Version: 1

Anon tugged on his collar nervously as sweat dripped down his forehead. His partner, Mouse, was sitting next to him and also appeared uncomfortable. The room was dark so that the screen which took up an entire wall could be seen clearly. Currently displayed on the screen was another meeting room that appeared almost identical to the one Anon and Mouse were in. Except it was occupied by a single dark blue alicorn. Princess Luna was wearing a pair of glasses on the end of her muzzle as she carefully examined a city map.

"Are you certain this is a realistic layout for a densely populated human settlement?" the dark mare asked, looking up at the screen pointedly.

Anon cleared his throat. "Of course, your majesty. We did our best to meet your request. It is inspired by, but not a copy of, a number of real cities."

The mare hummed as her gaze fell upon the map again. "The sports stadium is a nice touch, but I do not see a major road leading by the parking lot that could support the kind of traffic volume expected for such a busy location."

Mouse chose to answer this concern. "Your highness, as you can see from our design, the parking lot is made of multiple sections and is meant to be approached and entered from every direction at once. Therefor a single flow of traffic would be unlikely. Not a real construction technique that has been tried, but that is a... valid theoretical layout."

Princess Luna rubbed her chin and hummed again. "Interesting. What about these apartment blocks? I understand a large number of humans can live in each structure, but is there really enough housing here for 100,000 humans?"

Anon spoke up. "As you can see the apartments are distributed around the perimeter of the city. This is true to the majority of human development. The inner city tends to be mostly businesses and wealthier accommodations, with higher density living on the edges."

"You didn't answer my question," the Princess huffed. "Is there enough housing in this design for 100,000 humans? Would this qualify as a major city?"

Anon swallowed. "Maybe," he admitted. "You requested we not waste space or time on designing a suburban sprawl, but the suburbs make up a significant portion of the modern human--"

"How many humans could be housed in this city?" the Princess cut him off with a dark tone.

Anon hesitated so Mouse answered. "Just under 85,000. However, there are enough theoretical jobs in that space to employ over 120,000."

The alicorn clicked her tongue. She tapped the desk. She narrowed her eyes. Slowly she began to nod. "Very well," she eventually conceded. Luna then glanced down at the map. "How long would it take you to build?"

Anon sighed with relief before speaking up. "If you provide us the materials and space, as promised, we can begin construction in about six months. The finished product should require a little less than two years after that. Based on our estimations."

The alicorn suddenly glared at them. "That's a lot of time for one city."

Anon went stiff. "Please understand, your majesty. For us humans this is a very large and complex project. This is a city. It will take time just to get the equipment in, not to mention the number of employees we'll have to hire. Once we have the method refined I promise each new city will be built faster than the last. And even bigger too."

Princess Luna sat back thoughtfully. "So what you are proposing is that if we sign an exclusive contract with your company to build these cities for us you will become ever more specialized with each project. That you will be able to build them faster and bigger every time?"

"Exactly," Anon grinned confidently.

The mare tapped the table a few times. "We were hoping to avoid creating monopolies, but... we also don't want to wait. My sister and I want our toys ready to play with more often than once every two years."

Anon swallowed. "We should be able to build you structurally accurate cities, right down to the plumbing and sewer systems, in less than a year once we are established. A city this size should take only a little more than eight months once we refine our techniques and find regular employees."

The Princess sighed. "Your explanation makes sense. Very well, I will sign off on this project," she declared dismissively. "However, before we agree to a longer-term exclusive deal, my sister and I will have to discuss it."

Anon struggled to contain his excitement. "Of course, your highness. We appreciate your business."

"Yes yes yes," the mare waved a hoof. "A file with the location details will be sent to you shortly. Please update me as soon as possible with a proposed timetable. My sister and I want to be there to see when construction begins. And ends," she added with an ominous smile. "Good day, sir Anon and Mouse."

The screen went dark and Anon immediately rose from his seat and made for the exit. Mouse was startled by the abrupt and rapid exit and had to hurry after him.

"Sir!" Mouse called. "May I ask you a question?"

Anon stopped and turned to face his assistant. "I believe you just did," he said with a bit of happy sass.

"Sir, why would you try so hard to get that contract? You really want to build cities just so those... monsters can... destroy them?"

Anon stared at Mouse. "I don't care what they do with them or why they want them. The fact is a lot of new jobs were just born and a huge inflow of cash is about to hit this stalling economy because of it. The pony princesses are willing to provide the materials and they are going to pay us little humans to build them entire cities just so they can dance on-top of them? They are willing to pour billions into the human economy just to make them toys? So they can pretend to be living disasters? I don't care. I'm a businessman and the only thing that matters is our stockholders."

Anon then leaned in. "And if we get that exclusive contract, we are going to become the largest construction corporation that ever existed. That means you and me will be the richest men in the world. Congratulations." Anon patted Mouse on the arm and began walking away.

Mouse winced. "Richest men in the world at the cost of feeding a pair of giants with rampage addiction..."

Author's Note

Partially inspired by orpbus's pink dragon Eve, saatchi's blue alligator Nisha, and T-Bone's green dragon Anita. These three characters have an ongoing theme of being macros who own a corporation, so they regularly appear in business suits looming over employees or a city. Great gag and all, but what I always wondered is what the product/service of their companies were. Like, what kind of business would a macro run? I couldn't really think of anything logical myself, so I tried turning the question the other way around. What product/service would a macro happily pay for? The answer came to me immediately.

A city to rampage in of course!