In Which The Author Probably Goes On The No-Fly List For The Rest Of Their Life
The majority of ponies waiting in line to board the zeppelin rather naturally thought the taupe-and-tan stallion who operated the luggage inspection station was part of Security, and they were just as naturally wrong. The stallion wanted nothing to do with Security, because those were the ponies who responded to emergencies by Doing Something, and that was just never going to work out -- for him. There were certain fundamental understandings of the universe built into the stallion's birth certificate and one of those said during an Emergency, anypony named Petty Power had exactly one responsibility: to protect himself. And once survival had been ensured, the natural followup would be finding somepony to blame. In Petty's case, the ideal for that would have obviously been somepony else, and it was just one of the reasons why his current career was mere hours away from ending forever.
He didn't care about Security, because that wasn't his job. Yes, there had recently been rumors of an unknown party potentially planning some kind of sabotage against the company, but he didn't take them seriously. And whenever anypony who was about to board brought them up, he encouraged them towards equal dismissal. Because a portion of Petty's job was to be part of the relay chain which got those ponies onto the zeppelin.
In the ideal case, they would board with happy smiles, saddlebags jingling with bits, and they would also be freshly deprived of anything which might have slowed down the spending. Because zeppelin tickets could be surprisingly cheap, but anything you did while on deck came with a Slight Additional Charge and when it came to the magic of advertising terms, 'Slight' had to put in a lot of dictionary effort to levitate the sheer amount of mass. If you wanted a full zeppelin (or as full as the weight capacity would allow it to be, which was another crucial part of Petty's assignment), then you told ponies that everything was going to be fine and if you turned out to be wrong, then how was that your fault?
Being right wasn't in his job description. He'd checked.
The rumors didn't matter, especially since none of them could ever directly affect him. He had been working for the Gasbag Zeppelin Touring Company for eight years, and the closest he'd gotten to boarding an airship had been through peering into the baggage hold. (You couldn't even see the zeppelin from the enclosed inspection area, because that was the reward for those who had gotten through.) As far as Petty was concerned, the only important thing was to do his job properly, which meant following every posted Rule and Regulation. Doing so created a shield against responsibility, because anything which went wrong after getting through Petty's station was clearly somepony else's fault. Besides, why would anypony ever want to sabotage a zeppelin, anyway? The only thing the rumors could potentially do was sabotage ticket sales, which led to less onboard spending, and that could potentially summon Mr. Gasbag. Petty had never seen the company's owner and still understood that it was very important to keep him a long way off, just in case he exploded.
Rumors about potential sabotage were stupid enough. But Petty got to listen to the passengers as they waited to board (although he tried to ignore most of it, especially when they were openly anticipating having to Complain), and the gossip was somehow becoming dumber. Now there were ponies saying that there might be secret investigators among the passengers. Sent by the palace. And that was ridiculous, because if there was anything truly worth worrying about, then the company would have been investigating on its own.
There was a long, slow line waiting to board the zeppelin for the full-day-with-overnight-cruise tour: a slow, leisurely circuit of the capital and the lands surrounding the mountain, proceeding along a well-established path which was protected by spells, anti-monster techniques, and the certainty which came from knowing that every previous zeppelin had made it home just fine. It was a long line because the rumors still weren't being taken all that seriously, and it was a slow one because Petty liked it that way. Additionally, there was what normally would have been seen as a very overpriced drinks-only station directly adjacent to the line. It wasn't overpriced because it was a preview of what the passengers were about to face on board and if the line moved slowly on a hot day, Petty got a cut.
But the future passengers waited. They had no other choice. There was Fun to be had on the zeppelin. The zeppelin provided as much Fun as anypony could reasonably pay for, which was why it was crucial for Petty to prevent everypony from bringing any of their own on board for free.
The latest temporarily-confiscated items were placed into one of the many open-faced cubes in the special wall directly behind Petty. He wrote up a comprehensive list of everything taken, sealed the little cube with a shimmering wall of light, and nosed over the mare's receipt.
"It was just a double jaw grip tugging ball," she said. "I've never tugged against my mate on a zeppelin before --"
"-- there's a tugball activity scheduled for Sun-lowering," Petty told her. "So we only allow official equipment. You can sign up once you're on board. However, there is a Slight Additional Charge. Next?
She frowned.
"How slight --"
"-- next!"
The mare reluctantly moved along. The tip of a purple horn stepped up.
It took a second before Petty's eyeline adjusted sufficiently downward, followed by two more before he could tell himself not to hunt for the missing parents. Close inspection told him that the unicorn was clearly an adult: she just happened to be a rather small one. It was something which made the overfull saddlebags stand out all the more, because the mare also had an exceptionally narrow ribcage and the well-designed bulging jeweled carriers had effectively doubled her width.
So there was a lot to go through. He wished it was a hotter day.
"I am your Luggage Inspector," eight years of careful practice recited, and continued to do so no matter how often everypony behind the little unicorn in the line had heard it already. "I am here to make sure that no prohibited items are brought onto the zeppelin. You cannot board unless your luggage is inspected. Any forbidden items will be held here until you disembark. No item has been forbidden without reason, and those reasons can be explained to you at need." He told himself that the pause was artful. "You will receive a receipt. And then you can board the Eternal Golden Braid."
"I understand," the little mare said. "I just wish I'd had time to read the full list before I got the ticket! We --" she paused, quickly glanced behind her towards nothing Petty cared to regard "-- I. I wasn't expecting to be taking an air tour this week. It just came up. Unexpectedly." Hopefully, "That happens all the time, doesn't it?"
"Open your saddlebags for me," the speech pranced forth, "and arrange their contents on the table between us."
"How do you want them arranged?" she immediately asked. "Size? Color? Year of invention? Current level of thaum charge?"
Which told him that another cube was probably about to become occupied, because bringing enchanted devices on board for entertainment purposes was strictly forbidden. (Renting such devices from the dedicated booth on Deck 2 was strongly encouraged.) "Just extract the contents. All of them."
The little mare's expression briefly passed through an odd level of disappointment. "Okay..."
The horn ignited. Pinkish energy surrounded the saddlebag lids, lifted both sides at once. A number of things came floating out, and Petty immediately focused his attention on the three largest.
"No books."
Instantly, "But I thought that if we finished early -- I mean, finished sightseeing early, because I've lived around here for a little while now and I'm sure I've seen a lot of it -- I could --"
"No books," Petty firmly said. "Outside books are Prohibited, as the Written Word serves as a distraction from the beauty of the tour. But there is a book cart on board, if you truly care to indulge with a rental."
She visibly thought about that.
"Renting books."
"The per-page rate is quite reasonable," Petty falsely assured her.
Carefully, "Why aren't the rental books prohibited?"
"Mr. Gasbag has standards for the titles he permits to be on board."
"And those standards are...?" she carefully tried.
"There are ponies behind you in line," he reminded her.
"Is the central requirement," the little mare checked, "being available from a rental cart?"
Which was when he knew there was a Smart One in front of him, and the best thing to do with those abominations was to pass them through quickly before anypony else within hearing range began to catch on.
"So let's just look at the rest of your things," he quickly continued. "This --"
His gaze moved to the right.
It attempted to recenter.
Then Petty did his best to follow the curve, and that wasn't any better. The surface of the thing kept trying to get away from him.
It glowed. It sparked. It occasionally seemed to buzz, but that might have just been the result of the visual displays setting up some level of white noise within his brain. It existed in three dimensions, but had a time-share within a fourth and kept peeking through the door to see what the last tenant had done with the place.
If asked to describe it, Petty would have said that it was mostly brass, except for where it was aether and, towards the apex, turned into the metaconcept of Why? He then would have added an insistence that he'd known exactly what it was, because you didn't get to be Petty Power through ever admitting that you were out of your depth.
"No entertainment devices," he forcefully tried, because the item was clearly enchanted.
"Oh, it's not for entertainment!" the little mare smiled. "It's for science!"
"Science," Petty attempted. Was there a Regulation which forbade science? He wasn't sure. Up until this point, nopony had tried to bring any.
"Yes," the small unicorn insisted. "They measure things!"
"...they?"
She nodded towards the rest of the table. Petty risked a brief glance, and only managed to wrench his attention away from the black hole of the fourth through jolting his entire body to the right.
"I wanted to learn all about being on a zeppelin!" she gushed. "Like how your central device works. The one which changes the air into something that holds the airship up. And its charge level. How many thaums it takes per minute to maintain. How fast the charge drops. If it's dropping any faster than it should. I want to learn exactly how everything is enchanted. Because that's the single best way to work out how something could go wrong --"
She stopped. Winced once, as the striped tail briefly lashed into its owner's hind legs.
"-- it's all just science," she not-so-smoothly finished. "So there's no need to confiscate any of it. Because science is important."
He risked another look. A vault of his chin got him over #4, and nearly landed him in the optical mire created by the distortion of spacetime which surrounded #9.
"It's all science?"
"Yes!" she beamed, as a certain light began to rise at the back of her eyes. "I can explain the function of every last one! It'll just take a few minutes."
"There are ponies behind you --"
"-- and I'm sure they'd love the chance for a free doctorate-level education!" the mare gushed. "It's really just a few minutes! Each." (The happy announcement was met by a distant group muttering, and it wasn't as distant as it could have been.) "Also, I'll need that second book back. For the diagrams. And do you happen to have a chalkboard --"
Petty, acting mostly in self-defense, finished his internal review. There was nothing in the Regulations about Science and, once he got past the books and a small array of blank scrolls, nothing whatsoever which he recognized as belonging to the local reality.
He had a problem. And when you were Petty, the thing to do with a problem was giving it to somepony else. This was clearly a job for a specialist.
"-- there is a waiting area off to your right," he told the unicorn. "The one behind the ropes, with its own table. Collect your devices and bring them there. I'm going to send for somepony else, and you can explain your luggage to them."
The joyous inner light of Impending Lecture began to fade.
"Okay," the mare's disappointment offered. "But honestly, most ponies should really know this sort of thing on sight --"
"-- next!"
The pink earth pony mare was on the tall side, just a little overweight, had a tail which featured a wild tangle of bouncy curls, and she was very much Petty's type.
He almost passed her through with the few snacks she'd packed into nearly-empty saddlebags, because that would have been his idea of flirting. But there were Regulations to consider, and all food had to be purchased on board at a Slight Additional Charge. It made her briefly frown to see her treats confiscated, and Petty relished that because it had been a rather cute one.
However, once she was on the other side of the waiting area, he quickly looked up her contact information from the boarding pass purchase, and then surreptitiously copied all of it. After all, if Petty Power couldn't do things like that, then what was the point?
The white unicorn -- the third mare in a row to be wearing some version of those elaborate saddlebags, and he almost wondered if there was a new trend going around -- primly stepped forward, exactly on cue.
"Empty your --"
"-- a moment, please," she precisely interrupted. "The remainder is on the way."
He looked at her. Then he briefly regarded her perfectly-balanced saddlebags, along with the way they fully failed to bulge at any panel or seam.
"The remainder of what?"
The white mare carefully inclined her head to the left and back. Petty looked.
He kept looking.
Petty usually didn't pay attention to anything other than the prospective passenger directly in front of him, because to regard the whole of the line was to potentially estimate the number of ponies in it. That could only lead to horrors like trying to make it move faster. But he wasn't actually looking at the line. Instead, he was regarding the parade of huge, heavy suitcases and giant steamer trunks which were currently moving towards the inspection station of their own accord.
There was a total absence of glow. Instead, they mostly advanced through the power of sonics. Every grunt was a hoofwidth gained, or possibly a spine jammed --
-- porters. This mare was having luggage-obscured porters bring the whole of her luggage in. The grunts were the key. Multiple agonized ponies were pushing the burden with the tops of their lowered heads. Simple enough.
Then Petty remembered that the company didn't employ porters. There had never been any need.
"There's a maximum weight allowance," he told the white mare. "Tell your --" volunteers? "-- assistants to stop. Pick out a saddlebag set's worth of items, and I'll inspect --"
"Whatever for?" The dismissive sniff came with a toss of the elaborate mane, and the combination almost registered as Art. "There's certainly plenty of space on board a zeppelin! From everything I've seen in the magazines, a zeppelin is just about nothing except vacant, waiting space!"
"You don't understand the first rule of zeppelins," Petty irritably told her, because that much had been in the employee manual and so he knew it by heart. (Comprehension was somepony else's problem.)
"Which is?" she inquired.
"You can have all the space you want," he recited, "as long as you don't fill it with anything. The envelope only has so much lifting capacity. We keep it to the vitals." Which mostly meant that which was required for Profit, plus some passengers to generate it.
"But all of this is vital!" she protested. "Just for starters, I understand that part of the affair involves a group dinner! And how, one might ask, should a proper mare know what to wear for the occasion without personally seeing what Canterlot has brought to the party? So I fetched a few options. And brought them with me, so I could choose properly."
Petty made himself look past her. He counted steamer trunks and, when that got to be too much for him, switched to tallying thumps as exhausted ponies collapsed behind them.
"A. Few. Options."
"Along with some basic sewing supplies," the white unicorn brightly added. "Because there are times when the only solution is to make something new on the spot. Which, of course, requires fabrics. Bolts. A number of gems. But I did keep it to the more portable devices. Now, when it comes to the overnight accommodations --" shoulders, hips, and eyelashes each tossed off their own shudder "-- properly cleaning a bed which has been used by so many others has a basic requirement of --"
"-- take everything into the waiting area on the right," he told her. "Stand next to the mare with the devices. Get it down to two packed saddlebags --"
"-- oooh!" she fumed. "How can a civilized stallion possibly ask a lady to --"
"-- and one carry-on. Which you have to be capable of carrying in your mouth." Which he generally wouldn't have allowed, but Regulations could be stretched that far and while Petty usually didn't care about how long it took to get through the line, he was rather good at spotting a mare who was prepared to argue for several hours. "And then get back in the line."
"Oooh!" the angry mare repeated. "Very well! If the gentlecolts who followed me in would be so kind...?"
She stomped off towards the waiting area, joining the smaller unicorn mare with a lash of her tail and three rather unladylike snorts. Petty immediately ignored her, and so missed every whisper which followed.
"Twilight?"
"What is it, Rarity?"
"Memorize this area, please. Then, once we are all on board, come into my room and memorize that as well. Before the airship begins moving, of course. After that, teleport back here, collect the small blue bag from whatever cube it winds up in --"
"-- there's going to be a security spell. And there's rules --"
"-- which I trust you to briefly break without anypony noticing, and the rules appear to be rather stupid. Collect the bag, restore the spell, and return to me. I trust one additional piece will not cause us to crash, given how little some other ponies are carrying." She sniffed again. "I accept that I may have to improvise with whatever I find on board. Curtains, perhaps. Or bedsheets, once they've been properly cleaned. But I will not be deprived of basic sewing supplies. After all, a lady never knows when such a thing might be needed."
The pink earth pony, who hadn't tried to board yet, moved into the waiting area. The shift of the curly tail got Petty's attention, and he used a few seconds in watching it bob along as she carefully hung up several colorful streamers.
Petty's job involved dealing with the public. Ideally, he wanted to deal with each member of that line-waiting public just long enough for them to realize that he was Petty Power and therefore, they had better do what he said. He didn't want to know them, he had no interest in knowing about them (unless they were exceptionally cute), and he had quickly decided that anypony who seemed to be trying for a more personal approach was just working up towards getting him to break a Rule. The vast majority of them didn't even think to try a bribe. Which Petty would gladly accept -- followed by ignoring whatever he'd just been paid to do and tracking to the path of Regulations. Bribes made up a nice side boost to his income, but they didn't change the fact that Mr. Gasbag had been known to explode.
He only dealt with each member of the public for as long as was strictly necessary. In the case of the pegasus with the prismatic mane and tail, it took less than two minutes for Petty to realize she was insane.
"You pass," he told her, shortly before the lunacy kicked in. "Unless somepony's bringing in more bags for you." She had barely been carrying anything at all.
"I travel light," the pegasus proudly said. "Too much stuff slows you down."
Petty, still dealing with the afterimages of the white unicorn's traveling morass (and the scent of those who had fallen in trying to move it), gave her the unexpected courtesy of a nod.
"Next," he announced.
"And I can just borrow stuff from everypony else anyway," she added.
"Next," Petty hinted.
She didn't move. Or rather, the legs didn't. The wings had been subtly vibrating the whole time.
"Since it went so fast," she started, "I've got some questions. About the Eternal Golden Braid. Why that name, anyway?"
It had been in the manual. "It's named after the unique metal stitching used to form the lifting envelope. Next --"
"-- oh, yeah! I saw the glint before we came in here!" Her volume dropped, and did so by a whole conspiratorial decibel. "Can passengers get a look at the inside? I heard the air is really strange in there. It's supposed to make your voice go all funny."
Petty, who was dealing with the brash tones at close range, briefly considered that it might just make the mare's voice go all normal. "There's a small secured area for passengers to stand in. You'll have to schedule your view once you're on board. Careful booking might even get you time alone. There's a Slight Additional Charge. Next --"
Her neck arced forward.
"What about flying?"
"Pegasi who fly away from the Braid," he automatically recited, "are no longer the responsibility of the company. Next --"
"-- no! Flying inside the envelope!"
And then he was staring into madness.
(Madness had magenta eyes. He would have predicted something more in the line of blazing red.)
"I mean, is the air changed so much that you can't push against it any more?" the mare asked. "Has anypony tried? Am I gonna be the first? Because that could be important. Getting somepony to move around the inside in a hurry. So in case that's needed, somepony should really make sure flight is possible. And if somepony already did, then I've got to get some practice in. Because maybe whoever tested it didn't do hovers. Or tight turns. Or find out how close to the edge they could come without hitting it. Is there a record or anything? Closest pass? Most time spent in there without rebounding off something?"
He couldn't stop staring at her.
The brash tones turned oddly thoughtful.
"Also, speaking of stuff which ponies really should have tested already. Just in case one of those turns isn't tight enough. How fast can a pony be going when they hit the envelope without going through?"
Petty swallowed. Twice.
"You..." he forced out, and just barely.
"I think that's important to know," the pegasus said. "Not that it's gonna happen. But just in case."
Her luggage had been fine. All seven of the items within it. There had been no toothbrush, and a belated moment of personal horror told him she'd been planning to borrow one. He had no Rules-granted reason to ban her...
"You..." Petty choked, "...go stand in the waiting area. With the others. Somepony will talk to you. After they talk to her. And possibly her."
She shrugged.
"I'll go."
"Go --"
"-- but I'm gonna hover."
Her wings spread to their full span, and she flew to where the others were waiting. The pink earth pony favored the pegasus with a small sympathetic nod, then directed her to the smaller refreshment table (which had balloons at each corner) and offered up a bowl of peanuts.
The orange earth pony mare was big. Nowhere near a giant, but... big. Solid. Even to Petty's Rules-dimmed eyes, she seemed to have a way of standing in one place which suggested that she wasn't used to remaining still that long -- but if the circumstances dictated it, she was prepared to do so for a considerable amount of time.
That was what the stance told him. The lashing blonde tail added an extra note of unhappiness.
"An' why can't Ah bring it?"
Petty sniffed at the recently-opened cylinder again, and briefly regretted the existence of receipts. The cider within the thermos was perfect.
"Company Regulations," he dictated, "forbid anypony to bring more than thirty-two drams of any given liquid on board."
The mare's jaw went tight. Powerful muscles briefly became visible around the neck.
"Still waitin' on a 'why' here," she angrily declared.
There were several reasons available in the manual. The real one was that refreshments were available on board. So were certain kinds of liquid-based toiletries and in both cases, limiting passengers to bringing thirty-two drams -- a little less than four tablespoons -- of anything usually meant they had so little as to guarantee a number of Slight Additional Charges. But he wasn't supposed to recite that one.
Petty's training offered a number of other options and because the hovering insanity was now chatting with the overpacker while the little mare regarded the area as if trying to emboss it upon her brain, he went with the one meant to dissuade the stupid.
"There's a side effect produced by all of the spells used to make the zeppelin work," he told the big earth pony. "Any liquids of more than thirty-two drams in volume will explode."
It was meant to make her back away. Retreat in fear. A desperately muttered apology would have been a side bonus.
A solid left forehoof ground against the floor and in doing so, completely drowned out the sound of the little unicorn taking a very deep breath.
"Any liquid," the earth pony said.
"Yes."
"Like that one cistern which Ah saw your crew loadin' up while we were comin' in past the airship," she added. "Makes some sense, t' put it in the kitchen. Assumin' it's the kind of explosion which heats up first, 'cause you could make it double for stove duty before it went off."
She wasn't the first to say that.
"The cistern is enchanted to prevent it," he lied, and then verbally moved to intercept what he anticipated as her response. "As are the mugs we use. The sinks. Everything which holds liquids. But the spells, which only one unicorn knows, take several days to cast --"
"What spells?" when whispered by the little unicorn, didn't quite reach him. "And when does the caster sleep? Does anypony ever believe this?"
"-- and we clearly don't have time to enchant your thermos. So --"
"-- don't get much repeat business, do you?" the big mare asked.
"Many passengers," he automatically said, "having tried the overnight trip as a basic introduction to our services --"
"It doesn't have to be overnight!" decided a brash half-whisper. "I was figuring out the speed! Ponies can trot faster than this thing moves! And who wants to trot, anyway?"
"It is a zeppelin, Rainbow," the white mare stated. "The lack of speed is part of the appeal. The chance to slow down and simply enjoy the world."
"What kind of dumb pony enjoys slowing down?"
"You see more when you slow down."
"Prove it."
"For starters? I would suggest that at a somewhat lower speed, you might have seen the side of the Boutique in time to actually complete your turn."
Petty wrenched his attention back to the big mare, whose rope-bound tail had just completed its tenth lash.
"As a basic introduction to our services," he repeated, "later choose to book one of our many longer trips."
"And y'carry their corpses?" the mare sedately asked. "Respectin' a hire from the dead. Now that's customer service."
He couldn't seem to blink. Petty hadn't stared at passengers this often in years.
"What are you talking about --"
"-- bloodstream's a liquid," had its very own edge. "Ponies get on. Enchantments kick in. Zeppelin goes up. Ponies go boom. Which probably makes it easier on y'all for the next trip, 'cause they're gonna be in pieces. So for space efficiency, y'can book one passenger in Cabin Four. An' Five through Nine. At the same time. An' because you're all 'bout the customer, Ah'd expect you t' stick the heads by the windows for the best view --"
The manual had nothing for this, and so the stallion made a mistake. He improvised. Petty Power hadn't been meant for that sort of thing.
"-- the natural magic in a pony body stops it!"
"Oh, sure," the little mare muttered. "Now he's going to start into Advanced Biothaum Theory..."
"Does it?" the much larger earth pony darkly asked. "Comfort t' know that once the drink leaves the mug, Ah don't have t' wait for thirty-two drams t' get all the way through before Ah can have some more. An' by all the way through, Ah mean --"
"It's a thirty-two dram limit!" Petty could hear the desperation now. It still took a moment before he identified it as his own. "That's the Rule! Thirty-two drams isn't enough to do any damage --"
The little unicorn rather audibly cleared her throat.
"Actually," she lectured at normal volume, "that's not even remotely true. There's a lot of liquids where pouring that much in the right place could do a lot of damage. Just for starters, there's aqua regia. Do you know about that?"
"Aqua --" was as far as she let him get.
"It's an acid. One of the only things known to dissolve gold. And if you were very careful about which part you were dissolving --"
"-- next --" was just about all he had left.
"-- it starts out clear when you mix it, but it can pick up a color pretty quickly," the little unicorn added. "Because unless you seal it in a hurry, it'll start reacting. That usually produces nitrosyl chloride and nitrogen dioxide. It puts the final hue into a range from --"
Petty rallied.
"NO THERMOS! NEXT!"
The yellow pegasus took some time to fully come into sight. She had to force herself into view, one trembling leg at a time.
She was, in some ways, rather pretty. But there wasn't enough of her face visible, the wings were a little too large for her body, the tail was far too full, and she spent most of the inspection time looking at the floor. Or rather, the one visible eye did. The other was presumably enjoying its perpetual view of manefall.
There was a mare who was exactly his type, and she was pushing something heavy, metal, and wheeled across the center of the waiting area's party. After a moment, she thoughtfully stopped and trimmed off a trailing piece of fuse.
"...um," the pegasus finally said as he confiscated The Wilderness Spotter's Guide To What's Probably About To Eat You. (It was available from the book rental cart.)
He ignored her.
"...I was looking at the zeppelin's envelope on the way in," she softly continued. "Because it's pretty, with the gold stitching going all over it."
This didn't seem to be worthy of comment.
"...and because I didn't trust it to hold me up," the yellow pegasus added.
Petty slowly, slowly raised his head. Then he had to lower it again in order to meet the reluctant gaze of that one visible eye, ignoring her jeweled saddlebags along the way.
"...it's nothing personal," she told him. "I don't trust my wings to hold me up either. So I was looking at the envelope. And it's very nice stitching. Professional. I can tell. But..." Her ribs just barely shifted with the breath. "...it's all the same stitch. A gobelin stitch." One more breath, and then the words accelerated. "And the thing about a gobelin is that once any part of it goes, extra pressure can just send every other loop unraveling right after it. I know it's gold thread, you're stitching with gold and maybe that's because it looks so nice. Or because it's soft enough that you can pull it into thread to start with. But it's still a gobelin stitch. All of it is. And there weren't a lot of ripstop places or reinforcement zones. Barely any. It's almost continuous. So... um..."
After it all ended, Petty's attempts to save his job would offer up multiple excuses as to why none of it had been his fault.
"Gobelin."
"...I have this... freaky knowledge of sewing. I could show you a sample. How it goes together, and how it comes apart. Once I get some thread. My friend always has some --"
He could hear passengers muttering behind her. They sounded as if they were becoming nervous. Scared. Reluctant to board. And that was the important thing. The only important thing for somepony who didn't work in Security. Petty was doing his job, the most vital job, and that meant nothing could ever be his fault.
A single scaredypony could be dealt with, and the best way to do that was through getting her past his station. After that, she was somepony else's problem.
Regardless, nopony accepted the one about his not having possessed the necessary vocabulary, either.
"...and," she said, doing so before he realized that he'd missed a number of intervening words, "...I'm probably not supposed to say this, but... there's the rumors. About possible sabotage --"
"Nopony," Petty firmly declared, "is going to sabotage the Braid."
With soft, frantic insistence as every feather twitched, "...but the stitching -- you don't know --"
"What good would sabotaging a zeppelin even do?" the stallion demanded, and recognized too late that he'd done so out loud.
"...it could fall on something."
He blinked. This failed to calm the hoof-shuffling in the line.
"...it's heavy," the pegasus softly said, "and it would be falling fast. All it has to do is drop in the right place..."
A brash voice called out "She's right! I drop on things all the time!"
"And ponies," stated the little unicorn.
"Are you ever going to let that go?"
"No."
"...you need different stitching," the yellow mare whispered, and yet her words sounded throughout the inspection area. "More kinds. More variety. More safeguards --"
There was exactly one possible response for all of it.
"NEXT!"
"Hello," said a very young voice from somewhere well below his snout. "I've only got a few things. But I was listening, and... some of them are ink bottles. So I was hoping you might have some really small containers. I can pour the ink out and make them thirty-two drams or less each. But it's easier if I have something new that I can seal." Hopefully, "Do you have something like that? Even if there's a extra charge?"
Petty, already pulling up the price list in his head, looked down.
Further down.
Further still --
"-- NO! NO DRAGONS! NO SOURCES OF FLAME ON THE BRAID! SECURITY! SECURITY --"
The small reptile, eyes wide and fearful, was already pulling back -- but somepony else was moving.
"-- don't you dare!" yelled the little mare, thin legs pushing into a gallop as she raced towards his station. "That's species discrimination! I've got every law memorized! You can't keep my brother off, and I'd hope that none of the books on your precious rental cart are dusty! And your precious device doesn't even use hydrogen!"
Only two words got through. One had been 'discrimination,' and nothing made Mr. Gasbag detonate with more force than the prospect of being sued. The other...
"...brother?" Petty weakly said.
He wound up repeating the designation a few times as the other five mares who had clustered within the waiting area's party closed in. It didn't help.
It was over, at least in so far as that they were no longer his problem. Five very huffy mares had fully surrounded a visibily-protected dragon, collectively guarding the small reptile as they all went towards the exit, ready to board the Braid at last. The cute pink earth pony had stayed behind, because some dismantling was required before she could leave. She was starting with the chocolate fountain --
-- Petty blinked.
He inhaled, and vocabulary which hadn't known 'gobelin' wasn't capable of distinguishing '70% cacao' either.
He moved. And for the first time in eight working years, the stallion left his station.
"WHAT IS ALL OF THIS?" he screamed at the cute one, all four hooves nearly skidding out from the sudden stop and halting just short of the streamers. "WHERE DID IT EVEN COME FROM --"
"I had it all with me the whole time," the cute mare said. "So you passed it through."
"THAT'S A CANNON --"
Her left forehoof gently touched his lips, and all sound died.
"You've been watching me whenever you could," she passively observed. "Also the whole time. Because you like the way I look. Some ponies do. You looked as much as you could get away with. But you looking at me is like you missing my party supplies. It really really doesn't matter what you're looking at, because you don't see things the right way. So I'm going to pack all of this. Just because we needed to have some fun while we were waiting for you to stop being stupid doesn't mean I won't clean up. But I don't want you looking at me again. Ever."
She paused.
"Right after this next part," the pink mare added.
"Right... after..." he forced past the hoof.
"You like my tail," she openly noted. "Take a really good look."
The mare's body spun.
And given everything that came before and after, being whipped across the face by wild curls turned out to be the highlight of his day.
There was a zebra, and Petty had already been accused of species discrimination. (He was dearly hoping that didn't get back to Mr. Gasbag. He'd just remembered that dragons were supposed to have hoards.) He concentrated on the contents of the newest saddlebags.
The zebra had packed several thin, fine blades.
"Hoof shaving," the other stallion pleasantly said, and displayed the rather rough forepair. "To get rid of the stains."
There was a company pamphlet showing the Braid in cross-section. Several areas had been marked in ink. Times were written in descending columns, clustered around the illustration of the lifting envelope.
"Planning my onboard activities."
Multiple thin vials of liquid had been bound within padding. The contents ranged from yellow to red. (During the trial, an expert testified as to how this could be produced by the amount of exposure the acid received prior to sealing.) None of them were more than thirty-two drams.
"Medicine."
All of it passed.
The improvised emergency rescue which prevented the sabotaged Braid from crashing into the home of a certain Day Court representative, potentially shutting down the bill he'd been drafting to stop the import of certain suspect high-risk potions which had initially been brought into Equestria by a tiny, homeland-rejected cartel which cared about nothing except profit... that turned out to have a lot of moving parts. For starters, the little mare had effectively tried to levitate the zeppelin. All of it. A feat which had been beyond her strength -- but she'd managed to slow the descent enough for the others to act, giving everything she had until the point when calories ran out and the unicorn finally collapsed.
But she'd bought them time. Enough for her sibling to try something else, and he'd been the second to faint after all resources had been consumed -- but he'd still managed to help. The sabotaged lifting device had been failing, and the altered air which was leaking out of the acid-ruined unraveling seams couldn't be replaced -- but there was more than one way to gain buoyancy with air, and what remained could be heated.
Each sibling lifting, in their own way. Purchasing precious minutes. Time during which the prismatic had rapidly carried the white unicorn around the interior of the fraying envelope, and blue energies had frantically stitched a binding repair according to the pattern dictated by the yellow pegasus. And while all of that had been going on, the orange earth pony had been galloping across the whole of the Braid, lightening the airship through dumping and draining everything unnecessary. Multiple newspaper articles noted that she'd initially gone straight for the cisterns, because water had the most weight.
In the end, nopony was hurt. The cartel, with its members arrested, was shut down: the homeland reached out to claim its share of justice. The Braid itself required major repairs and needed two weeks before it could even be moved, but the zeppelin would fly again.
And yet, Mr. Gasbag still exploded.
He exploded all over the luggage inspector, because the company owner had heard a full account from everypony who'd been in the line, and somehow came to the conclusion that it was all Petty's fault.
This seemed horribly unfair.
Petty never worked in Equestria again. It took only a few moons before he realized that nopony possessed the common sense required to hire him, and he got away from his undeserved reputation through moving to Prance.
But if there was anything Petty Power needed in order to inflict himself upon others, it was Rules and Regulations. So, shortly after settling in, he started something new, because if Petty had to live in a foreign land, he was at least going to make sure all of the little houses were painted the right color.
It was a movement which only caught on in Prance, because that was a nation which loved to inflict itself upon its own citizenry. Equestria had the common sense to watch for the moment when the idea first tried to cross the border, followed by kicking it to death.
He founded the very first Neighborhood Homeowner's Petty Standards Association.
The picayune dictators for each of the hundreds of little fiefdoms which sprang up across the country were so happy about it as to almost consider giving him a little of the credit.
