Post by waxworks on Oct 23, 2013 4:13:01 GMT
PSSSSSSSSSSSST
The great machine gave another noisy hiss as the weight of a single, large-bodied pegasus came dropping onto it with full force, sending the equivalent mass possessed by three smaller pegasus ponies rocketing into the air above the machine. As the machine was repeatedly struck in such a manner, a conga-line of clouds proceeded through the device, coming in with a cheerful white, cottony appearance, leaving with a strained, electrically charged crackle. This was the machine that put the spark into the storm clouds, powered by teams of pegasus ponies working the massive bellows by leaping and dropping onto them. However on this particular day, there was a team of ponies on one side, and a single pegasus on the other, her tremendous bulk sufficient to replace an entire team.
As the whistle blew for the day, Galvanic Reaction dropped her head, sweat dripping from her mane, and a sly grin slid across her face. She normally worked the wind mill, turning the big fans that produced the breezes, crosswinds, and blusters from Cloudsdale, but today they'd been short of staff and a managerial weatherpony had nervously approached her to fill in. She wouldn't admit aloud that it had been fun, but as she trod off of the large platform, she gave it one last stomp with a back leg, sending an unprepared pegasus on the other platform popping into the air and onto the other members of his team.
It was hard to even call Galvanic a pony, given her tremendous size and muscular girth, but she was a weatherpony and storms were her specialty. As she headed back to her room in an upper floor of the wind mill, she reflected on the day. More successful than she'd thought it would be, pretty cathartic to punch the lightning pad all day. They'd even managed to beat quota for the day by a significant amount, not that she'd ever have use for that sort of overachiever mentality.
After letting a stray raincloud in the bathroom blast the sweat from her, she slid her headphones back on and cranked up what could only be described as music to flee a collapsing building to. Her room was fairly small in comparison to her size, but it was adequate. There was a bed, a desk, and a wrapping bookshelf that was filled with a number of well worn paperbacks. Mysteries, thrillers, spy stories, anything full of twists and turns, last minute surprises, desperate struggles against impossible odds. On the desk was a folded letter spread out to be read, with a neatly collected bundle of similar letters tied with ribbon and stored carefully to one side.
She regarded the letter again as the music blared, her mismatched eyes scanning over the lines again. Rivet Stitch. Her voice floated off of the page and into Galvanic's mind, but it wasn't quite right. When writing, she had emotion. Expression. The large pegasus girl knew that wasn't right but it had been too long since she'd heard her friend's voice. What had it been, five years? Six? She'd toyed with visiting her again and again, but again and again she'd descended into the fantasy of the visit rather than the actual act.
But today, she had a wild hare running through her brain. Maybe it had been the time spent slamming the lightning machine all day, maybe it had just been the right combination of music and adrenalin, but she was in the mood to rekindle old fires. Of course, a long journey wouldn't be that great, just a short visit as the weekend came up, fly out, visit, fly ba-
"Ponyville?" Galvanic blinked in surprise, and looked at the envelope again. Clearly written in Rivet's exceedingly readable magical penponyship, the large pegasus couldn't believe she hadn't noticed it before. She knocked over the bundled stack of letters and went over the envelopes. Ponyville, Ponyville, Ponyville. She couldn't explain it, she'd been certain, absolutely certain that her friend still lived in that distant little town where they'd both grown up. True she'd left for medical school, but Galvanic always assumed afterwards she went back there to practice. This was too good to be true. Ponyville was quite literally a hop, skip, and a plummet from Cloudsdale. She could be there in minutes.
She felt like she was about to swallow her tongue. All this time, her foalhood friend had been just minutes away, and she'd never thought to visit? There was a sudden flash of all of those times when she'd wished she'd had somepony to talk to, times she'd wanted to see Rivet, and a stabbing pang to realize she was just down there in the town, waiting. There was no question in Galvanic's mind now. Her brain had been thoroughly galvanized with action. She would visit, this very evening.
----------------------------------
In Ponyville, a typical, cool evening was coming to a close. The sun would set soon, and the Ponyville nightlife, what there was of it, would start up. Generally speaking, restaurants and clubs to help relax the workpony that had spent all day busy and now wanted to unwind. This serenity was disturbed however, by something strange in the air. A few dark clouds started swirling together, forming a rather small yet still frighteningly impressive cyclone that seemed to touch down in the center of town and deposit a large present in its wake.
Of course this entrance had been on Galvanic's mind the entire time she'd been brushing her mane and making her way out of the Cloudsdale weather works. She had time to think, as she generally wasn't the sort of mare that ran for anything. It just wasn't in character, she'd assured herself, to be seen running. But if she was going to make an appearance she wanted it to start off imposing to prevent any unnecessary questions. In her mind she thought Rivet would be just sitting there in town, perhaps at a cafe, and in that case she wanted her friend's first sight of her in so many years to be something a little jaw dropping. That wasn't the case, though.
Really, she knew where her friend would be. From the letters it'd been quite clear that Rivet was skillfully employed at the Ponyville Hospital, and that's where she'd be found. But still, Gally had always been fond of making a good entrance. She stalked through the streets with her gaze hung low like the headlights of a truck. As if she'd been wearing blinders, she kept her eyes forward, heavily plodding through the streets while some of the smaller ponies skittered out of her way. The hospital, that was her target. Just keep your mind on it, ignore everything else, keep your head low and mind how you're trotting. Don't gallop.
----------------------------------
A document bathed in magical energy floated before a single, uncaring eye. It was an article about treating older ponies with balance issues through the use of a clever little magical device, part of a collection of neurology articles Rivet Stitch had been thinking about using for an article to write. While a great percentage of her day at Ponyville Hospital had to do with treating the sick and injured, research and advancing medical knowledge was an equally important part of it all. A lot of that was the less exciting work of reading, writing, and submitting reports.
Rivet Stitch's eye scanned over the pages with seeming indifference, but a great curiosity kept her reading the pages. She'd just gotten to information on the device's inventor, an elderly pony afflicted with balance issues himself, when a voice casually came from her left.
"Well don't you look like a proper doctor now, Stitches."
The mint-colored unicorn's head swiveled like a shopping-cart wheel, with an absolute lack of expression on her face. She remained absolutely quiet, simply facing the large pegasus. For most ponies, they would've found this terribly off-putting, but Galvanic knew how to read Rivet Stitch's lack of emotions. Surprise in Rivet Stitch appeared as absolute, silent indifference. But it was for how long she went without comment that one could tell how surprised she was. Silence meant her brain was still trying to find the words to say. No expression meant she didn't have the time or focus to put on one of her practiced facial expressions. Galvanic smiled. She didn't do it often in front of others, but Stitches was special. She got the smile.
"Galvanic," Rivet finally managed, her brain finally screwing itself back in. After a moment of remembering where she'd left her body, she got up, and with surprising, mechanical speed shot over to her friend and wrapped her hooves around her neck, the same way a small child would wrap their arms around the branch of a tree they were trying to climb.
The large pegasus was unused to physical contact of this sort, her internal systems all screwed up right now. Typically there was a set collection of restrictions, responses, and expectations to sort through until an approved response came up, but Stitches had the old access codes that punched through all of this, punched through all of the barriers, and she was hugging the pegasus from her foalhood days. For one brief moment, Galvanic almost cried, but managed to suck the tears back in. It was a happy reunion, that's all. Stitches was here, looked just like she used to, a bit older sure, but here she was, the same pony she'd always known.
There was no point in asking how she'd been, the letters back and forth between them had said all of that and more. There'd been a tremendous amount of dialogue between the two of them over the years, but none of it had been said aloud between them. There'd only been imagination on each as to how the conversation had actually gone. Only one thing managed its way out, as Stitches stared at her friend dispassionately but with the sort of held gaze that could only be explained by someone trying to study some familiar thing they'd only seen years before.
"Where have you been."
-----------------------------------------------------
They talked at length about work and life, ponies they'd met, things they'd seen, things they hadn't. They filled in the cracks of their letters, added the color that no amount of writing on either end could do. Rivet remarked how much stronger Galvanic looked, Gally responded how much smarter Stitches looked. Like two ancient land masses that had long ago divided when the world shifted, they were now coming back together to find that while their coastlines may no longer have matched up like the seams of a zipper, they were still complimentary.
"You should meet my friends," said Rivet flatly, internally marveling at how cool and collected her friend still seemed after all of these years. Of course it's how she'd always pictured her friend, but after all of these years it was reassuring to see that it really was as she'd pictured it. Galvanic had meanwhile expected that she'd have found Stitches in some dramatic medical drama scene with nurses galloping left and right while sirens went off, but at the core of all of that she'd expected to see her friend working away like always. "I'm sure they'd just love you."
Galvanic didn't grunt. Normally she would have grunted the statement away, but not for Stitches. Stitches got consideration when she made a suggestion. Friends. Other friends. Friends other than her. The thought hung heavily in her head. True, she'd heard about them in the letters. She almost knew them already. The spooky one, the silent one, the cheerful one, the joking one, the fiery one. Something about actually meeting them made her hesitant.
Stitches was in. She was qualified. She was protected property to be defended from outside attack. She was inside the borders, sitting safely in the castle, far from the borders in fact. But now... these others. Did they get a pass? Were they already in? There was some strange argument going on at Galvanic's borders about policy that was making her stomach feel absolutely uneasy. But then she looked at her friend's face. Everything would be alright, she had a friend here. It was just like the old days again, as long as the two of them were together, everything would be fine.
Right?
The great machine gave another noisy hiss as the weight of a single, large-bodied pegasus came dropping onto it with full force, sending the equivalent mass possessed by three smaller pegasus ponies rocketing into the air above the machine. As the machine was repeatedly struck in such a manner, a conga-line of clouds proceeded through the device, coming in with a cheerful white, cottony appearance, leaving with a strained, electrically charged crackle. This was the machine that put the spark into the storm clouds, powered by teams of pegasus ponies working the massive bellows by leaping and dropping onto them. However on this particular day, there was a team of ponies on one side, and a single pegasus on the other, her tremendous bulk sufficient to replace an entire team.
As the whistle blew for the day, Galvanic Reaction dropped her head, sweat dripping from her mane, and a sly grin slid across her face. She normally worked the wind mill, turning the big fans that produced the breezes, crosswinds, and blusters from Cloudsdale, but today they'd been short of staff and a managerial weatherpony had nervously approached her to fill in. She wouldn't admit aloud that it had been fun, but as she trod off of the large platform, she gave it one last stomp with a back leg, sending an unprepared pegasus on the other platform popping into the air and onto the other members of his team.
It was hard to even call Galvanic a pony, given her tremendous size and muscular girth, but she was a weatherpony and storms were her specialty. As she headed back to her room in an upper floor of the wind mill, she reflected on the day. More successful than she'd thought it would be, pretty cathartic to punch the lightning pad all day. They'd even managed to beat quota for the day by a significant amount, not that she'd ever have use for that sort of overachiever mentality.
After letting a stray raincloud in the bathroom blast the sweat from her, she slid her headphones back on and cranked up what could only be described as music to flee a collapsing building to. Her room was fairly small in comparison to her size, but it was adequate. There was a bed, a desk, and a wrapping bookshelf that was filled with a number of well worn paperbacks. Mysteries, thrillers, spy stories, anything full of twists and turns, last minute surprises, desperate struggles against impossible odds. On the desk was a folded letter spread out to be read, with a neatly collected bundle of similar letters tied with ribbon and stored carefully to one side.
She regarded the letter again as the music blared, her mismatched eyes scanning over the lines again. Rivet Stitch. Her voice floated off of the page and into Galvanic's mind, but it wasn't quite right. When writing, she had emotion. Expression. The large pegasus girl knew that wasn't right but it had been too long since she'd heard her friend's voice. What had it been, five years? Six? She'd toyed with visiting her again and again, but again and again she'd descended into the fantasy of the visit rather than the actual act.
But today, she had a wild hare running through her brain. Maybe it had been the time spent slamming the lightning machine all day, maybe it had just been the right combination of music and adrenalin, but she was in the mood to rekindle old fires. Of course, a long journey wouldn't be that great, just a short visit as the weekend came up, fly out, visit, fly ba-
"Ponyville?" Galvanic blinked in surprise, and looked at the envelope again. Clearly written in Rivet's exceedingly readable magical penponyship, the large pegasus couldn't believe she hadn't noticed it before. She knocked over the bundled stack of letters and went over the envelopes. Ponyville, Ponyville, Ponyville. She couldn't explain it, she'd been certain, absolutely certain that her friend still lived in that distant little town where they'd both grown up. True she'd left for medical school, but Galvanic always assumed afterwards she went back there to practice. This was too good to be true. Ponyville was quite literally a hop, skip, and a plummet from Cloudsdale. She could be there in minutes.
She felt like she was about to swallow her tongue. All this time, her foalhood friend had been just minutes away, and she'd never thought to visit? There was a sudden flash of all of those times when she'd wished she'd had somepony to talk to, times she'd wanted to see Rivet, and a stabbing pang to realize she was just down there in the town, waiting. There was no question in Galvanic's mind now. Her brain had been thoroughly galvanized with action. She would visit, this very evening.
----------------------------------
In Ponyville, a typical, cool evening was coming to a close. The sun would set soon, and the Ponyville nightlife, what there was of it, would start up. Generally speaking, restaurants and clubs to help relax the workpony that had spent all day busy and now wanted to unwind. This serenity was disturbed however, by something strange in the air. A few dark clouds started swirling together, forming a rather small yet still frighteningly impressive cyclone that seemed to touch down in the center of town and deposit a large present in its wake.
Of course this entrance had been on Galvanic's mind the entire time she'd been brushing her mane and making her way out of the Cloudsdale weather works. She had time to think, as she generally wasn't the sort of mare that ran for anything. It just wasn't in character, she'd assured herself, to be seen running. But if she was going to make an appearance she wanted it to start off imposing to prevent any unnecessary questions. In her mind she thought Rivet would be just sitting there in town, perhaps at a cafe, and in that case she wanted her friend's first sight of her in so many years to be something a little jaw dropping. That wasn't the case, though.
Really, she knew where her friend would be. From the letters it'd been quite clear that Rivet was skillfully employed at the Ponyville Hospital, and that's where she'd be found. But still, Gally had always been fond of making a good entrance. She stalked through the streets with her gaze hung low like the headlights of a truck. As if she'd been wearing blinders, she kept her eyes forward, heavily plodding through the streets while some of the smaller ponies skittered out of her way. The hospital, that was her target. Just keep your mind on it, ignore everything else, keep your head low and mind how you're trotting. Don't gallop.
----------------------------------
A document bathed in magical energy floated before a single, uncaring eye. It was an article about treating older ponies with balance issues through the use of a clever little magical device, part of a collection of neurology articles Rivet Stitch had been thinking about using for an article to write. While a great percentage of her day at Ponyville Hospital had to do with treating the sick and injured, research and advancing medical knowledge was an equally important part of it all. A lot of that was the less exciting work of reading, writing, and submitting reports.
Rivet Stitch's eye scanned over the pages with seeming indifference, but a great curiosity kept her reading the pages. She'd just gotten to information on the device's inventor, an elderly pony afflicted with balance issues himself, when a voice casually came from her left.
"Well don't you look like a proper doctor now, Stitches."
The mint-colored unicorn's head swiveled like a shopping-cart wheel, with an absolute lack of expression on her face. She remained absolutely quiet, simply facing the large pegasus. For most ponies, they would've found this terribly off-putting, but Galvanic knew how to read Rivet Stitch's lack of emotions. Surprise in Rivet Stitch appeared as absolute, silent indifference. But it was for how long she went without comment that one could tell how surprised she was. Silence meant her brain was still trying to find the words to say. No expression meant she didn't have the time or focus to put on one of her practiced facial expressions. Galvanic smiled. She didn't do it often in front of others, but Stitches was special. She got the smile.
"Galvanic," Rivet finally managed, her brain finally screwing itself back in. After a moment of remembering where she'd left her body, she got up, and with surprising, mechanical speed shot over to her friend and wrapped her hooves around her neck, the same way a small child would wrap their arms around the branch of a tree they were trying to climb.
The large pegasus was unused to physical contact of this sort, her internal systems all screwed up right now. Typically there was a set collection of restrictions, responses, and expectations to sort through until an approved response came up, but Stitches had the old access codes that punched through all of this, punched through all of the barriers, and she was hugging the pegasus from her foalhood days. For one brief moment, Galvanic almost cried, but managed to suck the tears back in. It was a happy reunion, that's all. Stitches was here, looked just like she used to, a bit older sure, but here she was, the same pony she'd always known.
There was no point in asking how she'd been, the letters back and forth between them had said all of that and more. There'd been a tremendous amount of dialogue between the two of them over the years, but none of it had been said aloud between them. There'd only been imagination on each as to how the conversation had actually gone. Only one thing managed its way out, as Stitches stared at her friend dispassionately but with the sort of held gaze that could only be explained by someone trying to study some familiar thing they'd only seen years before.
"Where have you been."
-----------------------------------------------------
They talked at length about work and life, ponies they'd met, things they'd seen, things they hadn't. They filled in the cracks of their letters, added the color that no amount of writing on either end could do. Rivet remarked how much stronger Galvanic looked, Gally responded how much smarter Stitches looked. Like two ancient land masses that had long ago divided when the world shifted, they were now coming back together to find that while their coastlines may no longer have matched up like the seams of a zipper, they were still complimentary.
"You should meet my friends," said Rivet flatly, internally marveling at how cool and collected her friend still seemed after all of these years. Of course it's how she'd always pictured her friend, but after all of these years it was reassuring to see that it really was as she'd pictured it. Galvanic had meanwhile expected that she'd have found Stitches in some dramatic medical drama scene with nurses galloping left and right while sirens went off, but at the core of all of that she'd expected to see her friend working away like always. "I'm sure they'd just love you."
Galvanic didn't grunt. Normally she would have grunted the statement away, but not for Stitches. Stitches got consideration when she made a suggestion. Friends. Other friends. Friends other than her. The thought hung heavily in her head. True, she'd heard about them in the letters. She almost knew them already. The spooky one, the silent one, the cheerful one, the joking one, the fiery one. Something about actually meeting them made her hesitant.
Stitches was in. She was qualified. She was protected property to be defended from outside attack. She was inside the borders, sitting safely in the castle, far from the borders in fact. But now... these others. Did they get a pass? Were they already in? There was some strange argument going on at Galvanic's borders about policy that was making her stomach feel absolutely uneasy. But then she looked at her friend's face. Everything would be alright, she had a friend here. It was just like the old days again, as long as the two of them were together, everything would be fine.
Right?