The Trolley Problem

by Admiral Biscuit

Rating: teen
Tags: Slice of Life, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Other, Original Character, Mystery, Second Person
Length: 1662

An encounter with tourists who lack the fare for your trolley leaves you with a choice: follow the rules, or bend them just a bit?

An encounter with tourists who lack the fare for your trolley leaves you with a choice: follow the rules, or bend them just a bit?

A choose-your-own-adventure story

Written for Whinny City '24

Published 2024-09-01 11:50:04 UTC
Last updated 2024-09-01 11:50:04 UTC

Hero

“How much do you have?” you ask. It really doesn’t matter; you’ve already decided to let them board. You know full well that the city is more expensive than tourists realize, so it’s easy to understand how they might not have budgeted enough to have a trolley fare left over at the end of the day, especially if they weren’t expecting to be riding one.

“Enough for three,” she says, and that seals the deal in your mind. There’s a gray area when it comes to foals anyway; certainly if they’re small enough to be carried they don’t get charged, and while only two are being currently carried, a third could be if her hooves got tired.

“Welcome aboard,” It’s a slow night anyway; the trolley isn’t all that full, and if you’re considering the overall economics of it, it’s better to get three fares for six passengers rather than no fares for no passengers.

They all clamber aboard and the mare dumps out her bit purse into the fare box. Her foals trot off to seats and when you look back to make sure that everypony’s secure, you see that most of them are looking out the window, as you’d expect. One of them, however, is watching you intently as you advance the throttle and ring the bell.

•••

“So what made you decide that you wanted to be a trolley operator?”

“Oh, well, you’ll think it’s silly,” your trainee says. “Back when I was just a foal, we were visiting Manehattan and I thought that the trolleys were the most amazing thing and I really wanted to ride one but we didn’t have the bits, so Mom said that we couldn’t . . . but then we had to, ‘cause we were running late, we would have missed our train, and the trolley operator let us board even though we didn’t have enough.”

“Huh.”

He looks down at his hooves. “It’s weird, I know.”

“Not so weird,” you tell him. You reach back and flick off a circuit breaker.

The Trolley Problem

For the old-timers, the trolley was a sign of the modernization of Manehattan, a more convenient way for ponies to get around than the omnibuses or wagonways. For you—well, your first experience had been riding one when you were little, and the experience stuck with you and you knew that one day you’d be a trolley operator.

Some years later, that dream came to fruition. It wasn’t quite what you’d imagined at first, especially not when you started off filling out forms and then reading rules and regulations and operating instructions before you could even get into the operator’s cabin of a trolley. In fact, in some ways it was like being back in school, since you had a whole group of other new-hires, brought on as a result of line expansion: the trolley system had gone interurban, connecting Manehattan with several nearby communities nearly as fast as they could build rails.

The moment you knew you’d really made it was when the company issued you a uniform. A heavy woolen jacket with shiny buttons, each embossed with the trolley company’s logo, and a hat that was not unlike a ship captain’s.

You practiced running a trolley in the yard, and then you graduated to observing a senior motormare as she drove her route. You went to the workshops and saw trolleys in various states of repair, teaching you where all the components were and how they operated. You learned what might go wrong; what faults could be fixed on the rails, and which would require the trolley to be towed back to the repair shed.

You got booklets of timetables and regulations, you learned bell signals and when you had the right-of-way and when you didn’t, and then it was back out on the rails with another senior motormare, but this time you were at the controls, and she was only there to make sure you did it all right.

She’d constantly quiz you, her questions simple as you first started out and then getting more complex as you progressed. Which street was next? Which street paralleled the tracks? Where would a pony wanting to go to the natural history museum get off? Once she sabotaged the trolley, switching off a breaker when you weren’t paying attention. You twisted the throttle and nothing happened. A glance at the power meter showed that the trolley pole was still touching the catenary, so what had gone wrong?

It took you five minutes to solve the problem, and then you were on your way again, delayed. One fare had jumped off the trolley, muttering that he could trot faster than this newfangled contraption could travel.

She’d just shrugged. “Breakers trip on their own sometimes, and I know they don’t teach you that could happen. If it trips twice, though, don’t try to reset it. And always write it up in the log.”

The book hadn’t told you the difference between wet rails and dry rails, nor how they might buckle in hot weather, giving the trolley a bumpy ride. You’d learned that on your own. The book hadn’t told you that sometimes ponies didn’t respect the trolley’s right-of-way and would block it, sometimes as they were unloading a wagon. It had warned of fare-jumpers and daredevils who would try and hang on to the back of the trolley for a free ride. Ponies on roller skates were the worst offenders, and you were always wary as you saw them.

•••

Some of the shine had worn off the job over the years, but you still felt the same thrill as you dressed in your uniform, as you stepped into the carbarn and found your assigned trolley. In some ways, every day was the same; the trolley was captive on its tracks and couldn’t go off and explore any other part of the city. And yet, every day was different; every day was a new adventure.

You’d grown a thick skin when it came to ponies trying to board for free. They always had an excuse for why they couldn’t pay the fare and while you were sympathetic you couldn’t just be giving away rides for free.

You regarded the cluster of ponies gathered at the boarding door. A mother with her children—three foals on hoof, and both she and one of her children is carrying another on their back. They’ve got the usual accouterments of tourists, and give off a country vibe. She introduces herself as Apple Leaves.

“We don’t have enough money to pay all our fares,” the mother explains. “We were just going to walk back to the train station, but then Apple Tart, he—”

She continues on with her explanation, and you hold up a hoof. She’s delaying the tram, and the schedule is important.

CHOICE:
They don’t have a full fare; do you let them board anyway?

Yes, your job is to take ponies to their destination; if they’re a few bits short, so what? (Hero)
No, if they can’t pay, they can’t ride. Those are the rules. (Villain)

Author's Note

Pre-read by AlwaysDressesInStyle

Villain

You do have some leeway when it comes to admitting passengers, but she’s only got fares for half her family. “I’m sorry,” you say. “The company’s really strict about allowing fare-jumping. If you can’t pay, you can’t board. It’s just that simple.”

Her face falls. “I understand.”

You pull the doors shut and ring the bell, then twist the lever to get the trolley in motion. In the rearview mirror, you see the group of them start walking in the direction of the train station.

•••

There are any number of problems which affect the trolleys—breakdowns, line blockages, overcrowding . . . fires are a new one. The stoves seem to be the cause of the issue, but nopony knows why. Nothing has changed in years: the trolley you typically operate is two decades old now, and one of its sisters went up in flames just a few weeks before.

As a result, you inspect the stove carefully at the beginning of your shift, and whenever you happen to be in the passenger cabin. Thus far, you haven’t seen anything out of the ordinary—no one has.

Two days prior, another trolley on your route went up in flames; burned down to a husk before the fire department could get there and put it out. It’s affecting the routes; new equipment has been ordered but trolleys can’t be built overnight and it will be a while before new ones arrive. The equipment is spread thin, delays ripple across the system, the schedule has been cut.

The pony with the grimy smudges across his cutie mark doesn’t stand out when he boards; you serve plenty of working-class ponies. You’ve never seen him before but he could be a new hire. It’s only pure coincidence that you’re looking back at the mirror as he kicks something in the direction of the stove, and a few minutes later, you see flames burst forth, eagerly licking at the wooden walls of the trolley.

If he’d tried that on a later run, he might have gotten away with it; your first responsibility is to the safety of your passengers, not capturing an arsonist. But they’re all regulars, they know where the exits are and get out fast, and you tackle him as he tries to gallop off into the crowd of onlookers.

“Why?”

You can see the anger in his eyes. “Years ago, one of you turned my family away when we didn’t have enough fare . . . we missed the train, my sister lost her job, and we went hungry for a couple of years until we could get back on our hooves, so I swore my revenge.” And then he swings a hoof at you and gallops off into the crowd of rubberneckers before you can give chase.