even be a good educational opportunity…”

“I… well, I guess that was the idea in the end.”

“Well, consider me, Scarlet, and Orion your three newest regular customers.”

Zipper’s face lit up in glee. "You really mean it?!”

Silver nodded. "Of course! We need somewhere to unwind and as much as I’m sure Orion would love it, we can’t afford to make weekly Disneyland trips.”

Zipper jumped up and pulled Silver into a tight hug. "Thank you so much! I’m gonna have Sine set you up with all the free play you could ever want, and Orion can even try out the new games early!”

Silver awkwardly fidgeted around. "I… thanks Zip. I know it might not mean much, but I’m proud of you. You’ve come a long way, and I know you’re going to do great things… Now uh, can you let go of me? Kinda getting awkward here.”

The pegasus quickly released Silver from his tight bear hug, giving back an embarrassed. "I’m sorry!” And earning an amused laugh from Sine Wave.

Time would tell whether the arcade would be a success, and how far the sanctuary would get in it’s construction, but the more that Zipper worked, the more he felt as if he was getting to know the real him, and even if it took many years to pull off, he knew he’d be happy. He might have been an outcast, and probably always would be, but being himself with the ponies he loved was more precious than any short-term wish-fulfillment could ever be. As hard as it was at times, in an odd way he felt as if he had found who he truly was in the company of other outcasts.

Author's Note

Special thanks to anyone who’s stayed along for the ride. This story has been a work in progress for two years now and I’m so happy that it’s finally wrapping up. While it’s come to a close, as mentioned above, there’s still some threads left to lay out and I hope you’ll all stay along for whatever comes next.

Chapter 1: Finding a Friend

“Alright, miss Sine. Just relax and take it easy; this is going to sting a bit.” The artist, a pony, named Ink Rose, who fittingly had intricate tattoos running up her front foreleg calmly said as she began to rub one of Sine’s wings with an alcohol wipe.

“Okay,” Sine relaxed her tense muscles. “Now, when you say it’ll hurt a bit, are you just bullshitting me, or are you being serious?”

The other mare chuckled and nodded, giving her own webbed wings a small flap. “Well, it wouldn’t be very nice of me to say it’s gonna hurt like hell, now would it?”

Sine Wave laughed and shrugged. “Fair point. So I guess I’ll just give you a heads up when it gets too bad, right?”

“Yeah, that’s a good idea,” she reached over and attached the modified tattoo gun to a strap on her hoof and smiled. “Alright, deep breath.”

The sting of the tattoo needle on her sensitive wings made Sine Wave wince in pain again, but she didn’t dare cringe back… that was a lesson she did not want to learn the hard way. Instead choosing to try to dull the pain, Sine Wave thought back to why she was here in the first place.

This is my life, my decision, and no pony is going to tell me what I can’t or can’t do with it, she thought to herself.

To say that the decision she was making today was unorthodox would be a very steep understatement because, in a sense, she was doing something that could be considered more than taboo in some circles of night ponies— particularly in monumentally large communities like the kinds you’d see on the east coast in cities like Riverview. And just what was her high crime that might get her mobbed and attacked in those more aggressive communities? It was her tattooing her wings despite not taking Yinyu’s blessing.

This action had become something of a rite of passage in some parts of the United States, but it had yet to crop up in the Oasis, or most parts of the west coast for that matter— at least as far as she could tell. There was no taboo to give her any reason to fear making this decision here, even though she knew she was setting herself up for trouble elsewhere. While not necessarily meant to be an insult or rejection of that branch of night pony culture, getting her wings tattooed was a rejection of an established norm. Not very many ponies would sit down and get tattoos, but that didn’t stop Sine Wave from choosing to express herself in such a way. She was Sine Wave, after all— a pony who strived to live her life to the fullest, and she was very much opposed to simply falling in line with the others around her.

“So when did you take the blessing?” the artist asked her predictable question, looking up from the stylized set of space invader sprites that she was inking.

“I didn’t,” Sine replied.

The artist paused for a second, giving Sine the uneasy feeling she hoped she wouldn’t have to feel tonight. Admittedly, she wasn’t the best with luck. Still, the other night pony’s slight regional accent, her specific enough question, and the way she almost seemed to narrow her gaze at Sine’s answer told her all that she needed to know; this mare was not from around here, and things were possibly about to get messy.

“But…” the mare started, no doubt continuing down the line of confused questioning that Sine had presumed she would just a moment ago.

“But what?” Sine reflexively flicked her ears in annoyance. “Is there a problem with that?”

“Well, it’s just unusual, is all,” The mare replied. “I…” she narrowed her gaze. “You really shouldn’t be doing this.”

“Oh really?” Sine started to raise her voice into an accusatory tone. “You must be from Riverview or something then.”

The mare raised an eyebrow, “What if I am? Do you have a problem with that or something?”

Sine’s otherwise composed demeanor suddenly shattered with her scowl. “Maybe I do, maybe I don’t. Depends on what your next move is.”

Ink Rose seemed to hesitate for a moment, dropping her voice down to a harsh raspy whisper. “You’re asking for a lot of trouble with this; you know that, right? I mean, this is tradition; what happens when one of the mares who took the blessing finds out that you’re just lying?”

“She probably compliments me on my new tattoo and goes about her own business?” Sine fired back. “I know how things are on the east coast, but this isn’t the east coast and not everyone’s got such a barbaric reaction to this kind of thing.”

Ink Rose almost seemed to consider Sine’s point, but still frowned and shook her head. “I think maybe you need to find someone else to do this because I’m not gonna get dragged into this too.”

Sine raised an eyebrow, “Really? You’re pulling this kind of crap?”

Ink nodded. “I’ve seen what happens to mares that pretend like they got the blessing, and it’s not pretty, and I’m not going to get dragged into some bloodbath.”

Sine let out an annoyed groan. “Look, that kind of stuff doesn’t happen out here. Maybe it’s some sacred tradition in Riverview or something, but it's not some concrete law that everyone has to follow everywhere else. No one says what we can or can’t get tattooed.”

“Oh really? So you’re telling me that no one out here takes the blessing and gets their wings done up then?” Ink Rose flashed a skeptical gaze.

“Oh no, plenty of them do,” Sine replied. “Don’t get me wrong either; I think it makes them look even cuter, but that’s the end of it. We’ve got a few stallions here. One is in a committed relationship and has a foal; one is that foal, the other doesn’t want to be in any relationship period, and the other two? Well, one only stops by here every once in a while and doesn’t seem to be all that interested in anything long term.”

“But doesn’t that…” She paused. “I don’t know, back home this kind of thing ended very badly all the time.”

“Tie up the market?” Sine finished her earlier question. “Yeah, of course, it does. Doesn’t hurt that there’s a few dozen mares around, though… unless you’re not into that kind of thing.”

Ink shook her head. “You might not think this is a big deal out here, or even on this side of the country, but what about in the dream realm? Just because night ponies are so split between east and west doesn’t mean you’re not going to get way more heat for that in the dream realm.”

“And that’s supposed to scare me?” Sine countered. “You think the wardens are going to just let other ponies attack me in a dream? You think they’re going to tolerate that kind of behavior when half of them already try to condition fear into so many of us?”

“Maybe it doesn’t scare you, but think about me. I might not talk to them all that often, but I still have friends and family in a place where this is a big deal. How do you think they’re going to react if they find out that I did something like this?”

Sine shrugged. “I didn’t really think about that, but I guess it just goes to show how broken things are if something so benign in an entirely different part of the country is going to cause such an uproar in one little pocket.”

Ink Rose let out a frustrated sigh. “Sure, Riverview’s maybe one of the only places where this happens the way it does, but that’s not at all just one little pocket. It happens in other big populations too, just maybe not to the degree you see there. Compared to everywhere else in the country, they probably have the biggest population of night ponies around and that means that there’s a lot of ponies that could turn on me because of it.”

Something about the way that Ink Rose’s tone had taken caused Sine to reconsider her viewpoint, even if only a little. Sure, this wasn’t anything that would cause a problem locally, or even around most of the places either of them would be, but Ink did raise a valid point about the dream realm.

Sine nodded. “I guess I can understand your point, and I’m sorry for being so brash about it. I guess I just always thought this was dumb and that none of it made any sense or needed to be such a big deal.”

Ink looked back up at Sine, though this time with a softer gaze that almost seemed to betray her inner conflict. She seemed to struggle to find her words, but finally found something to reply back with. “It’s okay. I’m sorry I got so fired up about this too. I guess this kind of stuff is just so hard to break out of. I know it’s not the norm for the rest of the country, or even the world, but Riverview is so closed in that it’s just hard to even think about breaking their taboos.”

“Bit of a culture shock, eh?” Sine replied. “I understand. I’ve never fit in anywhere, even here. It’s hard to shake the feeling that you don’t belong, and I can’t even imagine what living somewhere like Riverview must be like for someone like me.”

“It’s a huge change,” Ink admitted. “And sometimes I wonder if I made the right decision to move or not.”

“What makes you say that?” Sine pressed.

Ink looked up at her again and shrugged. “Lot’s of things. Sometimes I feel like I shouldn’t have tried to broaden my horizons, sometimes I feel like maybe I was just overthinking things back home. I guess the real reason why I moved here was that I didn’t really fit in there all that well either, and I just wanted to take a breath of fresh air and see what else the world had to offer… I guess I didn’t really move on though if stuff like this still strikes a nerve without me thinking much about it.”

“I dunno, it sounds like you put a lot of thought into what you wanted to do, and I can respect that,” Sine looked back at her partially tattooed wing, this time feeling a twinge of guilt and sympathy towards Ink, and the stress and anxiety she was probably feeling. “If you want to know, there’s a reason why I’m so against taking the blessing.”

“Oh?” Ink Rose raised an eyebrow. “If you don’t mind sharing, what is it?”

“Maybe it’s dumb, but I guess I’m afraid— of what it means if I do. I never took the blessing because I never felt like I needed to. My barn door swings both ways, but I’m not ready to just wish away a part of myself. It’s probably just some stupid fear, but what happens when some fundamental part of your identity and psyche is just changed on a whim? Does it change who I am? Does it make me a different person? I guess I never wanted to just lock out a part of myself because it feels like I’m rejecting what makes me… well, me. I know it’s a loaded topic, and I’d be lying if I said that not finding a stallion to settle down with gets frustrating a lot of the time. But what can I do? I’m happy enough with the occasional side fling for now, so what’s the harm in just staying where I’m at and seeing where life takes me? I never felt like I needed to sacrifice a part of myself just to be ‘happy’ because what is happiness at that point?”

Ink Rose let out a sigh. “I can understand that. I know a lot of ponies that felt that way too, and I wish I could say it was an easy thing to overcome. I guess it ties back to how things are where I’m from. If you’ve seen what it’s like back home, you’d know what the harm is, and why this is such a big deal.”

“Well, guess it’s a good thing I live out here then, isn’t it?” Sine half-heartedly offered.

The mare paused. “I guess. It’s just… I don’t know, weird to me in that stupid weird taboo way that isn’t weird to anyone else but ponies like me.”

Sine raised a partially tattooed wing, “Well, what if it isn’t so weird out here? The damage has already been done, so why not finish.”

Ink Rose looked down at her tattoo gun and then back at the wing. “You wanna know the truth? I think I might be in the same boat as you.”

“Oh?” Sine replied. “How so?”

“I liked both too. Mares and stallions, that is. But like… there’s this whole stigma around untattooed mares and well… maybe that’s a part of why I moved away, and something I was always afraid to admit to myself.”

“And is there anything wrong with that? You are who you are, and I think that just makes you special.”

“I dunno…” she trailed off. “I just… I don’t know. Why did you rope me into this? You could have found some human to do it, or someone else or… I don’t know.”

“Because you’re the only tattoo artist here?” Sine replied. “I know, it doesn’t help. What also doesn’t help is that I didn’t care at all about how things were elsewhere, and I’m sorry for that. I know it’s a hard adjustment to make, and I can honestly feel for you now that you’ve shared so much. I guess what I can offer is this: if you’re still afraid that you need to fundamentally change a part of yourself just to get by, then I think you need to take another look at night pony society in the wider sense. I can get why they have to do that back there, and I know that you still see more of those ponies in the dream realm, but Riverview is a lot different than other places, and it doesn’t represent everywhere. I can’t undo what’s already been done, but maybe we can change things?”

“Change things?” Ink shook her head. “I don’t mean to be rude, but that’s not really practical for two ponies to do.”

“I guess I don’t mean like that. I know we can’t really do anything, but maybe we can start to make a difference in a small way? I feel bad about this now, and I wish I could just undo things.”

The sting of the needle picked up again as she continued her well-trained routine, “What do you mean by that?”

Sine was surprised by the sudden sharp pain. “I… what?”

“What you said about things being different out here.”

Sine nodded. “It’s complicated. There’s still competition and desperation, and you do get a lot of them who decide to just cut out the depression and frustration by taking the blessing, but it’s not something that we’ll risk starting fights over. That’s a sure-fire way to get your ass tossed out of here, you know? Hell, a few of them have even started dating outside the tribe, and it seems like they’re handling it well enough.”

“They’re dating outside the tribe? Like with day ponies?” Ink Rose seemed astonished.

“Uh-huh. Let me guess, that doesn’t fly either?”

“No, not at all. Believe me, that’s another big stigma.”

Ink Rose rubbed a paper towel across one of Sine’s wings, making the mare wince. “Sorry, I guess I got lost in thought for a second.”

“It’s okay,” Sine paused. “Guess I deserved it.”

Ink let out a small giggle and shook her head. “Go on.”

Sine nodded her head. “I know it’s weird, but I’m not the only mare out there who’s done this. We don’t deal with it a lot out here, but if you go and move somewhere else? Well, I’m sure it’s a coin toss on whether it’ll work out or not.”

“You’re telling me,” she sighed. “I guess I’m taking a leap of faith with this. Everything in my mind is telling me to just give you a swift kick to the side and throw you out of here, but… I don’t know. A part of me thinks that maybe I just need to take a chance to get out of my comfort zone, and I know this probably isn’t a healthy way to do it but… well, you already have half a design done, so I guess the damage is already dealt.”

“You don’t need to continue if you don’t want to though, I could just go find another artist to finish it, or just live with a half-finished tattoo as a mark of shame.”

“And let some other artist finish my work? I don’t know if you’re familiar with tattoo artists, but that’s another taboo in itself,” she laughed. “So I’m going to just have to take this risk and live with it, and hope that it doesn’t bite me in the ass later.”

This dug at Sine, but it wasn’t as if she could undo anything. “Look, if it’s any consolation, I promise I won’t tell a soul about anything. I owe it to you, and I’ll even go find some mind magic pony to make me keep my silence if it helps.”

Ink shook her head. “That wouldn’t really help unless you got a warden to do it I guess.”

“I can do that,” Sine offered.

“No,” Ink shook her head again. “What’s done is done, and all we can do now is hope that it doesn’t cause trouble. Whether I do anything else for you again… I don’t know yet, and I can’t really say.”

“That’s understandable,” Sine nodded. “So how about this, maybe I don’t get another tattoo from you, maybe I just stop by every once in a while and chat? Maybe we could get to know each other a little better than through inconsiderately breaking cultural taboos like I did.”

Ink hesitated but finally gave a small nod. “I guess we could.” she let out a small sigh. “It’s not often I get to just speak my mind about these kinds of things either.”

“I’m fine if that’s all we chat about. I know it’s a touchy subject and not an easy thing to talk about. I don’t particularly like it, but letting you vent your frustrations is the least I can do to even partially make up for this.”

Ink sighed again at Sine’s words, but something about the way she carried herself made it clear that she wasn’t sighing at Sine specifically. “It’s so annoying back home sometimes, and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t almost thinking about getting the blessing myself. Want to just hang out with a cute stallion and get some lunch somewhere? Better be ready to fight for him because some other mare’s going to swoop in and try to seduce him even if you’re not a pair. If you’re not a pair? Well, then you’re not doing your part to ensure the survival of the tribe, and everyone’s on your case about that. There’s so much competition and bullshit out there that you can’t even hang out with stallions unless you’re in some secluded woods somewhere. You know when the last time I had an actual date with another night pony was?”

“Umm… a long time ago, I’m guessing?” Sine wave asked.

“Yeah, you could say that. Try a few years ago, in fact. It got tempting just to take the blessing and cut out that problem entirely… but I don’t know. It just seemed hard to let go of that part of my identity.”

“And there’s nothing wrong with that either,” Sine reassured her. “I’m bi, and I’m happy with that. But you know why I didn’t take the blessing? Because I don’t care about that stuff. I just want to live my life and do my stuff, and I don’t need a bunch of drama getting in the way of it. I know not every mare can say the same, but I’m proud of who I am.”

“I see… I honestly can’t tell you how reassuring it is to hear that.” She paused again. “So why get your wings tattooed then? Do you just honestly really like the look of it?”

Sine shrugged, keeping her extended wing steady under the needle. “It looks pretty, and if it keeps the other mares off my case when I’m on vacation or out in some other big city, then so be it. I’m not ready to give up yet, but I’m also done with dealing with the drama. Like I said before, the complete lack of a partner out here gets frustrating, but I’ve accepted that I’m either going to be alone for the time being, or I’m looking outside the tribe for companionship.”

“You’re thinking about going for a day pony too?”

Sine seemed to blush slightly, “I’m open to it. But one hasn’t caught my eye yet. It just seems like the route I’m going to have to go if I decide I want to settle down with a stallion. I don’t know what I want right now, but if it works out, then it works out, and if it doesn’t? Well, I guess it’s a good thing I’m not picky then. There’s lots of ponies out here, and I’m sure I’ll find my match someday.”

“I see… this place is a lot different from back home.”

“Is that a bad thing?” Sine asked.

“No, I guess it isn’t. It’s just going to be a lot to get used to.”

A big grin spread across Sine’s face. “Well, if you need a friend to show you around, then I guess you’re in the right place.”

“You’d be my friend?”

“If you’re looking for one,” she nodded. “I can tell there’s a bit of a culture shock here, and I’d be happy to show you around and help you get acquainted with everyone else.”

Ink Rose smiled. “I’d… I’d like that a lot.” The mare looked down at Sine’s outstretched wing. “So, what’s the idea behind these designs?”

Sine Wave smiled. “This is going to sound weird, especially because I’m a nineties mare, but did you ever play old arcade games? Like from back in the eighties?”

Ink shook her head. “I was never really into that stuff; it was before my time and on its way out by the time I was old enough to even get into that kind of thing.”

“Well, they’re inspired by that.” She pointed over to the brightly colored neon designs, “Space invaders, TRON, Pac-Man…” she lingered on one, “And Gauntlet.”

“I know Pac-Man…” Ink replied with a goofy smile. “But that’s about it. I’m guessing that these are all important things to you though?”

“Mhmm,” Sine paused. “Really one of the only connections I have to my old life as weird as it is to say that.”

“Oh? Wanna tell me about that?”

Sine Wave smiled, “Well, if we’re friends, then I guess I could give you a little bit of a primer…”

The rest of the session was filled with some small stories from both of their pasts, though there were still many more to share. In a way though, it helped dull the pain better than anything else thus far. There was still a lingering sense of culture shock between the two, and Sine could tell that Ink Rose had a lot to move on from, but after they were done, she knew that this new pony would become a fast friend… what she didn’t know, however, was that she was about to be introduced to another pony, one who quite literally crashed into her life...

Chapter 9: Planting Roses, Picking Brains

Zipper knocked on Sine’s door and waited for the intercom to reply like it had a couple of days prior. While the sun was high in the sky, the weather was surprisingly cool, and because of that Zipper was actually almost excited to do the gardening he still owed Sine. He closed his eyes and breathed a relaxed breath, lazily leaning against the door while he waited.

Without much warning, the door opened and he was suddenly thrown down in front of a waiting Sine Wave.

“Morning, Bird Brain,” She replied with a laugh. “Did I catch you at a bad time?”

“I uhh— no it’s all good,” Zipper stammered out.

“You just weren’t expecting me to pull the door open out of the blue, right?” Sine held out a hoof and helped the flustered pegasi stand up.

Zipper scrambled to his hooves and dusted himself off, letting out a small sigh. “You could say that. Going to guess it’s an early day for you or something?”

“A little,” the mare shrugged. “Purline just stopped by and dropped off the roses maybe twenty minutes ago. Otherwise I’d be hanging out in my office working on stuff.” She waved Zipper in and closed the door behind her. “So, ready to get started?”

“While it’s still nice out? Of course!” Zipper cheerfully replied. “Can’t waste a good day like this.”

Sine smiled. “You really are trying to show a different side of yourself lately, eh?”

“As much as I can, I guess,” Zipper replied. Taking the lead, he trotted over to the back door, and slid it open. “Can I tell you a secret?”

“Only if you’re comfortable with it,” Sine replied.

“I’m still trying to find myself. I hid for so long behind a mask that it’s sometimes hard for me to figure out how the real Zipper is. I know, it sounds dumb.”

“No,” Sine shook her head. “Figuring out the true meaning of your talent and embarking on some self-discovery isn’t the most unheard of thing in the world,” She looked him in the eyes. “Look, I don’t know your whole life story, but these last few times I’ve seen you, you’ve been a very different pony. It’s not dumb to clean up your act, especially when you’re trying to be genuine instead of pretending to be someone else.”

Zipper idly brushed a hoof through his mane and tried to figure out what to say next. He was never great with being genuine, and surprisingly not the best at accepting compliments when it came to admitting his own shortcomings.

“Look…” he started. “I appreciate it… I really do. I’m still trying to be honest to who I am, and I guess I don’t always know who that is.”

“I’m sure we’ll both learn that soon enough. Especially if we’re working together more going forward.”

“Thanks,” Zipper smiled. “I know I’m weird and annoying sometimes, but I’m trying to do my best.”

“Keep at it,” Sine assured him. “You managed to make someone who hated your guts tolerate you… and I think soon we might even be able to call each other friends.”

A small blush spread across Zipper’s face, and he turned away to hide his embarrassment. “You think so?”

“If you keep doing cute things like that and sharing your real self then yeah, absolutely.

Zipper couldn’t help but freeze at the compliment, not because it caught him off guard, but rather because in that weird way he simply wasn’t used to this kind of positive conversation. It wasn’t to say he never had held friendly chats before, but the bulk of them were mostly shared between Blue Spring, and no one else.

“I…” he started to stammer out. “It means a lot to hear that!”

“It means a lot to see you make good on something,” Sine Wave agreed. “Why don’t we get cracking on this and then we can take a break and chat some more over lunch?”

“That would be great,” Zipper chipperly replied.

“Good,” Sine gestured towards a box of roses. “Let’s start at the far side of the garden, that way we can finish up back over here. Does that sound good?”

“Yeah,” Zipper nodded. “That’s a good idea.”

Being mindful of the time, Zipper took the first steps towards the soon-to-be-planted flowers and grabbed the first bundle. Sine wasn’t far behind him, and a few moments later they were at the edge of Sine’s garden. Zipper hadn’t originally seen much of a point in tilling the garden when the flowers hadn’t even been purchased yet, but now Sine’s reasoning for having him do so made all the more sense. With half the work done in advance, all he would have to worry about was digging little holes with his hooves and dropping the plants into place.

Sine, clearly picking up on his realization, couldn’t help but let out a snicker. “Always remember bird brain, I always have a reason for doing something, even if it’s not your way.”

Zipper pulled one of the plants out of the bundle and dropped it into the fresh hole he had dug. Careful not to crush the expensive flower he had dropped such a large sum on, Zipper gently patted the soil down around it. “Yeah, I’m figuring that out now.”

Though it was monotonous and boring work, the pair were able to work together well as a team, and before Zipper knew it, he had planted the last flower.

He was covered in dirt, was sweating, and was a little tired from all the work (and from missing his typical afternoon nap), but his and Sine’s hard work had clearly paid off and now a vibrant garden of roses spread out in front of them.

“You did good today, bird brain,” Sine praised him with a literal pat on the back. “I know it wasn’t your idea of fun, but seeing as how you upheld your end of the deal… consider the slate wiped clean.”

“So are we friends then?” Zipper asked, followed by a small yawn.

“Hmmm,” Sine started. “Not quite yet— but we’re close I think.”

Zipper smiled. “Well it’s better than being enemies, that’s for sure.”

“Of course. And if you keep doing things like this then maybe we’ll be friends. Sound like a fair deal to you?”

Zipper nodded. “I think that’d be good,” he paused and looked over to the fruits of his and Sine’s labor. “I’m sorry it took all of this to make things right.”

“Apology accepted,” Sine replied in a rare show of gratitude. “I’m not one to hold a grudge if the pony in question makes things right. You finished doing that today and that’s more than I expected from you. So thank you.”

Glancing up at the sky, Sine squinted at the bright light that was still a few hours away from setting. “You worked hard today, so why don’t we go inside and I’ll get you something to drink. I made some lemonade the other day and I don’t want to brag, but I think it’s fantastic.”

A small smirk spread across the stallion’s face. “Oh yeah? I guess I’ll have to give it a try then.”

“Am I supposed to believe that you’re some kind of drink connoisseur or something?” Sine giggled. “Because that would be the real twist to you.”

“No,” Zipper admitted. “But lemon is easily in my top five favorite fruits so you could say I like it a lot.”

Sine shook her head and pointed to the door. “Go on in then, I guess we’ll find out whether I’m bird brain approved or not.”

With one of his favorite treats being offered, Zipper was more than happy to oblige.

The inside of Sine’s home was as dark as always, but thankfully for him she had decided to light a few candles which at least offered something more than the gloomy darkness that most night pony homes were known to have. Even without the candlelight though, Sine’s house was at least different in the fact that her preferred decor consisted of dim faux neon signs and a handful of retro posters lit by black light.

As the mare poured him a glass of her world famous lemonade, Zipper couldn’t help but take a closer look at the quaint decor.

“You’ve got a thing for retro stuff, eh?” He asked.

Sine slid the glass over to him and cocked her head to the side. “Your little friend asked me to help you guys out with some arcade machines… so wasn’t that the big giveaway?”

Zipper took a sip of the delectable drink and smiled, basking in its citrusy flavor for a moment before giving a reply.

“I uhh… yeah, I guess that should have been obvious. I I just didn’t realize how much cool stuff you actually had here.

Upon closer inspection, Zipper couldn’t help but notice the entertainment center that sat in the nearby living room, and more importantly (and unsurprisingly), the collection of old fashioned game consoles that were proudly displayed for her guests to see.

“There’s a reason why I’m more than happy to help out with your arcade idea after all,” she took a few sips from her own cup. “If I had a big enough house I wouldn’t even think of renting the cabinets out… but then again, it would be more of a crime to not let others play them.”

“That’s honestly why you’re perfect for the job. I like this stuff a lot, but I don’t think I’ll ever have the means to get those kinds of things.”

“You’re a retro fan too? Wouldn’t have pegged you for it if I’m going to be honest.”

Zipper shrugged. “I grew up in Vegas. Arcades aren’t as big of a deal there but there was a cool one I always went to as a kid and it made me jealous of the people that grew up around them.”

“No kidding. That’s actually kind of cool,” Sine replied. “I grew up in SoCal so there weren’t a ton of legit arcades around— at least none that really scratched that itch for me. I was born in ninety-three so I missed the prime of arcades, but as cliche as it was, I was your basic nineties kid who loved geeky old stuff and it stuck with me.”

“You could say I was the same kind of way,”
Zipper nodded. “I was ninety-five but there was still some cool stuff around. Made it nice when I had to entertain myself after school.”

“It’s always the little things like that that you take for granted sometimes,” Sine admitted. “Maybe that’s why this whole arcade idea sounds good to me. My parents lived paycheck to paycheck so we didn’t ever have or get to do anything big or fancy, but dad would always take me to the mall and let me play whatever I wanted while the arcade was open there. I was the girl that loved the old movies more than the new stuff, so I didn’t have a lot of friends that liked what I did, but going to that place when I could have me a chance to at least hang out with other people that were like me.”

“I liked old movies too!” Zipper excitedly said, and then blushed as a wave of embarrassment rushed through him. “I mean— I just remember going to blockbuster as a kid and renting whatever I could get my hands on. The old goofy action movies were my favorite, but then there was stuff like Star Wars, and gremlins, and robocop…”

“Lots of good picks,” Sine chuckled. “You should do this more often, you know?”

“Hang out with you?” He raised an eyebrow.

“Not necessarily,” Sine laughed. “Though given what you’re saying that might be nice too. But no, I mean sharing what you liked. Because if you hadn’t said any of that before, then I probably wouldn’t be so interested in what you’re saying.”

“Doesn’t that make me a geek or something though?” He asked.

“Yeah, it does. But it’s cute, it’s honest, and by the way you lit up a second ago, I can tell it’s who you are, and who you should be instead of whatever macho stereotype you’ve always tried to be.”

“I didn’t put all that much thought into it before…” Zipper started. “But I feel like deep inside, that’s another reason why I wanted to do something like this.”

“For real?“ Sine asked. “Maybe it’s a sign then. Something that gives you more reason for doing it.”

Zipper closed his eyes and thought deeply about his motivations, before giving Sine a nod. “Some of that was— is rooted in me trying to be someone different than the pony I was pretending to be… and I think that in my head building up a place that caters to what I like gave me the hope that others who liked that stuff would stop by too.”

Sine Wave smiled and set her glass down. “You’ve done that with one pony at least.”

“I have?” Zipper asked in surprise.

“Mhmm,” she nodded. “I’ve always been an outcast, and even here I haven’t found too many others who like what I like. In a way you could say that’s why I always played games as a kid and why I keep to myself a lot. Other kids were into sports and clubs and I liked to hangout with the weirdos that pulled apart computers for fun— and well, outside of work there’s not too many of those here.” A wistful nostalgia seemed to radiate from the mare, and with a big smile on her face she continued. “I miss that stuff a lot, and it’s actually nice knowing that there’s someone else here who likes it too. The others don’t do that stuff outside of work, so it’s… well, something I just don’t get to do as much.”

Zipper considered everything that she had said for a moment, and then suddenly had an idea as if a lightbulb had flashed on above his head. “Would you want to set up something for that maybe?” He offered.

Sine broke from her nostalgic trance and raised an eyebrow. “Huh?”

“Like some kind of drive in where we could watch old movies, maybe set up a space to tinker with computers and stuff with… and whatever other geeky things you’d want to do.”

“Who’s gonna tag along? All the people at work have families and other stuff they’d rather be doing outside of work.”

“It could be us,” Zipper blurted out before covering his mouth. “I mean… like if you wanted to every once in a while or something…”

A small smirk formed on Sine’s face. “Just the two of us eh? Are you asking me out on a date or something?”

Zipper blushed and almost choked on the lemonade, and quickly downed the rest of it to hopefully stifle his coughing fit. Taking a deep breath, he regained enough of his composure to form a response, albeit one that could only deliver in a small hushed voice.

“I uhh… if you want to I mean… maybe it would be fun.”

His heart was pounding and he silently hoped that Sine’s house was dark enough to mask the bright red hue that his face was no doubt taking on. While the idea of going on a simple date or spending some time together on something fun with Sine sounded great in his mind, another part of him cursed him for getting too emotional too quickly out of nowhere.

“I’m— sorry if that was out of nowhere,” he frantically apologized.

“Hey,” Sine replied. “It’s alright. It’s honestly flattering, but maybe let’s work on doing stuff as friends first before we think about something like that. Sound good?”

“Yeahthatsperfect!” Zipper blurted out. “I mean— that would be good… wait, so we’re friends?”

Sine let out a laugh and nodded her head. “After all that? Yeah, I think we’re pretty close to being friends.”

Zipper couldn’t help but look away, and thankfully Sine had evidently picked up on his embarrassment enough to mercifully change subjects.

“So, what’d you think of my lemonade, Zip?”

He quickly turned his head and grinned a goofy smile. “It was amazing!”

Sine smiled again. “I told you it was world famous, eh?”

“You sure did,” Zipper breathed a sigh of relief. “So uhh… how do you want me to fix your wall?”

“Don’t worry about it. You did more than enough here today, and I’m proud of you. The rest is an easy fix I’ll just pay someone else to patch up.”

“Let me know how much it is and I’ll pay you back,” Zipper offered.

“Hmm,” Sine hesitated for a moment. “How about you take me to a movie and we’ll call it even?”

Zipper blushed again and meekly nodded his head. “That would be nice.”

“I got in touch with my guy about those cabinets by the way,” Sine added. “The guy said he can drive them over tomorrow. Is that enough time to get the arcade space prepped?”

“Huh?” The pegasus looked up. “Oh, yeah. That’s actually perfect.”

“Good,” Sine laughed. “Because I didn’t have a backup plan for if you said no. So am I cool to just have him deliver them there then?”

“Yeah,” Zipper nodded. “I’ll send you the address again just so you can forward it exactly as it’s written. I have no idea if map programs even give directions out here, but it’s better than nothing.”

“That’d be great. I asked if he could drop them off early in the morning, and he said that works out fine. So I’ll probably beat you there then.”

“I’ll set an alarm,” Zipper replied. “See you in the morning then?”

The mare smiled. “See you then.”