Old alliances

Canterlot. Two years have passed since Zerathur's last visit to the capital of Equestria, and nothing appears to've changed during this time. The ever-present scent of coffee and cologne that hung in the air was intoxicating, even inside the energy shield. Good Khas, these pompous unicorns with their little outside cafés and snobbish looks, if only they had proper hygiene, there'd be no need for such copious amounts of perfume. "Well, who am I to judge. I've been wearing these pajamas for what? A hundred and ten years by now? Granted, I do wash them daily, thank Khas for Synthread." Mumbled the protoss, having slowed to a halt by a street corner. For a couple of seconds, he stood there, watching with little interest as the shades of red and purple in the sky slowly gave way to dark blues. The stars would soon come out, and a part of him wanted to just stay there and wait for them to come. Well, it was also the same part that kept him in inactivity for long periods, and this might not be the best place to stay still for a couple of days, so no, not lending it any ears. Later, sure, but not yet. The smell of artificial scents grew stronger for a moment, taking Zera's attention away from the setting sun. An elderly couple slowly made their way past him, dressed in slightly more exquisite clothes than the others. Probably off to enjoy opera or whatever it is that rich old ponies do for fun in this upper-class hell, but that's not the important part. When wandering through Ponyville, the protoss finds it common to feel watched by hundreds of eyes. A dark-coated 'unicorn' that lives in a haunted-looking manor just off the small town, that oughta give 'em ponies the superstitious hibbie jibbies, aye? This did not apply here in Canterlot though. Even under the dimming sunlight, there were no weird stares or looks over the shoulder, this elderly couple didn't even bat an eye at him or his companion! Scratch the last part, some young folk just ahead are poking their lil' heads around a low stone fence to look at the uprooted olive tree. Fascinated by the idea of a tree waddling about the place, the buggers were, but younglings are fearful of that which they do not understand and would not approach further. Makes sense, everyone else is afraid of the unknown, but at least the adults (especially the unicorns, they're the fellows who know magic and stuff) just see this walking tree as some sort of intricate spell. Which is... Oh, right, there's a place that we're trying to get to. "It should be just two blocks from here, let's not leave our hosts waiting for too long." -+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+- "You have a lot of nerve coming in here!" "You have a lot of nerve being alive!" Snickers were followed by laughter as Zerathur took a seat. This was a rather large office, but the amount of misc furniture, the ceiling-high stacks of paper, and the dozens of action figures spread chaotically over everything really made it all feel quite cramped. The good news is that it didn't reek of perfume, the bad news is that the smell of expensive cigars managed to be even worse, and it wasn't even coming from the room itself, but rather, from the laughing unicorn behind the desk. "Good grief, Sir!" Exclaimed the yellow coated unicorn, sitting down heavily on the old padded chair. "You left us saying that you were about to perish, took you so long to return that we thought you actually did!" The wide smile turned into a grin for a moment, before finally vanishing. "Judging by your appearance though, one could even presume you're still very much dead. Haven't you eaten lately? I know where to buy a really good hayburger, ten minutes from 'ere." "Quit callin' me Sir, Flatline." Replied the protoss while doing the classic slight-lean-in-while-pointing before resting back on his seat. "Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in. To life, that is, not to work, I'm retired." Finishing the last sentence, Zerathur took a moment to look over the comrade's messy office. "The weight I lost seems to've transferred to you, pal, lookin' a bit thicker by the edges, more so in the belly. The new post has been treating you well, I presume, have you been doing the homework?" Flatline cackled and then stopped with a blank look on his face. "I uh, do you really think so?" He blinked and shrugged it off, eyeing for a moment the mountains of disorganized paperwork around the room just a few seconds after Zera. "You know I always wanted to be the one in charge, but it never crossed my head that there'd be so much paperwork. For the love of Khas-" This expression made the chloromancer immediately stare at him, "There are one-year-old documents here still that need to be read over and signed, I honestly do not know how you managed to do this and still have time to train new medical personnel." "Species-specific traits," Zerathur spoke, doing a little 'magic hands' (Or hooves in this case) gesture, "Sorry mate, but I couldn't teach you these even if I tried." He moved himself to sit a bit more upright and looked over the shoulder. "Juniper is getting a tad impatient out there, it's soon going to be their bedtime you know, so I best hurry up." He turned to face the yellow stallion again. "Say, are you still holding onto the spell books I gave you back in training? I kind of need 'em." "Oh, sure!" Flatline pushed himself off the chair he was sat on and wandered off towards a large metal locker that was on the very corner of the room. It looked rather out of place there, but alas, the place was already such a mess that it didn't matter. He took a bit of time to unlock it but finally managed to crank the steel door open. "So, uh, they're not here. I... Oh, right! I borrowed them to a young archaeologist mare, apparently, she read about the legend of your kind's existence in an old book and wanted to decipher your language or something." Zera had facepalmed so hard at this point that it could've broken his horn if it weren't for the naturally stronger protoss bones. "So not only did you lose the spellbooks, but also failed on getting a marefriend. Do you at least know where she lives?" "I- Yes, I'll give you her address." Well now that's off the way, back to the usual stuff, plus probably trying to get in contact with the archaeologist. - // This was originally meant to be released over a few days as separate lil' story posts, but no one's really interested in those (Or anything that I type, really, long live my existence in lore gang), so it might be wiser to just compile it all up for a singular lore post.